Christmas Should Cause Us To Rejoice In Christ Our Savior

We're going to look at two passages of scripture this morning. The first one

I want us to turn to is Isaiah chapter 9. Now, both of these passages will be very familiar scripture for you, things that are read many times over the

Christmas season. Sometimes, you know, Christmas events and cantatas will be centered around some of this, but I want to look at a passage in Isaiah 9 which talks about the coming

Redeemer, and then we're going to go and look at the first chapter of Luke this morning.

But Isaiah chapter 9, we have one of the, I don't know that you could say better or anything like that per se, but in my view, in my opinion, this is one of the passages that is prophetic about Jesus Christ that I appreciate personally more than, not necessarily more than some of the others, but just more among the ones that talk about Jesus.

And in verse 2 of Isaiah 9, it says, The people who walk in darkness will see a great light.

Now you're going to notice what's to me is very beautiful about scripture, the harmony and consistency of scripture, and how

Jesus Christ fulfills all prophecy. You'll see some of the things that Jesus says about himself.

You'll see in this passage, Jesus called himself, he said, I am the light of the world. We see in John chapter 3, how it talks about light comes into the world, and men love darkness rather than light because light exposes their sin.

There's a lot of language in scripture that uses the contrast of light and darkness.

That is why it's so vitally important, not just as a preacher of word or teachers in Sunday school or any type of teaching you do, whether it's to your children or in a

Sunday school or wherever you find yourself, that we draw application.

Application is how we take what the scripture is teaching us and how it applies to us.

And in the application of scripture, we see Jesus himself using the sometimes mundane, sometimes very ordinary things of life to make a point.

People use things like metaphors. People use object lessons.

People use situational things like, and then you'll have things like something that we all deal with every day, light, darkness, morning, night.

You can use that to make a point or draw application. So we see this use of light and darkness all through scripture.

It says the people who walk in darkness will see a great light. What do we know about those who walk in darkness through walking in sin?

Those that are in need of light, in need of a savior. It says those who live in the land of the shadow of death, the light will shine on them.

And we know from New Testament fulfillment that this light that the people need to shine on them is

Jesus Christ himself. He says, I am the light of the world. It says you, and this is looking forward and looking to Christ.

This you is Christ. This you or your language that you will see here is talking about Jesus.

You shall multiply the nation. You shall make great their gladness.

They will be glad in your presence as with the gladness of harvest, as men rejoice while they divide the spoil.

So the gladness and the joy that comes from being in the presence of the

Lord is greater than any other human experience. While we are not with God face to face at this present moment in time.

It is very true to say we have come into the presence of God. We have enjoyed and experienced the full presence of God in the sense of us being saved and having the dwelling spirit.

Notice it says, verse four, for you shall shatter the yoke of their burden and the staff on their shoulders, the rod of their taskmaster as at the battle of Midian.

Now in Isaiah, there is also the literal understanding of what's being said.

We understand that the people were in bondage and this is also in a sense pointing to the time when their rescuer would come.

You see a lot of this language when we're in the book of Lamentations and there's all this language being used about how we will be in bondage and captivity for 70 years but then there will be a rescuer that will come and someone that will come and free us from this and that has a very literal fulfillment because it's dealing with what was going on but there's always the ultimate fulfillment that we see and we know this to be true because of how the

New Testament writers utilize Old Testament scripture. They'll take

Old Testament scripture which may at the time may have been talking about a people and what was going to happen to them in history but then they'll take that scripture and apply it to Jesus Christ as the ultimate fulfillment of all of it.

So in ultimate sense, he is the rescuer, he is the redeemer, he's the suffering servant, he's the one that comes and rescues his people.

So when it talks about how he will shatter the yoke of their burden, it's no mistake that Jesus Christ comes on the scene and says, take my yoke upon you.

My burden is light. The yoke of their burden and the staff on their shoulders.

They used a lot of this imagery in this time because they did a lot of farming and they'd have the cattle with the yoke and you had a lot of shepherds with sheep and there was good loving shepherds and there was bad shepherds.

If you're under a bad shepherd as a sheep, you had a rod being used to smack you and hurt you and be rough with you and Jesus is like,

I'm the good shepherd. I'm the one that if I do discipline or if I do correct, is done lovingly for your good.

And I love my sheep. I would lay down my life for my sheep. So it says the staff on their shoulders, the staff on the shoulders of the unsaved is the staff of sin and that burden of carrying sin, knowing you can't fulfill the law.

You can't become righteous. You need someone to rescue you from walking in darkness, rescue you from the shadow of death, rescue you from this sadness and this lack of peace that you have.

It says this one will shatter that yoke, will shatter that burden, will take that staff off their shoulders, take that rod from the evil task master of sin for every boot of the booted warrior in the rumbling of battle and cloak rolled in blood will be for burning fuel for the fire for a child will be born to us.

A son will be given to us and the government will rest on his shoulders or be on his shoulders.

We see this phrase here fully realized and come to fruition, if you will, when

Jesus commissions his disciples and tells them all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

The government of this world literally rests on Jesus because he alone is equipped and capable of carrying it.

It says his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

Now we could spend the whole rest of the sermon developing and looking in the ways in which

Jesus Christ does all these things, but the one I want to pick out in passing, notice that it refers to him as the

Prince of Peace. We covered this in Sunday School. We talked about how you have peace with God through Christ.

Micah talks about the one that would come from Bethlehem will be our peace. You have rest.

You have quiet. We have peace with God because of this one, this child, this son that is coming.

It says there will be no end to the increase of his government or of peace, meaning there is no end.

When Jesus Christ says all authority is given to me in heaven and on earth, and I am the Lord and Master of this universe, there is never a time when that will come to an end.

Except as 1 Corinthians tells us, when the kingdom is ready, he will, Jesus will present it to the

Father. But all authority rests on Jesus on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore.

From the time in which Jesus declares all authority has been given to me, you shall go now and make disciples from then forevermore.

Jesus Christ reigns. He is the ruler. He is the king, and this will never change.

And it says the zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this. It is considered in scriptures to being a set fact, something that cannot be altered or changed.

It will happen and nothing can stop it. And so what a beautiful prophecy, what a beautiful picture of what is to come.

So if you'll turn to Luke chapter 1, Luke chapter 1, we now will see, which at that time was real history being carried out in real time, we look back to it and read about what happened.

For the people in this time period, when this happened, this was real history happening. This was real people, real places, real fulfillment of all these things that have been prophesied.

And so we see the beginning of the gospel of Luke in chapter 1 and verse 1, it says, in as much as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things that have, notice, the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, handed them down to us.

Notice right away that these are eyewitnesses.

And when they use the language here from the beginning, it's not talking about the beginning of time, the beginning of creation.

When they utilize this language for the beginning, they're talking about the beginning of the Christ, when he came into this earth and in the incarnation, was born at Christmas time, and was born in Bethlehem.

From the beginning of when his ministry began, he says, we're, meaning myself,

Luke, also Theopolis, and all the apostles.

And we read that when Jesus resurrected, he showed himself to more than 500 people.

I mean, at one time, there were untold number of eyewitnesses to the resurrected

Lord. He says, we're eyewitnesses. We're not making this up. No different in today's world.

If a crime goes down or something goes down, what do police value more than any other piece of evidence?

Eyewitness account. It's one thing to go collect gun casings or look at fingerprints or all these different things that can give you clues as to what happened or what might have happened.

But if you can get an eyewitness and say, I was there, I saw it with my own eyes, and I can tell you exactly what happened, that's more valuable.

We don't have to rely on people that say, well, you know, I heard that so -and -so's sixth cousin that might have lived somewhere around there, heard that this village person talked to the cook, talked to this person.

And he said, this is my wife. Might would have happened. No, we have direct eyewitness testimony because they were servants of the word.

He says, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated or followed everything carefully from the beginning.

So we remember from the beginning when Luke came into contact with Jesus and began to follow him from that Luke was a guy that was a historian, a writer, a doctor, an investigator.

So he was in the gospel of Luke, you get a little bit more detail than you might would in other gospels because of the type of person he was.

He says, I investigate everything carefully to write it out for you in orderly sequence, most excellent

Theophilus. So he's saying, I've been investigating this. I've been writing out what's been going on, putting it in an orderly way.

Why? So that you may know the certainty about the things you have been taught.

So I've been teaching you all these things. And I want you to know with certainty that these things are true.

These things actually happened, that Jesus is real. And so then we're going to skip over this next section.

Verses 5 down through verse 25, it deals with the prophecy of John the

Baptist and his birth and all that. And so then you get down to verse 26 and it says, now in the sixth month, the angel

Gabriel. Now this is the same angel in the section we're not going to read.

But when the angel went to Zachariah to tell him that his wife Elizabeth was going to have a son, it was going to be

John the Baptist. He identifies himself as Gabriel. So think about how cool it must be to be

Gabriel the angel. You not only get to tell Zachariah about the birth of John the Baptist, and we see in there fulfillment of the book of Malachi when it talks about how the one that will come before the

Savior will pronounce his coming, all of these things, and that's a sermon for another day.

But you get to tell Zachariah about this. But then you get to tell

Mary about Jesus coming. If he did anything special, or if God just said,

I'm choosing you for this task, or, you know, how do you, if you're an angel in heaven, how do you get in line to sign up to be able to do that?

You know, and I'm being, you know, somewhat playful here with it. Obviously, God specifically chose

Gabriel for this purpose and assigned him with this. But how cool must it have been to be the one to get to herald all this?

And so it says a six -month angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth.

Verse 27, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was

Joseph. Now, notice the use of the language of virgin, and it makes it very clear.

I mean, I think it's Matthew 1 .23 that makes this very clear, that this person, that it was prophesied back in Isaiah 7 about how the young maiden, the young virgin would have a child.

And now we see the fulfillment of that, that the virgin that has the child is Mary, the mother of Jesus.

It said the virgin's name was Mary. And coming in, he said, Gabriel says to her, greetings, favored one, the

Lord is with you. Now, how interesting is it that the one that Isaiah speaks about, the one that all

Old Testament prophecy speaks about, they say the one that comes, our Redeemer, will be called

Emmanuel, which means God with us. God literally tabernacled among men.

God is with us. And how interesting is it that when this angel tells

Mary about what's going to happen, he says the Lord is with you. She's very perplexed.

She ponders. The angel says to her in verse 30, don't be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the

Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give him the throne of his father,

David. Now, notice the consistency here. You don't have to turn there.

I can just read it for you. But remember back in Isaiah 9, where we started, verse 7, it said, there will be no end to the increase of his government or of peace on the throne of David and over his kingdom.

The throne of David belongs to Christ. And he says

God will give him the throne. God will give him the throne of David. He will give him the authority.

Notice it says he will reign. This is verse 33 of Luke 1. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever.

And there will be no end of his kingdom. Notice once again, the angel

Gabriel saying this now, but we have Luke under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, applying

Isaiah 9 to Jesus Christ, because notice Gabriel said, the

Lord God will give him the throne. Verse 33, he says he will reign forever and there will be no end of his kingdom.

Isaiah 9 said of the one that has come, coming, verse 6, a child will be born to us.

He's telling Mary about the child that's going to be born to her. The son will be given to us. The government will rest on his shoulders.

He'll be wonderful counselor, mighty God, eternal father, prince of peace. There will be no end to the increase of his government.

Notice says on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on to forevermore.

Just like Gabriel is telling her there will be at the end of verse 33 in Luke 1, he says there will be no end of his kingdom.

Clear, consistent, actual attachment of Isaiah 9 to Jesus.

And of course, Mary is perplexed. She says, you know, how will this be since I'm a virgin? And Gabriel explains to her, the

Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow you. And the power of the most and for that reason, the holy child shall be called the son of God.

So a miracle occurs. There is no relationship, sexual relationship with her and Joseph at this time.

So by a miracle, the Holy Spirit, she becomes pregnant without having engaged in what was the normal course of action for such things.

And so it goes on and he tells her about Elizabeth and how she has conceived a son and this, that and the other.

Mary goes on to visit Elizabeth all the way down through verse 45. And then here versus 40, verse 46 through 56 is where we're going to end our sermon for this morning, because I want to look at what

Mary says about this whole situation. Verse 46, it says that Mary said, my soul magnifies the

Lord, lifts up the Lord, glory to the

Lord, glorifies the Lord. And she says, my spirit has rejoiced in God, my savior.

Here is a woman that would have known the history of the Jewish people would have known the history of the

Old Testament, would have known about the captivity and all these things and all the talk of the redeemer and all the battles they had won in God's name and how he is their savior and redeemer.

And she says, I know, and she knows Deuteronomy that says, hero Israel, the Lord our God is one and you shall love the

Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And so she says, my spirit rejoices in God, who is my savior, my redeemer.

For he has looked upon the humble state of his servant, for behold, from this time on, all generations will count me blessed.

Now, our Roman Catholic friends take this a little too far and do not, are not consistent and subjected to scripture and the proper place of where Mary should be.

But just because they get Mary wrong, doesn't mean we go to the other extreme and ignore

Mary. It is very true that even down to our day, there is a sense of how we are blessed, how we appreciate

Mary. We recognize her special place in history. But when she says that all generations will count me blessed, yes, we look at her and say, you were blessed.

Think about this, of every woman that ever lived, every woman that ever will live,

God chose her to be the one to have this miracle performed in her womb by the spirit of God to make her pregnant without knowing a man and the child that she would give birth to, the literal son of God encased in human flesh that we all worship and adore.

She says all generations will count me blessed. Yes, we do count you blessed, Mary. But never mistake the fact that Mary was a sinner.

Mary needed a redeemer just like everyone else. She says, for the mighty one has done great things for me, and holy is his name.

You remember in Philippians, the section in chapter two, we talked about he's going to give him a name above every name, exalt

Christ. Here before these things have actually transpired in time, before Jesus has even grown, died on the cross, been resurrected, and the

New Testament writer put that pen to paper in Philippians, here we have Mary saying, holy is his name.

The people of God have always recognized the holiness and the righteousness of God in his name.

And she quotes the Old Testament here in verse 50, and she says, his mercy is upon generation after generation.

She's quoting Psalm 103 here. She says, toward those who fear him.

This was a woman that knew scripture, and this was a woman that is quoting

Old Testament scripture to speak about the things that are going on here.

Verse 51, he has done a mighty deed with his arm. He has scattered those who were proud in the thoughts of their heart.

He has brought down rulers from their thrones and has exalted those who were humble. Now, there's no way

Mary could have known at this time exactly just how much Jesus would fulfill these words, but the son that she gives birth to, who is the son of God, the second person of the

Trinity, is the one who has all authority. His kingdom will not end, and he will bring down rulers.

He will bring down the proud. He will exalt the humble. Nothing in this world happens outside of the sovereignty and the ruler, the kingship of Jesus Christ.

She quotes the Old Testament once again in verse 53. She quotes Psalm 107.

She says, he has filled the hungry with good things, and she says he sends away the rich empty handed.

He has given help to Israel, his servant, in remembrance of his mercy.

And then notice this beautiful scripture here. As he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his seed forever.

This is going all the way back to Genesis 17 here. As he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his seed forever.

It says that Mary stayed there with Elizabeth for about three months and then returned home, and then it goes on from there.

But notice the blessing that even Mary recognizes in the moment.

I'm blessed by having been chosen to do this. But ultimately, the greater blessing is to Abraham and his seed forever.

And we know that the true Israelite, true Israel is spiritual

Israel. Paul talks about this. The true Jew is not the one that is circumcised outwardly, but the one that has been circumcised inwardly.

The seed of Abraham, the blessed ones of Abraham are those that are blessed in the same fashion as Abraham by faith, that are justified by faith, that are blessed by the same person, the same son that Mary gives birth to.

Here are the pages of Luke. And we are blessed alongside with her because we were saved by the same savior that she talks about in verse 47.

So like Mary did at this time, I encourage you during this

Christmas season to say as Mary did in verse 46, her soul magnifies the

Lord. And our spirit needs to rejoice in God, our