The Crisis of Christmas

She will give birth to a son. And you're to name him Jesus. And listen to this. Because he will save his people from their sins. The sins they have committed in their past. The stuff they have done, the ways you have screwed up, the family situation that you have come from. Jesus has come to save those. You're no longer bound by them. It all starts with this Christmas story with a bunch of messed up people, but a perfect God who provides for it all. But let me tell you, church, I'm excited cuz I love Christmas. Christmas is by far the best holiday. If you argue, you're really like arguing off just weakness. Like, there is no other holiday that compares with Christmas. We have cookies. We have special food, peppermint, which is so much better than pumpkin spice. Can we all like just agree on that? All right. Most active you'll be all day. That's all right. Um, but in all that goes with one of my favorite things is Christmas movies. My wife actually just this morning text me as our kids have an advent calendar where they get to read piece of scripture and answer a question and then they get a prize and they're always so excited when they open it up. And I'm just as surprised as they when they open it up cuz I have no idea what's happening. But my wife text me this morning says it's Christmas movie night. I'm like I'm glad I was in the loop but we're ready for it. And you got movies like The Grinch and Elf and some will argue die hard or not. That's fine. You can have your opinion. We welcome both sides. All right, on that issue. But one of the all-time classics and my favorite is It's a Wonderful Life. And little known fact about It's a Wonderful Life is it is actually based and and it's written for and about my greatgrandfather George. If you're not laughing, all right, you don't realize my last name is Bailey. If you're still not laughing, it's cuz you have no idea that George Bailey is the main character of It's a Wonderful Life. All right, you need to get some culture in you. Watch a little bit of black and white movie. It's good for you. It's created in the 40s, but it's great. But but let me give you a little synopsis to catch you up if you've never watched It's a Wonderful Life or if it's been a couple decades since you've watched it. It follows the life of a man named George Bailey. And he grows up in Bedford Falls. And George always had dreams of leaving and going and doing these great things. But life kept on throwing him some curve balls. First that George actually doesn't get to go to World War II because of an injury as a child. And then during that process, he then has to because his father has a stroke and passes away, has to take over the family business. He gets married. He has kids. and all these dreams of leaving, of going away, of doing something different. All of a sudden, his life is somewhere he did not expect. And all of it builds kind of in the middle of the movie where all the weight of just all that he is carrying as a husband and a father and a business owner and a stalwart of the community. One Christmas Eve, he has just had enough. And as he can't deal with the stress and the depression and the anxiety, he goes on a bridge in a place that's a little different than Phoenix cuz there was snow there. And as he jumps off that bridge, he fully expects to land in a lake to freeze to death and call it quits. He had this lie in his head that it would be better if he didn't exist at all. And as the movie progresses, eventually he gets to see his life through the eyes of a guide of an angel, Clarence, of what would it be like if he never existed at all? But there's some interesting questions that are raised within that movie. And there's the first one that I kind of want to talk about today and spend our time dissecting this wonderful question is why does Christmas seem to bring out the bad along with the good? You see, Christmas is a joyous time. It's the most wonderful time of the year, but somehow it's the most wonderful time of the year and our family dysfunction is at an all-time high. It's the most wonderful time of the year, but our finances are a wreck. I can kind of understand that one, right? Got a lot of people to buy presents for. It's the most wonderful time of the year, but loneliness feels more apparent than other. It's the most wonderful time of the year, but our anxiety is raised. Maybe our depression is set in. It's the most wonderful time of the year, but so many things come alongside that that almost the bad stuff seems to leak in just as much as the good. And you see over these next four weeks that as we get study both on Sunday and through Christmas Eve, we're going to look at Christmas through the lens of it's a Wonderful Life, but we're going to do it with the answer coming from God's word. So, if you have your Bible today, why don't you open up to Matthew chapter 1. And here's what's beautiful today as we start this is over the next uh three Sundays and in Christmas Eve, we're going to look at the first chapter of each of the gospels, the life of Jesus, and how the Christmas story that we get glimpsed in each of these messages. And in Matthew chapter 1, starting in verse one, we get to preview and we get to kind of jump in how Christmas brings to light three parts of the crisis that rages through our life. And we start here in Matthew 1 starting in verse one. And he begins this way and he says, "And an account of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham." Now here's what we're about to dive into is this is the family tree of Jesus. This is all the people that came before him. And it may look like a big list of names. And just as we saw a couple weeks ago in Nehemiah chapter 3, that these are easy areas that we just gloss over and skip. But God put it in the Bible for a reason, for understanding, for the historical, but also of how it reaches us today. So, buckle up. We're going to go through this and it's going to be fantastic. And I might say some names give some grace if I say them wrong. But starting here in verse two, it says,"Abraham father Abraham fathered Isaac. Isaac fathered Jacob. Jacob fathered Judah and his brothers Judah fathered Perez and Zamar. Zarah by Tamar. Perez fathered Hezron. Hezron fathered Aram. Aramathered Aminadab. Aminadab fathered Non. Nishan fathered Sam. Sammon fathered Boaz by Rahab. Boaz fathered Oed by Ruth. Oed fathered Jesse. And Jesse fathered King David. The boyhood wonder. The King David who slayed Goliath. The king David who is the greatest king Israel had ever known with the line continues David fathered Solomon Bayiah's wife. Note that we'll come back to it. Solomon fathered Riaboam. Riaboam fathered Abijah. Abijah fathered Asa. Asa fathered Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat fathered Jerom. Jeram fathered Uziah. Uzziah father Jotham. Jotham fathered Ahaz. Ahazathered Hezekiah. Hezekiah Manasseh. Man, was he a nasty guy. Manassie Manasseh Aean. Aean father Josiah. the the boy king and Josiah father Jacoboni and his brothers at the time of the exile to Babylon. And this last part of this family tree, this is after the exile to Babylon, Jaconi fathered. Shietelathered Zerubbable, Zerubbableathered Abayud, Abayuda Eleim. Eleima Azor, Azora Zadak, Zadaka Achim. Akim followed Elude. Elude father, Eleazar father Matan, Matan, father Jacob. And here we go. And Jacob fathered Joseph, bringing us to this Christmas story. Joseph, the husband of Mary, who gave birth to Jesus, who is called the Messiah. So all the generations from Abraham to David were 14 generations. And from David until the exile to Babylon, 14 generations. And from the exile to Babylon until the Messiah, 14 generations. Now, you may hear all those names and you're glad I talked fast at this time through those. And you might think, well, what does that mean for Christmas? What does that mean for me today? Why is that so important? But I think as we start this Christmas story through the eyes of Matthew that we get the first thing that it shows as we talk about the bad that comes with the good is Christmas brings to light the crisis of our past. You see, you go through this list and here's what I just find so interesting and crazy is that if I was God, and that's always a bad statement is going to come after that, right? Because we are broken. We are fallible. But if I was God, if this was my story, I would want to come through the best line ever of just perfect people, of just awesome people, of the most powerful people in all of history. The ones that you hear and be like, "Man, that guy, that woman, they are awesome." But you look through this line of people, they are not a bunch of all stars. And even the ones we know from our Bible stories, you think of like Abraham, that father Abraham, he had many sons, thanks to Josh. All right, I set you up for it. All right. And you think of Abraham. He had all these sons. Abraham was great father of a nation. But Abraham also lied about his wife being his sister twice. Twice. You think you got in trouble the first time enough? So much so that his wife almost married a pagan king. You look at guys like Jacob. Jacob was a deceiver. Jacob constantly lied and cut deals to help himself and not others. Judah. Judah had an affair with his daughter-in-law. That's in the Bible. You keep going down this list, you get guys like David. David, a man after God's own heart. David, the one we strive to be. David who wrote most of the psalms that we read. This guy who was a super spiritual all-in. He was an adulterer and a murderer. Some of you know the story of David looking out over his kingdom when he should have been at war. He saw Basheba, a woman bathing on a rooftop. And instead of looking away, instead of going on, instead of being convicted to go do his work, instead he called her over. He slept with her. She was pregnant. And he called her husband home. He said, "Hey, uh, go be with your wife." And he's like, "My men can't be with their wife. I'm not going to be." So he's like, "All right, plan B. Let's get this guy killed in battle." And David arranges for Uriah to be killed. And here's what's crazy in scripture. I is that that baby that Basheba was pregnant with out of adultery ended up becoming a miscarriage. And later on, David, he he marries Basheba. He takes him as his wife and they later have a baby who is Solomon. But when you see the genealogy Matthew has, he doesn't say David by Basheba, his wife at the time. It says David fathered Solomon, by Uriah's wife. That his sin is recorded here. And you keep going down the line of guys like Manasseh and so many more is there is just broken person after broken person after broken person. And here's what this line tells us is if the savior of the universe of God himself of Jesus in human form would come to earth through a bunch of line of adulterers and murderers and deceivers and he would come through a past like that then he is not afraid of your past either. You see, often times at Christmas, we're reminded of how broken we are and how broken the things we have come from. Maybe around family members who remind you of things that are dark from your past and maybe your childhood or they're a reminder of who you used to be and you're ashamed of your past, the baggage you carry around with you. And honestly, in this time, it doesn't usually go away. Usually in the holidays and the traditions and all that stuff comes up. All of a sudden, the memories come rushing back of the ways that our family has failed us or the ways we have failed others. But Jesus is not afraid of your past. If Jesus would come through the broken line of a bunch of messed up sinners, he will come into our life in the darkness as well to redeem it. And I love what we see here in this that no matter how bad it got, no matter how broken these people were, God entered into this picture. Jesus entered into this story that the crisis of the past did not scare it. But as you keep reading this too, this is not just Jesus's story. This is Joseph's story. This is the line that Joseph had come down. This is the past that Joseph is bringing into the picture. And the story continues in verse 18. It says, "The birth of Jesus came about this way after his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph. It was discovered before they came together that she was pregnant from the Holy Spirit. We take for granted how crazy of a sentence that is outside of Christmas. Like we just know the Christmas story. We know of the virgin birth, but when you read that in isolation, you're like, she did a what a what happened? Verse 19. So her husband, Joseph, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her publicly, decided to divorce her secretly. For just a second, I want us to kind of put ourselves in the shoes of Joseph. And we talked about how Christmas kind of brings to light the crisis of our past, but Christmas also brings to light the crisis of our present. Look at what Joseph is going through in this moment. He's engaged to Mary and he's probably excited about this. He's about to marry Mary. Okay, got to be quick on that one. All right, that's actually a quote from It's a Wonderful Life. I'm about to marry Mary. Um he's about to marry Mary. He's so excited. He He's He's like, "This is going to his life is going to be set up. He's engaged to this woman." And then she comes to him is like, "Hey, I'm pregnant, but don't worry. It's God's baby." All right? Like this is the one time in history that a woman has said that and it was the truth. All right. Um I'm not going to go any further. I'm gonna get in trouble. But here like it's just I can't imagine what Joseph was thinking in this time that his fiance is pregnant with a baby. She claims it's God's baby. And then here are his choices. It says he was a righteous man. So he has no clear choice. He has no easy decision in this moment. So he decides to do the right thing when there is no right thing to be done. Joseph decides that he could divorce her quietly because if he went through with the marriage there would be questions about his character of like did could Joseph not control himself? Did Joseph not is the righteous Jew we thought he was? Did he not wait until marriage there was would have been smeared on him? He would have had this kind of aura around him or he could have turned Mary in and be like, "Hey, this is not my baby." And in that time, she could have been stoned to death for that violation. But instead, he decides to divorce her quietly. He tries to make the right decision when there seems to be no right decision to be made. When we come into Christmas, I think often times we we feel like we're put in situations where we're like, "How do I make the right decision in what seems like there is no clear-cut answers?" In our present situation, sometimes it seems like there is no easy way, and we get lost in it. Last night, my family and I, we went to the surprise Christmas festivities. I don't even know what the official name of it. And it was great. It was lit up. There was all this crazy stuff. It was really cool. We saw a ton of people from church, people from our community. There was like literally 5 million people there as we're walking around. And we ate dinner first, then we got there about 6:00, kind of walked around for an hour, about 2 hours. Um, solid drone show, started 30 minutes late, ended 10 minutes too soon. Um, but it was really cool on the sky. And and as we're leaving, my seven-year-old Archie's like, "That's it." I'm like, "Bro, I will hit you, right?" I'm like, "I'm going to smack this kid." And I'm like, "What do you mean that's it?" He's like, "We just walked around, saw lights, took some pictures, watched a short drone show, and now we're leaving." I'm like, "Dude, you got two younger siblings that are about to like stab someone if we keep them up any later. Like, they're losing it." And and in my mind, I was like, "Wait, we have four kids, you know, nine to one." I was like, "How do I make all these kids happy? All of them have the great Christmas experience all at the same time and both be happy when we leave at the end of the day." Someone said, "Good luck." I appreciate that. All right. That was your word of wisdom. I was really asking. Anyway, but it seems like there's, you know, in some of these things, as we're navigating life and as we're navigating the season, there's just always not a right decision in that instant. Maybe you're going through a strained marriage and there's no just one right decision that's going to fix everything. And it feels like the decisions you make seem to make things getting worse than better. Maybe you're in a job situation that is just untenable, and you feel like the way the more you keep diving in, the more you keep is just stretching you thin. Maybe your family's struggling financially and the answer feels like, "What if I just work more? What if I just pour myself into it? What if I'm just gone more?" And then there's other things being strained and cracked. You see, Joseph, as we enter into this story, he comes from this line of broken people and he comes into a story where he has brokenness among him and he's trying to do the best in the present circumstances with just a hand that is not there. But here is the encouragement. Too often, I think we lean into the present of crisis and we make it worse in our present situation when we try to handle it ourselves and like, I'm just going to do more. I'm just going to work harder. I'm just going to put my head down. I'm just going to ignore the problems and run faster and think they can go away. I'm just going to keep driving and things will run or things will work out. But we see through the story of Joseph that as he's going through these decisions all of a sudden someone enter else enters into the picture. And in verse 20 it says this. But after he had considered these things, after Joseph had considered what was what's the best choice in all these terrible choices, after he considered these, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, don't be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because what has been conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit." Getting the same message that she gave to him. In verse 21, she will give birth to a son, and you are to name him Jesus because he will save people from his sins. Now, all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, "See, the virgin will become pregnant and give birth to a son, and they will name him Emmanuel, which is translated, God is with us." When Joseph woke up, he did as the Lord's angels had commanded him. He married her but did not have sexual relations with her until she gave birth to a son. You see, Joseph, not only has he walked through the crisis of his past, not only then he enters in and sees the crisis of his present, but here we see how how Christmas brings to light the crisis of our future. Joseph here gets an angel that appears to him. And and here's what's so crazy and hard about this is as this angel appears to him, this angel is telling him what is going to happen in the future. It's going to bring to light all the hardship, all the crisis, all the craziness of what is going to happen. Now, he gets some good news. Is first the angel says, "Hey, it is God's baby, so don't worry." Like Mary's not lying. But then Joseph has a lot of things probably going through his head. It's like, "How am I going to do this?" He tells him that he's going to be the father of God's baby on earth. Think about that for a second. How do you raise God? Do you discipline God? Do you correct God? Like no Jesus, that's not what happened. Like let me tell you the actual facts of it, right? Like can you give God a bath? I don't know. Does he just walk on water? It's like there is so many questions to be had. We could do this all time. Like I have so many questions I want to go through. But it's like he is told that you are going to raise God's baby, him in flesh. And Joseph at this time is probably thinking like, what should I do in this circumstance? The future is so uncertain. Yes, he's telling me that this is God. Yes, he's telling me that we should name him Jesus. Yes, we should tell me this is fulfilling prophecy. But if I was Joseph, the question in my head is like, do I run? like just go run away, start a new life, just pretend like choose another guy, he's better suited for this, like God, I am out. He had all this uncertainty about him. Was he going to dive in and lean in or was he going to embrace this uncertain future, this crisis of not knowing how things will turn out to be a part of God's story? You see, I think Christmas has a natural way of causing us to reflect on the future. When you're sitting around the Christmas tree and you're watching your kids open presents, what you're thinking is like, are these kids going to turn out all right? Oh, will they turn out to be functioning adults? Will they turn out to one day move out of my house so they are a functioning adult away from me and give me grandkids? Right? It's like when you're looking at your finances around Christmas, when it feels tight, it's like, is things going to be okay? Am I going to recover from this season? Am I going to be all right? Am I going to be fine into that next section? When we look at our marriage, like, is it going to sustain? And as we get to New Year's and we're creating goals and resolutions, all of these questions come up and creep into our head. Is things going to be okay in the future? And as Joseph is walking this journey, as as we walk this journey, as we see my great-grandfather George walk this journey, and it's a wonderful life of how are things going to turn out. I love how it ends in verse 25. It says she gave birth to a son and he named him Jesus. You see, Joseph had every option to run for the door. Joseph had every option to do the things he considered before. Joseph had all options to cut bait and start over and not be part of what the scary journey that God had for him. Instead, it says he named him Jesus. And that name is so important because that name means Yahweh saves or the Lord saves is this was God in human form. That all the stuff that led to this, the messy genealogy, the craziness and the crisis of the present, the future of uncertainty. Do I know if I can lean into and trust it? All of this was probably going through Joseph and Mary's head. And what did they do? They followed God's plan so that Christmas could come. And here is the beauty of this story. As we begin to sit back and take this in and we begin to reflect on it in our own crisis is what are the past baggage that I'm keep dragging around with me that I seem to can't unload fully and it just peaks up every single time I hear like that song you hear last Christmas. That's a great Christmas song by the way. But you hear that song and maybe you hear other Christmas songs and it brings back memories of things that you just want to go away. Maybe in your current situation, you feel like you're so busy, so stretched, so strapped that you can't add anything else on or it feels like the situation is just untangable and will just crack and fall apart. Maybe you are thinking about the future and how God is going to show up and if you can truly trust God in this next season or if you need to rely more on yourself. And all of these questions come to light and all of them are answered in and he named him Jesus. That God has come that the Christ of Christmas is here. And here is the beauty of this. When we ask this question of why does the bad during Christmas seem to come along with the good? Why do all these negative emotions seem to come just when the good stuff and the joy and the holly and the jolly come up as well? As we get to this wonderful truth today that the Christ of the Christmas story, this Jesus who was born in this chapter, who was seen in history, the Christ of Christmas, the Christ of the Christmas story, he defeats the crisis of all our stories. that this Jesus, this God who saves, he is bigger than, he is greater than, he is more powerful than anything that we bring to the table. And here's what I love that we see this throughout scripture of how he defeats these different aspects of the crisis in our life in verse 21 when it talks about that she will give birth to a son and you're to name him Jesus. And listen to this. Because he will save his people from their sins, the sins they have committed in their past, the stuff they have done, the ways you have screwed up, the family situation that you have come from. Jesus has come to save those. You're no longer bound by them. The baggage you carry around with you, it can be released because Jesus has come who will save his people from their sins. We talk about our present crisis and sometimes you're like, "All right, I've got my past figured out. I've let stuff go, but this season right now is just kicking my butt. It seems every time I take two steps forward, I get knocked three steps back. Like, I don't know if I can keep going through this. In verse 23, and it talks about one of the names that they'll give birth to a son. And one of these names that Jesus has is Emmanuel. And I love it tells us right there what it's translated to is God is with us. in your present circumstance and your stress and your frustration, when your kids drive you crazy, when you want to strangle your boss, when you look at your bank account and be like, "What happened? My wife went shopping." When all those things happen, God is with us. Emmanuel, the God who is present, the God who is moving, the God who walks beside us no matter what our crisis is. And when we think about our future and not only a future of what is happening to our families, but the future of what is happening ultimately to our soul, we hear of this God that is named Jesus who has saved us from our past sins, who is saving us from our present sins, and because of his perfect life, because of his death on the cross, because of his resurrection from the grave, is saving us for all of eternity. And our future is secure in him. Amen. And it all starts with this Christmas story with a bunch of messed up people, but a perfect God who provides for it all. This past Saturday, I felt convicted that I had a project I needed to do at home. And I have a Christmas philosophy that if you're going to enjoy Christmas lights, if you are able, you should put up Christmas lights. Cuz if you don't, you are a thief of joy. You are stealing other people's joy of Christmas without contributing to the greater good of Christmas. I I yelled to my father-in-law every He hasn't put up Christmas lights in like 30 years. I'm like, you are a thief of Christmas. All right. You sit on a throne of Christmas robbing joy. Um, so last year in in our new house, we had only been in there about a month. So it was our first year where we did not put up Christmas lights in like 10 plus years as a homeowner. Okay? And and the reason was that I tell myself is I didn't want to put up temporary ones. So I bought permanent lights on Black Friday last year. I wanted to install them, but I was not ready to install them last year. So, after a lot of research, watching YouTube videos, after buying some extra stuff, finally I felt convicted that I was like, I got to put these lights up cuz my mainly cuz my wife kept asking me, "When are you going to put those up?" And last Saturday, I started a project. All right. So, as I'm starting to project and I've been watching YouTube videos, I've been waiting for this. I've been getting extension ladders, like borrowing them already. Last Saturday in the middle of the day, I came to this crisis point and I'll show you a picture of it where I'm up here on my roof that peaks about 30 ft. All right. And I've done some research. Permanent lights cost anywhere from 200 feet. How much I did from five grand to 8 grand to install. I'm like, I ain't doing that. All right. But as I'm doing this, I'm like, do I got five grand I can spend, right? I was never scared of heights. But as I'm going and reaching for that highest point, my my leg starts shaking. And like I grew up climbing trees, going on roller coasters, doing whatever. But somewhere as a father of four where I'm like, if I die, my wife will be so mad at me that she has to raise these kids alone. And I could just feel the fear going through my body. Get that terrible picture off there. All right. And as my legs are shaking, as I'm questioning all these choices, like, what was I thinking? There was no way I could do this. Like, I'm about to call someone a hire. And literally, there's no turning back. I'm either going to have to shell out some money to do this, but I have a string of lights hanging from my house halfway done. And here's the question that came into my head is, do I trust the stuff I'm standing on? Do I trust the roof that can hold my weight and I'm not going to fall through it or die? Do I trust the ladder that says it can hold 400 lb? I'm a little under that. All right, on the extension ladder, I'm like, do I trust the YouTube experts that I watched many hours of video to get ready and equipped for this? Do I trust that all the stuff I have done leading into this has equipped me, is ready? Can I trust the stuff around me that it's going to be okay and I can do this? And just so you don't ask me after service if I actually finished, I'll show you a picture. There you go. But for our lives, do we trust in the things that really matter? Do we trust after we're going through our crisises of our past and our present and our future? Do we trust the Jesus Christ of the Christmas story? Who is bigger than our problems? Who is more powerful than the past hurts that others have caused us and we have caused to others. that is present with us in the middle of the storms that we may be going through right now and is all knowing. All powerful, all glorious that will sustain us for the future, for all of eternity. Do we trust the Jesus of Matthew 1? The God who came into our mess to deliver us to something greater to forgive our sins, to restore our lives, and to give us the Christmas story to share with the world around us. I want to end our time in a time of prayer reflecting and I'm going to give two invitations in this. An invitation to those who maybe for the first time you have never said you trust in the God of Christmas. The one who died for you, who raised again, who wants to spend all of eternity with you. Maybe today you need to say you trust him. And then I'm going to give an invitation for the rest of us. How do we trust him deeper? And how do we share that trust with the world around us?