Our first reading this evening is taken from the Old Testament, from the book of Isaiah, and chapter 7. And in the church Bibles, that's on page 692, in a chapter headed, The Sign of Emmanuel. So Isaiah 7, and we're reading from the 10th verse. Again, the Lord spoke to Ahaz. Ask the Lord your God for a sign, whether in the deepest depths or in the highest heights. But Ahaz said, I will not ask it. I will not put the Lord to the test. Then Isaiah said, hear now, you house of David. Is it not enough to try the patience of men will you try the patience of my God also. Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign. The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son and will call him Emmanuel. He will eat cards and honey when he knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right. But before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid waste. The Lord will bring on you and your people and on the house of your father a time unlike any since Ephraim broke away from Judah. He will bring the king of Assyria." And then a further passage in chapter 9 of Isaiah, And this time reading from verse six. For to us, a child is born. To us, a son is given. And the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and with righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this. Amen. Our second lesson is Daniel chapter 9, verses 20 to 27. The 77s. While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and making my request to the Lord my God for his holy hill, while I was still in prayer, Gabriel, The man I had seen in an earlier vision came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice. He instructed me and said to me, Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and understanding. As soon as you began to pray, an answer was given, which I've come to tell you. For you are highly esteemed, Therefore, consider the message and understand the vision. Seventy-sevens are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgressions, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness. to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy. Know and understand this. From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the Ruler comes. There will be seven sevens and sixty-two sevens. It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble. After the 62 sevens, the anointed one will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood. War will continue until the end, and desolations will be decreed. He will confirm a covenant with the many for one seven. In the middle of the seven, he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of the temple, he will set up an abomination that causes desolation. until the end that is decreed is poured out on him. The third reading is taken from Micah chapter 5 verses 1 to 4. A promised ruler from Bethlehem. Marshal your troops, O city of troops, for a siege is laid against us. They will strike Israel's ruler on the cheek with a rod. But you, Bethlehem, Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times. Therefore, Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor gives birth, and the rest of his brothers return to join the Israelites. He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth, and he will be their peace. The next reading is Luke chapter 2, and we're starting to read at verse 1. In those days, Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria. And everyone went to his own town to register. So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem, the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger." Suddenly, a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace to men on whom his favor rests. When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about. So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph and the baby who was lying in a manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child. And all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherd said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told. On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived. Well, four wonderful texts read out to us so far this evening, each of them related to what I want to speak about just now, just for a few moments. I suppose it could all be kind of held together with a very common phrase, having ears to hear. It's a very common phrase throughout the Bible. In the Old Testament, of course, it's used far too often. When the people of God have failed to be hearing what it is that they were supposed to be hearing, have failed to see what they're supposed to be seeing, when they have failed to grasp who they were. and what God had done, what he was going to do. It's particularly used by many of the prophets, Ezekiel, Isaiah. Jeremiah 5, 21 says this, hear this you foolish and senseless people who have eyes but do not see, who have ears but do not hear. It's a phraseology used by Christ even against his own disciples in Mark 8. And he turns in some sort of exasperated sort of way, you know, he's trying to say, do you still not get it? Ears are not hearing, eyes not seeing. It's a phenomenon I'm actually well accustomed to now. It's not so much that the actual physical eyes and ears are not working. It's something slightly different from that. And having been a primary teacher and now a parent, I am very well aware of this phenomenon. So you would say to a child, please put those shoes away. Perhaps there's a particular shelf upon which these shoes reside. And so you say, put the shoes away. And you know the child knows where to put them. You know the child has heard the instructions. The child has looked you in the eyes. You can see the instructions going in. And by the time that child is halfway down the corridor, it's lost. The shoes are scattered, and he's up to mischief. Having ears to hear, it means something. And it's not just simply, okay, yeah, I heard you, okay, yeah, and then forget it. It's really grasping what it is that you've been told, really getting it and not letting it go. Having ears to hear or eyes to see, to really see. And all too often, the people of God, God gets exasperated and says, You've got eyes, but you don't see. You've got ears, but you don't hear. And I have to say, this is a phrase, although common in the biblical text, it's a phrase which is particularly appropriate for the people of Bethlehem, the night that Jesus was born. If we think of some of our texts, we had the Isaiah texts read out to us earlier on, Isaiah 7 and Isaiah 9. Now the people of Bethlehem had heard these texts, they knew these texts. They were very commonly used at this time in the synagogues in that region over and over again. They knew these texts. But perhaps they didn't see, perhaps they didn't hear. Isaiah 7 is a very interesting chapter. We have the prophet Isaiah coming to King Ahaz. He's not a particularly good king. And Isaiah comes to him in chapter 7 with a message for him. And it's very interesting because he comes and he says, you know, there's going to be a child that's going to be born. Now, the problems that they were dealing with, King Ahaz had a lot on his plate. The superpower at the time, the Assyrians, were causing everyone to be very much afraid. And so a lot of the smaller nations had decided to join together in a coalition or alliance to stand up against the might of the Assyrians. It had worked previously, a few generations before, and so they felt, well, this time we'll band together and together we'll be strong. We can fight off the Assyrians. Judah, where King Ahaz and Isaiah are, wants no part of this. They don't want to antagonize the Assyrians. If you knew anything about the Assyrians, you'd understand. They don't want to wind them up in any way whatsoever. And they say, right, you guys go ahead, knock yourself out. You go form your alliance. We're having none of it. But of course, Israel and Aram or Syria and the rest of the nations, they're not keen on having Judah not quite declared for them, behind them, when they're having to face Assyria. And so this coalition come together to attack Judah first. Judah don't stand a chance. They can't fight them. They don't have the might, the strength to fight them. And so Ahaz has to decide what to do. And into that Isaiah comes along. Now Isaiah and Ahaz have two very different solutions to this problem. Isaiah wants to rely on God. Isaiah wants a national strategy which requires repentance and requires that God is seen to be sovereign. Ahaz is a very different solution to this. He wants to reject God in every possible way, and instead, incredulously, he wants to write to the Assyrians and tell them all about his problems, and he is going to ask the Assyrians to come and help, which is a bit like the chickens inviting the foxes in to look after the coop. It's not a strategy which ends well. And into that comes Isaiah 7. And of course, Ahaz is offered a sign, and it looks great to start off with, doesn't it? You can choose whatever sign you want. He goes, no, no, I won't take a sign. I wouldn't do that. It sounds quite pious. It sounds quite proper, actually, to start off with, unless you know what's going on in the background. You see, Ahaz does not want God's help. He does not want to bend the knee to God. He does not want a sign because he's going to reject it anyway. But he gets a sign. And the sign is a trial. A child that is born. We're not too sure who the child is, whether it was a child of Ahaz or the prophet, but clearly there is a child, and by the time this child is weaned, by the time this child is old enough to know right and wrong, the danger will be averted, and indeed that is the case. In fact, within 12 years, the nation of Israel will cease to exist. Judah being safe for the time being. But he doesn't want a sign, and he says no. But the 7, verse 14 says, therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and will call him Emmanuel. Now, the wonderful thing about prophecy is that prophecy has to speak to the people who are there. It has to have a meaning for the people who are receiving it and not just have a meaning for an audience hundreds of years later like us here or those in Bethlehem. And so it's really interesting. And of course, Hebrew is a wonderful language. And we look at the word virgin. If Isaiah had come forward and said the word Isha for this word that we translate as virgin, it would have meant young woman. It wouldn't really have meant anything particularly important, I suppose, though all births are wonderful. Simply saying a woman will have a child wasn't quite hitting the nail on the head. He doesn't use the normal common term for simply saying a woman will give birth. He could have used betula, which means a virgin, which would have been miraculous and spectacular and beyond anything which could have been imagined. But then he would not have been talking to Ahaz. He would have been talking about the birth of Jesus Christ hundreds of years later. And quite frankly, the sign for Ahaz doesn't make any sense. And so the wonderful thing is that he uses the word Alma. It's an ambiguous term, it can mean both, or either. It's brilliant. And so what happens is, he uses a word, and I love the way the Hebrew can do that, we're kind of stuck a little bit in English. In Hebrew he does this, he does this wonderful way of saying, this has a meaning right now for you, he has, but there's something else going on. And after the crisis has been averted, once the sign of a child for Ahaz has indeed come and the disaster has passed, Isaiah in chapter nine takes this on and says, now I only gave you a hint in chapter seven. There was a hint there of something more. Here's some more. And this hint of God who would rescue a people through a child. gets built on. And we get Isaiah 9, which we also had a bit read out to us. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders, and he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And the idea grows from there. And there's these wonderful promises about a child who is to come. There is someone who is to come, who in the way that they signed Ahaz, it was like the small sign, this is going to be the real deal. This is going to be wonderful, this great rescue and salvation through a child that will be born. A child that will grow, as we see through the rest of Isaiah and in the other prophets. He doesn't remain a child, but he grows into a man, a man who will save. And the people of Bethlehem knew this. They knew that they were awaiting a child, a Savior, a Messiah. But in many ways, the people of Bethlehem didn't hear. because when it happened in their midst, they didn't really see. The Savior was born, but life continued like normal, as if he had not even been born. You see, the people of Bethlehem were really close to the child, but they were very far away from the Christ. Having been told to expect a child that would change everything, they missed out. What makes it even more amazing is that they weren't just simply told that there would be a child. We also had read to us Micah 5. Micah 5 was a very interesting text because it wasn't just that the people knew that there was going to be a child, they knew that this child was going to be born in Bethlehem. So it's not like they're simply saying there's going to be a child coming. They even knew where it was going to occur. They knew that it was their town that this child was going to be born in. That's how when the wise men turn up and they're saying, where will we look? They go, well, you have to go look in Bethlehem. They knew. Maybe they'd just heard it too many times. Maybe it'd just become ordinary. They were waiting for a child to be born in their town. And they missed it. They missed it. And so this time we could say they were so close to the crib, but they were far away from their king. He was right next door, but missed it. So they were waiting for a child. They were waiting for the child to be born in Bethlehem, but also, and this is where the Daniel 9 stuff comes in, they knew when he was going to be born. So not only are they waiting for a child, not only did they know it's going to be their town, they know roughly when he's going to be born. So the Daniel 9 text was telling them there's going to be a Messiah. And this Messiah, although he was going to die, he was going to save. And he was going to do the most amazing things. And we worked at all the 70 times sevens and everything else, it came to AD 26, which is when the beginning of his ministry was supposed to be. Incidentally, when Jesus turned 30 and began his ministry, which in the Daniel text tells us is going to be a three and a half year ministry, exactly like Jesus's was. And after three and a half years, he was going to be killed, he was going to be murdered, just like Jesus was. Now this is not some sort of secret knowledge, there was an awful lot of people at that time standing up and saying they were the Messiah It was a very common thing at that time to be saying, oh I'm the Messiah And lots of people would follow these different people who'd be standing up saying I'm the Messiah My favorite example is King Herod who even claimed to be the Messiah One of the things about the Messiah was that he was going to glorify the temple. It wasn't actually a reference to the building itself. But what Herod did was, he spent a lot of money making the temple look beautiful. There's this wonderful kind of revitalization project that he really did. And then he stood back and said, look, I have glorified the temple. I must be the Messiah. It was a very common thing at the time. It wasn't some sort of secret, hard-to-work-out piece of knowledge. So the people knew that there was going to be a child. The people knew he was going to be born in Bethlehem, and the people knew, roughly, when he was going to be born. And they missed it. This time we could say they were so near to the manger, but they missed the Messiah. So who did see, who did hear, who was left then to actually receive the message? Well, outcasts and foreigners is the answer. Instead of the inhabitants of Bethlehem having the eyes to see what was written in the text and the ears to hear what the prophets had said, came down to some wise men and some shepherds Well, we had Luke 2 read out to us. If I remind us from verse 8, it said this. And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today, in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you. He is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. Shepherds. Now, there can be a little bit of confusion about shepherds in the Bible. There seems to be something of a conflict about shepherds. In the Old Testament, it seems to be quite a good thing to be a shepherd, and in the New Testament, it's quite clearly not what you'd want your children, perhaps, to grow up and do. Quite a low-caste job. There's quite a conflict between the two testaments regarding shepherds. In the Old Testament, very different. In the Old Testament, they seem to be brave and strong and all these sorts of things. So when Moses stands up to the shepherds to save Zipporah, he seemed to be even braver than a shepherd, which is quite a big deal if that is already quite a brave thing. He will go on himself to become a shepherd. King David will start off as a shepherd and actually think of his shepherding as an appropriate foundation for kingship. Most importantly of all, God himself is described as a shepherd. Possibly most famously in Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd. Hardly a negative connotation. In Song of Solomon, the lover, the beloved, the man person in it, he is a shepherd. He's idolized, as it were, this kind of notion of shepherd. It had a very different connotation. So you'd be thinking of brave and strong and protecting. And so in our minds, we need to, when we read it in the Old Testament, we need to maybe not think about somebody with dubious personal hygiene, and perhaps think of it more kind of along the lines of a knight in shining armor, a rescuer, protector, able and willing to save. And this partly comes down to the fact that the sheep were effectively the family's wealth very often. It would be a family member or very close worker who would be guarding these sheep for you. They weren't kind of separate out there somewhere, they were an integral part to the society. both because of the wool and the milk and various things that could be produced, but also because of the role within the sacrificial system in the temple, the country couldn't survive without the sheep. And so it had great esteem. When you come to the New Testament, because a lot of people have become a lot wealthier, And they hire some people and they send them off to the hills to go look after the sheep. And the great social status is much reduced. The law is changed. It becomes a stick to beat people over the head with. And what happens is the shepherds, who are unclean, both physically, because there's a lack of sanitation out in the hills, but they also become spiritually unclean. They're working with animals. They would probably have to work with dead animals. They would not be accepted within polite society. You would not invite them into your house. You wouldn't want to even have to talk to them. The saddest thing of all, They weren't even allowed into the temple. So shepherd, having been a description of God himself, becomes something that couldn't even darken the door of a church. And out they are, unclean, unwanted, out in the hills at night. But they've got ears. They've got ears to hear. And so the angels come to them and they hear. They hear this wonderful message. The people that no one else wants, God loves. And so these people not wanted even in the poorest of homes went to go see the king of kings. The lowest of the people went to go worship the most exalted. And so whilst the community that thought them unworthy was asleep, they got to see with their own eyes the Messiah. And of course, the other group that were able to hear, that had ears to hear, were the foreigners, the wise men that we can add. If I read to you something from Matthew chapter two, from verse one. After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, where is the one who's been born King of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. When King Herod heard this, he was disturbed and all Jerusalem with him. We did call together all of the people's chief priests and teachers of the law. He asked them where the Messiah was to be born. In Bethlehem of Judea, they replied, for this is what the prophet has written. And of course, these wise men, they then set out with all of their gifts. They go to Bethlehem just as they'd been instructed. They find the child, and they give them the gifts, the gold, the frankincense, the myrrh, in their desire to pay homage to him. And it's striking that a group of foreigners far away had been watching, had been waiting, and saw that this group who were far removed saw something that the people who were right there when he arrived didn't see. These wise men who had been seeking the sky and then searching the land, who sacrificed a lot to get to Bethlehem and then with their costly gifts they give them to the king. Whilst those he had actually come to turned away without any room, certainly no room for a saviour in their lives. And so we have Christmas. And we've got to remember that every single interaction between God and man, every prophecy, every promise, every miracle has led to this point. Straining forward to this point, this moment that we celebrate as Christmas. Now God had not made it a secret, but few had the ears, few had the eyes. Those in Bethlehem who would have actually heard his infant cries ignored him. Those in Bethlehem who would have walked oblivious under the star never saw the angels. They had no time for this child inauspiciously born in a stable. And so what of us? That's an appropriate place to conclude, isn't it? Having seen what happened in Bethlehem, where does it leave us thousands of years later? You see, we can be distracted by the flashing lights and the presence of a winter festival, devoid of wonder. We can be robbed by the loneliness and pain that often comes at this time of year. It can be that on Boxing Day that life continues as if nothing has happened. The birth can be loudly celebrated and ignored for yet another year. The promised baby born in Bethlehem, you see, we know that he grows up. We know that he dies. We know that he comes back to life. We know that he becomes the savior and judge. And things will never be the same after Christmas. We cannot pretend the baby was not born. We cannot pretend that Emmanuel, God with us, didn't live and breathe and die and rise again. We fail to hear and we fail to see. We reduce Christmas to anything less than the moment when the Son of God became a man so that men could become sons of God. So, I guess for us, I would say, do not allow us, even for a moment, to be so close to a celebration, but so far from our Savior. Let us pray.