The Surprise of a Humble King

Here this morning.

And if I haven't met you, my name's Russ.

I'm one of the pastors here at Church of the Grove.

Um, so so good to uh celebrate with you guys today, and and even extra special to be able to celebrate baptism.

And and and I'll I'll I'm I can tell you this because I have the microphone and and and it this is personal because they these are neighbors from our neighborhood, and and so the Granthams are are just a wonderful family.

They love Jesus, they love people, and um and you can see the fruit of their lives because their children um now have turned their hearts and and lives over to the Lord, and so it's so special to be able to have you baptize Jeff and for you guys to be a part and have your family, all friends, friends and extended family here.

And so as you um uh get prepared to listen this morning and dive in together in scripture, if you want to, to go ahead and turn to Luke chapter 2.

Luke 2 · chapter mention

While you're turning to Luke chapter 2, let me just mention a couple things that are coming that are special into this season that we're in.

Luke 2 · chapter mention

Um a week from yesterday, we are gonna have Shop with the Heroes next Saturday, December 7th.

And Shop with the Heroes is an opportunity for us to invest and to love on children and to say thank you to our um community heroes that will be in uniform partnering with them.

If you want to be a part of that, you can stop by and sign up at our table outside if you want to be a part of Shop with the Hero.

We still would love to have more people that are personal shoppers that help us with setup and breakdown and that wrap gifts and and that are personal shoppers to help uh go with the the heroes and the children and keep up with what they're ordering.

And if you want, you say, Well, I can't be there, I can't personally be there.

Well, you can still take uh be a part, you can still take part in this.

You can sponsor a child, which is$125, to sponsor their shopping experience.

You can sponsor a hero.

We give heroes a gift card to say thank you for taking time out of their busy schedule to be a part of this event.

And um, and so if you want to invest in that, you can also be praying over the next two Thursday nights.

We've got some very important meetings with the city of Walnut Grove concerning our Four Generations project, our building out here.

Basically, they're gonna approve the exterior design of the building, and which is really it's like the one of the final steps um uh besides paying for it.

Um that's something for you to pray about too.

And it's an opportunity for um for us to really take a huge step and be prepared to break ground um in these coming days as we move forward.

So pray about that.

Uh that the city will give approval and and more importantly, that we just continue our partnership with the city and our community, and that that is something that will be fruitful for uh the kingdom of God, as we know is our priority, but also be fruitful for um families and and relationships that we have here in our community.

So here's a here's a confession I have for you as we begin this new series and we celebrate Christmas, is I'm an I am an information junkie, and so I begin to think about halfway through the year, what am I going to be able to say that is new and fresh about Christmas this year?

And so I I mean, I don't know about you, but just so you'd understand how there's this pressure that I think all preachers and teachers feel to present something radically new and something that will, and this is kind of what I go for, is I want a big pow moment in the sermon, somewhere around the middle to the end of the sermon.

I want to say, wow, and I want it to, I want the information that I present to be so new and so fresh that it will just it will just overwhelm you with with um with how smart and intelligent I am to come up with something new and fresh that other teachers and preachers haven't been able to discover for the past 2,000 years of the existence of the church.

And so I had my confession is that that I that I need to kind of humble myself and realize that there's probably not anything that's that new.

And if it's new to me or new to you, it's probably not new to somebody that has read and studied the scripture.

But that gives you a little insight into how preachers think.

We're thinking already in June, we're thinking of what I can say that's new and different.

Actually, I start thinking about it on December 26th.

What is new and different?

What is something new and fresh that I can say about a story that's been taught about for 2,000 years, and and and I didn't grow up in church, but but I've I've spent a lot of my life, you know, studying the Bible, a lot of my life in the Word, even preparing through my education to bring something that's that's fresh and that's new.

And so the conviction I had, and it is to and the in the and what I want to share with you and confess to you is I just I'm not that I'm not that knowledgeable.

I don't, I really don't have access or insight, or I'm not that connected to be able to bring something that the Holy Spirit Himself cannot bring to you as you read this story that's being read for a couple thousand years about how Christ came, how he was prepared to give his life, how he was prepared to be bodily resurrected, how he has gone on to be with his heavenly father and pray for us that are here on a daily basis as we carry out his mission.

And so the confession is that God convicted me and said, Russ, study the word, preach the word, and call people to a personal relationship with Jesus.

That's as simple as the Christmas message can get.

And so I'm I'm not gonna worry about wowing you.

I'm just let's just let's just look at the gospel story.

Let's just look at what God has taught for 2,000 years and let it and the power of the Holy Spirit be enough to refresh this story in our hearts, to bring us to a place where we're we're where this isn't just something we regurgitate every Christmas.

This is a fresh word from God, and it has the power to move beyond just being information to but to become transformational in our response.

And so we may know the truth about a story, but we may not be particularly connected to the truth giver who writes the story.

And that's what this series, I hope, is about is that you will be reintroduced or introduced maybe for the first time to the author of this story who first told us about this unexpected Christmas.

Not just a couple thousand years ago, there have been prophets and teachers and leaders who've been talking about this for thousands of years, even before the birth of Jesus began.

And so the title of the series is an unexpected Christmas, and I hope that the Holy Spirit will awaken our hearts to revel in the amazing truth of the Christmas story.

And whether it is new or whether it is something you have some familiarity with, that it that the familiarity will not breed contempt.

Oh, that's just a common story.

I've heard this over and over.

I'm gonna click off because I've heard this story.

I haven't even given my heart to Jesus.

I've responded to the gospel.

And here's the big idea for this Sunday for today is this the greatest, God's greatest gift came in unexpected rapping.

God's greatest gift came in unexpected rapping.

And so, and so the confession is this is this isn't anything that I can add to, is there's no there's no POW moment other than the Holy Spirit awakening you to the reality, reminding you of how He has brought about the circumstances that would provide for the transformation of your heart.

And so we're gonna read the text here in a second, but before we do, let me just tell you that there is some basic information to this story.

As a matter of fact, the information that we're able to look at and to find that is even outside of the Bible all comes together to help assure us and confirm to us that this story is not a story that you would read like a magical story to your children.

This is a historical story full of actual historical facts.

And we we see these historical facts in the text, and God gave us these historical facts so we could understand that Jesus was born in a point in history involving circumstances of people in that community, in that world.

And we read about Caesar Augustus, who is the Roman emperor at the time that Jesus was going to be born, and he referred to himself.

Caesar Augustus referred to himself as a savior of the world, he referred to himself as the Lord of all.

In the midst of this historical collection of events, you've got a world leader that considers himself as a messiah, one who can save, one who can be Lord.

In the midst of that, there's there's spiritual and religious silence that has been that has been significant for 400 years.

God has not spoken through a prophet.

And in the middle of this, the Holy Spirit is stirring, stirring something through the story of a teenage girl and a teenage boy and an immaculate conception that would bring about the birth of a baby boy.

The birth of that baby boy would be God Himself inserting himself into human history, into the human existence, into the human story.

This is where our story begins this morning.

Luke chapter 2, verses 1 through 7.

Luke 2:1–7

It says at that time the Roman Emperor Augustus decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire.

This was the first census taken where Criinius was the governor of Syria.

And these are all facts that we can gloss over, but you don't need to gloss over them.

These are important historical facts that help give us assurance and confirmation that this story is a true story that actually happened in human history.

Verse 3, all returned to their own ancestral towns to register for this census.

So there really was a census.

And it was it was decreed by the Roman Emperor Augustus.

You see, all these little details to show us this is actually a true event that happened in history.

And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea, David's ancient home.

He traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Galilee.

He took with him Mary, to whom he was engaged or betrothed, who was now expecting a child.

So we're introduced to Mary and Joseph.

We're introduced to Roman Emperor Augustus.

We're introduced to the governor, Quirinius, we're introduced to a young couple named Joseph and Mary.

Now, Mary and Joseph almost assuredly were very poor, living life hand to mouth.

And this trip would have would have not been an ideal experience for them because Mary is great with child.

This was about a 90-mile trip that they would have taken from the area around Galilee.

They would have traveled east across the Jordan River, then traveled south, and then traveled back west up to Jerusalem.

And it probably would have already, they it would have taken these two young men and woman who were trying basically to survive through the world events of their time, and it probably would have just broken them emotionally, financially.

Think of the physical toll that it would take on a woman who was expectant with child.

And it was a dirty, dusty trip.

The nights were cold.

Danger lurked in the dark corners of their journey.

They had to make this journey in order to follow the decree of Caesar.

He was the ultimate authority.

And Caesar's decree was part of God's sovereign plan that would take this young couple on a journey to fulfill multiple prophecies about the coming of the Messiah.

These prophecies had been read, had been taught, had been shared and worshiped for centuries for God's people.

In verse 6 and 7, it says this, and while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born.

She gave birth to her firstborn son.

She wrapped him in snugly strips of cloth and laid him in a manger because there was no lodging available for them.

And what we see is we see first an unexpected birth.

An unexpected birth.

The town was packed from the census that had been decreed and being taken by Caesar Augustus and his local governors.

And as a result, there's no room for Mary and Joseph.

There's no place.

They had not been able to look online or to make a phone call ahead and try to secure a place for them to stay.

They barely make it into town and they realize they've got to search for shelter.

They can't find any place.

And so they go to an inn and to another inn and to another inn and they're told there's no room, there's no room.

And finally, one innkeeper, out of compassion in his heart, says, Well, I have a stable, and it would have been more than likely a cave, an underground type of stable or manger where you can get some rest and you can sleep and you can prepare yourselves for this census that's going to be taken.

And so I don't, some of you may have been there, but I was able to visit this place a couple of times when I was in Israel.

And they've built, they've built a lot of what I consider our tacky churches on top of where all of these actual historical events have taken place.

And you can go visit right outside of Bethlehem one of these, one of these tacky churches.

This particular one is called the Shepherd's Church or in the Shepherd's Field.

And it would have been a likely place or a type of place where you would find a couple to find some type of shelter, and it would have actually been an underground cave.

And so there's a picture that we took while we're there.

Um there are tourists that are there every day in these places where you visit in the Holy Land.

But and we don't know that this is the actual place, but it would have been similar to the place, likely where Mary and Joseph would have taken up refuge.

And so now take away the picture, take away the artwork, the benches, the table, all of the areas that have been cleaned and prepared for tourists, and you replace it with darkness, there's no light, felt, horrible stenches and smells.

This would have been like the place where our Lord was born.

Smelled of hay, of animals, and just the grit of everyday life, especially in a first century world that was tough, tough living.

This wasn't the scene for the birth of a king.

There's no palace, there's no throne, there's no attendance, there's no hired help, there's no sanitary hospital, there is no epidurals, there is no pain medication, there's no medical staff to wait on you to take care of your every need.

They don't have a bassinet or a crib to lay this newborn baby into.

They have to settle for wrapping in strips of cloth that are just picked up, that are lying around, and that they place them in a feeding trough.

Most likely it wasn't wood, it would have probably been made out of some type of rock or concrete material.

Um, that's just the historical facts.

Not sure about that.

Would have been a place where animals were were fed.

And so we know that the conception and the birth of Jesus are miracles, but but we don't understand the significance of many other miracles that are taking place at the same time he's being born in this place.

Imagine how disease and bacteria and and and other types of of um microbes are would have been uh spread.

And we think about a baby being born in this environment.

I mean, this this would have been a place that you wouldn't bring your children to.

And a baby is born in this environment.

This baby is not just any baby, it is the it is the savior of the world.

Born in an unexpected place, a less than ideal place.

And so the creator of the universe enters into a world.

How would we think?

How would we pick the circumstances in which our Savior would be born into human existence?

I mean, I'd sound some trumpets, right?

I'd probably decorate the place very nicely.

I'd want to certainly want it cleaned.

And we we need we need people to stand at attention, right?

We need people that are that are that are prepared for a holy moment.

Sound the trumpet, celebrate it, let's have a band, let's have a welcoming committee.

In the stillness of the night, in the filth of a cave, in a very unexpected set of circumstances.

The savior of the universe is born into human existence.

Not in a palace, not sitting on a throne, not even in a beautifully decorated bassinet.

The savior of the world is born among filth, animal excrement, and in darkness.

Charles Spurgeon, the great British preacher, he says this.

He said he was in He was infinite and an infant all at the same time.

Eternal and yet born of a woman, almighty and yet hanging on a woman's breast, supporting the universe and yet needing to be carried in a mother's arms.

This is the beauty of the Christmas story.

It's the paradox, the paradox of Christmas, if you will.

God's ultimate plan to save the world begins not in a beautiful palace, but in the most humble state, the most unexpected manner.

Heaven meets earth in a manger in a quiet but revolutionary moment that has the ability to change human history, but also the ability to change your human heart.

An unexpected birthplace.

The birth of all and the consummation of all of God's plan coming in this quiet, dark moment in this dark stable, cave, underground place.

Yes, it's a place to escape the elements, but but out of the elements into human filth, animal filth.

God, defying human logic, a newborn king through his birth was seen as identifying with the lowly and the overlooked.

God's plan.

God's unexpected birthplace that leads us to an unexpected king.

An unexpected king.

We can't go wrongly assuming that the birth of Jesus is the beginning of Jesus.

I mean, I mean, it that that is that is our thought.

It's our human kind of thinking is that the the the birth of Jesus is the beginning of Jesus, but that's not what the Bible teaches us that.

Even though there is a physical birth of the human being who would be Jesus, it is not the beginning of his existence.

His existence comes long before.

As a matter of fact, there is no calendaring the beginning of Jesus' life.

He is eternal.

He is eternal.

There is no ending.

There is no ending to his existence.

He is our eternal King.

And Paul writes about this to the to the church at Coloste, Colossians 1, 15 through 17, that speaks about who Jesus is, who Christ is.

Christ is the visible image of the invisible God.

He existed before anything was created and is supreme over all creation.

For through him, God created everything in the heavenly realms and on the earth.

He made the things that we can see, and he made the things that we can't see, such as thrones and kingdoms and rulers, authorities in the unseen world.

Everything was created through him and for him.

He existed before anything else, and he holds all creation together.

That should bring us a little bit of comfort, maybe a little bit of hope and a little bit of joy in a difficult world that we're in.

Regardless of your circumstances, we have a creator that has provided for us the opportunity to know him up close and personally.

We actually can know the creator and the author in a very personal way.

And so you can, we can wrongly believe that Jesus began in the city of Bethlehem some 2,000 years ago, but we can miss the idea of the power of the story.

What is at the root of this story?

It's Jesus.

Jesus.

Jesus was and is and always will be the center of this story.

And he'll always be the one who is ruling and reigning.

And if this one true king becomes a part of our life in a very personal way, then we are, we are, he makes available to us all the power and might through his Holy Spirit that was that was on display at his birth.

He's our unexpected king, our unexpected king.

Paul writes about this in Philippians chapter 2, verses 5 through 11.

Philippians 2:5–11

And he said, this is what transformation leads.

A changed heart through a changed mind and attitude.

And he says in verse 5, you must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.

Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to.

Instead, he gave up his divine privileges.

He took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being.

This is a Christmas story.

When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal's death on a cross.

Now, let me stop.

I mean, why a cross?

Think of all the instruments for execution throughout all history.

And God chooses this instrument of execution that is not practiced throughout all of history, but it is practiced in the part of history when God would say, This is when I will have my son born.

And so even this the reality of him being born in a time of history where executions were were carried out on a Roman cross.

And so in verse 9, it said, Therefore God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God, the Father.

He gave up his divine privileges.

That's what we read and what Paul writes about.

He didn't lose his divinity, but he set it aside for this moment in history where he could become born as a human being.

Augustine, the great bishop of Hippo, he writes about this event.

Here's what Augustine says.

He says, the maker of man became man, that he, the ruler of stars, might be nourished at the breast, that he, the bread, might hunger, that he, the fountain, might thirst, that he, the light, might sleep, that he, the way, might be wearied by the journey, that he, the truth, might be accused by false witnesses, that he, the judge of the living and the dead, might be brought to trial by a moral judge, that he, justice, might be condemned by the unjust, that he, discipline might be scourged with whips, that he, the foundation, might be suspended on the cross.

It's the gospel.

The gospel story right there.

Jesus is an unexpected king.

His coming redefines power, it pushes back against the systems of the world, against the darkness of the world.

Caesar brought peace through military might and fear, while Jesus brings peace through reconciliation and sacrificial love.

And it leads us to this final kind of fill-in-the-blank is that an unexpected birth, an unexpected king, leads to an unexpected fulfillment.

The fulfillment of what?

Of prophecy, of the word of God, the promises of God come true in the form of a baby that is born.

Isaiah writes about this in chapter 9, verses 6 and 7.

He says, For a child is born to us, a son is given to us.

The government will rest on his shoulders, and he will be called wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

His government and its peace will never end.

He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor David for all eternity.

The passionate commitment of the Lord of heaven's armies will make this happen.

And so I don't have any wow moment.

I don't have any new information per se.

But what I have is the gospel.

And the gospel never changes.

The gospel is all powerful.

The gospel has the ability not only to give you hope, but to transform your life.

Where we collectively, as the church, embody the same characteristics that Jesus embodied in becoming the wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.

And so, what does this mean for you?

What does this mean for us today as we begin this new series of an old message, but has the ability to transform us, to give us hope through putting our faith in Jesus, going public with our faith, has the power not only to give us hope in the beginning, but to give us the power in the middle and all the way to the end of our life, even into eternity.

So, what does that mean for us?

Here's a few action steps for this morning.

Is number one, is stop chasing what the world defines as success.

Stop chasing what the world says is where the world says your hope and your meaning and significance is found.

Greatness is found looking into the eyes of Jesus, our Savior, looking at his life hanging on a cross, looking at an empty tomb, knowing that he was dead in that tomb, but now he has been brought back to life.

He ascended to his heavenly father to pray for us every day.

And so stop chasing the world's idea of success.

Secondly, make room for the king in your heart.

Make room for the humble king in your heart.

If you have not been introduced to him in a personal way, this morning is an invitation for you to turn and repent of your sin and to put your faith in Jesus, maybe for the first time.

If you've already put your faith in Christ, then this season is a reminder every year.

It's a reminder every year of the hope that we have.

And we reflect on it by looking at Jesus' life, his existence, who he is as the Son of God, how he came and his humility.

And we celebrate wanting to adjust our life to his character.

And finally, it's this look for God in the unexpected places this season.

Many of many, listen, I'm just being honest.

I struggle with the fact that I've got to come up with something new to give my wife and my kids and my family.

I've got to come up with a new present, a new idea.

I gotta come up, am I gonna am I gonna decorate?

What kind of decorations are we gonna have?

I mean, is it you know, am I gonna hire somebody?

Am I gonna do it myself?

I really don't want to do it myself, but but I feel this pressure from from this culture in which we live.

And and and so, so all of this pressure that comes, I'm just being honest, with this holiday season.

The reminder with empty chairs of who's not with us anymore.

And some of you are gonna be gonna, this is gonna be the first year for some of you to celebrate this season without somebody.

All these comes, all these things come about, all these reminders of uh of the good and the bad and everything in the middle.

And and but I don't want you to focus on all that.

Focus on the true meaning of this season.

Is there is a an unexpected intersection of your life with the Spirit of God this season.

My question is, what is that?

Can you be sensitive to that?

Can you pay attention to how Christ would lead you?

Maybe there's a neighbor for you to share with, maybe there's a meal for somebody for that somebody needs for you to bring to them.

Maybe there's an invitation to church or to our kids' program that'll be here in a couple of weeks over at the school.

What a great opportunity to share the meaning and this and the essence of this season, what it means.

Maybe it just starts with today, and you confess I'm struggling with this season.

This is not as joyful as it should be.

Let's just acknowledge that and then, hey, let's turn our hearts and let's remember what this season is really about.

It's about a fulfillment of a king who comes in unexpected circumstances, who is an unexpected and unlikely candidate to be a savior and to be Lord of all the universe.

But he is Lord indeed, and he provides hope and meaning in all the spaces of our life.

And so let's just begin this season through prayer.

Can we pray together?

Let's begin this season thanking God for his unexpected, unexpected story, unexpected manner in which he has come.

And it comes every year, whether we plan for it, whether we calendar for it, whether we have plans and whether we have know how we're gonna decorate or what tree we're gonna use and what room it's gonna go in, and how we're gonna do presents and gifts and all that, all of that, maybe it is important, maybe it is stuff we need to be concerned about, but but in the middle of that, the most important part of this season is the why behind the what.

Through his son Jesus, who is the manifestation, who is in physical form, he is the representation of the creator of the universe.

Show us up close and personal what the heart of our Heavenly Father is all about.

And if you have missed out on that chance to follow Jesus, let me encourage you this morning.

This is the morning in which you can say yes to Jesus for the first time.

Maybe you're struggling with this season coming upon us so quickly like it does every year.

You struggle with some of the same things that I shared and confessed with you, and maybe you need to refocus, recalibrate, and remember what this season is about.

It's not about lights, trees, presence, it is about the light of the world who came to give his life, and he actually died upon a tree, and he becomes the greatest gift given to us in our lives because that gift provides us eternal hope.

If you've never put your faith in Jesus, today's the day.

Say yes to Jesus.

If you need a touch of the Holy Spirit, you ask.

You ask of him, and when we ask, he promises to grant our request and he gives us that through the hope of Jesus, the gift of the Holy Spirit, the prophecy of his return.

Look forward to a world where all of humanity is reconciled with our Heavenly Father, and there is justice, there is truth, there is goodness, and it's found not in a palace, not through a bank, it's found in humility, in a little feeding trough, right in the middle of human existence, where a baby is born that would push back darkness and sin for all of history.

We worship you, and even as we come to sing this familiar hymn as your people that says, Come, come, all you faithful, let it let today be a day where we come, all of God's faithful, come together and we sing a song celebrating how He came into existence in humility, in the middle of human history to give us hope and joy.

So, Father, we love you and we thank you.

It's in Christ's name we pray.

And everybody said together, Amen.

Would y'all stand, stand with me as we sing this hymn together?