“The Difference Christmas Makes: The Security of Christmas”
2 Sam. 7:1-17
Christmas, for many people, is a time of great insecurity. There are adults whose frustrations increase and self-image drops because they cannot provide gifts for their children. Some children feel unloved or worthless – or feel they’re not good enough - because not even Santa leaves them anything. Persons whose families are far away or non-existent experience tremendous loneliness. Others find pangs of grief sharper as the empty spaces around the tree and dinner table remind them of loved ones now gone. The very season which ought to bring security instead brings insecurity. Perhaps that’s why the suicide rate always increases at this time of the year. That’s why we need to hear this Christmas message about security in the book of Samuel.
In Samuel we discover, first of all, that security begins with the fact that WE ARE PEOPLE OF GOD (1-13). In verses 1-3 we see David’s desire to build a temple for God; David recognizes that he dwells in a better, more beautiful place than God does; so David felt the appropriate thing to do would be to build a glorious temple for God. It could be crown of gratitude to God and a fitting climax for David’s reign. What better way to honor his faithful God?
But notice God’s response in verses 4-11: He tells David not to do so; God has other plans. God says, in essence, “It is not like me to be tied down to a place. As I have led you in the past without a place in which to dwell, so I will lead you in the future. I much prefer to dwell in your midst.” GOD PREFERS NOT TO LIVE IN A SECURE PLACE BUT IN A SECURE LINE AND DYNASTY OF PEOPLE. This dynasty will be both the recipient and conduit of God’s care. As Paul would later preach (Acts 17:24-25): “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.”
And God PROMISES TO CARE FOR THIS LINE THROUGHOUT THE GENERATIONS (12-13): “When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.” This was fulfilled shortly thereafter through Solomon but then ultimately through Jesus Christ. The rest of the Old Testament shows this royal line of David and then the Gospel writers boldly declare Jesus is of the line and lineage of David: Matthew takes 16 verses to trace the line; Mark begins by stating that his gospel is about Jesus Christ “the Son of God”; Luke forecasts the birth of Christ saying, “The Lord will give him the throne of his father David...”; John portrays Jesus’ birth “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us ... who came from the Father...” The Heidelberg Catechism puts it (answer 35): “Christ took upon himself our true manhood from the flesh and blood of the virgin Mary through the action of the Holy Spirit, so that he might be the true seed of David...” God built David a house, a royal line, a dynasty of people that was secured in Jesus Christ!
The difference Christmas makes is that we have been planted in that line! We are the people of the royal line; WE HAVE ROYAL BLOOD LINES. Paul writes it eloquently in Ephesians 2:19-22: “Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit.” We are the favored ones of God! We are the people among whom he dwells! We, like Mary, bear the Christ within us! In Christ we do live and move and have our being! We are secure because GOD HAS COME TO US - and has come in surprising ways.
Frederick Buechner has written of this powerfully: “Those who believe in God can never in a way be sure of him again. Once they have seen him in a stable, they can never be sure where he will appear or to what lengths he will go or to what ludicrous depths of self-humiliation he will descend in his wild pursuit of man. If holiness and the awful power and majesty of God were present in this least auspicious of all events, this birth of a peasant’s child, then there is no place or time so lowly and earthbound but that holiness can be present there too. And this means that we are never safe, that there is no place where we are safe from his power to break in two and recreate the human heart because it is just where he seems most helpless that he is most strong, and just where we least expect him that he comes most fully.”
This is vividly illustrated by Gerald Coffee who experienced this presence in a powerful, surprising way. He was spending his third Christmas in a North Vietnamese prison as POW. “It was 1968. He recalled it because it was the Christmas the Vietnamese distributed some candy bars to the prisoners. The candy bars were wrapped in foil that were red on the outside and silver on the inside. Coffee flattened one wrapper into an origami swan. Then he flattened the second and folded it into crisp little pleats, tied the pleats in the center with a thread and fanned out the edges to make a rosette ... there was one more wrapper. He began folding it, not sure of what he would fashion. It ended up a star. How appropriate, he thought, a star of Bethlehem! Removing three straws from the broom in his cell, he attached the paper ornaments to them. Then he jammed the straws into a crack in the wall above his head, and sat watching them in the light from the yellow bulb that always shown in the cell. He thought about the simplicity of Christ’s birth, and what it had meant in his own life. It was his faith, he realized, that was sustaining him through his imprisonment. He said, ‘I realized that although I was hurting, lonely and scared, that this was the most significant Christmas of my life.’” There is security in the God who comes to us, His people!
This security is strengthened when we recognize that we are a PEOPLE OF PERMANENCE (14-17). David’s line will last forever. We will belong to Christ forever! God’s promise here is unconditional. David’s temptations, trials, failures, and sins would never annul God’s promise! Verse 14-15: “I will be his father and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with the rod of men, with floggings inflicted by men. But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed before you.” David, and those that follow in his line, will suffer consequences of their sins but will never be cut off! They will not lose the kingdom or end the line!
And certainly all of this was GUARANTEED IN CHRIST. Assured of His Father’s care, Christ was obedient unto death. He took our rod, bore our sins, felt the lash of our stripes so we could have eternal life. As John saw it in Revelation 11:15: “The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, which said; ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign for ever and ever.”
And there is nothing we can do which will break the life or end the line! There is nowhere we can go where He will not be with us! IN CHRIST GOD KEEPS COMING TO US! Maya Angelou told the story of her Uncle Willie. “Willie was blind and had a physically handicapping condition, was unemployed, African-American and poor - a difficult combination of circumstances!” But he was determined to push forward and celebrate the whole of his life. As Maya put it: “Willie just keeps a-coming! I thought about how much Uncle Willie sounded like the Advent promise and the Christmas story. I finally understood: It’s not about what I do or don’t do, it’s not about what I accomplish or how many times I fail within the year. ADVENT AND CHRISTMAS ARE ABOUT GOD’S ATTEMPTS AT EVER SEEKING LOVE FROM ME!”
As a people of permanence we need not worry about being good enough - Jesus came to forgive us of our sin. No matter what we have done, or failed to do - the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us. No matter where we are - Jesus has promised to come to us and promises He will never orphan us. No matter who we are - we will belong to Him and be favored. No matter what the future holds, our bloodlines will remain royal. No matter what happens to us, no one and nothing will pluck us out of his hands. There is nothing anywhere that can ever separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus!
So we can be A PEOPLE OF POISE. God still rules in such a way that through Jesus Christ nothing comes to us but by His loving hands; because we belong - body and soul, in life and in death - “to Jesus Christ our faithful Savior who protects us so well that without his will not a hair can fall from our heads - indeed EVERYTHING MUST FIT HIS PURPOSE FOR OUR SALVATION.” Our status will never change. Not only are we secure in the present but we also need not fear the future. God has taken responsibility for our lives!
The Heidelberg Catechism beautifully pictures this poise. It states that first, we can BE PATIENT IN ADVERSITY. Since there is nothing that can come to us but through the Father’s hand, and since He never gives us more than we can bear, and since nothing will ever separate us from Him, and since all things work together to make us more like Him, we can be patient and let God do His work!
Second, we can BE GRATEFUL IN THE MIDST OF BLESSING. Again, since nothing comes to us but through His hands, anything and everything we have is from Him. We can be grateful for what we have rather than regretful for what we don’t have. Everything we possess is pure gift. We didn’t earn it, it’s not ours; it belongs to God. He’ll care for it. For all our blessings, great or small - for all our possessions great or small - we can relax, let go, give back to God and give thanks. The Apostle Paul put it this way in his 2nd letter to the Corinthians (9:8ff.): “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work…Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way so that
you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of the Lord’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God.”
Third, we can TRUST OUR FAITHFUL GOD AND FATHER FOR THE FUTURE. He has already taken charge of it! Whatever happens, He is in control! The battle has been won! The verdict has been handed down. No matter what may come, no matter who appears to be in control, Jesus Christ is Lord and the Kingdom of this world has become his kingdom and He will reign for ever and ever. Hallelujah! There is no greater security - it’s anchored in a manger, a cross, and an empty tomb!
In a sermon titled "The Hopes and Fears of All the Years," Craig Barnes says that the message of Christmas is not that we always get what we want, but rather that God will probably answer our prayers in ways we weren't expecting. Then he shares the following personal story: “[My father] left us when I was sixteen, and once he left, he never stopped running. Every time we tried to find him, he would only leave and disappear again. He died alone in a raggedy trailer park somewhere in the middle of Florida. A neighboring pastor, who did not know him, spent two days trying to find his family even though he did not know our names.
My Dad missed all of the important events in his sons' lives: graduations, weddings, birth of children, our two ordinations, and both of our Ph.D. ceremonies. He missed all of it. I prayed and prayed that he would return to us. I used to yearn for the day that he would show up in a congregation where I was preaching. My longing was for him to come through the line at the end of worship, take my hand and say, "Good job, son." But he never came.
At his funeral, I stared at the casket and wondered what happened to all of those prayers for him. Were they just lying around on the floor of heaven?
When the service was over, my brother and I went to his little trailer in hopes of piecing together something about his life. That was when we received the great Christmas gift. Sitting on his kitchen table was a devotional journal in which he had written his prayers and thoughts about various Bible passages. I was relieved to discover that he did not also abandon his faith. But then I came across a dog-eared, tattered page with the title "Daily Prayer List" at the top. The first two items on that list were my brother's name and my name.
I will never understand the lonely madness that drove my father away from everyone who loved him. But I am so thankful to know that to his dying day, he never forgot us. He talked to God about us, even though for some reason he could not talk to us. There was enough grace in that to get me through.
The grace was not that I received what I wanted. I did not find my father in time. The grace was that Jesus never lost him. And for me, the grace was that I then realized, through all of those years of praying for my dad, I was speaking with the Heavenly Father, who will never leave me or forsake me. (i)
We’re in the same royal line as Craig. God has come and is still coming to us. He did so in a manger. He did so on a cross. He does so through His Holy Spirit. Our past is taken care of. Our present and future are secure. Because of this tiny baby born in Bethlehem, all will be well. For He will reign for ever and his kingdom will never end. Hallelujah! Amen!
(i) Craig Barnes, from the sermon "The Hopes and Fears of All the Years," (12-5-10)
