The Story of Christmas

The Will of God for Christmas

When telling stories often there is a purpose to telling the story. There is some lesson that the storyteller is wanting his/her audience to learn.  You can say that it is the will of the storytellerthat you graspand apply the illustrated concept.

In the story of Christmas, there are also monumental lessonsto be learned.  There are some things that the authorof the Christmas story is wanting youto grasp.  It is His will that you would understandwhat it is that He has donefor you and how it has costHim dearly.

The authorof the story of Christmas, is also the creatorof the Heavens and earth, He is the Lord GodAlmighty.  This story can be trusted as factualas we have determined last week.  It is notsome fairy tale, it is not the imaginations of man, it is not made up, but rather the Christmas story is an expressionof God’s lovefor all mankind.

It is His willthat we would know this story.  It is His will that our lives would be impactedand changedforever, by this magnificent story.  It is His will that this story would be the foundationon which our faith is built upon.

Do You know what the will of God was concerning Christmas?

1. It was the will of God for our savior to come from a virgin birth

Matthew 1:18-22

¹⁸Now 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.

Part of the will of Godconcerning Christmas was to bring about our Saviorthrough a virgin girl.  She must be a virgin to prove that salvation comes from Godand not from man’s efforts. God selected this young virgin girl who was engagedto be married to bring forth His Son. 

Marriage is honorableand acceptable to God.  Sexual purity is honorableand acceptable to God. When God chose a womanto bring forth His Soninto the world, He picked someone who was both sexually pureand who esteemed marriageas an ordinance given by God.  The marriagemust take placebecause it was fit that her conceptionshould be protected by the covenantof marriage. But at the same time her conception must have takenplace before the marriage lest her husband gets the creditof being the child’s biologicalfather.  This child came from God.

The text says before they came together(intimately) she was found to be with a childfrom the Holy Spirit.  Neverhas this happened before and never has it happened again.  But this was done to fulfill the prophecyin the book of Isaiah (as my wife talkedabout last week)  

Isaiah 7:14

¹⁴ Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

1. It was the will of God for our Savior to grow up in a family structure consisting of a man and his wife

¹⁹And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

They are not married yetbut are engagedto get married. Joseph was a just man, and Mary was a virtuous woman. They were a couplewho sought to honor Godwith their lives, so they committed to get married.  

Joseph finds out that His finance’ is pregnantand he knows the baby is not his.  The punishment in those day for a woman to have “played the harlot”as the bible calls it, is death by stoning.

Mary knewthat she was innocentin this matter and that she had kept herself pureand that the child was conceived by the Holy Spirit.  Mary was one of the most dignifiedand virtuous womenof the Bible but here she is at risk of being accusedof one of the worse crimesthat a woman can commit.  So, how does she convince her finance’Joseph of her innocence? 

On the flip side, what is Josephto do in this case? I’m sure he was disappointed, heartbrokenand in disbeliefto discover that the woman that he lovedso much is pregnantwith a child that is not his.  If he divorces her(calls off the engagement) then Mary could be exposed and killed. 

Joseph loved herand was not willing to make her apublic example. He was a religious, goodman; and therefore, he was merciful as God is,and was willing to forgiveas one that was forgiven. Thankfully, the Lord intervenes.

²⁰But 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.

Joseph was to take Maryto be his wife. Mary was to have a son; they were to call Him Jesus.  They would be a family. 

I always knewwhat it was to have a family. Thankfully, I was born into a good family.  But I have learned a new appreciationfor family when I became a father of 4.  (Maylen example)

She is so content, as though the missing piecesof her life have been put back in place.

Though Joseph is not Jesus’ biologicalfather, he is the missing piecein completing the familystructure.  God could havecarried out His plan without Josephbut decided to let him have a leading rolein raising the child Jesus.  

As the adopted father of Jesus, Joseph was a carpenterby trade and is believed to have passedon his tradeto Jesus according to the customof those days. 

Later, when Jesus’ ministryis in full effect, He is found teaching in the synagogueand his listeners are astoundedby his wisdom, they say the following:

Matthew 13:55 Is not this the carpenter's son?                                    Mark 6:3 Is not this thecarpenter,

Joseph played an intricate role in Jesus’ lifeand it was the will of Godto have placedHis Son Jesusin that family structure. (let’s jump ahead to verse 24, we will come back to 21)

²⁴When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, ²⁵but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.

• It was the will of God to send His son to save people from their sins.

²¹She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”²²All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:²³“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).

It is the will of God to save.  It is His will that none should perishand that all should come to repentance. (2 Peter 3:9)                          

Why do we need to be saved from our sins?

1. Sin attempts to fill a voidwhich only God can fill.
2. Sinful behavior is selfish behavior.Which is contraryto the character of God.
3. Sin is like a trap; it appears harmlessuntil the consequencesbegin to wreckyour life.
4. Sin separates usfrom God; It prevents us from having a healthy relationship with God.
5. Sin has eternal consequences

Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The thing about sin is that we have all done it, we are all guilty(Romans 3:23). Therefore, we all need to be savedfrom our sins.

It was the will of Godto send His Son Jesusto this earth to be the ultimate sacrificeandsave usfrom our sins so that we can have eternal life. That is why we have the story of Christmas.  It is a story of redemption.

1. It was the will of God that the righteousness of Christ Jesus would be imputed to us as our righteousness.

There is a perfect righteouswhich God requiresbut which we cannot provideourselves. 

Romans 3:22-25

²²the righteousness of God through faith in JesusChrist for all who believe. For there is no distinction: ²³for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, ²⁵whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.

Here we learn that the righteousness of God is imputedto all who believe in Christ Jesusand all who believe are justifiedby His grace.  (Just as if I had never sinned)

The same words that Solomonused to speak of His beautiful wife, could spoken over those to whom the Lord has imputedHis righteousness.

Song of Solomon 4:7 Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.

Charles Spurgeon-

He views her in Himself, washed in His sin-atoning blood and clothed in His meritorious righteousness, and He considers her to be full of comeliness and beauty.

Charles Spurgeon-

A spot may soon be removed, and is the very least thing that can disfigure beauty, but even from this little blemish the believer is delivered in his Lord's sight. If He had said there is no hideous scar, no horrible deformity, no deadly ulcer, we might even then have marvelled; but when He testifies that she is free from the slightest spot, all these other forms of defilement are included, and the depth of wonder is increased. If He had but promised to remove all spots by-and-by, we should have had eternal reason for joy; but when He speaks of it as already done, who can restrain the most intense emotions of satisfaction and delight?

It is a wonder that Godwould send His son to save us from our sinsand to imputeto us His righteousness through Christ Jesus.  Yet, it is His will to declare over usthat thou art fair my lovethere is no spot in thee.

Recap:   There are at least four thingsfrom the Christmas storythat we can take to be the will of Godfor our lives. 

It is God’s will that:

• You would experience a Supernatural Birth- Just as the birth of Jesuswas supernatural, meaning it was divine and surpassedthe abilities of the natural orderof birth by giving a child to a virgin, There is a supernatural birth that needs to take place in each of us.Meaning we need to die to our waysof doing things and take on the new naturethat is given to us by believingin Christ Jesus.  Or as Jesus put it “unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”

• You would be Adopted into His family- If you are a Christian, then you have been adopted intothe family of God. He is your heavenly Father, we are your brothersand sisters.  You can be like my daughterand know that the piecesthat have been missing in your are now put in placethrough Christ Jesus.

• You would be Saved from your sins- As a Christian, you have been saved from your sins. You are saved from the guiltof your past sins.  You are saved from condemnationthat the enemy will bring upon you because of your sins. You are saved from the penaltyof your sins.

• You would be the Righteousness of God through Christ Jesus- As a believer you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. You are clean, you are beautiful, you are spotless. Not by your doing, but by His.