Sermon Extras

So this is Christmas…. Week 1

INTRO> The word Advent comes from the Latin word meaning “the arrival” During this season of Advent the church does 3 things:

• • • • We look back to see what God has done.
      • We look around to see what God is doing.
      • We look ahead to see what God will do.

Underneath all of this is a profound and essential doctrine of our faith, it is the word incarnation.

• • • • The incarnation is the union of divinity and humanity in the God man Jesus Christ. That is to say that, the eternal Son of God became “flesh”.

APP> As I have thought about this profound truth this year, it has hit me differently. I keep having this question pop up in my mind when I think about God coming to us…. “Why would God want to come here?” I mean think about it, if we are honest there is a real brokenness in this world. Just recently on Facebook I asked peoples opinions, from distance, disease, death, distrust and division everybody is feeling the tension. You see, there is a profound truth that this advent season can teach us and it’s a tension that we don’t like to hold:

• • • • • Advent forces us to face the darkness of this fallen world and the depth of God’s love for it.

*ILL> I think this can best be summarized by a NYT times article written in 2017. The article talked about the poorest country in the Arab world, Yemen. Yemen has suffered from an ongoing civil war for years. The NYT times intervened a man by the name of Yakob, who was a solider who hadn’t been paid in for his services in 8 months and his six year old daughter was dying from malnutrition, he was waiting by her side at a clinic and said, “Were just waiting for doom or for a breakthrough from heaven.” That’s it! That’s Advent!

APP> So again, “Why would God want to come here?” Well, that’s going to be our guiding question over these next few weeks and I don’t know a better passage that with it’s surrounding context that could help us with this than Isaiah 6

CONTEXT> The context of the passage is set in the first verse, “King Uzziah Died..” We know who this King was (PIC) He ruled for Twenty-Five years! Israel was prosperous the most at that time and he is gone! Everything that was stable has now become unstable (Sound familiar?) Then Isaiah gets this vision…. Of God on the throne… see the context here? But the thrust of the passage is found in what the angels are saying in verse 3… “Holy Holy Holy is the Lord of Hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory!” which actually reads.. “may his glory fill the whole earth…”

APP> Well, how is he going to do this? Well the passage actually tells us down at the end of verse 13… “The holy seed is it’s stump…” If you know anything about the bible… that word seed should recall something…

• • • • “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” Genesis 3:15
      • “In the same region there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them; and they were terribly frightened.” Luke 2:8-9
      • “And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.” Luke 2:13-14
      • “Isaiah said these things because he saw his glory and spoke of him.” John 12:41

APP> Why would God want to come here?

Big Idea > To reveal his glory in Jesus Christ.

APP> So what does this mean for us now? On this side of the first advent? On this side of the promise? On having even a fuller revelation of God’s glory than Isaiah did? How do we apply this?

1. God’s glory shines brightest in the dark.

“In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up…” Isaiah 6:1

2) God’s glory reveals our sinfulness.

“And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” Isaiah 6:6

3) God’s glory is seen in the cleansing of our sins.

“Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” Isaiah 6:6-7

APP> So many of us feel like we are wandering around in the dark… keep going towards the light!

Alexander Mclaren was a scottish pastor who preached on this passage to his congregation in the late 1800’s….

“Let me recall to you what I have already insisted on more than once, that the perfecting of this vision is in the historical fact of the Incarnate Son. Jesus Christ shows us God. Jesus Christ is the King of Glory. If we will go to Him, and fix our eyes and hearts on Him, then losses may come, and we shall be none the poorer; death may unclasp our hands from dear hands, but He will close a dearer one round the hand that is groping for a stay; and nothing can betaken away but He will more than fill the gap it leaves by His own sweet presence. If our eyes behold the King, if we are like John the Seer in his rocky Patmos, and see the Christ in His glory and royalty, then He will lay His hands on us and say, ‘Fear not! Weep not; I am the First and the Last,’ and forebodings, and fears, and sense of loss will all be changed into trustfulness and patient submission. ‘Seeing Him, who is invisible,’ we shall be able to endure and to toil, until the time when the vision of earth is perfected by the beholding of heaven. Blessed are they who with purged eyes see, and with yielding hearts obey, the heavenly vision, and turn to the King and offer themselves for any service He may require, saying, ‘Here am I; send me.’”

Big Idea > To reveal his glory in Jesus Christ.