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The Divine Child
Luke 1:26-33 26In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, 27to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.” 29Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. 30But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. 31You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. 32He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
Who is Jesus, the divine child born at Christmas? What is the purpose of the divine child coming into our world? In what the angel Gabriel says you have the summation of the entire work of Jesus Christ, the divine child. Luke 1:31 You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus.
Jesus in Hebrew means Yeshua. Yeshua means "Jehovah saves." God is a God of salvation. God is a saving God. He saves sinners. That's exactly why Jesus came.
1. JESUS SAVES.
The divine child saves.
Luke 19:10 The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.
Matthew 1:21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.
Luke 2:11 Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.
In Luke Chapter 2 Simeon is praising God, holding the child Jesus and he says: Luke 2:30 For my eyes have seen your salvation.
Luke 1:36-38 36There was also a prophet, Anna, the daughter of Penuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was very old; she had lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, 37and then was a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying. 38Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.
Paul said: 1 Timothy 1:15 Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners – of whom I am the worst.
As you read through the Bible the dominant theme is that Jesus came to save sinners. Jesus means "the Lord is salvation." Mary's Son would be the Savior and the only way He could save us from our sins was to die in our place. So bound up in the word "Jesus" is His saving death.
Illustration
When the California gold fever broke out, a man went there, leaving his wife in New England with his boy. It was a long time before he succeeded, but at last he got money enough to send for them. The wife’s heart leaped for joy. She took her boy to New York, got on board a Pacific steamer, and sailed away to San Francisco.
They had not been long at sea before the cry of “Fire! fire!” rang through the ship. The captain knew the in a few hours every man, woman, and child will perish.
They got out the life-boats, but they were too small! In a minute they were overcrowded. The last one was just pushing away, when the mother pled with them to take her and her boy. “No,” they said, “we have got as many as we can hold.” She entreated them so earnestly, that at last they said they would take one more. Do you think she leaped into that boat and left her boy to die? No! She seized her boy, gave him one last hug, kissed him, and dropped him over into the boat. “My boy,” she said, “if you live to see your father, tell him that I died in your place.”
That is a faint picture of what Christ has done for us. He laid down his life for us. He died that we might live. The mother went down to a watery grave to save her one son. Jesus died so that he can save mankind.
2. JESUS IS GREAT.
Luke 1:31-32a 31You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. 32He will be great… The divine child is great.
We say to people, "Have a great day. That was a great cake." We tend to use the word ‘great’ very casually.
Above all, the angel said Jesus that he will be great. By the way, we could translate that extraordinary, powerful, eminent which are synonyms for great. But they still leave us far short of what should be said about Jesus because others are called great in the Bible.
The Bible says about John the Baptist in Luke 1:15 He will be great in the sight of God. How are we to understand the greatness of Jesus as John the Baptist will be great according to the Bible? Is this the same greatness? Listen, John will be great, however, with a sort of imputed greatness. God will give to Him a greatness that really isn't His own. But Jesus' greatness is something not granted to Him but possessed by Him. It is an unqualified greatness. It doesn't say He'll be great in the sight of the Lord, it says Jesus will be great.
His greatness is best understood by what John spoke about Isaiah. John 12:41 Isaiah said this because he saw Jesus’ glory and spoke about him.
John say Isaiah saw Jesus’ glory. Isaiah kept saying about Jesus in his prophesies:
Isaiah 7:14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.
When did Isaiah see the glory of Messiah?
Do you remember that in Isaiah 6, he went into the temple and when he was there he received a vision. Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up and His glory filled the temple, remember, and the angels began to shout, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory." He was caught up in the momentous magnificence of that revelation of God's glory. Listen, when Isaiah saw the glory of God, he saw the glory of Christ because the glory of Christ is the same as the glory of God.
That is why John said in John 1:14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
It was the same glory that Isaiah saw of God that was in Jesus. The disciples saw that glory in Matthew 17 on the Mount of Transfiguration. They saw Christ's glory shining through His humanity and they fell like dead men to the ground in terror.
What is the glory of God?
The glory of God is the manifestation of His attributes. In the book of Exodus Moses wants to see God. God said, “I'll show you My glory,” and He let His mercy and His goodness and His loving-kindness pass before him. God's glory is the manifestation of His attributes.
So when Gabriel said he will be great, it means Jesus will manifest the very glory of God. You will see the attributes of God through His life. You will see God displayed in Jesus. Jesus will talk like God. He will act like God. Jesus rose the dead. Jesus will think like God. He discerned the thoughts of people. He will be great like God is great. Jesus will be glorious because Jesus is God.
So you have his saving death, and his greatness.
3. SON OF THE MOST HIGH.
The divine child is called the Son of the Most High.
Luke 1:31-32 31You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. 32He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
The Most High means ‘El Elyon’ there's nobody higher. That was a title for God. There is no one higher.
The Jews knew God as the Most High God. Remember what Gabriel said to Mary in Luke 1:35 The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.
Zacharias said regarding John the Baptist in Luke 1:76 And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,
Stephen preaching in Acts 7 referred to God as the Most High. It is a very familiar term for God, used all through the Old Testament, in the Pentateuch, the historical writings, as well as in the Psalms and the prophets. Our God is the God Most High.
To identify Jesus, as the Son of the Most High is to indicate that Jesus has the same essence as the Most High.
Hebrews 1:3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being.
John 14:9 Jesus answered, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.”
Jesus’ kingdom will never end.
The story of the divine child doesn't end with the birth of Christ. The story of the divine child does not end with the resurrection of Christ. The end of the story is the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever and His kingdom will have no end.
The story culminates in the glorious reign of Jesus Christ on the throne of His father David over the nation Israel from where Jesus will rule the world in an eternal kingdom.
God gives the kingdom to His Son. There will be an actual earthly kingdom and in that Kingdom the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the seed of David, will reign over the whole world. That is where history is going. History is going back to when paradise existed, before paradise was lost. It's going back to paradise regained.
Jesus didn't have any Kingdom when He was on earth. They killed Him. Jesus rose again and He went back to heaven. If you go to the book of Revelation 19, Jesus is going to return in the future. He's going to come as King of kings and Lord of lords. Jesus is going to establish His earthly reign.
WHAT CHRISTMAS MEANS FOR US?
We can get the message of the divine child by the proclamation of angels again at the birth of Jesus. It was a beautiful, probably a dark night in Bethlehem. There were shepherds watching their flock at night. As you look up from the shepherd’s fields you could see the sky silhouetted against the darkness of the night. Probably, some of the shepherds were sleeping while others were taking the watch during different portions of the night.
As the shepherds were in the field keeping watch over their flocks at night, suddenly the angel of the Lord appeared and the glory of the Lord shone about them. The darkness was split by this radiance of the glory of God. The shepherds were startled and were very afraid.
I can imagine their fear as their night was broken by this sudden appearance of this mighty angel. I think we would have been startled and astonished had we been there on that night. This angel of the Lord came and said to them, “Fear not, don’t be afraid.”
Luke 2:10-11 10But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. 11Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.
Then the Bible tells us that suddenly there was with this angle a multitude of the heavenly hosts. Luke 2:13-14 13Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, 14“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests.”
a. Joy for all people.
Joy for all the people is the Good news of Salvation. There is hope in Jesus. You are important to God.
b. Peace on earth.
c. Help in the present.
Immanuel God with us. Matthew 1:23 The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel (which means “God with us”).
Conclusion: Who is Jesus, the divine child born at Christmas? The divine child has the capacity to save us. Man needs that salvation. The divine child is great. In other words we can see the glory of God in this divine child. The divine child is the Son of the Most High and his Kingdom is coming which will never end.
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Illustration: He gave his son
After a few of the usual Sunday evening hymns, the church's pastor slowly stood up, walked over to the pulpit and, before he gave his sermon for the evening, briefly introduced a guest minister who was in the service that evening. In the introduction, the pastor told the congregation that the guest minister was one of his dearest childhood friends and that he wanted him to have a few moments to greet the church and share whatever he felt would be appropriate for the service.
With that, an elderly man stepped up to the pulpit and began to speak. "A father, his son, and a friend of his son were sailing off the Pacific coast," he began, "when a fast-approaching storm blocked any attempt to get back to the shore. The waves were so high, that even though the father was an experienced sailor, he could not keep the boat upright and the three were swept into the ocean as the boat capsized."
The old man hesitated for a moment, making eye contact with two teenagers who were, for the first time since the service began, looking somewhat interested in his story.
The aged minister continued with his story. "Grabbing a rescue line, the father had to make the most excruciating decision of his life: to which boy would he throw the other end of the life line? He only had seconds to make the decision. The father knew that his son was a Christian and he, also, knew that his son's friend was not. The agony of his decision could not be matched by the torrent of waves.
As the father yelled out, "I love you, son!" he threw out the lifeline to his son's friend. By the time the father had pulled the friend back to the capsized boat, his son had disappeared beneath the raging swells into the black of night. His body was never recovered.
By this time, the two teenagers were sitting up straight in the pew, anxiously waiting for the next words to come out of the old minister's mouth.
"The father," he continued, "knew his son would step into eternity with Jesus and he could not bear the thought of his son's friend stepping into an eternity without Jesus. Therefore, he sacrificed his son to save the son's friend.
"How great is the love of God that he should do the same for us. Our heavenly father sacrificed his only-begotten son that we could be saved. I urge you to accept his offer to rescue you and take a hold of the life line he is throwing out to you in this service." With that, the old man turned and sat back down in his chair as silence filled the room.
The pastor again walked slowly to the pulpit and delivered a brief sermon with an invitation at the end. However, no one responded to the appeal.
Within minutes after the service ended, the two teenagers were at the old man's side. "That was a nice story," politely stated one of them, "but I don't think it was very realistic for a father to give up his only son's life in hopes that the other boy would become a Christian."
"Well, you've got a point there," the old man replied glancing down at his worn Bible. A big smile broadened his narrow face. He once again looked up at the boys and said, "It sure isn't very realistic, is it? But I?m standing here today to tell you that story gives me a glimpse of what it must have been like for God to give up his son for me. You see, I was that father and your pastor is my son's friend."
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