Sermon Tone Analysis

Hark the Herald

Joy to the World

Once in Royal David’s City

Unto us a boy is born

In John 1:14 he says that the ‘Word became flesh and dwelt among us”.

Dwelt means living; so He lived among us but the root of the word is tent or tabernacle.

He tabernacled among us.

The Tabernacle was a special place in the Old Testament especially during Israel’s journey in the desert.

It was the place where Moses would go in to talk face to face with God.

If no one can see the face of God and live then who was it that Moses spoke face to face with?

Was it, by any chance, the pre-incarnate Jesus?

Even so, God does not live in tents or tabernacles for He fills the whole earth, the whole universe and beyond.

According to Hebrews 1:3, He upholds and sustains all things with His powerful Word.

This is the Word who was with God, the Word who was God, the Word who was in the beginning.

John, of course, is using Genesis 1 as a template to start his gospel: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth; In the beginning was the Word.

John says of the Word that He is the light of man for He was also the Word that said “let there be light”.

He is the source of light.

The Word is the creator.

The Word became flesh; He took on human form and human nature and became like us, literally becoming flesh as we are flesh.

The flesh is weak; it is vulnerable; it has needs.

Flesh needs food and water to sustain it along with air, along with clothes to cover it – without these things the flesh soon dies.

Flesh also feels, it can feel good, it can feel bad.

We only need to stub a toe, get a paper cut to know our flesh feels.

So, to say that “the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us” is to say that it was no longer just Moses who had seen God face to face.

But in becoming flesh and living among us He took on not only our physical form and our human nature—that He became a man—but also that He took on the entire human condition, and He shared with us our weakness and our vulnerability and our neediness and our mortality.

The only difference between us and Him was that He did not sin.

Jesus comes as the Word made flesh to redeem us by living in the flesh but not according to it.

He showed us a new and better way.

So, the strong Word became weak.

The sovereign Word became vulnerable.

The Word of fullness became needy.

The living, eternal Word died.

And the Word of God did this without ceasing for a moment to be the Word who was with God and the Word who was God.

Fully God and fully Man.

He did all this for our salvation.

The Word took our weakness to make us strong.

He assumed our need so that we could become full.

He became poor so that we might become rich.

And He died so that we could live.

Ultimately the Word has come so that we will receive spiritual bodies, so that we will be redeemed from our weakness and our mortality and our vulnerability, and we will have resurrection bodies that will live forever just as Jesus does; resurrection bodies that are full of the Spirit.

There is more to the story of the birth of Jesus than what first meets the eye.

That the God of the Universe, the One who created it all became like us to redeem us from the flesh and our fallenness.

Jesus was called the light of the world.

What needs light except those in darkness?

We are trying to feel our way through this dark world.

The darkness has a name: sin.

Sin is like an inherited disease and we are born in it and because God is light, brilliant light, unapproachable light, light so white sin is so offensive to God who is holy; He cannot bear to even look at us tainted as we are and has passed the just sentence of death upon us.

The light who had come into the world as a child at Christmas was rejected and put to death.

While Jesus was dying darkness came over the whole land for 3 hours.

In a mysterious way He took upon himself all our darkness; that is, all our sin.

And God the Father cannot look on sin.

And Jesus felt this as abandonment.

All because of us.

God gave His Son to solve a problem.

He did not want us to die without Him in hopelessness, so He sent His Son to take our punishment.

He paid for our sin with His death.

And to prove that He had actually achieved this, that the words on the cross: “It is finished” were true is that three days after dying on the cross Jesus rose from the dead defeating darkness; defeating sin; defeating death.

Now he wants to do an exchange with you.

You give him your darkness…and he will give you his light.

You give him your sin and he will give you his righteousness.

And then He will come and live within you.

He will tabernacle with you.

Sounds like a great deal, a great gift, a great present to receive at Christmas for this is the reason for our celebrations.

Jesus was born at Christmas to grow up and die for all of us so that we could be reconciled with God and have peace and hope this Christmas.

And our hope is not just for now for we do not yet have our spiritual bodies.

We continue to live in the flesh, but because “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”—because He assumed our condition and lived a sinless life—He enables us by His Spirit to live lives in the flesh that are yet lives according to the Spirit.

And one day we shall be taken to tabernacle with Him in Heaven forever.

Could it be that there is someone here who does not yet know Jesus?

Trust in Him today and He will come and live within you and give you eternal life.

For those who have received Jesus we have such a promise to be fulfilled ahead of us:

May the desire of God also be ours.

Silent Night

Benediction

May you be filled with the wonder of Mary, the obedience of Joseph, the joy of the angels, the eagerness of the shepherds, the determination of the magi, and the peace of the Christ child.

Almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit bless you now and forever.

Amen.

Bibliography

https://www.keepbelieving.com/a-christmas-benediction-2/

[Accessed 24/12/18] John Armstrong Benediction

Meditations on the Life of Christ.

(2016).

Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press