Sermon Tone Analysis

I love this time of year.

I think it’s starting actually earlier and earlier, but I love this time of year.

There are some really distinct things about this time of year,

that prey on those areas of fond memories in our minds and in our hearts.

I’m 41 but I can remember going to Christmas services with Niki and her family.

And then we would go out and look at Christmas lights afterwards

and then get home.

Her dad would have these jumbo shrimp and we’d all sit around and talk.

Then you get a bit older and all that this time of the year affords,

it all kind of comes around full circle.

But, listen, we cannot deny that there is a cultural shift around this time of of the year.

Something happens in a cross culture fashion.

Even lost people, no matter the music genre a person listens to.

Whether you like folk stuff, rap stuff, hip hop stuff, rock-n-roll stuff or easy listening,

wherever you are, in the scope of things,

in the scope of things,

this time of year (all of a sudden) everybody’s radio programming shifts.

There’s lights on houses, there’s fake deer in the neighborhoods.

Chandler, M. (2007).

Christmas.

In Matt Chandler Sermon Archive ().

Village Church.

There are all sorts of things that begin to occur that happen at no other time.

The house changes and even the food we eat shifts.

I mean all of a sudden we’re eating food that you don’t eat any other time of the year.

Nobody on Thursday night goes,

“Candied yams.

That’s what we’re having tonight.

We’re going to get yams and put marshmallows on the.

Green bean casserole!

We’re smoking a ham, it’s Tuesday.”

Nobody does that.

There are certain things that we eat this time of year that really

throughout the rest of the year

we probably don’t get near them.

And so you’ve got the presents and the trees and yards decorated and food and music that makes us nostalgic.

You’ve got all these thing that start happening.

It’s one of the weirdest shifts culturally that we have.

And I love every bit of it (except the traffic in Mereville).

I really do.

But here’s my fear, and it’s not a Christmas fear to be honest with you, it’s just a consistent fear that I have for us.

And my fear is that for

all the tinsel in the trees, for

all the presents and the pomp, for

all these lights and family coming in and

Chandler, M. (2007).

Christmas.

In Matt Chandler Sermon Archive ().

Village Church.

food to be eaten, for

all this stuff that we’ve got going on,

for all the shadows, if we’re not careful, then we’re going to miss the form.

And if you see the shadows but miss the form, then when everything’s said and done,

you’ve got Tuesday afternoon.

You’ll have more trash than normal,

you’ll have a little more debt than normal and

You’ll have more trash than normal, you’ll have a little more debt than normal and you’ll have a dirtier house than normal.

you’ll have a dirtier house than normal.

But besides that, that will be just what you have.

If you empty this thing of depth and

you stay on the surface, as the rest of our culture does,

because the culture has no real room for Jesus.

This speaks right into a text of Scripture from ’m going t read a extremely familiar verse and a couple of very unfamiliar verses.

7 "Then she gave birth to her firstborn Son, and she wrapped him tightly in cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them.”

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Then the unfamiliar verses: 34 "Then Simeon blessed them and told his mother Mary: “Indeed, this child is destined to cause the fall and rise of many in Israel and to be a sign that will be opposed—35 "and a sword will pierce your own soul—that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.””

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It’s an important part of the teaching of the Christmas accounts.

It’s a very important part of what the Bible teaches about Christmas, and

it’s seldom brought out and looked at in an undiluted form

the way I want to do this morning.

People seldom look at the full account because it seems like a downer,

even though it isn’t.

That is, the Christmas story tells us Jesus Christ came to be rejected.

Everything about this chapter in Luke is foreshadowing.

Luke is not simply a reporter, though

he’s certainly telling us accurate things about how Jesus was born.

He’s also a teacher, and he’s showing us Jesus Christ came to be rejected.

So on the one hand, you have this very famous place I mentioned.

It says, "While they were there, the time came for her to give birth.

Then she gave birth to her firstborn Son, and she wrapped him tightly in cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them.”

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Why does Luke bring that out?

He’s shut out.

Here’s Jesus Christ at the very beginning, shut out.

Doors barred.

Manger.

Out in the cold.

No room.

Then we read again 34 "Then Simeon blessed them and told his mother Mary: “Indeed, this child is destined to cause the fall and rise of many in Israel and to be a sign that will be opposed—35 "and a sword will pierce your own soul—that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.””

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Jesus came to be rejected.

Jesus came to get people mad at Him.

Jesus came to reveal hearts and have people speak against Him.

Jesus came to be barred.

Jesus came to be shut out.

Jesus came to be rejected.

Why?

It wasn’t because He loves rejection.

There are people who look for rejection, and the reason they seek rejection is it makes them feel important.

He wasn’t seeking rejection but He came knowing He was going to be rejected.

I would argue, that if you don’t understand why He was rejected and

the implications of that rejection,

then you don’t understand Christmas.