He is With You to Deliver You

Father, thank you that we can meet.

Viruses come and go.

Worry and anxiety comes and goes.

Being popular or unpopular,

fitting in with the culture or not,

all of these things come and go.

And we give you thanks and praise that this morning

we can gather together to be in your presence,

to hear your word, to receive grace from you.

And we ask, Lord, that you help us to be in your presence,

to be open and receptive to your grace

that you desire to give us this morning,

and help us to respond in a way which is worthy,

that is good for us and worthy of you.

And we ask this in the precious name of Jesus,

your Son and our Savior. Amen.

Please be seated.

Do we have both mics on, or is it just my hearing or something?

Everything's fine? Okay, it's just my hearing.

You guys watching it online,

you always get this little bit of extra commentary from me.

So I don't have my hearing aid in either,

so that might be part of it.

So one of the things which,

I don't know if I'm very different than other people,

I seem to be different than a lot of people in my family,

and that is that I have very few memories of my childhood.

In fact, I don't know if I have any memories,

other than maybe one, of before I was six.

And even, I think, you know, the couple of years after that,

it's hard for me to have really that many specific memories of them.

And I know, at least in the case of my family,

that I seem to be an outlier.

A lot of, you know, my wife and my kids

have a lot more memories of their childhood.

So what I can say, you know, spoiler alert,

if you're watching this or something like that,

I don't know when I stop believing in Santa,

like I probably did.

But I have no memory of believing in Santa,

and I have no memory of stopping believing in Santa.

But then again, that's not surprising,

since I have no memories of my childhood,

or my early childhood.

So it doesn't surprise me,

that it shouldn't surprise me

that I don't have memories of it.

The point of this is that

the Santa story is actually better

if it's not true.

Like, it's a better story

if you know that it's not true.

Like, if you think about it for a second,

if Santa's story is true,

it would be a bit creepy.

Like, he knows if you're being naughty and nice.

Like, really?

He's looking at you all the time?

Like, that's a bit creepy.

I mean, we'd actually call that stalking,

and there's laws against it in Canada.

And the second thing about it,

if you think about it is,

and maybe I'm the only one,

but I've never got a gift from Santa.

I mean, it would actually be sort of interesting

if one day they discovered that Santa's true,

the whole Santa story is correct,

and what's actually happened

is that all of North America and Europe are naughty,

and that's why we haven't gotten any gifts.

And that would actually make us all pretty mad

to discover that we're so bad in Santa's eyes

that we haven't gotten any gifts.

So the Santa story is actually better if it's not true,

and it's, you know, a fine enough story.

The thing is, though, that for real Christians,

the Christmas story has to be true.

You know, I think for a lot of my secular friends,

I mean, they'd almost think,

I mean, they'd know that, obviously,

Jesus probably really lived,

but they'd probably not make much of a distinction

between the Jesus birth story

and the Santa story and the other types of things.

They're all just sort of close to each other,

but most of them would acknowledge

that Jesus probably really lived in history,

just like the Buddha really lived in history.

But they don't, it doesn't really,

well, for my secular friends,

if you happen to be watching,

for Christians, it's absolutely essential

that the Christians,

that the birth story of Jesus is true.

And so we're going to look at it,

and we're going to look a little bit

about why it is that we would be so odd

to think that it matters, that it's true.

Today we're looking at the,

in fact, actually what we're doing is

because Daniel Avitan and his church plant

is his first time preaching through Christmas,

I decided we would use

the three classic Christmas texts

for this Sunday, Christmas Eve,

and Christmas morning.

So Matthew 1, Luke 2, and John 1.

And so today we're looking at Matthew 1.

And if you turn to your Bible,

that would be a great help as we look at it.

But I have to warn you

that we're going to not begin where I read the text.

We're going to begin with the really boring bit

that goes before it,

which is the genealogy.

So we're going to start at Matthew 1, verse 1.

Matthew 1:1

I was thinking about that this week,

that the way the Bible is usually used in Hollywood,

you actually hear it a lot.

It depends, I guess, on the type of movie you watch.

But you often hear them say,

it's going to be biblical.

And that means the slaughter and explosions

are going to be massive.

It's going to be biblical.

But probably there'd be another word.

If you said it's going to be biblical,

it would also mean boring.

It's going to be very boring.

It's going to be biblical.

Because that's how a lot of Christians

and non-Christians view bits of the Bible,

especially ones like this.

And here's how it goes.

But it's actually really significant.

Look at how it begins.

Matthew 1, verse 1.

Matthew 1:1

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ,

the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Abraham was the father of Isaac,

and Isaac the father of Jacob,

and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers.

And we'll just pause there for a second.

Now, here's the thing.

This story doesn't begin with once upon a time.

It doesn't begin with any of the type of language

of mythology or metaphor or symbolism.

It begins with a genealogy.

It begins as if we're going to be talking about

real people who really lived.

And I've just paused there,

but when we go through it in a bit,

we're going to see that they mention in it

like people who,

it doesn't matter if you're an atheist

or the world's biggest skeptic,

there's no denying that some of the people

who are mentioned in this genealogy

are clear historical people

of whom there is archaeological evidence

of their existence

and their existence having been reported

in other types of cultures.

So the thing is,

in fact, if you could put up the first point,

the first point is that Jesus is really real and true.

And he's really human.

He really did live.

And the whole,

the beginning of the rest of the story,

even if it's going to talk about

these remarkable miracles,

it's going to be talking about

his claims to being God.

It's going to talk about

the things he did to offend people

and all of this.

But it begins by Matthew saying

in as concrete and specific a way as possible,

Jesus really existed.

Like, it's true that he existed.

These things actually happened.

Now, you might disagree with him.

You might think they're lying.

But you have to understand

that's at least the claim.

And the claim that they happened

is also going to be connected in a moment

to the significance of the events,

not just the fact that they happened.

And so that's, you know,

that's how it begins right off the bat.

But then it takes

this really weird turn in verse 3.

Actually, we'll just read verse 3

and then I'll tell you

what the big weird turn is.

And Judah, the father of Perez,

and Zerah by Tamar,

and Perez, the father of Hezron,

and Hezron, the father of Ram.

Now, just pause here.

And I don't know if we're going to read

all of the verses in the genealogy,

but we're going to read most of them.

Now, this is a very, very weird turn

that's just been taken here.

And most of us,

and I'm just like you, by the way,

when I come to genealogies in the Bible,

I don't read them minutely.

I sort of let my eyes pass over them

and then at some point in time

I realize I've actually sort of finished

reading the whole genealogy

and not much stuck.

So in the ancient world,

and still in lots of parts of the world today,

genealogies are, in a sense,

almost like a CV.

It's trying to communicate to you

why this individual is important,

why they're significant,

why they're a person of substance.

And for lots of our,

our culture has different ways to present this.

For instance, quite a few years ago now,

I was in a place that I had

a regular coffee shop at.

There was a, the owner was Muslim,

really, really fine guy.

We had lots of good talks,

but his father-in-law,

who also worked in the restaurant,

would never look at me.

He'd see me there with the Bible.

He would never talk to me,

never smile to me.

If I tried to talk to him at all,

he would ignore me.

And then I'd heard a talk,

and I discovered that from that part of the world

where the man was,

because I knew the part of the world he was from,

that sons were a marker of significance

and substance.

And so I started to pray about this,

and about a week or two after I was praying about it,

the owner was there,

and his father-in-law was right behind him.

And the owner said,

you have lots of kids, don't you?

And the father-in-law looked,

and I said, yeah, I have five sons.

And the man looked at me.

He looked at me for the first time.

And from that time on,

he talked to me.

In his culture,

I was a man of substance,

of significance.

Didn't matter if I was rich or poor,

I had five sons.

And so in the ancient world,

often genealogies are helping to communicate to people,

your significance and your specialness.

But here's what's,

there's several things about this,

which should just happen,

which is really,

really,

really weird,

and very,

very revolutionary,

and starts to set the stage that this story,

historical,

true,

real story of Jesus,

is going to be radically different than people would expect.

First of all,

it mentions a woman,

which isn't unusual in our culture,

but in the ancient world,

you wouldn't have them mentioned.

But here's the other thing which is significant about it,

and you have to know what the relationship of Judah and Tamar is.

Now,

in the world at that time,

I know this sounds really weird to us,

but we can't be ethnocentric.

We can't see the world just through our eyes.

We have to understand that cultures are different.

In the ancient world,

the land was very significant,

and passing on the land,

and your name was very significant.

So there was a law that,

like,

you know,

in my case,

because I have a sister and a brother,

if I had died,

I married Louise,

and if I died before Louise and I were able to have a child,

then it would be my brother Stephen's obligation to sleep with Louise

so she could have a child that would carry on my line.

It wouldn't carry on his line,

it would carry on my line.

And so that was the law at that particular time of Judah.

And what happened is Judah's son,

he had three sons.

The first son is given in marriage to Tamar,

but the son dies before Tamar is able to have a child.

So Judah follows the law and the custom of the day

and gives his second son,

but the second son dies before a baby is able to be produced.

So now Judah is getting very superstitious,

and he worries that if he gives his last son,

to this woman to produce the heir,

that that son will die.

But the son's young,

so he puts off the woman.

But he does more than that if you read the story.

I guess nowadays we call it,

he ghosts her.

Is that the right word?

He ghosts her.

And not only does he ghost her,

he doesn't even provide for her.

She has to go way off.

He doesn't provide for her.

He forgets about her.

He just hopes she goes away,

maybe dies of some virus or something like that.

But the woman keeps track,

and she sees that the son is now old enough to get married,

but Judah's not doing anything about it.

So Tamar hears through the grapevine

that Judah's going to be in the area for some events.

So she dresses like a prostitute,

and she goes to where the prostitutes hang out,

and Judah's not a good guy.

Judah feels like having sex with a prostitute.

So he goes to where the prostitutes hang out,

and he picks up Tamar,

and he sleeps with her.

That's called incest.

And he produces Perez and Zerah, twins.

So, okay.

Like, you know, sometimes,

like my kids all know,

because, you know,

I have an older kid and younger kid.

My kids now know,

don't go to dad for advice about CVs,

because dad hasn't had to write a CV.

Like, I mean, the wheel had just been invented,

and back when I last had to do something,

so I don't know how to get it.

But I think I know enough about,

you don't put that type of stuff in your CV to impress.

Like, you leave that stuff out.

Like, you put the heroes,

the successful people,

you do all of that,

but you leave this out.

His lineage goes back to

a guy who goes to prostitutes,

has incest,

and that's part of Jesus' lineage.

Like, for devout Jewish people

who would have read that

in the days when Matthew first wrote this,

they would have gone,

like, hmm.

You didn't have to put that in.

You know?

But this isn't just like

a little bit of an accident,

as if, you know,

it's just like for one of us,

you know, we're doing our emails,

and we're doing our emails,

and then you press send,

and then afterwards you're going,

oops, I shouldn't have,

well, sure,

I forgot to edit that out.

No, no, no.

You see that it's not a bug,

it's a feature

of the genealogy.

Because look what continues happening

in verse 4.

And Ram, the father of Amminadab,

and Amminadab, the father of Nishan,

and Nishan, the father of Salmon,

and Sammon, the father of Boaz,

by Rahab,

and Boaz, the father of Obed,

by Ruth,

and Obed, the father of Jesse,

and now just stop there for a second,

Rahab.

Now, why is that sort of all of a sudden?

First of all, it's another woman.

So obviously,

it's not just that he forgot

to do the editing

when he pressed send,

but it's also very interesting

for another reason.

You see, who's Rahab?

Well, Rahab was a prostitute.

Now, she also ends up

being the hero of the faith,

but she's a prostitute.

And in a culture

which is concerned

with having, in a sense,

the biological line being pure,

and by the way,

as soon as I say that,

most, I don't know who,

I don't care who'd be watching this,

most Canadians would say,

like, that's a creepy idea.

But you know one of the reasons

why you think it's a creepy idea

of pure lineage?

It's because it's a Christian reason.

Like, even if you don't remember

that it ultimately comes

from Christianity,

that's actually where it comes from.

It comes from

the gospel and Christianity

that we start to challenge

this whole idea of racial purity.

It's like, in fact,

you see, when,

I just watch a really, really,

really, really good movie.

I don't, you know,

a lot of times I watch movies

I'm not necessarily recommending

you watch it,

but I'm watching a really,

really good movie,

just watch a good movie

on Netflix called

Just Mercy.

True story.

And if you watch that movie,

one of the things

that's just so offensive

is that it doesn't say

that all of the white people

in Alabama are Christians,

but you know they probably are.

And their racial concerns

is so abhorrent to the Bible.

It is so deeply abhorrent

to the Bible.

And if nothing else,

they just know to have it

look at right here

that Jesus' lineage

includes a pagan

who was a prostitute.

And that's part of his lineage.

Now, Ruth is also a pagan,

but is a heroine,

so to speak,

within the story.

But then notice this,

and then I'm going to do

two more in this lineage,

and then we'll move on.

But you're getting the idea.

Look at verse 6.

And Jesse,

the father of David the king,

and David was the father of Solomon

by the wife of Uriah.

Now, that's a better-known story.

But what is that story about?

Well, David's up one day,

and he sees Bathsheba,

and he thinks she's really sexy-looking.

So he wines and dines her

and sleeps with her.

And he makes her pregnant.

And this is a big scandal.

So he wants to cover it up.

So he brings Bathsheba's wife,

Bathsheba's husband Uriah,

back from battle

in the hope that Uriah

will sleep with his wife

and then mistakenly

get the dates all mixed up

and think that he's

the father of the child.

But if you read the story,

the first night Uriah

doesn't do it

because he's,

dang, he's so honorable.

How can I go to see my wife

when the king's army

is out there sleeping in tents

without those creature comforts?

And David's probably saying,

dang, I have to have a moral man

when I've done something deeply immoral.

And so the next night,

David gets Uriah drunk.

And even when Uriah's drunk,

he's still an honorable,

courageous, upstanding guy.

And so David does, of course,

the next best thing,

which he has Uriah murdered.

And Matthew puts this in here

when he's doing his lineage.

The child of that,

of the adultery, dies.

And the next child that's born

is Solomon,

who ends up becoming the king.

If you just skip down a little bit

to verse 10,

we'll just give you one more thing

about this whole lineage.

Look at verse 10.

And Hezekiah, the father of Manasseh,

and Manasseh, the father of Amos,

and Amos, the father of Joseph.

Well, Josiah.

Well, first of all,

you could go through this whole thing

and if you looked up

the different biblical references to them,

you'd be a bit shocked.

I mean, they're not all

just really terrible people.

But Amos was such a bad king

that the officials killed him.

But Manasseh,

Manasseh brought fertility religions back in.

And now what is fertility religions?

Well, fertility religions mean

if let's say the Morides

or some other family

or the Sinclairs,

I was really happy.

You know, we were really,

money was really tight

for decades with us.

So one way out of it

is I could have sold

some of my daughters

to the temple

and got money.

And if I sold my daughters

to the temple for money,

I'd get money,

I'd be helped,

I'd have two less mouths.

Let's say I sold two of my daughters.

I'd have two less mouths to feed

and I'd have a good chunk of money

and my daughter

would become a prostitute

for the temple

because there's a,

Manasseh brought back

into Israel this idea

that a guy could go

into a temple

and have sex with a woman

as an act of worship.

Like this is horrific

and that's what Manasseh brought back

and he even brought back

in another practice

that if I wasn't having

enough favor from God,

well, I have five sons,

I can kill one of the sons

because I believe

that there's this,

like, how do you want to get

the most powerful God

is going to ask you

to do the most horrific things.

Like that's how

the ancient mind thinks.

The most powerful God

asks you to do

the most horrific things.

And so what could be

more horrific

than going and having

my own son murdered

so that I could earn favor

with God

and be prosperous.

And that's what Manasseh

did himself.

He not only introduced it,

that's what he did.

And he's in the lineage.

Sorry, I just love this.

You know, they talk about

the Christian radio,

they want to say the word

Christian for the Christian

radio station

so they call it family

and it's family friendly.

This isn't family friendly.

Like, they wouldn't be able

to tell the story

on a family friendly

radio station.

Like, this isn't what

you're expecting.

And I can just imagine

my non-Christian friends

saying, whoa,

I didn't realize

there's a lot more drama

in the Bible

than I thought there was

in this boring thing.

But here's the thing.

Here's the thing.

If you could put up the point.

Jesus' lineage

is a train wreck.

Jesus' lineage

is a train wreck.

That's the point.

And there's a whole lot

of other things

you could talk about

just with this one,

you know, boring linea.

You know, boring

if you just started reading it

like I am.

But if you think about it,

there's something that

Matthew does

which is so cool

is he begins

with this train wreck

where, you know,

he has a prostitute,

there's incest,

there's terrible kings,

there's murdering

of your kids,

like there's selling

of your daughters

into prostitution,

like it begins

with all of this

and partly what it's doing

that, Tim Keller

has this wonderful line.

You know how on,

it used to be,

I don't know if they do it anymore,

it used to be that

on the day after Christmas

like there'd be certain stores,

big box stores

where they're gonna have

such special deals

that people would get there

like at two o'clock

in the morning

and camp out

because they wanted

to get in

the second they could.

Tim Keller

has this wonderful line,

even if you're camping

out at the gate of hell,

you are not so bad

that Jesus didn't die

to save you.

Isn't that a great line?

Even if you're camping

out at the gate of hell,

you're not too bad.

You can look at it

in this lineage

and the thing

that Matthew does

which is so cool

is he begins with this

and how does the book,

how does Matthew end?

It ends,

go to all the people groups

and make disciples

and you can see

that in a sense

the people groups

and the bad people

are all included

in Jesus' lineage

and because you see

Jesus' lineage

is a train wreck,

you know that only God

has to do something.

This isn't natural.

It isn't as if

the lineage is,

whoa, Abraham

is really great

and then the next guy

is like really even better

and then the next guy

and then the next guy

and then the next guy

and then the next guy

and boy,

by the time you get to Jesus

it's like,

I don't know,

it's like,

you know,

40 generations

of superheroes

marrying superheroes

and they're like

the super,

super,

like they're just,

you can't have enough

supers before them,

they can do everything.

No.

God has to do something

in the person of Jesus

because his lineage

is a train wreck

and given that he comes

to be the savior

when it says in a moment

that Jesus is Emmanuel,

God with us

which means that he comes

to live amongst our mess,

Matthew is communicating

this is real,

look at his genealogy,

it's a mess

and that's Jesus.

Now,

verse 17,

if you just want to

flip through it,

it's just a little,

tiny little thing here,

so all the generations

from Abraham to David

were 14

and from David

to the deportation

to Babylon,

14

and from the deportation

to Babylon

to the Christ,

14 generations.

Just a simple little,

it's a little number thing

there for people

who are motivated

by numbers

is that

if you go through

the entire Tanakh,

the Torah,

the Old Testament,

you'll see that the number

seven is very special,

world is created

in six days,

seventh day at rest,

two sevens,

two sevens,

two sevens,

two sevens,

Jesus,

the seventh seven.

That's why it's the 14,

14,

14,

14.

It's,

this is something,

a new series of generations

are going to come from this,

the perfect one,

the rest of God,

which the writer of Hebrews

takes up.

Now verse 18,

now the birth of Jesus Christ

took place in this way

and sort of

before we go any further,

we can also already see

that part of the misconception

about the Bible

and about Christianity,

you know,

that it's,

you know,

all white

or it's,

you know,

like all of that type of thing,

you see that,

yeah,

there's been lots of Christians

who live in complete

and utter defiance

of the Bible,

complete and utter defiance

of the Bible,

but the Bible

is actually remarkable

and you can see how

that time and time

and time again,

whether it's Wilberforce

with slavery,

you know,

wherever it is,

is that when Christians

actually,

it isn't that we need

to hear post-modern theorists

or theory

to try to wake us up,

we just have to all of a sudden

be woken up by the Bible

and we realize that racism

is wrong

or this is wrong

or some other great,

or slavery is wrong,

it just is all of a sudden

the Bible wakes us up

and we go,

oh my,

hey,

I have to change my life,

but the problem we have

with the rest of the story,

even though we say,

well,

okay,

there's more to that story

than I thought,

it still has a problem

of a weird miracle

and there's still

this offensive little thing,

you know,

one of the big problems

that I think most Canadians

have and Canadian Christians

have is at the heart

of hearts,

what is it that our culture

teaches us time

and time

and time again?

you've got to be the hero

of your own story,

you've got to be the hero

of your own story,

weaklings,

I mean,

that's the whole problem

with all those movies

made before recent days

where the woman

is rescued by the man,

no,

we have to understand,

women have to learn

that they have to be

the hero of their own story

and men have to be

the hero of their own story

and that's so deeply

ingrained within us

that when we come

to a story

of the birth of a hero,

we go,

yeah,

let's look,

verse 18,

now the birth of Jesus Christ

took place in this way,

when his mother Mary

had been betrothed to Joseph

before they came together,

she was found to be with child

from the Holy Spirit

and her husband Joseph,

being a just man

and unwilling to put her to shame,

resolved to divorce her quietly,

just in those days,

the way it worked

is in a sense

when you were engaged,

you could use the title

husband and wife,

even though,

even though,

by our way of using words,

it's not the way it works,

but in those days

that's how it would work,

you,

Joseph in a sense

could be called

the husband of Mary

as soon as he was engaged,

so they're engaged still,

the biblical pattern then

was that you would have

sexual knowing

after you,

after you were married,

became husband and wife,

so they're engaged,

but they can use this language,

she's pregnant

and it says

from the Holy Spirit,

which is going to be

explained in a moment,

verse 19 again,

and her husband Joseph,

being a just man

and unwilling to put her to shame,

resolved to divorce her quietly,

but as he considered

these things,

behold,

an angel of the Lord

appeared to him

in a dream saying,

Joseph,

son of David,

do not fear to take Mary

as your wife,

for that which is conceived

in her

is from the Holy Spirit,

she will bear a son

and you shall call

his name Jesus,

for he will save his people

from their sins,

and just sort of pause,

one of the things

I do with coffee people

or people in Loblaws

or something

who are serving me

after I've been there

a couple of times

and they obviously come

from another part of the world,

I'll often ask them

what their name means,

like my name means,

my name technically

means farmer,

but my parents

didn't name me

because it meant farmer,

but often if you come

from many parts of the world,

your name has a significance

in your original language

and culture,

so I'll just ask them,

what does your name mean,

and they'll tell me usually,

they might say sometimes

it's hard to translate

or get into English

or whatever,

but they'll tell me

roughly what it means,

so it was the same

by the way then

at the time

that the Bible was written,

so there's actually

a bit of a pun here,

she will bear a son

and you shall name,

call his name God saves,

because that's what

Jesus means,

so I'll read it again

verse 21,

she will bear a son

and you shall call

his name God saves,

for he will save

his people from their sins,

and this took place,

verse 22,

all this took place

to fulfill what the Lord

has spoken by the prophet,

behold the virgin

shall conceive

and bear a son

and they shall call

his name Emmanuel,

and then Matthew

tells us what it means,

which means God with us,

when Joseph woke from sleep,

he did as the angel

of the Lord commanded him,

he took his wife,

but knew her not

until she had given

birth to a son

and he called his name

Jesus,

God saves.

Now,

here's the thing

to understand,

if you could put up

the first thing here

is that Jesus' birth

began with a profound miracle,

Jesus' birth

began with a profound miracle,

what the Bible text

is saying is this,

if in a sense

if you could go back

in time

with all of the modern

scientific equipment,

even more advanced

than what we have

right now,

one moment,

Mary just had

a normal womb

and she wasn't pregnant,

and if you go back

and look at Luke

where there's the conversation

about the angel

asking Mary

whether she was willing

to take this big risk

and bear the cost

and the price

of being the one

by which God

would enter into the world

to save human beings,

and she says she is,

then one moment,

it's just a normal womb,

no pregnancy,

the next moment,

there's a zygote

attached to the uterus,

that's what happens,

now,

here's,

it's very interesting,

like many modern people

believe the myth

that Christianity

is opposed to science

or undermines science,

I'm trying to work up

a bit of the courage

to write a blog

about the fact

that actually

in our culture

it's only Christianity

which is preserving science

increasingly,

which is under attack

by irrationalism,

like most woke

progressive politics

are inherently irrational

and undermining science,

but you see,

just imagine for a moment,

here's how miracles work,

you see,

miracles actually only work

if there's regular order

of cause and effect

in scientific laws,

otherwise miracles

actually don't work,

and that's why

in a sense

science emerged

out of the Christian

Jewish worldview

as people,

it dawned on people

that the Bible,

that God has a mind,

that he's a creator,

that he's a law giver,

that they can go and look

and see how he's

ordered creation

and it's all because

there's ordered creation

that there can be

something like a miracle

and the miracles

don't involve

suspending the laws

of science

very rarely

or doing anything like that,

it's an insertion

into cause-effect,

cause-effect,

cause-effect,

cause-effect,

cause-effect,

cause-effect,

and it would be

a little bit as if,

you know,

I don't know,

Louise and I,

I'm walking out

and a lottery ticket

flutters down

and I pick it up

and a couple of days later

I've won 40 million dollars,

that's the only way

I'll ever win

with a lottery ticket,

God will have to have it

flutter into my hands

or I'll find it on the ditch

or something like that

and I win all the money,

and so we want to bless

our kids when they go

into university

and we just say,

you know,

how about,

you know,

Bria,

are you willing to have us

sort of have entry

into your bank account

and she says yes

because,

you know,

I love you Nana

and Papa

and I trust you

and you know,

we see the,

you know,

student loan money

going in

and this going in

and that going out

and she gets a part-time job

and this is going in

and out

and in and out

and in and out

and it's all

the law of mathematics,

it's all the law

of mathematics,

it's never wrong,

just the law of mathematics

but one day

we just decided

to plunk in $500

to her account.

Now,

we haven't done anything

against the laws

of mathematics,

the law of mathematics

just keep on going

but all of a sudden,

one second after we've

plunked in $500,

her bank balance

is $500 more

but then what happens?

All the other normal laws,

it just,

it,

the mirror,

in a sense,

the miracle,

just,

the flow just continues.

Mary's able to have babies

like she is.

She's old enough,

she's healthy enough,

there's this miracle

of the zygote

all,

one moment

in the twinkling of an eye

there's a zygote

attached to the womb of Mary

and then all of the normal

biological and scientific processes

which were never suspended

continue to happen

and eventually she has a baby

and that's at the very heart

of the Christian story

and it also helps us

to understand

how miracles work

and why it actually,

it's only if there's

the laws of science

that miracles can be happening

if there is a God

as described in the Bible.

But why does any of this matter?

If you could put up

the final point

that would be very helpful.

Emmanuel,

God with us,

Jesus,

the transcendent

became human

to really deliver you

from your transcendent

offense

or offenses

would probably be

a better way to put it.

there's lots of good advice

by people out there.

We have Daniel Gilman

visiting us

and I don't know

with his Ravi Zacharias training,

I don't know

what they used to tell him

about the word sin

but there's lots of people

out there

who advise Christians

not to use the word sin.

I mention this

because if you look here,

look back up at,

where is it here?

Verse 21,

she will bear a son

and you shall call his name Jesus

for he will save his people

from their sins.

And so there's lots of people

who advise us

not to use the word sin

and there's some reason for that.

There's some like,

it's because partially

the word sin

is often for non-Christians

that they think

it just means sex,

like being naughty

about sexual things.

But the big thing is

is it's easily mocked.

Like,

if I got a comedy

Netflix special,

I could just come

walking out to the stage

and say,

I see a lot of sinners

out here

and everybody would laugh

because it's a ridiculous idea.

Have you been sinning?

I just have to say that.

People will laugh.

It's a ridiculous idea.

It's mocked in our culture.

And so people will

tell us to get rid of it.

But here's the thing

and I might,

I don't think I'll lose

anybody in this room.

I might lose some of you

online by saying this

but just give me some grace.

Jordan Peterson

has some very wise advice

about things.

He's reacting to

forced use of pronouns

and other types of things

and he says basically this

which is just completely true.

It's just reasonable.

We think with words.

There's no thinking

without the use of words.

And if you have

controlled speech

and certain words

aren't allowed

then you have

controlled thought.

But controlled thought

is an oxymoron.

If your thought's controlled

it's not thought.

You're not thinking.

And so if you control

the language

you control

how people think.

It's an Orwellian

1984 world.

Welcome to Canada

in 2021.

And that's part of the reason

why we have to

find ways to resist it

and to not allow

our words to be controlled.

And so here's the importance

of the word sin.

Why we need to keep it.

Even if

it might be that

I'm talking to people

I might not use it

but I have to keep the word

and not be ashamed

or embarrassed at the word.

And here's the reason

the word is so important.

The word sin

actually is helpful

to Canadians

that just don't realize it

and it's very helpful

to Christians

because it maintains

the idea

of transcendence.

You see

our culture

does have the idea

that some things

well you know

if

if I

if

Louise slapped me

that would just be wrong.

Okay?

If I discovered

that one of you

had ripped off

an insurance company

for a hundred thousand dollars

well that would be wrong.

And there's a lot of things

most things

that are just sort of wrong.

But our culture

still has this idea

that there's some things

that are wrong

that touch on the transcendent.

Like when we say

that somebody is guilty

of a crime against humanity

that's what we're trying

to get at.

That a crime against humanity

is not just ripping off

an insurance company.

It's not just robbing a bank.

It's not just

you know

two drunk guys

fighting over a girl

and punching one another.

And that's all bad.

It's all bad.

It's all bad.

But there's certain types

of things that we want to try.

Our culture doesn't have

the language of transcendence

but even though

we don't have the language

of transcendence

we still have the sense

that there's something transcendent.

And some things

aren't just wrong

they're wrong in a way

and we start reaching

it's a crime against humanity.

To find out about somebody

doing ethnic cleansing

that's a crime against humanity.

Part of the reason

our culture is so concerned

about hate speech

is it's saying

that it's not just

that I call

you know

somebody in the congregation

a not

some type of thing.

But if there's a sense

that it's motivated

by a hatred

and a prejudice

of a whole race

or a whole class

of people

that are culturally

you know

important right now

that in some ways

that's not just me

not being right

with my language.

When you call it

a hate crime

we're trying to say

it's touching

on something

transcendent

that we violated.

And if you know

anything about our culture

there's no remedy

against something

which is transcendent

which has been violated.

we will all say

if I kill somebody

and there's a sense

that I didn't just kill them

but that it's a hate crime

or it's a crime

against humanity

people would be saying

that 20 years in jail

isn't enough.

You should be in jail

for the rest of your life

and not only that

that on social media

and other types of things

my sin and my guilt

has to be brought to me

day and day

and day and day again.

I have to be crushed

belittled with

and made

if I don't feel shame

everybody else

should feel ashamed of me.

Because there's some things

that people do

which isn't just wrong

it is wrong

against the transcendent.

And our culture has that

even if we can't articulate it

very clearly.

And you see

this is what is so important

with the word sin.

is that what the Christian story

is saying is this

Emmanuel

God with us

Jesus

God saves

that the transcendent

became human

to really deliver

you and me

from your transcendent offenses.

Because you see

if we start

you know there's no way

if you've cleansed

an ethnic group

how can that whole group

like

we have this sense

of the transcendent

but it's transcendent

and the transcendent

is connected to justice

but we just

it

there's no

way to connect it

to satisfy it

and if

there was anything

it would have to be

as if

all of that ethnic group

were every gay

who's ever lived

or every person

who's African American

or African

who's ever lived

could somehow

as one

speak into it

and deal with it.

And Christians believe

that

every human being

is made in the image

of God

and the image

itself

comes amongst

his image bearers

the transcendent

himself

becomes human

to deal with that

that only the transcendent

can deal with

in a way that is

both fully just

and fully merciful

where you have the sense

that justice

has been done

with no violation

at all

not covered up

not ignored

not forgotten

completely revealed

and the transcendent

has both revealed

that transcendent

offense

and dealt

with it

in a just way

but in a way

which is also

merciful

and gives you

hope

even if you're

camping at the gate

of hell.

And that's what

the Christmas story

is.

The transcendent

becomes human

to deal with that

which only the transcendent

can deal with

for us human beings

who violate

a moral order

and moral things

which are transcendent.

There's hope.

It's the birth of hope.

Please stand.

Thank you.

Let's bow our heads

in prayer.

And by the way

just before I pray

if you're watching

this online

either today

or later on

and if you have

never given your life

to Jesus

there's no time

better than just now

saying Jesus

I've been camping

at the gates of hell

and I didn't realize

that there was a way

that all those things

in my past

in my present

that I've dealt with

can be dealt with

by you

in a way that is just

but is also full of

grace and mercy

that you can give me

new life in you

that you are Emmanuel

that you are with me

in my mess

and in the midst

of my mess

you saved me

and redeemed me.

There's no time

better now

than say Jesus

be my Emmanuel

be my Jesus

be my Christ

be my Savior

and never let me go.

Let's pray.

Father thank you so much

that Jesus

is God with us

that he is your

great provision

for our great need

that he is

justice

transcendent

and real

justice

real at the level

of history

transcendent

as well

that he is

mercy

that he is love

that he is grace

and that by his

life and death

and resurrection

those things

which keep

human beings

like us

far from you

have all been

dealt with

and bridged

in his life

and death

and resurrection

and so Father

we give you

thanks for this

we ask that you

help us

Father

to treasure

these truths

and to be like

Mary

and to ponder

them

to live out

of the pondering

upon these

great treasures

of the truth

of the Christmas

story

Father

help that

to be more

and more

what describes

our lives

and we ask this

in the name

of Jesus

your son

and our savior

amen

you