Glory to Jesus Christ. Well, as you can tell
from that long list of names, one of the great
themes of the Christmas season, it's not just
because you hear it in the media, one of the
great themes is family. Getting together with
family, reconnecting with family. with friends.
Watching the Golden State Warriors losing season,
I saw a car commercial and was told that the
holiday season is about creating memories. That's
what they tell me. Well, memory certainly enters
into it all, but it's expectation of what has
happened, not So much creating new ones. Sometimes
those don't work out so great, I've seen. We
forget that Christmas is all about how God made
us his family. And how our fellow believers,
you are brothers and sisters in Christ by water
and the spirit. Not by blood, but by the spirit.
St. Matthew. Begins his gospel. Very strong.
You know, when you read a novel, we all have
those favorite opening paragraphs of a novel
that grab you, that take you right in. St. Matthew
begins very strong. The book of the genealogy
of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of
Abraham. Then you go, wow. What happened, Matthew?
Why are you telling us all this? You just lost
everybody. The names may not mean much for us
because we don't know the Old Testament as we
should. St. Matthew is using this list of names
as a shorthand. He's not telling you the whole
history. You can go back and read that yourself.
He's telling you that each name represents a
community. Each name represents some good people,
some okay people, some really dreadful people.
It's a family. It's a family story in interaction
with the God of all who is guiding the history.
The story begins. The gospel. The gospel is what?
The good news of salvation. It's the victory.
It's the story that the king has come so that
we aren't put in the grave and that's it. But
we have life eternal. And not only that, we're
transformed in this life. We become images of
him who created us. We are not enslaved to that
grave, the dust of the earth, the corruption
of sin. We become children of God. That's the
gospel story, and it's beginning way back when.
It's as if it's the resistance movement for the
enemy -occupied territory. And this resistance
movement has some great people in it. King Josiah.
On and on and on. David. Judah. And it's got
some sketchy people. Manasseh. And so forth.
But this... resistance movement is gaining ground,
surely gaining ground, each person's leading,
each begetting, slowly, to Jesus Christ, the
Son of God, the Savior of the world, born of
Mary, begotten, not by Joseph, but begotten of
the Father before all ages. wondrously, of the
pure and ever Virgin Mary. Jesus Christ, the
light, the Savior, coming to the world to save
it. Now a Savior presupposes that salvation is
from something that's dreadful, that we need
salvation. Like a drowning man needs to have
someone pull him out. Like someone in a burning
house needs to be rescued. In a recent essay,
one of my former seminary classmates said this.
He said, 2 ,000 years ago, the people in Judah
and Israel were praying for a Messiah that would
bring the wealth and the glory of King David,
equal to the Romans, back to their nation. by
saving them from the oppressing enemies, the
Romans, the Greeks, the Persians, you name it.
Is this what the Messiah was born to do? To come
rolling in like Eisenhower on D -Day with tanks
and machine guns to obliterate the enemy? I read
the lives of the saints. And it's clear that
for those in the resistance movement, and that's
us too, there is a great deal of difficulty,
hardship, carrying the cross, sorrow, and suffering.
And most of us aren't perfect at it. In times
of ease, that's not what the Savior has come
to give us. That's good. We need those material
blessings from God. enjoyment, and comfort. They're
not bad in themselves, but that's not why Jesus
came to supply all that. What's the heart of
the problem that we have? And I mentioned this
at the beginning just a few moments ago. It's
not bad people. It's not armies. It's not political
parties we don't like. It's not TV talking heads.
It's not different kinds of people. That's not
the authentic problem. The Messiah announced
by the prophets from the very beginning would
be the Messiah who would be sent to save us from
the triple tyranny. You heard of the tripledemic,
right? The flu, RSV, and COVID, those are terrible
things. We don't want those. But this is saving
us from the triple tyranny. frightening, dark,
corrupting. That is sin, the devil, and death.
That's why the resistance movement started, and
then we have the king, our savior, born. Not
in a famous way, not in a noticeable way, but
in a quiet way, in silence, in Bethlehem. And
then you read the gospel, you think, how is this
good news? Herod is killing a multitude of children.
The holy family has to flee to Egypt. Jesus is
baptized, he goes into the desert, and he's tempted.
Where's the good news, Lord? But as you continue
to read, and as you continue to act in faith,
brothers and sisters, as Christians, who know
that they have been born again by water and the
Spirit, you see the transformation. You see the
demonic power cast out. You see the healings
that occurred. You see the good news preached
of salvation and deliverance. You see joy and
peace on earth and glory to God in the highest.
This is our experience of being a Christian.
And if it's not, then perhaps... You're like
one of those names in the Old Testament. You
don't know anything about. They're foreign to
you. But you need to start learning how to be
born again in Christ. Because you've been saved
from the triple tyranny of sin and death and
the devil, which even the most rich, the most
popular, the most... physically ripped people
are going to experience. We are reminded that
Jesus has come to deliver us also from ourselves.
That's why we make confessions so frequently,
because piled on top of our soul are all things
that are foreign to it, and we need to be light
and purified, each and every one of us, whether
we know it or not, whether we... commune regularly
or not if we let those sins pile up they become
forgotten and just part of the scenery but they're
not they are foreign objects within us we're
saved from our willfulness and foolishness from
the inner death of the soul that our sin has
caused so as we prepare ourselves for the celebration
of Christmas the Lord gives us all these names.
The Lord and the church gives all that account
from the book of Hebrews of those famous men
and women who acted in faithfulness. That's what
should be in our minds as we're preparing. That
we become part of the Savior's family tree also.
That we live in faithfulness. We act in faith.
We remember that God is establishing a city,
not a theocracy, because he's coming in glory,
not of this world, but of the world and kingdom
to come, a city whose foundations are built by
God, filled with saints. Glory to Jesus Christ.