What is Matthew's other name? You'd be correct. Two, who is the third king of all 12 tribes of Israel? Correct. Solomon. Three, in what town was Mary living when Gabriel appeared unto her? Number four, what time of day did the Holy Spirit come upon the disciples during Pentecost or the number of lives of a cat? 9 a.m. is the correct answer. Number five, John baptized with water, but what did he say Jesus would baptize with? And fire. Good, very good. So far you're doing well. Whose daughter did David marry and what was her name? Correct. Very good, man. Y'all have been good. How long did it rain? There's a song that goes with it, The Cause of the Great Flood. It rained for 40, for 40 nights and daisies, and it rained for 40, for 40 nights and daisies, and it nearly... Roll those animals crazy, crazy. Number eight. What was the new commandment that Jesus gave? Love one another. My goodness, y'all doing well. Which judge was also called Jeroboel because he tore down Baal's altars? Gideon, yes. What three things were inside the Ark of the Covenant? Very good. How many days was Jesus on earth following his resurrection? 40, and Pentecost comes at 50. So 40 days, and then 10 days later, Pentecost. And the last one, who put perfume on Jesus' feet and wiped them with her hair? Mary, the Lazarus sister. You did exceedingly well tonight, Isaiah chapter nine, six and seven. Da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da. Isaiah chapter 9. So, three things we know about Isaiah. The book of Isaiah, or Isaiah himself. Can you give me three factoids you might know about Isaiah? Prophet. Prophecy. We'll put those together. Well, I'm going to put that with prophecy still. A little bit earlier. Prophecy, yes. So Messianic prophecy, is that what you're talking about, Mrs. McClure? Yeah, yes. Yes, it would. Yes, you're correct. 65, it might be, but that'd also be prophecy. His son had the longest name in the Bible. I don't know if you knew that or not. I can't pronounce it all for you. He was, he probably has the most, he was the most eloquent high Hebrew speaking, writing prophet. He saw the Lord high and lifted up in chapter six. He wrote 66 chapters or the combined 66 chapters. He was, sometimes they call it, they divide up Isaiah sometimes between one to 39 and 40 to 66. He wrote a lot of what George Frederick Handel used, which I think, I was thinking as I was listening to it, probably the number one most well-known and best oratorio ever, ever written, the Messiah. And because it has the word of God, every single song is nothing. Yeah, 53, yeah. So we know about Isaiah. So here we're gonna have the prophetic verses. So y'all did good thinking on that. It's just, we don't know as much about the Old Testament as we do the New typically, but that was a good answers. Six and seven. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Now you can just park on those for a while. Of the increase of his government and peace, There shall be no end. Just read it. Increase of his government and peace, not his government and war trouncing everybody. The increase of his government and peace, there shall be what? No end. upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice. From henceforth, even forevermore, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this." What a magnificent, about 700 years before Christ's birth, we have Isaiah is going to do this prophecy. And as you well know, The prophets did not understand all when they wrote that. There was often a two-part, an initial application, an initial answering of the prophecy, and then later on, a distant prophecy, and so part of the answering. So this is really the incarnation of the Messiah. Incarnation. We'll talk about that in just a moment. incarnation of the Messiah. Alexander McLaren said, in this prophecy, the prophet is plainly speaking greater things than he knew. But a lot of prophets did that. I mean, the prophets of the Old Testament didn't know who Jesus' name was going to be, so they were prophesying things they did not know all about what was going to happen in the future. They saw, typically, you have the Old Testament, and then you have the millennial kingdom, And you have the Old Testament. And this thing here called the church age was not something that the Old Testament prophets saw. Now God knew about it, but they just saw what the Old Testament time. And the idea that we're not gonna have a millennial kingdom, but really the Bible over and over, there's so many prophecies about just this verse right here. I was just thinking, even as I was studying about this, to establish judgment and justice. If we were living in a new world, the new earth, the eternal order, where there's no sin, there's no need for judgment because there's no sin anymore. So justice, we've been given justice. We have eternal justice because we're living with Christ for forever. And there's no more sin to judge any longer. But, so there's got to be this thousand year reign. This is the baby we talked about on Sunday night. But I was just talking to Leona's nephew-in-law about, he went and called a church, and the church had several, what's called elder board, and there was like different ones, disagree, some were all Mennonites, some were pre-Mennonites, some were post-Mennonites. But the idea there's not gonna be a thousand year reign of Christ, On earth, before the eternal kingdom, it just goes contrary to a lot of Scripture. You have to what is called allegorize. You have to say, well, that's not really literal. That's just meaning something else. But if you take a literal understanding of Scripture, we have some prophecies that cannot be replaced with allegorization, if that's a word, So some of the prophecies of incarnation of Christ is spoken of as though it already were accomplished. So do you remember in Revelation 13, it says, the Lamb of God slain, or the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. So from the foundation of the world, we knew, God knew the Lamb of God was gonna be slain. So that happened long before even the world was created and the mind of God, The Christ has already gone to Calvary. Now, again, we cannot grasp all that that God by any means, but God sees outside of time. He sees everything at once. So with God, a prophecy can indeed be spoken in terms of fulfillment for when God predicts it, it will come to pass. How many other religions do you know that the leader of the religion has predicted so many prophecies and they've all come to pass? None. There are none. How many other books have accurate prophetic? Now, you've got Nostradamus, but he might be just, you know, you know, there's gonna be a bird fly over the church tomorrow. And we watch it, and Jeremy sits there all day, we all sit in there drinking the high mountain dew. Oh, there goes the bird! Pastor Tim's a prophet! Woo-hoo! Now, but these are specific prophecies. I think it's 318 regarding the Messiah in Old Testament that either have or already have come to pass or will come to pass. And so that's our God. He talks, because he sees everything. He's, what do we call that? What would you, big word we might give that? Omni. Om. Omniscient, thank you, very good. Om, O-N-I-S-C-I-E-N-T. We also omnipotent. Omnipotent. all power, and we have omnipotent, and we have? Omnipresent. Omnipresent. That's who our God is. He's all-knowing, all-powerful, and everywhere at once. But we don't believe in pantheism. We don't believe that everything is God, but we believe that God is everywhere. That's just who He is. That's to be God. And so we also might throw the word in here, S-O-V-E-R-E-I, sovereign. Our God is sovereign. So when we talk about this, God can predict with apodictic certainty, which there's no doubt. You can take it to the bank. It's as good as already having been done. So when we read the scripture that we are given everlasting life because the same God who promised all these other things has given us everlasting life, then we can know, talking to a lady just today, And the nurse with Mrs. Carroll and Miss Becky about the Lord, and she said, well, she went through how good of a person she was, and she's a very nice lady. And I'm not a Christian, but I've done all these good things, and basically, I think my good works are going to outweigh my bad, and I'm going to go somewhere. And Becky said, I know that I'm going to be in heaven. And so a wonderful testimony they gave. And so her name is Suzette. Pray for Suzette, that she would see opportunity again to talk to her. Maybe she would see that need of coming. She said, I'm going to go somewhere. But let me just tell you, if you're going to go somewhere, there's only two choices. And if you're going to go to the good choice, you have to go to God's heaven. And the only way to get to God's heaven is through God's son, Jesus. So you can't just pop up to God's heaven because you've been good. You must have the the right key, you must have a key that is Christ, as you well know. Number one in your outline, the advent of Christ, the advent of Christ. Now we, do you have an advent calendar at home this year? No advent calendars? Well, advent simply, so it's an advent, it's not a bad word. Other people take it from us necessarily. It's coming into place or the arrival. So we have the first advent. What do we call the first advent? What is that? You have advent calendar, what does that mean? Jesus came into the first time, so he came, he entered in the first time, the first advent. Now, we also believe in the second advent. We're waiting, matter of fact, maybe tonight, part of that second advent will happen tonight and the church will go home, and then at least seven years later, he's gonna come back with the church at the ruins of rain for a thousand years, and so that is called the second advent. So it just simply means arriving or being in view. So we see under that advent of Christ, number one, the doctrine is your D word, the doctrine of the advent. In chapter nine, verse six, for unto us, a child is born. unto us a son is given. So the doctrine is a dual nature of Christ. So Christ has a dual nature, and there's explanation of the text. The text is your blank, a child is born. So we have here his D-E-I-T-Y, D-I, sorry, D-I, whoops, see? I'm gonna reveal my spelling. You can't take your finger and erase, you gotta use the right eraser, E-D, put it back there, D-E-I-T-Y. Deity. So deity, he's God. And so that's seen here, a child is born, a son is given. So we have, this is the Christ child. A child is born, humanity. A son is given, deity. So here we have both of those placed together in one. So a son is given. So if I give, if I give Jeremy my apple pen, It has to exist. Does it not? For me to say, Jeremy, if you're going to give it back, you can take it for just a minute if you want. There you go. Here, you can have it. A son is given. So the son existed before it was given. For unto us a child is born, but also unto us a son is given. And when you, if I gave this pen to Jeremy, I know he'd take good care of it. We were given the Son of God. And how have we done with that? Nothing. You're going to disagree with me, but I say, yes, he was called the Son of God. Yes, well, that was just that's just that's just his name. So so he but he was given to us the Son of God. So he was so it's more than just the babe in the manger. So a son has to be given. So he was. given to us. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Son and the Word are inseparable. The Son of God is the Word of God, and so they are inseparable. So in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God. So Jesus has existed in eternity past, whether you want to call him as the son or he's existed. I personally believe that he is called the son of God because that's just what his name, how he's been called. But you don't have to, but other people disagree with that. But. Either way he has been from eternity because he's God he has always existed He is the only God is he turn has the eternality of always always being We have eternal life, but we are not we don't have the eternality of God only God has eternality I believe that would even even angels are created beings so angels had a certain point again my personal opinion is they were created and before day three of the, before the third day, I'm sorry, before the third chapter of Genesis, somewhere in there, I think during the, I think personally during the creation week, but that's just my opinion again, it could be created earlier, but they still had a beginning point and they don't have, they don't have near the infinitude of God. God is clearly infinitely greater than angels, than anything, and so that's who was given to us Unto us a child is born unto us a son is given so we so we find there that that that's what a wonderful and it's and he brought if you heard the story read the book the peace child about Don Richardson and West Papua Indonesia there was a saw a tribe and they kept warring with one another fighting fighting fighting fighting fighting until the chiefs of each tribe gave a child of theirs to the other tribe, and they gave the chief's child to the other tribe, and they lived in peace. As long as those children were alive, and it's called the peace child. So instead of fighting, because I'm raising Jeremy's son, and Jeremy's raising my son, and we've stopped fighting like the Hatfields and McCoys because Yes, exactly. You want to take care of it. You want to take care of the child. And you want that person to take, he wants me to take care of his son? If we were trading cats, it wouldn't work at all. And how I take care of his? And so that's the peace child. And so Christ came to that for us. So there's not only the explanation in the text, there's the encouragement in the text. The dual nature of Christ is called the hypostatic union. And people have gone to seed on this so often, and they think, oh, well, he was just a spirit, or there were two people, or Jesus is one, and God was the other, and they're two separate, no. In Christ, he's so much man if he were not God at all, and so much God as if he were not man at all, it's 100%. And that's hard for us to understand. We can't understand the Trinity to the full extent, but it's biblically taught that if he was not man, he could not die for us. If he was not God, he could not have died for us. Well, he could have, but he wouldn't have been effective. But with God dying for us, Mr. McClure could die for the whole lot of us. Our own souls won't make a hoot of difference because he is not God. But when Jesus, the Son of God, lives a perfect, sinless life, as pictured all the way back to Exodus chapter 12 at the Passover, pictured there and fulfilled in Christ. It all fits. It's amazing, isn't it? And today, he's sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. and he has touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He was in all points tempted like as we are. Isn't that amazing? He knows all the things that you're going through, all the things you're having to face, and all these things. And so I know Brother Beals has been through a lot of injections the last year or two, and my wife yesterday had a lot of injections, and there's just a lot. You have gone through a lot. and you're facing a lot, He knows. He wants us to ask Him and call on Him and say, about every Sunday morning, I'm saying, Lord, I can't do this without You. And it's like, you know, I just can't do it unless you give me strength. And that's really what he wants us to be. Because when we think we have arrived, it's like the guy, I went to a corridor study of 23 down in Winchester, Greenup Avenue, doing a corridor study to see how they could make it safer down there in Ashland. And he said, he is a road person who does the studies. He said, I put on my vest, and the first time I was out there by the highway, and they're going 80 miles, it scared me to death. And then, I sort of got more used to it. And then, I'm getting a little bit more used to it. He says, complacency, such a danger. And spiritually speaking, complacency is such a danger. You're just going to sit here and spin your wheels. When you start drifting, What's the only way you can really drift in a river? It's down the stream, typically, right? Because up the stream, you don't drift there, right? We don't drift upstream. You have to paddle to get there. So we drift downstream. So typically, when you start drifting, there's neutral. You cannot be, the songwriter says. Someday, he'll be asking, what will you do with me? I can't think of the whole song. But we are to be working toward that, and growing, and not static, and not mediocre, and not complacent. Not only explanation. encouragement, but examples in the text. Christ's two natures found together in one text. How about Matthew 17 where Christ's humanity is seen and He's paying a tax, and His deity is seen as the tax money was obtained in the miracle of Christ. Go to the fish, etc. Christ was willing to do all these things. He did everything excellently. Everything excellently. Everything He did was just, we would call it today, spot on. But everything he did was just perfect the way he responded the way he reacted What he said what he did and that's he's the consummate example of everything. That's good That's our Savior and that's who we're going to be worshiping by the way for eternity How about humanity and deity and Luke chapter 8 he's sleeping in the boat in the ship. I He's worn out, sleeping in the ship, and yet he can get up and say, peace be still to the storm. That's the same. So you have the humanity of Christ, you have the deity of Christ, and if you try to separate them, you're gonna really go to seed and you're gonna find yourself in a very bad theological place if you try to do that. Jesus wept. At the shortest, perhaps English word, verse in the New Testament, John 11, 35, Jesus wept. It's not the shortest in Greek, but the shortest in English. Jesus wept. And yet, just a few verses later, Lazarus, come forth. And Lazarus comes out of the grave, and he has the weeping on one side, and you have the power of God on the other, just in the same few moments of time. So that's the Savior. So the doctrine of the advent, remember, advent is just simply an appearing, a coming in, if you will, or arriving, et cetera. Secondly is the demotion in the advent, D-E-M-O-T-I-O-N, I forget, I might have typed that in there, demotion, in 9.6. For unto us a child is born. So the incarnation of Christ. Now what does incarnation mean? That means first time in the flesh. So incarnation. N-C-A-R-N-A-T-I-N-O-N-O-N-E-M-O-U-S-E Incarnation is first time in the F-L-E-S-H. So we believe in the incarnation of Christ. We believe that he came. And he was a physical, I mean, he came as a physical baby placed in the Mary's womb. Nine months later, he comes out and he lives so quietly for so long, 30 years approximately, he lives quietly. And then he comes on the scene for his ministry. But what we don't believe in is re-incarnation, right? The second time in the flesh, or the third time, or the 300th time in the flesh, we just don't believe in that. And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this, the resurrection, after that, the resurrection. So we have one life, only one life will soon be passed, only what's done for Christ will last. How true that is. So we have all these things going on, and I'm not sure where my paper's going, but there we are. And going right on, so we have the demotion. So how did we say that Christ is demoted? Okay, if you move from 5th Avenue, New York City to Heberlin Road in Wortland, I have officially been demoted in the eyes of Miss Cindy. And everybody, oh man, you were on 5th Avenue, New York City paying $4,000 a month for a two-story apartment. Yes, and you're living in Wortland, Kentucky? Yes. Or I'd rather be demoted. So here we have the Son of God, God the Father, God the Son, Holy Spirit, in heaven, living in perfect, seamless harmony, and He comes to earth. He who is upholding all things by the word of His power steps out of that. Down from His glory, an ever-living story, our God and Savior came, and Jesus was His name. oh how I love him and so that's beautiful that's a beautiful song not that I'm singing it right but that's so he came all the way from heaven to earth to be and was there a big celebration like whoa it is the birthday of oh Only once in history has the king been born a babe. Now many times the babes have been born a king, but only once has the king been born as a babe. And he came for us without fanfare. I was reading an article which I may share about how the One reason was because Satan was probably looking for Jesus. Why did he have the census? Satan probably has read the scripture where Christ is going to be born in Bethlehem, but now Bethlehem, Micah 5, verse 2, I know where he's going to be born. So I'm going to watch every couple coming in and every baby born in Bethlehem, but then the census comes on and people living in Nazareth of all things, has to go to Bethlehem. And not only they go, but everybody's grandmother goes. And so he probably couldn't keep track of all the people. And it's not even in the hospital. He's born in, I believe, a sheep birthing stall out here where the shepherds are. And so God works it all out. And then angels come, and they announce the birth. Glory to God in the highest. And the shepherds, who I think knew exactly where to go, because it was their stall, run to find and find the manger. And about a year and a half later, the wise men come. But it's all very quiet, until at 30 years of age, approximately, he comes on the scene. And then his public ministry starts. You notice we have hardly any what goes on in Jesus's life from birth to 30. Now we have that time at the temple, but there's just not a lot. Very quiet thing but then when he opens and you ever wonder why there's almost all this demon possession all the demons are fighting Jesus and trying to kill ever wonder why because Satan's got all his hunchman if you were trying to thwart the plan of God So you wonder why there's such much so much demon possession and attraction and and fighting because he's got to do something and so God works it out. Aren't you glad to our God that is in control. Our God has a plan for the ages. So, the demotion. no one ever so humbled. Three, the day of the advent. So if we were to picture the day of the advent, so what kind of social conditions were happening when Christ came to be born? And it says in Matthew chapter two, I'm reading Matthew chapter two verse one, Matthew two verse, was it a good time? And when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, we don't have to go any much further than that, but Herod the king was a terrible, that he was good in some, he was a great builder. He was different things positively, but negatively, he was very, he's very conceited. Most kings are like that probably, but he, how do we know that? Because what did he do when he found out the Christ child, tell me where he's born, but a bunch of a hogwash that was. I will come and worship him too. What did he want to do? And how long did Herod live after Jesus was born? Not very, a couple years. Wasn't very long at all. But he was so, I mean, the baby could never have been taking his place, but yet it was someone who might be standing against him. I'm gonna end their lives. It's interesting. I know we always say boys, but it says children. So you can look for yourself. We look for ourselves. And chapter two. verse 16, and Herod saw when he was mocked of the wise men, how many wise men were there? A lot. A lot, I like that. A lot, I like that. That's the best answer tonight. Was exceeding wrath, and forth went, sent forth, and slew all the, what? Children. Now, I've thought boys, I don't know if you can find the language there or something other than that, but the boys are bad enough, but if he slays all the children, two years old, what a maniacal, self-centered, egomaniac, evil man he was. He did. He killed his couple of wives, I think it was, killed his own children. He had people put in prison so when he died, they would be killed, there'd be mourning. He was a very disturbed man, wasn't he? Very disturbed man he was. So it's a dark setting. So when Christ comes, what does it say? And how about Galatians chapter? Is it 4-2? 4-2. I don't know. You're teaching a lesson. How about 2 verse 4? 2 verse 4. Galatians chapter. Maybe it's 6 verse 4. When the fullness of time was come, I'm looking for that first, oh, four verse four, sorry. And when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his son made of a woman made under the law. the fullness of time. So at the right exact moment in history, when the timing was just right, God sent his son. And it was, how do we know it was probably a difficult time? 400 years. They hadn't heard from God much at all until John the Baptist was on the scene. 400 years of silence from God. And now they've gotten to the point in time where, and the religious leaders are just absolutely off the rails, spiritually speaking. And so we have, he comes into a very dark night. It'd almost be like if he'd come to America right now. I mean, not quite that bad, but he comes in a very dark night just when it's the right time. So the day of the advent, it was a, we don't know for sure if it's December 25th, it may have been. Interesting, in September, there's called Michaelmas, September 21 approximately, and then that's when the church celebrates the angels appearing to the shepherds. So if he was conceived or placed in Mary's womb, sorry, placed in Mary's womb on December 25th, then he may have been born in September 25th, and that's the Michaelmas celebration. So anyway, just a thought there on that. But the most important thing is he came, and we all can agree on that. The Bible's abundantly, apodictically clear. He came. Why did he come? He loved the world so much he's gonna give himself for it. That is something a child can understand. I was saved when I was six years old, my wife was four. Isn't that the beauty of the gospel? It's so clear that we don't understand all about it. Matter of fact, there's nobody in here understands all we're gonna get with the gospel by any means, but we can understand the how-to, receiving by grace through faith. So we'll give God another 100% best way how to be saved by grace through faith. Let's pray. We're just getting started. I will finish this up next week or sometime. We're thankful. We as a group want to say thank you tonight for coming to die for us. The prophecy was fulfilled. You came, you lived, you lived a sinless life. You were horribly treated. You died a terrible, painful death. You willingly gave up your spirit to the Father, saying, it is finished, and we have life everlasting, because up from the grave you arose. And so we give you thanks. May we celebrate the true meaning of Christmas this season. Be with us as we go our separate ways, please. In Jesus' name I pray, amen.