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If you have your Bibles, turn to Luke 2
I’ll be reading from the ESV because this morning, and since we don’t have ESV pew Bibles, the words will be on the screens for you as well.
Valley of Vision:
All your ways of mercy tend toward the goal of
our delight.
You wept, sorrowed, and suffered that we might rejoice.
For our joy you have sent the Comforter,
multiplied your promises,
shown us our future happiness,
given us a living fountain.
You are preparing joy for us and us for joy;
We pray for joy, wait for joy, long for joy;
give us more than we can hold, desire, or think of.
Measure out to us my times and degrees of joy,
at our places of work, our businesses, and in our duties.
If we weep at night, give us joy in the morning.
Let us rest in the thought of your love,
pardon for sin, our title to heaven,
and our future unspotted state.
We believers are unworthy recipients of your grace.
We often disesteem your blood and slight your love,
but can in repentance draw water
from the wells of your joyous forgiveness.
Let our hearts leap towards the eternal sabbath,
where the work of redemption, sanctification,
preservation, glorification is finished
and perfected for ever,
where you will rejoice over us with joy.
There is no joy like the joy of heaven,
for in that state there are no sad divisions,
unchristian quarrels,
contentions, evil designs,
weariness, hunger, cold,
sadness, sin, suffering,
persecutions, or toils of duty.
O healthful place where none are sick!
O happy land where all are kings!
O holy assembly where all are priests!
How free a state where none are servants
except to you!
Bring us speedily to that land of joy.
This Sunday’s Advent Theme/Candle represents the theme of JOY.
The last two weeks we’ve looked at HOPE and PEACE.
We saw Hope in God’s Sovereignty, and Peace in Christ’s Incarnation.
Today we look at the Joy of Christ’s birth.
The Joy of Christ’s Birth
This account of the visits to the Shepherd tells us about the JOY of Christ’s Birth, and we’re going to ask the text three questions today...
The Joy of Christ’s Birth:
What is this joy’s nature?
Who is this joy for?
Why is this joy good news?
So first, let’s answer the question...
1) What is this joy’s nature?
Let’s see from Scripture that this joy surpasses mere feelings.
A) The joy of Christ’s birth surpasses mere feelings.
The joy was not just a personal feeling, but the type of joy that is brought about by the arrival of the long-awaited age of the Messiah.
In the book of Luke, the theme of joy is pervasive as it relates to the spreading of the Kingdom of God.
The kingdom of GOD broke in at Christ’s birth and with many signs and miracles God confirmed that the long-awaited Messiah was here.
This wasn’t the kind of joy you get when your team wins a game.
This is the JOY of all HISTORY coming to its fulfillment with visible manifestations that the darkness of this world is being pushed back at the sunrise of the dawn of the Kingdom of God!
This joy continued after the death and resurrection of Jesus.
When great sorrow and great darkness seemed to have blotted out all hope of this Kingdom age... gloriously, Jesus burst forth in the light of the resurrection, securing an eternal kind of JOY that will never fade.
And so when Jesus appeared before his disciples at the end of this same gospel, Luke records...
Jesus promised the Holy Spirit who would be the guarantee of this kingdom joy.
Paul would go on later to call the kingdom of God a matter of righteousness, peace and JOY in the Holy Spirit.
And then after the promise of the Spirit, Jesus would ascend into heaven before their very eyes, and the disciples...
This joy…the joy of Christ’s birth surpasses mere feelings.
It’s a HISTORY FULFILLING JOY because of the inbreaking of the kingdom of God.
But secondly, we see that...
B) The joy of Christ’s birth replaces great fear.
Notice how the shepherds are told to trade in their great fear for great joy… Look at Luke 2:9-10
Common response to being in the presence of God or even of angels.... FEAR
But this joy is different.
The joy of the announcement of the coming of Christ into the world is a joy that replaces all fear.
We’ll look more deeply into why this joy is good news and the reasons it replaces fear in just a minute.
But for now, it is sufficient to say that the great joy of Christ’s birth replaced the great fear of the shepherds.
Thirdly, we should note that...
C) The joy of Christ’s birth outlasts earthly joys.
One man has said: “Earth’s joy is small and trivial, but heaven has sent us joy immeasurable, fit for immortal minds.”
In our text there is no note of a time frame, or no hint that the message of joy in Luke 2 will ever be reversed, so you could say that the joy of Christ’s birth is a LASTING joy.
It is a joy that OUTLASTS all other earthly joys.
David understood this even before the advent of the faithful Messiah to come.
He knew there would come a day when God would bring about the resurrection of the body to life eternal, full of joy in the very presence of God.
What is the chief end of man?
To glorify God and ENJOY him forever!
The joy of Christ’s birth is the onset of everlasting JOY.
Joy eternal!
Jonathan Edwards wrote:
God is the highest good of the reasonable creature; and the enjoyment of him is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied.
To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here.
Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends, are but shadows; but the enjoyment of God is the substance.
These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun.
These are but streams, but God is the fountain.
These are but drops, but God is the ocean.[1]
– Jonathan Edwards
In summary: the nature of the joy we have in Christ’s birth is one that surpasses feelings - it is the joy of all history.
The nature of the joy we have in Christ’s birth replaces great fear - it is the joy of our hope.
The nature of the joy of Christ’s birth outlasts earthly joys.
It is the joy of all heaven.
Secondly, we want to know who this joy is for.
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