Sermon for Christmas Day, 2022
“Glory to God in the
highest, and on earth peace, good will toward mankind.” “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to
all people.” Amen.
Isaiah 52:7-10 7How beautiful on the mountains
are the feet of a herald, who proclaims peace and preaches good news, who
proclaims salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God is king!” 8The voice of your watchmen—they lift up their voices.
Together they shout for joy, because with both eyes they will see it
when the Lord returns to Zion. 9Break
out, shout for joy together, you ruins of Jerusalem, because the Lord is
comforting his people. He is redeeming
Jerusalem. 10The Lord lays
bare his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the
earth will see the salvation from our God. (EHV)
God’s beautiful Gift
brings peace and salvation.
Dear people of the living God,
Somewhere
today, a mother gives birth, and the parents and grandparents marvel, “O what a
beautiful baby!” Somewhere today, a happy
woman is admiring her Christmas gift of a beautiful, diamond, engagement ring. Many places today, you will find little girls
admiring their precious, new dolls and little boys excitedly operating new toys.
The prophet proclaims the beauty of God’s
Christmas gift to the world. However,
the beauty of this gift is not in His human features, nor in what we might
imagine doing with Him, but in the forgiveness, peace, and salvation He brings
to a world struggling under the curse of sin.
Today, we marvel and rejoice because God’s beautiful Gift brings
peace and salvation.
On Christmas Day, most people celebrate with
joy, but do we know why? Maybe we
celebrate families gathering together. Maybe
we are excited about the stuff we are given.
Many of our world celebrate without any understanding of what makes this
day something to celebrate. Isaiah’s
message celebrates the gift of God’s Son.
“How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of a herald, who
proclaims peace and preaches good news, who proclaims salvation, who says to
Zion, ‘Your God is king!’”
I am sure Isaiah’s prophecy had fulfillment in
the return of the people of Judah from their captivity in Babylon. However, the real point of this prophecy is
to tell the world of God’s plan to rescue sinners from their exile in this
sin-polluted world through the gift of one perfect Child. Many commentators use this passage to talk
about those who tell others about Jesus, and certainly it is fit for that. However, there would be no point to the
message without its main fulfillment in the arrival of the Savior.
The beauty of Jesus as a Proclaimer of Good
News is unsurpassed for He is the Good News.
Isaiah would tell us that it wasn’t His physical appearance that made
Jesus desirable. The prophet writes, “He
had no attractiveness and no majesty.
When we saw him, nothing about his appearance made us desire him.” (Isaiah
53:2) Yet, what a glorious celebration
was witnessed at Jesus’ birth, for “Suddenly, there was with the angel a
multitude from the heavenly army, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the
highest, and on earth peace, good will toward mankind.’” (Luke 2:13-14) The heavenly host knew what mankind would
eventually learn. This Baby in the
manger, ordinary in human terms, is none other than God’s only-begotten Son,
who came to win the redemption of all people—to set free those walking in
darkness and controlled by the devil’s evil whims.
We find confirmation that Isaiah’s passage
refers to Jesus in Jesus’ words to John the Baptist’s disciples: “The blind receive
their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are healed, the deaf hear, the dead are
raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.” (Luke 7:22) Jesus’
words confirm several prophecies, none more so than this one from Isaiah. God’s own dear Son walked this earth in human
flesh delivering Good News to the poor of the world. His words are found from the first word of
Genesis to the last word of the Revelation.
The apostle John reported, “In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) This is our Jesus, our Savior, our Redeemer.
At the arrival of your Savior and King, the
angels of heaven sang for joy, and the shepherds were witnesses to the
glory. Isaiah wrote, “The voice of
your watchmen—they lift up their
voices. Together they shout for joy,
because with both eyes they will see it when the Lord returns to Zion.” The apostle Luke
confirmed it: “There were in the same country shepherds staying out in the
fields, keeping watch over their flock at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and
the glory of the Lord shone around them.” (Luke 2:8-9) Humble shepherds that so many people give no
credit for what they saw, yet God foretold their eyewitness testimony seven
hundred years in advance. Do you think common
folk like those shepherds will see Jesus’ return when He comes to judge the
living and the dead? The Revelation
tells us, “Look, he is coming with clouds, and every eye will see him,
including those who pierced him.” (Revelation 1:7) At Jesus’ birth, those ordinary shepherds witnessed
God returning to His people, and they, you and I, and everyone else will
witness Jesus’ return in the end.
Still, here is the most important part: “Break
out, shout for joy together, you ruins of Jerusalem, because the Lord is
comforting his people. He is redeeming
Jerusalem.” In this precious,
beautiful, unusual birth, you and I and every repentant sinner are
comforted. Though we all had been torn
away from the love of God because of the devil’s deceit, Jesus came to redeem
us. Charlie Brown begged everyone he
knew to tell him the real meaning of Christmas.
In answer, his friend quoted Luke’s Gospel report of a Baby born in
Bethlehem and laid in a manger. Under no
other circumstances would news of such a humble birth have survived for two thousand
years, but this Child in a manger gives us life, hope, and everlasting peace
with God.
The skeptic of our times thinks we are foolish
to put our hopes in Jesus. Yet, it is
precisely because Jesus is the fulfillment of all God’s promises that we
celebrate His birth and the salvation we receive by faith. We, who are just as much the ruins of
Jerusalem as any Jews of Jesus’ day, can sing for joy because God’s Son came to
pay the redemption price that set us free from the devil’s control and bought
us back for the kingdom of our God.
Redemption comes at a cost. A few verses before our sermon text, Isaiah
wrote, “Yes, this is what the Lord says.
‘You were sold for nothing, and you will be redeemed without money.’” (Isaiah
52:3) Who sold mankind into the slavery
of sin? I suppose you would have to say
Adam and Eve. For no gain at all but
only trouble and pain, they sold themselves and all their descendants into the
devil’s hands. It was a terrible
trade. Yet, the God of love trumped
every evil intention Satan conspired upon us.
St. Peter wrote, “You know that you were
redeemed from your empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers,
not with things that pass away, such as silver or gold, but with the precious
blood of Christ, like a lamb without blemish or spot.” (1 Peter 1:18-19) That Christ Child in the manger at Bethlehem,
the only truly innocent Baby ever born, became the ransom price that God paid
to set you and me free from Satan, sin, death, and the grave.
Many a delighted parent has oohed and aahed
over the innocence of a newborn baby in a cradle, but only One was without sin,
and that One is Jesus, Son of God and the virgin Mary. Sinless from all eternity, and innocent in
every thought, word, deed, desire, and action, Jesus lived righteousness for
you and me. Isaiah testifies, “The
Lord lays bare his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the
ends of the earth will see the salvation from our God.” The Son of God rolled up His sleeves to do
the work that saves us. Yet, still more
than doing the work of living purity and righteousness for us, Jesus came into
this world to be the sacrifice of blood that took away the sins of the
world.
If you want to know why Christians marvel at
the Baby in the manger, it isn’t a fascination with the sentimental scene, or
the hardship and dedication Jesus’ earthly parents faced in bringing that
precious Holy One into the world. No,
it’s because we always remember that this little Child of lowly birth is the
Son of God. Furthermore, God the Father
and the Son loved us enough to make Jesus the redemption price to win us a
place of glory in heaven, because “God made him, who did not know sin, to
become sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.”
(2 Corinthians 5:21)
We celebrate Christmas for the same reasons we
celebrate Easter, because Jesus lived, died, and rose again so that we might
live and never die. Talk about a
beautiful gift. The whole world marvels
when someone gives a kidney so that someone else can have a better life. Yet, Jesus, the Holy One of Israel and God’s
own beloved Son, gave everything: His life, His body and blood, even His honor
was put on the line so that the redemption price for you would be paid. Nothing more will ever be needed to make you
right with God, because Jesus has done it all.
To the world, it looks like Jesus’ story starts
in the manger in Bethlehem, but the real story started before God created the
world. Before He even began His creating,
God knew the sacrifice He would have to make to have His people dwell with Him
forever. Even knowing what His dear Son
would have to suffer, God laid out His plans to make us holy and to bring us
back into peace and harmony with Him.
So, dear friends, celebrate today, and every
day for the rest of your life, that through baptism and the gift of faith you
are a child of God, bought out of slavery and death by the life and death of that
little Child in the manger, who gave Himself to set us free. What a beautiful gift God has given us in
that manger bed that first Christmas Day.
God gave His Son to be the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the
world. Rejoice, therefore, God’s
beautiful Gift brings peace and salvation.
Amen.
The Lord of peace himself give you peace at all
times and in every way. The grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.
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