Sermon Tone Analysis

Well I hope at this point all your Christmas shopping is done, or maybe just as done as it is going to be.

I wonder how many of you embarked on a quest this year…a quest to find the perfect gift for someone.

You’ve heard that expression before, “I’ve found so and so the perfect gift” or maybe you have said it yourself…maybe you are sitting there tonight optimistic, perhaps even overly confident that you have done it…you have braved the malls and shopping areas like a suburban Indiana Jones.

You’ve jumped over speeding shopping carts, darted in and out of people obliviously standing in the aisles talking on their phones, you’ve made it to the front of the long checkout lines…you are amazing and you know it.

Hopefully this describes none of you in here, but some people just go absolutely nuts trying to find the perfect gift.

Like the lady who when trying to beat out other customers for a discounted video-game console, did what any sane person would do.

She pepper sprayed the fools who got in her way.

Or as one store employee recalls three grandmothers getting into a fist-fight over a single Furby toy for their respective grandchildren.

For those too young to remember, a Furby is an electronic "pet" that was, for a brief period, the most sought-after holiday gift in the world.

To get their hands on one, the women got into a "full-on brawl, rolling around on the floor, kicking and punching."

Or the time when it was an hour before a mall was scheduled to close on Christmas Eve and violence erupted at a kid's clothing store between two angry customers, one of whom pulled out a gun.

The police were called and the mall's stores were put on lockdown, but many of the customers weren't afraid for their lives, they were just "angry they were unable to finish their shopping," recalls one former mall employee.

As he tried to get customers to lie on the floor and cover their heads, he says, "one woman yelled at me to finish her transaction."

But, allow me to let you in on a little secret...you are not giving someone the perfect gift this year.

You see, playstations break…diamonds get lost…hoverboards burst into flames…and yes, even ponies one day…well, you know.

We want that perfect gift to meet a need, meet a desire, and have a huge impact on someone.

But in reality, material things have a hard time living up to those expectations.

Don’t get me wrong…giving gifts is good and joyous and loving…and special.

But, its all fleeting in some sense.

But, when God gives a gift...it is by its very nature the perfect gift.

So tonight, I want to share with you why Jesus is God’s perfect gift to us.

To do that, I’d like to focus on: Luke 2:8-20

Joy for the Outcast

I think its important we understand who these shepherds were.

The reality is, we tend to go off on extremes when talking about the shepherds.

In one sense we tend to romanticize them.

Look at our nativity plays and nativity sets…how many little boys get a pillow case draped over their head and a staff put in their hand and then be told to stand there and smile?

But then on the other extreme, the shepherds get a really bad rap.

In fact, I’ll admit I’ve preached with that emphasis before.

We read in commentaries and other sources that Shepherds were rough men.

They lived outdoors among the sheep.

So, physically they were dirty, and probably had quite an odor about them.

Because they lived that way, they were considered ceremonially unclean according to the Mosaic law.

They were just one notch above lepers in the social strata of the time…their testimony was not admissible in court.

But to be perfectly honest, there is very little biblical or historical support for those statements.

Hatred for the shepherds really comes from two primary sources…Aristotle and the Babylonian Talmud.

Neither source can really give us a good idea of shepherds in 1st century Israel.

Aristotle lived 300 years before Jesus…and he lived in Greece.

Yes, he wrote horrible things about shepherds but it is both chronologically and culturally far removed from Bethlehem.

The Talmud was Jewish…but it was complied 200 years or more after Jesus’ resurrection.

So again, its far removed from the time period.

So, what were these guys really like?

Well, all we can do is infer from the Scriptures…and here is what we can infer...

They were hard working men who lived among the sheep.

They led them to feeding areas, protected them from predators, and care for them.

Since they lived among the animals, they lived outside of the city walls.

They were outsiders…they were poor…they were dirty...

Were they absolutely despised and seen as subhuman?

No, probably not.

Were they clean and tidy like the little boys in the plays?

No, not that either.

What the Bible is clear about is that these shepherds were the only recipients of this message that night...

That God decided to bring this announcement to these men.

By definition they were outcasts…they didn’t live among normal society.

They did jobs no one wanted…they worked hard…and were generally forgotten.

Yet, on that night they became the recipients of news that could only be described as purely joyous.

And I wonder whether you ever feel like the shepherds…outcast, marginalized, forgotten.

You ever feel like the world and time is rushing by you at lightning speed and you are left standing still?

Whether that is you or not…you probably know someone that feels that way.

And the message the angel brings to the shepherds…this good news of great joy…is still as good and joyous as it was 2000 years ago in a field outside of Bethlehem.

It really is the perfect gift.

Just think, without this revelation by the angel to the shepherds, the birth of Christ would have gone unnoticed.

Bethlehem was asleep…they had rejected this poor pregnant woman and her husband and forced them to give birth in a dirty, dark stable.

This time of the year, there is a lot of talk about gifts being rewards for good behavior…but when God’s gift is different.

I want to focus on verse 11 in particular, as the angel describes exactly who this child is.

Luke 2:11

Unto you…the angel means you the shepherds!

Outside of Jesus’ own family, the only people who knew he was born were the lowest class of people…outcasts…but the verse before says it was good news for all the people, this refers specifically to the people of Israel, but Simeon’s prophesy reminds us that Jesus is not just God’s gift to the Jews, but to the entire world.

Jesus is the perfect gift because he is the provision, the promise, and the power.

Let’s see how verse 11 shows him as the provision, the promise, and the power.

So, lets look at verse 11 a little more closely.

First, the angel says Jesus is a Savior.

If you have ever sinned against God you need a Savior, like it or not that includes everyone in this room.

To really appreciate the need for a Savior, you must understand the danger you are in.

The angel said to Joseph

Matthew 1:21

Only God can forgive sins against God.

That is why God sent the eternal Son of God into the world, because he is God.

That’s why Jesus said, “The Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.”

Therefore, a Savior was born.

Next, he is the promise.

The angel said he is Christ.

Christ is the English for Christos, which is means “anointed one,” which is the meaning of “Messiah.”

This is the one long-predicted, long-awaited, the one anointed above all others (Psalm 45:7).

The final anointed King to sit on the throne of David.

This is why we have been examining the Christmas story through the lens of the promised Son of David over the last 4 weeks…Jesus is the promise of the covenant God made with David.

2 Cor 1:20

He would fulfill all the hopes and dreams of godly Israel.

And more, so much more.

Lastly, he is the power.

Not only is he the Christ, but he is Christ the Lord.

The ruler, the sovereign, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father.

The Lord of the universe.

Isaiah 9:6-7

Jesus is God in the flesh.

Remaining what He was, He became what He was not in order to be our salvation.

As JI Packer put it, Christ “was not now God minus some elements of his deity, but God plus all that he had made his own by taking manhood to himself.”

Jesus is our provision, the promise, and the power of God for our Salvation.

He is Emmanuel, God with us.

My friends, tomorrow many of us will be giving and receiving gifts.