I had the privelege to spend two weeks in the Philippines this past year and share the story about the birth of our savior with the youth and adults there. I originally put this together geared towards reading it to kids, but we ended up only reading it to the youth and their guardians. Leading up to this trip, I went on a hike on Catawba Mountain to listen to some pastors reading to kids (like Chuck Smith on The Word For Today app reading his kids book about the ressurection) and studied Matthew and Luke’s accounts. Thanks to Jake for recommending that app and to Jeff and Kameona for making suggestions and proof reading the document, and to Victor for the coffees I got in Roanoke while piecing this together. It’s not my story, it is a factual documented story in the Bible, and I got to share it with people across the world, some who accepted Jesus as their savior shortly after it. I am blessed and wanted to share it in case anybody else is looking for guidance putting the story together whether it’s for a nativity scene or other Christmas even, or just to re-familiarize yourself with the birth of Christ.
Biblical Text: Matthew 1-2, Luke 2
Intro
We are going to be talking about Christmas and the whole meaning behind it. It’s Something better than gatherings, parties, and even presents! We’re going to be talking about the birth of the world’s savior! And that savior is Jesus! You may have heard of Him, but did you know that and the whole reason for Christmas is because it’s His birthday?! His name is even in the holiday name Christmas. He is referred to as Christ, and that’s where the term Christmas comes from.
Jesus birthday story
We all have different birthday stories, some of us here were born in the Philippines, and some of us were born in other countries. Jesus actually had a wild birthday story too so let’s take a look at it.
Back about 2000 years ago, there was a woman named Mary from a town called Nazareth. She was engaged to a guy named Joseph. Before they were engaged however, an angel came to Mary and told her the Holy Spirit would be putting a baby inside of her, and that she was going to be having a baby boy and to name him Jesus! She thought this was impossible because to have a baby you have to have a human father. But the angel told her with God, nothing will be impossible. Joseph was concerned about this because she would become pregnant and they were not yet married and wanted to keep it secret. But an angel talked to Joseph too and told him that the baby inside Mary was God’s son, and they ended up getting married.
While on a journey, the couple came to a town called Bethlehem, and it was time for the baby to be born. They went to an inn (hotel) but there was no room! So they went to a place where they kept animals, and laid baby Jesus down in a manger (food trough) instead. Can you imagine having a pregnant lady show up and say “sorry there’s no room here but you can go over to where they feed the animals” ? So the boy was born and they named him Jesus just like the angel said to.
Nearby, there were shepherds taking care of their animals, and and angel told them that Jesus, who would save the world, was born nearby in Bethlehem. So they went and found Mary, Joseph, and Jesus just like the angel said, and they went about making Him widely known.
Unfortunately though, not everybody was happy Jesus was born. Some were even jealous! Some wise men came to the king at the time, and asked where is the baby that was born, who was going to be king? For we have seen His star and came to worship Him. The king was troubled and asked people about this baby that was born. See it was known that the savior was going to be born in Bethlehem. Once the king heard this, he told the wise men to go find the baby so that he would also worship him. So the wise men followed the star to Jesus and brought him gifts. However, they were warned in a dream not to go back to the king, so they left in another direction. They were warned because the king they talked to betore,, actually wanted to kill baby Jesus! So Joseph, also being warned, fled to Egypt to escape the king until the king died. The king, who’s name was Herod, was very angry the wise men didn’t show back up and as a horrible large effort to kill Jesus, he had all baby boys under two years old in and around Bethlehem killed. That’s so sad, but even he as king was not able to kill baby Jesus. Eventually, the family made it’s way back to Narezeth, just like prophets hundreds of years before Jesus was born said he would be. What a wild story right?!
Importance of the birth of Jesus
So why is Jesus’s birthday so important? Who is Jesus? To answer this we need to go all the way back to the beginning of the world and how loving God who created this world that we live in is! You see, God loves us, and wants to have a relationship with us. He is not just out there doing nothing, and He didn’t just create the world and tell us “good luck” and abandon us to figure everything out. Like I said, He loves us, but there is something that separates us from Him, and that thing is sin. Sin is when we disobey God’s commands. He tells us how to live and warns of things we shouldn’t do like stealing and killing. We all know those things are wrong, but he also tells us that lying is wrong, hating is wrong, and loving other things more than God Himself is wrong. Just like in other areas of life, when we disobey, there are consequences and those consequences when we get in trouble are not fun.
See, back a long time ago, as a payment for sins we committed, a lamb had to be sacrificed. It was really sad and can be uncomfortable, but it shows how serious God is about keeping us on track and following his commands. And, because He loves us, his plan was not for people to continue sacrificing lambs forever, even though they would continue to disobey Him. His plan included one final sacrifice in place of a lamb, and that was His son Jesus. Jesus would be the final sacrifice once and for all. Jesus, who loves you and He loves me, was sacrificed on a cross two thousand years ago to pay for our sins! We all have sinned, including me. But we do not need to sacrifice any lambs because Jesus paid it for us with His own body. He took a penalty that we should be paying on himself to save us from the consequences of our sins.
Our sinful choices left the world in the state it’s in, filled with anger, and selfishness, and sad times but there is hope because once we leave this world, we can be with God forever in heaven. God promises it will be so good, there will be no more crying or pain! However, we have to choose to follow him. Otherwise, this pain and hurt that we feel in today’s world will continue even after we die and we will be separated from God and His love forever.
So you may be asking how to follow Jesus and it can be explained with the ABC’s.
A – Admit that you are a sinner. We all have sinned, and the Bible words it as all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
- Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”
B – Believe that Jesus paid for your sins as the final sacrifice, died and rose from the dead.
- Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord
C – Confess that Jesus is your Lord and savior.
- Romans 10:9 “that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.
- Romans 10:13 “For whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved”
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