All right, Luke chapter 2. Let's go ahead and read in verse 1 through 7. 1 through 7, and that's going to be the extent of how far we get into chapter 2 today. That's kind of the natural division here. The first section, verse 1 through 7, let's go ahead and read it. And it came to pass in those days that there went a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed. And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria, and all went to be taxed, everyone into his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee out of the city of Nazareth into Judea under the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be taxed with Mary, his espoused wife, being great with child. And so it was that while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. Let's pray. Dear Lord, I thank you for today. Lord, I thank you for your word. I thank you that you sent your son, Jesus Christ. Lord, to enter into creation, Lord, to become a human child that he could redeem all those, Lord, who were under the curse of sin. Lord, we thank you for all that you've done in sending Christ for us. I pray that you'd help us now, Lord, to see how you operate, to see the humility of Jesus Christ, the humiliation, Lord, and the example that that sets for us. And I pray that we'd learn from your word And I pray that you'd be glorified and we thank you in Christ's name. Amen. Well, as we've been learning on Wednesday night, part of studying the Bible or reading the Bible to understand it is to, uh, when you come across a verse like chapter two, verse one, it came in to pass in those days that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed. Well, you can take that verse and you could just kind of say, Oh, that's interesting. And move on to the next one. Or you can ask yourself a couple of questions. Like who's Caesar Augustus? Why is everybody being taxed? What is this? And you could get out some books and some commentaries or whatever and try to read and understand those things. And that helps you then to understand the context and gives you an idea in your mind. You can picture in your mind what was happening historically at that time. And that does wonders at helping you to understand the word of God. In fact, whenever you see in the Bible a place named, you know what you ought to do? You have to take your Bible and flip to the maps in the back and look at those places. So when you see that Joseph and Mary are traveling from Galilee to Bethlehem, you have to get the map out and look at that and say, okay, they're here and now they're traveling down to here. And then you can see it in your mind. It helps you to understand. In fact, in my Bible, Oftentimes, when there's a place mentioned, I put a page number next to that place so I know what map to go to in the back so I can see it. So there's a variety of tools we have to understand scripture and to give us a historical or geographic setting to understand the Bible. And here in verse 1, we're going to take a minute just to learn about Caesar Augustus. Who is Caesar Augustus? I am not a history buff. I came to Jared this morning. I said, hey, did you know what Caesar Augustus' name used to be? Of course, he rattles it all off. He knows it all. right? Jared's got a photographic memory and he remembers the dumbest things. Don't ever play Jeopardy with Jared, right? I learned my lesson with that. I used to go over to his house and play Jeopardy on the computer. Yeah, don't ever do that unless you want to be embarrassed. So anyway, he already knew all that kind of stuff but I had to study it to come up with this stuff and to learn about Caesar Augustus. And I found, as I studied Caesar Augustus and the Roman hierarchy and all that kind of stuff, and the politics and the romance and the divorce and the murders and the suicide, I'm like, Jerry Springer, right? That's what this is. This is an episode of Jerry Springer. family tree of the royal line there or the Caesars, I mean, again, this is Jerry Springer. You can't, because this person married this person who divorced that person who married this person's nephew who is actually the uncle of this person and so on and so on and so on. And it gets confusing. And on top of that, everybody's got six names, right? And a lot of their names are the same. And you find that with Caesar Augustus. His name was originally Gaius Octavius, right? He sounds like a supervillain. Gaius Octavius, and he's sometimes referred to as Octavian, his grandmother was the sister of Julius Caesar. She was the sister of Julius Caesar. Julius Caesar kind of had a special relationship with Gaius Octavius, his grandnephew, and he kind of showered him with gifts and he favored him and so on. When Julius Caesar was murdered and his will was read, it was determined that he had named his grandnephew, Gaius Octavius, as heir to the throne. And when Gaius Octavius heard that, he changed his name. which they tended to do. He changed his name to Gaius Julius Caesar. So, as you look into history, you find that he's got multiple names, and even in the Word of God, you see him called by a different name, Caesar Augustus. We'll get to that in just a second. Octavius had a sister who was married to Mark Anthony. Anybody know who Mark Anthony was? What he's known for? Wait a second, I thought he was married to Octavius' sister was he was until he started to have a fancy for Cleopatra and he divorces Octavius's sister and he goes and continues his affair and eventually marries Cleopatra who was the Queen of Egypt. So you had Octavius, you had Mark Anthony, and you had another man who are part of what History calls it a triumvirate, that is, you have these three leaders who are ruling together. But Octavius got angry at Mark Anthony, because here's Mark Anthony, he's married to his sister, he divorces his sister and goes and shacks up with Cleopatra there in Egypt. So Octavius is angry with him, so the relationships are strained. Eventually, you have Octavius, who goes to battle with Mark Anthony and Cleopatra and just decimates or defeats their navy in Egypt. And the battle was, there's no contest, and Rome defeats Egypt and Mark Anthony and Cleopatra together commit suicide. A little bit of history for you. That's what I told you, right? Very interesting stuff. It's like a soap opera. It's like a talk show all mixed in one, right? Nothing new there. In 27 BC, the Roman Senate changes or they give Gaius Octavius a special name. Really, it's kind of conferring upon him the idea of deity. They call him Augustus, that is reverend or majestic or highly revered. And that's now why Gaius Octavius, whose name was Gaius Julius Caesar, is now called Caesar Augustus. You do know that Caesar is not a name, right? Caesar is a title. And here he is now called Caesar Augustus. And that's how we find him in verse one, when it says that the decree went out from Caesar Augustus. Caesar Augustus was a ruthless man, but he was a good leader. And there's countries and nations will excuse the immorality and the ruthlessness of their leaders if they can bring peace and prosperity. Right? And you see that even in the modern world and even in the West. You can have a man in office who's a reprobate, but if you've got a job and the economy's going around, going on pretty good, then we excuse all those things. And the same was true with Caesar, Augustus. Rome, under his rule, experienced a lot of peace. That's what people call the Pax Romana, the Roman peace, which lasted for a very long time. It's an idea of the moral standing of Caesar Augustus. He was married to a woman who did not produce a son for him, so he divorced her because she only produced a daughter named Julia, and she didn't produce a son for him, so he divorced her and married a woman named Livia. Livia has a son named Tiberius. So Caesar Augustus looks at the son named Tiberius and says, Tiberius, now that you are my son-in-law or my stepson, however it may be, you need to divorce your wife and marry my daughter. Tiberius Caesar did just that, divorces his current wife so that he can marry the wife of Caesar or the daughter of Caesar Augustus Julia and Tiberius Caesar is the one that we find during the ministry of Jesus Christ so Caesar Augustus he was a wonderful leader he was a wonderful military commander he had an organizational mind he's the one that really built up Rome to the magnificence that we see in history that was really under his rulership but he was still an immoral unsaved really pagan That's who this man is. Now part of his methodical organizational mind caused him to send out this decree. You know what? I cannot govern all these different nations without having some idea of who I'm ruling over. So he says we need to have a census. And that's what this is. So he sends out the decree to all of the areas that he is ruling over and says there needs to be a census. He would allow nations to keep their kings and to keep their culture and so on to a certain extent as long as it didn't contradict what Rome desired. So you find what you call vassal kings who were kind of ruling over smaller areas that he was the emperor over. But he sends out the decree, we need to have a census. And in chapter two of verse one, you find that that census or that decree comes to Galilee. And Joseph and Mary are told that they need to go to their home city so that they can report for the census. And that's the setting. Here we have Joseph and Mary being told they need to go to their hometown to be taxed and to register with the census. Now, picture this. You've got Mary. The Bible says she's great with child. You know what that means? It means she's ready to pop, right? I mean, she was overdue. She's going to have to travel from Galilee to Bethlehem, which is about a hundred mile journey. I mean, a hundred mile straight shot, but they're not going to be going a straight shot. They're going to be going all around the, taking the roads that are there and trying to avoid the high places and so on. So it's a couple day journey she's going to have to make. And she's not going to be sprinting. She's not going to be walking. She's going to be waddling all the way there. Right? Which is going to slow you down even more. They might have had an animal that they had borrowed. Who knows? But it would have been quite the journey. If she wasn't ready to give birth now, she would be after the 100-mile journey. Right? Think about that, ladies, as you get up there in your pregnancies and have to complain about the things you've got to do, tying your shoes and so on. And here you've got Mary being told by the government, you have to come under threat of penalty all the way to Bethlehem just so that you can register. for the census, verse 3. And all went to be taxed, everyone into his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee out of the city of Nazareth into Judea, under the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be taxed with Mary, his espoused wife, being great with child. Now, although Bethlehem was south of Galilee, the Bible says he went up. Well, why is that? Why would the Bible say he's going up when he's actually going south? It has to do with topography. That is, he was actually ascending as far as the land, the lay of the land, so it says he was going up, right, even though he was going south. Look at a map and you'll see that. So here he is coming to Bethlehem. Why? Because he was a descendant of David. Matthew 1.20, Joseph is contemplating the fact that Mary is gonna give birth and they're not married, right? It's a virgin birth, he's been told, by her, that she's pregnant, he knows he didn't have anything to do with it, and he's questioning what he ought to do, thinking about putting her away and having a divorce. But in Matthew 1.20 it says, But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. Right? It's a miraculous birth, and there he calls Joseph son of David. Why does that matter? Well, we learned in the past that there is a promise that God has given to David that there would always be one to sit upon his throne and that one would rule and reign forever. That's called the Davidic covenant. So it's important and the word of God is showing us that Joseph is in the line of David so that his offspring, which would be Jesus Christ, legally could have rightful ownership of the throne of David. So he's of the lineage of David, so he goes to Bethlehem. And 1 Samuel 20 verse 6, here's David talking to Jonathan, and he says, if I father at all miss me, then say, David earnestly asked to leave me that he might run to Bethlehem, his city. Right? It's the city of David. Bethlehem, it means the house of bread. There's a prophecy about Bethlehem in the Old Testament in Micah 5 too, and this is what it says. It says, But thou, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me, that is to be ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have been from old, from everlasting. So he's saying there's somebody coming who's going to be a ruler over Israel who is eternal. His goings are from old, from everlasting. And he's going to be coming to Bethlehem. That's a prophecy of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, being born in Bethlehem. And then the wise men, when they came to Herod in Jerusalem, and they said, where is he who's born king of the Jews? He sends for his scribes. His scribes go, and they look into the word of God. And they said unto him, in Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophets. They looked, and they read Micah 5 too, and they said, Christ is going to be born in Bethlehem. Now, this is what's interesting. Mary and Joseph leaving their home country, she's ready to have a baby, just a few days off of giving birth, they're moving from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Now who would have thought, right, that this baby is going to be born in Bethlehem? As a result of this unsaved pagan ruler putting out a decree for all the world to be taxed, you know what's happening? Prophecy is being fulfilled. That is this ungodly man who has no reverence for God whatsoever, yet is even taking on him titles of deity. He was called the Savior. He was even called the Savior of all men. People referred to Caesar Augustus this way. God is using him to fulfill his own prophecy. That's not new for the way that God operates. Do you remember, this is one of my favorite, favorite passages of scripture. In the Old Testament when Moses Pharaoh sends out a decree and says, hey, all the male children of Israel need to be killed, right? He was trying to ensure that they didn't continue spreading the way that they were because they knew that they were mightier than the Egyptians, and if there was a civil war, then the Egyptians would probably lose. So he's trying to have a little genocide going on there to wipe out the Jews. Moses' mother takes him, puts him in a basket, puts him on the river. Okay? She's desperate, right? This is my last chance to maybe save my child. He might make it. He might not. I'm trusting God. Put him in the thing. Goes down the river. Goes down the river. Pharaoh's daughter hears the baby crying. Finds the basket. Opens it up. She has compassion and love for this. I mean, how could you not? For this little child that she finds in the basket. Moses's sister runs to Pharaoh's daughter and says, I see you found a baby. Would you like me to go get one of the Hebrew women to nurse the baby? And Pharaoh's daughter thinks that's a good, yeah, go get a Hebrew woman and I'll pay her some wages. So who does Moses's sister go and get? Moses's mom. So now you have Moses's mom reunited with her child, nursing her child and getting paid for it. What a coincidence. God uses Pharaoh's daughter. God uses those circumstances so that Moses could grow up, that he would not be wiped out. He would actually be grown up in Pharaoh's. The Bible says that Pharaoh's heart was hardened towards God, that he would not let God's people go. Okay, his heart's hardened. He drives Israel out of Egypt. What has he done? He has just ensured that Israel will become an independent nation, which is a fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant. So he drives them out of Egypt. They're no longer going to be intermingled with the Egyptians, but they're forced out. They become a nation. He pursues them. They go across the Red Sea on dry land. Pharaoh follows them. He's in the midst. The water comes down, kills Pharaoh and his army. And what God has just done is he's used Pharaoh not only to make Israel a nation, but now something has happened in Israel's life that will be referred to for generation upon generation, and that is the death and deliverance from Pharaoh. Did Pharaoh do that? Did Pharaoh's daughter do that? God did that, sovereignly, working in circumstances, using even ungodly leaders to perform His will. In Isaiah chapter 10, God's talking about how the Assyrians are going to come and they are going to attack the Israelites. In Isaiah chapter 10 it says this, verse 5, O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger. Did you get that? God calls the Assyrians, a pagan nation, the rod of his anger. And the staff in their hand is mine indignation. I will send him against the hypocritical nation. That's Israel. and against the people of my wrath will I give him charge to take the spoil and to take the prey and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. Howbeit he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so, but in it but it is in his heart to destroy and cut off nations, not a few. He's saying the Assyrians are going to come. They're going to think that it's all about them and all about their power. They're going to cut off Israel. But he's saying, no, they're my rod. I am using them to chastise my people. And in 2 Samuel 7, that's what God told David he would do. He says that, yeah, I'm making a covenant with you. And when your descendants rebel against me, he says, I will chasten them with the rod of men. What is he saying? He said, I'm going to use man. I'm going to use men, even pagan nations, and I'm going to use them to fulfill my will. And he does the exact same thing with Caesar Augustus. In Proverbs chapter 21, verse 1, it says, The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord. As the rivers of water, he turneth it whithersoever he will. God's in control. And even though Joseph and Mary were in a situation where the Rome, the most powerful nation ever to exist here, is ruling over them and giving them a decree saying you must go and be taxed. Though they could have felt helpless, like what can we do? We're being victimized. They did not feel that way because they understood that God is sovereign and he was in control. So here you have Caesar Augustus being really turned by God to give this decree, that situation being used by God to fulfill an Old Testament prophecy that Mary would come, she would be in Bethlehem, she would give birth to Jesus Christ, fulfilling Micah chapter 5 and verse 2. So here they are on their 90 mile journey, nine months pregnant, probably on foot, maybe a borrowed animal, two day journey. Two day journey if you're not nine months pregnant, who knows how long if you are nine months pregnant. There they are and they are traveling. So verse six, so it was that while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. It says there that Mary brings forth her firstborn son. The days were accomplished. It was time for her to give birth. She was delivered. She brought forth her firstborn son, which is very significant. Firstborn child is rightful heir. to inheritance. Firstborn child is called holy unto the Lord. The firstborn child was the one that was to be brought to the temple and a sacrifice was given in order to redeem them because they were the Lord's. So you take them and instead of offering your child actually to the Lord, you give a sacrifice to redeem the child and then you would keep the child. But you know something else that that means when it says that Mary gave birth to her firstborn son? It means that she had more sons. He was the firstborn because there was a secondborn. He was the firstborn because there was a thirdborn, and a fourth, and a fifth, and a sixth, and a seventh, and maybe more. In Matthew 13, verse 55, you have people looking at Jesus Christ and looking at all that he was doing and said, hey, isn't this the carpenter's son? I mean, isn't that the son of Joseph? How is he able to do all that he's doing? He's the son of Joseph. Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary? And his brethren, James, Joseph, Simon, Judas, And his sisters? Are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things? Hey, that's Mary's son. That's Joseph's son. We know his parents, we know his brothers, and we know his sisters. So count that, okay? Count with me. James, one. Joseph, two. Simon, three. Judas, four. Sisters, at least two. Jesus, the seventh. at least, and it could have been more sisters, right? So Mary brings forth her firstborn son, but she didn't stop there, right? She was like many members of Calvary Baptist Church. She had a large family. She had at least seven children. In Matthew 1, verse 25, it says that Joseph knew her not, that is, they didn't consummate their marriage, till she had brought forth her firstborn son and called his name Jesus. So Mary, was she a perpetual virgin? Well, not unless she had seven miracle births, which she didn't. The Bible says that Joseph knew her not till she brought forth her firstborn son. The Bible says then that she takes the child, wraps him in swaddling clothes. That is, you ever swaddled your baby, you take the blanket, and the nurses in the hospital are great at this. I never quite figured it out. I try to swaddle my baby, and the blankets are all flowing all over the place, and the arm's hanging out, and so on. I mean, the nurses, You know, and the baby's all snug in there and all happy. And they did that, they've been doing that for many years. In Christ's day, here's you got Mary, it would have been more like strips of cloth that they would have put around the baby, almost like a mummy, and held him in real tight. And there she takes the baby, puts him in swaddling clothes, and this is a reminder to us. Here you have the Savior, the Son of God, who would redeem all mankind, fulfilling prophecy, but you know what? He's still a baby. She's still a mama who gives birth to the baby, wraps him up in swallowing clothes, looks at his little face. He could be crying at this point. Wraps him all up, holds him close to her. A very sweet, sensitive scene as Mary wraps him up. And then the Bible says that she places him in a manger. The Bible doesn't say they were in a stable. The Bible doesn't say they were in a barn. But it does say that she put him in a manger that is a feeding trough, which means that they probably were somewhere where animals were housed. So she takes the baby, places him in the feeding trough in the housing area for these animals. And why? The Bible says there's no room for them. in the end. No room for them in the end. The word in there could just mean a place to stop to get rest. It doesn't necessarily mean that they're at the Motel 8, right, or whatever it's called. They weren't at the Holiday Inn. They were just at a place where they would lodge strangers. And oftentimes what these were, were simply a place for animals in the bottom, a place for lodging in the top. So you'd come and you'd travel, you'd bring your animals, you'd tie them up on the bottom, and then you'd go and sleep in the top. There was no rooms left in the top portion, the second level, when Mary and Joseph got there, so they were told, well, you could sleep in the bottom, where the animals were. And there they were sleeping in the bottom. That's where their quarters were, because those above were full. Why would they be full? Because everybody's coming, to register for the census. Now think about this. Mary and Joseph, nine months pregnant. You could call them victims of the state, right? Here's the government saying you must come. Joseph's saying, but my wife is nine months pregnant. We can't make the journey. Has to go. You don't question a decree of Caesar. So they go and they make the journey. They get there and finally we're here and we can rest. but there's nowhere available to rest. The houses are full. The lodging quarters are full. The best they can get is a place where the animals are. And even this, we know later on that this is in the middle of the night. So it's the middle of the night. They are there. There's no place for them. You would think that somebody would look at this woman who's been on a journey for two days or three days. Who knows? She's ready to give birth. This young girl, you'd think that somebody would offer her a room. Hey, men, I'll sleep on the straw, young lady. You go have my room. None of that, right? So you have the insensitivity of the people, you have the decree from the oppressive state. Here they are, they're there. Could anything get worse? Oh, Joseph, I could be wrong, but... I think I just felt the pain. Things just got worse. I mean, is that, men, not your worst nightmare? I remember when Becky was pregnant, every time she was pregnant, all six times, that if she felt anything, we went in the van and started driving. I don't care if we had to drive around the hospital for an hour. We're going to be close to the hospital, right? Because there's no chance I'm going to be in a situation where I have to be any more part of that birthing process than sitting in a chair watching the doctors do their thing. Thank you. The closest I ever got was seeing some little legs come out, and that's all that I want. I didn't cut the cord. I didn't do anything. I didn't have anything to do with it. When the baby's out, the cord is cut and washed up, I'll hold the baby. Could things get worse? Yeah, they got worse. Here's Mary in the stable. Here they are bedded down on straw. You've got animals around them. You've got all the smells, all the sights that go along with being in a barn. You've got the dusty straw. You've got the manure. You've got the animals that are making their sounds. I mean, just the smells alone. We go and we give birth in a sterilized, clean environment, and here they are in a barn. Joseph looks at Mary and Mary says, I think it's time. It can't be time. What are you surprised? It's not time. There's no way it's time. It's not time until we go home. That is time. Not now, we're in a barn. Mary says it's time. No doctors. You got Joseph, who's a carpenter, right? I'm a carpenter, not a doctor. So the baby's coming. Mary can't stop it. Joseph can't stop it. And Mary gives birth and there's Joseph and he's there and he's delivering the baby. Everything that happens when you give birth to a baby, you know, you get, it can get messy. Baby's born, baby comes out, blood all over the baby. Joseph's got his hands on the baby, his hands are all full of blood and everything else. Here you got this baby, the umbilical cord's still there, he's gotta cut the cord, he's gotta hold the baby, and all of this, probably by firelight, right? In a barn, with animals all around him. Here he's got the baby, what is he thinking? Oh look, it's the Son of God. He's thinking, what a miserable situation. What a miserable situation. What miserable circumstances. Wouldn't you be feeling that way? Being in a situation like that? I've got a brother-in-law who's, or sister-in-law, who gave birth in a cab under a bridge. And you think, well, that's bad. That's not as bad as being in a barn with the animals all around him. There you have Joseph holding the baby in this terrible environment. What do you think they're doing? Where's the verse that says Joseph and Mary said, God, why are you doing this? God, what's wrong? God, where are your promises? Where are those verses? They're not there. Because Joseph and Mary understood the sovereignty of God. Joseph and Mary could look back to the promises that God made them in the previous chapter, and they could see that God was still in control, even when circumstances looked bleak. Here you've got the baby in the hands of Joseph. surrounded by animals, with the straw and with the manure and with the smells and the textures and everything that goes with a barn. Think about that next time you're in a place like that, next time you're in a petting zoo, next time you're in a barn. Think about Jesus Christ being born in that environment. Here's Joseph holding the baby. What is God telling us by this scene? You know what he's telling us as I read this passage? The humiliation of Jesus Christ. And I'm not talking about humiliation as we use the word, that somebody humiliates you. No, the humiliation that is his utter humility as he comes. God's planned it this way. This is the way that God has designed it to be. Why? He wants to show the humility of his son. Jesus Christ setting the example of Jesus Christ doing everything that he could to be countercultural to the point then where people naturally reject him because of the way that he came, because of the way that he taught, because of the way that he died, and so on. Philippians chapter two and verse four. It says, look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God. but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. Being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." Jesus Christ who thought it not robbery to be equal with God. He was equal with God, but he didn't look at it as something that he had to grasp or hold on to. Now the point of this passage in Philippians is to tell us not to look on our own things, but the things of others. How many times Are you grasping onto your social status? You're grasping onto your reputation. And you hold onto those things and you defend it at any cost. Somebody says something about you, somebody goes and gossiping about you and talking about you, saying negative things about you. What do you do? You get on the phone, you fire off the email, try to defend yourself and try to get those people that are getting a bad view of you to support you instead of them, right? That's generally how we operate. That's not how Jesus operates. He says he thought it not robbery, not something to be grasped onto. He was in the form of God, but he let go of that. Not that he let go of his deity, but he let go of all the privileges that went with being a divine, and he made himself of no reputation. What does being no reputation look like? What does that look like? I'll tell you what it looks like. It looks like a little newborn baby. covered in dirt in the middle of a manger being held by a carpenter with no doctor around in the middle of the night by firelight after a long journey under the oppressive hand of a Roman government. That's what it looks like. Not only that, but it looks like a man who goes through his life despised by those whom he heals, despised by those who he seeks to save, and then being put on a cross and dying in such a way that, again, is despised by the people. Even the death of the cross, the Bible says here. He made himself of no reputation. 1 Timothy 3.16 tells us, without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh, make no mistake. As human as that scene looks here in the manger, as ordinary as that baby might look, he was God manifest in the flesh. John 1.1 says, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Then in verse 14, it says, The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory. The glory is the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. God in the flesh, Hebrews 1.3, calls Jesus Christ the image of his person, the express image of God's person. Colossians 1.5 calls him the image of the invisible God. Think about this. Colossians 1.15, who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature. For by him are all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things are created by him and for him. That's Christ. That's the baby in the manger. He made all things, and all things were made not only by Him, but for Him. And here He is, this babe, helpless babe, in this terrible circumstance in our eyes, but He's actually God the Creator in the flesh. 2 Corinthians 4 again tells us that He is the image of God. But He made Himself of no reputation. He emptied Himself He came to earth saying, I'm not going to avail myself to my deity. I'm going to be humble, not only a man, but I'm going to come in the form of a servant, according to Philippians 2.7. It doesn't stop there. He comes as a man, letting go of all the privileges of deity, but not just a man. He comes as a servant, that is, a slave. He comes as the form of a slave. He's the master. He comes as a slave. He's the creator, and he comes as part of creation. He made everything, yet during his ministry, he had nothing. Remember when Peter comes to Jesus Christ. People come to Peter and say, Peter, does your master pay tribute? Does he pay taxes? And Peter said, oh, yeah, he pays taxes. He didn't want to offend anybody. Yeah, he pays taxes. So he goes to Jesus and says, Jesus, we need some tax money. So Jesus, of course, he being God, he's got all the resources in the universe, right? So he reaches in his pocket and gives him some of his money. It's not what happened. Says Peter, Jesus Christ does not have a coin. He does not have any money on him whatsoever, even just to pay taxes. So he tells Peter to go and to catch a fish. He catches the fish. He says, in the mouth there, you'll find money. You know what Christ had? He had what he needed when he needed it, because he relied on God to provide it for him. He didn't have the tax money. Think about people wanting to follow Christ around, and he says, hey, the Son of Man, foxes have holes, birds have nests, the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head. He didn't have shelter. He didn't have a home. He has no money. He has no shelter. Even when it came time for him to enter into Jerusalem, he comes on a baby donkey, and even that would bore him. When it came time to have his final feast with his disciples, he tells them to go and borrow an upper room that he could have this feast. And even the tomb that he was buried in, the Bible teaches us was borrowed. He had nothing. He came in the form of a servant as a slave. He came as part of creation. He came destitute with humility. He was made in the likeness of men. We did a study on that before. He came like a man so that he could redeem mankind. He came under the law so that he could fulfill the law. He came in the likeness of men. Isaiah 53.2 says of Christ, he shall grow up before him as a tender plant and as a root out of dry ground. He had no form nor comeliness. When we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. and we hid as it were our faces from him, he was despised, and we esteemed him not. That's Christ. The interesting thing about Jesus Christ, he's rejected by the world, he's hated by the world, but those who come to him in faith, what do we do? We exalt him, don't we? We come to him in faith, we exalt Jesus Christ, but as far as the world is concerned, it's just two different worlds. Outside of the church, Christ is despised and rejected by men. Inside the church, he's loved and he's exalted as Lord and Master. So he being found in the fashion as a man, humbled himself, became obedient unto death, and not only death, but death of the cross. So from God, to man, to a servant, to death, to death on a cross. That's humility. You know, even his earthly parents then, as Christ comes with this humility, Even his earthly parents then were subject to the same humiliation. They experienced that same humility. Mary was poor. She was a nobody from a nobody town. She was accused of fornication. Here she has a virgin birth. Nobody believes her. She's accused of fornication, an illegitimate pregnancy. They're compelled by God, this government, to go and to make this journey when she's nine months pregnant. They get there. They face the indifference of people, the insensitivity as people, as this pregnant woman is placed in a manger. And I don't know. This is speculation. I wonder, though, if they come into the city and people look at her and you just think somebody would be sensitive to them, giving them a room. But you just wonder, so how long have you guys been married? Oh, we're not. Oh, okay, well, there's room in the stable for you. I don't know if that's what happened or not, but you just think, just humanity would allow this pregnant woman to have a room who's ready to give birth, but they end up in the stable. They face the insensitivity of man, the godless government compelling them. They get the crude lodging, treated really in an inhumane fashion. Just think about the sense of helplessness. Have you ever felt like life is just happening to you? Right? I mean, you just don't control the circumstances that all these things are happening, and it just happens to you, and you kind of get a victim mentality. Like, there's nothing I can do for myself. There's nothing I can do to change my circumstances. It's just all happening to me. They could have had that attitude, couldn't they? Mary and Joseph, with all that's happened here. It was just one chapter ago, in chapter 1, verse 28, that the angel comes to Mary. and says, Hail, thou art highly favored. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women. Verse 30, the angel says unto her, Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favor with God. Verse 31, And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest. And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David. And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end. And verse 35, The angel answered, said unto her, the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the highest shall overshadow thee. Therefore, also, that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. Mary is awestruck. You mean God is doing all this for me, and I'm a nobody? And all of a sudden, she's looking. See, all that God's doing, and it looks wonderful, all that's going to happen. But the reality comes in chapter 2. When she's on the journey, she's in the stable giving birth with no doctor, with her husband who doesn't know what he's doing, delivering this child in the dirt and in the muck of a stable. How do those things compare? Mary says, I know what God promised me, but circumstances don't seem to be playing out that way. What do you do? Do the circumstances then say those promises must not be true? Or do the promises say the circumstances ultimately will work out to fulfill what God has promised? It's that way, isn't it? And it's that way in our lives as well. When things seem to be bleak, we look at the fact that God says that all things He does in our life, He does for our good. Everything that He does, He does to bring us into a place of Christ-likeness. And we trust the promises God has given us even when our circumstances don't reflect it. And that's what faith is all about. So they didn't blame Caesar. They didn't blame the innkeeper. They didn't blame the insensitive lodgers that were there, who would not give up a bed. They did not question God. But they trusted him, even in the midst of bad circumstances. Even in the face of what seemed to be contrary circumstances, they trusted God. Remember back in Luke chapter one, when Mary's giving her song, her Magnificat? She says, for he that is mighty hath done to me great things, and holy is his name. and His mercy is on them that fear Him from generation to generation. He has showed strength with His arm. He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has put down the mighty from their seats and exalted them of low degree. He has filled the hungry with good things and the rich He has sent empty away. The theme of that is about God reaching down to those who are of low degree. God reaching down to those who are lowly and taking those who are lowly and exalting them. That's how God works. And that's what God is showing us by the birth of Jesus Christ and how it played out. So don't ever confuse exaltation in the world's eyes with exaltation in God's eyes. And don't ever confuse humiliation in the world's eyes with disfavor in God's eyes. Those two things don't go hand in hand. Oftentimes they're the opposite. The world humiliates, the world despises, but God exalts. That's how he operates. Mary was told by God that she'd be highly exalted, yet she faced accusation and slander by the world, giving birth in a barn. But you know what happens to Mary? She's exalted by those who love the Lord, while she's despised by the world. The Bible says of us, marvel not if the world hates you. Marvel not if the world hates you, but then it says that we're accepted in the beloved, in Jesus Christ, we have his righteousness, and it hasn't even entered into our mind what God has prepared for us. You know what the difference is? You need to learn to get your eyes off of what the world thinks of you, right? And realize that God loves you and God exalts you within the fellowship and the body of Christ the church. That's where the exaltation comes in the spiritual realm, not in the world. And if we go through life looking for exaltation there, it's not going to happen. And that's what God is showing us through Mary. Psalms 138.6 says, though the Lord be high, yet hath respect unto the lowly, but the proud he knoweth afar off. God, highly exalted, God who is the God of the universe, yet he has respect to the lowly. Proverbs 16.18 says, pride goeth before destruction, a haughty spirit before fall. So humility leads to honor in God's eyes. Pride leads to destruction before God. And you see those two things summarized in Proverbs 29, verse 23. It says, a man's pride shall bring him low, but honor shall uphold the humble in spirit. We see that even as God chooses men and women for salvation. All you gotta do is look around the church, right? Why did God choose you? Why are you saved? Because of your bank account? Because of your intellect? Not at all. But just as God takes Mary and pulls her out and takes Joseph and pulls him out, these lowly, humble people, and exalts them, he's done the same thing with us. God's chosen the foolish things to confound the wise, the weak things to confound the things that are mighty. The base things of the world have God chosen. The despised things he has chosen. Why? so that no flesh can glory in his presence, right? That's why God's done it. So no flesh can glory in his presence. We see it in God's method to reach the world through preaching. The Bible calls preaching what? Foolishness. He uses foolish people to preach a foolish message in a foolish way, and he ends up with all the glory from it. We see it in the ministry of Jesus Christ as he goes and he picks his disciples and he picks fishermen and he picks tax collectors. We see it in his ministry when he's healing lepers, when he's healing the blind and the lame, when he is talking to the Samaritans and the publicans and the sinners. What is Christ doing? He's always associating those with those whom the culture looks down upon. What do you do with the Samaritans? The Jews hated the Samaritans. They didn't want to associate with the Samaritans at all. But Christ in John 8, I'm sorry, John 4. There's a woman of Samaria talking to him at the well. And there, Jesus Christ talks to the woman and offers her living water, offers her eternal life. She goes into the town and tells all of her Samaritan friends, and they come and Jesus Christ teaches them in the Bible, says, many believe. Well, Christ was a Jew. He wasn't supposed to be talking to the Samaritans. But Christ didn't worry about being politically correct, did he? But he reached out to those that others despised. He did the same thing with the Gentiles. The Bible says he was a light to lighten the Gentiles in the glory of thy people Israel. He was a light to lighten the Gentiles. When the Jews rejected the Gentiles, Christ reached out to them. He was a light bringing salvation to them eventually. Matthew 9 verse 10 says, It came to pass as Jesus sat at mead in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and sat down with him and his disciples. I hope Calvary Baptist Church does not become a church of snobs. Look at people who are not Christians, unsaved people, and look down upon them. Because we're so smart, we've figured out where salvation is. We're saved, they're not. You're saved because God has chosen you and God has drawn you to himself. He gets all the glory. It's not your intellect that has caused you to be saved. Christ looked at the publicans and the sinners, and you know what he saw? People who need to be saved. He looked at those people and he didn't condemn them for their sin as much as he looked at them and said, you need to be saved from your sin. And then he reached out to them and that ought to be our attitude as well. But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto his disciples, why eateth your master with publicans and sinners? He's better than that. Why would he eat with these people? In Luke 15 too, it says that they actually murmured saying the man receive his sinners and eateth with them, jerks. Look at him, he's eating with sinners. What am I gonna say if I hear that you've got some friends over for dinner who don't have the most respectable lives? Why are you having those people over? If you're doing it to reach out to them and share the gospel with them, you're really practicing exactly what Christ did. But when Jesus heard it, he said unto them, they that behold need not a physician, but they that are sick, but go ye and learn what that meaneth. Have mercy and not sacrifice, for I'm not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Even when a prostitute comes into the house with her alabaster box and breaks it open and puts the ointment on Christ's feet and cries in his presence and washes his feet with her hair. And others look and said, if he knew who this woman was, he wouldn't be letting her touch him. Christ knew who the woman was. Christ knew the woman's background. And he just says to her, thy sins be forgiven. Why are we talking about all this in the context of the birth of Jesus Christ? Because this is the pattern. You find it in chapter one, you find it in chapter two, you find it in the rest of the gospel message that God uses the humble. And he sends his son in the most humiliating fashion. He lives his life in a humble way who dies in the most humiliating fashion. And the lesson for us then is that God accepts the humble and rejects the proud. The woman was brought to Jesus Christ who was caught in adultery. Are you against adultery this morning? I hope you are. If you're not, we need to talk after the service. But yeah, we're against it. Yeah, it's a sin. But these people bring a woman to Jesus Christ who's caught in adultery. They're self-righteous. They want to stone her. They want to kill her for the adultery. They bring her to Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ stoops down, writes on the ground. looks up at him and says, hey, who's without sin? If you're without sin, cast the first stone. Waits a little bit longer, looks up, they're all gone. He says, woman, where are thine accusers? She said, no man, Lord. That is, they're all gone, right? She says, who's condemned thee? Where are your accusers? No man, nobody's condemned me. Jesus Christ said to her, neither do I condemn thee. Go and sin no more. The adulterous woman, the prostitute, the publican, the sinner, the Gentile, the Samaritan, Christ reached out to them all to bring salvation. What about those in that society who had that gross disease called leprosy? I mean, those people who had their own colonies, right? They still do today, leper colonies. They got their own colony. They had to let it be known they had leprosy so that nobody would come near them. They're untouchable. You don't go near them, you don't breathe the same air, you don't touch the same stuff. If you did come into contact with one, you're considered unclean and you've got to go through a cleansing process. You stay away from the lepers, they stay away from you. They are worse than the filth of the earth. What did Jesus do with the lepers? Matthew 8.1, when he was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him, and behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou can't make me clean. And Jesus put forth his hand and touched him. saying, I will be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. Christ reaches out, touches the leper. Touches the leper? Yeah, He touched the leper. He touched him and He healed him. Listen, Christ's ministry is one of reaching out to the downcast, reaching out to the humble, reaching down to the humiliated. Why? Christ was one of those, wasn't He? Downcast, humiliated, despised. That's how He chose to come. In Luke chapter 7, verse 22, John the Baptist is questioning whether Jesus Christ is the Messiah or not. Jesus Christ sends some of his disciples to talk to John. He says, tell John what things you have seen and heard, how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached. That's God's method, isn't it? Going to the poor, the lame, the despised. He touches the untouchable, forgives the unforgivable, and he loves the unlovable. That's Jesus Christ. and it's reflected in the method of his birth. In Matthew 11, verse 25, Jesus gives him parables. He speaks in parables, and many reject him because they don't understand the message. You know, his disciples come to him and say, hey, why are you talking in parables? You know why he's talking in parables? Because he was hiding the message. He was hiding the message from those who had no ears to hear it. Matthew 11, 25 says, at that time, Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and the prudent and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. So he sends Christ as this baby. He goes through his ministry, reaching out to the despised and the lame and the rejected and so on. He speaks in parables so that those who come to him in humility and faith can receive the message, but those who are prideful cannot receive it. Matthew 5.3, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Then in Matthew 23, Christ has an encounter with the Jewish leaders, and he's warning his disciples not to be like them. He says, be not ye called rabbi, for one is your master. That is, don't be called master. For ye have one master, even Christ, in all ye are brethren. And call no man your father upon earth, for one is your father which is in heaven. Don't call me father. Don't call me rabbi. He says we're all brethren. Neither be ye called masters, for one is your master even Christ, but he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased, and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted. And that's true about salvation, isn't it? How do you come to salvation? You come, the Bible says, humbly as a child. That's what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 18. So if you're gonna enter the kingdom of heaven, except you be converted and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. This whoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. You wanna come to faith in Jesus Christ, you come through humility. Just as he is born as a humble child, he says you come to him for salvation as a humble child. That is, as a child is naive, he is dependent, he's completely dependent, he has a simple faith, he comes in humility, the same is true when we come to Christ. for salvation. We don't come with pride and salvation then does not result in pride. If you're here this morning and you've heard the gospel message in the past, maybe you're hearing it for the first time, that Jesus Christ came to save sinners. He did it by dying on the cross to pay for our sins. You don't come to Jesus Christ in pride. You don't come to God in pride saying, God save me. You come to him humbly. You come to him with humiliation over your sins. and repent of that sin and receive Christ as your Lord and Savior, the despised and rejected little child who was killed, crucified on a cross in the most humiliating fashion, we bow before and receive as our Lord and our Savior. We come with humility and not pride. In Luke 2, verse 7, again, she brought forth her firstborn son, we'll be done with this, wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. The animals all around her, the straw under him, the smell of manure all around them, Joseph cleaning up blood on the manger floor, the baby wrapped in these clothes looking like a little mummy laid in the manger. Who was that child? God in the flesh, entering his own creation. He would live and he would die to redeem not only the world, not only people, but all of creation. The day would come when he would die, be buried, and rise again. God would exalt him as Lord over all. Later still, after Christ is exalted, this little baby grows, dies, exalted in heaven as Lord over all. There's coming a day where there's gonna be a heavenly scene. And we see that in Romans chapter five and verse 11. There's gonna be a book, and the book is gonna have the title deed to the universe, that is ownership to the universe. And nobody's able to open the book to claim ownership of the universe except for one, and that's Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God who dies on the cross to pay the price to redeem all of the universe. Therefore, he has the right to open the book and reclaim it. And we find that in Revelation chapter five, verse 11. And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne, and the beasts, and the elders, and the number of them was 10,000 times 10,000, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing. And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, blessing, and honor, and glory, and power be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever. And the four beasts said, Amen. And the four and 20 elders fell down and worshiped him that liveth forever and ever. Who is that? The baby in the manger who comes in humiliation, who lives in humiliation, who dies in humiliation is exalted. And the Bible says power and glory and honor and blessing. He's exalted and he's going to reign forever and ever. the person who comes to Jesus Christ in humility, believing He died for them on the cross, that He's risen again, that He is Lord of all, the one who comes in humility saying, I am a sinner, unable to save myself, unworthy to be saved, comes and bows before this one, claiming Him as their Lord and Savior, you know what's gonna happen? You're gonna be exalted as well. Not in this world. You're gonna be humiliated and hated in this world, just as Christ was. But the day will come when God changes your body, when you're with Jesus Christ, and you rule and reign with him forever. Humility leads to exaltation. Christ was the perfect example, and he's the perfect example of how he was born, how he lived, and how he died.