Christmas Advent…From the Cradle to the Cross

u who are not here in the house we don’t forget you we we actually save seats for you and we hope wherever you are some of you I know are in places that are far from here in other cases you’re in a situation that’s extreme to say the least I want to say something about the reality of Life as We Know It we talk about things that some could scoff at and dismiss as fanciful and wishful thinking how is it possible that somebody could have joy

when finish the sentence whatever you’re going through is that possible or are there exceptions or exemptions that doesn’t work for people like you remember you didn’t I don’t know finish that sentence or is it a state M that’s supposed to stagger our senses and say no I’m here for you in fact I left my Throne another hymn that we sing tells us it was a kingly throne I left the right hand seat next to the father doesn’t get better and I came to a Dusty dirty

planet to reach out to people that are soiled and broken and and I did it for reasons we’re going to talk about this morning if you’re stuck in that don’t don’t feel bad don’t kick dirt clots and assume that you made a mistake coming I hope just the opposite and you who are joining us from other places if you’ve never been to a church setting or heard these words they’re true I’m not making them up I don’t do that wouldn’t change your life you might leave

impressed but not impacted So to that end I want us to come to this moment and realize something we are in the second week of Advent and it got got me thinking so is it an assumption on my part we all know what the word Advent means and I thought I would take a second and talk about the meaning of Advent so the word simply means arrival I don’t know if you knew that it’s not a it’s kind of a plain word you would maybe say

of an airplane pulling up to a a gate at a terminal they have the Advent only there’s a little twist to it in in lots of ways actually the twist is that when whatever it is when someone or something arrives for the first time or they arrive in a very impactful way to people everywhere then we don’t use arriv Ral we dub it Advent you almost feel a difference don’t you arrival is one thing but Advent is much bigger and our lives are full of examples

of what I’m describing to you the fact is a bunch of things that have become a part of our now daily lives began as well advents for example take cars Henry Ford comes to mind I don’t know if he was the first but it was a mass production thing that changed the lives of well how many of you have ever driven a car you know it’s it’s a game changer and the first time it came it was an advent in every way you can go from

Cars to computers and you can take it to smartphones some of you are right now on Google doing things you shouldn’t do because of that no I’m just kidding you but you know smartphones I still remember Debbie and I were about to get our latest our phones had worn out a number of years ago and we went to an AT&T store we were with them at that time and the guy said we said we need new phones and I really like my flip phone so I’ll

take one of those again and there really weren’t any other options and he stopped us remember and he said hey I would hold up just a little bit if they’re not broken keep using because there’s this new phone coming so far the name we’re hearing is smartphone how many have a smartphone today how many have a flip phone you’re weird if you do but it’s cool it’s really cool so phones I let’s go back a click or two to televisions they’re part of our Lives how

many have more than one in their home you shouldn’t that’s ridiculous okay but we we have televisions and by the way I remember our first McCracken family television I’m not talking about the Mac 5 I’m talking about the previous McCracken and I was the Caboose of that Clan and I remember my I was watching Let’s Make a Deal and I I was a little boy and I was so stoked because the thing they were going to give away was a console television I have you raising

your hands well this is like getting exercise how many remember consoles okay console television is about as wide as this stage I exaggerate but for sure the communion table it was that wide and it was mostly Furniture like wood had nothing to do with the TV except right in the middle there was this big sort of an eye bulging look to it and definitely black and white and it came in and went out it came in and went and you could I remember trying to watch

Lost in Space don’t laugh at that it’s better than Star Wars any day but the we couldn’t get the television to work and I just burst into tears I I came apart I was just like oh my life is wrecked what am I going to do you know so console TVs was the start of well we have a we have a flat screen TV it’s as wide as you want it today the list could go on and on and it’s kind of an entertaining list but

here’s the deal like TVs and computers and smartphones and cars when they were first introduced they were described as Advent the Advent of each of those products all of that applies now to Christian theology when referring of course to Jesus Christ his coming and his future Second Coming you with me his first coming and his future second Co coming are referred to as advents so today I want us to explore that a second it’s just mostly devotional this will be short but I want you to

to take go with me let’s transport ourselves back to Isaiah the prophet’s words in 740 BC to put it in plain speak 740 years before the first coming of Jesus and I my Bible’s open to Isaiah chapter 9 I want you to turn there if you would find it on your app whatever go to that and it’s what I think I’ve made clear would be known as correctly the first Advent of Jesus Christ these words are familiar to many that we’re about to read what is

less familiar is that they predated the first Advent by almost eight centuries it’s a long time before the words that make up Matthew 1 and 2 and Luke 1 and 2 800 or eight year eight centuries rather before that a baby was born in Bethlehem of Judea and and it’s it was strangely similar to the first Advent are these words that were spoken by Isaiah they describe not only the day to come as he wrote but I want to challenge you without I don’t need to

leverage this at all I just need to say hey make a connection to this day in other words we’re about to read words that may very well describe the day in which we live chapter nine look how it begins even nevertheless there will be no more Gloom I told you make a connection I don’t need to stop here every sentence but you’re making it already how much Gloom fills our world today Isaiah in 7:40 BC said the day is coming and there will be no more

Gloom for those who were in distress and that would describe most people in the day of Jesus in the past he humbled the land of zebulun and the land of naph think of those as two tribes that represent the Northern Kingdom at that time in the divided Kingdom after Solomon the northern kingdom was made up of 10 tribes they’re collectively described here as zebulin and naph but in the future look at the change he will honor Galilee of the Nations now you can take any map

of Israel today and you will still find the largest body of water is Galilee the Sea of Galilee it’s really a lake but we’ll call it a Sea of Galilee and where was Jesus raised in Nazareth and where is Nazareth right next to Galilee Way up north now you’re getting hints here but in the future he will honor Galilee of the Nations by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan west of the Jordan east of the Mediterranean Sea now he gets very personal about his

predictive words that had eight centuries before they’re fulfilled the first time the people walking in darkness again what’s our world today what are the people that are close to you today your family you the people walking in darkness have seen a great light on those living in the land of Deep Darkness a light has Dawn that’s a way of saying it’ll be both personal and Incredibly public the land described as deep darkness my paraphrase would be no one will miss it there is this great light

that has dawned and then he gives us some illustrations that make a lot of sense if you connect them to all this you have enlarged the nation and increased their Joy they Rejoice before you as people Rejoice at the Harvest as Warriors rejoice when dividing the plunder in both cases you seow seed and you wait you know it’s a season later you never reap in the same season you sow it’s some cases much later the same is true with war most wars take take time and

most victories don’t come overnight occasionally that’s that’s changed with modern warfare but Warriors rejoice when the battle has finally been won when there’s a declared Victory and plunder which always went to the Victor is dispersed divided and then he gives more examples for as in the Day of midian’s Defeat you have shattered the Yoke that burdens them if you took the time in every one of these and look back you could go to judges the Book of Judges and Gideon was a deliverer we know him

as judges in the Bible but he was a deliverer he was a we would say today a hero there was a serious problem God tapped his shoulder and said I want you to go take care of the midianites they’re bad ombres they’re bad people deal with them and and get rid of them and Gideon did remember how he smashed the jars and they shouted for the for the Lord and for you know it was it was a cool thing and sure enough and there’s even a

song G anyway you remember from vacation bible school so that’s what he saying as in the days of midian’s defeat you have shattered the Yoke that burdens them the bar across their shoulders the rod of their oppressors it’s a great description of people today largely it’s not a a slavery situation but it’s the bondage of the greatest enslavement of all time sin right if you sin you’re a slave to sin Jesus said John chapter 8 check it out so he shatters this burden that’s across the

shoulders of the people that oppresses them look verse five every Warrior’s boot used in battle and every garment rolled in blood will be destined for burning it will be over and done it will be fuel for the fire if you’re an audience in this day 740 years before you have no idea what he’s talking about but you know it’s it’s something and and it’s something big and something’s coming there’s a an arrival that’s going to happen they didn’t know if it was next week or next

month or centuries later but it’s it’s coming and it’s big and that’s that’s got to raise the question how you going to do this God what means are you going to take look at verse six these are the words you’re familiar with for to us a child I’m just being honest here a child you’re talking about winning a war you’re talking about midians defeat we can look back in time and see that happen a a child is born to us a son is given do you

hear the pronouns there to us a son is given and the government will be on a child’s shoulders are you reading that right and he will be called he has a name many names actually wonderful counselor I love the second one in the list Mighty God there’s a Hebrew construct that can actually be translated hero God I like it I I like Heroes why do you need a hero because everything’s dark and we live in a Land of darkness and because there’s no fixing it any

other way I need a hero and I’m not going to sing the song that I need a hero you get it some more it’s it’s for a female voice anyway so he will be called wonderful counselor because life is confusing and we need that he will be a mighty God or a heroic IC God he will be an everlasting father that means it’s more than four or eighty year term it’s not a political solution an everlasting father and look at this DNA Prince of Peace of

the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end doesn’t run out he will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom establishing it and upholding it a certain way with Justice and righteousness from that time on and I hope you circle the word forever who has the power who has the authority to say things like this I cannot think of a single human leader in all of history that if they said this wouldn’t be scoffed at and mocked and you’d just turn them

off but we’re told something different at the end of verse S I’ll tell you how this happens the Zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this you cannot read those words as we did this morning if it bothers you that I interrupted as every other sentence or word I just can’t contain it I just I want to make sure that we get this and and read it again read it in several translations it just gets more colorful and more personal and impactful but you can’t read

this or hear me read it this morning without sensing something big remember almost eight eight centuries before and anything big had happened these are people living like this burdened weighed down hopeless there there’s got to be something or someone big about to come they tell of a truly impactful event that’s why some people have asked where do you find out the details well you can go to Matthew and Luke chapters 1 and two in both cases and you can read the realtime details of this event

they’re consistent yet strangely curious accounts of messiah’s arrival biggest standout thing of all he came like we read as a king a baby king really I know power I know strength we all do we have a definition of that but how many of us ever point to a baby a baby king not a warrior king the king described by Isaiah came but as a baby why am I surprised by that well we have we had three babies in our lives and in every case these labels

fit they are weak they are vulnerable and totally dependent I like that portrayal in this particular scene they’re totally dependent and can I even say without offending you helpless now we all want to go no yeah but he was God and he could you know somebody messed with him even as a baby he smoke them we miss the point don’t we there’s something here Philip yansy is a writer that has held my attention for decades I read everything he writes don’t agree with 100% but 99

point something of what he says and he was marveling at the Majesty of this baby idea the baby king I think it’s so he asked what many of us have asked here’s the deal if Jesus came to reveal God to us can you hold on to that premise for a sec if Jesus came which is really the biggest question people ask about this person that came no one denies that if he came to reveal God to us then then yansy finishes his question what do we

learn about God from the first Christmas okay I just want to give you a couple of my impressions in answer to that question he came to reveal himself to reveal to us God and and what is it about what he revealed on that first Christmas that’s supposed to impact us here’s the first he took a humble approach to make contact with humans if you’re a God and if you’re a king you could come that way but he came as a king and as a baby king

so here’s the deal it strikes me royalty and and celebrity and nobility don’t live that way that’s not what important impressive influential people do they just don’t do that have you seen a chauffeur standing at an airport with a sign and somebody’s name has it ever been your name bunch of boring people right all of us I I got off an airplane at doulas airport back when Debbie and I were just engaged and it was my second visit back and I get off there’s a mid

terminal and then those buses bring you to the main terminal and I come out of the gate and as I did there’s a series of chauffers this is Washington DC so a lot of people apparently can’t drive they get drivers so and then I’m I’m looking and they’ve got all electric signs like lit up signs and it’ll be the initial of the person and then their last name and my kid you I see the name s McCracken on one of them right I walked straight up

to the guy and I said hi guys I’m here I have no idea about this right I’m expecting to see Debbie and I’m like I’m here and they’re kind of looking at me a little surprised and they said you’re alone I said oh no and I’m thinking in the moment she has four brothers and they are cool dudes and they probably pulled their money and thought let’s bring it on you know cuz I we were five years of dating and finally I got over myself and

asked her to marry me and they had a sign at our engagement the crack that was my name is back for Dean that was her maiden name the crack is back for Dean the queen and this time he brought the diamond ring okay so I’m thinking they’re just pouring it on right it’s a big deal for me and I’m saying she’ll be here in a minute and they go she’ll she and just as we’re we’re looking at each other confused there’s two guys that walk up

and go hi we’re McCracken they got off my same airplane from Los Angeles and I’m like fraud you know I mean what who are you you know and and so there’s this little who is it just then Debbie walks up I said hold on what is this about and the chauffeur says well I’m supposed to pick up Steve McCracken an attorney from Los Angeles with his law partner and I go is that you and they go yeah and and I saidwell I’m Steve McCracken and I’m

not kidding you I said what’s your middle name prove it you know kind of thing what’s your middle name he says Clark SC C McCracken my middle name is Charles I’m like bro let’s rock paper scissors this dude right now you know what we drove home in a Mazda okay the the chauffer wasn’t for me it’s never been for me big deal people get those things but the Bible insists Jesus being in very nature God did not consider himself equal with God his equality with God

something to be used to his Advantage rather he made himself nothing I’m quot in from Philippians 2 he made himself Nothing by taking the very nature of a servant and being made in human likeness he wasn’t a weird looking baby he was normal human likeness and being found later in his life in an appearance as a man he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death even death on the cross we get asked every year why do you have the nativity scene and still the cross is

that not the whole point of him coming years ago I was a college Pastor in Southern Cal and I I had a a real college students I led them and still do they are passionate people and you can you can stoke the fire of vision and passion in their hearts and they are they’ll show up at the airport tonight and go wherever you told them you you could be used mightily by God you’re ready to you all in they’re like heck yeah let’s do it that’s

how they do and so we would send college students all over the world we would send them not just for a short 10 week 10day trip All Summer Long Hungary Trinidad Colombia lots of places in the world really cool stuff here’s the problem about college students they’re poor almost all of them so they get a big passion but they got no money to go so we had to help find a way to pay help them pay the bill by the way add to that the fact

that many of them were firsttime believers they they’re first generation Believers so they don’t have a list of family and friends that goes oh that’s so wonderful here let me write a support check they had nobody to send letters to and so we did a lot of things to try to raise money we needed to raise in the 80s almost 0,000 a summer that’s how much money it’s a lot of money today it was huge then and so well one of the ideas we came up

with was to create benefit concerts where we would reach out to very well-known artists and ask them to come and do a concert for the night and we would our agreement would be that we would pack the house several thousand seats would be full we would do all the promotion we did we wrote up advertisements and radio and newspapers and everything else in that day and all you need to do is come and do a concert middle of the concert we’re going to pass the hat

and try to raise even more money without shame but we need you to do all that the concert they’re coming to hear you and like I’m not naming names because I don’t want to embarrass anybody but yeah just come and by the way we’re not going to pay you because you know we’ll put you up for the night maybe in somebody’s house so we can save the hotel money you know that kind of thing and we’ll have great food and everything for you and all this

it was all fine for a while and then I started to receive these things called contract writers I didn’t know anything about that but I’m like what’s that about and apparently our F our one of our mothers famous lasagna was not good enough and the water you know the kind where you go to a fountain and push the but how many do that still you should there’s nothing wrong with it okay but how many insist that there’s only one kind of water and I won’t touch

anything else that’s a writer and I started getting a lot of those and you know what I stopped doing concerts they told us how they wanted to come to the church from LAX for real you lost it you lost me that’s not the Jesus arrival we’re talking about he he found a way to take a humble approach to connect with human beings you seeing that here’s a second quickly he found a way around fear fear most religions you may be surprised to hear this most religions

worldwide evoke fear in their followers it’s a good control method if I can make you afraid that I might just take you apart if you don’t behave well or something even Christianity throws in this thing called legalism we’re going to control you not not the Jesus way those of us that have been reading the Bible this year we’re near the nearing the end we’re in Corinthians now it’s really cool but most of us have a long stretch of reading some pretty fearful things in the Old

Testament right you’re you’re familiar with what I’m talking about but but big things this year and we some of us for the first time have come to understand a common fear among Jewish people in the Old Testament these words capture many of that the burning bush of Moses the hot coals of Isaiah this is yansy the Extraterrestrial vision of Ezekiel a person blessed with a direct encounter blessed is in quotes blessed with a direct encounter with God expected to come away scorched or glowing or maybe

half crippled as in the case of of Jacob there were those fortunate ones Jewish CH children also learn stories about them the sacred mountain in the desert that proved fatal to everyone who touched it mishandle the Ark of the Covenant and you die enter the most holy place and you would never come out alive yet most yet among people who who actually walled off a separate section of the temple for God shrank from pronouncing and even spelling his name even to this day there are Jewish

books that have G Dash D for fear that they would do something irreverent and spell God’s name that’s done that’s a that’s a fear of God I would add a un unhealthy fear but in the midst of that kind of world first century Jesus God made a surprise appearance as a baby in a Manger what could be less scary than a newborn I can’t think of anything I think that’s intended in Jesus God found a way of relating to human beings that didn’t evoke fear no

one freaks out at a baby you just don’t indeed the go gospels record Jesus imploring his people Jesus as a man now on a lake that we mention Galilee imploring his people fear not and then he added often the connecting because I’m with you don’t run from me we would say run to me what a great changer one more impression that’s hard to miss he came to us in a cradle and he went for us to a cross I’ve alluded to that along the way but

here’s the add-on all because of his love the cross was in play when he came in the Cradle don’t ask me to they answer was he conscious of it was he aware all of those things I have no idea about he was a baby but the cross was in play when he came in the Cradle in fact it’s why I said earlier he came to carry the sins of all who repent and turn to God to a place where those sins belong nailed to a cross

such good theology the Apostle Paul noted this in Galatians chapter 3 when he was hung on a cross about 30 or 33 years later when he was hung on a cross he took upon himself the curse for it’s a pronoun again our wrongdoings Galatians Chapter 3: 13 folks what explains that but his love I it was read so well by the by the msons earlier but hear these words from the passion translation for here is the way God loved the world he gave his one and

only son as a gift now everyone who believes in Him everyone is everyone will never perish but experience everlasting life you see God did not send his son into the world to judge and condemn the world but to be its Savior and to rescue it it’s so different which brings us to appropriately to communion they fit together there’s a there’s a great song we’re going to sing in a minute as the worship team comes to reset I want you to tuck away your notes or your

close your Bible for a second and I want you to just Ponder some words that in a minute you’re GNA you’re going to hear him sung and you’re going to be among the singers it’s called because of your love which is really the heart of this message it’s because of your love why did he do it we know he has the power why did he do it because of your love my debt is paid takes on the extra meaning when you realize you couldn’t pay it

neither could I I hear from people often late in their life in the Final Chapter when they’re about to turn for home wondering I thought I got it right I thought I lived good enough can you affirm that and in the most gentle loving way I know I say no you’re a good person I’ve known you for a few years or many years in some cases but you’re

Transcript machine-generated from the sermon audio, so it may contain errors. 5,111 words.