If you would, take your Bibles and turn with me to the Gospel of John chapter 1. John chapter 1 and we will read verses 1 through 18. John beginning with verse 1. 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 nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to bear witness of the light that all through him might believe. He was not that light, but was sent to bear witness of the light. That was the true light which gives light to every man who comes into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believed in His name, who were born, not of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God. and the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory the glory as of the only begotten of the father full of grace and truth john bore witness of him and cried out saying this was he of whom i said he who comes after me is preferred before me for he was before me and of his fullness we have all received and grace for grace. For the law was given through Moses, but the grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten son who is in the bosom of the father, he has declared him." I think we are all aware of the various views that Christmas people have about Christmas. We know that people have many different ideas, and we could divide them up, I guess you would say, in this way. First of all, there are children who look at the Christmas lights, they see the trees, Santa, all the mystical magic about Christmas. It's a very fun time for them, anticipating excitement for that day, like no other time of the year. It's a time that they desire to receive gifts. And then there's teenagers who look at Christmas as a time, first of all, to get out of school, have some time to where they can spend time with their friends and go to parties and get a new wardrobe, electronics, and even bigger gifts. But still to them, it's about receiving gifts. Now most adults, of course, see Christmas as a time of family and friends being with one another. And of course, They also try to find, quote, the right gift, the perfect gift for the right person. And they, of course, desire for everything to be perfect, and they're upset if things go wrong, not according to what their plans were. And, of course, there are businesses who see Christmas as a time to deplete the inventory, to increase their profits with their year-end sales so that they might be able to finish in the black. So those are some of the various views that people have at this time of the year. But even in the church, there have been various views. There have been much disagreement throughout church history pertaining to Christmas. Some reformers see Christmas as the start of the church calendar, with the event season, the advent season, setting the tone for the cycle of the church calendar. Of course, after you have the Advent season, then you would have the Passion of Christ, then Good Friday, and Easter, Ascension, and then Pentecost. Of course, the Puritans avoided any observation of these days. They believed that celebrating Christmas would leave people to hold it as a special day above all the other ordinary Sabbaths. And they believe that celebrating such a day would lead to worldly activities and bring great abuse and dishonor to Christ and his church. And these, of course, are very legitimate concerns. Some reformers celebrate what is called a modified church calendar, which would be different from the Lutheran and the Roman Catholics. Of course, they hold to the church calendar, which designates every single Sunday with certain events, but they hold to, some reformers, the modified church calendar, and they warn people not to abuse the church calendar by thinking that Christmas or Easter or Pentecost are more special than the regular Sabbath. As Paul exhorts us in Romans 14, five through 12, that we're not to esteem a day greater than another day. And there's a danger in exalting one day above all the other days, because we know that all the Sabbaths are to exalt Christ. But we see that many have erred in that, and they exalt days above the others, and that's why some people don't darken the doors of church except on these special days. I'm glad that's not the case in our church, but there are those when the pastor gets up to preach on Easter, he normally says, I won't tell you Merry Christmas because I won't see some of you till Christmastime. That's sad that that happens, but that does happen. And the reason for that is because certain days have been exalted and people think, well, those are special days, we're gonna go to church on those days, but the other time of the year, it's not that important that we go to church and we know that they're wrong in such thinking. But many reformers today hold to the fact that it's a good custom to follow the church calendar, of course, a modified church calendar. And if you don't bind the custom, then don't become legalistic in that, then therefore it's good to do such. You must not be like, of course, the religious leaders of Jesus' day who did such. So therefore they used a church calendar to emphasize the major events of Christ's life, beginning with his birth, and then his life, beginning there in Bethlehem, through his life, all the way to his death, burial, resurrection, and ascension. Now most Christians don't realize how often the incarnation of Christ is mentioned throughout the New Testament. Of course, we know it's mentioned there in Matthew and Luke, as we looked at last week, and they give us the historical setting, but there are a number of references that speak of Christ's advent throughout the New Testament. not only in the Old Testament. We see that Paul speaks of it in Romans 1, 2, and 3, which he promised before through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures concerning his son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh. And then he goes on in Romans chapter 6, verse 23, for the wages of sin is death. But what? But the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. And then in Galatians 4, 4 and 5. But when the fullness of time had come, Jesus sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And then Philippians 2, 6 and 7. who, being in the form of God, did not consider robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking on the form of a bond-servant, and coming into the likeness of men. I could read other passages. I won't. If you want to jot them down and look at them later, you can. 1 Timothy 1, 15-17. Colossians 2, 9-10. Titus 3, 3-7. Hebrews 2, 14. 1st John 5 11 all speak of Christ's coming and then of course we all know John 3 16 for God so loved the world that he sent His only begotten Son So we say quite clearly that God has pointed out the incarnation of Christ throughout the New Testament And we have to remember that. That we don't celebrate Christmas just once a year, that we celebrate the Incarnation of Christ throughout the year. Every time we gather to worship God, we are celebrating Christ's coming as the gift of God. Now, if you take away the stable, the manger, Joseph, Mary, Bethlehem, the shepherds, the angels, The wise men, the star, what would you have? You would have John's account of the birth of Christ. What we just read a moment ago that is expressed there in chapter 1, verses 1-18. There are those who think that you cannot have the Christmas story without these features, such as Bethlehem, the manger, the angels, all of that, but they're wrong. I mean, this is exactly what John is saying here. John is summing up the Christmas story, and he sums it up quite clearly in four words. What are those four words? The word became flesh. That sums up Christmas. And that's what we need to meditate on and think upon. I mean, here we have the most profound truth ever written. Even more profound than what the other Gospels record, which records about the stable and the manger and Bethlehem and the stars and shepherds and all those other things. I mean, the reason why we celebrate Christ's birth is found here this is the real story not that these others are not the real story no they're the historical story what we have here is the biblical truth we sang just a moment ago in singing hark the herald angels sing probably one of the most profound verses of any hymn i don't know if you recognize that or not In heart, the herald angels sing. Verse two, Christ by highest heaven adore, Christ the everlasting Lord, late in time behold him come, offspring of the virgin womb. Veiled in flesh the Godhead sees, hail the incarnate deity. Pleased in flesh with us to dwell, Jesus our Emmanuel. I mean that is the Christmas story. God in flesh coming to dwell among man. So this morning I want us to look at the Christmas story from the Gospel of John and see the wonder of it all. See the majesty of Christ being born of the Virgin, coming into this world and bringing about the salvation of His people. First of all, look at what he says there in verse 1, "...and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us." Now this, again, is the meaning of Christmas. God has come into the world. And we must understand that. That God sent His Son, as we've looked at, born of a virgin, in the person of Jesus Christ. And these verses are full of a particular truth about Christ, His incarnation. They are the utmost importance for the Christian faith. I mean, this is especially important for us today, even among false religions and cults. Because many false religions and cults even seek to esteem Jesus to a certain point, They will say, well, we even esteem him more so than Christ or Christianity because we do not have him suffering and dying on the cross. We esteem that he was a good man, that he did good and wonderful things, but we present him in a better picture than Christians even present of him. And therefore we need to understand the gospel so that we might be able to defend the faith. I mean there is a crucial point that must be made clear to false religions and cults so that we might understand the difference between us and them and be able to speak the truth to them. I mean, John explains to us this glorious truth concerning Christ as the Word being made flesh. I mean, His desire is for us to see Him for who He is and understand who He is so that He might be received as Lord and Savior. That's why He wrote His Gospel. as we saw last week the angel told joseph you shall name him what jesus why because his name meant savior he shall save his people from their sins and the old testament teaches that he is the messiah that he is the christ and this was the title that he was referred to he was the long-awaited king of the jews who would give victory to his people and bear the government of the world upon his shoulder. Remember when Andrew brought Peter, his brother, to Jesus? Remember what he said? He said, we have found the Messiah. And John adds the words in his gospel, which means Christ. So he understood that we found the long-awaited one, we have found the Messiah, even though he did not fully comprehend what he was even saying, because in their mindset they had a particular understanding of the Messiah and what his work would be on earth, and it was not that which eventually Christ accomplished. So the person John speaks of these verses in his gospel about Christ, and he refers to the names of Christ, which carries tremendous meaning that He is the Savior and the King. Now, the Word exists as God, and was with God, the Scripture tells us here, before the Word came into the world. It says there, in the beginning. Now, what is He talking about there? In the beginning. Well, He's talking about in the beginning of the world, before the creation of the world. What? The Word was there. So we see that before anything was created, the Word existed. That's why we call Him the Eternal Son of God. And we know that there are those that reject that He is eternal, especially cause. They say, He can't be eternal. Well, you ask them the question, well, is the Father eternal? And they have to answer that question, yes. Well, the only way a father can be eternal is to what? To have an eternal son. So we see quite clearly that He is the Eternal Son, He is the Word, as John points out here. So therefore, we must press upon them this phrase that he's using here, and there's two phrases, that the Word was with God, and the Word was, what? WAS God. So, they simply don't believe the truth they don't believe the scriptures they say you can't have it both ways either he was God or he was with God he can't be both is what they will try to tell us but we have to point out to them the scripture is quite clear on what it's speaking of here to escape the truth of these two sentences some of them will actually change the translation and they will put an A in there and they'll say well in the Greek there's not a definite article which shows their ignorance of Greek. Now, I know our Greek professors here, those that are studying Greek, they understand. Probably Pastor Tiago already explained to them why there's not a definite article here. There's good grammatical reason and in the context for not having the definite article. So it's speaking of God. So therefore, the Word was with God and the Word was God, not a God. That's a bad translation. It's a false translation. Now what verse 1 is teaching us is that one thing we know for sure, and that is that before He was made flesh, before He became the God-man, He was fully God. and that the Father also was fully God. So we have what? Two persons of the Trinity. We know there's one more person, and that of course is the Holy Spirit. So it's pointing to the Trinity, and we worship God. We worship God the Father, we worship God the Son, and we worship God the Holy Spirit. So three in one. And we see that before he became flesh, John calls him the Word. There in verse one. Now why was he called the Word? because calling Jesus the Word, or Logos in the Greek there, points to His identity so that His readers might understand what John is speaking of here. Both the Jews and the Greek understood the Word. Of course, they understood it in two different ways. There was Jews that understood the Word of God as being a very important concept. Throughout the Old Testament, God had revealed Himself how? By speaking, he spoke to his people. The Lord spoke as we've gone through Genesis, what? The Lord spoke to Adam and Eve, and we see later on that God spoke to Enoch, then he spoke to Abraham, he spoke to Noah, he spoke to Jacob, he spoke to Isaac. We see that time and time again, God spoke to his people, and God revealed to his people by speaking. speaking who He was and what He required of them. And the Jews knew that the Word of the Lord was revelation, that it preceded from God. Over and over again in the Old Testament it says what? Thus saith the Lord. Who's speaking that? Well, usually it's a prophet, right? And the prophet comes to his people and he says, thus saith the Lord this, thus saith the Lord that, and they listened and they took it as the word of God. And we know they took it as the word of God because it was recorded and we have it before us. So when the Jew thought about the power of God, or thought about the will of God, or the mind of God, or the purpose of God, or the design of God, or the plans of God, it was all embodied in the Word of God, never separated from the Word of God. So we're told that God spoke all things. And God spoke what? The world into existence. We see that in Genesis as well as in Psalms 33 9. which says, for he spoke, and it was done, he commanded, and it stood fast. So we see that the very Word of God brought everything to existence. And we see the same thing with the Word of God that we read. That it was, as Paul tells us, speaking to Timothy, that it was God breathed. So these are the very words of God. So John adapts this terminology to first of all, identify with the Jew. And John is saying, if you want to see the word of God, if you want to know the very creative power of God, then look to Christ, look to Jesus. Here he is, the Logos, the word. Now the word Logos itself is very unique, but yet common. in the Greeks' mind. I mean, they saw the Logos as an impersonal force which came from God. In other words, whoever the God is, they didn't look at it as God as we look at it, they looked at it as an impersonal force, impersonal being responsible for bringing all things about. And they saw the word proceeding from this force. It brought all things into existence. And many of the Greek philosophers wrote about the Logos. Plato called it the power of creation, the tiller by which God stirs all things, the intermediator between the world and God, the priest which sets forth the soul before God. Now again, that's a little G there when he talks about the force and God. So John is saying to the Greek, by using their same terminology that they used for century, he says you have thought about the Logos, you've talked about the Logos, you've written about it, you've discussed it, you've philosophized about it, all these things, and here I submit to you is the Logos, Jesus himself. We see the same thing today. You know, the evolutionists have just fallen apart. Most people no longer hold to evolution. So what have they moved to? They've moved to what is called intellectual design, intelligent design. Well, that's the same thing that the Greek we're talking about. An impersonable Being one that they have to admit that something has created all things So therefore they say whether is this something and of course, they're not going to go what to what scripture says that God created it thing So they're just gonna say whether this this impersonal being this force Created all things so in using this terminology Logos, he's addressing both the Jews and the Greek and he says this is one eternal This one is equal to God. He's one with God. He is the eternal one because He is God. Now also, this is John's way of emphasizing the very existence of the Son of God for the sake of communication. First and foremost, He exists and has always existed from all eternity to communicate. And He communicates, first of all, with who? With the Father. Before time, before the beginning, He was face-to-face with the Father. The Trinity was face-to-face with one another. And they needed no one. God in His grace and in His mercy and in His wisdom decided to create man. God did not need man, but He chose to create man to show forth His glory. So we see that God Himself existed in perfect harmony in the Trinity, and He communicated with one another. The Trinity was communicating the love of one another, the knowledge of one another. But yet, definitely important to us is that the Son of God became the divine communicator to us. So in summary, he's calling Jesus the word to imply that God is the expressible communicator. He himself. As he said, if you have seen me, Jesus said that, what? You've seen the Father. So he's making it very clear that he came to communicate to us who God is and what God's will is. Now second, all things were made, it says, through Him there in verse three. All things were made through Him and without Him nothing was made that was made. So we see from the very beginning He was there and Christ Himself made all things. He is the Creator. And there's at least two reasons John says this about the Word. First of all, it underscores that He is God. When we think of God, we immediately think of what? the Creator. I mean, God is the originator of everything, and He explains all things. So when John says, all things were made through him and without him nothing was made, it means that he's God and he was not created as false religions and cults seek to say. Matter of fact, Paul says in Colossians 1.16, for by him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or power, all things were created through him and for him. So everything was created what for him for his glory to bring glory and honor to himself And we see also The second reason is found there in verse 10 when he says He was in the world and the world was made through him and the world did not know him So we see the point here seems to be undermining the seriousness of the world's guilt in their blindness, the greatness of the world's evilness in rejecting Christ as the Son of God. I mean, He comes to us as the Word, He comes to us as the Creator, as the Maker of all things, and what? The world still did not receive Him. So as we see, next they remained in darkness and the third thing the word was life in him and that life becomes what the light of men as it says there in verse 4 in him was life and the life was the light of men so all life originates with the word now this is obvious because he's what The Creator of all things. But here the focus is primarily on spiritual life. In other words, there's two overwhelming problems that men, women, and children have. They are spiritually dead and spiritually blind. And John is saying Jesus is the remedy to those two problems. He is, what, the life? And He is the light that we need. And later on in John 5, verse 21, he says, the Son gives life to whom He will. In other words, He does that for man which man cannot do for himself spiritually. I mean, what did He do for Lazarus? We know that Lazarus died. He'd been in the tomb for over three days. And Jesus stood outside the tomb and he said to the dead man, Lazarus, come forth. If Jesus would not have said those words, would Lazarus have ever come forth? Well, we know the answer to that. No. Jesus brought him forth, and we see that picture of physical resurrection pointing to spiritual resurrection. Christ does the same thing. A man is dead in his transgressions and sins, and Christ says to him, come forth, and he arises and comes forth. So how does that life given by Jesus relate to the light that he speaks of? Well, it relates to it in two ways. First, it enables us to see. When dead men are given life, he sees. Scales are removed from his eyes. He is now able to see that which he did not see. He could not see the glory of Christ. He could not see who Christ was. He could not see how precious all that God has given us is. He could not see that Christ is the treasure. But when the scales removed from his eyes, he's able to see. So therefore, to change the image, we could say that he is, as the scripture says, born again, born from above. And when a man is born again, what does Jesus say to Nicodemus? That he'll be able to see. So spiritually speaking Jesus told Nicodemus truly truly I say unto you unless one is born again he cannot what see the kingdom of God he doesn't understand the kingdom of God he doesn't desire the kingdom of God he doesn't desire the things of God why because he can't see You can do anything in your power to try to get him to see, but he's not going to see until what? Until Jesus allows him to see, causes him to see. So first Jesus gives him life, and then that life becomes light. Now the question is, have you been made light? The ability to see spiritual reality. Do you see the things that are truly important as far as speaking about spiritual things? Now, the second way that the life Jesus gives relates to light isn't that it enables us to simply see, but that Jesus himself is the light that is seen. We see the glory of Jesus. We see that He is the one that is the precious Savior. He is the one that has saved us. And we delight in Him. We long for Him. We want to serve Him. And He came and went into the darkness. The light shone forth. I don't care how dark it gets. You know, last Tuesday they said was the darkest night in 500 years. Now, I don't know how they know that. But somehow or another, they know it. I'm not a scientist, I don't study astrology and all that other stuff. But they said it, last Tuesday, the darkest night in 500 years. But you know what? If you're out there hunting, it got dark, and you took your cell phone, and you just hit the screen and it lit up, guess what? You could be 300 yards away, and what? You see that light. That light, what, penetrates the darkness and shines forth. And we see here that the world was in darkness and Christ came as a baby and shines forth in the darkness. Now, again, we in our lost estate were blind as unbelievers to this truth. We didn't care about Christ, we didn't care about serving Him, we didn't care about the Lord's daily, we didn't care about doing what the scripture says as far as our sanctification is concerned. We had no desire for those things. We may have done those things because we wanted to look good in other's eyes, or we may have done them because we knew if we didn't do them, the result of what our parents would do to us. But we had no true desire, we had no true understanding of the worthiness and the glory of Christ to where we would worship Him. So when John says, in Him was life and the life was the light of men, he's probably pointing out that the power to see spiritual splendor and the splendor seen. So when God opens our eyes, We're able to see the spiritual splendor, spiritual things, and the splendor that is seen. And that's why it says there in verse 14, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and what? And we beheld His glory. You cannot behold the glory of God without it changing you, making an impact upon your life to where you live for Him. If there's no change in your life, if there's no impact, then you have not beheld His glory. You don't understand His glory. You don't understand why He came and died for your sins. See, John says in John 8, 12, I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life. So one who follows after Christ will no longer walk in darkness. He will walk in the light. So the Word made flesh has life in Himself, and that life becomes light unto men. And we see that quite clearly elsewhere in Scripture, that we are called to be the light of the world. We are called to go out and penetrate the darkness with the gospel, proclaim the gospel, be in His messengers. Now finally, what is our response to all of this revelation about Jesus, the Word made flesh? one response we see here in the scripture there in verses 10 through 11 when it says he was in the world and the world was made through him and the world did not know him he came to his own and his own did not receive him well one response is i do not know him and i do not receive him and that was the response of majority of the jews i mean the son of the highest was here in the lower world. That light was in this dark world. That holy thing, Christ Himself, entered into this sinful, polluted world filled with sinners. He left His throne of glory for this world. this miserable, sinful world. I mean, he came to this miserable, sinful world to reconcile this world unto God, and therefore was in the world to satisfy God's justice so that we may discover God's favor, His mercy, His grace upon us. So he was in the world, but not of it. I mean, the greatest honor that this world has ever had placed upon it, which was the Son of God, born to the Virgin, incarnate in the flesh, the One who created all things, subjected Himself to create a thing. I mean, He subjected Himself to Mary's womb. I mean, God could have put Christ in Mary's womb as a fully developed baby at nine months, ready to be born instantly. But God didn't. God put Him there at the very beginning of a pregnancy. And He developed for nine months in the womb. I mean, He was inside the womb of Mary, the one that God had created, Mary, He put the eternal King of Kings who humbled Himself inside the One that He had created Himself. I mean, that's something that is mysterious to us, but I mean, that's something that's glorious. I mean, think about that. God created all things. The Word created all things. And the very One that God created, Mary, He submitted Himself to, He humbled Himself to become flesh and was placed inside the Virgin so that He may humble Himself to be born of the Virgin. I mean, how sinful this world is when it says the world knew Him not. I mean, the great creator, the great maker, the great ruler, the great redeemer of the world was here and few of its inhabitants were even aware of it. And when King Herod was made aware of it, what did he decide to do? Destroy it. Of course, King Herod had the power to do it. Many others wanted to do it. The religious leaders of his day wanted to do it, but they had no power to do it. That's the reason why they deceived the rulers of that day to bring it about, even though Powlett wanted nothing to do with it. He yielded to the political pressure and allowed it to be accomplished. I mean, they did not know him, did not bid him welcome. They did not build him welcome because they did not know him. They did not know him. because he did not make himself known to them in the way that they expected him to make himself known to them. They had their preconceived ideas who the Messiah would be, how he would come here on this earth, and what his kingdom would be like. They expected all of that and when Christ came and it wasn't all of that, they were thoroughly disappointed and therefore put him to death on that cruel cross. And people continue to reject this Jesus today. Now a lot of people accept a Jesus, but it's not this Jesus that they accept. There's a lot of people in church today that say they worship Jesus, but they don't worship this Jesus. They don't worship the Jesus that was born of the Virgin. They don't worship the Jesus that lived the perfect life here on this earth. They don't worship a Jesus that died on the cross and suffered for his people's sin and was resurrected on the third day and ascended to be with the Father. They don't worship that Jesus. They worship a Jesus of their imagination. You say, well, how in the world can you say such a thing, Pastor? I look at the world. And I look at how most people who call themselves Christians live. They've not been changed by this Jesus. They have a Jesus that they keep in their pocket. They have a Jesus that they look upon as their genie. When they get in trouble, they pull him out of their pocket and they run and say, well, get me out of this messed up situation. It's not a Jesus that they bow down to in worship. It's not a Jesus that they humble their self to. It's not a Jesus that they submit completely to and seek to follow day in and day out. They reject the true Jesus because they reject His teachings. I mean, His teaching is what? No man can come after me and what? Unless he dies, dies daily to himself, unless he crucifies himself, he cannot be my disciple. He cannot be my disciple unless he gives up everything and follows me. that I'm more important than father, mother, sister, brother, and yea, even His own self. I have to be the utmost. I have to be the one that you will worship, not just on one given day out of the year called Christmas, but that you worship Him every day. But you join His people on the Lord's day to worship Him. because you know that that's what He has prescribed in His Word. And you do all that He would command you to do. And what is that? Well, we have the wonderful pattern of the Ten Commandments. And we delight in the Ten Commandments. And we break it down, of course, to we love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and we love our neighbor as ourselves. And why are we able to do that? Again, because we have seen the light, we have been changed by the light, we have come into the light and therefore we love the light and we want to fulfill the light and live for Him because we know that brings glory and honor to the Messiah. But there's this response other than the one of rejecting Him there in 12 and 13. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believed in His name, who were born. But how were they born? Not of blood, or the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. We know there are no grandchildren to God. They're all His children. Just because a mother or dad converted doesn't mean their children will be converted. It has to be God birthing us into His Kingdom. He came unto His people. He came unto His lost sheep. He came to the house of Israel. For it was He who owns His sheep. And though most of the Jews rejected Him, His own did not. His own did not reject Him, but yet they worshipped Him. And even though there are many who profess Him here on this earth, even though they do not receive who He is, because they will not depart from their sins, and they will not have this one reign over them, even though they profess to be a Christian, we see quite clearly they're not a Christian because of what the Bible says. But the true Christian receives Christ. and believes upon His name. To believe upon His name is to assent to the gospel discovery, to consent to all that the gospel calls us to, to consent to the gospel's proposal, all that the gospel proposed to us concerning Christ. I mean, His name is the Word of God. His name is the King of Kings. His name is the Lord of Lords. His name is the Lord of Righteousness. His name is Jesus, our Savior. And to believe on His name is to acknowledge that He is who all of these names proclaim Him to be. And therefore, we submit to Him. And secondly, Believing in Jesus's name is receiving Him as the gift. Receiving Him and all that He has taught in the Scriptures about His Heavenly Father and what it means to be a Christian. We receive it, we don't reject it. Whatever the Scripture says to us, we say, I'll receive it by faith. Because what? Because the Scripture has said that those who are born of God will live for. Have you believed in His name? Have you submitted to Him in all things? I mean, if this has happened in your life, then you understand the meaning of Christmas. If it hasn't, I pray that today it would happen so that this would be the best Christmas that you've ever had or ever will have in receiving the Christ who has come in the manger. But not only to the manger, He lived a perfect life and went to the cross and died for the sins of His people and was resurrected and ascended to the right hand of the Father to be the mediator of His people. That is the Savior. that John is speaking of. And may we worship Him this day. Let us pray.