Advent: Shepherds & Angels Series

Advent: Shepherds & Angels

December 13, 2020 Morning Service

Third Sunday of Advent

Immanuel Baptist Church, Wagoner, OK

Rick Boyne

Message Point: God’s message is for everyone.

Focus Passage: Luke 2:8-20

Introduction: Announcements these days are pretty easy, especially if you have a Facebook account. You just type what you want to say and everyone who is your friend, or even a friend of a friend, sees it. Well, that is the intention. However, with so many advertisements and other junk, it is getting easier and easier to miss something that is actually important. The announcement or news gets lost among the unimportant. That’s how it is today with the original Christmas message. It has somehow gotten lost among the unimportant. It is drowned out by Santa Claus, Frosty, Rudolph, and political correctness. The original message now offends those who don’t believe. But we must make sure everyone knows that Jesus was born to die in our place. Believing that gives us the greatest gift of all.

I. The Angels

a. Angels – created beings with purpose to serve God

b. often messengers

c. this time sent to announce a peace mission

d. Therefore, angels are only servants—spirits sent to care for people who will inherit salvation. (Hebrews 1:14 NLT)

II. The Shepherds

a. Outcasts – social and religious; looked upon with suspicion; not necessarily religious;

i. Don’t participate in society

ii. Don’t participate in temple activities

iii. Spend all their time with sheep

b. Last people you’d expect to be give the good news

c. When the angels left, the shepherds decided to go check it out for themselves

i. They didn’t make excuses about the sheep

ii. They didn’t make excuses about going in the morning

iii. They didn’t make excuses about not knowing where to look

iv. They didn’t make excuses; they just went

d. And they looked until they found

i. Everything was exactly like it was described

e. When they saw what they found, they told everyone what they had seen

i. They told Mary and Joseph

ii. They told everyone else they saw

f. Their telling resulted in two things:

i. Everyone wondered at what they heard

ii. Mary treasured these things in her heart

III. The Message

a. God’s intention to make peace with all people

b. The Savior is born according to prophesy

c. There is a sign to prove what God declares

d. The message of God’s gift is still valid today.

Application/Invitation: Does your life testify to the receiving of God’s salvation? How are you defined by the lost? As someone special and different (in a good way) who represents God? Or as someone who calls themselves a Christian but lives like the world? If you would like to receive this special gift of salvation from God, the Bible says that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

(Romans 10:9-10 NASB)