December 24, 2023 – Christmas Eve Evening                                                           Text:  Romans 3:23-24

Dear Friends in Christ,

            What is a Christmas memory that lasts?  Every year as a kid it was the holidays in Wisconsin.  Christmas Eve on mom’s side and Christmas Day on dad’s side.  Before my organized sports and when my parents were both teachers we would stay up there until the New Year.  This all changed on December 24, 1983.  Oh, the usual plan was in place but . . . a snowstorm hit.  Blizzard conditions.  We left and traveled through the country from Argenta to Maroa.  Could barely see the road.  The 10-minute trip took 45 minutes.  We took many trips to Wisconsin in the snow, but this was different.  My parents made the wise decision to head back home.  That day many of you will remember that Illinois played Kentucky in basketball with high school referees wearing players high tops because the regular refs couldn’t get there.  I don’t remember any of my gifts that year, but I do hold that memory.

            What about the shepherds this night?  Routine, right?  I don’t think so, my friend.  They were probably sitting around jawing, “Bill, are you going to see your family for Christmas?” and then an angel appeared and made it a night they would never forget.  The reason for that?  They were going to see a gift wrapped in a manger.  They were going to realize as I pray we do that . . .

“SOME GIFTS LAST”

            Many of our Christmas gifts do not last.  Get a box of chocolates or fruit and it usually gone before Epiphany.  Clothes might work for a while, but then you binge on some cinnamon rolls, and you are looking for an alteration store.  A book is well read and then becomes something you have to dust around.  Calendars are nice . . . well, you know where this is going.

            This gift lasts because it has always been.  This gift is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.  This gift was prophesied for hundreds of years and now here He is in the flesh.  The Godhead see.  That’s the gift of the Savior born today.  No past promise was thrown away, they all came true as this gift lived His life and went to His death for us.  This gift lasts because it is what the world needed, what it needs, and what it will need.

            Why do you and I as part of the world need this gift?  “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God?”  You do fall short, don’t you?  No one can live the holy life.  Scripture shouts everywhere that we are far away from the perfection that the Law of God requires.  Wouldn’t life be more peaceful if we could live the holy life?  If certain issues faded or we repented or are worries were carried away?  God has the answer.  We are in God’s caring hands.  He surrounds us with His love.

            While we fall short of God’s glory, He doesn’t leave us hanging.  “We are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”  This gift is always useful, this is why it lasts.  Sin, yes thank you, every day.  Grace, yes thank you, every day.  Justification, yes thank you, every day.  Redemption, yes thank you, every day.  Christ Jesus, yes thank you, every day.  Christ is always there, because we always need the gifts that He provides. 

            Every day we get up could be the day of our death.  But that shouldn’t concern us.  When God sent this gift down to earth, He knew He wouldn’t return for about 33 years and 40 days.  His Son had a job to do.  His Son was obedient to His Father.  He was gift giving.  He lived the perfectly holy life.  He didn’t fall short.  He healed.  He did miracles.  It was a wonder.  Then He suffered.  Then He died.  Was the gift dead?  No, it was a wonder.  He came back to life.  This gift appeared to many.   He unwrapped a plethora of blessings for us.  We are forgiven.  We are loved.  We have an eternal home that awaits us.  The gift of Christmas lasts and lasts and lasts.  It has no end. 

            Maybe tonight or tomorrow you will get a gift you remember for a while.  But then the memory of it begins to fade.  Christ is born for you.  He will never forget you.  You are most precious to Him.  Jesus and His grace is the gift that lasts.

                                                                                                Amen.     

Sermon – December 24, 2023                                                                      Text:  Romans 16:25-27

Dear Friends in Christ,

            How many of you enjoy logic games?  I recently did one that had 10 logical questions.  With questions like this, the thinker is control.  They are using deductive reasoning to answer the question.  I remember this question from the 10.  “Before Mt. Everest was discovered, what was the highest mountain in the world?”  Got your answer?  Mt. Everest.  It didn’t need to be “discovered” before it was the highest mountain. 

            With the mystery of the Gospel, deductive reasoning may help communicate it, but it can never reveal the mystery of the Gospel.  St. Paul says in our text that the mystery “was kept secret for long ages.”  No one could deduce that God would create human beings perfect, that these same humans would rebel and do nasty things and He would take upon Himself the painful work of saving them.  No one could ever deduce that God would sacrifice His Son for man’s insults and demand no kind of payment from them.  No one could deduce that God would achieve all this through the humble birth, deprived life, and agonizing death of His own Son.  This mystery could only be revealed in God’s written Word and his incarnate Word, Jesus Christ the beloved Son of God.  But now, all this has been revealed so we say . . .

“TO GOD ALONE BE GLORY”

            God’s glory is so great but human beings have always been trying to understand it.  We think of glory as might and power and prestige that serves the glorious one.  Glory is about the one who has it and the others around them are weak and inferior.  An athlete’s glory is in winning – which means he beats someone else.  A businessman wants to be on the cover of Fortune magazine thus lifting him further.  An actress goes on stage at the Oscars with her trophy and thanks “all the little people.”

            If God’s glory were that way, we would give it grudgingly because it would humiliate us.  In that way it would still be a mystery and we wouldn’t understand it all.  Because . . . God’s glory is an entirely different kind.  God’s glory is an attitude toward us that we can’t understand.  Toward God we are rebellious and loud and obnoxious and yet He delights to favor us.  We smash His commandments like a spoiled child, and He takes the punishment and the hell that goes with it – really?  God’s glory wants to declare us righteous.  Does that make sense?  We shame Him in the way we talk about Him and He says we are not guilty because of Jesus.  Go figure!  God considers it His glory to give us a gift.  We have Christ’s righteousness by believing it, through verse 26, “the obedience of faith.”

            To God alone be glory, because He did not keep it a secret from us.  His glory became clear when Jesus came into the world.  “The preaching of Jesus Christ” is what we are about to celebrate.  In these last days God “has spoken to us by His Son.” (Heb. 1:2)

            Jesus is the full and final revelation of the mystery.  “God in man made manifest.”  Jesus is the incarnate Word.  The “prophetic writings”, the Old Testament, always spoke of Christ, long before He came.  They are connected and were the texts used by the apostles and Jesus Himself.  Those prophetic writings with the Word of fulfillment in the New Testament, make the mystery of God’s glory known to all nations.

            To God Alone be glory.  In praise, we say “thank you.”  The whole letter to the Romans unveiled God’s plan of the Gospel.  Enemies of God to forgiven saints.  Helpless sinners to righteous men and women.  Like the Romans, all we can do is say thanks. 

            Soli Deo Gloria.  To God alone be glory.  Let us say it in everything we do.  God considers it His glory to save us.  When that is the way He sees things, there is no reason to claim any glory for ourselves.  Because of Jesus, His glorious death, His glorious resurrection, this is what we’ll say forevermore.  Glory to God!

                                                                        Amen.