Closer To Heaven
|
|
|
This week’s lesson, Worthy Is the Lamb , presents quite a challenge for me as a Sabbath school teacher. Because of the nature of the book of Revelation, it can be easy to just have a forward-looking history class
Read more at the source: Worthy Is the Lamb – Hit the Mark
Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Sabbath School Net.
Smyrna was a beautiful and wealthy city but also was a center of mandated emperor worship.
Read more at the source: Sunday: Christ’s Messages to Smyrna and Pergamum
Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Sabbath School Net.
Accident or Miracle?
All Americans were saddened in the Christmas season of 2006 when Gerald Ford, our 38th President, passed away at the age of 93. People from both sides of the aisle really respected Ford for coming to power at a very difficult time and bringing healing and a new sense of hope to our country. Pardoning Nixon was a wrenching, perhaps disastrous, political decision . . . but it was really the only way for America’s completely dysfunctional, scandal-consumed government to get a fresh start and survive.
President Ford was the only Vice President and President to get into the White House accidentally. He was never elected to either position. He was appointed VP when Spiro Agnew had to resign in 1973; a year later, when Nixon followed the same ignominious trail, a lowly congressman from the obscure 5th District of Michigan abruptly found himself living with his wife Betty and four kids at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. West Wing had a story like that once, but this is real, and some of us lived through that very poignant time.
There’s a devout Christian pastor named Nick Twomey who serves his Lord at a medium-sized church, also in Michigan, and there’s nothing very spectacular about it. The only point of interest is that when he was a teenager, his high school girlfriend was named Madonna Ciccone, who grew up to become a pop singer who usually doesn’t use her last name. Quite a story—and it illustrates the sometimes accidental nature of fame.
I tell these two stories to contrast them with the brief life story of this Baby born in a stable in Bethlehem. Because there are many people in the world today who consider the Christmas story a sweet, touching, entirely human string of accidents.
Jesus was born, in their secular thinking, to a girl who wasn’t married. We usually call that an accident. He was born into poverty, which is very common but not something anybody would choose. When he was 12, his parents flubbed up and accidentally left him at the temple in Jerusalem for three days. And for the next 18 years, he lived such an uneventful life even the best of scholars don’t know a single thing about him.
Then he began to preach and teach. He was pretty good at it; many people listened. Some of the things he talked about are rather well-known even today. But he foolishly, or accidentally, antagonized the religious establishment of his day. He said the wrong things at the wrong times. He didn’t know when to keep His mouth shut. He accidentally healed people on the Sabbath when he should have waited until sundown. Finally, he riled the religious right to the point where they contracted a hit on him; they got him crucified on a Roman cross.
End of story. To those who believe in accidents but not in miracles, that is definitely the end of the story. Jesus was a Gerald Ford politician who only got a partial term of power, and whose time in office was cut short because . . . he was only there accidentally in the first place.
Now, do I believe this? Not for two seconds! I’ve already mentioned that we who are Christians reject entirely the “accident” motif; we have the word of the angel Gabriel, who says to the shepherds: I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; He is Christ the Lord.
Moments later the skies are filled with an angel army which tells Planet Earth that what is happening is not an accident, not a blip in the space-time continuum, not an aberration or an anonymous moment of teen promiscuity. No, the arrival of this baby is heaven’s proclamation of good will to us, the announcement of an intergalactic rescue plan.
I’d like to backtrack from this billboard-in-the-sky moment and go to a much quieter encounter, this one between one angel, Gabriel, and one confused earthling named Joseph. In Matthew 1, right after Mary has told her boyfriend that the blue plus sign in her e.p.t. test came out positive but not an accident, heaven’s #1 angel comes to Joseph and has this to say: Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a Son, and you are to give Him the name Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins.
And here’s what I want for us to realize. Heaven comes to Joseph and tells him four things. One, Mary’s pregnancy is legitimate; it’s heaven-designed; it’s not an accident. Two, she will have a son. Three, God in heaven has already designated the name of Jesus. Mary and Joseph never went through a list of names, because the name had already been assigned. Four, this Son, Jesus, will grow up and succeed in a salvation plan yet to unfold.
In other words, not only is Mary having a baby not an accident, this is all part of the most concise, precise, grand, intricate, perfect, pristine, holy, galactic plan ever put together. Jesus being born on planet earth is something that was not conceived in the back seat of a car, or in a bedroom while Mom and Dad are away. This was conceived in the highest courts of heaven, and conceived there even before Adam and Eve ever sinned, creating the need for the plan.
It is sometimes suggested that Eve took the apple from the tree, and that this act of rebellion threw heaven into crisis mode. Oh no, what shall we do? I have read literature portraying this as an unexpected time of turbulent fear among the angels of heaven. What was going to happen? Was this new world doomed to be lost? But notice what Paul tells us in Ephesians 1. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love He predestined us to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with His pleasure and will.
So there was a salvation plan before Creation Week; there was a rescue plan, an adoption plan before Creation Week. By Genesis chapter three, a plan conceived long before has already been explained to Adam and Eve.
Hollywood actor Bruce Marchiano was contracted back in 1994 to play the part of Jesus in a four-hour multi-million-dollar miniseries based strictly on the book of Matthew. They went to Africa to film, and Marchiano, a very devout Christian, just immersed himself in the role. It was a wrenching time for him emotionally; he came out a changed man. But he writes in his book that he caught a glimpse of a Jesus who was in full control all the time. He said what he said because it was right; He healed people at certain times because it was part of his plan. And Jesus went to Calvary because he came here to go to Calvary. To redeem us was his unassailable role; it could not be altered. That’s one reason why Jesus was almost a bit impatient with Cleopas and his fellow disciple as they walked in discouragement to Emmaus on Sunday evening after the crucifixion. “Why are you distressed?” Jesus asked them. “The Lamb of God came to give His life, and that’s what He did. This is all part of the cosmic plan spelled out in the prophetic writings of Isaiah. Every salvation puzzle piece is perfectly in place.”
I don’t want to belabor this point, but I want to give us one more morsel to think about. We sometimes debate and discuss the issue of Christ’s nature; was it fallen or unfallen? Could Jesus have sinned? The Adventist Church takes the position that he indeed could have sinned; the many temptations in Matthew 4 and in Gethsemane seem to indicate that. But we also have here in the Christmas story a clear declaration by the angels that this baby WILL save us; he will not fail; there is no possibility of failure. He will go to the cross and win. In John 14:30, Jesus says calmly to His disciples, speaking of Lucifer: The prince of this world approaches. He has no power over Me. He has no hold on Me says the NIV. So I cannot speak to the impeccability of Jesus’ nature, but I can gratefully proclaim the immutability of heaven’s eternal plan. Let’s never forget that God does not lose. Jesus does not fail. Heaven does not surrender. And this Baby being born was not just part of God’s biggest plan; Jesus was God’s biggest plan.
Verse 15, as we return to the midnight choir concert in the fields outside Bethlehem. When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” They saw this incredible thing, the sky lighting up, the thunder of many voices singing. But now it’s dark again. The moment is over. The glory has faded. And what do they do? They act upon the miracle which has come to them.
All through Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John there were people who saw or experienced miracles. Some responded; others just walked away. But praise the Lord for these shepherds. They were given this rare privilege of receiving the announcement, and their response was the right one. Let’s go check it out. Let’s go see. The Adventist commentary points out that there is a special blessing for those who hear this kind of proclamation and who then act upon it.
Verses 16-18: So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the Baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen Him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this Child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.And right here I think you and I find something that is starkly relevant for us in this church we all love. What does this mean for us today? They spread the word concerning what had been told them about this Child.
Our Survival Depends Upon It
And friend, I was seized by this reality. The most important ingredient in our survival and growth here at this church is the challenge that we must go to others and tell them about Jesus. The shepherds saw Jesus and went and told someone else. And there have been times when someone here had a very vivid and real encounter with Jesus Christ, and a little time later, they brought by the hand a new person, a different person, someone not yet in our ranks, and brought them into this building and said: See? I told you. I have found a Friend so precious; He’s all the world to me.
We all have social connections with people who do not truly know the Christ Child as their Savior. We could say more than we say; we could share with more power than we do. We could exercise more intentionality than we do. If you spend time here in December going around in your cul-de-sac giving out Christmas cookies, you will probably be struck by the embarrassing reality of how little we know about people living less than 100 feet from our front door. We know some names, but not all. We have neighbors who are fellow believers, and we have no true communion with them as we should.
Think what would happen if every single person here, by the end of next year, found and brought to church just one other person. And just having babies doesn’t count, even though I applaud that missionary plan as well. I know that multi-level marketing schemes prove that we can’t double our church every single year, but I think we could definitely do it during the year that begins a few days from now. If these shepherds, who were basically shiftless thieves and tax cheats, could do it, you and I with our M.D.s and Ph.D.s can surely do it too.
Now we move on to Scene #2 in this story. Verse 21: On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise Him, He was named Jesus, the name the angel had given Him before He had been conceived. When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took Him to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord”) (Exodus 13:2), and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: “a pair of doves or two young pigeons.” (Lev. 12:8)
I’m a bit embarrassed to tell you this, because I frankly do not know all of the ways of the Lord. But it was God’s rule for Israel that if a young woman had a baby boy, she was unclean for a week. If she had a baby girl, she was unclean for two weeks. Another gender inequity is that the long-term purification schedule for the mother of a baby boy was 33 days, for a girl 66. And the assigned gift for a poor family, instead of being a lamb, was two doves. And this is what Joseph and Mary brought.
It’s sweet to think that Mary, who received this Baby directly from heaven, now comes to the Temple to give Jesus back, in a sense. To present him to the Lord. We have baby dedication services here at church where we do this very same thing. But I would like to impress upon all of us as we head into the new year the wonderful Bible challenge to bring back to God’s house the things we receive from God.
If you have gotten talents from God, bring them here. If you have gotten children from the Lord, then it is right and proper to bring them here. You owe God that. If God blesses you with a good income, part of that income should come to this temple’s coffers. I don’t say that for myself; I say it because it is what the Bible teaches.
I am so moved when an economically challenged person here who is barely hanging on by their fingernails still gives back to God out of the blessings they have gotten from him. I know someone whose entire income is less than their rent; they are upside-down before the month even begins. And yet they come on Sabbath and bring a dish of food. Isn’t that amazing? And here Joseph and Mary, who have received this miracle Baby from God, come to the temple and give him right back.
Someone has suggested that Israelite families essentially paid these two doves to the temple as ransoms, as it were. Rather than sacrifice their firstborn children, they were permitted to “buy them back” with this sacrifice of a lamb or a pair of doves. Some people here have paid in the five figures to bring their baby home from the hospital; how much would you be willing to give the Lord for the gift of your child, were he to ask you for it? But it is inspiring to think of Joseph and Mary, ransoming this little Baby who would someday ransom the entire world with His blood. In her book, The Desire of Ages, Ellen White observes that some no-name priest held this little Baby, maybe the tenth one that day, amid all the sacrifices and blood and altars and this huge, legal system . . . and had no idea in the world that this one unique, heaven-sent Baby was going to fulfill it all, supercede it all, bring their entire edifice of legalism, of works, of blood to a crashing conclusion at the cross. Like people in Michigan who went to the polls one day back in 1948 to vote for a young Michigan State football hero and World War II vet . . . and never dreamed that young Jerry Ford would one day be President of the United States.
Now to Scene #3, and this is very touching. One of my favorite people in the Bible comes into the story now. There’s an old woman named Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. It’s not entirely clear if she was 84 years old or if she had been a widow for 84 years. One way or another, she had been around for a long while; her hair was gray. And what I like is this: even at the age of 84, or maybe 104, she was always at church. She never skipped church! As we head into the new year, I invite all of you to be like this great old gal of the Bible. She never left the temple, it says in verse 37. But before we get to her, there is another old prophet we want to read about.
Verse 25: Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel—in other words, he was waiting for this exact moment, the arrival of the Messiah—and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord’s Christ.
And as Simeon holds Baby Jesus in his arms, he says with beatific joy: Lord, now let Your servant depart in peace. He was willing to lay down to his rest, because he had seen the arrival of his Messiah. This is the Child. This is God Himself. This Baby will save all of us. Our rescue is absolutely assured at last.
Verse 30: My eyes have seen Your salvation, which You have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to Your people Israel. And then this great old man says to God: okay, let me go to sleep in peace. I saw what I’ve waited all my life to see. Somehow God made sure that Simeon was at the temple that very day.
So here are these two old, faithful saints. They waited for years, for decades. There may have been talk through the years of closing the church, or folding, of quitting. People then were tired of waiting for prophecies to come true, just as we sometimes are. They got weary of commuting to the temple each Sabbath. But they kept coming. And God went out of his way to keep them alive long enough so that they could have this rare, sweet experience. They got to hold the Redeemer in their arms, and know he was their Redeemer.
We’re told in the Bible, Deuteronomy 19:15, that all important matters should be established by two witnesses. And here these two old, faithful, reliable voices tell the world: Here He is. This Baby is the hope of all mankind. We saw it with our own eyes. If you don’t want to believe me, then believe them. But here at Christmastime, this one Baby is still the One. He is still our Savior, our only hope.
There’s a hard moment for you moms to think about. Simeon, holding Baby Jesus, promises the salvation of our lost world. That’s wonderful. But then he quietly says to Mom in verse 35: [But] a sword will pierce your own soul. In the Message paraphrase: A figure misunderstood and contradicted—the pain of a sword-thrust through you. In 33 years, Mary will watch her little boy up on the cross, dying for all of our sins. She’ll stand right there and hear the nails going in, sense the agony of her own flesh and blood.
This sword, we’re told by the Greek experts, was a rhomphania—a large battle sword. Not a machaira, a small dagger. No, this is a major weapon of heartbreak; in fact, it’s the same word used for the sword of Goliath. Mary is going to have her heart broken by the sacrifice on a hill far away.
I want for us to close by going back to the announcement by Gabriel. A Savior has been born TO YOU. And then this: He is Christ THE LORD.
Please stop with me and think carefully about what “Lord” means. Television sometimes uses that word carelessly; let’s not make that mistake. Jesus is our Lord. He rules over us. Jesus rules in a holy and complete way in our lives and in the life of this church.
I was talking to someone last week about surrendering his life to Jesus Christ. And I made the point that if Jesus did create us, and then did come to earth and die on the cross for our sins, then him being Lord is plain reality. In legal terms, we owe Jesus loyalty in a de jure sense—legally. By rights. It may be fun; it may not be. We may enjoy it; we might not. You might have a personality that loves church and worship, or maybe you don’t. Frankly, it doesn’t matter. Jesus is our Lord. He deserves all that we can give; He deserves our worship and our time and our offerings and the gift of our children. He deserves the powerful, dedicated functioning of this church right here. He is Christ the Lord.
And Simeon says to Mary: You are so blessed; you’re favored above all women. But there will come this sword moment. Your heart is going to break partway through this process. In the end, the world will be saved . . . but you’re going to cry one Friday afternoon.
Maybe you and I will have some hard times too. Maybe a rhomphania of loss, of pain, of death will happen to us. Christianity may mean a sword for us too. But it does not matter because Jesus is our Lord. He came to save us from our sins, and both Anna and Simeon give a testimony which rings through the centuries. We have seen the Christ Child. Shall we pray?
Lord God, in one of our final Sabbaths of this year, we bow before Jesus as our Lord and Savior. We accept the sure word of these two great saints of old, that you are the Baby sent from heaven. And like the shepherds, we want to take this good news and now share it in a tangible way with some precious person in our lives. Make us effective heralds of your love, we pray. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
______________________________
Submitted by David B. Smith. Better Sermons © 2005-2008. Click here for usage guidelines.
Read more at the source: Bethlehem – Part 3
Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Better Sermons.
From Here to There
Have you ever wondered if perhaps we’re actually alone in this universe, and that there’s just empty sky above us? A few years ago pop star Don Henley, formerly lead singer of the Eagles, composed a pessimistic hit entitled They’re Not Here, They’re Not Coming. It was about UFOs; little green men in flying saucers. Are there intelligent beings out there billions of light years away, and if so, are they planning to show up here any time soon? What do we have here that they could possibly want? Would extraterrestrials travel all that way just to stand in line at Disney World in Orlando? One line went: “Go screaming through the universe, just to get McNuggets?” And his conclusion: there’s nothing out there. We’re here all by ourselves. Which, of course, is the antithesis, the cynical opposite, of the Christmas message.
There are days when all of us struggle with this possibility. We’re all alone. We Adventists were raised in a culture that bought this theory about heaven out there somewhere in the far reaches of a fully inhabited universe. But on the days when doubts hit us in the face, we begin to think: You know, maybe not. Maybe when our parents die, they simply lie in the ground, in the darkness. And when we die, that’s what we’ll do too. And since there’s no way for someone to come back from there and tell us there’s something – or nothing – out there, churches will keep hanging in there and Christians will keep hanging in there, until finally one generation in the distant future will just give it all up.
Some of you may have the opportunity to attend or even sing in a Christmas performance of Handel’s Messiah. A couple of lines from a bass solo give us food for thought today. There are several recitatives that are frankly kind of boring, and which we all endure, waiting for the more lively mass choir parts to come around again. But the bass sings this dirge from Haggai 2:6, 7: Thus saith the Lord, the Lord of Hosts: Yet once a little while, and I will shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land. I will shake all nations.
And then, in his next solo part, the bass stands up again and sings this line from Isaiah 9:2:The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light. And while the mall and TV commercials try to remind us about a man in a red suit, in the Bible all things center on one Baby who is born in a manger. Everything hinges on Him. Baby Jesus is the great light. Will He succeed in His mission? Will He destroy evil? Will He survive the cross? Will He go to the cross?
As you and I face a new year together, here is our question: are we prepared to fully believe in this story? To separate the fiction on our televisions and in the children’s stories from the life-saving reality in our Bibles? I ask again: do you believe today that Baby Jesus can save your family from eternal death?
We’re studying together in Luke chapter 2, and I mentioned last week the humbleness of this great story. Verse 7: [Mary] wrapped Him in cloths and placed Him in a manger. All parents here have spent some time in the maternity ward, and we know for a fact that mommies don’t usually have to wrap up their own babies. There are doctors and nurses and specialists who look after the newborns and who bathe and clean and diaper them. But Mary had nobody. No one was there to give her an episiotomy or stitch her up. Whatever got done, Mary and Joseph were the only ones to do it, because this was as lonely a birth as there has ever been.
Here’s the second half of verse seven: Because there was no room for them in the inn. Have you ever been on the road in a distant land and faced the gloom of night without a hotel reservation? Where will you stay? Who will provide you with some shelter and a warm cup of cocoa? Then it begins to rain. It is a lonely thing to not have a hotel room for the night, even if you’re not experiencing labor pangs every two minutes.
Tradition suggests that this might have been a cave Joseph and Mary stayed in, or at best a small, unused house where animals were kept. The Bible doesn’t say, “Born in a stable,” but a stable is the only place where there’s a manger or feeding trough, so this is what we infer.
I heard a cute story about a kindergarten play at a Christian school. Joseph and Mary, little five-year-olds, came up to the door of the inn, knocked, and had a fellow student come to the door dressed as the innkeeper. “I am sorry,” he said, reciting from the script. “We have no room for you.” And the girl playing Mary was such a good little actress, with a quivering lip and tears in her eyes, the kid inadvertently blurted out: “But would you like to come in for a drink?”
But what a lesson there is for us right here! This innkeeper, whose name will never be known, didn’t know that the Savior of the world was going to be born that night. Or that he could have been the host of the pivotal birth in our world’s history. But he didn’t have room for Jesus that night.
And I don’t ask you this question; I ask myself this question. Have I fully made room for Jesus in my life here in this soon-concluding year? How often have I spent time doing good stuff, busy stuff, important stuff . . . but not really experiencing the presence of Jesus in my thoughts? How many Sabbaths have I spent here at church where I did a lot of things and checked off many tasks and drove home with many future priorities crowding my mind . . . but didn’t really stop and just let the reality of Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior fill me with peace and hope?
We have all fretted with some hard realities about the difficulty in keeping a church alive and thriving. What policies will help us? What nimble plans might take us in a new direction? Well, I know one thing is true and always true: we need to have room for Jesus in this place. If we have music without Jesus, and sermons without Jesus, and social times without Jesus, and potluck conversations without Jesus, we will have masterminded a failure as colossal and sad as the one this innkeeper had. There was no room in the inn.
Let me put it to you another way. It is a wonderful thing when you open up your hearts and invite new people to join our wonderful family. Nothing moves me to tears like stepping into the waters of baptism with a new friend. Sometimes we have a guest enter who looks or sounds different from the rest of us. They live in a different neighborhood; perhaps their economic status is not quite up to the average we enjoy here. But they come in. We baptize them, they join us, and now week by week they sit here in our presence. They share our dinner tables; they own a membership here as true as your own. They are, in a sense, the visiting Christ to us, because we are told that the strangers all about are as Jesus Himself. Matthew 25:40: Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me.
Now, in the coming year with its 52 Sabbaths, is there room in the inn for five more? Or ten more? Or for as many more as God may bless us with? On that cold winter night, Mary looked like an unwed mother to the manager of that Motel 6, who was decidedly not leaving the light on for her. Will we have room here next year for the unwed mother, the out-of-work mother, the welfare mother, the single mother with her ragtag kids? This is one of the greatest tests of a church and its purity: does it obey Matthew 25 and make room for those in our neighborhood who are hurting?
Every December, you understand, the pastor and his wife receive some Christmas cards and phone messages from people who are grateful for our church’s hospitality. Those kind words belong to all of you, of course, and I am proud of this church and its generosity. Next year I pray that our generosity will grow, that it will take in more than our credit cards and our recipes, but will also include our time and our own dining room tables and our personal friendships. Do we have room for Mary and her baby at our Sunday birthday parties as well as our Sabbath potlucks?
Back to Luke 2, verse 8: And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. We have sometimes assumed that December 25 as a Christmas date is probably way off; in fact, sometimes we connect it with pagan rituals and ceremonies. There are various sects which do not celebrate the day for that very reason; I’m glad our church is not in that camp. But it’s observed that shepherds would not have been out in the fields at night during the cold winter months. However, I was just reading the other day that near Bethlehem, grazing flocks which were reserved for temple sacrifices actually were in the fields, both day and night, on a year-round basis. So it’s possible that December is the true Christmas month after all.
But who does this glorious news come to? Who gets the great announcement? It’s not the preachers and it’s not the General Conference officials or the Pharisees. It’s not the wealthy doctors and lawyers. Instead, it’s the shepherds in the fields. In fact, the humility of this moment is deeper than we realize. One commentary points out that “shepherds were a despised class; their work kept them from observing all of the ceremonial law.” That’s ironic, since they might have been raising the very lambs used in those ceremonies.
What’s more, shepherds were often considered to be thieves by nature. “They confused ‘mine’ with ‘thine,’” one writer complains. “They were precluded from giving testimony in law courts” – so they were not a particularly trustworthy bunch.
And yet, verse 9: An angel of the Lord appeared to THEM. And the glory of the Lord shone around THEM.” God bypasses all of the successful people who govern on the church board and gives this great news to the people who attend the church’s soup kitchen instead.
And how do the shepherds react? Three words. They were terrified. Of course. In the King James, they were sore afraid. An angel appears to you at midnight, and almost always, that is going to be a scary and possibly unwelcome situation. Angel messages tend to involve some lifestyle upheaval. Your girlfriend’s going to give birth to the King of the universe. Go to Ninevah and tell them their city’s going to be destroyed in 40 days. The hour of judgment has come. Things like that. Plus, this blinding glory was just plain scary in and of itself. Going back to Luke 1, we find that this angel is Gabriel himself, the highest of all created beings, the archangel who stands in the very presence of God.
And what happens next is so wonderful. Verse 10: “Do not be afraid,” said the angel.
For four thousand years people had been afraid of God and terrified of religion. False religions had people burning up their own babies; appeasing the gods. Offering blood sacrifices. Even the true religion of Jehovah had elements which were intended to teach the beauty of Calvary, but which made people afraid and apprehensive instead. At Mount Sinai, everybody was terrified of that thundering voice in the mountain; they said to Moses, “You go up and talk with God; we’re too scared. Find out what He wants and then come tell us.”
If you ever have a chance to visit the country of Thailand, you will pass many stores that are filled with ornate spirit houses. A good Buddhist will have a little mini-temple / house on his property for the evil spirits to park themselves in. (Better in the backyard than in the living room.) Once in a while the owner will go out and put an orchid there or a bit of rice. Now, who eats the food offerings, I don’t know . . . but there’s an element of fear to their faith. Will their next reincarnation be kind to them? Will the gods forgive them for some of their bad karma?
Some of you have attended Pioneer Memorial Church at Andrews University in Michigan, and back when Pastor Dwight Nelson did a global TV event called “Net ‘98,” he used as his tag line: “God is not someone to be afraid of, but someone to be a friend of.” Jesus says to His disciples in John 15: I have called you friends. In the Adventist Church, we believe in the tragic necessity of a cleansing hellfire, but not an eternal hellfire, because God is not someone we have to be afraid of. I want with all of my heart for God to have enough fire to someday burn Lucifer into nonexistence and then I want those fires to go out, because God is our strong but gentle Friend. I cherish the fact that Jesus spent the last night of His life with His 12 best friends, and that He even loved the Judas who sat there among them.
Here’s the rest of verse 10: I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. The Christmas story is supposed to be good news of great joy for all the people. The Living Bible says it this way: The most joyful news ever announced, and it is for everyone! I go without shame on mission trips to share Jesus in foreign countries because the story of Jesus is intended for those people. It’s good news for those people. I wrestle with the reality that we ask young people to convert, to do something which hurts the feelings of their Buddhist or Hindu parents. It feels like a betrayal of their national heritage. And I want to say in response, “No, you are still a loving child. But this is good news of great joy. It will make your life vastly better and, in the long run, perhaps give your entire family, including your parents, eternal life.”
Close your eyes for a moment and think of great headlines. The war in Iraq is over. Your child is given a full scholarship to Harvard. You just won the California lottery. You thought you had cancer, but the doctors call to tell you the tests are negative. You and I should get dressed each Sabbath morning and come to church with a feeling that we have news greater than all of that rolled up into one headline. “Jesus has come; we have eternal life. We have a home in heaven with God’s family for all eternity.” That should be what colors our attitude as we pull into the parking lot of this church. We have pledged, in our new church board, that in all our discussions and interactions this coming year, we are going to be in a hope-filled, celebratory mode for these next twelve months. Why? Because the angel announcement – good news of great joy – is still intact here in December. Nothing has changed. The offer hasn’t expired. After 40 centuries of discouragement and doubt and despair, we get the same Redeemer the shepherds did. They sang Christmas carols; we sing Christmas carols. They got eternal life; we get it as well. They received hope for their children; that’s our inheritance also.
Verse 11: Today in the town of David a Savior has been born TO YOU; He is Christ the Lord.These may be two of the most wonderful words in all the Bible. A Savior born TO YOU. Jesus is God’s gift to the human race. This is not a sterile salvation transaction; Jesus is born to us. I and my loved ones deserve death; we deserve to be wiped out. But God, aware of me and my needs, says: Here is a Christmas gift for YOU, Pastor X. My Son. I give My own Son to be born and live and die and sacrifice His life FOR YOU.
Again borrowing from Handel’s Messiah, there is a beloved song that comes from Isaiah 9:6. In fact, 15 of the songs in this oratorio come from that prophetic Old Testament book. But here is what we sing together: For UNTO US a Child is born; UNTO US a Son is given. And this King, who shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace . . . is ours. He is heaven’s gift to you and to me. UNTO US this Christmas miracle is offered.
I found a couple of encouraging insights in our Adventist archives that I would like to share with each of you today. As we carefully tell our children that Santa’s workshop at the North Pole is a fun figment of our imaginations, I’m afraid that we perhaps think of heaven as being almost fictional, perhaps fictional, and many trillions of miles from this lonely planet. Sometimes people drop out of church for various reasons – and this is one of them. The Christmas story is just too remote.
But here in Luke 2, there are shepherds in the fields. Real men, living their spartan lives, doing their thing, earning the few copper coins that are in their pockets. And suddenly there’s an angel standing in their presence. Gabriel comes all the way from the inner throne room of heaven and stands among them in a field outside Bethlehem. So it’s not really that far away after all. The book of Daniel chapter 9 has a story where Daniel is deeply troubled and praying through tears about a confusing prophetic vision he’s had. And before he even says amen and gets up from his knees, Gabriel is there to give him encouragement and explanations.
And the author of The Desire of Ages makes this observation: “Heaven and earth are no wider apart today than when shepherds listened to the angels’ song. Humanity is still as much the object of heaven’s solicitude as when common men of common occupations met angels at noonday, and talked with the heavenly messengers in the vineyards and the fields. To us in the common walks of life, heaven may be very near.”
I know we surmise that heaven is close because of the miracle of prayer. Today you can travel around the globe and then pick up a phone and converse back to those you love virtually for free using something called Skype and an Internet connection. But heaven is also near when we bring heavenly values into the lives of others here, when we extend grace to those who wrong us, when we are a faithful part of this spiritual community, when we pray for one another. In fact, Jesus once said to His disciples: The kingdom of heaven is among you. It’s here now; it’s already begun. It’s not in limbo until the Second Coming. True, the streets of gold are a ways down the road; the pearly gates haven’t yet come into view. But angels travel from heaven to earth quickly and easily, and when you call someone who is discouraged and say, “Hang in there; I love you; I’m praying for you,” you help to bridge the gulf between this cold world and the waiting Paradise.
Verses 13 and 14: Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom His favor rests.” In the King James: Good will toward men. When we sing “Gloria in Excelsis Deo,” that’s from the Latin Vulgate for this expression: “Glory to God in the Highest.”
I mentioned earlier that this church does not exist to make ourselves happy or socially fulfilled, although it can have that blessed side effect. But we are here, as we sang in “O Come All Ye Faithful,” to adore Jesus. To worship Him and give Him glory. “Yea, Lord, we greet Thee, born this happy morning.” Our corporate worship is for the purpose of bringing glory to Jesus and to the Father who sent and sacrificed Him. All other benefits are frankly incidental.
But notice that this song ends with what God gives to us. After four thousand years of mistrust and fear, God not only proclaims His good will through a baby but also through a sky-filling choir. Every angel heaven has comes down to Judea and helps sing this song: Peace to men on whom His favor rests. God sends the entire population of heaven to say to us: “I like you. I really, really like you. I’m not your enemy; I’m your Rescuer.”
And on earth . . . peace. We don’t live in a world of peace, but peace is God’s gift to us. Someone remarked about the irony that most armies bring turmoil and death, but here in the skies there is an army of angels and they bring us the gift of peace. An army of peacemakers, armed with nothing but good news about God’s plan to bring peace to planet earth.
Sometimes people who belong to a church are anxious about its future. Jesus brings peace. Sometimes we have a trace of animosity with another person; someone told me recently about a church quarrel they had had and how they had acted to get past it. Through the influence of Jesus, we have peace. There are those sitting here today who have deep concerns about their ability to survive financially during these holidays. Jesus, working through His church, helps to bring peace. Married couples go through times of tense communication and misunderstanding; the influence of Jesus brings peace. Many of you work in high-voltage jobs where one wrong move can mean substantial financial loss; the promises of Jesus and His guarantee of security bring you peace as you face the new year.
Let’s prayerfully look around us at the babies we are blessed to have in our family. They don’t seem to know that we’re struggling mightily with a conflict in Iraq and that the Middle East is a cauldron of controversy and that we don’t trust Vladimir Putin very much. They doesn’t know that some Adventists disagree with other Adventists about what happens at the end of the 2,300 years mentioned in Daniel chapter eight.
But I’m glad these precious, innocent infants live in homes which have embraced Jesus being the Savior who brings peace to our world and to our lives. I’m thankful that Mommy and Daddy are teaching them that Baby Jesus can save us from our sins and bring us peace. Shall we pray?
Lord, in a season where myths abound and where the man in a red suit seems more real than the Baby in swaddling clothes, help us to keep on believing. Thank You that heaven is both real and near. Thank You that heaven’s gift to us is personal and that You love us enough to give us peace. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
______________________________
Submitted by David B. Smith. Better Sermons © 2005-2007. Click here for usage guidelines.
Read more at the source: Bethlehem – Part 2
Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Better Sermons.
In the movie 42, Branch Rickey (Harrison Ford) is a Major League team executive with a bold idea. Rickey recruits Jackie Robinson (Chadwick Boseman), an African-American baseball player playing in the Negro League, to break the unspoken color line and become the first modern African American Major League player. As both anticipate, this becomes a major challenge for Robinson and his family as they endure unrelenting racism on and off the field, from player and fan alike. As Jackie struggles against his nature to deal with the abuse, he finds an ally in Ricky, who is also a Christian.
On their first meeting, Robinson asks Rickey, “You want a player that doesn’t have the guts to fight back?”
“No. No.” replies Rickey. “I want a player who has the guts not to fight back. People aren’t going to like this. They’re going to do anything to get you to react. Follow a curse with a curse and they’ll hear only yours. Follow a blow with a blow and they’ll say the Negro lost his temper; that the Negro does not belong. Your enemy will be out in force and you cannot meet him on his own low ground. We win with hitting, running, fielding — only that. We win only if the world is convinced of two things: That you are a fine gentleman, and a great ball player. Like our Savior, you’re got to have the guts to turn the other cheek. Can you do it?”*
“To him who strikes you on the cheek, offer also the other; and from him who takes away your cloak, don’t withhold your coat also” (Luke 9:29, WEB).
“A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger” (Proverbs 15:1, NASB).
It seems that much of society’s view of dealing with conflict is quite different from the response to relational struggle that Jesus spelled out in the scriptures.
Radical? Undoubtedly. Effective? Jackie Robinson’s career testifies to it.
Is it possible that we could learn something from this amazing baseball player who chose to follow the words of the One that he claimed to follow? It’s well worth our consideration!
Michael Temple writes from North Dakota.
The post Jackie’s Life appeared first on Answers for Me.
Read more at the source: Jackie’s Life
Article excerpt posted on en.intercer.net from Answers for Me.
Intercer is a website with biblical materials in Romanian, English, Hungarian and other languages. We want to bring the light from God's Word to peoples homes. Intercer provides quality Christian resources...[Read More]
