Our Heavenly Father, we want to give you thanks. Lord, we take time gathered together to consider you, both, Father Lord, your works in history past, the amazing redemptive work you have accomplished in Christ, but what's more, your humble heart, God, your heart of love. And we know, Father Lord, all things come forth from your character and who you are.

And so today we want to thank you and praise you, lift up to you everything we have, including our hearts and our minds. We thank you, Lord, in Christ's name we pray. Amen. It was sweet to see just the many photos, you know, of the children. I want you to take a moment to think about a time when you saw your own photo.

And I'm not sure if maybe you've had an experience, especially in times when you go visit your parents and holidays and things like that, maybe you see old photos of yourself on their wall and little picture frames. What's your reaction when you see those photos? Do you think, "Oh, look at me, so cute.

What happened to me?" Maybe we get very nostalgic, thinking back, "I remember those times. We didn't have much, but it was so sweet because we were together," or something like that. What's more, if you've seen little baby pictures of yourself, it's trippy. Trippy meaning it just kind of makes you feel a little weird because it does humble you to some degree.

You're like tiny. You know, you're the size of somebody's forearm. You're very vulnerable. And everything about you is just so small and innocent, right? Eyes are all big, skin is all peachy, toes, nose, everything all tiny. And it just makes you feel a sense of, "Oh, this is precious.

What a precious, precious thing." And then you get kind of weirded out because that's you, right? But honestly speaking, anytime we see any baby photo or an image of a precious child, it is heartwarming. I mean, lately there's been photos of Yoda going around that's baby and everybody loves it, right?

I want you to take a moment to ask a strange question though, is because today is, you know, we're approaching Christmas and this is Christmas Sunday. We are thinking about our Lord, Jesus Christ. And the crazy truth and historical event is that Jesus Christ came, went through the full gamut of human experience, including being born in a natural way, in such a vulnerable fashion.

That alone is just amazing and mind-blowing. But then I took a moment and paused and started thinking a weird thought, which is, "Hmm, what if Jesus had photos of himself as a baby? Would he look upon himself in the same way? Oh, look at me, all peachy and small and cute." And strangely enough, I took extra time to think about that and my word and theme of this sermon to you is going to be that from that thought, I realized, "Hmm, I don't think I appreciate that coming of Christ as a baby enough because I don't think Jesus looks at that as some kind of precious, high privilege for him to come as a baby, but rather something entirely different." Now what we know is Jesus coming to this world as a human baby was a momentous, momentous event, a pivotal event in all of history.

Galatians chapter four talks about it this way, "When the fullness of time had come," meaning this has been building up, it's a pivotal moment, "epic," yes? "God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law so that he might redeem those who are under the law, that we might receive the adoptions as sons." That's an amazing thing.

However, we recognize that that amazing feat of Jesus coming to save and to redeem, to give us the precious gift of adoption, it came at his dissension. He had to absolutely lower himself. And so when I think about Jesus, potentially, in his perfect memory, thinking about the time as a baby, whereas we have commercialized it, where we have painted it, that he is this precious, precious baby in a precious, precious, sweet moment of peace, and the mother and father are surrounding him, I wonder if Jesus looks at that and says, "But that was my moment of great humiliation." That, to him, was being made lower, lower than angels.

That to him was being made even lower than, let's say, a full-grown human being. This was a baby, vulnerable, dependent. Precious, yes, but vulnerable. To our Lord, he might have seen that as a moment not to look back on as saying, "Yay, happy birthday to me," but potentially, "Do you recognize to what degree I've had to come down?" And that's what we're talking about this morning, this Christmas Sunday.

And so, going to the very first point of the sermon, I want to make this case that Christ's infancy is to his humiliation. That unlike maybe when we're looking at our photos, like, "Ah, that's so embarrassing. Now I had fuzzy hair or a huge head," or something like that, we are talking about his looking at the past historical event in a strange way.

Absolutely necessary, pivotal moment in history, and yet incredibly humbling for Christ. Turn your Bibles, please, to Philippians 2, verses 5 through 8. Philippians 2, verses 5 through 8. This portion of Scripture says to us, "To have this attitude in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus, who although he existed in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant, and being made in the likeness of men, being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." So when you look at that passage as a whole, think about the general statement that it's making.

What he's saying is, there is an attitude of humility, and the perfect example of that is Jesus Christ. Christ is the prime example of self-sacrificing humility. And what he says is, he talks about his incarnation. That although he existed in the form of God, and this therefore is my point A, that there is this massive contrast the Apostle Paul is trying to show us.

Jesus Christ was in the form, had the fullness of God Almighty. Glorious, majestic, and sovereign. And yet the repeated contrast is there is a progression. And yet he took this form of a servant. He took the form of a man. He took the form of a man subject to death.

He took the form of a man subject to death on a cross. Wow. What huge contrast. And the way I want us to think about it is, wow, what huge depth. If we're talking about some kind of quantifiable distance of which our Savior had to come down, think about this passage.

Scripture tells us in Colossians chapter 1 verse 16 through 19 that Jesus Christ was fully God. Verse 16 says this, "For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible, invisible, where the thrones, dominions, rulers, or authorities, all things have been created through him and for him." Wow.

What's more, he is before all things and in him all things hold together. He is both the beginning, the sustainer. He is the source of everything. Verse 18, "He is also the head of the body, the church. He's the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he himself will come to have first place in everything.

For it was the Father's good pleasure," look at this, "for all the fullness to dwell in him." That means the fullness of God's authority. In Scripture we'll talk about that. The fullness of his power. The fullness of his glory. The fullness of the praise and worship that all the host of heavens gives to him.

That belongs to Christ. And then Scripture says, "Although he was here," but look at this, "we have to think in this time and wrap our minds, try, at least chip away at the immense, the immense humility of Christ." Amen? He has come down so far, and the case that I want to make to you is, that to us should shock us, because if then Jesus is fully God and he deserves all of heaven's praises, anything less than that is, guess what?

Wrong. It's inappropriate. It's humiliating. It could even be offensive. But then Scripture teaches us that even though it was, although he had this form of God, he humbled himself. Now in order to make this case even more emphatic, what I'd like to say is, the kind of birth that Jesus had, the arrival of our Savior Jesus Christ onto this world, if that was applied, or that was the experience of even a human king, even that would be humiliating.

Right? That's point B. If you think about this, even somebody who is human, but is of high-ranking authority, this kind of birth and entry into this world is still humiliating. I mean, you imagine with me, if you were royalty, you know? You were in Europe, and you are in the royal line, and your whole life, not your whole life, but the life of the family, the whole heritage, was all this incredible palm, and pageantry, and dress up, and you live in the castle, and all that kind of stuff, right?

And imagine if you were, let's say you're an adult now, and you're all grown up, and yeah, you're a king, let's say you're a prince, whatever it may be, you're royalty. You look at your family photos, and all of a sudden, you catch a picture of a baby, and it's straight up by the litter box.

It's with the farm animals. What is this? Right? Would you like to show that photo? Hey, let me send you my Christmas card, the nativity scene. It would just be an unfit, it would just be embarrassing, it's like, what is this? Would you have me be born next to sheep, inside the trough, in the feed?

That's embarrassing. You see, Jesus Christ, even on his birth, yes, was hailed as a king, and people thought that he would be an amazing human king. He had prophecy predicting it, he had people confirming it, and yet he was born. No vacancy, no VIP reservation, next to animals. Now just to put a little bit more tangibleness to that, have you guys ever taken kids to a petting zoo?

Place is gross. People think it's a great idea, you take your kids, and they're like, let's go, it's like, yeah, let's pet the sheep. You get over there, sheep aren't nice, they're not nice. You get down low to them, they want to knock you over. What's more, just being real, the stench of urine is unbearable.

The smell. And all of a sudden, the parents get up, like, did you wash your hands, did you wash your hands? Hurry up, let's pet that thing and leave. Okay, why do I say this? I even have this photo, I believe right now, it's just too commercialized almost, where we have this perfect image, like we think, we think that outside of the privileges of having a nurse with you, a doctor with you, that mother and father, young, I believe they were, Mary was probably really young, forced to give birth to their child next to animals with the stench of their feces, and they come out looking like this.

All of us, we know, dude, after labor and delivery, you don't look like that, okay? Now why am I saying this? Even for a high-ranking human, this is humbling. How much more than the God who created this. To be born in such circumstances, to be born in such scenarios, and let me even make it more emphatic to you, please take another moment to fantasize and imagine with me that Jesus, rather than coming to this world as a baby, he came into this world like Terminator, where he materialized, and when he stood up, he was perfect.

His hair was thick and black, there was not a single white hair on him. His shoulders was broad, his chin, this line was defined. What other things do we want to be? He was tall, he had a great deep voice, and he was muscular, not the gross muscular, but the right muscular.

Now I say that, yes, a little bit tongue-in-cheek, but if he was an amazing specimen of a human being, that we would all be like, "Wow, look at him, he's perfect," right? That would still be humiliating for God to enter that form, right? For the one who is timeless to touch time, a finite limited space, for one who surpasses all material to now come into this material world, subject to the need of food and water, like he would get tired.

That's humiliating. That's humiliating. Have you thought about this? We should, because during this Christmas time, we are remembering the moment when our Savior came down. C.S. Lewis puts it in this way, he's a great British writer, somebody with a great imagination, and he writes in his book called The Miracles.

He says, "In the center of the Christian story, the center of the Christian story, God descends." This is a miracle. He comes down, down from the heights of absolute being, an eternal being down into time, an ever-present being down into space, down into humanity, flesh and bone, down to the very roots and the seedbed of humanity of which he himself created, stooping lower and lower to get himself underneath this great complicated burden of mankind.

Wow, well put. If we think about the incarnation, we have to look up, and I'm challenging every single one of you during this time, look up and see the depth to which Christ has descended, because letter C is that Christ emptied himself of all of this, right? For him to have the fullness of God, including then the glories, the honors, the riches, the exercise of his authority, his rights and privileges, and then to empty and pour that all out, that to us is the grace and love we hear in the gospel, amen?

That is our Lord freely pouring out and giving to us. And so I want to challenge every single one of us, let's not have some strange commercialized view of Christmas, or even in our best intentions, thinking we're going to sing happy birthday to Jesus, you know? It's going to be a sweet time, almost like we're going to encourage him and remember you on your birthday, because I'm not sure Jesus actually sees it that way, neither is that the reality.

This is an incredible paradox, great humiliation for our Savior, exuding joy and celebration for us, amen? Moving to point number two, the idea of the dissension of our Deliverer, our Savior Jesus Christ gets more intensified. Point two is that the descent of Jesus is even deeper than we assume, okay?

The descent of Jesus coming down to us is even deeper than we would presume, why? Because just look at us. You might be thinking, what do you mean just look at us? In the previous point, point number one, I said essentially look up to the heavens and see the depth to which Christ had to come down, but now what I'd like you to do is look at yourself and ask, why did Christ have to walk, or metaphorically walk and travel such distance?

Where were you? In order to come to your aid, to the place that you are, to the circumstance and the state, the status quo that you are in, where did he have to go? Let me put it in another way. When Jesus shows up and says, "I am here to save you and to help you and have come to your aid," you know what that normally does?

It makes you look at yourself. I'm in need? Do I need your help? There are times when I would look at the gospel narratives of Jesus' arrival and I'm sitting here thinking, why does the entire generation not get it? They literally knew where he was going to be born.

He was going to be born in a small city of Bethlehem. You take the right turn over there and he's going to be in the state. They were able to give directions. There was a star for crying out loud, and these wise men from afar came even looking for him, and they asked the scribes if they knew exactly where he was.

How could people miss this? I think this is why. I think they failed to look at themselves. He came to help, and rather than thinking, "Yes, we knew it. We knew we were in help because I was sacrificing animals and it never worked, and my sin was right here and right here, and I can't get it out." But instead of doing that, they said, "What?

Are you saying I'm sinful? You're saying I need your forgiveness? Somehow I need your help. You show up one day and all of a sudden I need your help? Do you see what I'm saying?" And so A, I find a common sinfulness and a common error that across time mankind have shared, which is one, we typically try to devalue Jesus.

We bring him down and underestimate who he is, but the other is we overestimate who we are. We regularly think that we're better. "Ah, you know, I just messed up normally. I'm like really good, but this time I was bad just this one time." Let's be real. If we count the sins of our minds, the sins of our hearts, we sin regularly.

Scripture teaches us this, that we are so adverse. Another way of putting this, that not only are we frequently overestimating ourselves, we are so adverse to feeling guilty, feeling weak, feeling powerless, right? And we can admit to that. We are so adverse to being guilty, but let me tell you this.

The arrival of the deliverer makes everyone feel guilty because that arrival then announces the reality of the state of affairs. We are a broken generation. Take a look at Philippians chapter two one more time, Philippians chapter two one more time and starting from verse six, it says this, again, "Although he existed in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, meaning held onto, but he emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant and being made in the likeness of men, being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." And earlier, I highlighted and pointed out to you, did you notice that there is this sequential humbling or I guess progressive humbling that Apostle Paul points out?

He says he didn't grasp it, but instead let go. And then there was this being made in the likeness of men, lower, there's a being made in the likeness of a bondservant, which means slave, lower, and then he's being made one, like one who is subject to death. That is incredible weakness when you don't last and you have an expiration date.

Lower, and then he says to the point of death on the cross. Let's ask the question, as good students of the Bible, what categorical people, who dies on the cross? And the answer is criminals, people who break the law. That symbol, the cross, was a symbol of punishment, that your crime of action, your crime of intent, you have been indicted, you have been convicted, and you are guilty and therefore deserving of a heinous death, being also propped up as a symbol of that consequence.

For Jesus Christ then to descend, point B, Christ descended to the form of a condemned criminal. Think about that in that act and its relation to us. We don't like being judged in our heart, meaning we don't like people assuming things of our intention and we say stuff like, "Oh, I know I hurt you, but you know I didn't mean it." It's like, "You meant it." It's like, "I did it." Truth be told, I'm a pastor and I'm regularly trying to work on my heart, but are there moments when I have rage in here?

Sure do. Are there moments when I feel hatred, embitterment, frustration? Sure do. Do you know what scripture says? Man who sits there hating his brother is a murderer. All I need is the opportunity and I'll hurt that person. That's what it's saying. I am just simply confessing the fact that if we are real and honest with ourselves and with each other, there is a whole slot of various wickedness.

Yes, I am using the word wickedness and evil within all of us, within all of us. Let me show you another passage. In John chapter one, it summarizes in big overarching narrative the coming of Jesus. This is what it says in John chapter one verses one through five. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God.

He was in the beginning with God and all things came into being through him and apart from him nothing came into being that has come into being. That's what we just reviewed. Jesus is high. Jesus is God. Yes. Verse four, in him was life and the light of the light of men.

And the light shines in the darkness, but the darkness did not comprehend it. What am I saying? Jesus Christ, when he entered into this world, he didn't come to a nice, lovely community of people trying hard. He didn't. When Jesus Christ entered into the world, he walked into darkness.

What is he talking about? The geography of it all? The circumstance? The layout of the city? No, he's talking about the darkness of the times of the people. There was wickedness. Now I recognize that this is Christmas Sunday. Perhaps many of you weren't expecting a sermon like this where I'm talking about the darkness of our generation and also the darkness of our heart.

But this portion of it is the reality of Christ's coming. He didn't just come to help nice people in Irvine and Orange County and the greater LA area to do better at their jobs. And at that time when he came, he didn't just come so that the Greeks and the Romans would get along and the Jews would too.

He came because there was depravity. And you might be wondering and thinking, "Whoa, Pastor, are you just condemning everybody of vile wickedness?" And the answer is humbly yes. The scripture says so. The scripture says that we stand condemned. The scripture says that we must accept this truth. That wickedness is not out there.

The wickedness is here. And so I give you this challenge. James chapter four verses nine through 10 commands us, "Be miserable and mourn and weep and let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord and he will exalt you." He says be miserable actually.

He says mourn and weep. We have to accept that without Christ we are desperately lost in darkness. Without Christ we are desperately lost in sin. And this is not just simply a ploy to manipulate people. This is the reality. Otherwise Christ would not have to come. This is the reality.

Otherwise Christ would not have to descend. This is the absolute reality. And I want to say, again, I recognize that perhaps today we do have family and friends. I'm assuming that there are people in here who, you know you're not a Christian, maybe you have certain reservations about it.

Isn't all faith the same? Something like that, you know? But I want to share with you what's strange to me is that every single religion understands there is some kind of sin, evil, wickedness, right? Every single person does. And you don't have to be a religious person to know certain things are vile, certain things are virtues, certain things are criminal and evil, yes?

But the apprehension comes when all of a sudden that finger starts pointing not at the world because everyone would say it, right? This world is like wicked. Yes, we all have the news. We could point to various things, pointing here and pointing there. It just gets super troubling when that finger starts coming towards me.

That's how it is. And I'll confess right here, prior to becoming a Christian, I was a vile, wicked man. Incredibly filled with rage. There were moments when I got into many, many fights. I was a vile, wicked man. Incredibly filled with lust, selfish desire, concern only for myself. All the things that you would think as vice, it was here in abundance.

It was here in abundance. I don't think that's the case. I have to prove. Do I? I mean, do you have to prove to the world like this world is full of decay, it's not just weak, there's like wickedness here. Do you have to prove that? It's like all around us and many of you have been hurt by it, like directly hurt by it.

But here's the trouble. The question is, so where do you turn? You see, all since the beginning of the history of mankind, people have turned every which way. Maybe I can hide it. I'm going to hide. Like, where are you, Adam? I've sinned. It's like, I can see you behind the bush.

People have tried different things to deflect. It's like, what happened? She did it. People have turned to whatever which way. Anything that will help. People have sometimes said to me, when I share with people, just recently I was at the mall, we had a wedding there. Oh wow, this was yesterday.

I was at the mall and we were talking and I just told somebody, I said, "What are you doing?" I said, "I'm going to church." And they said, "Oh, that's so good. It's good to have faith generally." And I'm sitting there like, "Ugh, no. I'm not just turning to faith because it's helpful, because it's beneficial." Right?

Because otherwise I could turn a faith into, "I believe in Santa. Makes me feel better. Frosty, he makes me feel really encouraged." Rudolph, he goes from a, "Oh man, he's a runt." And all that kind of stuff. "Can't do anything." "Leave my sled." It's like, "Yay. Makes me feel better." That's not what we're talking about.

People turn every which way to find the solution for the feeling they have of deficiency in their lives. Both the weakness, susceptibility, and also the vital things they look into their lives. The challenge is, first and foremost, to not be frustrated, to not give up, to not be arrogant and be like, "No.

I'm not as bad as them. No, I'm not sinful." The challenge is to accept it. Because that is a part of the whole story. And what's more, I want to give this challenge. Please do not resist what Christ is doing when he shows up and he is saying, "I am here to deliver you.

I am here to save you. I am here to do for you that which you cannot do." Do not resist. Point three is to resist Christ is both foolish and offensive. To resist Christ when he appears and his presence comes before you is absolute foolishness. Absolute foolishness. Have you guys ever tried to help a young child who's trying to do an art project?

They're doing something together, making a mess, glue's everywhere, their hands are starting to get all solidified. And you walk over and you're like, "Let me help you." You try to touch their hands to help them. They're like, "No. I can do it." Is that foolishness or is that cute?

When they're young, it's cute. And then it becomes really bad, right? It's not cute anymore. Imagine God is reaching down because he sees we're making a mess. We're only making things worse. But to slap his hand away and say, "I can do this." Absolute foolishness. He would say to us, "You know, I just tried to reveal to you how much I've had to come down and how much I've had to sacrifice.

I just tried to show to you how deep you are in sin and the kind of pit that you live in is unredeemable by your flesh. Why? Because your flesh is corrupt." And then here you are, "I can do it. Let me do it." That is absolute foolishness. And there's an entire book called the Book of Proverbs that says, "Open your heart and your mind to the instruction of the Lord." We have to do that.

But I just want to give this further warning that resisting Christ is not only utter foolishness, it is offensive. And what I like to say is not only is it offensive, but think about this. It is doubly offensive. It's placing sin upon sin. Why? I would like to highlight a special passage for you.

And it comes from John chapter three, verses 17 through 20. John chapter 16 is a very, very famous verse. Many people know it. "For God so loved the world." Right? Now, here, take a look at what he says immediately after. "For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

He who believes in Him is not judged. He who does not believe has been judged already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." Already there. It shows you. Verse 19, "This is the judgment that the light has come into the world.

And the men love the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed." Think about this. How is this doubly offensive? Clearly so. Why? Because first and foremost, we already, according to this passage, we already stand condemned.

Underneath the lives that we've been living, the history of mankind, there has been a plethora of sin. We live like God doesn't exist. We do whatever we want to. We follow our desires and appetites. The list can go on and on and on. But God, He sends His Son with mercy.

He recognizes some of you are just so ignorant. I need to teach you. Some of you are hardened. I need to soften you up. Some of you, you need an example. Some of you are weak. I need to strengthen you. And Christ comes not to judge, but to do all of that, to heal, to minister, to convict of sin, and to rescue.

And if you see that and you resist, that is sin upon sin, and it is offensive. What's more, if you have this attitude of like, "You know what? I know I need help. I know I'm not superhuman. Everybody knows we need people around us. But saying I need all this, and I need all that, that's too much.

That's too much. All I need is X, Y, and Z." To not admit that you need Christ, but to think that you need just little bits of help, that is absolutely also offensive. And let me now speak to some of the Christian brothers and sisters in here. I've been counseling many, many people, and what I find is that sometimes the scenarios of your lives are very difficult, and genuinely so.

Good. But if we sometimes act like all we need in our lives is just that small fix, "Help me and my family just stop having so much strife, and maybe just give me a better family," or something like that. You just need that small fix. "Give me the skills to have that job, to persevere in this.

Give me this and this." And you feel like that's all you need, and all you would need in life, in this life, is to have that rectified, and then you'd be good. Think about how offensive that is. Let me explain. For us, we're all children to our parents, no matter how old you are.

Try going to your parents when you're younger, and you are so dependent on them. And you say, "You know what I was thinking? I think I'm fine without you. All I needed in that moment of time was your car, and I would have been good." That would be such a slap in the face to your parents.

Really? You didn't need people to feed you 18 plus years of your life? Really? All you needed was a car, huh? That kind of mentality of thinking, "All I need is just one thing from you, one thing from you." That would be for you to act like you did not receive the greatest thing from Him.

We can't think like that. And so I want to say now, I know the sermon so far has been a bit convicting and heavy because we talked about sin. But when we realize these things, this is when we celebrate. So point four, point four. If we know that we are in desperate need, lost without Jesus, if we know that our Savior is capable, and He has freely and willingly sacrificed and humbled Himself to come down to us, then we will now recognize, "I have exactly what my soul needs, my Deliverer and Savior." And this is why we celebrate together all the various experiences of being lost, being frustrated, being stuck in your sin.

Now you have freedom in Christ because that Savior is going to free you. All that you've been looking for of overcoming your greatest fears, your longing for your greatest loves, these are satisfied in Christ Jesus, amen? To us as we celebrate Christmas, we are saying, "Wrapped up in this Savior is everything I need." Let me turn with you to a passage in Hebrews chapter two, a beautiful passage highlighting again the importance of the incarnation, the rationale beyond why Jesus had to come just like us.

Hebrews chapter two, verses 14 through 16. "Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is the devil. He might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives.

For surely He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the descendants of Abraham." We are here at an incredibly privileged position. Christ has already come. And that first coming, He has said, "I did not come to judge, although I could." He could have very easily come and said, "You know what?

I know the future. I know how this is going to turn out. You're all going to reject me. This place is dark. I'm going to judge all of you." He would have been justified to do so. But He came with forgiveness in His heart. He came to save. And what He says to us now is, "Yes, He is coming with that help and aid, but that's help and aid to you.

The only problem is, are we willing to trust the helping hand, the merciful sacrifice, the great descent of our Savior? Are we willing to trust ourselves to Him?" If you have not experienced the freedom of doing that, let me tell you from personal experience, that is the definition of freedom.

To be in the safety, to be in the forgiving, loving hands of God, that equates freedom. You can be free all you want from the things you think are problems and solutions in your life, but if you are still living with your fallen heart and mind, you are not free.

It'll haunt you till the day you die. But to be forgiven, washed, cleansed by the Savior, this to us is our deliverance. And so today we remember Jesus Christ who has come down, humbled Himself to such great depths, sacrificed to the point of dying on the cross to help us.

Would we with great trust, great faith receive that? I want to end with this passage, Philippians chapter two, verse nine. For this reason also God highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

Let's take a moment to pray. Lord God, we took time to meditate on the height from which you came down. We cannot even fathom what you had to let go of just to help us. But for that Lord we thank you so much, what grace you have given us.

We also took time to meditate, Lord, the depth of our sin and how deep into the muck you had to travel. God, to sympathize with our weakness, to experience the limitation, to experience also the many shameful things that happen in this darkness. But thank you so much, God, that you are willing to experience all of that so that Lord you would deliver us and God that you would rescue us.

Praise and worship be to you. We thank you, it's in Christ's name, amen.