Baby Changes (John 1:1-18)

In a telephone conversation with a high school principal years ago, we lamented aloud what it would finally take to get some awful parents to become more responsible. All too many parents treat their children as a distraction more than a privilege or divine blessing. Frankly, many school officials openly wonder if some children have parents at all!

There was a great Anna Quindlen editorial in Newsweek magazine years ago entitled, In Search Of A Grown-Up. Quindlen was discussing a murder trial in which terrible parenting was suggested by the defense as contributing to the death of a young girl. Quindlen used the case to discuss some of the shallow parenting attitudes surfacing in our country. She said:

“...a curious attitude seems to have taken root among some modern parents. And that is that life with kids is just like life without kids, only with bunk beds. It is possible to have children and still work punishing hours. It is possible to have children and still have a [wicked] social life. It is possible to have children and still booze it up and do drugs, just as you did when you were young and single. It is possible, but it sure isn’t desirable. Having children changes everything...the moment that little cord gets cut with those little scissors, two little people have been turned into role models instantly, whether they like it or not. The center has shifted, from sleeping late and midnight movies to Saturday soccer games and those night terrors that lead to three people in the bed, two of them exhausted. Clean up your language. Clean up your act. Cut down on the business trips, the profanity and the beer because a child is now watching...having kids changes everything. Or at least it ought to.”

I completely agree. Having a baby changes everything; at least it ought to.

I’ll never forget the very cold winter day in 1987 when my life changed forever. On Valentine’s Day morning, Saturday, February 14th, I went to my boring, early morning graduate school class (ironically it was a labor relations class!), leaving a very pregnant Monica and her sister Leonor still sleeping in the apartment. As it was Valentine’s Day, I bought two roses for each of my sweet Ecuadorean ladies when I came home from class at noon. But when I came into the apartment with my simple Valentine’s Day greetings, I was abruptly welcomed home by Monica’s anxious sister who told me Monica was fully in labor and we should get to the hospital immediately. My precious roses were dumped on the table and off we went through an ice storm to Womack Army Hospital at Ft Bragg, North Carolina. Twenty-three unbelievably difficult hours later, Monica finally gave birth to Maria Gabriela Hanson, our oldest daughter.

I remember everything about that experience. I remember Monica falling completely asleep from exhaustion between her difficult contractions. I remember the mean Army nurses who made an already difficult situation worse. I remember asking really dumb questions, which seemed perfectly legitimate to me at the time. I remember Monica rambling away in Spanish about all sorts of different things without even realizing she was doing it.

I remember how perfect Maria looked even from the beginning. I remember being so pleased and proud we were getting to take home the pretty baby when everybody else on the ward got stuck with the dumpy kids. I remember holding her in my arms like terribly fragile crystal and kissing her little face over and over again. I remember trimming her tiny fingernails (so she wouldn’t scratch herself) and cutting one of them too close and making her cry.

I remember not wanting to leave my Monica and Maria in the hospital that night. I remember desperately wanting to take my girls home immediately. I remember wanting to run up the credit cards at Toys-R-Us buying baby stuff. I remember being terribly afraid we were going to do one thing wrong as parents and somehow ruin our little girl forever. I remember the wonderful, sporty, red pickup we thoughtlessly traded away for our first junky family car. I remember how hard it was for Monica to adjust to Maria’s almost constant feeding schedule; and I remember how voraciously our little Maria ate. I remember our first Christmas years later in Minnesota when our little Maria got dresses from everybody and she wore them all simultaneously! And I remember how happy she was when she got a new little sister to play with. I remember little baby Tesia fresh out of the bathtub trying unsuccessfully to walk in wet feet down the wooden hallway floor. I remember the time we strapped a huge dollhouse Grandpa made for the girls on the back of our tiny Dodge Colt and drove all the way back to North Carolina with this massive dollhouse tumor sticking out in back. I remember all of it.

I will never forget the birth of these little baby girls because their birthdays changed my life completely. Their birthdays took all my priorities, all my passions, all my dreams and held them up in the air and shook them until the junk and useless stuff fell away. Monica and I now spend money much differently. We spend our time differently. We are interested in different things. We make different friends. Two little February birthdays completely changed our lives.

Jesus’ birthday must do the very same thing. This baby changes everything! I truly wonder if most of us realize how very much it truly does. Quite honestly, sometimes I think many people attempt to do the same sloppy, irresponsible things as Christians some earthly parents attempt as parents. Too many people think being a Christian is like being whatever they were before, but with just a few religious bunk beds thrown in the spare bedroom.

Nothing could be further from the truth. This incredible birthday we choose to celebrate on cold, snowy December days changes everything in our lives. This Birthday Boy takes every part of our lives in His chubby hands, happily holds it all up in the air and radically shakes it until all the junk falls away. We can’t bring this Baby home with us and think life is supposed to go on as normal. Things just don’t work that way when this Baby truly enters our lives…

Open your Bibles this morning to the first chapter of John. Let’s look at some of the completely revolutionary changes this Baby Jesus brings home.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all people might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God--children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.
The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, "This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.' " From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known.

This passage is one of the most theologically rich, fascinating passages in the entire Bible. The Apostle John packs into his Gospel, and especially this passage, almost everything we need to know about the changes this Baby brings. We could spend weeks discussing just the first verse! But I don’t want to do that this morning. I believe God wants us all to catch a simpler, more global Christmas glimpse of the changes this Baby Jesus brings into our lives.

So what are those revolutionary and exciting changes? I see four enormous ones.

Creation

The first change entering our lives is huge and wonderful. Somehow, this miracle Baby brings the very power of creation itself to play in our lives. John says “through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” Even though I’ll be the first to tell you I don’t have a clue about the scientific particulars of all this, somehow this verse means Jesus Christ, second person of Trinity, is not only eternally God but creator God. John said Jesus was and is somehow the very means of creation itself. Now why do you suppose John thought this creative piece important to mention right at the beginning of his Gospel?

What difference does this new Creator relationship make?

I believe it means a real relationship with Jesus brings the power of creation itself very personally and particularly into our lives. Think about it. In theological terms, we say God created this world “ex nihilo” or out of nothing. And so when we hear John telling us here this Baby Jesus who has come to us was the means through which our world came into existence, we are actually saying we have now established a new and incredibly powerful relationship with the Creator and creation itself. We now have a personal relationship with the Creator – with the One able to make something wonderful, beautiful, precious, joyous and whole out of the nothing of my life! Wow! That is epic, almost inconceivable change.

Life

This Baby brings the very power of creation to bear in our lives. But even more importantly, this Baby brings us to life! This is the second change. John said: “in him was life.” The Bible says we were completely condemned, dead and rotting in our sins and this Baby Jesus we took home with us rescued us. We were trapped in the meaningless temporary. We were living uncreative, utterly powerless and dead lives with no evidence of the miraculous in view. And this Baby Jesus found us there, loved us, picked us up, breathed new life in us and is now still shaking all the death off us. He shakes the temporary, uncreative, powerless stuff out of us and brings us to life! We aren’t dead anymore; we have been resurrected with Jesus. This Christmas Baby isn’t some optional religious accessory we’re trying to politely add on to our lives; He is life itself!! We were dead and now we live! Our casket has been busted open…

If there is one facet of following Jesus I think many Christians misunderstand, it is this one. Although none of us would ever say it aloud, I think many of us often look and act as though our relationship with Jesus brings death and dying to us. Somehow, we give the false impression taking this Christmas Baby home with us means no more laughter, no more fun, no more wildness, no more fresh air or happy frivolity. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Jesus sets us free to live! We are resurrected! Jesus breathes air into our clogged up lungs and sets us free to joyously live and embrace life and possibility in a way we never could before! We were given life when we took this Baby home! We were dead and now we live!

Sight

This Christmas Baby we brought home opens our eyes to the life God offers us. That is the third way this Baby changes everything. “In him was life, and that life was the light of everyone.” The eternal, creative, wonderful life we’ve been given is the very light of the human race. When we bring this Christmas Baby home, we are not only reconnected to creation and brought to life; we also receive our sight. We receive light, sight and vision. Jesus turns on the light and clears away the darkness around us in a way we never could before. The veil in the Temple gets ripped apart and we get ushered into the Throneroom of the King to see and understand things we’ve never seen or understood before. Ideally, we become so completely filled with creativity and life that the Light of Christ shines out of us for all the world to see.

Do you feel you’re living in darkness? Is your life more characterized by a stumbling fog of unknowing and shadows than the well lit narrow path to life? Do you suppose that might be true of you simply because you haven’t been allowing the Light of Jesus to illuminate your life? You haven’t been reading and studying your Bible, spending quiet time listening to Him in prayer or allowing the Holy Spirit to make a way in the darkness for you? Jesus is your light!

Adoption

But perhaps the most important and eternal change this Baby brings into our lives is the final one. Jesus brings the very power of creation to us. Jesus gives us fullness of life beyond wild imagination. And Jesus illuminates our path and our world in a way nothing else can. But perhaps the most important, most sweeping, most sweet and precious change Jesus brings to us is adoption. Jesus is the means by which we can come home! Jesus is the means by which we are allowed to leave our broken, sin-plagued human family and become the very sons and daughters of God Himself. The Apostle John tells us in this passage that“...to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God--children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.”

I don’t just religiously accessorize my life at Christmas; I am reborn at Christmas! I am miraculously adopted into the very family and wonderful body of Christ. When I receive and fully embrace the changes this Baby Jesus brings into my life, God the merciful Father of all prodigals runs down the road, puts His arms around me, dresses me in the family robes, puts the signet ring of sonship on my finger and throws a “welcome home son” party for me!

This Baby changes everything! This Baby rearranges my spiritual DNA and gives me a whole new home and a whole new family!

Folks, we all have some obvious choices to make about how this Baby’s birth is going to change our lives. Are we going to pack away Jesus along with our Christmas decorations when we start cleaning up next week? Are we going to continue the utterly uncreative, lifeless, and lightless life we’ve been living? Or will we let this Baby wonderfully change everything?

May this Christmas Baby change everything in your life this year!

Amen.

While Shepherds Watched (Luke 2:8-20)

So there we were...me and my little sister, sitting there around the fire, yapping about nothing mostly. The weather, wolves, latest schemes, schisms, thieves and robbers; anything to keep us awake. It seemed like we had been out there forever, doing this stupid job nobody cared about until something went wrong and a few of our father’s sheep got stolen. Day in and day out, digging stupid sheep out of the dumb places they constantly got into, fighting with the sheep, briars and each other, trying to keep the herds at least a little bit together, sometimes almost wishing something dangerous or exciting would happen just to break up the monotony!

Being a shepherd wasn’t exactly a high profile job back then. No sir, not very high profile at all! To tell you the honest truth, it was pretty much a bottom of the barrel, no account kind of job – if you could even call it a job. I don’t really understand why...but being a shepherd means you’re pretty much a worthless person. You may have heard we shepherds had such a lousy reputation we aren’t even allowed to speak up as witnesses and give evidence in court...not that anyone has ever asked me to vouch for them. Who would care what I think?

Who would care what we think about anything?

I suppose part of our bad reputation was deserved; I’ll be the first one to tell you there are some less than honest folks watching the sheep herds around here. But not all of us, my younger sister and I are out here just because we were the youngest kids in the family; there are a lot of daughters and youngest sons out here anonymously watching sheep at night. I guess somebody has to make sure the thugs and hired men don’t steal all of my father’s flock…

But nobody really thinks much of us. Nobody thinks much about us. Nobody notices us much at all – unless something’s missing, of course!

Sometimes the nights out here are almost impossibly long and sad. It isn’t that the work is so much worse than anything else; its just knowing you’ll never be good enough for anything else. Once you’re just “a shepherd boy,” once you get enough of this sheep stink into your clothes and sheep soil on your sandals, it seems like there’s no way you ever quite get shut of it. Sometimes I think care more about their stupid sheep than they do about us…

Anyway, just after most of the lazy hired men and the younger ones had fallen asleep on that particular night, we were sitting around, my little sister and I, trying to stay awake, minding our own business, making idle conversation, when, all of a sudden, BLAM!!

The feeble, flickering light from our little campfire was swallowed up in a blaze of white perfection that seemed to explode before our eyes! There was this … man, or something like a man, standing in front of us glowing. Huge. Overwhelming. Terrifying! On fire and yet not on fire. Violent, overpowering spiritual noise and yet no real physical sound. I couldn’t tell if I was seeing and hearing all this bombastic stuff with my eyes and ears or just with my mind. I found myself immediately on the ground, not knowing how I got there. I wanted to scream, but I had no voice. I wanted to cry, but I had no tears. I wanted to say, “I’m sorry!! I don’t know what I did, I don’t know where I did it, but, whatever it is, I’m sure its really bad for somebody like you to come all the way here to punish me...so I’m sorry!! For whatever...I’m not such a bad person, just a lonely and stupid or something...! Oh, please don’t hurt me!! I’ll do whatever you say! I’m sorry for whatever dumb thing we did! If you’re going to kill me, do it quickly, but please oh please don’t hurt me!! Please don’t hurt me! I’m sorry, I’m sorry…I’m sorry!”

But then...I heard this voice, as sweet, pure, clear, lovely and strong as any voice I’ve ever known, speaking softly to me – a voice running down over my head like warm, sweet cream butter over a fresh, hot biscuit. I heard a voice without a shred or slightest hint of anger in it. A voice without any of the disregarding, dismissive tones we’re so used to hearing around here. Terrifying and yet a voice I think I could have happily listened to for the rest of my life. “Don’t be afraid,” the voice said, “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people.” I peeked up from the ground just a little, realizing somehow I was still alive and breathing; listening more intently than I have ever listened to anything or anyone before. The voice continued, “Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: you will find the baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

And then, just as I was beginning to calm down enough to really listen to this man or whatever he was; just as my eyes were finally beginning to come back into focus, the heavens exploded, the hillside erupted into one great singing, speaking, shouting mass of uncontrollable, immeasurable, indescribable, Northern Lights, Borealis angel song joy! I couldn’t breathe! I couldn’t stand the unbelievable goodness of it! I’ve never been around so many happy, joyous, squirming people at one time! I thought I was going to die from the sheer pleasure of it all...

“Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace to those
on whom his favor rests.”

Next thing you know, I found myself standing there, arms outstretched, tears streaming down my face, every part of my body bathed in a wonder, saying those words over and over and over and over again to myself. Glory to God in the highest! Glory to God! Glory to God! Take me with you! Oh please, take me with you! Glory to God! Glory to God! Glory to God!

I don’t know how long I stood there like that, it could have been moments – it could have been hours or days for all I knew, but when I opened my eyes again, I looked around and the whole crazy thing was over – no sign of them. There was no burned grass. There were no footprints in the dirt and, amazingly, no scattered sheep. If anything, it seemed the sheep were actually clustered around closer in order to hear the angels just like us! But other than that, there was no evidence whatsoever that these clouds of angels had ever been there.

But then I turned to my right and to my left and saw this was not a dream; all my friends were still standing there as stunned and overwhelmed as I was. Tear-stained faces, and wide eyes. Arms up into the air and giggling like a bunch of babbling kids or something! We stood there for a moment, still shaking from the incredible intensity of the moment and then, it dawned on us simultaneously what we had all just been told. We were so overwhelmed by the incredible experience we shared, we hadn’t really paid much attention to exactly what we had been told. But suddenly, it all occurred to us...everyone started talking at the same time...

“Oh my goodness, did you just see what I just saw? We couldn’t all be out of our minds at the same time, could we? If this thing we just saw really happened, then what about this baby the guy spoke about? Could it be that the Messiah, the Christ has actually been born? Could it be that the King has really come? Could any of this possibly be true? And, if so, why would anyone bother to telling us? Nobody is ever going to believe all this! Especially coming from us! This is nuts! This is crazy! Aw, who cares what it is…let’s just go see if it’s true!”

And so we took off for Bethlehem as fast as our stumbling feet, fleeting breath and excited chatter could carry us. (I don’t even rightly remember now exactly what we did with the sheep!) Sure enough, we found the baby there, just exactly as we had been told he would be. We found a kid lying in a manger, nobody much around but his simple parents and some stable folks. The somewhat frantic innkeeper’s wife would pop in now and again for a moment just to see that the girl was doing okay. But she didn’t seem to really care about maternal things; nobody seemed to notice what was going on. Who cares about yet another dirt poor baby kid? Nobody seemed to think much of it. Everybody else had their own problems to take care of. With the census going on and everything, Bethlehem had its mind on other things.

All we could do was stand there, jostling each other for a better view – and wondering.

Could this scrawny kid possibly be the prophesied Messiah? Could this poor, cherry-nosed newborn lying here in this dirty stable, this anonymous, poor kid...born just like so many shepherd kids like us are born, could this unknown kid possibly be the one destined to save our nation and our world? Could this possibly be the Messiah King destined to set us all free?

We looked around to see what other people were coming to see Him; other people to whom the angels had appeared. You know – important people who got the announcement. We kept waiting to get shoved out of the way at any moment. We expected it. Certainly, if this was really the great Messiah of all our dreams, the choirs of angels would have made the announcement to cleaner, more reliable, acceptable people. Certainly a fancy delegation from the Temple would be here in a moment to take Him out of this sloppy, God-forsaken place. Certainly the King or at least the procurator had been told what was going on; or at least one or two of the smarter scribes or somebody sent to at least get a proper record of things.

But nobody came. How weird is that?

Eventually we figured out the angels hadn’t talked to anybody but us. Wow! If this whole thing was really “good news of great joy for all people,” then why hadn’t the good news been given to somebody who mattered? Why had the good, the greatest Gospel news been entrusted just to us? For a moment, we stood around wondering if we were all just crazy or something. We asked ourselves and each other if what we saw on the hillside was true. We all immediately agreed it was; we could still feel our hearts warm and pounding feverishly in our chests! Fellas like us don’t leave our flocks and go running into town like we just did for no reason. We all knew what we saw, but standing here alone crowded into a dirty stable, we couldn’t help but wonder why hadn’t this good news been given to somebody who mattered?

Or maybe, just maybe, the good news was...we do matter!

Maybe we do matter…

Maybe that’s the good news the happy angels were chattering on about. Maybe that’s the whole glorious point! Wouldn’t that be something? Maybe the good news of great joy the angels sang about was that this kid was going to grow up someday and make us all joyously matter! Even shepherds, little sisters and youngest brothers. Maybe we were the ones who received this announcement because broken, bored and ignored people like us are precisely the ones He came to save! Maybe we’re the very best ones to tell this joyous story...

In any event, we haven’t stopped telling the story since!

We went back to work that night and have not stopped talking about Jesus since!

No one could ever fully describe in mere human words what our experience on that hillside and in that humble manger was like, but a doctor named Luke a few years later came pretty close. Strangely, the good doctor Luke was the only one of the Gospel storytellers who seems to have remembered us much. The birth of this baby Jesus, the events of that particular night, were so uneventful, so boring, so completely unremarkable in the eyes of most people at the time, that even the great Matthew, Mark and John don’t bother to discuss them. But Dr. Luke, who made a point of researching all this stuff, who seemed to be particularly interested in our side of the Gospel story, told the story of that shepherd’s night pretty well...

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. 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. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” 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.”

Are you one of us this morning? Are you a shepherd too? Are you a forgotten person looking for the same things we were? Have you heard the angels? Have you heard the Song?

“Do not be afraid. 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.”

Go check out the stable, go see the Baby Jesus and see for yourself if what I’m telling you is true. I wonder if Almighty God is trusting you this morning with this good news of great joy for all the people just like He trusted us all those year ago. So go check out the stable. Go looking for the Baby. And if you find Him, if all this makes sense to you, if all these things are true, then I suggest you go back to work tomorrow and tell somebody about it all…

Tell some other shepherd who matters every bit as much as you do.

Amen.

A Jingling Christmas Story

What a wonderful afternoon! I am truly a blessed man! We had a delicious roast beef dinner, good conversations with friends, lots of laughter and a sweet program. There were Christmas carols, readings of several types, a quiet prayer, some special music and an utterly indescribable Jingle Bell quartet that went horribly wrong, but in absolutely the best way! No matter how hard they tried to do it as they practiced, it didn't quite work out right. Nobody was cooperating. And yet it may well have been the most joyous and wonderful rendition of Jingle Bells I've ever heard. I honestly wonder what could be more precious and joyously tender than a room full of smiling seniors all shaking happy fists full of noisy, jingling bells while a quartet of goofy costumed women tried to corral us all into doing it the way they planned? It was wonderful! Absolutely wonderful! Truly a Christmas memory I hope to never forget.

Earlier in the program, my good friend Esther Dalberg shared a Keilloresque story of Christmas memories of years past. She couldn't remember all the old song titles in English, so she recited them in Swedish. And as she closed her remembrances, she spoke of her excited, newly baptized 7 year old granddaughter wanting to read the Christmas story to the family last year. Esther closed by quietly sharing with us her deep, heartfelt desire that the children pick up the stories where all of us will soon leave them off - if only all the old stories could be remembered and carried on.

Thanks for a lovely afternoon, my old friends! I have deeply enjoyed your stories. I will carry them on. Merry Christmas to each one of you!

Come Long Expected Jesus (Isaiah 61:1-4)

What are you looking for this Christmas? What are you hoping for and expecting?

The LORD told the ancient Israelites in Jeremiah 29:13-14, at the end of their exile and awful time of punishment, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you. I will bring you back from captivity.” While those words were spoken to a specific people at a very specific time and place, the principles transcend time and place.

Almighty God longs for us to find and enjoy him. He promises we will find him when we seek him with all our heart. He will be found by us. Glory! What a promise!

So what are you looking for? What are we hoping for?

From Genesis through Malachi, the people and prophets of the Old Testament looked for a Savior and a King. Beginning with the very mysterious language of Genesis 3:15, where God curses the serpent saying, “and I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” Why the singular and what could this be about if not the coming Messiah?

Micah 5:2 said the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. Isaiah 7:14 said he would be born of a virgin. Deuteronomy 18:15, 18-19 said he’d be a prophet like Moses and Zechariah 9:9 said he would enter Jerusalem in triumph. Isaiah 53:3 said he would be rejected by his own people and Psalm 41:9 said he would be betrayed by one of his followers. Isaiah 53:8 said he would be tried and condemned, yet verse 7 said he would be strangely silent before his accusers. Isaiah 50:6 said he would be struck and spat on by his enemies. Psalm 22:7-8 said he would be mocked and insulted. Psalm 22 clearly depicted Messiah dying by crucifixion and Isaiah 53:12 said he would do so alongside criminals he would be praying for. Psalm 69:21 said he would be given sour wine to drink and Psalm 22:18 said people would throw dice for his garments. Yet strangely, Psalm 34:20 said, in spite of all this horrific abuse, just like any good Passover sacrifice, not one of his bones would be broken! Isaiah 53:5-6 said he would die as a sacrifice for our sin. Psalm 16:10 said he would come back to life and Psalm 110:1 said he would now serve at God’s right hand. And all this stuff is just the tip of the prophetic iceberg! All these prophetic expectations and hopes came vividly and clearly true and yet most people missed it all because they weren’t looking for the Jesus that showed up.

And so I say again, what are you looking for? What are you expecting?

Come, Thou long expected Jesus born to set Thy people free; from our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in Thee. Israel’s strength and consolation, hope of all the earth Thou art; dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart.

When the great Charles Wesley wrote the words to that beautiful old hymn in 1745, he wasn’t encouraging us to invent some lovely, politically correct, sanitized Christmas fantasy. He was saying, “Let these words be true! Let Jesus come, the Jesus we were taught clearly in your Word to expect – let this Jesus come and live among us again and do the things He promised!”

What are we really expecting? Do we even know?

Probably the single most important prophecy about Jesus is found in Isaiah 61:1-4. I say this is the most important prophecy because, in Luke 4:18-19 when Jesus stood before his hometown synagogue in Nazareth to introduce himself and his mission, these are the words he quoted and claimed. These are the words that got Jesus angrily run out of town and almost thrown off a cliff had God not protected him. This is what Jesus said we should be expecting.

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor [interestingly – Jesus ends his quote here] and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.

On this first official Sunday of the Advent season, this Sunday of prophecy, expectation and renewed hope in Christ our Christmas Messiah, we must clarify for ourselves what sort of Jesus we’re expecting. What sort of Jesus has the Word of God taught us to expect?

I passionately believe God’s Word has a two fold answer for us today. This prophecy Jesus embraces, the one that got him in so much trouble, gives us a two-sided expectation we must be clear about. The second verse of this prophecy proclaims two unassailable facts.

The Year of Favor

Our LORD Jesus came to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor. If you’re here this morning hopelessly stuck in poverty of one sort or another, if you are brokenhearted and alone, if you are held captive or trapped in some sort of prison darkness, Jesus comes to you with very good news. Jesus comes to you this morning with the offer of comfort and provision, a crown of beauty, gladness instead of morning and a life of praise instead of despair. Our long expected Jesus comes to you today with God’s favor in his hands as a free gift to you.

If you feel like some sort of awful leper sitting unwelcome on the outside of church and respectable society, Jesus comes to you today as a friend. You are not alone. You are not at all unwelcome. You are not weak. You are not worthless. You are not ugly. You are not just some awful list of diseases that plague you and cause others to avoid you. Jesus loves you.

If you came in here this morning utterly convinced your sins and wrong-doing are too awful for God to forgive, too heinous and disgusting for others to know about and too ingrained to give up, Jesus comes to you and says, “Don’t be silly! Stop thinking that way! Compared to the staggering holiness of God, you are all swimming in the same swill of condemnation.” Jesus comes to all the sad and guilty today, offering complete forgiveness and a completely different life. Jesus offers the real possibility of purity and pleasure beyond our wildest dreams.

If you feel trapped in darkness and imprisoned, perhaps even as a result of your own sinful and stupid decisions along the way, Jesus comes to you with a big, old set of Christmas keys able to open any door. While we might read the words of this prophecy in a prison cell, as many of you are, Jesus smiles at each one of us and offers us release. Where we are is just a question of real estate – what we do there is what matters. From what I read in the Bible, I suspect the Apostle Paul may never have been freer than when he was writing letters from a Roman jail cell. We don’t have to live a stuck life just because we’re momentarily stuck!

This is the great year of the LORD’s favor. Come thou long expected Jesus!

There is no longer any such thing as hopeless!

Corrie Ten Boom, the Holocaust death camp survivor, has famously declared, “There is no pit so deep but Christ is deeper still.” Dr. Ray Ortlund, a Nashville pastor and well known author has taken this quote as the theme of his blog, Deeper Still. I was looking at his website this week and came across a painting by Frank Bramley, entitled “The Hopeless Dawn.” It is a painting of a young woman who just found out her husband was lost at sea, being comforted by her godly mother-in-law. And in the picture is a table suggesting the Lord’s Supper and huge open Bible lying in the light of the window. You are not alone in this thing, sweetie! This moment of hopelessness is not the end for you; it is the dawn of something new. Jesus is constantly offering each one of us, even in the depths of our despair, a completely new day.

If that is where you find yourself today, broken, sinful, guilty, suffering, alone or captive in some awful way, please know that this is the year of our LORD’s favor. There is no longer any such thing as hopeless. This is the first, long expected message of prophecy for us today.

The Day of Vengeance

But this is only half the long expected message. Our LORD Jesus spent most of his time focusing on the first clause of the prophecy because it was most immediately relevant to his first century hearers. Jesus cut off his prophetic quotation mid sentence, but we cannot do so. While we are still living in this wonderful year of the LORD’s favor, the somber second part of the prophecy might be even more important for us to consider today. Our long expected Jesus came not only to bring a year of favor, but also a great and terrible day of vengeance.

The video I played at the opening of this message is a lovely image of someone finding what they were looking for with all their heart. A little girl anxiously looks for her dog while the soft music plays. The two are reunited, they cuddle and everyone lives happily ever after.

In one sense it is a beautiful picture of our pursuit of Jesus. The more we understand of God’s lavish, absolutely prodigal love (as Tim Keller describes it ), the more we truly begin to fall in love with his Word and its good guidance, the more we will honestly begin to feel our relationship with God somewhat resembles that between some girl and her affectionate dog.

But folks, our LORD Jesus is not your lost puppy. Our long expected Jesus came into the world proclaiming not only the wonderful year of the Lord’s favor, but also the great and terrible day of God’s vengeance. We cannot spend only one side of this coin.

There are many today who would discourage any conversation about the wrath and vengeance of God, certainly during the Advent season. They paint any attempt to do so as old-fashioned, judgmental and hateful. Almost any meaningful conversation about sin, biblical standards of righteousness or the profoundly clear and absolute truths of God become quickly suspect. Many today set up elaborate, yet utterly superficial, straw man images of bullhorn preachers screaming hellfire and damnation at the world and then they knock them down. And the sinful world, coddling its evil, applauds their wonderful enlightenment and sensitivity! One writer I read last week proclaimed, “The Bible that I read says that God did not send Jesus to condemn the world but to save it.” True, but the writer ignored the central, underlying context of the verse. While the Gospel of John tells us clearly our LORD Jesus didn’t come into the world to condemn it, it also makes clear he only did so because the world was condemned already. Condemnation is our default condition. A miserable eternity apart from God is our default destination apart from this baby. This condemnation was foundationally understood. And frankly, I don’t believe our condemnation apart from Christ is so well understood anymore.

I don’t see it. I see people doing whatever sinful, utterly selfish thing they wish to do whenever they wish to do it and, if anyone ever stands up and quotes them a Bible verse or two, that person gets grouped together with the bigots and haters and is summarily dismissed.

Folks, our LORD actually expects us to read, know and obey His Word! Our LORD longs for us to spend time with Him in prayer, know His voice and do whatever He tells us to do. Our LORD expects us to enter our churches (whatever kind of church we’re going to) hungry to worship, not hungry to selfishly dissect and gluttonously consume. Our LORD expects us to constantly display the fruit of the Spirit. Our LORD expects us to seek Him first in all we do. Our LORD expects us to sacrificially give of ourselves – our time, talents and treasure. Our LORD expects us to really love Him and love others. These things are not optional suggestions.

We’re not going to get into heaven, we are not going to see our LORD’s kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven unless we properly appreciate our utterly condemned condition apart from Jesus Christ. Those who refuse to admit how lost they really are never go looking for a map! I will never embrace the full favor of the LORD unless I see how precious, valuable and necessary it is. I will never properly embrace favor unless I properly understand vengeance.

There is coming a day when God is going to say “enough” to this world’s sin. Folks; the Gospel is not good news to those refusing to embrace it. This prophecy is a choice! We can choose to wallow in God’s favor or we can continue on our rebellious path to God’s vengeance.

Jesus Christ is not your lost puppy.

Late Tuesday evening after finishing up the bulk of this message, I went home and lamented to Monica the strange, surprising direction my sermon studies took this week. I shared with her how profoundly struck and utterly exposed I was by this year of favor and day of vengeance stuff and Jesus using only half the quotation. But as soon as I mentioned the day of vengeance side of the conversation, my sweet, wildly non-confrontational Monica had an almost visceral reaction. “Oh Kevin, don’t use the word vengeance during Christmas time. That’s terrible - I hate that word! It makes God sound so mean!”

Sorry Sweetie! I’m really not the one using the word.

As a side note, I found it very humorous that for the rest of the evening as we were talking and watching television, the word “vengeance” kept appearing in every program, over and over again. It was downright creepy! I kept chuckling and poking Monica in the ribs. Finally she shouted, “Vengeance is mine!” to which I immediately responded, “Says the LORD!”

We may not like the word, I suspect we aren’t supposed to like the word, but it is very clearly there. In Psalm 94:1, David, a man after God’s own heart, prayerfully exclaimed, “O Lord, God of vengeance; God of vengeance, shine forth!” Eew! We may not like the sound of that prayer, but there is coming a day when that prayer will be fully, finally answered. Folks, the only way to avoid the scary word we hate is to fully embrace the wonderful word we love.

This prophecy, this Advent season, this day like every other day, offers us a choice. If you recognize your brokenness, your sin, your need of a Savior, your darkness and your utter captivity, if you enter this room on your knees – this long expected Jesus has very good news for you. This day is about favor. We have been living in a long and wonderfully gracious year of God’s favor, but there is coming one sure and certain day of God’s vengeance.

So choose wisely today!

Come, Thou long expected Jesus born to set Thy people free; from our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in Thee. Israel’s strength and consolation, hope of all the earth Thou art; dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart.

Amen.