25 “And there will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity from the noise of the sea and its surging, 26 people fainting from fear and expectation of what is coming on the inhabited earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. 27 And then they will see the Son of Man arriving in a cloud with power and great glory. 28 But when these things begin to happen, stand up straight and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near!”
“Look Up, Your Redemption is Drawing Near”[1] by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Let’s not deceive ourselves. “Your redemption is drawing near” (Luke 21:28), whether we know it or not, and the only question is: Are we going to let it come to us too, or are we going to resist it? Are we going to join in this movement that comes down from heaven to earth, or are we going to close ourselves off? Christmas is coming—whether it is with us or without us depends on each and every one of us.
Such a true Advent happening now creates something different from the anxious, petty, depressed, feeble Christian spirit that we see again and again, and that again and again wants to make Christianity contemptible. This becomes clear from the two powerful commands that introduce our text: “Look up and raise your heads” (Luke 21:28). Advent creates people, new people. We too are supposed to become new people in Advent. Look up, you whose gaze is fixed on this earth, who are spellbound by the little events and changes on the face of the earth. Look up to these words, you who have turned away from heaven disappointed. Look up, you whose eyes are heavy with tears and who are heavy and who are crying over the fact that the earth has gracelessly torn us away. Look up, you who, burdened with guilt, cannot lift your eyes. Look up, your redemption is drawing near. Something different from what you see daily will happen. Just be aware, be watchful, wait just another short moment. Wait and something quite new will break over you: God will come.
You know what a mine disaster is. In recent weeks we have had to read about one in the newspapers.
The moment even the most courageous miner has dreaded his whole life long is here. It is no use running into the walls; the silence all around him remains.… The way out for him is blocked. He knows the people up there are working feverishly to reach the miners who are buried alive. Perhaps someone will be rescued, but here in the last shaft? An agonizing period of waiting and dying is all that remains.
But suddenly a noise that sounds like tapping and breaking in the rock can be heard. Unexpectedly, voices cry out, “Where are you, help is on the way!” Then the disheartened miner picks himself up, his heart leaps, he shouts, “Here I am, come on through and help me! I’ll hold out until you come! Just come soon!” A final, desperate hammer blow to his ear, now the rescue is near, just one more step and he is free.
We have spoken of Advent itself. That is how it is with the coming of Christ: “Look up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”
Application & Challenge
So often, this time of year is called the season of giving. Consider ways that you can give in the upcoming week. Here are a few suggestions:
If you are able, buy a present and give to a local ministry that seeks to share the love of Christ to families having a tough time.
Maybe you cannot financially support a ministry or buy a present at this time:
Do you have items that can go to support local ministries – extra clothes, coats, food, or used housing items or toys, etc.?
Are there opportunities to give of your time to minister to others – nursing home, food pantry, soup kitchen, etc.?
[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God Is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas, ed. Jana Riess, trans. O. C. Dean Jr., First edition. (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 40–41.
1 Who has believed our message, and to whom has the arm of Yahweh been revealed? 2 For he went up like a shoot before him, and like a root from dry ground. He had no form and no majesty that we should see him, and no appearance that we should take pleasure in him. 3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering, and acquainted with sickness, and like one from whom others hide their faces, he was despised, and we did not hold him in high regard.
4 However, he was the one who lifted up our sicknesses, and he carried our pain, yet we ourselves assumed him stricken, struck down by God and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, crushed because of our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon him, and by his wounds we were healed.
The suffering of Jesus didn’t begin on the cross; it began in his straw bed and continued through to the cross, all for our redemption.
In truth, that beautifully decorated tree, those gorgeously wrapped presents, and all that tasty holiday food, which make us happy during the Christmas season, are poor representations of the world into which Jesus was born and what his everyday life would be like. Jesus didn’t show up for a celebration. He wasn’t here for a vacation. His world wasn’t well decorated, and he surely wasn’t well fed. He came to a world that had been dramatically broken by sin, and his calling was to expose himself to the full range of its brokenness. This is where the details of Christ’s birth are important. It means something profoundly important that the cradle of his birth was a feeding trough in a borrowed barn. You are meant to pay attention to the fact that he wasn’t in a palace, attended to by servants. It’s important to notice that the first smells that entered his infant nostrils weren’t oils and perfumes, but animal smells.
These seemingly unimportant details set up a sharp contrast between our celebrations at Christmas and the true conditions of the Messiah’s entry into our world. Most of us would be in a complete panic if we had to birth a baby in such conditions. But none of this was an accident. These conditions were God’s plan. They announce to us that the Messiah came not to be served but to serve (Matt. 20:28). Since he came to rescue sufferers, it was essential that he suffer too. And his suffering wasn’t reserved for the cross; it started the moment he was born. Everything he suffered was on our behalf. He would suffer but not lose his way. He would suffer and not quit and walk away. He would suffer and not grow bitter and angry. He would suffer and not respond with vengeance. He would suffer without thinking, desiring, saying, or doing even one wrong thing. He exposed himself to our world, to live as we could not live, so that as the righteous One, he could pay the penalty for our sin and give us not only peace with God, but a ticket to a future where suffering would be no more.
Don’t let shiny ornaments and bright lights keep you from seeing the dark, sad drama of the life of that baby in that borrowed barn. Jesus experienced not one moment of ease in his life. Read the passage from Isaiah 53 again and let it sink in. Jesus wasn’t good-looking in the way that would make him naturally attractive and popular. People regularly despised and rejected him. He was alienated from the very people he came to love and to rescue. His life was marked by sorrows and griefs of every kind. He willingly walked to his torture. He hung on that cross, body bruised, beaten, pierced, and broken. He did not look for escape. He did not selfishly use his power. He did not mock his mockers. He didn’t do any of these things because he understood that suffering was what he came to do, and he was willing.
Jesus suffered because he did not demand what was his right; he endured what was wrong so that we may be right with God. The manger of his birth is a clue to what he came to do and what every day of his life would be like. The way God chose to rescue sufferers was by becoming a sufferer himself. Every moment of his suffering was done with us in view. Every dark moment of physical, relational, societal, and judicial suffering had a high and holy purpose to it: our salvation. You see, Jesus came to suffer because he came to be our Savior.
There’s nothing wrong with the shiny ornaments and bright lights. Your celebration of what Jesus willingly did for you should be a festival of overflowing joy. So celebrate the blessings you’ve received, the best of those being the gift of Jesus, by passing that blessing on to others with gifts of love. Eat wonderful food, but let it remind you of the lavish spiritual food that God feeds you with every day because of the willing sacrifice of his Son, Jesus. Here is what this means for you: commit yourself this Christmas to be a sad celebrant. Let your joy at what your Savior has gifted you with be mixed with grief at what it cost him. Remember this Christmas that you are celebrating the birth of the “Man of Sorrows.” Remember as you celebrate that the One whom you celebrate enjoyed none of the things that likely make up your celebration (a house, beautiful things, fine food, etc.). This Christmas may your holiday joy be shaped and colored by remembering that you have eternal reason for joy because of the birth, life, death, and resurrection of your humble, willing, suffering Savior.
3 For I passed on to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, 4 and that he was buried, and that he was raised up on the third day according to the scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve, 6 then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at once, the majority of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep.
1 Corinthians 15;3-6
21 He made the one who did not know sin to be sin on our behalf, in order that we could become the righteousness of God in him.
2 Corinthians 5:21
8 But what does it say? “The word is near to you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim), 9 that if you confess with your mouth “Jesus is Lord” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth one confesses, resulting in salvation. 11 For the scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord is Lord of all, who is rich to all who call upon him. 13 For “everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.”
Romans 10:8-13
“Good News of Great Joy, or A Weary World Rejoices”
We have spent a good bit of time this week in Luke 2:10 and the verses around it. The declaration of the angels to those poor and frightened shepherds should just about be memorized at this point: “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring good news to you of great joy which will be for all the people”. Good news. Great joy. For all people.
The word translated “good news” is often translated gospel, and the message that the angels proclaimed on that hillside 2,000 years ago is a beautiful and succinct picture of the gospel. They preached that the Savior “who is Christ the Lord” was born for them – for those dirty, stinky shepherds – and that He could be found that very day in Bethlehem. It was news that would and could change the trajectory of their lives. They just needed to believe in Him and receive the salvation He had to offer – they would receive grace by faith through Him.
Now, I know that on the day they heard that gospel message Jesus was still laying in the feeding trough, still an infant, and was decades away from His death, burial, and resurrection. But the babe in the manger was still “the Word [become] flesh” (John 1:14). He was still the Lamb slain “before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1:4).
We sometimes want to overcomplicate things. We know the whole story and want to add and fill in the gaps in the angels’ proclamation that day, but the “good news of great joy” is still just as simple. In fact, Paul gives very succinct proclamations of the gospel, too. The first can be found in 1 Corinthians 15 where he tells the church at Corinth that he is passing on to them the most important message he had to offer – the very same message that he received himself: Jesus died for our sins according to the way that the Bible said He would, He was buried, and He rose from the dead on the third day exactly as the Bible and Jesus’ own preaching said He would. That’s good news!
Paul’s second succinct gospel summary comes in his next letter to the church at Corinth in 2 Corinthians 5:21. In one little complex sentence, he shares that God put the sins of those who would be saved on Jesus. Jesus had never sinned and did not deserve any condemnation, but He willingly bore our sin on our behalf. Those who trust in Him no longer are under the condemnation and shame due to their sin; Jesus bore that (Colossians 2:13-14). In a great exchange, Jesus traded His righteousness for our sin. He bore the wrath of God and exchanged it for God’s favor. Basically, He traded His extravagantly full bank account for our bankrupt one so that when God looks upon those who Jesus has saved, He does not see their sinfulness but Jesus’ righteousness! That’s good news!
The gospel is good news, but there is also bad news. Those who do not confess Jesus as Lord and believe He died for their sins and rose again do not receive part in that great exchange. They remain in their sin. Their condemnation remains their own. It does not have to be that way. All who call out to Jesus in faith will be saved. Anyone who believes in Him will not be but to shame (Romans 5:5), but not believing leaves the shame where it belongs – on the sinner (John 3:18).
Long lay the world in sin and error pining Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn Fall on your knees!
Those who are without Jesus are still in their sin and “pining” after the wrong things, sinful things. But everyone – all people – have the opportunity to fall on their knees, believe in Him – confess Him as Lord, and repent of their sin. And those who do will not only have heard the good news of great joy but also to have believed it and received the salvation Jesus offers.
I love the phrase “good news of great joy” because 1) it is straight from the Bible, and 2) it captures what Jesus offers. But I also love the way the writer of “O Holy Night” captured what it is to be a sinner and receive Christ: “a weary world rejoices”. If you have been reading with us over these past two weeks, you have read snippets of the “good news of great joy”, but have you received it? Have you believed on Jesus, or are you still on the fence? If you haven’t, I urge you: fall on your knees, believe what the Bible says about Him, confess Him as Lord, and rejoice in the salvation He brings!
30 Now Jesus also performed many other signs in the presence of the disciples which are not recorded in this book, 31 but these things are recorded in order that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
I feel so strongly that among those of us who have grown up in church and who can recite the great doctrines of our faith in our sleep and who yawn through the Apostles Creed—that among us something must be done to help us once more feel the awe, the fear, the astonishment, the wonder of the Son of God, begotten by the Father from all eternity, reflecting all the glory of God, being the very image of his person, through whom all things were created, upholding the universe by the word of his power.
You can read every fairy tale that was ever written, every mystery thriller, every ghost story, and you will never find anything so shocking, so strange, so weird and so spellbinding as the story of the incarnation of the Son of God.
How dead we are! How callous and unfeeling to his glory and his story! How often have I had to repent and say, “God, I am sorry that the stories men have made up stir my emotions, my awe and wonder and admiration and joy, more than your own true story.”
The space thrillers of our day, like Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, can do this great good for us: they can humble us and bring us to repentance, by showing us that we really are capable of some of the wonder and awe and amazement that we so seldom feel when we contemplate the eternal God and the cosmic Christ and a real living contact between them and us in Jesus of Nazareth.
When Jesus said, “For this I have come into the world,” he said something as crazy and weird and strange and eerie as any statement in science fiction that you have ever read (John 18:37).
O, how I pray for a breaking forth of the Spirit of God upon me and upon you. I pray for the Holy Spirit to break into my experience in a frightening way, to wake me up to the unimaginable reality of God.
One of these days lightning is going to fill the sky from the rising of the sun to its setting, and there is going to appear in the clouds one like a son of man with his mighty angels in flaming fire. And we will see him clearly. And whether from terror or sheer excitement, we will tremble and we will wonder how, how we ever lived so long with such a domesticated, harmless Christ. These things are written that you might believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who came into the world. Really believe.
Application & Challenge
Conversation can be a very powerful tool. If you are reading or listening to these readings and devotions with others, stop and have a conversation. What are some movies – maybe even a Christmas movie – that act as reminders of redemption or love or grace or mercy? Talk about how these stories reflect the Story.
[1] John Piper, Good News of Great Joy: Daily Readings for Advent 2013 (Minneapolis, MN: Desiring God, 2013).
10 And the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring good news to you of great joy which will be for all the people: 11 that today a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, was born for you in the city of David. 12 And this will be the sign for you: you will find the baby wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a manger.”
Luke 2:10-12
“The Birth of Jesus Considered in It’s Spiritual Meaning”[1] by Martin Luther
Faith is first, and it is right that we recognize it as the most important in every word of God. It is of no value only to believe that this history is true as it is written; for all sinners, even those condemned believe that. The Scripture, God’s Word, does not teach concerning faith, that it is a natural work, without grace. The right and gracious faith which God demands is, that you firmly believe that Christ is born for you, and that this birth took place for your welfare. The Gospel teaches that Christ was born, and that he did and suffered everything in our behalf, as is here declared by the angel: “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people; for there is born to you this day a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.” In these words you clearly see that he is born for us.
He does not simply say, Christ is born, but to you he is born, neither does he say, I bring glad tidings, but to you I bring glad tidings of great joy. Furthermore, this joy was not to remain in Christ, but it shall be to all the people. This faith no condemned or wicked man has, nor can he have it; for the right ground of salvation which unites Christ and the believeing heart is that they have all things in common. But what have they?
Christ has a pure, innocent, and holy birth. Man has an unclean, sinful, condemned birth; as David says, Ps. 51:5, “Behold I was brought forth in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.” Nothing can help this unholy birth except the pure birth of Christ. But Christ’s birth can not be distributed in a material sense neither would that avail any thing; it is therefore imparted spiritually, through the Word, as the angel says, it is given to all who firmly believe so that no harm will come to them because of their impure birth. This it the way and manner in which we are to be cleansed from the miserable birth we have from Adam. For this purpose Christ willed to be born, that through him we might be born again, as he says John 3:3, that it takes place through faith; as also St. James says in 1:18: “Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures.”
We see here how Christ, as it were, takes our birth from us and absorbs it in his birth, and grants us his, that in it we might become pure and holy, as if it were our own, so that every Christian may rejoice and glory in Christ’s birth as much as if he had himself been born of Mary as was Christ. Whoever does not believe this, or doubts, is no Christian.
O, this is the great joy of which the angel speaks. This is the comfort and exceeding goodness of God that, if a man believes this, he can boast of the treasure that Mary is his rightful mother, Christ his brother, and God his father. For these things actually occured and are true, but we must believe. This is the principal thing and the principal treasure in every Gospel, before any doctrine of good works can be taken out of it. Christ must above all things become our own and we become his, before we can do good works.
But this can not occur except through the faith that teaches us rightly to understand the Gospel and properly to lay hold of it. This is the only way in which Christ can be rightly known so that the conscience is satisfied and made to rejoice. Out of this grow love and praise to God who in Christ has bestowed upon us such unspeakable gifts. This gives courage to do or leave undone, and living or dying, to suffer every thing that is well pleasing to God. This is what is meant by Isaiah 9:6, “Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given,” to us, to us, to us is born, and to us is given this child.
Therefore see to it that you do not find pleasure in the Gospel only as a history, for that is only transcient; neither regard it only as an example, for it is of no value without faith; but see to it that you make this birth your own and that Christ be born in you.
[1] Martin Luther, “Christmas Day (Luke 2:1–14),” in Luther’s Church Postil: Gospels: Advent, Christmas and Epiphany Sermons, ed. John Nicholas Lenker, trans. John Nicholas Lenker, vol. I, The Precious and Sacred Writings of Martin Luther (Minneapolis, MN: Lutherans in All Lands Co., 1905), 143–145.
8 And there were shepherds in the same region, living out of doors and keeping watch, guarding over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the Lord stood near them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened. 10 And the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring good news to you of great joy which will be for all the people: 11 that today a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, was born for you in the city of David. 12 And this will be the sign for you: you will find the baby wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a manger.” 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God and saying,
14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among people with whom he is pleased!”
Luke 2:8-14
“The Angels’ Song: How Did God Come? (Part 2)”[1] by Alistair Begg
The God of Surprises
But [God becoming flesh and dwelling among us] is not the only surprise. The place where God’s Son was born is also a surprise, and the people to whom God sent the angels is a third surprise. And they show us something of what God is like.
First, look where the God-child is. “You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” It was not unusual to have a baby in swaddling cloths. It was unusual to lay a baby in a food trough.
In human terms, the reason why Mary had her child in a shack (or very possibly a cave) used for sheltering animals was straightforward. In distant Rome the emperor, Caesar Augustus, had ordered that a census be taken, obliging Mary and Joseph to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and there was no room for them to stay anywhere else. Augustus meant “worthy of adoration.” According to an inscription on a stone carved in around 9 BC and found in a marketplace in what is now Turkey, Augustus’ birth “gave the whole world a new aspect.” He was regarded as a “Savior.” He encouraged the worship of his adoptive father, Julius Caesar, as a god, and allowed himself to be styled as “the son of God.” So great was his power and his impact that the inscription continued that “from his birth a new reckoning of time must begin.”
And so the shepherds must surely have been struck by how vastly different this child in a manger was from the power and majesty of the Roman Emperor, from this Caesar Augustus figure—from the person who established the glory of his name and the might of his empire at the head of his armies, and who could move his subject peoples around at the stroke of a pen. And yet here in this food trough lay the one who really is worthy of adoration, whose birth changes everything, who came as Savior and who really is the Son of God—and whose birth-date is the way we still reckon our time 2,000 years later.
He was not born to a queen, in a palace. He was born to a girl, in a cave, and his cradle was a food trough. The Son of God came to be just like us, among us, rather than to lord it over us. If you have known poverty, so has he. If you have known what it feels like to be an outsider, so has he. His was not a gilded, protected existence. He knows what life is like. As Jesus himself put it when he had grown up, he “did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10 v 45).
The second surprise is where the announcement was made. God did not make his announcement to Augustus. It came to a group of poor shepherds. We might expect that God would be most interested in those who had status, those who were powerful, those who were mighty. In actual fact, throughout Luke’s Gospel, we discover that again and again he goes for the least and last and the left out. He works in a way that we might not anticipate him working. And we have to allow him to surprise us: to be different than a god we would make up, and to work differently than how we would if we were God. This is the real God, and you and I are not him. People find it perfectly easy to tolerate Jesus just to the point where he contravenes their expectations—and then they tend to have a very different response.
Peace Offer
So that’s the message of the angel—but no sooner have the shepherds picked themselves up off the ground than the reinforcements appear. The Redeemer has come and the angels of heaven are there to announce it for him.
And the choir declares what this baby will achieve: “On earth peace.” Augustus had established what was known as the “Pax Romana”—an empire at peace and guaranteeing safety (unless you happened to be a slave or a rebel). But the peace of Rome was about to be dwarfed by the peace of God. Epictetus, a first-century philosopher, observed rightly that:
“While the emperor may give peace from war on land and sea, he is unable to give peace from passion, grief and envy; he cannot give peace of heart, for which man yearns for more than even outward peace.”
Caesar Augustus could not transform any of his subjects’ hearts or change any of their eternal futures.
But, the angels say, this baby could. Here is an announcement of a peace that goes deep within, and lasts beyond the grave—the peace “for which man yearns.” The peace of God that invades a life is based on the discovery of peace with God.
Today, our newspapers are filled with all kinds of attempts at peace. Peace between husbands and wives, between family members, between nations, and so on. But Epictetus is still right—peace of heart proves elusive. No matter how well we do at trying to establish peace with each other, until we discover what it is to have peace with God, we’re not going to discover the peace of God.
And, since we are separated from God—since we have declared independence and rebelled against our rightful Ruler—this is a peace that can only be brought about by the intervention of God himself. We may try to find peace without God in our own way—peace through owning stuff; peace at the bottom of a bottle. We may try to find peace with God in our own strength—peace through obeying religious rules or through being “good people.” But the truth is that only God can give us peace with himself. The angels tell us where his offer of peace was made. This is a peace that isn’t found in something. It’s a peace that is found in someone. And it is a peace that pursues us, seeks us, comes knocking on the door of our lives.
But it’s a peace that so many miss out on because they fail to make room for the one who brings it. Remember why Jesus was lying in a manger in the first place? Why was the God of heaven in a feeding trough? Because there was no room anywhere else. No one had made room for him. He made the entire universe. He came into his universe. And there wasn’t a place for him. Let’s be honest; in the lives of many of us, it’s no different. We have no room for him either—not if it makes life in any way uncomfortable for us, not if his presence brings any inconvenience to us, not when his actions and words surprise us. But our response does not change the truth. God has visited this world. He has come as one of us, to bring peace to us by redeeming us from our sins. Will you say to him, “No room?”
[1] Alistair Begg, Christmas Playlist: Four Songs That Bring You to the Heart of Christmas (The Good Book Company, 2016), 45–49.
25 And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. 26 And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he would see the Lord’s Christ. 27 And he came in the Spirit into the temple, and when the parents brought in the child Jesus so that they could do for him according to what was customary under the law, 28 he took him in his arms and praised God and said,
29 “Now dismiss your slave in peace, Lord, according to your word. 30 For my eyes have seen your salvation 31 that you have prepared in the presence of all the peoples, 32 a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory to your people Israel.”
33 And his father and mother were astonished at what was said about him. 34 And Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed—35 and a sword will pierce your own soul also, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed!”
Luke 2:25-35
“Simeon’s Song: How Did God Do It?”[1] by Alistair Begg
Of all the things that are said when someone takes a little baby into their arms, many are quite silly and said out of embarrassment. We don’t know what to say and so we just come out with, “My, he has his mother’s nose” or, “Can you believe how much hair he has?” or whatever else. Older men are often the worst at knowing what to say in this situation (I know, because I am one of them).
But our fourth and final “singer” was in no doubt about what he would say when he held the infant Jesus in his arms the first time Jesus was brought to Jerusalem, the capital, and to the temple, the center of Jewish religious life. His name was Simeon. He was a devout believer in God. He was patiently waiting for the promises God had made to be fulfilled. And not only that, but God’s Holy Spirit had told him that he wouldn’t die until he saw these promises begin to unfold on the pages of history.
The angels had brought the news that a Savior had been born. Likewise, Simeon announces the truth that he is looking at God’s salvation, lying in his arms. And Simeon understands that this Savior has come to save not only “your people Israel”—the ancient people of God, the descendants of Abraham—but he has also come “to the Gentiles”—everyone else. If you carry on reading Luke’s Gospel, you find the adult Jesus living this out. People think he’s going to go for the religious folks, and he doesn’t—he hangs out with the irreligious folks. People think he’s going to go for the people who are doing their best, but he doesn’t—he welcomes the people who have done worst. That’s because he has come to bring to light and then deal with their greatest problem, whether they are religious or irreligious, good or bad—their sin. As the angels promised, this child would be good news of great joy for all people. There is no one who does not need Jesus to offer them salvation, and no one to whom he does not offer that salvation.
So this old man is now content to die. He has been waiting his whole life for this one sight, and now he has seen it—the Sovereign Lord’s salvation, in the shape of a human, lying in his arms.
Your Heart will Break
But Simeon did not only speak of salvation. He spoke of suffering too. He had more to say to Mary…. He was explaining, or rather hinting at, what was to come—not just announcing that this child would bring salvation, but hinting at what it would cost him to bring it. He was the child who would cause many to fall, and others to rise. He would reveal the deep secrets, and the true attitude towards God, that lies in every human heart. He would be opposed verbally; and one day, his mother’s soul would be torn apart emotionally. Imagine taking a newborn child in your arms, then looking at his mom and saying, One day, your heart will break because of this child. That is what Simeon is warning of here. He does not tell Mary what will happen; but he does tell Mary how it will feel.
Easter at Christmas
My guess is that Mary never forgot Simeon’s words, nor that she really understood them, until the other end of her child’s life. As an adult, the one who had lain in the devout Simeon’s cradling arms was hung from a cruel Roman cross. But this is Easter—and isn’t this a book about Christmas?! Yes, but unless you understand the events of Easter, you’ll never grasp the heart of Christmas. Simeon understood that—which is why he pointed forwards to Good Friday even as he welcomed the baby at the center of Christmas. Simeon is pointing us to how God redeemed his people….
And this is why the wooden food trough led to the wooden cross, and why you will never get to the heart of Christmas if you don’t grasp the meaning of Easter. Christianity is not good advice about what we should do. It is the good news of what Christ has done. Christianity does not proclaim that you are worth saving or able to save yourself. It announces that God is mighty to save.
Paid
Do you like paying bills? I actually love it—I think it is because of the satisfaction and relief of getting it dealt with. I don’t like that I have to pay the bill—but I do like getting the bill paid. And it is especially satisfying to pay a bill in person. You walk over to the counter and you pay for it, and then you have the joy of seeing someone take your bill and write PAID. I prefer it actually when it is a stamp that stamps PAID in red with double circles.
As long as I have that bill marked PAID, no one can make me pay again. It’s been settled. It is all over, paid for, in the past.
And three days after the events that must have pierced Mary’s soul, God stamped PAID unmistakably against all the sins I have committed, all the debt I owe to him. After all, the death of Jesus could have been merely a tragic incident. The afternoon darkness and the ripped-apart curtain could have been sheer coincidences. Within hours, his corpse lay cold in a tomb. But three days later, God the Father left no one in any doubt that he had accepted Jesus’ payment for sinners’ debts—that the price to free sinners had been paid:
1On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared andwent to the tomb. 2They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’” (Luke 24 v 1–7)
Luke’s Gospel finishes in a very similar place to where it began. We began with angels appearing, and we finish the same way. We began with an angel announcing the presence of life where it is, humanly-speaking, impossible—in the wombs of a woman who was infertile and a woman who was a virgin. We finish with angels announcing the presence of life in a tomb—the resurrection of a crucified criminal to eternal glory.
And between the events of the first Christmas Eve and the first Easter Sunday, Simeon’s words had come true. Jesus had reached out to those who were outsiders, excluded. He had been opposed. He had revealed what people really believed. Physical nails had pierced his hands as an emotional sword pierced the soul of his watching mother. And, as he hung on the cross, he had redeemed his people—he died the death that tore the curtain and he paid the price that bought the salvation that Simeon had spoken of all those years before.
He died on that cross because Simeon, Mary, Zechariah, the shepherds, you and I are sinners—and because he loves them, and us, anyway.
[1] Alistair Begg, Christmas Playlist: Four Songs That Bring You to the Heart of Christmas (The Good Book Company, 2016), 51–64.
8 And there were shepherds in the same region, living out of doors and keeping watch, guarding over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the Lord stood near them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened. 10 And the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring good news to you of great joy which will be for all the people: 11 that today a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, was born for you in the city of David. 12 And this will be the sign for you: you will find the baby wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a manger.” 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God and saying,
14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among people with whom he is pleased!”
Luke 2:8-14
“The Angels’ Song: How Did God Come? (Part 1)”[1] by Alistair Begg
Birth announcements are big business. There are so many ways to announce the entrance into the world of your little one—Pinterest, Shutterfly, WhatsApp, Tiny-Prints.com. You can take hundreds of pictures, magnify and crop them, and send them round the world. It becomes a competition. “Here’s our new arrival in her crib. Here she is in her first nappy. Here she is having her first bath. Here are her footprints.”
Well, if you happen to have a baby next year, here’s how to outdo everyone else. Forget emails. Forget a photograph on Facebook or an entry in the New York Times. Here’s how to win the announcement competition: have an angel announce the birth. Have an angel coming down the street in the middle of the night, waking your neighbors to tell them what’s just happened, and then follow that up with a whole choir of angels providing celebratory backing vocals.
That’s how to win. And (although sadly the angels aren’t taking bookings right now) that is how the arrival of Mary’s baby was announced on the night he was born….
God’s Name
The angel told these shepherds who it was who had been growing in Mary’s womb, and who was now “wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” He described the baby’s job—“Savior”: Redeemer. He announced the baby’s title—“Messiah”: God’s King promised for centuries to his people, promises recorded for us in the Old Testament. And he revealed the baby’s identity—“the Lord.”
And that word, “Lord,” is making a staggering claim, because it is the word that was used by Greek-speaking Jews to translate the Hebrew word “Yahweh”—the personal name of God, by which he had introduced himself to his people for centuries. “God” is not God’s name, any more than “Pastor” is mine. My name is Alistair, and my friends call me that. God’s name is Yahweh, and it’s what he told his friends, his people, to call him. In other words, here’s the deal: good news, great joy for all the people, has come because a Redeemer, the ultimate Ruler, has been born. And he is God Almighty.
Every so often at Christmas, we hear about a wealthy businessman who’s gone and served in a soup kitchen, or about a very successful athlete who spends some time on Christmas Eve in the children’s hospital. And everyone says, “That’s great—what an amazing and kind and humble thing for him to do.” And it is. But now see what this angel is saying: The God who made you, who gave you your DNA, who woke you up this morning, who has sustained your life—that God, in the person of Jesus, stepped down into time, making himself accessible.
On the first Christmas night—and this is the heart of the Christmas story, and the heart of the Christian faith—God took on flesh. The voice that made the cosmos could be heard crying in the cradle. The hands that placed each star in its place grabbed hold of Mary’s fingers. Her son was fully human, and fully God. In this man, divinity met humanity.
So, unlike every other conception and birth, this was not the beginning. God the Son had always existed, equal with and eternal with the Father and the Spirit—one God in three persons, what often is called the Trinity. God the Son—the “Word”—predates his birth; he is older than his conception, or what is often called his incarnation:
1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning. (John 1 v 1–2)
I remember my daughter when she was young once asking me, “Where was I before I was born?” And the answer is, “You did not exist before you were conceived and born.” (I avoided mention of the conception part when I answered my daughter.) But that’s not what happened with Jesus. He did exist before he was conceived and born. What happened that night was the birth of God the Son as a human. But it was not the beginning of the person God the Son.
This is unparalleled. It is unique. It is mysterious. And Luke is claiming that it is historical.
A Virgin Birth—Really?
Perhaps this is where you struggle with the Christian faith. You are prepared to accept Jesus as a great teacher, a religious leader, or a brilliant philosopher. You are prepared to accept that he spoke for God, perhaps. But you struggle to accept that he is God—that as Mary and Joseph peered into the manger, they were looking at the eternal Son of God. You struggle with the idea of a virgin birth and a miraculous incarnation.
Well, if your starting point is that there is no God, then the incarnation question is irrelevant. If there is no God, he could not have been born as a baby in Bethlehem. But if your starting point is that there is (or even that there might be) a God who created the entire universe, then surely he is capable of entering his universe. Why would we be surprised that he can do what he wants to do? After all, in the last century or so humanity has worked out how to bring about conception without sexual intercourse. A hundred years ago, that idea would have seemed impossible and not worthy of being believed. Now it seems plausible and obvious. If doctors can do it in their way, do we really want to say that God cannot do it in his? God the Son taking flesh is a mystery that we will never understand. But not being able to understand how God became one of us is not proof that he did not become one of us.
Of course God’s ways are mysterious and at times inexplicable to us! He would not be much of a God if our limited minds could reason out everything about him. No, this is mystery, because it is divinity; it is God—but it is also history. Heaven is breaking into earth. The shepherds would find the Creator of the universe wrapped in strips of cloth. Here is the answer to the human predicament, the solution to our slavery to sin and our separation from God. God bridged the gap by coming from heaven to earth. This is how much the mighty God cares about us. Love was when God spanned the gulf. Love was when God became a man. Love was when God surprised those he had created by being born as one of them—as a baby.
[1] Alistair Begg, Christmas Playlist: Four Songs That Bring You to the Heart of Christmas (The Good Book Company, 2016), 39–44.
“My soul magnifies the Lord, 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. 50 And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. 51 He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts; 52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate; 53 he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. 54 He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, 55 as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”
Song | O Come All Ye Faithful —
Song | Adore Him —
Scripture | Isaiah 9:2-7 —
2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. 3 You have multiplied the nation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. 4 For the yoke of his burden, and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. 5 For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. 6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.
Song | Noel —
Song | Your Great Name —
Invitation | God With Us —
Offertory | Light of the World —
If you have not been gathering, consider gathering with your church family again. We have a 10:00 Bible study where Jamie Harrison is walking us through the book of Revelation. If you are at-risk, this Bible study would be perfect for you so you can spread out (and even dip out the side door before the 11:00 worship gathering begins).
15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 And Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” 17 And Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.
Matthew 16:15-17
37 Turn away my eyes from looking at what is worthless; revive me in your ways. 38 Fulfill your word to your servant, which is to bring about a reverence for you….
Psalm 119:37-38
“Get Your Eyes Ready for Christmas”[1] by John Piper
The absolutely indispensable work of God in revealing the Son—both then to Peter and now to you and me—is not the adding to what we see and hear in Jesus himself but the opening of the eyes of our hearts to taste and see the true divine glory of what is really there in Jesus.
When people have doubts about the truth of Jesus, don’t send them away to seek special messages from God. Point them to Christ. Tell them what you have seen and heard in his life and teachings. Why? Because this is where God breaks in with his revealing power. He loves to glorify his Son! He loves to open the eyes of the blind when they are looking at his Son!
God does not reveal his Son to me by coming to me and saying, “Now, John, I know that you don’t see anything magnificent in my Son. You don’t see him as all-glorious and divine and attractive above all worldly goods. You don’t see him as your all-satisfying treasure, and you don’t see his holiness and wisdom and power and love as beautiful beyond measure. But take my word for it, he is all that. Just believe it.” No!
Such faith would be no honor to the Son of God. It cannot glorify the Son. Saving faith is based on a spiritual sight of Jesus as he is in himself, the all-glorious Son of God. And this spiritual sight is given to us through his inspired Word, the Scriptures. And the eyes of our hearts are opened to recognize him and receive him not by the wisdom of flesh and blood but by the revealing work of his heavenly Father.
The apostle Paul said, “God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”
How shall you prepare your heart this Christmas to receive Christ? Fix your gaze on him in the Bible. Look to Christ! Consider Jesus. And pray. Look beyond your own flesh and blood, and ask that God would give you eyes to see and ears to hear that you might cry out with Peter, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!”
Application & Challenge
How can you fix your eyes on Jesus? Maybe, outside of these Advent readings and devotions, you have not been spending time in God’s Word, or maybe there is something you need to stop looking at – an ungodly TV show, inappropriate websites, etc. If you are a smartphone user, look at your screen time. On an iPhone, it will tell you how many hours – that’s right hours – you have spent that day and week on various apps and/or websites.
Challenge yourself to:
Repent of fixing your eyes on worthless things and pray to God to turn your eyes from worthless things from worthless things and that He revive you.
Delete apps that you have allowed to eat up too much of your time, and find an accountability partner to help you monitor your phone use and help find healthy balance.
[1] John Piper, The Dawning of Indestructible Joy: Daily Readings for Advent (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2014).
Just Keith Harris 