[0:00] We've been going through a series, and I've been healthy for a majority of it, but something that seems like has made me sing the bass right now, and so I'm struggling.
[0:15] So the frequency might be a little bit off from what's usual from the sermons, but throughout the healthy season of this series, we've been looking at various carols and hymns that have been sung for many generations, and the significance of the words and what the songs communicate in regard to redemptive history of what God's been doing since creation, but also what it means and reveals of who Jesus Christ is as well.
[0:49] And so I would like to finish this series tonight and look at specifically a song called Silent Night that we'll be singing in just a moment.
[1:05] And before we do, I'd like to pray as we begin our time in God's Word and looking at what these words speak to us regarding of who God is.
[1:18] And as we go into this, let us sit and wonder about the meaning of Silent Night and what that means this year.
[1:29] So let's turn to God right now in prayer and speak to the Lord. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this gathering, a special designated gathering throughout the year.
[1:44] where we can really focus on who you are and when you became man. And we pray that if there's anybody who may not be a Christian watching on the live stream or potentially within our midst today, we know that you have searched all of our hearts.
[2:04] You can inventory our lives and you know if that relationship is united or broken with you. And so Father, even if we think that we are Christian, Father, let us submit to the authority of your Word and the teachings of Scripture tonight and help us to be unified and united with you tonight for many of us for the first time.
[2:26] We praise in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. So going through the Advent series, we are focusing on Christ and a sermon titled, Once Broken, Now United.
[2:44] And just as the song sings, there was a night that was described as being silent and it was a night that was also described as being holy, silent and holy.
[3:00] And the essence of these two terms that are described upon this night rest upon the shoulders of this infant child in Bethlehem.
[3:13] And I imagine that the silence of that night represents the awe of creation witnessing what God is doing right now in redemptive history, that God has come.
[3:28] And the holiness being the very fact that this is God coming in the flesh, just as the angel has spoken. And we sing, Silent Night, Holy Night.
[3:44] And in the third verse of the song, Son of God, loves pure light, radiant beams from thy holy face with the dawn of redeeming grace.
[3:58] Jesus, Lord at thy birth. You see, the descriptions of this very night are central to the one who is revealed as love's pure light.
[4:14] And the mark, the dawn, the marking of the dawn of redeeming grace. What this carol successfully encapsulates within this common tune is one truth.
[4:31] Truth that Jesus is central to the significance of this night. Just as Jesus is central to salvation.
[4:43] Just as he is central to redemption. All found simply residing within himself. But we might ask, maybe if you might not be a Christian, what's all this fuss about with Jesus after all?
[5:03] Salvation, redemption, the rise of the evil one and the conquering king, right? What's all this fuss about? It sounds like the bad Matrix movie that was just released and hit the theaters or possibly the incredibly good Spider-Man from what I hear.
[5:20] It sounds like just one of these common narratives of evil and good at war. What's all this fuss about and what's it mean to me? Tonight we're going to be reminded of our sin.
[5:34] Our condition. And also the qualifications of Jesus Christ and specifically his righteousness, which is central to this silent night, this holy night, all attributing to that night.
[5:48] And so what we understand, I'm going to have two points, but they're not going to be up on the screen. But what I want us to understand in this short message today is that the Bible says that we have a problem.
[6:03] What's all the fuss about? We have a problem. Romans 5, 18 through 19 says, Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification in life for all men.
[6:22] For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous.
[6:33] And the problem is that every man and woman that has been succeeded within the family line from Eve, stretching back into creation, or Noah, have inherited sin, have inherited a heart that is corrupt and broken and sinful.
[6:56] And between Jesus Christ and Adam, there are parallel fruits produced from each representative in creation and all throughout history.
[7:07] Through Adam, the fruits of his representation is condemnation. And over on the other side, there is Jesus Christ being the representative. The representative fruits of that is justification, as Romans says.
[7:22] Adam is the head of all people except Jesus Christ. He is not the head of Jesus Christ, and we'll get to that in just a minute. But all have sinned and fell when Adam sinned.
[7:36] It was a generational sin that tainted all of creation. But those who Jesus Christ represents are made righteous, according to Romans 5, 19.
[7:49] And Christ is their representative head. The problem? We are simply fallen. We are simply sinful. That's what the fuss is all about.
[8:02] That's why we gather as we do. Because we know we are sinners, even Christian sinners, saved by grace.
[8:13] And those who are detached from the grace of God, who have not come into the fold yet, are still in a broken relationship with God. There is no life improvement plan.
[8:25] Any book that you can find that has the jazzy title on the bookshelves of Barnes & Noble that will help you improve your condition with your sin, unless that book is actually the Bible.
[8:36] But any uninspired author might make all these claims to improve your life and help you to keep from sinning. But we know that we cannot help ourselves from following our evil desires.
[8:51] James 1, 14 makes that clear. As he says, But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Verse 15 continues, Then desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin.
[9:08] And sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death. But it was a silent night. It was a holy night.
[9:22] And while all creation has suffered the effects of the fall, what about Jesus coming in this manger? This is simply not the case.
[9:34] God was making a way, just as was told by the angel Gabriel to Mary in Luke 1, verse 35. It says, And the angel answered to her, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.
[9:52] Therefore, the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God. This was, I would say, a creative act of the Holy Spirit.
[10:04] Some sexual scandal that we see in pagan mythology of God coming to earth and impregnating a mortal woman. We wouldn't consider that the case here.
[10:16] It was a creative act of the Holy Spirit. And this way provided Jesus' exemption from the stain of sin from Adam's representative head.
[10:30] From the guilt, from the defilement brought by Adam to his descendants. Jesus Christ's conception came not from man. His conception came from God.
[10:42] And he inherited zero corruption because in his essence, he is righteous. He is holy, as the angel told Mary, the Son of God.
[10:55] Not the Son of Joseph. And his divine nature was concealed by flesh, human flesh. But it was a silent night.
[11:09] It was a holy night. This is redemption from this broken narrative.
[11:20] Throughout the story of the Bible, a particularly perfect sacrifice was to be made in order to atone for sin.
[11:33] It couldn't just be any sheep. It couldn't just be any bull. There were regulations. This sacrifice was to be made particular and particularly perfect without a spot or blemish.
[11:48] So if Jesus was intended to accomplish and atone for the sin of mankind, he had to be sinless. And so God made a way for that to be.
[11:59] So this was the mission of this baby in swaddled cloths. This was the mission of this baby that was laying in this manger.
[12:11] And Jesus even made it so that this is his mission in Matthew 3.15, where Jesus answered right before his baptism, Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting to fulfill all righteousness.
[12:26] This was his mission. In fact, the gospel depends on the fact that Jesus was the righteous for the unrighteous. This is when fallen humanity experiences something called substitutionary atonement, where the death of Jesus Christ was born in our place.
[12:51] The perfect spotless lamb died in our place. And Jesus Christ was like us in every way, diapers and all. I can hear the babies back in the room.
[13:04] Jesus Christ was like us in every way, cries and all, yet without sin, without sin.
[13:18] And it was a silent night. It was a holy night. What made this time, this night so special? Well, God only knows that why this was just right.
[13:34] But as the hymn reveals the melody within Scripture, we know this to be true. This was truly, as the hymn says, the Son of God, redeeming grace, salvation in the flesh, the dawning of a new era.
[13:55] Friends, consider the realistic sense of the weight that this night revealed to mankind.
[14:08] That we sit here on December 24th, 2021, and specifically reflect upon that night.
[14:18] Think of the weight that this had. Think in scope of redemption through the generations of God's people sort of following in devotion.
[14:31] Then the cycle goes round. And then all of a sudden, they're acting in rebellion against God. It's all throughout the pages of the redemption narrative. And God has fulfilled at this moment in time, sending the Son of God, the begotten Son, only begotten Son, mind you, in the flesh.
[14:54] This is the fulfillment of a promise long ago in Genesis 3.15, where God instructed the serpent and Eve. He said to the serpent, I will put enmity between you, Satan, and the woman, Eve.
[15:10] And between your offspring, Satan's offspring, and her offspring, Eve's offspring. And he, God speaks of one person specifically.
[15:22] He, someone in Eve's offspring. Namely, as we see it in the story, Jesus Christ. He shall bruise your head, the serpent's head. And you, Satan's, shall bruise his heel.
[15:37] In other words, long ago that was promised, Jesus is revealed as one who is going to come. And he is going to crush Satan.
[15:50] He is the skull crusher. That lays in this manger. And you know what? Maybe the silence of this night can be attributed to the speechless wonder of creation marveling at God's plan.
[16:10] Think of all the people in the world. And God shows this night, this point of the book that we have bound here. Not over here, not over here.
[16:22] But right here. To reveal hope in this hopeless world. Maybe the holiness of this night is actually the cause of its silence.
[16:34] For us tonight, might we not lose the wonder of God's love that God had sent the one who would crush the head of Satan, conquering sin, conquering death, and conquering the devil for your redemption and God's glory.
[17:00] The same remains true. The same remains true because God's promise of redemption and salvation are still within an earshot away. And we know one thing. According to God's word and the prophet Isaiah, that God's word will go out and it will not return void.
[17:17] Simply give your life to Jesus Christ today. Understand our fallen condition and what God has done in order to bring redemption to fallen humanity.
[17:33] Give your life to him. Ask him to save you from your sin tonight. Ask him to save you from your sin tonight. Ask him to save you from your sin tonight. And if that might be you on the live stream or within our congregation today, come pray with us.
[17:49] Don't walk out here alone without allowing somebody to come along your side. Don't walk out here alone without allowing somebody to come along your side.
[18:24] No matter the size. Can illuminate the biggest of chambers. A flame that Jesus Christ has symbolically lit within all of us when he resided through the power of the Holy Spirit within us as his church.
[18:41] And more so, when the church is united upon Jesus Christ, when we look upon a room lit with candles, we can see the glory that happens when the family of God comes together as single individual flames united as one burning essence, burning brightly.
[19:01] I don't want you to miss this. I don't want you to miss this tonight and the significance of it. Because we are his church. And lighting these candles is a good way of showing that.
[19:13] And that we have the power resting within us that burns brightly. And may the resulting demeanor of that silent night long ago lead to a life of resounding praise today within our midst for what God has accomplished for us that's found solely within the work and ministry of Jesus Christ.
[19:34] Because it was a silent night. And it was a holy night. Let's pray as we go into lighting the candles.
[19:44] And I'll give you some instructions. Worship team, you can gather up here as we get ready to pray. Thank you.