All that being said, if you got your Bibles, go with us over to the book of Revelation, chapter number 12. I want to look at a subject here. We're going to use this passage of Scripture as our jumping off point again. So, once again, I hope you brought your running shoes, because we're going to be hitting a few different passages of Scripture today. Amen. Revelation chapter number 12, trust you've found your place by now. We'll begin reading in verse number 1. And there appeared a great wonder in heaven. A woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars." Now this is all allegorical here. It's actually the time in the book of Revelation where it's all prophecy, except here we're getting an allegory of a past event. So verse 2, "...and she being with child cried, travailing in birth and pain to be delivered." And there appeared another wonder in heaven, and behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads, and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads. And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and it cast him to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman, which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born." Verse 5. And she brought forth a man-child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up unto God and to His throne. As we said, this is allegorical. It's talking about a past event in reference to Jesus being birthed into this world. They're of the Hebrew people in the land of Israel. And that Satan absolutely hated this notion. And he did his absolute best to kill Jesus before he could even get his ministry started. This enemy of our soul didn't like this baby boy. And this past week, as we were getting closer and closer to Christmas time, I got to thinking about, well, who doesn't like babies? And I got to thinking about it, I said, you know what, I can think of four off the top of my head who don't like babies. So we wanna deal with this subject here today of who doesn't like the baby? Who doesn't like the baby? Because remember, this is talking about his birth there in Bethlehem. Our most gracious Father in heaven, wonderful, merciful, loving Father, The One who sent Jesus Christ out of eternity and into time. Sent Him from His heavenly place to this earthly mud hole here. To dwell among sinners and do so with a perfect sinless life. To die there upon that cross perfectly sinless. A substitutionary death for me. Thank you Father for that. Thank you, Father, for loving me, though I never deserved it, nor ever will I deserve it. But thank you, Father, for that greatest gift possible, the gift of eternal life, that Jesus paid for with his own life. Thank you, Father. I want to ask you, Lord, please, for all the prayer requests we've made known in the unspoken, that you take care of them as you see fit. I pray, Father, for those who are ill, dealing with life-threatening illnesses and such, for the healing that they need, for family situations to be resolved, financial issues to be fixed, and for your people to get back to you. And just stop playing church and be the church. Stop avoiding church and come to church. Not because it's the church, but because that's where you've chosen to meet with us, to help us to draw strength from one another. Help us please Lord. Help us to keep Christ in Christmas, not just at Christmastime, but year round. Because we know it's Christmastime all over again each time a lost soul asks Jesus to save them. That's it for now Father, we'll talk to you in a little bit. In the name of Jesus we're asking you for all this please. Amen and Amen. So who doesn't like the baby? Now let's get honest here. We tend to get a little excited when we see some newborns. We get to see them grandbabies and nieces and nephews and ultrasounds of children in development in their mother's womb and it just oh it gets so exciting and for the most part people act really cool about it. And it's like, oh, so precious. Oh, the child looks just like you, even though they look like a can of stewed tomatoes still, because they ain't really forming any features yet. But people try to be decent about it. A lot of people get excited about it. But there's the whole human element, and there are people who it's like, Okay, congratulations, now stay away from me. I don't need babies. I don't care for babies. Whatever floats your boat, just stay away from me. I don't like babies! Maybe they come right out and say it, maybe they don't. But let's face facts, there are those people. And as we look at this time of year here, church, we have the debates, shall we say. Those who will say, Merry Christmas! And those who, because they don't wish to offend, or because Merry Christmas offends them, it's Happy Holidays. And then you got the ones that's Happy Kwanzaa, it's Happy Hanukkah, it's Seasons Greetings, it's anything and everything to avoid that this is supposed to be about Jesus. Whether He was born on December 25th or not is irrelevant. Fact of the matter remains this is the time of year we have set aside to commemorate a date that we do not know 100% for sure about specifically Now yes, if you go through and you study Luke and first chronicles and all that you're gonna find he was born in a springtime Okay, we don't have an exact date Okay, so we have made December 25th the exact date to commemorate Jesus being birthed into our world a world he made But people don't like this baby Jesus. So they do their best to give us Santa Claus, and Frosty, and Rudolph, and anything other than Jesus. Because they don't like this baby. Well Jesus said that He did not come to unite people, in fact He came to cause division. So it stands to reason that even His very birth caused division. I want to show you 4 this morning who did not like the baby Jesus. First of all in Luke chapter number 2. Verse number 7 says, And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger. Now a manger is not something you typically find in a house that's out in the barn. Because there was no room for them in the inn. There was no room for them there in the inn. The first person we see who didn't like the baby was the proprietor. The businessman. The innkeeper. The guy who had no room for a very pregnant woman couldn't come up with anything to give them a decent place to sleep for the night. Now were they out there in the stable? I don't know. Was it a cave? I don't know. Was it just outside, period, the stars directly overhead, no roof over them, and there a manger nearby? I don't know. But I do know this, there was no room there in the end. Now why wasn't there room there in the end? Well, Luke chapter 12, verse 34, Jesus said this, For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. I can just imagine as Joseph rides into town here, or probably walked into town, maybe Mary was riding on a donkey, and they come into town and every room is booked because everybody, according to the Roman law, has to report back to their town of origin, and Bethlehem is jam-packed. I can just picture him getting there to one inn after the other. Sorry, sold out. Sorry, we're completely filled. We're booked. Gets to the last one there, Mary's like, I think my water just broke, and Joseph's like, let me see what happens here. And he goes inside and the innkeeper says, I've got one room left, it'll be $100 a night. Joseph's jaw just drops, whoa. Excuse me, your prices are normally $10 a night. Well, supply and demand, young man. I have the supply of rooms, and I demand this much money. And as you can see, everybody else around here is already filled. If you want this room, it'll be $100 a night. If not, I'm sure the gentleman behind you will take that room. And Joseph's sitting there looking. He says, I've only got the money to pay my tax. And I've got enough money for a couple of nights at $10 rate. I don't have $100 total. And the man behind Joseph sticks his money out there, says, sir, I got a $100 bill right here, sold to an American. So Joseph Wooten may not have been able to afford the room with the markup that I'm sure would have been present there, because this was a businessman. And he saw the opportunity to make a killing just like everybody else does. Maybe he looked there at Joseph and Mary and said, she's about to pop. That means that normally the room would be X amount, but now you're going to have a third mouth in there, a third person sleeping in the room, not just the two of you, so I've got to add an extra amount to that room. You know, that fascinated me growing up, when me and my folks would go on vacation and we'd be wanting to find a cheap motel room for the night, and I'd be looking at these signs. It says it's only 20 bucks for the night. Why aren't my parents stopping here? Come to find out years later, it wasn't 20 bucks a night, because that's only for one person. They double the price when it's two, then you triple it for three, so on and so forth there. It'd have been 60 bucks for the night, a little on the expensive side. But that's how business works. And this proprietor here, he's about making money. He's about the almighty dollar. He's looking at Mary and Joseph and saying, hmm, y'all are here. You might as well consider yourself to be tourists, because you don't live around here. And you ain't going to have the money to spend anyways. I mean, it ain't a free continental breakfast in the morning. You'll also have to buy breakfast from me. You ain't got the money for that neither. I can't make no money off you, coming or going. His treasure was in his heart. was a treasure for cash, dinero, gold, silver, precious stones. And a simple carpenter didn't have it. And that baby certainly wasn't coming out of mama's womb there with a purse full of money either. So there was no room in the end. No room in his heart. for a baby. No possibility for him to like the baby because there was no money for him. People don't like when they can't see any profit in it for them. And it looks like that possibly was the case here. Well who else besides the proprietor doesn't like the baby? Well let me say the priest don't like the baby. Matthew chapter 2 verse 4 and 5, And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born. And they said unto him, In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet." If they had the answer, these priests, where Messiah was to be born. The angels have sang in chorus out over the hillsides there and the shepherds made their way to Bethlehem. Eight days later Mary and Joseph walk into the temple there to do offer the necessary Sacrifices on behalf of G baby Jesus there and there's Anna and there's Simeon and they're doing their Proclamations all around the temple about how they have seen the Messiah. They got the hold the baby Messiah and so they knew what was up And Yet They didn't go They themselves didn't bother to go see him. And when he's there in the temple itself! I could just imagine them looking over at you, you crazy old coot. Went right back on about their business. Shush! Don't you know this is a temple? You're not supposed to be making all that noise over there! They wanted business as usual. You see, Back during the time of the Maccabees and a little insurrection going on there against Rome, Rome figured out real quick that the Israelites were not about to give up their religion. They weren't about to conform. And so to try to keep some order in this part of the Roman Empire, they decided, okay, let's make it a law that Judaism is a legally recognized religion in the Roman Empire. Thus, wherever the Jews are, they won't be a problem, and because they won't be a problem, we ain't gotta worry about them when it comes time for conscription, I'll get to that in a moment, for our soldiers and such. It'll all be good in the hood. We don't have to fight them over it. But because it's a legal religion, the priests were large and in charge. Didn't matter if you were the high priest or just a regular old-fashioned run-of-the-mill priest who helps out at the local synagogue. You are important. So they wanted to keep things just the way they were. Because they had power. They had authority. They had privilege. They had things the way they wanted them. Quite frankly, I think they expected Him to come to them. You're going to be the Messiah? You're the one who thinks He's going to be the new guy in charge of the temple here? Well, don't you think you should be coming here to the temple itself? you should come and introduce yourself to us so that we can uh... make arrangements aren't we like that too church jesus you wanna be in charge of my life don't you think you should be coming to me so we can make arrangements on how this is gonna work They knew where Messiah would be born. They talk about it there, that He's going to be born in Bethlehem of Judea. For thus it is written by the prophet, that prophet being Micah, in chapter 5 verse 2, But thou, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of these shall he come forth unto me, that is to be ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have been of old, from everlasting, They knew where to go. But that would have required them to go to him first. We can't have that. Us go to him? You might as well say that we have to go bow the knee to him while we're at it. We don't do those things. We're the priests. We're not called to do such things. So many people, SO MANY PEOPLE are only willing to meet Jesus if they can set the terms. They want their brand of religion. They want to worship God their way. And they want to take and twist everything else to where it suits them. It either explains why they don't do it that way, or it justifies why they do it their way. Because they've been able to twist it. And if it just so happens to line up with them, well hey, fine, less work they got to do. But we're all all of us priests of our own lives. How are we going about that? Are we worshipping self? Are we worshipping Him? Are we worshipping money, creation, one another? What are we worshipping as priests of our lives? You know who else besides the priest and the proprietor didn't like the baby? The Potentate. Matthew chapter 2 verse 16, that word Potentate, I needed a P word. This is a fancy word for King. Then Herod. Matthew 2 verse 16, then Herod. When he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, remember he demanded, you know, hey, wise men, come talk to me, because I am the king, and that you're obviously looking for, and the wise men said, not you. Thanks anyways, we're looking for the newborn one. And Herod got a little upset and a little worked up and hot under the collar. He says, hey you priest, where is this newborn baby king going to be born? Because we've got to deal with this. And they told him, say, in Bethlehem. So he goes back to the wise men. He says, hey. check out Bethlehem and when you find him and you know exactly which house he's in and the name and all and you know his parents all this good stuff here y'all take and come back to me so that I may come and worship him oh okay King we'll do that and they go out to Find the baby. See the star. Follow it to Bethlehem. There's baby Jesus. They worship Him. They give Him their gold, frankincense and myrrh. Get a vision. Don't go back to Herod. Go a different way. So they left a different way. Herod saw that he was mocked of the wise men. That they didn't come back to him. He was exceeding the law. and sent forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men." A seven-year, seventy-year-old man was threatened by a baby. Well, let's be honest, that ain't the first time he's felt threatened by anybody. After all, Herod did kill two of his brother-in-laws. He killed a high priest. He killed not one, not two, but three of his own sons. Because he was worried that they were going to try to kill him and usurp the throne. As a matter of fact, when the Bible goes on to tell us there in Matthew 2 that Joseph received the vision that everybody who sought the baby's life is now dead, it's safe to come on back, we believe that that lines right up with the hit list that Herod had of people who were to be executed so that his hand-picked successor would be able to ascend to his throne without any obstacles. Upon his death, I should add, Any time there was any sort of insurrection taking place there in Jerusalem or any part of Herod's area, he put them down as brutally as he could. He was heavy-handed. He ruled with an iron fist on everybody's throat. In fact, he was so bad that Augustus Caesar Okay, Julius Caesar's nephew, who was still alive at the time and reigning there, he said it was better to be Herod's dog than to be one of his own children. And we insult people by calling them, you dog, treating them like dogs, and Caesar himself said he'd be better off being a dog than one of his kids. This was a bad dude. And that doesn't even include the unknown number of children two years and younger that Herod slaughtered after the wise men left in an effort to kill this potential threat to his reign. He didn't like the baby. How hard do people work to keep Jesus out of their lives? What will they kill in their own lives to keep Jesus out? Bible talks about in the last days that their conscience will be seared over with a hot iron. Seared over talks about how they kill the nerve endings. So if you took the hot iron and laid it right there on the shoulder, and it would kill off the nerve endings, besides burning the skin, you wouldn't be able to feel nothing else there, because the nerve endings were killed off. People do that to their hearts, so they don't have to have a Holy Ghost conviction on them. People will kill off their fellowship with blood relatives, with lifelong friends, to keep from hearing about this Jesus fella. To keep them from telling them about their need to be saved. To keep them from convincing them to get right with God, back to where they used to be. Because they are king in their lives. They rule their hearts. They are not going to put up with anybody else trying to tell them what to do. Trying to tell them what NOT to do. They'll do whatever they want. They are the potate in their own lives. And don't you DARE, DON'T YOU DARE try to convince them otherwise. They don't like the baby. But I want to show you one more here today. The person. The person. Matthew chapter 1 verse 21. And she shall bring forth a son, and now shall call his name Jesus. Watch this part church. For he shall save his people from their from their sins. The person who wants their sin. The person who craves their sin. The person who relishes their sin. The person who flaunts their sin. The person who's comfortable just being in their sin. They're a good person. but they're still hell-bound sinners. They're a wicked person. They're still hell-bound sinners. There is no difference between the two. They could be your best bud, your next-door neighbor, or that you've gotten along with for years, you help each other out, you practically raised each other as kids. Anytime someone's sick, the other runs over there and helps out, brings them chicken noodle soup and all this other stuff there, brings them some bacon, praise God for bacon, But if they don't know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior and they are refusing to accept Him as their Lord and Savior, they want to keep their sin. They're the person who in their heart of hearts doesn't like the baby. Because there's no room for Him in their heart. There's only room for their sin. Well, they might call it something else. It's just a drink. They might call it something else. We live together. We're not hurting anybody. They might call it something else. It's just cheating on my taxes. They might call it something else. It's just I've got other things to do. But the person is more interested in their sin. when Jesus came to save them FROM their sin. NOT IN THEIR SIN! Because if it was IN THEIR SIN, then they could continue to sin, not have any consequences about it whatsoever, not have any conviction about it whatsoever, and still get to go to Heaven. Instead, it's FROM their sin. You've been blood-bought, born again, birthed into the family of God. You have been saved from your sin, yet you still have to suffer the consequences in this life? The chastisement of God as He tries to correct you and such? The results of the sin you committed? But you don't have the ultimate penalty of going to hell anymore. And you will have to bear the conviction of the Holy Spirit that what you're doing is wrong. But the person who doesn't like the baby doesn't care for any of that. Because it's all, church, about their sin. Matthew 19 talks about a rich young man who came to Jesus, a good master, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus gave him a couple of the Ten Commandments. And the young man saith unto him, All these things have I kept from my youth up, what lack I yet? In other words, come on, Jesus, give me that little bit there. Just go ahead and say it, that word I want to hear. You done got in. Come on. I know you're going to say it. I know you're going to say it. But Jesus says, no, I came to save you from your sin, person. Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come and follow me. But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. The word possessions can also mean estate. Your estate is everything you own. House, cars, clothes, money, bank accounts, boat, lawnmower, tools, CDs, trust funds, stocks, bonds, Baseball card collection, stamps, whatever. The food in your refrigerator, the clothes that you wear, the toilet paper in your bathroom. Yeah, I know that would have been more appropriate a year ago, but you know, I digress. It's still a possession. It also includes your sin. Because until one Accepts Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. They still own their sins 100% Christ came and died upon the cross of Calvary for the whole world for everyone who has ever been born on this planet The caveat is this The sin debt is only paid for those who accept His payment for their sin debt So in other words, if you don't accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you still own the penalty for sin. 100% through and through. So yeah, He had great possession, alright. But another way of looking at it, from your sin, means that it's got you. So He's saving from, to take back, to take away from sin. Now I realize here in closing that baby Jesus doesn't save us. But His earthly life had to begin this way. The cure must be in the form of the disease. Without this birth, the cross and the empty tomb are meaningless. But without the cross and the empty tomb, the birth is meaningless too. They all are linked together. When Christmas came this year, let me ask you these three questions. When Christmas came this year, was Jesus welcomed into your house? Or were you one of these four persons? One of these four people? Is Jesus welcome in your life now? If you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior, is He large and in charge in your life, or have you relegated Him to the closet? We'll deal with you later, Jesus, when I need you. It will treat you like a break glass in case of emergency type thing. Not gonna help. But that leads me to my final question here, and this is the most important one. Do you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior? If you don't, now is the perfect opportunity to confess to Him that you are a sinner, that you need to be saved, and that only He can save you, and put your full faith and trust in Him. Because He's promised that whosoever shall call upon His name, He will save them. And Jesus always keeps His promises. Father, we come before you here again to thank you, Lord, for the opportunity to bring this word here to your people today and to any who are lost that might be watching or listening later on. We ask you, Father, please to help them to see their need to be saved before it's too late. To help us to see our need to stay right with you or to get right with you if that's the case. So that we can go with you throughout the course of this life. Thank you Lord for loving us and saving us. In the name of Jesus we do pray.