The Birth of the Son of God

THE BIRTH OF THE SON OF GOD.

Luke 2: 1 – 7

Christmas Sermon by:

Rev. C. Pronk

PUBLISHED BY THE

PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE

OF THE

FREE REFORMED CHURCHES OF NORTH AMERICA.

(November 2007)

LITURGY:

Votum

Psalter 349: 1, 2

Scripture Reading: Luke 2: 1 – 7

Text: Luke 2; 1 – 7

Psalter 38: 1, 5

Congregational Prayer

Offerings

Psalter 222: 1, 2, 5

Sermon

Psalter 375: 1, 5

Thanksgiving Prayer

Psalter 405: 1,6, 7

Doxology: Psalter 294: 3

Congregation:

Luke 2 is probably the best-lovedchapter in all of Scripture because it tells

the story of the birth of Jesus Christ. Despite the fact that secular forces in our society are trying to take Christ out of Christmas and turn December 25 into a neutral holiday, most people in North America continue to associate Christmas with the birth of the founder of Christianity. The picture of baby Jesus in the manger of Bethlehem remains etched on the minds of millionsand it still produces feelings of kindness and generosity. But to get true spiritual benefits from the birth of Christ we need more than vague sentimental notions about His incarnation. We need to know exactly how, when and why Jesus was born. And Luke gives us that information. Like any good historian Luke supplies us not just with the bare facts but he takes us behind the scenes and helps us put things in the proper historical context.We never get tired of hearing or reading this familiar story so let us go over it again this morning. Our text covers the first seven verses of Luke chapter 2 and we will focus on v. 7 where we read “and she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn"

Our theme is The Birth of the Son of God and we will note:

1.the miraculous nature of his birth

2.the historical context of his birth

3.the appalling circumstances of his birth

4.the glorious message of his birth

Beloved, in Luke chapter 1 we read that the angel Gabriel came to Mary a virgin of about 13 or 14 years of age. She had been betrothed or engaged to a young man whose name was Joseph. And this is what the angel said, "Hail, thouthat art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee:blessed art thou among women.” Of course, she was very surprised at what the angel said and wondered what he meant by this statement. She was afraid. But Gabriel tells her not to fearbecause he reassured her that she had found favour with God. Then he explains the reason for his visit "And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus.He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest." Having heard this Mary has a question for the angel."How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?" The angel replied, "the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore also that holy One shall be called the Son of God." In other words, it will be a miraculous conception. God is going to plant life in you without the involvement of a man. But then,nothing is impossible with God.

Now we are in Luke 2 which tells us how this prophecy is fulfilled. Nine months have passed since Gabriel's announcement. Mary is full term and presently gives birth to the baby Jesus. Luke uses very simple words to describe the miraculous event: "And she brought forth her first-born Son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes." That's all. On the face of it there was nothing unusual about that statement. There were probably other babies born that same night in Bethlehem. Yet this baby was different as we will see in a moment. But before

we do that we will first look at some of the events surrounding the birth of Mary’s baby. Like any good historian, Luke provides a setting for this event. The setting is the time when he was born, the political and religious situation and the location and so on.

In vv.1-3 we have the world setting. "It came to pass in those days," that is the days when Herod was king in Israel, the days when Gabriel came to Elizabeth and Zacharias, the days when John the prophet and forerunner of Messiah was born, in those very same days, it came about that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that a census be taken of all the world. This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria and all went to be registered, everyone to his own city."

It's amazing how God directs everything. Whether He works through willing or unwilling instruments, He accomplishes exactly what he has planned, in this case when His Son will be born and where and how. The emperor of Rome knew nothing about the Messianic prophesies of the Old Testament. He knew nothing about God and His Word whatsoever. Yet he played a key role in the fulfillment of prophecy at the birth of the God-Man, Jesus Christ.

His name was Caesar Augustus, Caesar being a title meaning king, or emperor. "Augustus" is an adjective meaning honored one, or majestic one. His actual name was Gaius Octavius but in 27 B.C. the Roman Senate conferred on him the honourable title of Caesar Augustus and that is how people have referred to him ever since. He ruled the Roman Empire for 45 years, from 30 B.C. to 14 A.D. and he was one of Rome’s best, if not the best, emperor. He created the Pax

Romana, the Roman Peace that prevailed throughout His empire. Augustus was looked upon as "the savior of the world,” and was worshipped as a god.

This supreme ruler decided at some point that a census should be taken in his Empire. The Roman Empire was vast and needed a lot of money to operate a huge bureaucracy and provide services. So the main purpose of the census was to raise taxes.In the year 8 BC Augustus made a decree that all his subjects had to be registered. This included the kingdom of Israel ruled by Herod. The Jews, however, did not like to pay taxes to Rome and apparently Herod was able to stall it off as long as possible. But in the end they were forced to comply and the census took place some timearound 6 to 4 B.C.Among those required to comply with this imperial decree were Joseph and his very pregnant wife. In their case they had to make a 90 kmslong journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem. On foot or maybe in Mary’s case, riding a donkey over very rough terrain in late fall or winter. All of that was necessary to make sure that God’s plan would be realized because that plan called for Jesus’ birth to take place in Bethlehem, not Nazareth. Caesar of course didn't know anything about this. Herod didn't either. But God was working out every detail of His sovereign plan through them.

According to v. 3 everybody had to register for the census in the city where they came from.That was not a Roman stipulation as far as we know. The Romans would have been OK with everybody registering in the town where they lived. So it's most likely that the fact that they went back to the city of their ancestry was a Jewish stipulation. Possibly Herod, or more likely Israel’s spiritual leaders, decided that everybody should go back to the place where the

records were kept. You remember when the children of Israel came to the land of Canaan the whole land was divided into sections and given to the various tribes as their inheritance. And in those tribal areas families were given certain towns and villages where theyand their descendants would live. The Jews kept detailed genealogical records and these records were located in each city, town or village.So that’s where everybody had to go for registration, to the place of his ancestry and as a result Jesus was born in Bethlehem. All this in fulfillment of the ancient prophecy recorded in Micah 5:2.

So God uses Caesar Augustus and king Herod and the religious establishment of Israel to bring Joseph all the way from Nazareth to the city of David to be registered there becauseaccording to Luke 1:25-26 he was of the house and family of David. And from chapter 3 we learn that Mary could also trace her ancestry to David.Consequently Joseph went to register for the census, along with Mary who was engaged to him and was with child.

The question has often been asked why Mary had to go with Joseph to register. Was it not sufficient for a husband to register for his wife and family? We really don't know the answer to that. It may well be that Joseph could have done it alone but that he did not want to leave Mary behind in Nazareth in the difficult circumstances she was in, what with the gossip and all. And of course he wanted to be with here when she would have her baby.

Now it says in v. 5 that Mary was his betrothed wife. In other words, they were engaged. But in Matt. 1:24 we read that they were married. At the direction of the angel, Joseph had taken her as his wife because his suspicion of her was

completely unfounded. So they got married. There was a wedding ceremony perhaps a private one but legally they were married.That was the right thing to do. It certainly quelled a lot of questions. Joseph could now introduce her as his wife. He did not have to say, here is Mary my pregnant fiance. He gave her a cover this way by making the relationship legal.To the outside world they were a married couple but in actual fact they were not living as man and wife. So when they entered the inn at Bethlehem Mary could still say what she had said to the angel when he told her what was about to happen: “I do not know a man.”

We now come to v. 6 which says, “And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be deliveredetc." Where in Bethlehem did they stay and how long? The answer, of course, is in the local inn. But how long they were there we don’t know. All we are told is that while they were in Bethlehem, Mary “brought forth her first-born son, wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in manger because there was no room for them in the inn."

Now you’ve all heard ministers say that when Joseph and Mary arrived at the inn and asked for a room the innkeeper told them, sorry no vacancy.But where is the innkeeper in this story? Nowhere. It’s not at all necessary to invent one in order to explain why there was no room for them in the inn. We should think of it this way. Like all the travelers to Bethlehem, Joseph and Mary needed a place to stay and there were such places provided for people like that.Every city, every town or village had public shelters where travelers could go on a first come first serve basis. When we hear the word inn we tend to think of some kind

of three-story motel. But no such facilities existedat that time, certainly not in a small hick town like Bethlehem. What these public shelters looked like has been reconstructed by archeologists so that today we have a pretty good idea about the kind of place Joseph and Mary were probably staying at the time. The word inn

here simply means shelter. It's more like a camp ground. Typically it was built on four sides and it had two floors, the top part being like a loft in a barn. One part of it would beenclosed to offer some protection from the elements. In any case, it would be a very primitive kind of place where travelers could stay on the first or second floor while their animals were put up in the centre of the main floor that was fenced in.

By the time Joseph and Mary arrived in Bethlehem this public area would already be filled to overflowing with Roman officials charged with the census taking and many travelers who had come to register. The rooms were all taken so that Joseph and Mary had to make do with whatever space they could find in the open air among the animals. They had probably brought their own bedding. Don’t forget that they must have spent several nights in similar campings prior to getting to Bethlehem. The young couple probably had only the garments they were wearing plus some baby clothes, the swaddlingcloths mentioned in our text. In that case they would have wrapped themselves in their robes trying to keep warm with a fire. We should not exaggerate the plight of Joseph and Mary because what they went through was quite common in those days and besides, sleeping on the ground floor near the animals would also protect them from the cold. As I said, we don’t know how long they were there before or after

registering. Either way they could not very well go home because the baby was due any day. So they had to wait until the birth came.

When the big moment arrivedJoseph must have beenvery curious. I mean, if you knew that your wife was going to give birth to the Son of God you might

have a few ideas about what this child might look like. He probably held her hand through the long silent night of her labor, smoothing her forehead with a cooling cloth, speaking words of comfort to his dear young wife as she spent hours in labour in a place that offered very little comforts, no doctors, no nurses

and above all, no mother. Every girl would want her mother there. No family, just a 14-year old and a somewhat older husband. Finally, at the culmination of the labour Mary pushes one more time and there he is: the Son of God crying the cry of life.

In the fullness of time God sent forth His Son born of a woman, Immanuel, the God of eternity steps into time and space. The Lord of immensity, the Lord of omnipresence is confined to a body about ten pounds in weight and under two feet in length. That little life is held up in the arms of Mary’s loving husband. Neither of them could fathom what was going on. They had been told by an angel but that did not mean they understood everything.

Luke is careful to tell us that she gave birth to her firstborn son, prototokon, firstborn. He does not use monogenes, only son. The Roman Catholic Church would have us believe that Mary had only one child and that she remained a virgin till she died. That is not true. She had otherchildren. Matthew says in 1:25 that Joseph kept her a virgin until Jesus was born. After that Joseph

and Mary lived as husband and wife and together they hadother sons and a few daughters as well. In Matthew 12 we are introduced to Jesus' half brothers. In chapter 13 they're even named for us. You know, the crowd at that point was incredulous. They were saying Jesus is nobody special. He’s just a carpenter's

son. His mother is Mary, His brothers are James and Joseph and Simon and Judas, and His sisters, they're all with us. So Jesus was not the only son Mary had. He was the first-born which means He hadfirst rights to the family inheritance. Now obviously Joseph didn't have a lot to leave Him; he was just a

carpenter. Mary didn't have any great estate, as far as we know, to leave Him either. But Jesus did have the right to the throne of Israel. There hadnot been a king in a long time in Israel. The Babylonians had devastated the whole land and they were followed by the Medo-Persians and they were followed by the Greeks and after that came the Romans. There was always somebody on the throne of Israel but never anyone in the royal line of David until Jesus was born.

Moments after Jesus was born He was wrappedin swaddling cloths." That was normal; that was routine. All Jewish babies were wrapped in cloths. Swaddling is an Old English word that means wrapping. They would take long strips of cloth and wrap the baby’s arms and legs and his little body tightly. This was for warmth. This was for security. They believed that wrapping up those limbs and wrapping up that little body protected the infant. They also believed that it helped to keep their bones straight as they grew up.

The point is, Mary treated the baby like any other baby was treated. There were no royal robes and fancy clothing on display here. Jesus did not arrive with

a little halo over His head either. He came out like everybody else comes out, exactly the same way you were born, boys and girls. No doubt the Baby Jesus was smothered with kisses as His mother wrapped him tightly and warmly and caressed Him and nursed Him.