Keep Close to the Heart of Christmas

00:00:00.000 | [Music]

00:00:04.000 | Today we venture out on a six-part series related to Christmas, answering your hard

00:00:08.760 | questions about the conception and the birth and the childhood of Jesus.

00:00:14.560 | And we begin today talking about the miraculous conception.

00:00:18.200 | A question from a listener named Kelly who writes this, "Pastor John, hello.

00:00:22.760 | Every Christmas I'm left wondering about the angel that came to Mary and informed her that

00:00:26.280 | she would have a child by the Holy Spirit.

00:00:29.260 | She wondered how it would be, and I know nothing is impossible for God.

00:00:34.080 | So here's my question.

00:00:35.720 | Did God become a fertilized embryo which was implanted into Mary's womb, or did Jesus somehow

00:00:42.480 | combine with Mary's natural egg to create the God-man?

00:00:47.120 | Are we given any biblical clues here as to how this happened biologically?"

00:00:52.480 | Let's read the most important section in the Gospel of Luke about the conception of Christ

00:01:03.480 | in Mary's womb and see how much God has revealed to us.

00:01:08.520 | Let me read it.

00:01:10.080 | This is Luke 1, 30 to 38.

00:01:14.380 | And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

00:01:19.640 | And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name

00:01:26.120 | Jesus.

00:01:27.120 | He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give

00:01:31.720 | him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever,

00:01:36.520 | and of his kingdom there will be no end."

00:01:40.240 | And Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?"

00:01:47.980 | And the angel answered her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most

00:01:53.520 | High will overshadow you, and therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the

00:02:00.840 | Son of God.

00:02:02.440 | And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son.

00:02:09.240 | And this is the sixth month with her who was called barren, for nothing will be impossible

00:02:16.680 | with God."

00:02:18.080 | And Mary said, "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord.

00:02:23.880 | Let it be to me according to your word."

00:02:27.600 | And the angel departed from her.

00:02:30.360 | I think this is as close as we get to the actual description of the event of the incarnation

00:02:40.320 | of the divine nature in some way uniting with the human nature in the womb of Mary.

00:02:50.840 | We know from numerous texts in the New Testament that Jesus was God, very God, had a divine

00:02:57.960 | nature.

00:02:59.960 | He had a real divine nature, like Colossians 2.9.

00:03:06.560 | In his body, there was fullness of deity.

00:03:11.980 | We know that Jesus Christ also had a human nature, because Paul says there is one mediator

00:03:17.520 | between God and man, the man, Christ Jesus.

00:03:21.640 | So he was a mediator between God and man because he was a man.

00:03:26.720 | So we know that Jesus was a God-man.

00:03:30.480 | There were two natures, a divine nature and a human nature in this one person, Jesus Christ.

00:03:36.320 | Now in this passage in Luke 2, the angel says to Mary in verse 31, "Behold, you will conceive

00:03:45.880 | in your womb."

00:03:48.760 | Now the natural way to take this is that Mary provides her ordinary part of the conception

00:03:57.560 | process, her egg, and God miraculously in some way—we do not and probably never can

00:04:05.800 | understand—provides the divine nature of Jesus, of Christ, the Son of God.

00:04:15.320 | Because when she asks how this can be, since she's a virgin, the angel says, "The Holy

00:04:23.840 | Spirit will come upon you, and the Most High, the power of the Most High, will overshadow

00:04:30.040 | you, and therefore the child to be born will be called Holy, Son of God."

00:04:35.440 | In other words, the angel veils the mysterious process in metaphorical language.

00:04:43.320 | The Most High will overshadow you, like the Shekinah glory.

00:04:51.400 | One of the reasons that I think we should assume Mary conceived with her own normal

00:04:58.880 | egg is that the same word for "conceived" is used in verse 36 when the angel says, "Behold,

00:05:07.000 | your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son."

00:05:13.800 | And this is the same word, and the word "also" so that there's no reason to think anything

00:05:19.480 | different than Mary conceived.

00:05:22.560 | She didn't become pregnant through Joseph.

00:05:25.720 | She became pregnant through the Holy Spirit in some way that we simply cannot fathom.

00:05:33.200 | So I don't think we should go much farther than that in detailing any of the mechanics

00:05:40.240 | of the miraculous conception, and I would give Kelly and the rest of us a caution here

00:05:46.840 | and a happy exhortation.

00:05:49.840 | The caution is that we beware of the temptation and the mindset of being excessively fascinated

00:05:58.720 | with non-essential matters.

00:06:00.840 | I have met people—and I'm not saying, Kelly, that you're this kind of person at all, but

00:06:05.000 | I've met people like this, I had them in my church for years—I have met people over

00:06:09.920 | the years who seem to be continually gravitating toward the margins of what is important rather

00:06:18.160 | than gravitating toward the center of what is important.

00:06:21.440 | They love to speculate about things that we cannot know and that are not essential to

00:06:28.040 | know, but these marginal things seem to hold an amazing fascination and attraction for

00:06:34.800 | them.

00:06:35.800 | I think that is spiritually dangerous for the soul to be so preoccupied with marginal

00:06:41.960 | matters while the joy and energy and passion for the center and the glorious main realities

00:06:49.280 | often goes languishing.

00:06:51.960 | So that's my caution.

00:06:52.960 | Now here's my happy concluding exhortation.

00:06:57.120 | We are in the presence here in Luke 2, in the presence of one of the greatest mysteries

00:07:04.800 | and wonders of the universe.

00:07:08.340 | The Creator of the universe, who is of a completely different dimension and reality

00:07:15.680 | than what he made, in a way that is scarcely conceivable to us, is united in one person,

00:07:25.360 | Jesus Christ, with a divine and human nature for the central purpose of being able to die.

00:07:37.360 | God cannot die.

00:07:40.000 | God cannot die.

00:07:42.000 | But Jesus Christ, the God-man, can die.

00:07:45.960 | This is the most spectacular fact in the universe, I think, more spectacular than creation itself,

00:07:53.320 | that God would clothe himself with humanity for the express purpose of dying so that rebellious

00:08:03.440 | people, people who are in rebellion against him, might live with him in joy forever.

00:08:09.240 | Listen to Hebrews 2.14, "Since the children," that's us, human beings, "Since the children

00:08:16.360 | share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of that same nature, flesh and blood,

00:08:26.800 | that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil,

00:08:31.880 | and deliver all those who through fear of death were held in lifelong slavery."

00:08:36.640 | Amazing.

00:08:37.640 | "He took on our nature so he could die."

00:08:43.600 | So let us stay close to the glorious center.

00:08:48.040 | God took on human nature so that he might die to destroy our enemies, deliver us from

00:08:54.200 | slavery to sin, give us eternal life with him forever.

00:08:58.480 | Yes, this is worthy of much meditation this Christmas and every Christmas.

00:09:06.640 | Wow, what a miracle.

00:09:08.840 | What a grace.

00:09:09.840 | What a gift.

00:09:10.840 | Thank you, Pastor John, for stirring our worship on these central things when it comes to the

00:09:15.480 | coming of Jesus.

00:09:16.480 | And, Kelly, thank you for the question.

00:09:18.920 | There are some biological mysteries here that we will never understand on this side of eternity,

00:09:24.000 | and even more mysterious to me are the divine mysteries at play in the incarnation as well.

00:09:30.360 | For the fully divine Son and creator of the universe to incarnate as a baby in a barn

00:09:36.320 | in Bethlehem, what divine attributes did he lay aside, if any?

00:09:42.620 | On Monday, we're going to pick up this next question as we march through some hard questions

00:09:46.240 | on our way to Christmas, and that's the next one.

00:09:48.920 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke.

00:09:50.300 | As always, thanks for listening to the podcast and have a wonderful weekend.

00:09:53.960 | We'll see you on Monday.

00:09:54.960 | Bye.

00:09:55.460 | [END]

00:09:57.460 | 1. What is the most difficult thing you've ever experienced?

Keep Close to the Heart of Christmas

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