The One and Only...the Only One

And we have a wonderful guest speaker this morning to bring God's Word to us today. Before becoming the president and CEO of Mount Hermon, he spent 30 years in pastoral ministry and he is a fellow twin laker, someone who I am very grateful to also call a friend. He's here with his lovely wife Jane who's sitting back there, wave to us Jane, just there she is. They have four lovely kids and it is just a privilege to have our very own Mike Romburger bringing God's Word to us this morning. Let's give him a warm TLC welcome.

Well good morning everybody. It is really good to be here and thank you Mark so much. What Mark didn't mention is that he is on the board of directors at Mount Hermon so he's a part of a wise guidance and counsel and spiritual oversight. He can also fire me if he wanted to so I want to say I love Mark Spurlock. He's a great guy, truly a dear friend and we love being a part of this church. We're so grateful Jane and I and our son Caleb. We have three other kids but they live in different places and I hope you know what a treasure this place is as a church.

In fact if you were here a few weeks ago you heard it announced that Pastor René was named the Man of the Year for Santa Cruz County which is incredible. Now I want you to think through that for a little bit. In Santa Cruz County they chose a pastor of a local church to be the Man of the Year and René was very gracious in saying it wasn't just about him, it was about the staff, it was about the church as a whole and all the people but I am just so impressed that they would do that and that says so much about our pastor and so grateful for him and I know you are too.

So thank you Lord for Pastor René and also there might be one thing about René that you don't know because he's very private about this area of his life and I thought you know he's not here so I thought it'd be time to open it up a little bit but I don't know if you know this but a little over a year ago he became a grandfather and so I thought I'd just show you a few pictures because you probably never seen this is Freddie and just because he keeps that very under wraps and very quiet you know I think I dream about Freddie actually but anyway.

Well we are starting a series here for the Christmas season called What Child Is This? What child is this? Is Jesus that we celebrate at the Christmas time? Who is he really? You know we live in a culture that has a lot of folklore and myths about who Jesus is and so myself and some others this Christmas season will be bringing messages from God's Word in regards to what child is this? Who is this this Jesus that we get to hear about and understand and you know we get to hear a lot of messages at Christmas time about this year after year and these are messages of internal importance.

To fully understand the Christmas message you really have to understand all sorts of things going back to the Old Testament, the fall of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden, the problem of sin, the Old Testament sacrificial system, the Old Testament offices a prophet, priest, and king. It helps to understand Jesus' life, his death, his burial, his resurrection. It's important to understand the second coming of Christ and the Judgment Day and in the middle of all of that is this event that we celebrate of Christmas which has eternal implications which oversees all of those things.

In fact it would take libraries to hold all the books written of all the subjects I just mentioned but today in one sentence, in one line, we're gonna see the truth that culminates all of those understandings and teachings. It was said by an angel to a man named Joseph when he told him this: that she, Mary, will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save his people from their sins.

Yeah, let's pray and just bring this time to the Lord and then we'll move on. Lord, we thank you for the opportunity that we've had already this morning to worship you, to lift up your name, to thank you for who you are. Lord, at this time we ask that you would do what only you can do, that you would come and you would move in our life, that you would comfort us, you would confront us, you would challenge us, you would care for us, you would encourage us, whatever Lord we need, and we would listen to you during this time as we're in your word. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen.

I invite you to take your Bibles and turn them to Matthew 1, Matthew the very first book of the New Testament, the very first page, very first chapter. Matthew chapter 1 and before we camp on this one sentence that we read from verse 21 of Matthew 1, we're gonna look first at what precedes it and then we're gonna jump over and see what comes after it and then go back to how this one verse is so critical for us to understand.

So when you get to Matthew 1, right away you're hit with a genealogy. A genealogy is this person had that person and that person was born this person all the way down you had this genealogy that hits us right away and some would say that this is about the most boring set of verses in all of the Bible. So let me try it out on you and see what you think, okay? I'm just gonna do a few verses. Let's start at verse 12 and after the deportation to Babylon, Jeconiah was the father of Shealtiel and Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel and Zerubbabel the father of Abbaud and Abbaud the father of Eliakim and Eliakim the father of Azor and Azor the father of Zadok and Zadok the father of Achem and Achem the father of Eliad and Eliad the father of Eleazar, Eleazar the father of Mathan and Mathan the father of Jacob.

And you're like really this is the way you start off the New Testament? I mean shouldn't you have like a little bit of a hook to try to get people to want to read this thing? I mean after the first 17 verses you're like closing it up and saying I'm not gonna read the rest of it if this is what this is all about. Why would you start with such a boring start? I like John Grisham novels and one thing I like about a Grisham novel is right away he just grabs you as a reader and you just want to read all the way to the end very quickly and right away it's just bam there's action and there's things going on and you get to Matthew 1 you're like really seriously a genealogy?

Well look at verse 1 of Matthew 1, first verse of the New Testament. Matthew writes this: the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. The genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Now the author of this gospel is Matthew who is one of the disciples who followed Jesus when he was on this earth and important to note he is writing to a Jewish audience, a Jewish audience who had known that for centuries there had been prophecies about a coming Messiah, a leader who would come who would rule and reign over them. They were hopeful for this coming Messiah to come and to break them away from the oppressive Roman government and they were looking forward to this one who'd been prophesied.

The prophecies said that the Messiah would come in the line and lineage of Abraham and David so he starts off with the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. And Matthew ends this genealogy basically in verse 16 when he says this: and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ. You see this isn't just a list of names but it is Matthew proving that the promised Messiah, the Christ, that Jesus has the right pedigree, has the proper lineage as he is born in the line and lineage of Abraham and of David. He is the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies. He's the real deal.

The Jewish people who would have read Matthew 1 would not have been bored; they'd have been looking at carefully, check, check, check, check it fits. And then he says at the end of verse 16 that he is the Christ. The Christ. Why is that significant? In the Greek you find that word is translated Christos or in the Hebrew is translated Messiah, the Messiah, the promised one, the anointed one of God, anointed by God to do what? To save the world.

Now let's leap over our verse, verse 21 that we looked at previously, and go to verse 22 and look on what's on the other side of this verse. Verse 22: all this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet. This is the prophet Isaiah: behold, the Virgin shall conceive and bear a son and they shall call his name Emmanuel which means God with us. So verse 16, the end of the genealogy, he's called Christ but now he's called Emmanuel. They shall call his name Emmanuel which means God with us. Think of that description for a moment: God with us, God among us. Wow!

Only three times in the Bible when the word Emmanuel that title is given, twice in the book of Isaiah in prophecy and then once in the New Testament in Matthew 1. What does this tell us about Jesus according to Matthew, according to the Bible? It tells us that Jesus is God himself. He is the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one who came to save the world and he is the Emmanuel, God himself with us. Eugene Peterson in the message communicates this truth by translating John 1:14 and talking about Jesus by saying this: the word, meaning Jesus, the word became flesh and blood. He became a human and moved into the neighborhood. Isn't that good? He is God with us. He moved into the neighborhood, became flesh and blood, he became a person.

These are amazing bookings to what we're gonna look at in verse 21 that he's the Christ, that the Messiah, the anointed one to save the world and he is Emmanuel, God with us. That's who he is and then we're gonna look at what Jesus does and so I want to give us the context to this story that is very familiar to us and then we'll read it just a little bit. Matthew 1 is the perspective of the Christmas story from Joseph's point of view. Luke has it from the perspective of Mary. Mark and John Gospels, they don't even do the Christmas story so this is Joseph's perspective.

Mary and Joseph are engaged. We see in some translations the term is betrothed, which was a form of a contract if you would that was basically so binding you would have to have a divorce settlement to get out of it even though it was a period of engagement. That's what it was like in that culture. It was a time of chastity, it was a time of preparation and in the midst of this time of betrothal we find out that Mary is pregnant. Mary's pregnant. Joseph finds out that she's pregnant. This is not good news to him. It says that they had no relations together sexually so obviously what is he going to assume? That she's been involved with somebody else. And when you're engaged to somebody you want to spend the rest of your life with them, this is like one of the worst news you could possibly get that she's gonna have a baby but it's not your baby. What do you do with that?

It tells us also that Joseph is a just man or a godly young man. He's the kind of young man that Jane and I would love our daughters to marry. He's that kind of a guy and because he's such a just man, a godly man, it says that he wants to do this getting rid of this relationship quietly, respectfully. He doesn't want to shame Mary in the process; he just wants this problem to kind of go away quietly and so he works on doing that it appears behind the scenes. And in the midst of this turmoil that he is in, an angel comes to him when he's sleeping and lets him know what's really going on behind the scenes. That would be extremely helpful.

I mean can you imagine when he puts his head on the pillow that night? He's thinking through all of the ramifications. I would have to go into marriage with a woman who's been faithful to me during this time of betrothal. I have to have a baby that's not mine. We don't even want to have a baby right away. All of the shame that's gonna come with this, all of the accusations are gonna be flung. People are gonna think that I'm the one who got her pregnant and all these things. When he puts his head to the pillow he's in turmoil and then that night the angel comes to him and tells him the real scoop. What's interesting, and when you look at the gospel of Luke, the angel also does the same to Mary. He does both sides of the equation because both of them need to know what's going on and he tells her we find that we find out in Luke that that's the angel Gabriel so probably it's the angel Gabriel also here in Matthew 1.

So let's read the story that's so familiar beginning in verse 18 of Matthew 1. Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way: when his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream saying, Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save his people from their sins.

That's quite a message, the angel's message to Joseph. He says to him first of all don't be afraid to marry Mary. Hmm, don't be afraid to marry her. Why would the angel tell him that? Because he was afraid to marry her, wouldn't you be? We already talked about that. It says don't be afraid to marry Mary. He says to him Mary has done nothing wrong. She's not slept with anybody else. This baby that is inside of her, it's an act of God. The Holy Spirit placed this baby inside of her. You say, well how does that happen? God's the creator of life; he can do that. He says to him you're going to have a boy. It's the first sonogram told him in advance.

We had four children, Megan, Aubrey, Noel, and Caleb. We chose, Jane in particular said, well there's only so many secrets in life and so this is special. I don't want to know till the baby comes out if it's a boy or girl so we never found out. And after, you know, kid number one, girl comes out, kid number two, girl comes out, kid number three, girl comes out, and then we're done. We're done having kids. We're fine; we give away all our baby stuff. Then Caleb shows up and by the fourth kid you don't need stuff, you just put them wherever, right? It's that's how it goes.

But people would walk up to Jane and they would say, so are you having a boy or a girl? And she said we don't know, we chose not to know. And then you would get this, and if you've been pregnant you've probably gotten this before, they would size her up and look at her and say, well by the way you're, you know, by the way it's lower or higher or around her or whatever they were thinking. I can tell that it's a boy or I can tell that it's a girl. And people literally would say to us, and I'm never wrong, they would say that. Sometimes people would say that and one said a boy and one said a girl. I am never wrong. But here's the first sonogram: you are going to have a boy and you are going to name him Jesus. You are going to name him Jesus.

Well why were they not to pick out their own name? Well there's a purpose behind that. In the Hebrew the word Jesus is the word Yahshua; the English word is Joshua. Back two of our band members this morning are Joshua. Why Yahshua? Why that word? Because it means one who saves, one who saves. There's every reason to call him Jesus because of what he was going to do. Remember what the angel said to Joseph? He said for he will save his people from their sins. He's coming to save, saved from their sins, not from the oppressive Roman government which was definitely a difficult thing for them to handle but from their sins.

They often had the wrong idea of who the Messiah would be. They thought he'd be the one to conquer the government but instead he was going to be one to conquer their sin. He's gonna come and save them from their sin. Myself, I've never been saved. Say what I mean? Like in great danger, I've never been saved. The best story that I can come up with in my life is when I was in high school I went on a catamaran with my youth pastor, the church I attended down in Southern California. He took me out just he and I on this catamaran and we went out of the Long Beach Harbor and we sailed in a beautiful day with great wind and went all the way down to Balboa Island and went around the island and sailed back out to sea.

When we got out to sea it was different in the afternoon than it was in the morning. There was much choppier and at times waves would literally were hitting us, not huge waves, I don't over dramatize it, but enough big enough that we were getting wet. And one of the waves actually hit the jib, the front sail, there's a bigger sail in the back, smaller sail in the front, hit the jib and broke it and it came down so all we had was the big sail in the back. And so as we were going and these waves are hitting us I'm soaking wet and I'm shaking because I'm getting so cold and I'm singing hymns. I'm singing hymns because all I can think to do and my prayer life was improving by the moment and yet I never thought we were gonna die because the shore wasn't really all that far away. We could have swam in; I think we would have been okay but certainly it was not a very fun experience.

And then we finally waved past the time when we were supposed to, we got into the Long Beach Harbor and we got in Long Beach Harbor there was no wind at all, like zero wind, and we literally begin to back out into sea and a little Coast Guard boat, you know, not one of the big ships but a Coast Guard boat saw us and here's the big rescue reached out a pole and drug us to where we needed to go. That's the best story I can come up with of being saved in my life. I've never been like on a mountain peak where they had to send out rescuers. Quite honestly, I'm not adventuresome enough to need to be saved. I like nice hotels, all right? And it's amazing, Mark, that I lead a camp, right? And I've never been in a foreign prison, you know, just none of that. I just kind of play it safe enough to make sure I'm okay.

And that's how a lot of people do their spiritual life. They play it safe enough, they make sure that they're not really bad so that, you know, God will accept them, that they'll be good enough to do the place that they don't do the big sins of 2017. You say what are the big sins of 2017? Well, you know, sexual harassment, right? Hmm, racism, shooting people indiscriminately. I mean those are the big sins now so just be safe and not do the big sins and we'll be okay before God.

A number of years ago Jane and I would take college students down to the Los Angeles mission when I was a pastor of college age students when I was in seminary. We would go down there, we would do a church service for them and they would bring people in from the streets to feed them. But in the middle of the area where that church service in the middle section on both sides were guys who were in the program which meant they lived there, they worked there. These are guys who had come off the streets for all sorts of reasons and they had given their life to Christ and they were now like newly followers of him and they were alive and they were vibrant and they were filled with passion and they would share their stories and they would cry and talk about what Jesus did for them and how he got them off the streets and put them on a new path and they had been great sinners and then they'd be saved by a great Savior.

And then you would leave that and then, you know, on the weekend you would go to the suburban church and that passion and fervency just wasn't there because they were all fine. We're just fine. Most people don't think they need to be saved. Look at this: Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes 7, surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins. The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 3, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. John wrote in 1 John 1:8, if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. All have sinned, all fall short, all are lost, all need to be saved, me, you, all.

But here's the scoop: all it takes is one sin, a little tiny sin, really big sin, medium sin, all it takes is one sin to separate us from a holy God. Let me try to make this understandable because it has everything to do with Christmas. You see God is holy without sin and because of that sin separates us from a holy God. Little sin, medium sin, big sin, it doesn't matter, any sin separates us from a holy God. One cannot be good enough to get into heaven no matter how many good works you do, it doesn't really matter because all it takes is one sin and all of us have sinned to fall short and be separated from a holy God. Therefore we are, some would say, lost in our sin and need to be found, need to be saved.

Therefore God, out of his great love for us, sent his son Jesus to save us from our sins so that we can have a right relationship with him. The most important verse maybe that people go to on a regular basis is John 3:16, right? For God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever would believe in him would not perish but have eternal life. They would not perish but have eternal life. Out of God's love he sent his only son to die so we might have life, so that we might be saved, to be saved from the plight of separation from God, to be saved from the plight of spending eternity away from God in a place called hell.

A lot of people don't like to talk about hell. A lot of people don't believe in hell; they only believe in heaven. The only problem with that is both heaven and hell come from the same book and out of God's incredible love for us he sends us a Savior so that we can spend an eternity with him in heaven. Listen to what others say about Jesus. John the Baptist said about him, the next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and he said behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The Apostle Peter, who is one of the disciples with Jesus and talking about him in Acts 4, said and there is salvation in no one else for there was no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

The Apostle Paul, who rejected the idea of Jesus being the Messiah, who tried to destroy Christianity, finally had an encounter with Jesus and gives his life to him. He says this about Jesus: let it be known to you therefore, brothers, that through this man, through Jesus, forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you and by him everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses. And listen to what Jesus says about himself. He said I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me. Remember what the angel said to Joseph: and she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save his people from their sins.

You see Jesus is the one and only. There's only one like him. He is the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one of God. He is God with us, Emmanuel. He's the one and only and he's the only one. Only through him can one have the forgiveness of sins. Only through him can one be made right with the Holy God.

I love Christmas. I always have. My mom made Christmas very special for us growing up. December our house would be decorated, there would be Christmas music, she made Christmas cookies and throughout December she would bring out presents little by little that were wrapped, always looking the same every year, white paper, red bow. Every year, white paper, red bow, no names on the packages. And so we would look at the packages throughout December and wonder, I asked for this, I wonder if it could be in that box, kind of the right shape. And on Christmas Eve night we had a very special night. I loved Christmas Eve in many ways. I loved it more than Christmas morning when we'd open presents.

My mom would always make a meal, often a brand-new meal she never made before. Some of those were memorable, but anyway she would even admit to that. And then we would go out and be by the Christmas tree and she allowed us to bring three packages without names on them, packages that during the month we've been thinking maybe that one's mine, maybe that one's mine, maybe that one's mine. And we would bring them to her and see if they were ours and then she would take it in terms of down, there's a little number at the bottom, she had a little chart and she would see if it was and if it was what, you know, if I brought in it was mine she'd write Mike on the box like alright. But you couldn't open it till the next morning so all night long you're like wonder what's in that box. I think it's the one that I was hoping for, that particular present.

And then at the last thing we would do before we go to bed is my dad would read us two stories. He would read us 'Twas the Night Before Christmas and all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. And then he would read the Christmas story from the Bible and we go to bed. Loved it. JD and I got married right around Christmas time. The church was filled with beautiful poinsettias and lights and the bridesmaids were in green velvet dresses. It was beautiful. We love Christmas music. We're the kind of family that starts Christmas music like before Thanksgiving and we're that the family that the day after Thanksgiving we are decorating the house inside and out. We just love it.

We lived in Colorado for 14 years before moving here a few years ago and our neighborhood was enchanting on Christmas Eve. You know people had their Christmas lights on their houses, often there was snow on the ground and then on almost every house in the neighborhood there were luminaries, those white bags with sand in the bottom and a little candle and people would light them in line their driveways and their sidewalks and you drive through or walk through this enchanting Norman Rockwell type picture of Christmas. Loved it.

But my very favorite part of Christmas, bar none, is Christmas morning with just us as a family. I know the answer is supposed to be my favorite is Jesus, Jesus I know, but really honestly my favorite part of the Christmas time is Christmas morning with just the family, with Jane and Megan, our oldest, and her husband Eric, with Aubrey, with Noel, with Caleb as we just love on each other and give each other presents and hug each other. Thanks, Jane always makes these wonderful cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate and we just, for several hours, we just enjoy that time together. I love that it's about the family and a relationship.

Now listen carefully please. Jesus came so that we could have a right relationship with God the Father so that we would not be separated from him for all eternity, so that we could be with him in heaven forever, so that we could be part of the family of God for all of eternity in heaven. God the Father sent his son to die on our behalf to take away the penalty of our sin, to forgive us of that sin so that we can have a family relationship for eternity together with the Holy God. Amen is right. This is not about a religion; it's about a relationship. God Almighty initiating that relationship so that we might be together with him forever. That's why Jesus came to save us from our sins, to make us right with God.

Let me finish the story. Verse 24: when Joseph woke from sleep he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him. He took his wife but knew her not until she had given birth to a son and he called his name Jesus, one who saves. I don't know where you are in the journey of spiritual things in your own life. Maybe you're just trying to figure all of this out and figure out who Jesus is. Maybe you absolutely totally disagree with almost everything that I said today or maybe you have embraced Jesus long, long ago. But know this: God loves you. He wants a personal relationship with you so much so that he sent his only son to take care of what separated us from him and Jesus on that cross took on our sin and all we have to do is receive the gift of that forgiveness and we have eternal life. He's the one and only, the only one.

And I want to give you the opportunity today if you have never before asked Jesus to be the one who saves you to do that. It's acknowledging that he is indeed God and admitting that you are indeed a sinner and asking him to forgive you of your sin and inviting him into your life. It's a gift from God that cannot be earned or deserved. It's through the love of God, it's a gift to us. So I ask you to bow with me right now and in prayer and just make this time between you and God. If you've never prayed a prayer of asking the Lord Jesus to come into your life and to make you right with the holy God, I invite you to just to pray this prayer. I'll say the words but you make it from your heart.

Dear Lord God, thank you for loving me. Thank you for sending your son Jesus, the one who saves, to save me. And I admit I am a sinner and I'm in need of a Savior and so please forgive me of my sin and wash me clean and make me new. And it will be my joy to serve you the rest of my days on this earth and my greater joy to live with you forever in heaven for all of eternity. Oh Lord, my guess is that your favorite prayer to hear people who call upon your son to give them new life in you. Or thank you for the gift of eternal life that comes through Jesus, the one who came to save. And Lord, we say to you Merry Christmas. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen.