Why Did Jesus Come To Earth? - [Hebrews 2]

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This morning on the

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Lord's Day here at Bethlehem Bible Church, I was thinking about some Christmas traditions that I've found, and I never knew about these until this week.

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When you decorate your house, many people for Christmas use red, gold, and green.

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And I didn't know there was a symbol behind that. There were symbols behind that. Red, of course, is the blood of Christ.

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Gold, a gift for a king. Green is a symbol of everlasting life.

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So there you have it. I found out that Christmas trees became very popular because Queen Victoria's husband,

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Prince Albert, brought one over from Germany in 1841. There was a picture taken with him in Windsor Castle, and everybody thought, that's a great idea, let's use

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Christmas trees. Christmas wreaths were introduced because wreaths symbolized honor and victory.

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And they thought, you know what, what else would symbolize such great honor and victory than the incarnation of Jesus.

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Here's one that I didn't know about, Christmas stockings. Some of you will go home with some Christmas stockings today, or maybe you've already opened up the presents in them.

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Saint Nicholas, according to legend, wanted to help some poor people. And these poor people had three daughters who needed a dowry, and he didn't want to embarrass them by trying to give them coins, so he threw them down the chimney, they landed in the stockings.

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There you have it. I can tell you're impressed. Like, get to the Bible. Indulge me with one last one, because it deals with food.

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Mincemeat pies. I thought those were just for grandparents, but now I am a grandparent.

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Brought to Britain in the 13th century from the Middle East by crusaders. First made in an oval shape to represent

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Jesus' manger. They had meats in them, but later they just left out the meats, the

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Victorians did, and they just had spices, cinnamon, clove, and nutmeg to represent the three wise men.

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Christmas traditions. Anthony, you're welcome. So today,

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I'd like you to take your Bibles and turn to Hebrews chapter 2, and we're not going to look at tradition or lore or myths or fables or how people come up with some interesting ideas or something that might slowly resemble the

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Bible, but we're going to look at actually what Jesus came to do in that wonderful book, the book of Hebrews.

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Here's what I love about Christmas messages. They're about what Jesus did. Of course, you can respond with rest, with belief, with praise, with thanksgiving, but Christmas is not about what we do.

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It's not about what we accomplish. It's about what God has done, and it's a good thing to be reminded of because we are built in such a way where we think, how do

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I please God? It's something I do. It's something I don't do. Something I have to avoid.

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Something I must buckle down and get done. But remember, the Lord God is pleased by the work of His Son, and without faith in Him, it's what?

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Impossible to please Him. So what I love about Christmas messages, it's about the Lord Jesus, and of course,

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I want you to respond with trust and rest and praise and thanksgiving, but we're going to learn and be reminded today what

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Jesus Christ has done. As the creeds say, this God who came down from heaven and became incarnate by the

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Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and was made human. He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate.

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He suffered and was buried, and the third day He rose again. The Christmas message this morning is, what did

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Jesus do? Did He stay in a manger? Did He stay in Bethlehem? Did He stay in Nazareth?

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What did Jesus do? What did He accomplish? And we're going to look at six wonderful things that Jesus came to do, and He did them.

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That's the outline today. Six wonderful things that Jesus came to do, and He did them so that you might be thankful, that you might be forgiven, that you might rest in Him and know for certain that you're saved by the blood of the

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Lamb. Jesus didn't just attempt these. He did them. He just didn't try and fail. He didn't just do some of them or half of them.

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The Father sent Him to do these six things in Hebrews 2, and He did them perfectly and exactly.

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He did these six things. Let me give you the outline first, and then we'll break it down. He came to, number one, destroy.

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Number two, deliver. Number three, seize. Number four, identify. Number five, propitiate.

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And number six, to help. Jesus came to do these very things, and you can rest in your

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Savior. I mean, if He just did one of those things, I'd be pretty impressed. If He did two, I think that's pretty marvelous.

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If He did three, fantastic. Four, pretty incredible. Five, spectacular. But all six, that should make us respond, oh, come let us adore

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Him, Christ Jesus the Lord. It's been, I think, I started, let me rephrase that.

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In 2015, we started the book of Hebrews, and we should probably finish next week. But I'm always drawn back to Hebrews because it's so Christ -centered.

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It's so, let's exalt who Jesus is. It's a sermon. If you were to read it, it takes about 45 minutes to read, and it's about Jesus and His high priestly work.

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It's about Jesus and His supremacy. It's about Jesus is greater than angels. He's greater than the prophets.

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He's greater than Aaron. He's greater than Moses. You think of anyone, Jesus is better than that person.

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And in this sermon, in chapter one, the writer says Jesus is divine.

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That's chapter one. And in chapter two, he talks about the humanity of Jesus. Because to be a

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Savior, you have to be divine and you have to be human. And so we come into chapter two and parachute in to see these six great things that the

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Lord has done. And I think after this morning, you'll think, I'm glad to have such a Savior. I'm glad that He would save me.

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I'm glad that I can trust in this great captain of my salvation.

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To set us up a little bit in context, let me read verses eight and following, because our passage really is in 14 through 18.

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Of course, context are very important. Hebrews 2, verse eight, again, stressing not

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His deity like He did in chapter one, but stressing chapter two, His humanity, putting everything in subjection under His feet, verse eight.

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Now in putting everything in subjection to Him, He left nothing outside His control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to Him.

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But we see Him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely

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Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God, He might taste death for everyone.

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For it was fitting, verse 10, that He, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering.

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For He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why He is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying,

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I will tell of your name to my brothers. In the midst of the congregation, I will sing your praise.

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And again, I will put my trust in Him. And again, behold, I and the children

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God has given me. Now before we look at these great six things that Jesus did, these six accomplishments, if you will, go back to verse 10.

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And I want you to see that word fitting. Do you notice it? For it was fitting. The writer,

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I almost said Paul, maybe it is Paul, but the writer, the Spirit of God, of course, He wants us to realize that the salvation

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Jesus was sent to do was planned. It was appropriate. It was proper.

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That is the idea of the word fitting. When you think of the plan of salvation, there is an actual plan.

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And I do not want you to ever think that the incarnation was chance. That it was luck.

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That it was fortuitous. That it was, what other words can I think of? Serendipitous.

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That it was just, well, kind of got lucky. I know it was not really, you know, it was kind of inadvertent, but it was a good payoff.

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The word there, fitting, means it was a plan of God for the

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Father to send the Son. King James translates fitting this way, for it became

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Him. The Holman Christian standard Bible translates it this way, it was entirely appropriate.

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Why was it appropriate? Because the Father, before Genesis 1, sends the

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Son, or they talk about how the Son is going to be sent. There was a purpose. This is an affirmation of the sovereignty of God.

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God is sovereign, even over the birth of that little baby Jesus. Before time, within the council of the

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Trinity, there was an agreement, there was a pact to send the Son. Martin Luther said, no man can be thoroughly humbled until he knows that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, devices, endeavors, will, and works, and depends entirely on the choice, will, and work of another, namely

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God alone. And so we come to the book of Hebrews, and we realize what Jesus came to do, it was planned out, because left to ourselves, we could never save ourselves.

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We're good at sinning, we're not good at saving. We're good at doing unrighteous things, not honoring

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God. That's why Jesus came. I've often said to my unbelieving friends, if we could get to heaven by being good, why send

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Jesus? Why have Jesus be crucified on our behalf? No, it took a

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Savior, it took a Redeemer, it took a Rescuer, and it was planned by God, it was fitting, in the right time, at the right moment, with all the right circumstances,

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Jesus arrives on the scene. The Eternal Son now assumes humanity to rescue and deliver.

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It was fitting. What was planned for him to do, number one?

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So that you can rest, and believe, and praise. The first wonderful thing

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Jesus came to do, and did it was, number one, destroy. Verse 14, Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil.

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I mean, if I say to you, Satan, do you think true, real, myth?

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You begin to think, you know what, Satan's kind of this caricature, pitchfork, red

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Halloween costume, kind of, you know, tooth fairy, kind of, I almost said

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Santa, but I can't say that, Santa. I remember one time,

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I talked to one of our neighbors, and our kids were little, they were growing up, and the neighbors were like, you know, we know you're in the

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Bible and all that, and you're the Jesus people, but could you please tell your son to stop telling our family that Santa doesn't exist?

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Okay, Luke, Satan certainly isn't cartoonish, he's not something that's made up,

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Satan's real, Satan's an enemy, he's your enemy, and left without Jesus, you think about the prince of the power of the air, you think about Satan roaring like a lion, you think about Satan tempting, you think about Satan controlling the dominions of all the other hordes of the fallen angels, we're going to need someone who's going to destroy him, because holy water,

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Latin phrases, aren't going to do it. Now, of course,

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Satan isn't in charge of hell, of course, Satan isn't all -powerful, of course, Satan isn't omnipresent, of course,

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Satan is only going to do what God allows, but he is an enemy, and when

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Jesus comes, what do you think he's going to do for his people that have an enemy? Well, you'd think that he'd come and rescue them by destroying

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Satan's works, and that's exactly what Jesus came to do. The accuser, the

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Bible calls Satan, the tempter, the deceiver, the God of this age, Jesus comes to destroy.

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I think we have to be very thankful for that. Now, the word destroy does not mean, you can see it again, right there in the text, that he might destroy, it doesn't mean annihilate.

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If I was God, that's probably how I would have planned it all, Jesus can just obliterate Satan and he doesn't do anything ever again.

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But he's not annihilated, he's still walking, prowling, 1 Peter chapter 5, he's alive.

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And you say, okay, well, it says here in the text, he might destroy the one that has the power of death, that is, the devil.

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Well, certainly God has control of life and death, but it's a delegated thing now that Satan has, you could maybe argue that way, but I want you to see something more important.

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I think what the writer is trying to tell you is simply this, here's the power that Satan has about death.

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Mike Abendroth, the pastor, just sinned. He deserves death.

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That's what Satan would say. And now, do I need to cower under that? Do I need to be immobilized under that?

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Satan demands your death because you sin. And now we have a

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Savior who has destroyed that power and we can no longer be afraid of the penalty that must be paid because Jesus came to remove the grounds of the devil's accusations.

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If God is for us, who can be against us? He did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all. How will he not also with him graciously give us all things?

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Listen, who shall bring a charge against God's elect? Who would like to bring a charge against you? Satan. It is

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God who justifies who is to condemn. Can Satan condemn you? He can say, look at that Christian, he or she has sinned, but he has no power after that because Jesus has died for those sins.

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That's what the writer is getting at. His power is broken. Can spiritual death hold you in hell forever?

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No. Just like physical death can't keep your body in the grave. It's amazing to me to think about what

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Jesus came to do. You can almost think like a Jewish person, which you should lots of times, especially if you're reading the book of Hebrews.

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Was it Barnhouse that said the book of Hebrews is a book written to Hebrews so that they might not no longer be

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Hebrews any longer and trust in the Hebrew of Hebrews Jesus? I think that was Barnhouse. Remember Job and the account with God and Satan.

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Satan says, stretch out your hand and touch all that he has and he will curse you to his face. And the Lord said to Satan, behold, all that he has is in your hand only against him.

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Do not stretch out your hand. So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord. And even the power that Satan would have is a delegated power.

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Even the devil is God's devil, Luther would say. And Luther goes on to say, why should you fear,

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Christian? Why should you be afraid? Do you not know the prince of the world has been judged? You have a stronger, different Lord Christ who has overcome and bound him.

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Therefore, let the prince and the God of this world look sour, bare his teeth, make a great noise, threaten, act in an unmannerly way.

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And he can do no more than a bad dog on a chain. I hope you guys have a good dog, two good dogs.

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JL's like, you don't have to worry about Satan.

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Whatever authority he has is a delegated authority. And whatever authority he has, the ultimate authority to say, by the way,

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God, you should cast that Christian into hell. You should cast that person into hell because they've sinned against you and your thrice holy person.

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And therefore, abandon all ye who enter in here. No more hope for you. And we say we have an advocate.

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First John comes to your mind when you think of chapter two. And if anyone does sin, even Christians, when they sin, we have an advocate, the

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Lord Jesus, the righteous one. I love the passage here.

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Take a look at it again in verse 14. He himself likewise partook of the same things. What's that referring to earlier?

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Flesh and blood. That's why we celebrate today the incarnation. Jesus, the eternal son, assumes human nature so that he might obey for us and die for us.

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Spiritual death cannot hold us any longer, all because of the incarnation. Sometimes people think, well, the incarnation somehow limits

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Jesus and he's confined now to the manger. Not at all. Death cannot separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

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Well, not only that, number two, deliver. They don't all start with these, by the way. So far, so good.

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I'm trying to use the language of the English text. Jesus came to destroy and he did.

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Jesus came to, number two, deliver, found in verse 15. Why do we celebrate Christmas?

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Because Jesus came as a baby to do something. What did he do? He destroyed. And number two, he delivers.

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And deliver, verse 15. You can see it in your own Bible right there. All those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

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As you know, in the book of Ecclesiastes, we've been going through week by week. Death happens a lot in Ecclesiastes.

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The thought of death happens. The wise person thinks of death. The foolish doesn't. But a thinking person who is not a

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Death is fearful. Death is scary. What happens when I die?

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Should Christians be that way? Should you be afraid of death, dear Christian? Without the incarnation, yes.

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With the incarnation, what does Jesus accomplish? And to deliver. This is what he came to do, to deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

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Paralyzed by the fear of death. Paralyzed by what's beyond the grave. And Jesus comes to break that connection, literally the word would mean.

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To release us, to deliver us. Christian, you don't have to fear death. Because of the baby in the manger, and what he grew up to be, and what he did.

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Jesus came to earth to deliver you, dear Christian, from the fear of death. You're released.

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You don't have to worry about it anymore. Spurgeon said he took upon him flesh and blood, as to die in our nature, that he might slay death and free us from the fear of death.

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Now sometimes we are afraid of death. I've been afraid of death before. And now we simply say,

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Father, please forgive me for being afraid of something I ought not to be. Jesus came to do that work on my behalf.

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I'm not to be afraid of death. I'm to fear you, and I'm not to fear the grave. And therefore, forgive me, and help me rest.

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Help me trust you. Now some people think the fear of death here is the experience of dying. Some people think that there's a concern there's no life after death.

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Some people think it's an eternal separation from God in the lake of fire. Well, let's just add them all up.

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If all three of those are true, Christians ought not to be afraid of death. If I just read these words to you, would they not comfort you, knowing that Jesus is your shepherd?

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The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.

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He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

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I will fear it completely. I will fear no evil.

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He's talking about this very thing. For you are what? With me. Kind of sounds like Emmanuel to me.

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Donald Gray Barnhouse, I mentioned him earlier. He was a pastor of 10th Presbyterian in Philadelphia. And his wife died of cancer, and he had three children under 12.

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You probably know the story. And the account goes this way. The day of the funeral, Barnhouse and his family were driving to the service when a large truck passed them, casting a noticeable shadow, turning to the oldest daughter, who was sadly staring out the window.

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Pastor Barnhouse said, tell me, sweetheart, would you rather be run over by that truck or its shadow?

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By the shadow, I guess it can't hurt you. And then Barnhouse said, your mother has not been overridden by death, but by the shadow of death, there's nothing to fear.

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Because of the incarnation, Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil and all his accusing power and to deliver us from the fear of death.

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If you're a Christian, I have some good news for you. We are of good courage and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the

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Lord. So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please Him.

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For me, to live is Christ and to die is what? Loss. Of course not.

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If you're trusting in something besides Jesus, it will be the worst loss ever. But if you're trusting in the Lord Jesus, it's gain.

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No wonder Paul said, I'm hard pressed between the two. He wasn't afraid of what

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Job called the king of terrors, that is death. If you're here and you're an unbeliever, it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living

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God. You should be afraid. But trusting in the Lord Jesus, we ought not to be afraid.

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Paul even taunts death. Sometimes I watch football games and basketball games, not on Sundays, but on other days when

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I'm watching. In Nebraska, we had the worst chants.

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Not ch -n -s -c -e, but chants, like chanting. And we would just sing dumb things like, we've got spirit.

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Yes, we do. We've got spirit. How about you? Just dumb. Then I moved to Los Angeles and I would go to UCLA games.

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And they would have like really impressive, long chants with all kinds of great diction and grammar and other words

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I didn't understand, but it sounded pleasant to me. And they were really into these chants, you know, and fight songs and taunting the opponents.

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And you can think about baseball games, a -batter, a -batter, a -batter, swing, right? Taunting. Because of what the

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Lord Jesus has done, Paul taunts death with songs. Listen to 1

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Corinthians 15. Death is swallowed up in victory. Oh, death, where's your sting? Oh, death, where's your victory?

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Bring it on. I dare you. A -batter, batter, swing. Sometimes people say to me, why do you talk that way, kind of addressing children?

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Because they're sitting here in the congregation, number one. I'm trying to get your attention, number two.

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We don't have to be afraid. My mom was dying and she was dying from her own fluids in her lung because she was dying of lung cancer.

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And I remember reading the end of Pilgrim's Progress to her about how

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Christians struggle with the fear of death, but he was safe. Do you remember the story? Christian going across the river, death to the celestial city.

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He began to sink, crying out to his good friend, Hopeful. He said, I sink in deep waters. The billows go over my head.

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All his waves go over me. Then said, Hopeful, be of good cheer, my brother.

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I feel the bottom and it's good. My friend said, Christian, the sorrows of death have compassed about me.

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I shall not see the land that flows with milk and honey. And without a great darkness and horror fell upon Christian.

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So he could not see before him. And here in a great measure, he also lost his senses.

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So he could not neither remember no orderly talk of any of those sweet refreshments he had been met with earlier, but all with the words that he spoke still tend to discover the horror of mine.

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The heart fears he should die in that river and never obtain entrance into the celestial gate.

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Hopeful said, brother, I see the gate. I see the gate. They went under the water.

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They died. He says, I see the gate, the men standing by to receive us. The two men went into the gate and low as they entered, they were transfigured.

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They had Raymond put on that shown like gold. They also were met with them, harps and grounds.

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They were given to them harps to praise crowns and token of honor. Enter ye into the joy of your

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Lord. Number three, seize, destroy, deliver, seize kind of a parenthesis here, but a wonderful one for it is surely verse 16, not angels that he seizes literally, but he seizes the offspring of Abraham.

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What does the word seize mean? It means to take hold of by the hand. It means to grab.

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It means to, to take even by the scruff of the neck in a, in a kind way. Could that be a kind way?

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How does that work? I'm thinking like a, a mother dog or something rescuing a dog. Why do I think about dogs all day now?

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Um, don't get me a dog for Christmas. Better not go home for a dog. I'm drowning and I need help.

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I'm in quicksand and I can't get out. I'm going to have to have somebody that comes over and grabs me and holds me by the hand.

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And if you were a Hebrew reading the book of Hebrew, you'd say, that's exactly what God did to Israel when he was, when she was in Egypt.

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That's the language of Jeremiah. That's the language of Isaiah seizing Israel out of the bondage of Egypt.

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And now how much more we're in sin, we can't get out. It's kind of like, you know, for those of you that deal with trees or cut down trees and, and all of a sudden got a bunch of pitch on your hand, or you're cutting down a

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Christmas tree and you've got pitcher in your hand. And then you, you do this and, and then you do that. And it's just like everywhere it's tar, it's pitch.

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You can't get yourself out of it. Somebody is going to have to come and help me. Somebody is going to have to come and save me.

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This is the same language where Jesus took the hand of the blind man and led him into the village and healed him, seized to help.

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This is language that you, you go to Auschwitz and you liberate the people in the concentration camp.

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And they're so frail, you grab them by the hand and pick them up. That's the exact language here of liberation, help.

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Jesus is walking on the water. Lord, if it's you, command me to come out on the water.

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Come. Peter got out of the boat, walked in the water, came to Jesus. But when Peter saw the wind, he was afraid.

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And he began to sink. He cried out, Lord, save me. Jesus immediately reached out his hand and same word in Hebrews seized him, took him saying,

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Oh, you have little faith. Why do you doubt? And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased and those in the boat worshiped him saying, truly, you're the son of God.

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And so just think about your own life. If you would, you're a Christian. You weren't born a Christian. One day,

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God opened your eyes. Maybe your mom and dad preached to you. Maybe you heard a sermon. Maybe you're listening to some, some things on the radio or a podcast.

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And one day you realize like pastor Steve just said, reading Isaiah chapter nine, I'm a sinner.

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Jesus is the only savior. I believe him through that whole event.

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It's God taking you by the, his hands as it were, and seizing you. You're not going to go to hell.

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You're not going to pay for your own sins. Jesus instead will pay for your sins and he grabs you and rescues you.

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That's the idea here. While we are still weak,

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Romans five at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly and he didn't die for angels.

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Angels sinned. They fought, fell a third of them. He didn't seize them. He didn't grab them.

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He left them as they were. And he could have in his justice did that for us, but he didn't. And that's why everywhere you look at the

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Christmas story, it's, I have good news for you. I have good news for you. Seizing gripping, not just Jewish people, but Galatians three says, if you're

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Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring heirs according to the promise. Number four, identify

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Jesus came for many reasons. The six here in chapter two of Hebrews to destroy, deliver, seize, identify verse 17.

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Therefore, he had to be made like his brothers in every respect. This is language of representation.

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This is language of incarnation because he has to identify with us. So he has to be truly human.

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He has to be perfectly human. How can it be a substitute for humans if he's divine only?

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So in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God.

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Now, sometimes we don't like priests. There's scandals with people that have priests.

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We're not too sure about priests, but dear Christian, you need a priest.

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Would you like to have somebody to stand between you and God to help you to, to be a defense lawyer, to be an advocate, to be a helper.

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So you wouldn't have to face him on your own. You're walking to the judge in a regular court here in Boston and, and, and you walk up and you have no defense lawyer.

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You don't know the law. You don't know all the details. You don't know everything else. And he just walk up. Hopefully you'd say,

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I need help. What do they say about the people that are going to be their own defense lawyers? There's a little slogan about that.

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It's basically they're crazy. Don't do it. I need someone to identify, to be a priest.

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You need a priest. Priesthood is good. You look at the old Testament. Everything was about a priest, priest stand before you and God by prayer and also by sacrifice.

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And Jesus is the sacrifice. And of course he is the ultimate prayer warrior and he identifies. He had to be truly human to do that.

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Philippians 2 echoes this truth. Although he existed in the form of God, he did not require regard equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bond servant and being made in the likeness of men and being found in appearance as a man.

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He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

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We need a priest. What kind of priest do you want? Harsh and unfaithful.

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That's the kind of priest we want, right? Of course not.

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What's the text say? I mean, just knowing a little bit about Jesus and who he is and how he treated people on earth, blind, sexually immoral.

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Are these going to be like Eli's sons? What kind of priest is he? He's merciful and faithful.

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I'd like mercy when I do something wrong. I need a merciful high priest. I'd like to have a faithful priest when

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I'm unfaithful. That's exactly what he is. Faithful and merciful. Get ready to discipline the children.

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You disobeyed dad, disobeyed God's rules. I'm going to discipline you. I love you. I'm not mad at you.

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This is justice and daddy's going to have to discipline you. This isn't this week, by the way. This is when they were little.

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Once in a while I'd say, and by the way, when you don't get justice, you get mercy. And so while you deserve to be disciplined and corrected right now,

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I think I'd like to be like God, the father and give mercy to you. So I'm going to either give you mercy or I'm going to give you justice.

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Which one would you like? Mercy, mercy, mercy. Dad, I'll take mercy. And then like two weeks later,

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I'm not going to give mercy, but they're begging for mercy still. I want mercy, mercy, mercy. Do you want a high priest like the old

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Testament ones that were sinful? They weren't always faithful. They weren't always merciful. Of course not. So Jesus, the eternal son assumes human nature and he's perfectly merciful and perfectly faithful.

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It's fascinating to me that when you read the gospels, the way Yahweh, the way

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God has talked about in the old Testament, they talk about Jesus. The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in long -suffering and mercy, steadfast love.

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That's how they talk about Jesus in the new Testament because Jesus is the eternal God. That's why you can trust him.

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He's always faithful to you, faithful to the father. Number five, two more to go.

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Destroy, deliver, seize, identify, propitiate. So far, dear congregation, I haven't told you to do anything.

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We want to respond to God's grace by loving God, loving neighbor. That's all true and I get that.

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Right now, I only want you to think, I'm thankful, I'm trusting, I'm resting.

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If you're an unbeliever, I want you to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, but our incarnation is what God did for you.

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Say, is there a response? Yes, to believe, to rest, to be thankful, to praise. I praise

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God that we don't have to be worried about Satan anymore. We don't have to be worried about death anymore. God came to help us.

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God came to identify with us. And now number five, propitiate. And I use the word propitiate because it's right there in the text, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

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Do you see it? Propitiation. It means what? To assuage the wrath of God, to exhaust the wrath of God, to take on the wrath of God.

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Most people don't like the word propitiate because it means God is holy. It means God has wrath.

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It means God's going to judge. He's not grandpa God. It just overlooks every little thing.

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My grandmother who raised me on certain days of week while mom was working, she had the yardstick from the hardware store.

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It was yellow. I can still see to this day. And she kept saying, Mike, if you keep doing that, I'm going to give you a spanking. She said it every day.

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She never did it. So what do you do if you're a kid with a crew cut living in Nebraska that doesn't know any kind of chants and fight songs?

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Just pick up that thing. You break it over your knee and hand it to grandma. And she still didn't spank me.

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I think if I would have been a grandpa, we might have done something about that. But since God is holy, he's holy, holy, holy.

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He has to judge sin. He has to judge your sin. Every one of your sins, including mine that you'll ever commit, has to be judged on Jesus or on you in hell forever.

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Propitiation means God's wrath is assuaged. It's absorbed. It's intercepted.

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It's poured all out. And now you don't have to deal with it anymore. People that say,

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I will not believe in Jesus because I want to run my own life. You are going to drink the wrath of God forever.

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Don't why there's there's a God who delivers and destroys and seizes. Why would you do that?

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I plead with you, don't do that. Be like many of us who say, you know, it's easy for me to say

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I've got an illness these days. People talk about that all the time and syndromes and diseases, and that's no longer taboo to talk about.

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But what's still taboo is to say I'm a sinner and I've got to have a Jesus like this. He makes propitiation.

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You know, most religions, they try to get the God to not be angry at them. They try to get the

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God to be nice to them by their own propitiation. And they give gifts to God.

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Oranges. They give gifts to God. Pomegranates. They give gifts to God's little babies and to Molech killed and offered so they might have more babies.

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They give virgins to God and kill them. They try to make God not mad at them. It's not raining.

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How can we get God to make it rain? We'll give him a gift. That's propitiation. But here Jesus comes.

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For what reason? If we could make propitiation, why send Jesus? If we could get rid of Satan, why send

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Jesus? If we could get out of the quicksand of sin, why send Jesus? But since we couldn't do that, we are enslaved to sin.

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Now he comes in. He makes propitiation. He satisfies the wrath of God.

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Remember the Old Testament idea of the box, the Ark of the Covenant? Most people know the

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Ark of the Covenant, not from the Old Testament, but from Indiana Jones. But I'll take whatever I can get. And in that box, that special box, they had

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Aaron's rod. They had some manna, some manner following with me.

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And they had the Ten Commandments. And on the top, there was a gold seat. It was called the mercy seat. It's here's the picture.

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Of course, God sees everything. But here's the picture to help us understand. God sees the Ten Commandments in the box.

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You broke them. There's got to be punishment. There's got to be propitiation. God sees that all of us have broken the

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Ten Commandments. There has to be blood spilled unto death. And so God helping us understand

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Jesus, the sacrifice, Jesus, the substitute, Jesus, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. We take an animal, sacrifice it, and pour blood on top of the mercy seat.

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So it's like when God sees the broken Ten Commandments that we have broken, he doesn't see them anymore.

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He sees paid in full. He sees it is finished. He sees there's already been one payment.

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I'm not going to exact payment on the people, too. That'd be double jeopardy. First John says that's love.

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You want to understand love? It's by propitiation. In this is love. First John 4. Not that we love

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God, but he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

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You don't have to pay for your own sins, and neither do I, dear Christian. And when I say dear Christian, I'm saying only

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Christians who are trusting. Lastly, number six, help.

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This is a different word than seize. Probably translated the same in your English text, but here is the word help.

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Last but surely not least, verse 18, for because he himself has suffered when tempted, it's hard to suffer if you don't have a human body.

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It's hard to suffer without the incarnation. It's hard to be tempted without the incarnation. He is able to help those who are being tempted.

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Maybe he's in heaven, and he's far away, and he doesn't understand my troubles. Maybe he's, since he's passed through the heavens, and he's seated at the right hand of God, the

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Father, he doesn't know what I'm going through. It's easy to tell me to be holy. It's easy to tell me not to be tempted, and indulge, and give in to my temptations.

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What would he know? He's far away. What would he know? Temptations like we've never experienced by Satan.

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Never giving in. This is not some kind of lab experiment of God. This is not a theoretical experiment.

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This is not some kind of hypothetical, well, you know what, I'm sympathetic, but you wouldn't know that.

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No, we know God is sympathetic, and faithful, and trustworthy, because Jesus is truly human.

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Tempted to cave in. Tempted to say, why is this obedience unto God even worth it? I want glory.

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I don't want the cross. The Lord knows all about it, and he's able to help you. Maybe one of the best prayers you could ever pray is this, in the middle of it all.

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Help. You have a son or a daughter, and they're going through some trial, and they're 2, 3, 5, 6, 10, 15, 25, 30.

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Help. What's your first response as a parent? Well, if we're not thinking, maybe the response is, you earned it.

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You planted the seed. You reap what you sow. I wonder if that's

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God's response. I think God's response is what? You call out for help.

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God, help me. This could be anything in life. I'm struggling at work. Help. I'm struggling at home.

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Help. I'm struggling with these sins. Help. I'm struggling with pornography. Help. I'm struggling with my marriage. Help.

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But you know what, how can he help everybody at the same time? You'd have to be pretty powerful to do that. Helping people in India.

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Helping people in Uganda. Helping people here. What kind of power must he have to help everybody? What's the text say?

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He is able. Powerfully able. More than able to help those who are being tempted.

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Dear Christian, Christmas is about what Jesus did.

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And we're to just stand there and say, oh, come, let us adore him. For he alone is worthy. We'll give him all the glory.

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That's our response. Where would we be if we didn't have Jesus who comes to destroy the accusations of the devil, to deliver us, to grab us, to identify with us, to assuage the wrath of God, and to help us?

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I hope you're thankful for such a savior. And because of that, you know what's going to happen on the day you do die instead of being afraid?

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I think the Belgic Confession helps us and just warms my heart. The faithful and the elect on that day will be crowned with glory and honor.

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This is you, Christian. The son of God will profess your name before God as father and the holy and elect angels.

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And God will wipe away all your tears from your eyes. And as a gracious reward, the

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Lord will make you possess such a glory such as the human heart could never imagine. So we, you,

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Christian, look forward to that great day with longing in order to enjoy fully the promises of God in Christ Jesus.

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What's Christmas about? Jesus came to rescue sinners like you.

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And because of that, guess who's going to heaven by grace and grace alone? Every Christian here.

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Aren't you glad? Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for Hebrews, so rich, so wonderful.

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I do pray for the Christians that are here. We still struggle. We still sin.

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We still do the wrong things, have problems in life. But God, who's rich in mercy, the great grace by which you've saved us, help us.

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May today, Christmas celebration be wonderful around the dinner table and the children.

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You've given us the greatest gift. We thank you. And what Jesus came to do, he finished the work.

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This is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased, the father said of the son. And we want to say the same thing, that we are pleased with the work of God, pleased with the work of the son, pleased with the work of the spirit of God.

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Would you help us? And for those that are here today, maybe coming out of respect for family members, or maybe not sure what they believe, may today be the day of their salvation.

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Let them understand the joy of salvation and the good news and glad tidings that Jesus Christ has came to save sinners just like them who think alone in Jesus.