Advent Joy Luke 2:8-14
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Advent—Gift Exchange
Trading Sorrow for Joy
Intro: When a baby is born we want to our family and friends. It was not too long ago that you had to call everyone. Now you can send out a group. Text with a photo and it’s donee.What kind of ways have you done or seen birth announcements or celebrations? Cigars? Cakes. You can print up postcard announcement with all the statistics in a creative way.
Why do we want to tell everyone that this small baby we waited for 9-10 months to arrive even though we are exhausted from lack of sleep and the physical labor that it takes to deliver the baby? Because the baby brings joy. He or She brings happiness. Even though kids are expensive and they don’t listen and they require attention, and love
Read Verses:
Main Point: Jesus Brings Joy to the World
I. The Messenger is Sent (8-10)
As Luke closes chapter 1, the baby Jesus is born and then the scene shifts from the guest house that Mary and Joseph were in to the shepherds are in the fields and all of a sudden this angel appears. Of course every time an angel shows up people get scared.
Angels do a good bit of work in Luke’s Gospel and they are God’s form of Birth announcements. First Gabriel brings news to Zechariah about John the Baptist. Luke writes “Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great before the Lord. . . and he will go before him to make ready for the Lord a people prepared for him.” ()”
Then Gabriel goes to Mary to announce the pregnancy and birth of Jesus.
We see the Joy between two future mothers, Elizabeth and Mary when they visit each other.and Luke records that even The unborn John the Baptist leaps for joy in .
Just as Jesus’ birth would bring joy, so did John’s. This joy was not just a personal feeling but the eschatological joy brought by the arrival of the messianic age (2:10; 10:17; 24:41, 52).
Many will rejoice because of his birth. “Birth” here means the coming on the scene [of the Messiah’s forerunner]. Clearly Luke did not see John the Baptist as bringing a negative message that stands in contrast to Jesus’ “good news.” On the contrary, he brought the joyous announcement of the awaited eschatological hope of Israel!
As Luke sets the stage with the messengers and the angel delivers the message to the least of the people.
Application: Jesus Brings Joy because God has Come to Restore His Kingdom.
Verse 9 is gives a key when Luke tells us That the Angel of the Lordappeared to the shepherds and the Glory of the Lord shone around them.
Normal people don’t get a messenger or herald to announce where they are going. And angels appear for important aspects of the story. God doesn’t send Gabriel around just for run of the mill jobs.
The incarnation of God the Son fulfills all of the promises and expectations of theOld Testament.
The messiah fills one of his three roles which is the office of King.
Christ’s kingship over his people or the Church relates to the spiritual realm, which produces our salvation.
Christ is the head of the church as Paul references in Ephesians and and 2:19
The kingdom is both present and future. The Spirtual reality is developing i our hearts and our lives as we are moving though sanctification and becoming more like Christ. It is future because we know that Christ wil return at the end of the age to establish the new heaven and new earth.
II. The Good News is Delivered (11-12)
This statement works in both ways because Jesus has arrived, he has been Physically delivered
But it also to whom the message of the good news is delivered. Shepherds were not the most favorite people in the first century. Shepherds were generally viewed as dishonest and unclean according to the standards of the law. They represent the outcasts and sinners for whom Jesus came. Such outcasts were the first recipients of the good news.
The angels announce the arrival of the messiah, a savior, Christ the Lord.
And The angel gives a sign, basically if you want proof go into Bethlehem and find the baby in the manger.
Application Jesus brings Joy to the World because he is the Savior
This title of Savior is applied to God in , in Mary’s song, (ESV): 46 And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
but its use here of Jesus is prepared for by 1:69 (cf. ; ). There is a sense in which this statement is not only Christological in nature, explaining the nature of Christ, and who he is, but also anthropological, for it says that the Gospel’s readers, both past and present, are the kind of people who need a Savior!
The shepherds were the people who were judged outside the law or unclean. Jesus healed people who needed to be healed because they had a physical ailment, but also because they were deemed unclean as well.
In the other birth narrative in Matthew says 1:21 an angel tells Joseph
Matthew says 1:21
"She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."
It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.
"For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost."
and they were saying to the woman, "It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves and know that this One is indeed the Savior of the world
It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.
TS: We are saved because of Christ’s work on the cross and that brigs us ultimate joy and peace.
III. The Savior Brings Joy and Peace (13-14)
At the delivery of the Gospel message an entire heavenly host appears before the shepherds to praise God
Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”
We should give glory to God in Heaven for coming to earth to save us. Glory to the father for sending the son.
“Peace” refers here to the fullness of blessing which the Savior/Christ/Lord brings and is essentially a synonym for salvation (cf. ) Peter explains the Good news to the Gentiles in starting at verse 34
(ESV): So Peter opened his mouth and said: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, 35 but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. 36 As for the word that he sent to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ (he is Lord of all), 37 you yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed: 38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. 39 And we are witnesses of all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, 40 but God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, 41 not to all the people but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42 And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. 43 To him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”
Application Jesus brings us Joy because we no longer have to be at odds with God
The truce has been declared and worked out. The New Covenant has been made between God and His people. As we saw last week, His people consist of Jew and Gentile alike. People who were on the outside are now on the inside.
We will have sorrows here on earth, but they are temporary. We know when we get to heaven we will have ultimate Joy. And we can live our life on Earth knowing tat our true joy and peace are in God.
Whenever times are tight or tough we know that it is temporary. You can have joy because God is either sanctifying you and teaching you to rely on Him. James tells us that “Count it all joy my brothers when you meet trials of various kinds for you now that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete lacking in nothing”
Each of us have to shift our focus just from the physical realm to the spiritual realm, this kingdom of God
Conclusion
We do not know what our children wil be when they grow up. We hope and pray that they will be successful, and do something that they enjoy and that God has called them to do in and for His Kingdom.
One article sums up the Joy that we can have in the Story of Jesus like this:
“The baby born in Bethlehem was born to die in our place. He went to the cross and received the wrath we deserved for our sin (). He died to purchase the joy the angels announced at his birth. And three days later, he rose from the dead, the firstborn of all who would follow him. He appeared to his disciples and showed them how all of the Bible was pointing to him — the baby born in a manger, the preacher of good news, the Son of God crucified on the cross, the King who conquered the grave, the Joy of the world.”
Closing Quote In his sermon on , Charles Spurgeon closes and says “May God give you peace with yourselves; may he give you good will towards all your friends, your enemies, and your neighbors; and may he give you grace to give glory to God in the highest. I will say no more, except at the close of this sermon to wish every one of you, when the day shall come, the happiest Christmas you ever had in your lives.”