The Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 22, 2013 - Pastor Adam Moline
Isaiah
7:10-14 Romans
1:1-7 Matthew
1:18-25
Grace, mercy and
peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text today is the Gospel lesson just
read.
Dear friends in
Christ. Somewhere around 700 B.C. it
happened. Isaiah the great prophet of
Israel spoke the Word of God in regards to a promise of God. “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a
son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” It
was a promise spoken to Ahaz, the King of Judah, sitting on the throne of his
ancestor David. Ahaz is described in
scripture as a wicked king, who did not believe the Word of God spoken either
in scripture or by his prophets. He
worshipped false God’s. He sacrificed
his own child to a false God. He
desecrated the temple of Solomon, removing and destroying some of the great
decorations. He built places to worship
false God’s.
And so it was that
Isaiah spoke the word of God to him, as if to say, “Believe in me, for my Son
Immanuel is coming. Believe Ahaz, for it
is in the salvation given by the Virgin’s Son that your life is saved.” It’s a promise that Ahaz ignored, instead
trusting in his own devices and decisions.
And so it is spoken in scripture, that King Ahaz died, and was buried in
Jerusalem, but because of his great sin and doubt of God’s word’s, he was not
buried in the tomb of his father David. By
ignoring God’s promises he separated himself from the great promises of
heaven.
For despite Ahaz’s
unbelief, God did fulfill his promise spoken by Isaiah, 700 years later, as a
young virgin was found by her fiancé Joseph to be with child. The woman’s name was Mary, and her child was
truly Immanuel – God with us. Joseph,
being righteous, was going to divorce the woman quietly, for he knew the child growing
in her was not his. But an angel
appeared, and spoke the very same words to Joseph as to Ahaz so many years
earlier. “The virgin will conceive and
will bear a son, Immanuel.” The
difference, was Joseph believed the promise, and he took Mary to be his wife,
and the child was born as God promised, wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid
in a manger, as we will speak of later this week. He believed God’s promise, and raised the
child as if Jesus was his own child. He
loved the child Jesus, until finally, his own days came to their end, and he
was buried.
Dear friends, that
same promise is made to you as well. The
virgin will be with Child, and he will be Immanuel. God with us, God with you and me. The question is, will you believe, as did St.
Joseph the adoptive father of Christ? Or
will you doubt the promise, and trust your own thoughts and desires as Ahaz the
king did?
Because of our
sin, it is so easy to doubt God’s promise.
It is so easy to believe that all this Jesus talk is just a bunch of
mumbo jumbo. In fact in our society in
this day and age, we are happy to take the Promise of Jesus out of
Christmas. Just in the news yesterday, a
5th grade choir in New York sang Silent Night at their school choir
concert, but they took out all words of Promise, all allusions to the Virgin,
or the Christ child himself.
We ourselves doubt
too, don’t we? We try to hide the
promise of Christmas too. In the midst
of the busyness of gift opening, food preparation and family visiting, we will
fail to find time to make it to this building for a Christmas worship
service. We’ll forget about Jesus. We’ll disbelieve his Word in our day to day
life. We show that by our actions, which
are filled with sin. We show that by our
thoughts, which are filled with the vilest of filth. And we show it by our words, where we slander
the name of Christ.
Dear friends. Repent!
Jesus is almost here! Christmas
is coming. The promise is fulfilled, the
virgin is with Child, a child who is so much more than you and I are. For the Child is truly Immanuel, God with
us. In the flesh of that baby is the
fullness of the Eternal God. That baby,
that God will go to the cross to die for you.
That’s what his name itself is, Jesus – which means The Lord Saves! God comes to be with us, to take away your
sins, to set you free to be his people, now and forever more. He is Coming, his Advent is drawing nigh! Dear friends, Believe the promise of
God. For he has done marvelous things!
Your sin is
forgiven. Your eternal life is
assured. It’s the promise of God, the
promise of an eternal savior. The
promise of a baby born in a manger and named Jesus by his step father at the
command of the Angel. He’s coming. He’s nearly here. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
