In this sermon, Pastor Babij explains the true meaning of Christmas. Specifically, Pastor Babij discusses:
1. The Purpose of Christmas to Find Its Meaningfulness
2. The Price to Make Christmas Meaningful
3. What the True Meaning of Christmas Produces
4. For What People Is the True Meaning of Christmas
Pastor Babij admonishes listeners that they must go beyond affirming facts about Jesus or Christmas in order to inherit everlasting salvation.
Full Transcript:
Let’s bow our heads in a word of prayer before I begin this morning. Father, we do thank you again for the gift of the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, we know that we can continue continue to sing about Your great gift that You’ve given us. I just pray, Lord, that this season would just not be a season where we just do a lot of things; we visit; we have some good food; and we share gifts. But I pray, Lord, the focus of the season would be the real true meaning of Christmas. Lord, we know that the world has lost this. Commercialism has taken over. Lord, You’re not even in the picture anymore. So I pray, Lord, the church’s job is to make sure You stay there and that you are the reason for this season. So I pray, Lord, that today, You would just allow us to look at the Word of God and consider our own condition before You, our own standing before You, that You may give us clear thinking on that. That we may know that we have a relationship with You through Christ, and that we can hold to that passage of Scripture that these things have been written to us, that we may know we have eternal life. I pray, Lord, as we consider that, that we would not deceive ourselves, but we would see our real standing. And if we have not trust You, then today may be the day, this season maybe the season, that we really know the true meaning of Christmas. I pray this in Christ’s name. Amen.
Christmas means many different things to many people. It means gifts – receiving and giving. It means, to some, Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer along with his boss Santa Claus. It means mistletoe. It means I’m dreaming of a white Christmas. It means the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. All these may have meaning for you, or they may be meaningless to you. The most important thing to know is that these things are not the true meaning of Christmas. No matter what you think of Christmas or what you should or should not do at Christmas. If you are going to celebrate celebrate Christmas at all, then you ought to know at least the true meaning of Christmas.
So what is the true meaning of Christmas? Well to get at the meaning, we need to really examine the purpose and the price it took to make Christmas meaningful. And then what it actually produces when you understand that, and to whom does it have meaning in reality. So the first thing I want to look at it, and I want you to take your Bibles and turn to Romans 3:23. I’m going to be giving you a lot of passages, some I’m going to ask you to look up, some I’m going to put on the screen so you can follow along.
But the first thing is really the purpose of Christmas, to find its meaningfulness. Jesus Christ would never have had to be born into the world, and we would never have to have Christmas, except for three things. At least three things in a minimal sense, but in a very important sense. The first reason is the fall of man into sin. For it says in Romans 3:23:
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
See, all people have a huge problem, and the problem is sin. Sin has separated a person from God. The condition will be fatal if the cure is not applied. This is the worst effect of sin – separation from God is the worst. The God who created us in His image. So Scripture really expresses the effects of sin upon us like this – sin is missing the mark or the goal God has appointed and fallen short of the glory of God, which we were created to enjoy. Sin also means to deviate from the right path, and of course finding ourselves under a verdict of guilty and in the presence of an eternal Judge who judges clearly and righteously. Sin also means to rebel against a rightful and loving King. The Bible tells us that sin is lawlessness. And then sin is a really a traitor to the goodness of God because we don’t listen to what He says; we just do our own thing.
So first thing is the fall of man, if we’re going to know the purpose. The second is God’s curse upon man because of sin. For the Bible tells us in Genesis:
Then to Adam He says, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat from it’; cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.
See, the curse that came because of Eve and Adam’s disobedience to God really made life very hard. It made it twisted, because now sin came in and darkness came in. And they were actually blinded to the fact of how one gets right with God. Sin has left mankind wandering, lost, and spiritually dead, without understanding about what to actually do. That this sad condition in which people find themselves, that sin has left man under the dominion of sin and death, as it says in Romans 6:23:
for the wages of sin is death.
Then of course it declared man guilty before God, under a sentence of condemnation. If you look at your Scriptures in Romans 3:19-20, it says:
Now we know that whatever the Law says, it’s speak to those who are under the Law, so that every mouth may be closed and all the world may become accountable to God; because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.
So if one remains in that condition, apart from Christ, the wrath of God remain upon them. The Bible does tell us in John 3:36:
He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.
So real life, the Bible is talking about, is in God. But sin has separated mankind from the real life that they could enjoy in God. So this is precisely why the Creator became man – to provide a way back to God. Listen to what this passage of Scripture says 1 Timothy 1:15:
It is a trustworthy statement, deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all,
Paul was writing to Timothy, saying: listen, I’m the greatest of sinners. I persecuted the church. I came against the plan of God. So I’m on the top of the pile when it comes to being a sinner. Matter of fact, sin has left man in such a dead and spiritual condition that his very mind is distorted, and his will to do things is affected. Now he wants to do just what he wants and not what God wants him to do.
So the price of sin is huge. No one would ever be able to pay it off. No weak, sinful mortal being would be able to pay off the debt of sin that we owe before God. There’s nothing that we could do in and of ourselves to rescue ourselves from this curse that we’re under. So the price of sin, the Bible already told us, is death – eternal separation from almighty God. God is a holy God. He’s a just God. He cannot look upon sin. It even tells us in the prophets, in Habakkuk. It says:
Your eyes are too pure to approve evil, and You can not look on wickedness with favor.
The Scriptures again tell us:
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned,
That means through the transgression of one, it resulted in condemnation to all people. That’s the plight that we have today in this world – is that we are under condemnation. That’s not good news. That’s bad news. But people need to know the bad news before they can ever get to the good news. They need to know that so they can get to the real meaning of what Christmas is, or it’ll get clouded out by all kinds of other things.
So these three things that I’ve just mentioned – that of being the fall of man, God’s curse upon man because of sin, and the price of sin, leads me to a second point. This point is the price to make Christmas meaningful. These three things give us a clearer understanding of the purpose of why Jesus had to come to this world. Of course, He had to come to pay a price. With the fall of man into sin and man being totally unable to save himself, the Bible tells us:
For by grace you have been saved through faith; that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.
That God would have to save us, in other words. We were dead in trespasses and sin, and God would have to step up and pay the price to make Christmas meaningful to you and to me. So the price had to be paid for sin by someone in order to satisfy the justice of God the Father, so that sinners can be forgiven and made right with God. Christmas becomes meaningful when one sees the qualifications of the Man who was chosen to actually pay the price for sin. This man had to have certain qualifications. Number one – He had to be sinless. He had to be sinless. He had to be a man who was perfect and never committed or never would commit a sin. Now, there’s human being that I know that can fit that qualification, except one. And there’s only one. First, this man had to be sinless. In fact, the Bible tells us in 1 Peter chapter 2 that this is what Jesus did not do when He came to provide for the price of sin. He did not come like we think He would come. He did not sin. He actually suffered as an innocent one. And if sinless, He must have been suffering for someone else. The Bible tells us that:
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
So He did not sin. Secondly, He did not use words to bring insult. The Bible tells us in Peter:
nor was any deceit found in His mouth.
Now that’s showing that – listen, this is nothing normal way to fight against something. We would normally take things into our own hands and hold revenge on somebody who is our enemy, but Jesus didn’t do that. No deceit was found in His mouth. In fact, the Bible says that not only was He the innocent one, but He was the silent one. He was a lamb led to the slaughter, and He was silent against accusers. That’s who He was. Then of course, He did not use violence or threats, for says in 1 Peter 2:23:
and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats,
So Jesus suffered also as the non-violent one, even though people said that Jesus was possessed by demons. That He was a glutton; that He was a winebibber; that He was a blasphemer; that He was delusional. He was a perverter of the nation and deceiver of people. Yet, the prophet Isaiah said about this sinless man – that He would accomplish this mission without violence. In fact, instead of Him being violent towards others, he took the violence for us, the violence that sin produces. So Jesus never strayed in word or deed. He never got upset at all whatsoever. He never used anyone for a laugh. For the Bible tells us:
You know that He appeared in order to take away sins;
That was His mission. And here’s His character in 1 John 3:5:
in Him there is no sin.
Jesus suffered verbally, physically, and spiritually, and yet threatened no retaliation on His tormentors. But He endured all that for us. So He had to be a sinless man.
Secondly. He had to be a perfect man. It says in 1 Peter 1:18-19:
knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.
So this man had to be perfect, and we know this man is Jesus Christ. So with precious blood as a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ. So Christ’s blood is of inestimable greater value than any earthly temporary commodity like silver or gold. Jesus purchased us with His own blood, not with any temporal human payment. Without the shedding of blood, without Christ’s death in the place of sinners, no sin could be covered or washed away at all. So He had to be a perfect man.
In fact the Bible also tells us that God ransomed His children by Christ’s extraordinary death. It does not say in Scripture Christ is a lamb in the class of all other lambs – a top-quality, unblemished, and spotless lamb like in the Old Testament sacrificial system. No, Christ actually stands alone as such a lamb and there being none other like Him before or after. The person of Christ is, in the mind of the author Peter, and it’s not an animal that he has in his mind – a lamb, but it is the original. It is Christ as the original of all the copies and shadows of the Old Testament that looked forward to what He was going to do. It was like when John the baptist came on the scene after 400 years that God wasn’t speaking through a prophet. This is what he said when Jesus came on the scene – behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. So He had to be a perfect man, and He qualified for that.
Also thirdly, He had to be a willing man, willing to die. Not for himself, but in the place of others. Again in Romans 5:6-8:
For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one would hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare to even die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Jesus knew exactly what He was doing and for whom He was doing it. He knew that. He was a willing man – wasn’t forced to do it. He wanted to do it.
And then a fourth thing is that He had to be an able man. He had to have the ability to carry out the plan of salvation unto completion. So this man must be able to do something. And so what did Jesus do? At least some of the things He did was – number one He had to carry away our sin. He had to do that. Actually it says in 1 Peter 2:24:
He Himself bore our sins in His body…
So He had to carry away our sin, which we could never have done. This is the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ. In that atonement, He provides forgiveness. He provides cleansing of sin. He averts the wrath of God away from the sinner. The Bible also says that He ransomed us. That means He had to pay the full price for sin. It tells us in Mark 10:45:
to give His life a ransom for many.
So His life was a ransom. It’s the Greek word “lutron”, which means the price paid to affect release of the one who was held in bondage. The ransom was offered to God the Father, against whom we have sinned and who alone has the power to inflict the penalty. That means that Jesus saw His children caught in the slave market of sin and had pity on their hopeless situation. How did he do that? By paying the ransom price with His own blood in order to redeem out of slavery His children and bring us into the family of God. So Jesus’ sacrificial death on the cross purchased the release from bondage of those many sinners who would believe in Him.
So this man had to be sinless. He had to be perfect. He had to be willing. He had to be able. And maybe this one I should have given first, but I left it for last – He had to be God who’d become a man. The birth of Jesus into the world. That passage of Scripture that is so famous:
She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, and He will save His people from their sins.
It’s the very fact of sins that keep us separated from God. Unless Jesus takes care of those sins, you’re still in your sin. Remember, there’s only two ways to ways to die. You either die in your sin, or you die in the Lord. There is no other way to die. If you die in the Lord, of course, things are taken care of. If you die in your sin, the payment has not yet been paid, and that’s why there is a place called hell. And it’s eternal because people will never pay the debt off that they owe God. The Bible also tells us:
We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.
Only God could defeat death and take His life back and rise from the dead, the physical bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, for our justification. That’s what the Word of God says. That means that Jesus is the sinless and perfectly righteous One. He is our only basis for forgiveness with God the Father. Jesus’ death and resurrection are the only basis of righteousness before God. So faith in Christ alone, not in our goodness, to save us. So God the Father accepted the sacrifice of His Son by raising Him from the dead.
So we see that this Man was a special man. And this Man we know of course is Jesus Christ. This leads me to a third thing – what the true meaning of Christmas actually produces. What did Christmas produce to make it so meaningful, as far as God and man is concerned? It produced at least two things that are so extremely important to know. The first thing is this – it produced a finished, complete, eternal salvation to all who believe in Jesus Christ. For all who have believed or would believe and receive Jesus Christ, it’s accomplished. In fact that with John 17:4 says:
I glorify You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do.
It’s finished. He finished everything God the Father gave Him to do. We know also, the Word of God tells us in John 19:30:
Therefore when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, “It is finished!”
It’s done. It’s paid for. No one will ever have to add nor subtract to what Jesus has done to have eternal life. All they must do is repent, repent of their sins and unbelief and believe and receive it as a free gift from God.
So the first thing for Christmas to be meaningful and what it produces is it produces a finished and complete eternal salvation. But a second thing that it produces – that we have a complete destruction of Satan. The destroyer of our souls, the great deceiver from the garden of Eden. Even until now, he’s deceiving people, leading them astray, usually by religious system. He’s leading them away from God instead of to God. They’re thinking they’re doing the right thing when they are slipping off into an eternity without Christ. So Christ would have to defeat our enemy of death, our arch enemy. That arch enemy is Satan. In fact, this passage of Scripture tells us that:
the one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.
So it was Jesus that had done that. Not only did He died on the cross for sin, but He defeated Satan and death on that cross. Death, because Satan likes to keep people in slavery with that particular thought of dying. We don’t have a book that says this is what’s going to happen after death, unless you’re reading the Bible. People, when it comes to death, are completely confused about what it is. The fear of death is a reality. Because if they don’t know the truth, if a person doesn’t know their standing before God, they should fear that. Because death does have fear rendered and packaged into it. Yet this is what Jesus did – He came. He produced for us by paying the price a complete eternal salvation and a complete destruction of the enemy so he can no longer can hold us. He has no authority over us. And of course he cannot prevent you anymore. Once you’re God’s possession, he cannot prevent you anymore from having eternal life and having your sins forgiven. You are now God’s possession.
So that leads me to a fourth thing. It’s this – for whom or what people is the true meaning of Christmas? You see that the true meaning of Christmas is really the love of God, and the whole purpose of the love of God was to redeem all God’s children from the devil’s hell and of course take them to a wonderful heaven. Then you look in the Bible and you find that the people of the true meaning of Christmas – number one: who are they? Anyone who comes to the God-man in repentance toward the Father and faith in Jesus Christ. Those are the ones who come and understand the gospel. In Acts, it tells us:
solemnly testifying to both Jews and Greeks.
That means it’s encompassing everyone. Of what? How are you made right with God? You repent. You turn from your sin toward God and you have faith in the solution that the Father provides for your sin, and that is Jesus Christ our Lord. Unless a person does that, they cannot have eternal life and they do not understand the true meaning of Christmas.
A second group, what really goes along with this one is not only anyone who comes to the God-man in repentance and faith, but secondly anyone who calls upon Jesus from their heart of belief. What happens is that we realize we’re sinners and we realize that Jesus is the only way, the truth, and the life. So we come to Him because He’s the Savior. We can’t save ourselves and we ask Him to save us. We call upon Him. That’s what the Scriptures tell us. It says that:
if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.
Then there’s a third thing – anyone who is willing. To forsake everything else they are trusting in to hopefully save themselves. In other words, you got to leave everything you’re trusting in. And what do people trust in? They trust in religion. They trust in churches. They trust in their good works. Some people trust in their money, that as long as they give enough money, they think that God’s going to look at with them with favor. They trust in their morality and their ethics. They trust that they kept the sacraments. They trust because they have confessed their sins to a priest and have done some kind of penance. See, if you trusted in any one of those things and of course the list can go on, you would have to have done all those things perfectly all the time, every time. What happens is that you and I can’t do that. That’s not the way you could get saved anyway. Nothing we could do we could have ever done perfectly or consistently. We all fall short of that. We’re all unable to do that.
So when faith looks at the cross, it sees more than a terrible evil. Faith sees God at work and believes His promises. Faith sees this is why Christ came into the world. Faith reckons that if God has said Christ will save His people from their sins, then that is exactly what He will do. He will accomplish it by means of the perfect life, the death, the burial, the resurrection, and the ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. God’s plan in Scripture is always focused in on the cross and centered in on the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. You can never get away with that. There’s no other way to be saved except through Christ.
Now that brings me to a question. And this question seems to always come up. Here’s the question – is salvation an easy thing? We can answer that question with a yes and no. Some say that salvation is a simple thing. Just by following certain steps and logic. If you believe this or if you believe that. One’s mind goes through this little system of logic and intellectually ascent to the facts of the gospel. You believe Jesus died – yes. You believe that He rose – yes. You believe He’s coming again – yes. Just because a person says yes to all those things does not mean they know God. It does not mean they’re saved. They may conclude that if I believe those things, then I’m a Christian and all is well.
Others say anyone can, if he or she chooses to become a Christian, do it. It’s a simple thing. It’s an easy thing. It is as easy as signing a card, raising your hand, walking an aisle, assenting to some of the facts of the gospel. It’s easy. Yet, when you come to the Word of God, there are those who believe because of Scripture that it is not an easy thing. In fact, in this passage of Scripture right here it says:
And someone said to Him, “Lord, are there just a few who are being saved?” And He said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.
It also says in Matthew:
Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
So the broad road is more enticing because it’s lined with all kinds of attractive glitter. Matter of fact, on the broad road there are many different viewpoints. And that’s good today, isn’t it? You have your viewpoint of how to get to heaven or how to be right with God. Somebody else has their viewpoint. Some other system has their viewpoint. See, that’s not a good thing. God actually have to move away all our viewpoints and just show us one viewpoint, and that’s the biblical viewpoint. If somebody says they have many different viewpoints on which way leads to life, but the reality is that the many viewpoints are wrong and actually lead to destruction. At the narrow gate, one can’t bring in the baggage of one’s own homespun philosophy or religion or self-righteousness. You just can’t get it in there. See the biblical message is one must come to Christ alone to be saved. God accept us only on His own provision and that is Jesus Christ. Why is that? Because of the corruption and the deadness of the human heart. It is extremely difficult for people to believe. Why do I say that? Because human beings need divine help in order to be saved. They need God to do His work because God has done all the work already to be saved.
So our job really as Christians, if you are a Christian, is to wake people up. To get them to think about what road they are on. Of course, you can only be on one of two roads. You are either on the broad road that leads to destruction or on the narrow road that leads to life. There are no other roads. The famous word today – I guess that’s the new word added to our vocabulary today is: are you woke? Are you woke? Do you know what road you are on? That’s a simple question. Do You know for sure that if you died today, you would go to heaven?
I also have to say this – that continuing the faith, once you become a believer, is extremely difficult. We need God’s help with that, too. The reason why is because we live in enemy territory. All this striving is not over once you enter the narrow gate because there’s still the narrow way. There’s a plethora of things that can distract us while we’re on the narrow road. Riches can distract us. Problems can distract us. People can distract us. Pleasures can distract us. They all want to lure us off the straight and narrow way onto the broad way. See, the enemy’s strategies are to bewitch our minds and to steal our wills and to divert our attention off the will of God.
I say all that for this reason – that you must make sure, profoundly sure, that you are a real believer. That you’re just not faking it. You’re just not riding the wave. You understand it. You know what the cost is. You know who you believe, why you believe. You love the Word of God and you want to know God’s will. You want to do God’s will. Even though we do it imperfectly, we still want the direction of our life to honor and worship God. That is the whole point of being a believer, not just to say I believe all that and just do your own thing. Are you kidding? That’s not what the Bible teaches. There’s a profound difference when we become believers and we come to know Christ as our Lord and Savior. Everything changes. Our thinking changes. Our desires change. Our wills change. Our whole perspective, our whole worldview changes. Because Christ changes us, transforms our minds so that we can know the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God.
And we know that someday He’s coming again, or we may die before He comes. The point is to make sure before He comes or you die, you know where you’re going. That’s the point – that you can know you have eternal life. That’s what the Scripture is. All the word of God from Genesis to revelation is written for that purpose – so you can know. It’s a profoundly real thing, where the Bible says in 1 Peter 4, it tells us this:
For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will the outcome of those who do not obey the gospel of God? And if it is with difficulty the righteous is saved, what will become of the godless man and the sinner?
What will become of them? That’s the question. What will happen to the murderer and the druggard and the drunkard and the liar and the thief and the adulterer and the idolater and the practicing sexually immoral person? And the morally good unbeliever and the ethically good unbeliever and the religiously devout person who have been faithful to their belief and practice of their religion, but it’s one that does not teach the truth? It does not lead one to an understanding of what it really means to be a Christian. See all types of unbelievers from all walks of life – what will happen to them? Well, if they do not repent and believe in Jesus for forgiveness of their sins, they will not have eternal life. They will have eternal death. An eternal death is not an unconscious death. Eternal death is the second death in Scripture where a person will be resurrected from the grave with a body that can never die and spend eternity separated from God in a place called the lake of fire. It may appear, though, that the wicked escape in this world. But rest assured, their judgment is only postponed to a later time.
Noah had a vessel along with seven other righteous persons. When God brought the flood upon the whole world, but what about the multitude who had no vessel? But remember, Noah preached for 120 years, a righteous preacher, to be saved. And only seven people came. Only seven people entered the ark. So don’t think you can live in ungodliness and unrighteousness and in your own philosophy of what you think God will accept. And believe in Christ and have Christ as your Savior and everlasting kingdom. You are thinking all wrong about it. If you’re thinking wrong about it, you will be believing – what is the inevitable consequences of rejecting Christ? well, the consequences would be you would believe a lie. If you’re not believing the truth, you would have to believe a lie. Any lie that can conclude something like this – there are many ways to God besides Christ. There is no hell because God is a God of love. I’ve been a good person since I’ve been born, so I’ll be okay. I’ll rest on my record. Nobody really knows the right way, so I’m not alone. I’ll take my chances with the man upstairs. I’ve heard every single one of these things from people, every single one. And they walked away with the assurance that they are fine.
But you know what? that’s not the true meaning of Christmas. Unless you know Christ personally, unless you have repented and turn to Christ and ask him to save you and Him alone, you cannot be saved. Spiritually dead people are characterized by unbelief and rebellion. Their minds are not functioning spiritually. Of course without Christ, they will not make it into the kingdom of God.
But on the other hand, just reiterating what I have been saying – the purpose of Christmas are all fulfilled in Jesus Christ. The price of Christmas were all paid in full by Jesus Christ. The products of Christmas were all accomplished and finished by the Lord Jesus Christ. The persons who understand the true meaning of Christmas have come in repentance towards God the Father and faith in the Father’s solution to our sin problem, which is Jesus Christ. They are now on the narrow road, in which they enter through the narrow gate. And they are on their way home. It’s those who understand the true meaning of Christmas and could, at that point, worship God from their heart, knowing that God has done all this on their behalf and given them the greatest gift that they could ever receive, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.
That’s why again, this passage says:
She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, and He will save His people from their sins.
That is the message of Christmas. That is the meaning of Christmas and I pray that you really would come to know that. Not in the theoretical way only, but in a practical, in a real way, you would know for sure that if you were to die today, you would go to be with Christ in heaven.
I just would like to say merry Christmas and have a blessed a God-blessed new year. Let’s pray. Lord, thank You this morning. Lord, thank You that the truth of the gospel is a reality. It’s why You came. It’s what we really need to hear. And Lord, we just pray that by Your Spirit You would take the Word of God, You would take the meaning of what it means to be saved, impress it upon people’s heart so they would too not trust in something that is faulty or that they’re not sure of or that’s going to fall apart in judgment. But they would trust, for the first time possibly in their life, in Christ alone. I pray You would do that Lord, work in people’s hearts and lives. And for those who are believers, strengthen their walk. Make them more faithful than they’ve ever been. Make them servants in the church of Christ. Make them witnesses to a dark world. Lord, do that with us. Lord, don’t let us wander off onto some meaningless path that we shouldn’t be on. Lord, keep us on the straight and narrow path. Thank you Lord. Thank you, Lord Jesus, for coming and accomplishing the will of the Father. We give You praise now and honor because of what You have done and accomplished on behalf of sinners like us. We didn’t deserve it. But thank you for your mercy, that You had compassion on us, Lord. And thank You for Your grace, this free gift You’ve given to us that we don’t have to work for, but have to receive it by faith. And I pray this in Christ’s name. Amen.