Luke 2v40-52

This incident of Jesus’ parents losing their 12 year old son and eventually finding him in the templein Jerusalem sitting at the feet of the teachers is unique to the gospel of Luke. He has a purpose in including it. It is one of the most amazing and intriguing incidents in Jesus’ life and ministry.  It contains some of the most important teaching in the whole of the Bible about Jesus Christ. 

Every year v41 his parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of the passover - when the Jews remembered God’s rescue of them from the oppression of slavery in Egypt. Every year - we get an insight here into the religious devotion of Mary and Joseph - committed to their faith, nurturing their children in the ways of God. And this particular year is very significant because v42 Jesus is 12 years old. This year’s passover will be a rite of passage into his 13th year - that period of life in the Jewish education of children when a boy is beginning to prepare for the special responsibilities of growing into adulthood. This event takes place in Jesus’ life just as he is going through that transition. And we, though we are in a very different culture, we recognise the significance of this transition don’t we? the big difference between being 12 and being 13 a teenager! It is particularly a transition in your relationship with your parents. For any of us parents facing this quite scary transition in our children it is wonderful that Luke has included this account of this incident. But what this incident reveals to us of Jesus Christ will be a great comfort for us all whatever our age or stage of life. 

v43 After the feast was over. They stayed the whole 7 days which was quite unusual - another sign of Mary and Joseph’s serious devotion. Maybe it was because Jesus was at this special point in his life. 

After the feast is over the 80 mile 3 day journey home to Nazareth begins but the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem but they were not aware of it. Thinking he was in their company, they travelled on for a day. Then they began to look for him among their relatives and friends … and they could not find him. 

It might sound a bit shocking to our modern ears to make a whole days journey and only then realise your child is not with you. But it’s not too difficult to see how this could happen in that culture. The long journey back to nazareth is in a large caravan of people. Necessary for safety on relatively dangerous roads where you’re camping out at night. Many friends and relatives are there. All the kids playing with each other. It’s likely that the women and childern would walk up front the men would walk towards the back of the caravan. And i guess during the day Mary might have assumed the 12 year old Jesus was with Joseph and the men while Joseph might have assumed that Jesus preferred to be with Mary and the other kids. It’s only at the end of the first day’s travel when they’re pitching tents settling for the night calling for Jesus to come and sleep that they realise that Jesus is not with them..

Children lost on the southbank. Festival Hall to Borough Market - stop off in St Paul’s cathedral. Colourful coats. Scooters. 

Concerned. Looking. Jog ahead. Deeper concern. split up.. looking. retracing our steps. phoning. it’s getting darker. running. call the police. phone call. found! perfectly happy. anger and relief “how could you do this to us?!”

Our kids were gone for about 45 minutes. Jesus was gone for 3 days!

Whether those 3 days include the day of travelling or not - it’s a long time for parents to be v48 anxiously searching. There must have been tears each of those nights - where was their son sleeping? was anyone looking after him. Or had something terrible happened. Feelings of awful pain and dread. Surely they had checked the crowded temple courts? Maybe they had just missed Jesus’ comings and goings there because that’s where he had been and that’s where they eventually found him v46 sitting among the teachers and listening to them and asking them questions. And Jesus has been the cause of much interest for the devoted in the temple, there’s no shortage of people to look after him practically though i guess they must have wondered where his parents were! v47 Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him they were astonished. Because he’s so unconcerned? His Mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been searching anxiously for you.” It rings so true, Luke’s account, this is exactly what a mother would say - grabbing and hugging her son - fear and anger mixed with total relief! 

and Jesus’ reply …is astonishing. This 12 year old boy. Almost could at first seem insensitive and a bit rude! 

“Why were you searching for me?… Didn’t you know i had to be in my Father’s house?” But they didn’t understand what he was saying to them. 

There’s almost a sad moment here. Because Jesus hadn’t worried about his parents worrying because he had thought - oh well they’ll know where I have to be now. They’ll understand - oh .. he’s in the temple. But his parents didn’t understand. That’s why they’d searched frantically rather than returned to the temple and waited patiently. And so there’s a sadness in Jesus words. They didn’t need to be so worried and hurt. so the incident ends v51 Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. 

So why does Luke include this incident of Jesus’ boyhood at this significant stage in his gospel? 

What is it that is being said here about Jesus? 

The answer is there in the bookends of the passage in v40 and v52 

This is the Jesus at this point of transition who is v40 growing and becoming strong, filled with wisdom and the grace of God upon him. growing v52 in wisdom and stature and in favour with God and men. 

did you take that in. Jesus is growing. Like children do. And he’s growing in wisdom, stature and he is growing in favour with men and amazingly he grows in favour with God.

That’s what Luke wants us to see 

Jesus who has come into the world and taken on our full humanity with all our infirmities and weaknesses, excepting sin over the course of his life grew in favour with God. 

That’s a provocative idea. God’s opinion of Jesus, his favour, his admiration, his love for Jesus grows. If it wasn’t there in the NT you might think that was a bit unorthodox 

Surely Jesus, the eternal son of God is eternally favoured by God. How can Jesus grow in God’s favour? 

He does so according to his humanity. As a growing human being. Fully human Jesus grows in favour with God. 

Theologians have found it helpful to distingush between Jesus’ full divinity - his divine nature and his full humanity his divine nature. So for example in answer to the question: If Jesus created and sustains the cosmos moment by moment by his powerful word (Hebrews 2) How was Jesus doing that when he was an embryo in Mary’s womb or a weak baby or even more so when he died and was buried? 

Well.. according to his divinity Jesus never ceases to uphold all things, he is never off the throne of the universe, he is One with the Father. But according to his humanity he is truly a weak baby, just as you and i once were, he lives and serves God in the power of the Holy spirit just as we must, he weeps and suffers and dies according to his humanity. And through his human life he grows in wisdom and stature and favour with God and men. 

This is what we are being told here. That Jesus’ humanity is exactly the same as ours apart from sin. 

[Jessica Jones. Netflix adaptation from marvel comics of lesser known superhero Jessica Jones. She’s a New York private investigator with a troubled past. she has superhuman strength and fights baddies with superhuman powers with the help of a man with unbreakable skin. They look just like anyone else.. More than human. Less than human. Something else in human skin] 

But that’s not Jesus. Jesus is not God hiding in a man suit. Looks the same on the surface but totally different underneath. No, Jesus’ humanity is exactly the same as our apart from sin. The road that we all must walk, he walks. 

And you see - that is absolutely crucial for our salvation 

Jesus saves us by uniting himself to our humanity and living the perfect human life that we should have lived for us and dying the death before that we deserve because we haven’t lived perfectly for us. 

So that when we are united to him by our faith - his perfect life for u becomes ours and his saving death for us becomes ours. 

In order to do all that. Jesus had to be fully human 

If Jesus had a different human nature to you or me he would never be qualified to be our saviour. 

But Luke tells us he IS human 

and He IS perfectly human for us 

Jesus grows in obedience and love for God and favour with God 

At aged 12, at every age and stage of life he covers and carries our humanity perfectly. He is able to be our saviour as he lives humanity for us. 

Briefly see 4 things about the 12 year old Jesus that already gives us deep confidence in and worship filled wonder for our Saviour 

1. Jesus’ desire to be taught by the word of God vv46-47

sitting at the feet of the best teachers of the day. day after day. saying ‘Please teach me from God’s word. I want to know God and his will and how to live for his glory” 

By this age Jesus would have memorised whole sections of the OT and he engages in this question and answer teaching of the rabbis and he so impressed the rabbis by the penetraton of his questions. 

That’s often true of youngsters isn’t it? It’s not just the answers they give but the questions they ask! How extraordinary it would have been to hear the growing wisdom of Jesus. “Everyone was astonished at his understanding and his answers” Remember his wisdom is not is because he is God, but bacuse he is perfect humanity for us. 

In the third servant song in the book of Isaiah which speaks of the Messiah, the servant says “Morning by morning as I am awakened i listen to your word and this is why i am able to speak a word in season t those who are weary” 

This is why Jesus’ teaching and his words were so marvellous because he had waited on God’s word to be taught by God’s word. 

2. Jesus’ growth in the knowledge of God. 

in wisdom 

Psalm 119 - the longest Psalm. But a Psalm that is designed for young people to memorise. Each section begins with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Right in the middle of the psalm vv99-100. 2 verses that would have delighted young people 

As i learn your word 

You make me wiser than all my teachers 

that’s what you want don’t you when you’re a kid?

and it’s true 

the boy and girl who really knows the word of God may well be wiser than their teachers because they are growing in the knowledge of God. To really know him. 

we’ve just appointed Nic as our children’s and families worker. 

we need to take the spiritual development of children very seriously. children everywhere have spiritual questions. it’s part of being a child. the opportunities that i have had to receive children’s questions in schools. they ask the most penetrating questions that can be asked. Who made God? How can God be everywhere? How can God be 3 in one? Why suffering? What happens when we die? How can i know God loves me? These are the questions that theologians pore over in their ivory towers! And in all the confusion of our age many parents say to their children in answer to their spiritually searching questions ‘you shouldn’t be interested in those things” which basically means ‘I don’t have any answers and i’m terrified to admit that to you and so i am going to squash your spiritual interest. It’s a very grown up thing isn;t it to say that children aren’t interested in spiritual things. Those grown ups are basically talking about themselves. Hiding. 

Jesus shows us the sheer joy of a youngster growing in the knowledge of God. He is true humanity increasing in favour with God and man. 

3. Jesus’ love for the presence of God. 

“Oh mum and dad” he says “why have you been anxiously searching all over Jerusalem You should have known i would be in my Father’s house” 

This is the place where you have brought me year on year. Where you devoted me to God as your firstborn son. This is what you’ve been preparing me for and now at this age of transition.. I’m here! 

But Mary and Joseph didn’t understand. They weren’t banking on this level of devotion. What is it like if your children are more zealous for God than you. This zealous! It gets in the way, rocks the family, challenges the status quo. Are you embarassed? Annoyed? How could you do this to us?

But Jesus is growing in true humanity which entails a deepening growing love for the presence of God. Seeking and enjoying God. 

Ps 27 One thing i ask of the Lord this is what i seek that i may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple. …

where we fail to seek God, to be truly human 

jesus succeeds perfectly for us. on our behalf. to bring you to God 

So that you and i too with the Psalmist 

My hearts says of you “seek his face”. Your face, Lord, i will seek 

4. Jesus’ beautiful awareness that he was the Son of God 

My …. Father’s …. House 

Jew’s didn’t speak of the temple in those terms. These are Jesus’ words

In the midst of Luke emphaising that the Lord Jesus did not come into the world with some kind of superman humanity. He shared your humanity and mine apart from sin. and he grew in favour with God. 

however he did so as one who is the very Son of God. Living to please his Father. Obedient to death. Even death on a cross for us he came to save. 

And as he moves forward in his humanity he grows and grows in favour with God. 

just like a blessed friendship or marriage - you can’t imagine liking or loving or appreciating that person more than you already do and yet over the years of being together that love and bond of affection is deepened. 

So as Jesus grows in wisdom and obedience and devotion to his Father through his life so the Father’s favour grows. “This is my Jesus. This is my son whom i love. with him i am pleased. Listen to him.” Love him. Put your confidence in him. He is the saviour of humanity. 

Luke 2v1-20

Welcome to SBD for our Carols. A joy to see you here. 

My name is GF. I’m the vicar of the church. 

We’re going to spend a few minutes looking at those very familiar readings from Luke’s gospel. 

“There were shepherds watching over their flocks by night

An angel of the LORD appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone’

Light in the darkness. That’s what Christmas is about, according to the Bible. Light breaking into darkness. 

The world is a very dark place sometimes. Most of the time we don’t walk around saying ‘the world’s a dark place.’ we don’t look at it frontally all the time - we can’t. But then the next tragic event strikes - and the fact of the world’s darkness presses down on you. 

When tragedies happen - we take action, we seek solutions… and that’s right. That’s many people’s job. But JRR Tolkein’s words on the lips of Gandalf ring true: “Always after a defeat and a respite the Shadow takes another shape and grows again.” The Shadow: darkness; evil “after a defeat and a respite …takes another shape and grows again” 

But Christmas…

far from being intended as a temporary seasonal escape from the darkness. 

Christmas is about God’s plan to deal with the Darkness.

‘The people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light!’ 

—

When most Londoners today hear these familiar readings - of the virgin birth, the child in the manger, the angels, the shepherds. they say, (you say) “Ah - lovely legend.” It’s a legend. But it’s a lovely legend because it symbolises the things we should be doing. For example it symbolises hope. We should always have hope. 

But Luke, when he wrote these things was clearly not intending to give us a lovely legend filled with symbolic language. Look at how Luke starts chapter 2.. He doesn’t start his account of the birth of Jesus Christ saying “Once upon a time” nor does he say ‘a long time ago in a galaxy far far away.’ which we know is another way of saying: here is a wonderful story that is going to inspire you but of course it never really happened. No, that’s not what Luke says. Luke starts his account, “In the year that Caesar Augustus had his census of the entire Roman world, when Quirinius was governor of Syria? that’s the year when what I am telling you about happened.” At the beginning of chapter 1 - we don't have it printed, but - there, Luke tells us that he’s carefully researched what is written in this book. These are eyewitness accounts of true occurences!

Can we really know that? The gospels are the most attested documents that we have from antiquity - such are the number and prevalence of very early manuscripts that we have..

Does it really matter anyway? Why does it matter whether this is truth or myth? 

Here’s why it matters. Go back again to that statement of Tolkein. 

“Always after a defeat and a respite evil takes another shape and grows again.” Within the bounds of history that is absolutely true isn’t it? 

All of our medical and technological advancements bring us all kinds of good things and yet… far from making us more secure we know that those very advancements actually open us up to new fears, new threats. ‘the darkness takes another shape and grows again.’ 

Why? Why is it like this? 

It is like this, the Bible says, because the ultimate source of the darkness of this world is in here, it’s in us, it’s in our hearts. And all that progress does is it creates new shapes for the darkness and sometimes bigger shapes. It always comes back. It’s the darkness of the human heart that is the source of the whole spectrum of evil out there. From terrorist atrocities to unhappy marriages. 

And now you see why Luke is insisting this isn’t just a legend? 

See what do we really need? - we don’t need stories to inspire us to try a little harder. Because every time we do something about the darkness.. it just takes another shape and appears again because it’s in here. We do not need legends about the glory of God appearing.. we need the glory of God to appear - to break in from outside and intervene.. 

And Luke says:… It has. It did. 

God himself came into the world. An utterly unique event - marked by equally unique and unusual circumstances a virgin birth, angelic messengers. He has come says Luke. It really happened. He’s come to deal with the darkness. 

Well, How? How does he do it? 

The answer is most surprising. God deals with the darkness by making himself poor, making himself vulnerable, by submitting himself to the darkness. 

I was reading about a woman in Sussex who again this Christmas is renting out her stable as a hotel room. ‘bringing Bethlehem to Brighton' is the headline. 

The stable comes complete with a straw bed for two, a resident donkey and tea making facilities. 

They even have costumes if anybody wants to dress up as a shepherd or a king (which is where it starts to sound a little bit weird, i think). 

Mrs Turton is the landlady she says “this is back to basics providing guests with the authentic nativity experience - bath towels and wifi available at additional cost” 

Brilliant - no room at the inn is one thing but no internet access would be a proper disaster wouldn’t it?

the authentic nativity experience? Is that the nativity?

Every day at the moment we see images in our papers and on our screens of child refugees born into oppression fleeing violence, on the road, vulnerable, unwelcome. babies passed from rubber dinghies. 

These very contemporary scenes are more reflective of the authentic nativity. It is not just that God when he chose to enter our world entered our humanity …and at it’s weakest point - as a newborn baby. He is also born into an oppressive regime he is born on the road as Mary and Joseph travel to Bethlehem to register for taxation. There is no room for him. And then, if you know how the nativity unfolds, from Bethlehem the family have to flee the country to Egypt - a long dangerous journey - away from Herod’s death squads slaughtering male infants. 

God when he came… God became a child refugee. 

When you think of God think of this.. 

He submitted himself to the darkness. 

But why? 

How does becoming weak, submitting to the darkness.. how does thatdeal with the darkness?

when ever people talk about suffering and evil people say - if there’s a God why doesn’t he stop it? 

and if God came to earth into this darkness -  why in the world didn't he come to stop it? 

why did he come in weakness? why did he come human? why didn’t he come as a Divine king or general on a mighty warhorse with a sceptre and a spear to destroy all evil?  

well the reason is plain, you know we’ve actually already talked about it…

if JC had have come that first Christmas to destroy all of the sources of evil 

there wouldn't have been any of us left would there?

…

there wouldn't have been any of us left.

if you know your own heart at all you know that is not an exaggeration. 

therefore.. in mercy and love 

Jesus Christ came 

not to be accepted but to be rejected. 

not to be crowned but to be killed

he came not to bring judgement he came to bear judgement 

He, our Creator, the living God, assumed our humanity at its darkest point - Jesus the refugee - and he died on a wooden cross to bear the judgement that we deserve for our self centred-ness, for our wrongdoing, for our sin - to pay for it, to remove it. 

So that someday he can return - which he has promised to do - and he can end evil without ending us. 

Hidden away in the news a couple of weeks ago was the extraordinary story of the five Tanzanian gold miners who were finally rescued after spending 41 days trapped in total darkness 100m underground after the collapse of part of the mine. 

Weeks after the official rescue operation had been called off, surviving on cockroaches and frogs and collecting seeping water in their helmets the miners wandered desperately through the network of tunnels. Until there was a glimmer of hope atlast. "We saw a tiny crack in the rock where sun's rays shone through the darkness.” 

Wonderful story for Christmas 

Christmas is light breaking into the darkness. 

That our Creator God was pleased to dive down into our humanity, to take hold of us in our weakness, giving his life that we might live.

He takes hold of you.. grab him back. 

Find out more this Christmas.. It’s too important not to. Take a gospel to read. Discuss these things with the friends that brought you. Or come and discuss in the New year. 

Light breaking in to the darkness. 

After the choir sing we will sing our final carol. 

At the end of the service Mulled wine and Mince pies will be served here at the front of church and at the back. Please enjoy. 

If you have children in the crèche or Christmas party please collect them immediately at the end of the service and bring them in so you can have some refreshments. 

There will be a retiring collection for Refugee Support network. Read about them in your service sheet.  Please give generously to a worthy cause as you go. 

Luke 1v26-45

Christmas is often seen as a time when you get together with your family. For some of us that might well be something that we’re looking forward to - things are ok. For some of us it might be something we’re dreading. For some of us still.. it might be friends that constitute the only sense of family that we have. 

Whatever our situation. We have a deep human longing for family that really works. A healed family.  A place we know is home. 

This longing takes us to the heart of why Christmas is such good news and offers such hope. See,  we don’t really understand Christmas (and by that i don’t mean Christmas is about Jesus not presents) - even Christians - we think Christmas is just a vehicle for Easter, for getting Jesus into the world so that then he can die for our sins. But, no, the good news of Christmas, of the incarnation goes much deeper than that. 

This is the miracle of Christmas: 

That the son of God became human so that humans could become children of God. put another way. 

Jesus Christ came into our family to take us into His family. 

that’s Christmas. that’s what we’re going to think about for the next 15 mins or so. 

—

The virgin birth is really important for this. 

Is the virgin birth really important? it’s difficult to believe. does it really matter? Luke thinks so. 

Do you see how it’s emphasised in the passage? 

In v27 Mary is twice called a virgin before we even get her name.  

In verse 34 she says: "How will this be, since I am a virgin?"

and the angel answers “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.”

We are not really told how a virgin birth is possible. The Holy Spirit does it. 

But we are told why a virgin birth is essential. Because the Holy One to be born already has a Father. He is the Son of God. See in the womb of the virgin Mary and in the person of the saviour Jesus, there is the uniting of two families. From the Father and the Spirit, Jesus remains fully God and from his mother Mary he takes to himself a full and perfect humanity. 

Fully God, fully human. 

Two families united in the person of Jesus 

Jesus came into our family to take us into his family.  That’s Christmas. 

Well let’s think about those 2 families then.  

First we’ll think about our family that Jesus joins himself to - humanity 

Our humanity. 

Think about Mary for a sec. 

Jesus’ Mother is sometimes lauded as a sort of supreme human being. ‘Hail Mary, full of grace’ - so goes the RC prayer to Mary. Now while it is right to call her ‘the blessed virgin mary’ and it’s right to call her ‘the Mother of God’ - Elizabeth uses both those titles, and while it’s right to seek to imitate Mary’s godly faith (we’ll come to that later). The emphasis in the passage is not on a woman who we need to come to because she is full of grace, NO, the emphasis is on a very ordinary person who is graced by God (a better translation of v 28) ordinary humanity ‘highly favoured’ by God. 

See Mary’s name means ‘bitter myrrh’. She was the lowliest of a downtrodden people.  From a poor family. From backwards Nazareth - the butt of every placee-name joke.  A servant girl. Her age was probably between 13-15 years.  

God could have gone to Jerusalem picked out Caiaphas’s daughter who was fair, rich, clad in gold embroidered robes and attended by a retinue of maids in waiting. But God chose Mary because to come into our humanity is to come low. 

Turn over to Luke chapter 3 v23ff because there Luke gives us a summary of the human family - our humanity - as he traces the human ancestry of Jesus.  

It’s interesting how it starts in verse 23:Now Jesus Himself was about 30 years old when He began His ministry.  He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph. Luke again draws our attention to the virgin birth by letting us know that, although people thought Joseph was Jesus’ father, that was not the case. (we’ll come back to that). Nevertheless, born of Mary Jesus is fully human and part of the human family. 

I don’t know if any of you who are pregnant are looking for baby names, but there are some great ones here.  There’s Naggai and Zerubbabel and Er. And there’s famous people like David and Isaac and Abraham.  But crucially Luke traces Jesus’ lineage all the way back to Adam. To say that Jesus is part of the One human family. 

Adam - the first person with whom God initiated relationship. The first human being.  Adam is the head, the father of the entire human race. (Now set aside biological questions for the time being. The scriptures are seeking to tell us something about the unity of our humanity. In Adam) He is the one that unites all humanity as one family. 

So imagine a vast family tree (Christmas tree shaped!) with every person in the entire world who has ever lived and somewhere in that tree (towards the bottom for now) is YOU and your father and his father and his father all the way back to ADAM. Just like Jesus’ lineage. All the way back to Adam …And Adam’s Father? v38 God. God ‘made Adam out of the dust of the ground.’ Adam is called the Son of God. 

That’s the human family. United In Adam. Can you see it? It’s remarkable …

But it’s also dysfunctional. ‘All families are psychotic’ so the canadian novelist Douglas Coupland reminds us.  And this is true of humanity. We are a dysfunctional family because Adam rejected God and we all do the same. That’s the family likeness. We all want to be in charge of our own lives - not God. we want to be god in God’s world. That’s the dysfunction of the big family that ruins all families and all lives.

So you see this (family) Tree is like a Christmas Tree in more ways than just it’s shape.  Christmas trees are weird aren’t they? we dress them up to look so nice - all glittery and sparkly. But cut from its roots it’s actually a dying thing in the corner of your room and one day very soon it will need to be thrown away. 

In the same way the human family can dress itself up, we put on a good show but having cut ourselves off from the life of God we are therefore dying and will one day be thrown away. It’s not just that we’re dying physically.. but spiritually we have no future. We are a broken family.. 

So that’s the human family - the poverty of Mary - ‘bitter Myrhh’ 

And yet there’s hope because there’s another family in this story 

An ancient family - as old as time itself. 

Jesus we see here is the Son of the Father in the unity of the Spirit. 

Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

The bible consistently reveals that the one God is not a single solitary being but a community of loving persons. A family.  The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. So close in relationship that the 3 ARE 1. This is who God is a tri-unity. Trinity. Family. 

The trinity is all over this passage. The trinity is all over Christmas. Jesus v32 is the Son of the Most High, the Son of God v35;  The Lord God v33 is giving Jesus David’s throne forever and the Holy Spirit v35 is making it all happen. 

This is who God is.  A father loving his son in the joy of the Spirit.  

This is the God in whose image we are made. The kind of family you and I long for because it’s what we were created for.  This is HOME.

So you know when you glimpse, if ever, the joy of Christmas - round the dinner table, with loved relatives, with children or maybe it has to be with your friends. Those brief moments. The best Christmas ever gets is a hint of this love for which you were made. This family. Father Son and Holy Spirit.. This is what we long for.

Please forgive another family illustration. But it’s obviously appropriate. Sometimes Fiona and i have a hug in the kitchen and we’ll often feel one or two or three little people burrowing their way in - do you remember doing that with your parents? we want to be in don’t we? and we parents open up a bit and extend our arms to welcome a Rebecca or Hannah or Zac in. 

The foundation of reality is God - A Father loving his son in the joy of the holy Spirit. Trinity. The perfect family.. And the miracle ofChristmas is this: that God in his love, in the womb of Mary, in the incarnation of the Son of God, the stooping of Jesus to become flesh he extends his family to us to draw us in!! Right in. The Son of God became what we are so that we might become what he is. Jesus came into our family to take us into his family.

Remember that important verse: Jesus was not, as it was thought, the son of Joseph. Jesus was not just one more son of man perpetuating the old race of Adam.  No, In the virgin birth we have a NEW humanity being established.  A new family tree. A second Son of God to belong to.  The true and eternal Son of God becomes Man.  A Second Adam.

Where the first Adam failed Jesus succeeds. 

Jesus lived a perfect human life towards his Father God.. 

And then in his death, Jesus bore the brokenness of humanity; consequences for our rejection of God. 

And when we now like Mary, trust in Jesus we are like a branch that is snipped out of the Adam tree and grafted into the Jesus tree.  That’s a Christian.  We’re all born in Adam and share in His sin and curse.  But trust in Jesus and you are BORN AGAIN and come to share in His righteousness and blessings and his LIFE. As the carol says: Jesus was “Born to raise the sons of earth, born to give them second birth.”

I look out and I know one thing about this congregation.  You’ve all been born once. That’s beyond dispute. Have you been born again?  Grafted by Jesus into his eternal family. Call out to him in your heart, ‘Jesus give me new birth into your family’ and see if you don’t feel differently about Jesus by the end of this sermon. 

And if by grace you are part of God’s family. How are you getting on knowing him and enjoying him and living for him and sharing this amazing news.  Use this advent to draw close to the God who has drawn close to you. 

Luke 1v5-25

Luke 1:5-25

if you weren’t here last week we began last week a study of luke’s gospel. we looked at the first 4 verses. this week we accelerate into chapter 1 

even though our reading was from the first part of the chapter. I want to do a wide scope overview of ths chapter. and then next week and the following we’ll look more at the detail. 

Cast your eye over the chapter as a whole and you’ll see its content. That is is a chapter of 2 angelic miraculous birth announcements, 

there’s the one we just had read to us - the promise of a son to this barren elderly couple.  

and that’s followed in v26 with the more familiar, extraordinary promise of a son to a virgin - Mary. and then those birth announcements are followed by 2 celebratory songs: the song of mary v46ff and then the song of zechariah in vv67ff. and those songs provide the key to what is happening with the arrival of these 2 miracle babies. 

what is happening? 

well, we will discover i hope that God is demonstrating that he is RICH IN MERCY 

i wonder if you believe that about God 

I wonder what you do believe about God? I don’t mean can you recite the creed with faith. I mean what do you believe deep down about God? Who is he to you?

a crucial question isn’t it because what we deep down believe about god will affect everything - our decisions, our behaviour, the way we pray or don’t pray. does god really care about the world? is he a god of mercy? does he care about me? 

we look at the suffering and the injustice of the world. where is he? perhaps when things go wrong in life personally - the loss of a job, or a relatonship, the pain of illness, prayers that for years seem to go unamswered. we are bound to ask: does god see me, does he know me? why doesn’t he help? sometimes a bitterness can grow up can’t it where we stop praying, stop expecting. become resigned to small thoughts about god. 

or perhaps we have got so bogged down in our moral struggles, failed so repeatedly that we believe that god must have given up on us; thrown his hands up in frustration and walked away.. 

well we saw last week that Luke has an aim with his gospel. he wants his reader/us to be certain. 

to be strengthened in faith.. 

and straight away as we enter chpt 1 the resounding message - the word occurs several times - is that god is a god of MERCY/ God cares about the world and he cares about you. you better believe it!

1. God’s mercy in his promises

In order to God’s mercy in fulfilling promises in this chapter. We need to go back and learn what the promised. History lessons can sometimes be a bit dry - so tune in especially hard if you will for the next couple of minutes as we do a brief history of time acc to the Bible.

In the beginning, the bible says, God created a perfect world. he didn’t have to. he did it because he wanted to - an overflow of his lifegiving love. But it didn’t last long. 

Human beings sowed the world’s troubles by rejecting God’s rule.  All of our problems are self inflicted wounds. 

Now at that early point God could have left us in our misery. 

BUT because of his great mercy he acted..

The bible says that right at the start God bound himself by a promise to one man - Abraham 

It was a promise to bless Abs descendents and through those descendents to bless the whole world. 

Well during the ensuing history of Abs descendents, the nation of Israel, that promise of world blessing is given progressive shape and definition. And in particular a key figure emerges - the Messiah - who would come and singlehandedly enact God’s rescue and restore God’s rule. He would be a mighty King born from the royal line of King David. Messiah. 

And, final thing, the sign that the Messiah was comingwould be the arrival of another key figure - a messenger. The prophet Isaiah calls him ‘a voice ..calling in the desert, prepare the way for the Lord’ and Malachi the last prophet of the OT calls this messenger “Elijah” and uses a stange phrase “he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children” 

Well now you see when we come to Luke chapter 1, the power and significance of this chapter is that here the fuse is finally lit; the countdown is started. the long promised rescue operation of God is underway. So look at the angel’s word in v13 to Zechariah “But the angel said to him: ‘Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John.” and look at v17 “And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous – to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” Do you hear it? do you hear Isaiah? it’s almost a direct quote from Malachi - this baby! here is the promised messenger!

And then…. just as God had promised, hot on his heels comes the Messiah himself. So look over the page, v30 “But the angel said to [Mary], ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favour with God. 31 You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. 32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants for ever; his kingdom will never end.”

In our culture we’re so used to broken promises. Politicians who make pledges that they either do not or cannot keep. We just become cynical. 

But imagine someone who’s word was absoultely sure. Who is so pure of character that he will never go back on a promise.  And who is so able in his power that he can carry out exactly what he says. Well this is who God is. 

Just have a look at how his promise keeping, his ‘covenant faithfulness’ is celebrated in the songs in the second half of the chapter. Zechariah’s song from v67 

“67 John’s father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied:

68 ‘Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel,

    because he has come to his people and redeemed them.

69 He has raised up a horn of salvation for us

    in the house of his servant David

70 (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),

71 salvation from our enemies

    and from the hand of all who hate us –

72 to show mercy to our ancestors

    and to remember his holy covenant,

73 the oath he swore to our father Abraham” 

Mary expresses something similar at the end of her song v54 

“He [,God,]has helped his servant Israel,

    remembering to be merciful

55 to Abraham and his descendants for ever,

    just as he promised our ancestors.…” 

Normally when we talk about remembering something it’s something that we’ve previously forgotten. “oh no! wedding anniversary!”

But occasionally we talk about remembering as a stimulus to action: “I remembered my Grandmother’s death by going to her grave” or “my work is done in memory of her.”

And when the Bible talks about remembering it’s in this second sense. God doesn’t suddenly remember to be merciful because it had slipped his mind to do so. No, God’s promises are rooted in his mercy.  And when the time is ripe God acts to fulfil his promises.  he remembers. 

So listen, God has promised good things to those who trust him. he promised Jesus and he delivered. And now many of the promises of the full fruits of Jesus’ work are Future things:- that one day he will put all things to rights and give his people life eternal in a restored creation. These promises are absolutely sure. 

2. God's mercy in our need. 

What is the nature of the salvation that the messiah brings? 

Imp Q - what is christian salvation? Is it only spiritual? Forgiveness? the hope of heaven when we die? 

Look at Zs song again v71 “salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us” or v74 “to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear…”

could be spiritual enemies? 

But then look at Mary’s song v51 

“He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;

    he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.

52 He has brought down rulers from their thrones

    but has lifted up the humble.

53 He has filled the hungry with good things

    but has sent the rich away empty.

It’s remarkable. The Messiah’s birth has just been announced as coming soon. She speaks of the Messiah’s rescue, all these things as if they have already happened! It is as if in her mind they are as good as accomplished because the Messiah is now here.  Even though as yet he is barely a foetus in her womb! 

But here’s the thing: The salvation that Messiah brings… it’s not just a spiritual salvation is it? Not in Z and Mary’s minds. It’s not just forgiveness and eternal life..this sounds like political revolution doesn’t it? Bringing down rulers, lifting up the humble, filling thehungry with good things. This sounds like Practical down to earth help. Which is exactly what they needed. Ist C Jews living in grinding poverty under the brutal regime of their Roman overlords, their enemies. Because of course our needs are not just for forgiveness - primary as that is - we long for other things such as justice and peace and harmony! Is God’s salvation about those things too?

When Jesus grows up he heals the sick and demon possessed. To some extent he does feed the hungry. he even raises the dead. But of course he doesn’t overthrow the roman overlords, he doesn’t bring political restoration and justice to Israel .. let alone to the world

So had Mary and Zechariah got salvation wrong?

Well no, they hadn’t got it wrong. 

v67 Z was speaking directly under the leading of God the Holy Spirit

They hadn’t got it wrong. It’s only that their timing was a bit out. See the coming of the Messiah IS God putting the whole world to rights. It’s not just forgiveness. It’s turning back all the effects of sin. It was always going to be but there’s this small matter of ‘timing’. 

Salvation comes, if you like in 2 stages, 2 comings of Jesus. Jesus comes the first time as a baby, to die for the brokenness of the world and to rise again. He’s done it - everything is in place. 

But,  the writing of all wrongs will not be fully implemented until Jesus’ second coming. This is what advent waiting is all about. And Jesus’ feedings and healings which we’ll see as we look at Luke’s gospel are like the blue print of that fulfilment, that future kingdom that future world taht he is gonna bring. 

Z and Mary might have missed the timing but they haven’t missed the nature of the salvation that Jesus brings. and neither must we. it’s breathtaking in its scope. God’s mercy extends and will extend to every detail of brokenness and need. God feels for our suffering world and one day through Jesus he will put it completely right. He’s promised to do so. 

And if God cares, with deep mercy, about justice, about poverty, about suffering then the church, as his people now, cannot stand back from suffering and injustice and poverty. The church is to live out that blue print of the future kingdom of God. 

ill. so many people involved in HWNS - drop in the ocean, makes a difference and people give up their time and energy to show mercy. and often the motivation God is a God of mercy towards human need. he cares for the world. 

and now it follows that if God cares for the world it means that he cares for every individual in his world. 

This chapter contains a wonderful illustration of God’s personal mercy in the story of Z and Eliz. 

Let’s just look at them very briefly. Z and Eliz were this lovely godly older couple. the kind of couple in church that you love going round for a cup of tea to sit down with them. Godly and faithful. But of course there is this shadown of sorrow v7 they’d never been able to have any children because eliz was barren. No doubt they’d tried for children for years. They’d prayed we’re told in v13, they’d hoped; they’d wept and in v25 eliz calls her childlessness her disgrace. the stigma of childlessness in that culture presumably would have affected their relationships socially; with each other and i guess their rel w God. They’d lived for God, they’d prayed. They must have said does God see us? does God care for us? 

You kind of get a hint of that with Z when he’s in the temple. I mean ok any of us encountering an angel would be freaked out. But when God does turn up with the answer to Zs prayers, Z simply can’t believe it. Maybe his view of God had gotten small? 

But God acts and look at what he says again v13-15a “‘Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. 14 He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, 15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. …”

You know that lots of names have meanings don’t they. so people say “i’m Sarah, which means princess” or “I’m James which means loved of God” or even “I’m Giles which means young goat” (Cheers, mum and dad) 

Well Z is to call his miracle son, John. This son whom the angel says will be a joy and delight; who will perform this function of preparing the way for the Lord. The messenger of Isaiah and Malachi’s foretelling. This is Z and Elizs longed for son. His name will be John… which means?: God is gracious. 

You see God knows. God knows what he’s doing. he heard Z and Eliz’s prayers v13 every one of them, just as he hears yours. he wept with them in their pain, just as he does with us in ours. But he knew what he was doing. he had something better for them. Something worth waiting for. John. 

And of course when it came to it Z just couldn’t believe it! If only Z and Eliz had known how God cared for them in his mercy. How God saw them, every step. How he had plans for them. If you look over the page at v57 “When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. 58 Her neighbours and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy.…”

You see God is a God of mercy in our needs. 

It doesn’t mean that he will always answer our prayers in exactly the way we think he should. he knows best for us. and perhaps the things that we most long for and deeply need will only be there for us when God puts all things to rights at the end of the age. And yet he is rich in mercy, he is with us, he knows, he knows what he is doing, his timing is perfect. 

3. God’s mercy for our sin

the salvation that Jesus brings is more than a spiritual salvation 

but it is certainly not less than a spiritual salvation. 

the salvation that Jesus brings encompasses the whole world put to rights

but at it’s heart is thegift of forgiveness. 

our greatest need, it doesn’t always feel like our greatest need, is for God’s forgiveness 

Z proclaims this in his song as he holds his 8 day old litle son in his arms 

look at v76-78a “And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,77 to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, 78 because of the tender mercy of our God,…” 

we sometimes speak of God’s hatred of sin. his anger towards our rebellion and his judgement on it. and we rightly speak about those things because the bible speaks about them. but there is also v78 God’s tender mercy as he looks upon us in our sin. It’s actually just one word in the original language and it’s the word for bowels; guts the greek word splachna. In the ancient world - the seat of your emotions was not the heart but the bowels, thats where you felt things. lit says ‘the forgiveness of sins ,because of the bowels of our God!!”

i don’t know what illicits in you your deepest feelings of pity, or outrage of longing, 

for me seeing that photograph of the body of that refugee child drowned in the mediterranean and washed up on the beach. so much need in our world  

but you know even though God looks upon those things and he sees them much more deeply than we do - he has mercy in our need. Even so above all the sufferings of the world, all the attrocities, nothing moves the heart of God, the bowels of God like human suffering in sin.  

Look at how Zs song describes that human plight in v79 “living in darkness and in the shadow of death” It is to be without direction, without peace. And yet in the tender mercy of God he must act . And so God acts in the person oh the Messiah, his recuer King to bring light into that darkness. Salvation in terms of sin being cancelled, it’s debt being paid; the barrier it creates being broken down to allow light to flood in. sin done away with so that we can have peace again with God. It’s like, Z says v78, the coming of the dawn. Think of someone who’s been in a dark place all night and it’s been a miserable night. campageddon - no electric light, no matches, no fire and the pitch darkness makes the agony in their hearts all the more painful and then the dawn at last comes and with the pink flecks on the horizon comes a rising in their hearts.. dispeling the darkness and then the sun itself is coming up pouring out rays of warmth and light. 

and that is what the coming of Jesus will do, says Zechariah ‘because of the tender mercy of our God by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and the shadow of death to guide our feet into the path of peace.” 

God’s mercy for our sin 

So what do you really believe about God? 

That he isn’t involved. that he can’t be trusted? God keeps his promises unfailingly 

That he doesn’t care about the world; that he doesn’t care about you? God’s mercy in our need. He knows, he sees, he will one day right all wrongs and satisfy our hearts. 

Do you believe that he rejects you in your moral failures? Well no, God’s mercy for our sin is deep and everlasting because of jesus. 

So put your trust in him 

Like Mary in this chapter  

Blessed is the person who believes, rejoicing in being his, waiting for him, trusting. 

Pray 

Luke 1v1-4

Luke 1v1-4

We are embarking upon a new series in the gospel of Luke 

written by Luke a Gentile and a Doctor 

written to someone called Theophilus.. who may have been 

• a Roman Official hence his title Most Excellent who was interested in Christianity. 
• a lawyer who was defending Christians on trial - Paul? - Luke writes his gospel and his subsequent book, Acts, as a legal brief for a defence Lawyer. This is what’s been happening. 
• the name could be a catch all term for anyone reading this book and coming to faith in Jesus because the name is a compound of two greek words Theos - God and Philos - Love. Theophilus means loved by God or lover of God. 

and that’s one of the big purposes of Luke’s gospel you see. the book is all about the love of God on display in the life, the death, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Saviour of the world. God loves you.. and he wants you to love him in return. Love him back. Theophilus. 

Well let’s have a look at Luke’s opening words with which he introduces his gospel

vv1-4  luke tells us straight up his aim in writing his gospel 

v4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. 

Certainty - that’s Luke’s aim 

and that’s immediately difficult 

certainty is a bit of a dirty word isn’t it in our culture. More so than anywhere i would say in Dalston, in Hackney. Certainty - at it’s best is arrogance - a kind of i’m right and everybody is wrong dogmatism. At it’s worst certainty is to blame for the terrible things that we have seen in Paris this weekend. 

There’s no place for certainty. 

And yet there’s a kind of certainty that we all embrace; engage in every day of our lives that i think is closer to the certainty that Luke is talking about here. We’re all certain about some things: that strawberries fresh in summertime taste wonderful; that a swim in the sea is exhilharating; that our babies in church are beautiful and worth fighting for. Lots of things that we’re certain about. they are self evident to us, to our hearts.. 

And that’s the certainty of faith that Luke I think is talking about when it comes to the person of Jesus and the truth of God and the love of God. 

he wants us to grow in that because it will make us people of love. 

and so 3 things from just these opening verese 

be certain about jesus 

be certain it’s true 

be certain about salvation  

1. Be certain about Jesus 

Strange phrase 1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled[a] among us. The reports that Luke is ordering are reports of historical events but historical events of a special character: these are not merelythings that have happened but ‘things that have been fulfilled[a] among us,’

London Acquatic centre yesterday. Reminded me of the London Olympics. gold rush. sports you’ve never heard of - clay pigeon shooting and tai kwondo and dominos. our gold medalists - virtual unknowns come from nowhere and become household names (for a few weeks anyway) for them of course the gold medal didn’t just happen from nowhere. it is the fulfilment of years and years of dreaming and training and competing. it’s only when you know something of that background that you understand the true significance of what they’ve fulfilled - what it really means. 

well luke here in his gospel describes the life of Jesus Christ as a fulfilment. Actually THE fulfilment. the fulfilment of human history.  JCs life and death and resn, luke tells us, is the proof and climax of God’s working in the world for centuries before it occurred. 

and this is really important 

our salvation, the salvation of our world - is rooted in ancient somehwat events - a man dying on a cross 2000 years ago, 2000 miles away. in the concrete streets of modern life it feels precisely that - very distant. how can these 1st Cobscure events make a difference to my life in the 21st C? make a difference to the future of this planet???

But you see these events were not just isolated occurences somewhere in distant history. they didn’t just happen. they were filfilment. Jesus didn’t just appear from nowhere; out of the blue. Luke will show us even as we read his gospel over the next few weeks how Jesus’ coming was the climax and fulfilment of the plan of GOD which itself stretches back 1000s of years before him. 

so luke’s gospel will bring us face to face with JC in all his meaning and significance 

and we all need that no matter where we are in our believing. we all need that if we are to establish any kind of certainty. we need to encounter JC as he truly is. 

Many people say something like this: ‘in order for me to believe in God i would require a watertight argument.’ Well God hasn’t given us a watertight argument. Actually he’s given us something far better. he has given us a person. JC- there are no holes on him, there’s no escaping him. He’s the watertight person against whom there ultimately can be no argument. And Millions have found that to be true. Just by looking at the life of JC they have found HIM intellectually inescapable and certain. …

—————-

what will we see as we look at JC as Luke portrays him?  

2 sides: 

on the one hand we will see his welcome. his inclusion of people who, in that culture, were total outsiders. we see him time and again reaching out to the poor, women, children, prostitutes, lepers, to colaborators with the enemy, to gentiles. He brings the outsider in. and we modern people we love that kind of thing. we love that openness. especially if we’re from hackney ‘isn’t this remarkable?’ we say. 

but you know it’s way more remarkable with Jesus. because this was utterly unheard of in his day. there was no 1stC children in need. Charity was seen as weakness. No, Jesus was utterly unique in this, in reaching out to the outcast. jesus literally turned his world upside down and his welcome it could be argued has shaped the kind of just society that we benefit from today..  

so that’s the one hand - his welcome. 

but on the other hand - a seeming contrast - his claims. you are gonna see Jesus on every page making the most self centred claims. Claims about himself.. which go beyond megalomania. Routinely Jesus says that He is going to judge the world at the end of human history; he says that he is the giver of life;  that He alone has authority to forgive sins; that he is equal with God the Father! Now we kind of get used to jesus saying these things, that’s what he does. but face it as it is. His claims go way beyond all of the megalomaniacs of history outside of mental instititions. Beyond the Hitlers, beyond the Stalins and yet of course the reason why we don’t lump Jesus in with these lunatics is because combined with his self centred claims is the moral beauty that we have just mentioned. Jesus is kind, Jesus is tender. He lays down his life in love. 

How do you explain him? 

How do you explain claims like that and a life like that? 

You see over the years millions of people have looked and looked and looked and come to the conclusion that this is inescapable. he must be who he said he is. 

So you see in a way it’s a dangerous thing to look at JC in Luke’s gospel because he himself engenders certainty. 

When the sun comes up in the morning (if it does! this is the summer or somewhere with decent weather) and it’s on your face you don’t need me to say let me prove to you that the sun is bright and hot. It’s self evident. Well in the same way how do you know that there is a glorious God?  Not an infallible argument but a person. 

As the apostle Paul writes ‘we are given the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.”

So are you still waiting for a water tight argument? Well look, doesn’t God have the right to send you a water tight person instead? It is as we look at Jesus Christ that our certainty is deepened. 

Are you struggling to grow in joy and assurance and confidence as a Christian? Well It is as we look at Jesus Christ that our certainty is deepened. 

be certain about Jesus - the fulfilment 

2. Be certain that it’s true 

Face to Faith - Guardian. David Bradnack retd. teacher 

“My salvation finally came when well into adulthood i found that there was at least one intellectually acceptable way of explaining that whatever happened about AD33 was not a resurrection as understood by the pious and that the gospels are not the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.” And he finishes by saying “The creed makes christianity the religion of deception. Either you deceive yourself into believing in the virgin birth and the resn as literal fact and you know they’re metaphor or you mouth the words to deceive the gullible that they must believe them.” 

I think he’s capturing, perhaps in a bit of an extreme way, the prevailing mood in 21st C London about the gospels. These events really happened? Come on! These are legends. Wonderful legends. Metaphors of new life and love. Not something that we’re literally supposed to accept. 

The problem with that is that such an idea is completely foreign to Luke here in his first 4 verses. See Luke explains his method in composing his and it blasts this kind of call to uncertainty out of the water.

When it comes to the writing of his gospel, Luke tells us that he is acting as a journalist. He’s done careful research in order to give us an orderly account. In v1 he tells us about the existence of many accounts of the life of Jesus that he has studied and compared and used. Luke without doubt had the gospel of Mark open infront of him. Well over half of Mark is quoted verbatim in Luke’s gospel. So Luke has open on his desk all the other accounts.. But more than that v2 Luke says i not only checked on everything that has been written i also went and interviewed the eyewitnesses; people who were there,  to check and see if what is written in these accounts matches what these people really saw. Yes or no? 

You know one of the things that you occasionally get in Luke’s gospel is comment about how people felt about what they experienced about Jesus. In the next few weeks we’ll encounter Mary the mother of Jesus, receiving the news of her pregnancy, giving birth, bringing up her child - and we get a glimpse of her feelings, the internal working of her heart. How? Because Luke interviewed Mary. He asked her about these things. She told him. 

the life of jesus has fantastical elements to it, yes. but they are never presented as myth, legend or metaphor but as fact, history, true events. God in this world! historians date luke’s gospel somewhere between the late 50s to early 70s AD - that’s 25-40 years after the death and resurrection of Jesus. I guess the reason why Luke wanted to get his gospel into the public domain so early was so that it couldn’t be passed off as legend. You could go and speak to the eyewitnesses yourself. 

Now let me press on a little side bar here because there’s an obvious other problem for us. 

The text of Luke’s gospel that we have translated in our english Bibles is not directly from what Luke wrote down. What I mean is we do not have, sitting in a museum somewhere Luke’s own original of his gospel. The earliest copy that we have of Luke’s gospel is a fragment of the Lord’s prayer, it’s called papyrus 75, it’s in the Vatican and it’s dated 200 AD - about 130 years after Luke wrote his original. the earliest full copies of Luke that we have are the codex vaticanus and the codex siniaticus. Both of those full copies date around 330 AD so some 300 years after Luke’s original.

And of course it’s that gap which introduces doubt in our minds isn’t it? Because the codex sinaiticus which lives in the British Library down the road, ancient as it is, is still only a copy of a copy or a copy of a copy of Luke’s original. And we have to wonder has there been some funny business going on with the copyists whereby somewhere along the line the story was changed. That’s an argument you hear. That the real Jesus of Luke was not the fantastical Jesus of the gospels we have. Couldn’t it have been that the legends grew up during that gap. 

Well it’s a legitmate question.. 

However using the standards and science of historical scholarship the NT has strong credibility. 

See, we want to believe that the writings that we have from antiquity are the actual writings of Plato, Tacitus, Homer, Aristotle whoever it is. And the way we build that credibility is by comparing the earliest tangible copies that we have of those documents.. 

For example Plato was writing in 400BC the earliest fragment copies that we have of his writings are from 900AD - a gap of 1200 years. And the number of ancient manuscripts we have of Plato? 10. BUt because they’re discovered in different places we can compare them and if they are alike we can conclude that the copies through the ages have been accurate. 

Let’s do a better one Homer’s poem The Iliad - written 900BC, earliest fragment copy 400BC a gap of 500 years. Number of ancient manuscripts 643. We can be sure that the Iliad that we study at school is Homer’s 

What about the NT? I love this. This builds my certainty..

Written in it’s entirety between 40-100AD - the earliest fragment we have is a fragment of John’s gospel in the John Ryland museum in Manchester. it dates to 125AD - only 50 years after the writing of John.  We’ve already said that the earliest full copies we have are just 300 years after the original. But here’s the thing. Number of ancient manuscripts: Full copies in Greek 5,300; full copies in Latin:10,000 other early fragments of the NT 9, 300 of which more than a thousand are in languages other than Greek - Syrian, Coptic, Armenian, Gothic and Ethiopic. 24,000 manuscripts in total found all over the middle east representing hundreds of lines of passing down copy from copy from copy and when the manuscripts are compared to form the most uptodate versions of the greek NT from which our engish versions are translated. the differences in those far flung copies are minimal. 

The NT has been remarkably preserved for us! 

The scholar John Warwick Montgomery comments “To be sceptical of the resultant text of the NT is to allow all of classical antiquity to slip into obscurity, for no documents of the ancient period are as well attested bibliographically as the NT”  That’s an understatement!

Be certain it’s true!

we’re almost out of time but very briefly as we end 

3. be certain about salvation 

It’s a book about salvation. 

We all love stories don’t we. If you eat with friends or go for a walk in the country or a drink down the boozer. Conversation normally revolves around stories where you want others to know something and be affected by it to involve others in your experience.. And story follows story…

Luke here is not just a journalist, he’s a novelist 

He tells us right from the outset that while he’s not writing legend, he is writing ‘the story’ of Jesus Its actually there in v1 it’s the greek word diagesis meaning story or narrative and unfortunately it hasn’t been translated that way in NIV. What it actually reads is ‘Many have undertaken to draw up a story of the things that have been fulfilled among us. and luke said it seemed good for me to do the same. I think probably the NIV chooses a different word because of the connotations that story has with fiction? 

what luke is writing is true but a true story

what luke is emphasising is that his aim wasn’t to put together a compendium of jesus’ teachings or a collection of his sayings or vignettes of examples to follow from his life.  

no from the beginning Luke says i want to tell you the story of Jesus 

why? 

Luke writes story because it’s not the teachings, hte sayings or the example but the actions of Jesus that save you. 

When it comes to the salvation of the world he is the hero of the story not us 

In this respect Christianity is unique

In all other religions the focus is not so much on the story of their spiritual leader but on that leader’s teaching. And if there are events recorded of that leaders life they are primarily there as examples to be followed. And that’s becaus ein every other religious system you’re saved by the way you live. By following that inspirational teaching and example. 

But you see in xianity it’s the exact opposite. For a start the moral teachings of Jesus are not inspirational and uplifting. they are unachievable and humbling: Be perfect as God is perfect says the sermon on the mount. You’ve heard it said do not kill i say never become angry. You’ve heard it said don’t commit adultery, i say if you a look at someone lustfully you’ve committed adultery. Do not worry. Love your enemies. these teachings are not inspiring they’re impossible, they’re devastating - you can’t do them. nobody can. 

people say ‘oh i love the sermon on the mount - i try to live it” they’ve never read it. when you read it you end up saying “God save me from the sermon on the mount!” 

and that’s the point 

the Bible says we are fallen, spiritually broken people and so our great need is not for a teacher to tell us what to do but for a saviour to do for us what we cannot do our great need is not for an example to show us how to live but for a saviour to live the life that we should have lived and to die the death that we susequently deserve to die. 

we need one who will come and act on our behalf 

and luke says praise God he’s come 

this is why Luke gives us the story of Jesus because it is the actions of Jesus that we need. hsi actions for us. 

we cannot save ourselves. if it was down to us there would be no certainty about our salvation. have i done enough? 

But Jesus Christ is the saviour of the world. And here is the story of that great salvation he has enacted for us

That’s why we can be certain about salvation. It’s down to him. 

Certainity

certainty about Jesus 

certainty that it’s true 

certainty about salvation 

the certainty of heart makes us people of love

let’s pray