It's good to be here this morning. I want to read one of my favorite prophecies for Christmastime from Isaiah chapter 9. We appreciate Missy and Terry and Rusty and Chris helping decorate the sanctuary Friday. My manger disappeared so I've got to make a new manger. I don't know what happened to it. But we'll have, hopefully we'll have that set up next week. I've been using a manger for the last 20 years on Christmas, so. Pardon me. It's pretty big, you know. So. Well, Isaiah chapter 9. But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In a former time, he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Neptali. But in the latter time, he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, and Galilee of the nations. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined. 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 divided the spoil. For the yoke of his burden, the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. For every boot of the trampling warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. For to us, a child is born. To us, a son is given. The government shall be upon his shoulder. And his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 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. May the Lord bless his words, your hearts, and mine. Let's stand and sing, O come, thou long-expected Jesus. ♪ Born to set thy people free ♪ ♪ From our spirits and sins release us ♪ ♪ Let us find our rest in thee ♪ ♪ Israel's strength and consolation ♪ the earth thou art, dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart. Born by people to deliver, born a child ♪ And yet a King ♪ ♪ Born to reign in us forever ♪ ♪ Thou, thy gracious kingdom bring ♪ ♪ Thou, thou eternal Spirit of God ♪ Okay, we're going to sing O Little Town of Bethlehem. O little town of Bethlehem How still we see thee lie Above thy deep and dreamless sleep The silent stars go by Yet in thy dark streets shineth The everlasting Light ♪ The hopes and fears of all the years ♪ Are bent in thee tonight ♪ For Christ is born of Mary ♪ And gathered all above ♪ While mortals sleep, the angels keep ♪ Their watch of wondering love ♪ O morning stars together ♪ ♪ Proclaim the holy birth ♪ ♪ And praises sing to God the King ♪ ♪ And peace to men on earth ♪ ♪ How silently, how silently ♪ ♪ The wondrous gift is given ♪ So God imparts to humankind a blessing on his head. Though you may hear his coming, but in this world of sin, where big souls will receive him still, the clear Christ enters in. O Holy Child of Bethlehem, be sent to us, we pray. Cast out your sin and enter in, be born in us today. We hear the Christmas angels, the great glad-toppings tell. Amen. Well, I've been fighting the cold the last several days and it seemed like it jumped on me with both feet today. And so, I guess we should keep our distance, okay? What happened to that six feet thing, huh? So let's go to Lord in prayer, and I'll keep talking as long as I can, and I'll do sign language, I guess. So let's go to Lord in prayer. Father, we thank you for this season. We thank you, Father, that we've celebrated your goodness to us in Thanksgiving with family and friends. We ask, Father, you continue blessing on each family that's represented here, Lord, and you know every need of every heart. We ask, Father, that we would look to you in faith and in trust, And that, Father, we know that you're faithful to meet every need in our life. Jesus told us if we would seek you first in your kingdom, that all these things would be added to us. So, Father, help us with priorities. Help us, Father, with just seeking you, Father, and loving you with all of our heart. We thank you, Father, for the season of the incarnation. We thank you, Father, that you had a plan before the foundations of the world. that Father you determined within the Godhead between the Son and Holy Spirit that you would send your Son on a mission of redemption. And Father Zephies in chapter one tells us Father you're carrying out that plan according to your eternal purpose and your goodwill. So Father we celebrate the coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the incarnation. We celebrate his life. His sinless life, we celebrate, Father, His sacrificial death. But, Father, we celebrate His resurrection. And so, Father, we thank you for all that you've given us in your Son. Father, I know at this time, because we've had loved ones that have been separated from us, that sometimes it's hard, because they're absent from our celebration. But, Father, we thank you that those who know you are in your presence, that they're safely home, that, Father, we will meet them one day and be reunited. So father, we thank you for that hope that we have in your son, Jesus Christ. Father, we pray that this nation would humble itself before you and truly seek your face. Father, we're, I think we're under your judgment that you are telling us that we cannot trust in man, but we can only trust in you. So father, may we turn to you as your people and father, may you run the heavens and come down. And father, I pray that as the gospels were claimed. that those present without Jesus, that you call them to Jesus today. For it's in his name we pray. Amen. You may be seated. OK, we're going to sing Good Christian Men Rejoice. Good Christian men rejoice, hearts full and full of joy. do what we say. Jesus Christ is born today. Man at peace before him bow and he is in the manger now. Christ is born today. Christ is born today. Christian Mary, joyous with hope in soul and voice, now ye hear of endless bliss. Jesus Christ was born for this. He has opened heaven's door, and man is blessed forevermore. Christ was born for this. Christ was born for this. Good Christian men rejoice with heart and soul and voice. Now you need not fear the grave. Jesus Christ was born to save. He calls you one and calls you all to gain his everlasting love. Christ was born to save. Christ was born to save. OK. We're going to sing, Hark the Herald Angels Sing. Why don't we stand on this one? Sing out loud this morning. Hark the herald angels sing. Glory to the newborn King! Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled. Joyful all ye nations rise, Join the triumph of the skies, With angelic host proclaim, Christ is born in Bethlehem. sing, glory to the newborn King. Christ our highest heaven adored, Christ the everlasting Lord. Virgin time, behold Him come, offspring of the Virgin's womb. ♪ Hail, then, personal God, and see ♪ ♪ Hail, then, God and dear King ♪ ♪ Pleased as man with man to dwell ♪ ♪ Jesus, Lord Emmanuel ♪ ♪ Hark, the herald angels sing ♪ ♪ The heaven-born Prince of Peace ♪ ♪ Hail the Son of Righteousness ♪ ♪ Light and life to all He brings ♪ ♪ Risen with healing in His wings ♪ ♪ Mild He lays His glory by ♪ To raise the sons of earth, Or to give them second birth, Or to hear all angels sing, Glory to the newborn King. That was one of Charles Wesley's great hymns of Christmas time. Charles Wesley was a brother of John Wesley, who his followers, John Wesley didn't really establish the Methodist Church, it was his followers that established it. It's called Methodism because John Wesley was so methodical. He was such, everything together, I mean, he was an A personality quadruple, you know, and he had everything together, he was methodical. And so his followers continued in that tradition and it became known as the Methodist Church. A little history there for you, that's free, no extra charge. I'm going to look at this morning a passage sometimes we don't think about at Christmas time but we should. It's from Galatians chapter four. It's just a few verses in Galatians, verses four through seven. But it has a lot in it that applies to the season of the incarnation. And I try to always frame it as the incarnation, the coming of Christ into his own creation, more than just Christmas time. I remember when I was in high school, we had a youth council at Riverview Gardens Baptist Church. I think I was vice president at this time. A friend of mine was president of our youth council and we wanted to throw a birthday party for Jesus and we went to our pastor and talked to him about it. He, and I understand this once I became a pastor and understand kind of the nuances of things, and he was just questioning us about just a birthday party for Jesus and not emphasizing not just his birth, but his purpose of his birth. And so we kind of talked about that. I was, I think I was probably 16 and Steve was 17 and we had that discussion with our pastor and he said, go ahead boys, go with it. And we had a birthday party for Jesus. But it's more than a birthday party, it's the incarnation. It's God, a very God who's entered his own creation. John tells us in chapter one, he came into his own, that word own there is in the neuter in the Greek and it means really his own creation. But then his own people, which is in the masculine, means his Jewish people did not receive him. So there's a distinction. He came to his own creation, but his own people did not receive him. And so Paul tells us the purpose of Jesus' coming in these few verses in Galatians. He's getting to the point of adoption in this short passage here, but he tells us how that happens for us and to us. So if you're able to stand as we look at these few verses. When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father. So you are no longer a slave, but a son. And if a son, then an heir through God." Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your work and your plan and your purpose and your son, the Lord Jesus. And Father, we're celebrating. We know that he wasn't born on December 25th. But Father, we celebrate His coming. We celebrate the Incarnation. We thank you, Father, for your plan of redemption that you set in motion and eternity past. before you even spoke the world into existence, Father. Your word says that our names were written in the Lamb's book of life, that the Lamb was slain before the foundations of the world, that you called us in Christ before the foundations of the world. And so, Father, we thank you for that eternal purpose and plan that you are carrying out. And thank you, Father, that you've called us to yourself and that we're part of that plan. And that we have this privilege to say, Abba, Father, and that, Father, we are your children by the new birth and by adoption. We ask these things, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. I kind of like this deeper voice. Do you like it? So I've shared some of these things previously, but it's good to get them in our heads and know about them. But first of all, I want to take these two words, but God, now, there's a little bit of separation. in the text the first word in chapter verse 4 is but Allah and that's a very important conjunction that's in scripture in Ephesians 2 after Paul gives the devastating reality of verses 1 through 3 of our lostness he uses this conjunction but God God has done something for us and so in a similar way let me just read verses 1 and 2 and 3 I mean that The heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave. He's talking about the cultural reality of his day that an heir, until he becomes of legal age, has really no rights more than a slave. And he's saying because we're enslaved to sin, we have no claim on God's goodness until something happens, until he declares us his children in Christ. Though he is the owner of everything, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of this world. As we have no claim on God, until God declares us righteous in Christ, until He adopts us into His family. And then, Paul says, He gives us the spirit of His Son, where we can cry, Abba, Father. We can acknowledge God as our Father. And so that's kind of the background of what he's saying, how this comes about, how we become, in a sense, of legal age. Once the Son became of legal age, He was the full heir. He had every right as that heir, once He was declared by the Father, to be of legal age. And when we come to Christ, when we come to Christ, we are declared of legal age in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so I want us to look at that. And the key is, but God, God has done something here. And so God is sovereign in his plan, okay? We've all experienced that. I was in a meeting a couple weeks ago and I forgot to turn mine off and it went off during that meeting. And, right. So God is in charge. He's sovereign over all things. And I've tried to mention in my prayer and introductory speaking, This plan of redemption, you know, when Adam sinned, God didn't go, whoops, what happened here? You know, God, God, we, we can't comprehend why God went ahead and created Adam knowing that Adam was going to fail the test. Maybe he created Adam because he knew he was going to send his son who would not fail the test. That's part of what we'll see in just a moment. Jesus was born under the law. Okay. But God in his sovereignty went ahead in creation, but before he even spoke anything into existence. Now my orientation theologically is called a covenant theology. Okay. And I think the first covenant that is implicated in scripture is that before God spoke anything to existence before the foundations of the world, that the father, son, the Holy spirit entered into covenant to accomplish redemption. And the Father would send the Son, and the Son would willingly come. and live a perfect life for us, and die a substitutionary death for us to pay the wage of sin, and be resurrected for us, and ascended for us, and promised return for us. And the Holy Spirit, God the Holy Spirit, would then apply the finished work to us who believe, to everyone who believes. That's the power. Paul says in Romans 1, I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto what? Salvation. For who? for everyone who believes, okay? If you fail to believe, we don't experience that power, we don't experience justification or forgiveness of sin or reconciliation. So God is sovereign in his plan. Now when Jesus in Matthew's gospels tells his disciples to pray for laborers to enter the field. That's what we are. We're laborers. We're not in charge of the harvest. We are laborers in on the authority of the one who is in charge. God, the father's in charge of the harvest and he's bringing in his harvest. But Jesus said, pray that we would be obedient and enter into those fields of harvest and be used by God to bring in the harvest. But he's the God of the harvest. He's the Lord of the harvest. In fact, that's what Jesus said, pray to the Lord of the harvest, that there will be more laborers in there. And so God is sovereign. He's carrying it out. Let me read it real quick from Ephesians 1. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessings in the heavenly places. Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him in love. He predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ. according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the beloved. King James translates that we've been accepted in the beloved. In him, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth. In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him," you get the point? God's sovereign in His plan, "...who works all things according to the counsel of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be the praise of His glory. In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth," that's us, The gospel of your salvation and believed in him were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of his glory. Now we're going to require, we're going to experience the possession of it when Jesus comes back and we're glorified. But God is sovereign in his plans. And God is the God of history or his story. I thought about going into Daniel and I'll just kind of mention it. There are several chapters in Daniel where God gives a vision and He delineates the different kingdoms, Babylonian kingdom, Medo-Persian kingdom, the Greek, Alexander's kingdom, and then the Roman kingdom. God is the God of history. And He is, even as we read the Christmas story in Luke, It was God who moved in the heart of Caesar Augustus to make a decree that all the world should be taxed so Joseph and Mary would travel from Nazareth down to Bethlehem because that's where Micah the prophecy said that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. So God moves in Caesar Augustus' life to declare this taxation so that Joseph and Mary ends up in Bethlehem and Jesus is born in Bethlehem. God is in charge. Now when we look at the newspaper, we listen to the Well, I don't listen to the news anymore. This is our second round to not listen to the news. But everything's upside down. It looks like the world's in complete chaos. I mean, there's legislation right now that the Senate is pushing to legalize or to codify the decision from 2015 by Supreme Court that legalizes homosexual marriage. And now the Senate's pushing to codify that in law And there's 12, what I think I heard, there's 12 Republican senators that are voting with them. And so all across our land, we legalize sin. And a lot of people don't want to hear that, but marriage is between a man and a woman. That's why God is the one who established marriage, not the state of Missouri. Now, when I marry somebody, I say, by the authority of the state and by the authority of God, I pronounce you man and wife, because there is a sanction by the state. In fact, if you come to me and say, will you marry me and my Fiancee or my boyfriend, my girlfriend, you marry it. I said, well, the first thing I have to do when we have that date, I have to see the marriage license. I can't marry you until I see that you have a marriage license. I cannot perform the ceremony until I see that with my own eyes. Because there is a sanction. But the ultimate sanction is God. And he made male and female. And he said, the man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. So we're taking turns in America to legalize sin and to validate it. And a day is going to come when we'll be persecuted for taking a biblical view. In some ways, we're already into that. But God is the God of history. No matter how it seems upside down, God's still in control. He's still on His throne. We have to believe that. We have to remind ourselves of that. I think in Psalm 11, the psalmist says, what shall the righteous do when the foundations are crumbling? We look up. God's on His throne. He's taking account of everything that's happening. And a day is coming when the wicked will be punished and the righteous will be rewarded. And so we have to always look up and know that He's in control. And God is the God of redemption. This is His purpose in Christ. This is His purpose in sending the Lord Jesus is to redeem us. everyone who believes is redeemed. So God is in control. So we can say, but God, God has done something. God has spoken. Hebrews 1 tells us that in times past He spoke to the prophets in various ways, in symbols, in visions, in proclamations, but in these last days, and we're in the last days because the last days started in the incarnation. When the Lord Jesus came, that began the last days and we're in the last days until he returns. Okay. So the Hebrew says in the last days, he has spoken now, ultimately, completely, fully, as much as he wants us to know in his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is God incarnate. And so God is the God of redemption. And in the fullness of time, these are pretty across the board. You read any commentator in this passage here, they're going to talk about these four things basically. There's a common language. It was Koine Greek. Koine means common Greek. It's kind of like, you know, here in America, a lot of times we don't speak English. We speak Americanese, you know. And colloquialism, you know, depends what part of the country. I remember the first time I went down, to the boot hill in Southeast Missouri, they call soda, what do you think they call soda? Pop, yeah. I said, I want a soda. They think soda is kind of, they think soda water, you know. And I wanted a Coke, or it probably was Dr. Pepper. But they call it, see, so we have these colloquialisms. But in the time of Jesus, kind of the universal language all through the Roman Empire was Koine Greek. Anywhere you would go in trade and writing and all kinds of things, just about someone, any place you went, spoke Koine Greek. It was just a common language. In Rome, the official language was Latin. In Israel, it was Hebrew, Aramaic, predominantly Aramaic when Jesus was walking on the earth. When you watch the Passion of the Christ, they're speaking in Aramaic. That was a common language. the language of writing and of commerce was Koine Greek. And that's why our New Testament is in Koine Greek. There's a few Aramaic words interspersed here and there, but it's primarily Koine Greek. So it was a common language for the message to be spread across the world. There was the Pax Romana, the Peace of Rome, that made travel accessible. Now, Paul tells us in Corinthians that he experienced a lot of things. He experienced being robbed, being beaten, being ambushed, he experienced hunger, he experienced shipwrecks, all kinds of things. But in general, just like here in America, there's basically freedom of travel here in America, right? That's the way it was in the Roman Empire. There was freedom of travel. And the Pax Romana made it primarily safe. I mean, I think last time I drove from my neighborhood down north St. Louis was several years ago at nighttime. I drive through there in the daytime now, but I don't drive through there in the nighttime anymore. In fact, it was probably, actually it was probably about 25 years ago. I came over here to watch our daughter. She played softball for Missouri Baptist College at that time. And they were playing Lindenwood, and I drove over on Tuesday night to only discover that she played on Monday night, and I missed the game. And so, it dawned on me that the Blues had a playoff game on Tuesday night, and I didn't plan this, it was just sovereign. So I went down to the Blues game and watched the playoff game. And then I decided to cut through my old neighborhood, because Tucker, in downtown St. Louis, which was formerly 12th Street, when you come basically north on Tucker, it turns into North Florissant Road, and it crosses Grand, turns into West Florissant, and off of North Florissant, you can cut down on Salisbury and jump on 55. So I decided that's what I was going to do. I was going to avoid the traffic downtown, so I just jumped on Tucker. Carol knows because she lived in that neighborhood. She knows exactly what I'm talking about. So I'm driving this 11 o'clock at night, and I see the Boys of the Hood on every corner. And about every stop sign, I just rolled right through it and kept going until I got to Salisbury and cut down. And that's the last time I drove through my neighborhood at night because there's still some dangerous places, right? But then there's the fulfillment of prophecy. With the prophecy I just read from Isaiah 9, the prophecy of Isaiah 7, 14, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son. Matthew tells us in his account of the Christmas story that that fulfillment was ultimately in Mary and the Lord Jesus Christ. Where when the Magi came to Herod, came to Jerusalem and looking, where is he this born King of the Jews? They expected him to be born in the capital city. If you're a king, you're going to be born in the capital city. And so Herod the Great asked the scribes. They said, well, Micah says he's going to be born in Bethlehem. And so all these fulfillments, that he was going to be raised in Galilee, that he would come out of Egypt, that he would be called a Nazarene, all these prophecies of the Old Testament are fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ, because God is sovereign over all these things. Now quickly, I'm going pretty fast. You listened pretty well this morning. I want to go through these statements here in this passage, okay? So, when the fullest time had come, God sent forth his son, and the first statement is, born of woman. And why is that important? Well, this is how Jesus took upon humanity. Philippians 2 tells us that he counted his equality with God not something to be grasped or hung on to. And the word in Greek is kinesis. He emptied himself. And theologians, since the first century, have been trying to understand what that all means. What does it mean that Jesus emptied himself? At the very minimum, I think, he laid aside his glory. He laid aside his divine rights. He never ceased to be God. That's a heresy. But he laid aside hanging on to that and demanding that. And by the miracle of God, through the womb of the Virgin Mary, conception occurred, and Jesus was born, and he was truly and fully, in the sense of Adam when Adam was created, human. Sometimes we say fully human. We're all fully human here, but we're all fallen. We're all in Adam. We have the Adamic nature. But in the Incarnation, Jesus was not conceived and was not born with an Adamic nature. He was born in a similar way that Adam was created. This is why he's called the second man, but he's also called the last Adam. That's very important. That distinction is very important. I remember when I was in college, I worked for a friend of mine. We were working downtown stripping precious metal out of the cotton mill building. It was a whole block long and half a block deep. One half it was 11 stories, the other half it was 7 stories. We pulled, I want to say 20 tons of copper out of that building. That's when copper was a dollar a pound back in 1972. Toward the end of working that job, I was on the roof at 11 stories high. And I could look down on Keener Plaza there in downtown, and Sung Young Moon was holding a rally at that time. And they were playing all kinds of music, and he was speaking. And I only mention this because Sung Young Moon, which has kind of faded off the scenery, because this is back in 1972, he claimed to be the third Adam. That Jesus got the spiritual stuff right. But there needed to be a third Adam to get the physical stuff right. And part of his false teaching was you had to be married by him and had to have a sacred marriage by him to produce proper children. And he just scammed people. He deceived people. He was a liar. He was a heretic. He was an adversary of Satan with false doctrine. But he claimed to be the third Adam. There's only two Adams. There's only two men, the first man, Adam, and the second man, the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the last Adam. And he came in the incarnation and took upon humanity. He was fully human in his humanity, but at the same time, he was fully God. He never ceased to be God. He never ceased to be separated from the Father. All through John's Gospel particularly, Jesus, I, and the Father are what? One. in their essence, in their union, and he never ceased to be that. So Jesus, his humanity, is one reason he was born of woman, so he could take upon, he could add to himself a human nature. One reason, and we'll see this, one reason, and probably the primary reason, well, two reasons. Let me just go ahead. Then it magnifies his deity because of his miraculous birth. Two, I guess three places that Christianity is attacked. The humanity of Jesus and the deity of Jesus. There's either the denial of his humanity or there's the denial of his deity. And those are all rooted in denial of the revelation of scripture. When someone begins to approach the Bible as less than fully the Word of God, then they're going to begin to imagine their own thinking about who God is, and begin to deny His humanity, or deny His deity, and deny His purpose in coming. But the Incarnation establishes both His humanity and His deity. Born under the law. This is one of the reasons Jesus had to take upon human nature. So he could live under the law. Because God never changes his standard. You and I would do that. You and I would change the standard. Because we don't understand the holiness of God. We don't understand the otherness of God. God cannot change His standard because He would violate His own nature. Because our nature is corrupt and fallen, we easily change the standard. Even in our own life, we'll rationalize sin and justify it at times because of our fallenness. But God never changes His standard. So Jesus came and was born of woman to add to Himself humanity as God the Son. And He was born under the law And so he could fulfill it for us. He could, Jesus was tested by the law. What's the first commandment? Thou shalt have what? No other God before me. In his humanity, Jesus never violated that. You and I violate that all the time. Even as born again believers, we fall short of that all the time. But Jesus never violated his complete devotion and worship of the true and living God, God the Father. Jesus never created any idol of his hands or his heart. And all through the Ten Commandments, Jesus never violated one of them. He was without sin. So he was tested by the law and he kept the law for us. Again, a critical passage from Romans 8, I think it's verse Four might be three, I think it's verse four. You've heard me mention this many times because it's critical to understand why Jesus came. There's therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, for the law is spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. Now what's Paul saying there? The law demands from us complete righteousness and we fail, right? Not only does the law demand from us complete righteousness, but the reward for our failure is death. That's the law of sin and death. The law reveals our sin to us. In fact, Paul says later or earlier, if it wasn't for the law, I wouldn't know what sin is. When the law said, thou shalt not covet, he said, something rose up in me to begin to covet. That's the fallen nature. God says, don't do this. And we say, well, I'll show you. You know, you take a toddler and you say, I don't, you can play in the driveway but don't go past the sidewalk. What does that toddler do? Well, at least he'll go up to the sidewalk and take a look at you to see if you're watching and then he's going to step across the sidewalk. You know, the Bible says foolishness is bound up in the heart of children. That's why we have to teach them discipline and character and all these things to try to deal with that fallenness. We do the same thing. God says, don't cross this line. We walk up to it. I'll show you when we cross over the line. The law of sin and death is the law reveals our rebellion. It reveals our sinfulness and the consequence of that. See, there's therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Those who are not in Christ Jesus are under condemnation. Again, chapter 3 of John's Gospel, I think it's verse 18, he that believeth is not condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already. Verse 36, that if we believe in Jesus, we have everlasting life, but if we fail to believe in Christ, the wrath of God remains on us. So Jesus kept the law for us. And that's what Paul says here in Romans 8. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. The law demands we cannot produce. But God has done it by sending His own Son, the likeness of sinful flesh, in the incarnation. And He sent His Son for sin. He condemns sin in the flesh. He overcame it. He conquered it. In order, here's the kicker, verse 4. In order that the righteous requirement, God's standard, the righteous requirement of the law might be fully or fulfilled in us. How does that happen? Well, God imputes to us Jesus's righteousness. He was tested by the law without failure and he kept the law for us. So, you know, we talk about we're saved by Jesus's death, we're also saved by his life. In theological terms, this is called the active obedience of Christ, where he lived under complete submission in his humanity to the Father and to the law. That's his active obedience. And then this passive obedience was when he laid, the idea of being the passive voice means that action is done to someone or something, okay? So Jesus' passive obedience is when he laid down his life freely on the cross for us and he received the wrath of God's judgment for our sin, okay? And so Jesus was born under the law to be tested by it and pass the test. That's what Hebrews 5 says. Though he were a son that lived in obedience by the things which he suffered, and being made perfect, being made complete, having passed the test, he became the author of eternal salvation. And his purpose was to redeem those who were under the law. We're all under the law, and without Christ, we're condemned under the law. I try to emphasize this all the time. One of the lies of Satan, one of the false hopes of mankind is that God hasn't decided yet about our eternal salvation, our eternal destiny. The majority of people believe that they're going to stand before God, but they're hoping when they stand before God that he's going to have a scale in heaven to weigh out their good and their bad deeds and hope that their good deeds outweigh their bad deeds. That's a lie from the pit of hell. We're under condemnation already. He that believeth not is condemned already. The judgment, the soul that sinned shall surely what? Die. The wage of sin is what? Death. God has already determined the reality. Our only hope is to cast ourself among Christ to believe on him and be made righteous in him. That's why we need redemption. That's why this idea of redemption is a marketplace word. It means to buy back, to purchase. And Jesus purchased us with his life, death, and resurrection. And we're under the law, and we're enslaved to sin. Jesus in the gospel said, he that commits sins is a slave to sin. We can only be set free from our damning nature in Christ. What Jesus says in John 8, you shall know the truth. I hear politicians, all kinds of people misquote this verse of scripture. But Jesus said, you'll know the truth, and the truth will what? Set you free. What's the truth? that there's only forgiveness of sin, reconciliation, salvation in Jesus Christ. That's the truth. Because just a few verses later he says, when the Son sets you free, you shall be what? Free indeed. And so Jesus came to set us free. That's what the whole picture of Romans 6 is. Paul says sin shall not have dominion over us. That's what sanctification's all about, is being set free from the power of sin. Jesus broke the power of sin, that we died to sin in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, we still sin. Our Nazarene friends, Wesley, John Wesley basically advocated this. He believed that a person could come to a state of complete sanctification where you would not willfully sin. And the Nazarenes, one of their favorite songs is Higher Ground. Pressing on the upper way, new heights I'm gaining every day. And because they believe in this concept of entire sanctification where a person, a Christian will not willfully sin. I got news for you folks. Every sin we commit is willful. Now they get to begin to categorize sins, what's willful, what's not, what crosses the line. No, every sin we commit, every time we engage in anything less in obedience to God is sin. The last verse of Romans 14 says, whatsoever is not of faith is sin. That's why Paul, when he writes Romans 3.23, for all have sinned, that's in the aorist tense, we died in Adam, and fall short is in the present tense. It means right now, even as believers, we fall short of the glory of God because we're still in the process of sanctification. There's no, I don't believe there's such a thing as the entire sanctification. Now, Wesley didn't advocate sinlessness. He just said you get to a point of such devotion that you won't willfully sin. Again, the only sin I know about is willful sin. Jesus came to set us free from slavery of sin and to provide the adoption of sons. To give us that privilege, verse 12 of John 1, to as many as believed on him, to them gave he power, authority, the privilege, the right to be called the children of God. First John 3, 1 through 3. Behold what manner of love the Father has lavished upon us, that we should be called the children of God, and that's what we are." And so we have the adoption of son. Now, the privilege of that is now we can truly address God as our Heavenly Father. We can cry, Abba, Father. I've read different discussions on this. Abba is Aramaic. Sometimes it's translated daddy, an intimate relationship between a child and their father. That's a point, it's talking about intimacy, it's talking about relationship, it's talking about closeness. And Paul says, once we're adopted by God through Jesus Christ, we have this privilege to call God our father. Now in a general sense, sometimes the psalmist speaks of this, in some areas Paul alludes to this. In a general sense, God is the father of all people because he's the creator of all people. But there's a unique sense that we have this privilege to be a child of God. Because what verse 13 says in John 1, something's happened. But to all who did receive Him, let me back up. Verse 9, the true light which enlightens everyone was coming to the world. He was in the world and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him. He came to His own, His own creation, and His own people did not receive Him. But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right, the privilege, I think King James translates that power, to become children of God who were born not of blood. I'm not a Christian because my mom and dad were Christians. I'm blessed that I was raised in a Christian home. I'm blessed that I was taken to church, and I heard the gospel. I've told you before, my sister, who was two years older than me, a year younger than my brother, had cerebral palsy. And back in the 50s, there was no accommodation at churches for folks. My sister couldn't walk. She couldn't feed herself. She couldn't talk. And so on Sunday morning, my dad would stay home and watch her. My sister was never an excuse for my family, for us not to be in church. So on Sunday morning, my mom, my brother, and I would go to church. And on Sunday night, my mom would stay home, my dad, my brother and I would go to church. And so it was a great privilege that I was born in a Christian home. My dad wasn't. My dad didn't come to Christ until he was 23. I told you before, my dad came home when he was 15 from Central High School as a sophomore, walked into his house down in the basement, found his dad, my grandfather, had hung himself and committed suicide because he was an alcoholic. My dad wasn't raised in a Christian home. My dad joined the Navy in World War II at 16 years old, went through the last year and a half of the war as a typical sailor. And I think he was on the road to the same alcoholism that his father was on until he met Christ. And he was delivered from that slavery. He was set free from that slavery. And so I was blessed by God's grace to be born in a Christian home. But that didn't make me a Christian. not born of blood, nor the will of the flesh. I can't make myself a Christian. It's by the grace of God that he called me. It's by the grace of God that I heard the gospel. It's by the grace of God the Spirit brought conviction in my heart of my own sin and gave me the understanding that my only hope was Jesus Christ, nor the will of man. Some pope or some preacher or some ecclesiastical person cannot declare me a Christian. It's the grace of God, it's the working of the spirit. He says, but are born of God, by the grace of God, by the working of the planted seed in our hearts, God gives us this privilege to be called his children. I don't think we take full advantage of that. I think if we took full advantage of that, we wouldn't worry as much as we do. We wouldn't be as fearful as we are. We wouldn't struggle as much if we take a full advantage that we, and that's what John says there in 1 John 3. He says, behold, what manner of love the Father has lavished upon us. that we should be called the children of God and that's what we are. Now we don't need to be arrogant about it, we need to be humble about it, we need to be grateful for it, but we ought to Seek the fullness that we have in Christ. As I read from Ephesians 1, Paul says, God's blessed us with every spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in Christ. That's our privilege. That's our blessing. And God is a God that lavishes his love upon us. And we need to take advantage of that in the sense that we believe it, we walk in it, we trust in it, and we follow Christ. That's all I got today. What we couldn't do, God did by sending his son. And we rejoice in that, that we've heard the gospel, that God's spirit works in our heart, and we've trusted in Christ, we believe the gospel, and now we're to be light shining in darkness. See, the people were walking in darkness. People are still walking in darkness. They're walking in religious darkness, pagan darkness, all kinds of sinful passion darkness, and they need to see this great light. And that great light is not us, it's Jesus. He's the light of the world. But he's determined to let that light shine what? Through us. Let's be great lights for Jesus, particularly this season. Let's go Lord in prayer. Father, we thank you for your faithfulness to us. Father, help us to grasp in some way a deeper sense of this privilege to be called your children. Father, one aspect of that is, Proverbs tells us the glory of children is their father. that Father, we have something built within us in our birth that we want to emulate our parents, our fathers. Sometimes that's broken by sin, sometimes that's broken by abuse, but innately, it's in our heart. And Father, may that be in our spiritual heart, that we desire to be like Jesus, that we desire, Father, to know you as fully as we can, that we would seek you with all of our heart. We ask this, Father, in Jesus' name, amen. Let's stand and sing Emmanuel. Amen. Good to see you today.