Well, before we turn to scripture, just a very quick word about what's going on tonight. A sermon on the Incarnation at the beginning of September on Labor Day. I don't have my holidays mixed up. I understand what's going on. We've worked through the Shorter Catechism with a series of evening sermons earlier in this calendar year. And for various reasons, number 22 was skipped. So if you go to the YouTube page or the sermon audio page, you can listen to sermons on, I believe, 1 through 26, with the exception of Shorter Catechism 22. And with a mind like mine, I just cannot abide that. So tonight is a good evening, a holiday evening, to remedy that situation. But it's also because with the end of the year coming back into place, we'll be moving back into the series through the shorter catechism, picking up, I believe, with number 27. But tonight, we'll look at number 22. which is a summary of the incarnation of Jesus Christ. I'll read the summary. How did Christ, being the Son of God, become man? And the answer is Christ, the Son of God, became man by taking to himself a true body and a reasonable soul, being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary and born of her, yet without sin. And I want to read some verses from those texts in the bulletin, and I'll be reading more after the sermon itself as the conclusion. First, though, not often enough thought of as a text to read on Christmas, and is more, I guess, precise to say it's about the incarnation. John 1, 1 through 3, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. And then the book of Philippians. Chapter two, just five through eight for now. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Let's pray together. Father in heaven, we just pause one more moment. We have read of The Son sent by the Father, we now appeal to the Holy Spirit to bring to bear in our own lives these words, mysterious words, wonderful words, words of good news, gospel words. Bring them to bear in our hearts and minds and to linger with us throughout today and even throughout the rest of our lives. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Well, it is September 1st, 2024, and though you may have not yet paused to think about this, what September 1st, 2024 means is that in a matter of moments, or at least in a matter of what feels like just moments, it will be Thanksgiving. And then, of course, all of the hustle and bustle will lead to Christmas. So perhaps this isn't as off the mark as a sermon to come to the incarnation as Christmas will so soon be upon us, just with the busyness of life. And in thinking about that, September bringing me already to thoughts of Christmas, seeing that we should look at shorter catechism number 22, which is about the incarnation I realized two things. First was, I don't mind the word Christmas, but I wish it was celebration of the supernatural incarnation of the second person of the Trinity, the eternal son of God. But I realized that doesn't have quite the concise ring to it. And then I started thinking a strange question, and I almost went on from it just thinking it's not profitable. I started thinking, what's the opposite of Christmas? You know, we have Christmas, but what would the opposite of Christmas be? What would life with no Christmas be? And then I realized that C.S. Lewis kind of covered that in the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, but I kept with this question and thought eventually that there might be something more to it than just a sort of odd question that had hit me. the opposite of Christmas? What's the opposite of Christmas? And I think as we come to this answer in the incarnation, as we come to celebrate the incarnation and consider it, we can begin here looking first at a consideration of the opposite of Christmas, and then go on as the second point of the sermon to since Christmas, you know, since the incarnation, since the conception and birth of Jesus Christ. And I think what, well, what I hope to accomplish is that by spending time on those two points, we make it to a conclusion where we can hear the New Testament testimony of the incarnation of Jesus Christ. I hope that the two points will sort of lead us to, in a fresh way, in a new way, just considering what the various human authors of the New Testament say specifically about the incarnation. So it would be a different sort of conclusion, one that will have more scripture reading than we had before the sermon began, but I hope it will be helpful for all of us as we consider this question and answer number 22 for the Shorter Catechism. What's the opposite of Christmas or what would life be like if there was no Christmas since we're not in Narnia and we're in this real world here? What would it be like without Christmas, without the incarnation? And I think what we have to begin with is just sort of even a consideration before that, that this world is not. We always struggle to say this because God's in control of all things, but we recognize that there's so much about this world that could be better, and then we recognize that's the understatement of the century. We realize that so much is broken, that we don't live in the best of all possible worlds, that without too much effort, we could conceive of a world that's better, and we're not God, so why is this? Why is it the way it is? Why are things broken? Why are news reports devastating? Why do news broadcasters just feed on negative information and pound it home to us, and it is there for them to find? And it's interesting. I heard another pastor say this, and I thought it was very helpful. He said, you know, without sin, the Bible would be four chapters long. You would have the first two chapters of Genesis and the last two chapters of Revelation, both of which are about paradise. But because there's the fall in Genesis chapter three, you have this whole story of redemption that is necessary because God's creation, the image bearers of God, have insisted on not only plummeting into sin, but staying in that sin. And the story of the Bible is one of grace, good news, salvation, not just sin, but Savior. Not just a bunch of sinners that we read about in all the different Old Testament and many of the New Testament accounts, but the one sinless man, the Son of God, Jesus Christ himself. But for a moment, consider that that not being the case. That there's just the sin part. No, and the Savior. Galatians 4.4, we'll come back to this later, but it says, in the fullness of time, Jesus Christ sent forth his Son, born of the woman. If it wasn't for God's grace, there would be no waiting for the fullness of time, no need for an Old Testament, because that hope of the Savior, the Messiah, just wouldn't be there. It would never come. The whole Bible would only be the chapters without Galatians 1 and 2. Well, maybe Genesis 1 and 2 would be there, but the end of Revelation wouldn't be. Sin. Sin without Savior. Can you imagine? I actually think that when I ask that question, can you imagine, that the answer is no. because this world is absolutely full of false religions, false ways to attain some sort of salvation. I think sin and being made in the image of God is so devastating that if we don't come to truth, if we don't come to the true and living God, if we don't come to salvation and hope, we'll make up a reason for hope, which is why there's just so many false religions and ideologies, philosophies, ideas. But we can look at history before Christ. We can look at history outside of Israel, and Israel gets an awful lot wrong too in the Old Testament. And if you remember back on just studying ancient history, you'll recall words that I feel like become euphemisms, pillaging, plundering, exile. If you study ancient history, if you study before Christ, outside of Israel, it is a non-stop saga of enslaving, kidnapping, exile, stealing, pillaging, rape, exploitation, Sacrifice that includes child sacrifice. It's actually a stunning thing to stop and think that we think in terms of World War I and World War II. But before that, it was just a world often full of wars. Man going to war against man. The sort of slavery you find in the New Testament was one empire enslaving the people of the empire next to them. Not love your neighbor, certainly not love your enemy. Go attack your neighbor. Kill the strong men. Enslave everybody you can. This was one of the hardest things for me to hear, just to consider human history on my own. I was studying the Roman Empire. And the lecturer, not a Christian, said, if you want to understand what slavery was like in the Roman Empire, think about the relationship that your car plays in your life, your automobile, your means of transportation. And that's exactly how a Roman slaveholder would think of his human slaves. Property, equipment serves a good end. I'll use it as long as it lasts. Discard. Just to go one step further on that, because it mentions crucifixion. I also learned during that same lecture, if one slave rejected the owner, insurrected, fought off his shackles, every slave, children included, would be crucified. The Practice of breeding slaves to sell their children as slaves was common. Sin without a savior. Dark. Sin. Death. The opposite of Christmas. We'd have to think about those practices just to fight off neighboring armies, neighboring people. And thank God we're not left without the incarnation. And I think it's just helpful to consider these things as a worldview, not just what scripture says, but human history. Since Christmas, you know, this other point in the sermon that's actually full of hope, not the opposite of Christmas, but since Christmas. And these are Statistics, I know what Mark Twain said about statistics. He said, and it's often true, he said there's statistics. He said there's lies, big lies, and then there's statistics. And there's a lot of truth to that. You can take statistics and often construe them to tell a story that isn't quite accurate. At the same time, I think you'll recognize some of these things and resonate with some of these things. According to so many studies, life expectancy is higher now than at any time in modern recorded history. The child mortality rate is lower than any time in modern recorded history. We don't hear as often about a mom dying in childbirth or the child dying as well. More people are wealthier, better fed, literate, educated than ever before. Believe it or not, wars are less than what they've been in the past. Famine. especially since fertilizer is a lot less than it was in the past. Global poverty is a fraction of what it was even a century ago. And we're all aware of technology having so many challenges, so many bad things associated with it. But isn't it remarkable that the good news is just a few clicks away, that multiple versions of the Bible are probably right now in your pocket, that you can listen to great preaching and teaching And not just that, you know, information available to people who it just wouldn't be available to elsewise. Business, starting a business, making money is something that's easier for each person regardless of where they live in this world because of the prevalence of the internet and access to it. And I'm not saying, you know, all of that's because Jesus Christ came into the world, but I do believe that those things that we can rejoice in and be thankful for have so much to do with the fact that Jesus Christ was born, became a man, and lived a life. I believe that that really is the reason we can contrast the way things are now where we see dignity in human beings, where we don't treat them like property. It's not acceptable to do that in our circles. And we respect even personality and a sense of humor and dignity and worth and are concerned and will often say things that a human life is more valuable than any amount of money. Well, that's just not something a Roman slaveholder could ever say. He would think that was crazy. I think it testifies that there was a dramatic change that came into this world. I think our calendars testify to it. I love this. I have to admit that I smirk every time I see BCE in any book, which stands for Before Common Era. Instead of saying before Christ, you use the same thing pretty much at an eon, before common era. Because it just raises the question, well, why was it the Common Era? You recognize, as a secularist, everything changed around this time, but you don't want to mention Christ's name, so just call it the Common Era. Well, I'm not quite sure that's an insult. Our calendars still have Christmas in them. They still cry out to a watching world. There's something, there's something about the birth of a man still worshiped as Christ. Something about that. Something about that that brings people to, at least in the United States, take lights, as many as they can get their hands on, and light up the darkness. Isn't that remarkable? He said, I am the light of the world, John 1, 1 through 3. He's shown in the darkness? We divide history before Christ, after Christ. And you can't ignore something called the New Testament when you do that. That's a remarkable thing. I already mentioned this verse and I'll mention it again in the conclusion, but Galatians 4.4, in the fullness of time, God sent forth his son born of a woman. Well, building up to that fullness of time is the Old Testament. That's exactly what the Old Testament is. And then the Old New Testament begins with the conception, incarnation, birth of Jesus Christ, which we read about in the four gospels. And at the end of them, in the beginning of Acts, that same Jesus Christ ascends up into heaven, and in chapter two of Acts, sends the Holy Spirit down. And now you're starting to say, well, it's not just before Christ, after Christ. We have to bring the Trinity into this because God sent forth his son at the fullness of time. His son was born the incarnate in flesh, son of God named Jesus Christ. Then he ascended up into heaven and sent down the Holy Spirit. And that's why there's a common error. I mean, before Christ and after Christ. He sent his Holy Spirit down, and you have the beginning of something called church, at least as we know it. New Testament church, not Old Testament animal sacrifices, altars, tabernacle, temple, synagogues. You have a New Testament church, it's new. The old has passed away, the new has come. You can't put old wine in new wineskins. The new wine that he makes in Canaan, the church age organized in those early chapters of Acts, planted place after place throughout the rest of Acts, and then throughout the rest of the New Testament, letter after letter, opening up the significance of the incarnation, life, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of the Christ. who is still on December 25th of all of our calendars. So that today, when we meet for worship, even at this time, we recognize Christians, those who call themselves by the name of Christ and go to worship and call upon his name, have been meeting across this globe, not every single person who has ever lived, but certainly in every time zone. People have said, I'm a Christian, today I worship this man, Jesus Christ. And it's been going on for century after century, millennium after millennium, so that it's very helpful to think in terms of before Christ and the year of our Lord, Jesus Christ, anno domine, which it is right now, 2024. The calendars before Christ, after Christ, The New Testament itself, the beginning of church, the continuation of the church, brings me to a point I want to make about conspiracy theorists. The greatest conspiracy theorist is one who can look at all of that evidence, testify to through history, testify to through the calendar itself, testify to in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. by the church of all ages, by numerous confessions and creeds, and saying, it's all hogwash. There's no God. There's nobody behind this. Jesus was just a man. He was a good teacher. That's all he was. He died and went to his grave like the rest of us do. Everything Christian, the church of all ages, every church is just At its core, because of a conspiracy theory, a bunch of people got together and somehow made this up. All the New Testament authors got along with the information in the Old Testament and tossed out a New Testament somehow within, you know, the same century. And it took root. And even though Jesus was dead and he didn't rise again, he was just a mere man, all these different things happen. That's a conspiracy theory like I have never even gun to have read or heard. It's beyond me, I can't believe it. And I want this, if nothing else has, to just drive home to you the incarnation. I'm gonna read seven passages, all from the New Testament. But here's what's remarkable. This is by at least five different authors, human authors, at least five different human authors who are talking in Trinitarian incarnation. Jesus Christ is not just man, but God. Jesus Christ is not just man, but Savior. Jesus Christ is not just man, but the Son of God, the eternal person of the Trinity. They have all that in common. They do not conflict whatsoever. They all tell the story of the incarnation, and they all did it in the first century, around, you know, just years after Christ had ascended into heaven. What would it take to get five people to agree on anything, let alone the intricacies of incarnational Trinitarian theology about the eternal Son of God. Matthew chapter 1, verses 18 to 23. Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband, Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which means God with us. Next reading is the beginning of the Gospel of Luke. Just so you can hear it this way, not necessarily because it abbreviates anything. I'm just going to read what Gabriel says. I think it's great to hear his whole speech as a unit. In Luke 1, 26 through 35, we read, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Gazareth to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And Gabriel came to her and said, Greetings, O favored one. The Lord is with you. Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David. And he will reign over the house of Jacob forever. And of his kingdom there will be no end. The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God. In the Gospel of John, the first chapter, I've already read some of it, but I'll reread that part. I won't read every verse here, but as it focuses on the incarnation, I'll read those verses. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and darkness has not overcome it. The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into 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, and his own people did not receive him. But all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory. Glory is the only son from the Father, full of grace and truth. For from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, the only God, who is at his father's side, but he has made him known. Galatians 4, which I've referred to, this is on page 1156 Bible, if you're following along. Yet a fourth, unique, different human author, this time the Apostle Paul, not Matthew, Luke, or John. When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law. to redeem those who are under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. Philippians 2, five through eight, just a few pages over. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant. Being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. One more from the Apostle Paul, Colossians 1, 12 through 20. It's page 1168. Give thanks to the father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He, that is the beloved son, is the image of the invisible God. the firstborn of all creation, for by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things. And in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent, for in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of the cross. And finally for now, assuming Hebrews isn't written by the Apostle Paul, we come to a fifth human author, Just read the first four verses of Hebrews. Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs. There isn't a mere man, not one, that I have read the equivalent of any one of those passages about. Not one mere man, not one passage. The fact that you have five different authors in the same century, only decades after Christ ascends into heaven, agreeing entirely on the eternal nature of Christ that he is sent in the flesh at a moment in time, out of which comes the New Testament and the Church Age and these five human authors testifying to the entire sequence of events. It's beyond what I'm able to believe. To not see, we have good reason to think of human history as before Christ and now year of our Lord. Jesus Christ. I think I'm at the point where I go a little bit further. It's not since Christmas things have changed for the better. It's because of Christmas. Because of the incarnation. Because Christ, the Son of God, became man by taking to himself a true body and a reasonable soul, being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and born of her, yet without sin. Let's pray together. Father in heaven, thank you for so loving the world that you sent your only begotten son, Jesus Christ, thank you for being so rich in the splendor of heaven but becoming poor for our sake so that we, through your poverty, might become rich. Holy Spirit, how we rejoice to know how involved you were with the incarnation and that you are involved with us, each of us, personally as believers in Christ. You bring us to your word. You work faith in us. You illumine our minds. You renovate us from within. You indwell us. You make us temples of God in Jesus Christ. And you dwell among us as God's own people. We thank you for saving us and not leaving us in our sin. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.