In one church where I served I asked some of the small
groups to give me lists of the characteristics of God. As you could imagine, all of the groups
included love. To my surprise none of
them mentioned holiness. God is
love. He is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and abounding in kindness.
But He is also separate and holy.
Up to this point in the Bible there has been an emphasis on
the fact that God is inapproachable. He appears
in a pillar of fire and a whirlwind. Get
too close to Him and you will fall down dead.
So how amazing that we now read that in Jesus we have Immanuel, ‘God
with us’. The God of love and holiness
has found a way to dwell with people.
Jesus is God
In the New York Times there was a review on a book about
Jesus. The reviewer was Jewish and he
made the following observation: ‘the big question is actually, why did Jesus’
first disciples worship Him?’
The Jews of that time were hoping for a Messiah, they wanted
a political leader who would free them from Roman occupation, but they were not
thinking in terms of God becoming man.
They were the last group of people who would have thought like that.
Yet Jesus acts like God.
In the book of Job, we read that God treads the waves (Job 9:8), in the
gospels we see Jesus walking on water. When
Jesus forgives a man all His sins, Jesus’ enemies rightly ask, ‘who can forgive
but God alone.’
Our God is mysteriously, one God and yet three persons
within the God head: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Here is God the Son!
Jesus is God with us
How can God, who is infinitely holy, live among people who
are not holy. The answer lies in part in
the carol, ‘Hark the Herald’, which includes the line, ‘veiled in flesh the
godhead see.’ When God the Son becomes a
man, His glory is somewhat revealed. Yet
at the very same time, Jesus in human flesh reveals the glory of God. In Jesus we see His compassion, we witness
His love, we hear His truth.
The surprise of us
But why would God have had a problem dwelling among people? Why had people feared to be in God’s
presence? Well, ask yourself, ‘what are my
attitudes like?’ ‘What are my thoughts
like?’ ‘Would you want everyone to see
and hear what you think and feel?’ The
truth is we are not holy. We are not
like God. We are not pure and good. That is why people could not dwell with the
perfectly pure God.
So, you might expect that when the Son of God walked amongst
us, it would be the religious and respectable that came close to Him and that
those who had made a mess of their lives stayed well clear of Him. Yet just the opposite happened. The religious hated Him and people like the
sexually immoral flocked to Him.
Why was that? Because
the ‘good’ are bad, and the bad know they need to be forgiven.
One day, a respectable and ‘good’ man came to Jesus to talk
about eternal life. Jesus told that man
that ‘there is no one good, but God alone.’
We are all selfish, bitter, self-absorbed and proud. It is when we realise this that we rejoice in
the words, ‘He will save His people from their sins’. Through His death He offers full
forgiveness. Through His resurrection He
gives us the power to change.
Climax:
I want to finish by pointing out that ‘God with us’ even
becomes ‘God in us’. The risen Jesus
offers to dwell in our hearts. With Him
there we can experience the power to change.
You will not be perfect in this life, and if anyone claims to be you can
be sure they do not know God. But you
can change. Jesus gives us new desires
and new loves that show themselves in compassion and truth. The Christian is someone who is both humble
and growing—humble because we know that we have done nothing to deserve His
love, and growing because He is making us more like Himself.
(The idea for this sermon and the illustration from the New
York Times are taken from Tim Keller).
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