Transcription
Well, if you knew this morning, or you've come just for the curls in communion service, then it might help you to know that we've been in a series on angels and demons. And really, what started for me is just kind of a filler series, in-between the holiday season and our, our wrap-up of our previous series, just to kind of spend maybe three weeks. And now it's become seven weeks. Next week will be the final installment as we look at the angel of the Lord and the name of the Lord and how that interacts to encourage us as we begin a new decade.
But this morning, we're going to talk about angels on this Christmas Sunday, which is fitting because the word angel or angels appears 21 times in the Christmas story. That first Christmas was filled with angelic activity. In fact, when you look at the New Testament, you find that throughout the New Testament, and if the New Testament is in any way a descriptor of what life for the Christian should be like, then we immediately come to the conclusion: we live in a very angelic world. Because you find angels mentioned in the New Testament, the word angel or angels 185 times, mentioned more than prayer, mentioned more than hope. The, the idea of angels. And I would suggest to you that just on that, as on that first Christmas, there was intense angelic activity. That in Christmas 2019, for all of us and for believers around the world, there is angelic activity.
This morning, what I'd like us to do is to look at the Christmas story and to look at a specific angel. Not just any angel. In fact, he's one of only two angels named in the Bible. The first angel is Michael the Archangel. This is the angel Gabriel. He is a fearsome, awesome, glorious being, often called an archangel, though the Bible does not give him that title. It only gives it to Michael. But Jewish tradition names him as one of seven Archangels. In the book of First Enoch, which is an intertestamental book, so it was written between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New Testament, and certainly reflects thought that influenced our New Testament writers, it lists seven Archangels. There's Michael, there is Gabriel, there is Raphael, there is Uriel, there is Raguel, there is Sariel, and there is Remiel. Among those seven is the angel Gabriel.
And when you read through scripture, what you find is he was not only active in announcing to Mary that she would be the mother of the Messiah, but you find Gabriel talking on different occasions to three different people in scripture. We meet him first in Daniel chapter 8. I mean, just kind of set the table for you. Daniel's had a vision, and the vision doesn't sound very startling to us, but to Daniel, it was. The vision involved a ram that was standing strong and without opposition on the face of the earth. And all of the sudden, a goat with a horn between its eyes, kind of like a unicorn goat, if you will, goes charging toward the ram, knocks the ram down. And at the height of its goat's power, the single horn is broken off, and it becomes four horns. And then there's this one horn, and this one horn becomes more powerful than the other horns. See how I don't get how that works, what that looks like, we don't know. Only Daniel saw it. But that one horn is so powerful that it cast down to earth some of the angelic hosts. And is that, that's a very unusual dream. And what that looked like, and what that vision looked like, we don't really know. I mean, how do you describe the things of eternity? How do you describe the things of the supernatural realm in a, in a physical realm vocabulary?
Daniel gets done, and this is how he felt about it. Verse 27: "Then I, Daniel, was overcome. I lay sick for several days afterward. I got up and performed my duties for the King, but I was greatly troubled by the vision, and I could not understand it." So why God does is God sends to Daniel the angel Gabriel. Look at it, Daniel chapter 8 and verse 15: "As I, Daniel, was trying to understand the meaning of this vision, someone who looked like a man—and I want you to remember that phrase because we'll come back to that in just a bit—stood in front of me. And I heard a human voice calling out from the Ulai River: 'Gabriel, tell this man the meaning of his vision.' As Gabriel approached the place where I was standing, I became terrified, so terrified that I fell with my face to the ground. 'Son of man,' he said, 'you must understand that the events you have seen in your vision relate to the time of the end.'" And while he was speaking, I fainted. I mean, to see an angel with the appearance, the presence, the awesomeness of the angel Gabriel, it causes him to faint. I lay there with my face in the ground, but Gabriel roused me with a touch, helped me to my feet. Then he said, "I'm here to tell you what will happen later in the time of wrath. What you have seen pertains to the very end of time."
Then we see Gabriel again in Daniel chapter 9. Now, years have passed, and as we come to this particular vision, maybe 20 years have passed. And as I was praying, Gabriel, whom I had seen in the earlier vision, came swiftly to me at the time of evening sacrifice. And he explained to me, "Daniel, I've come here to give you insight and understanding." Notice it says he came swiftly. I don't know what that, what that means exactly, other than apparently he saw him a long ways off and instantly or quickly he was right in front of him. Something about that to give Daniel the idea of the speed with which Gabriel moves. He explained to me, "I've come here to give you insight and understanding. The moment you began praying, a command was given, and now I'm here to tell you what it was for. You are very precious to God. Listen carefully so that you can understand the meaning of your vision."
What does Gabriel look like? Well, I'm going to suggest to you that he is the angel we've looked at before from Daniel chapter 10. Look at it: "I looked up and I saw a man." This is always how Gabriel is described by Daniel. He's an angel that looked like a man. Not every angel looks like a man. I don't mean man as opposed to a woman. He looks like he has a human figure. Some, you remember, have feet like calves, some have, have the head of an eagle, or the head of an ox, or the head of a lion, or the head of a human. But, but Gabriel is in a class of angelic being that looks like a man. And this is the angel that he is. The angel that embarrassed Adana and talks to Daniel. If this is the case, then, then this is a description of Gabriel. And he is also the angel, I might add, who does battle with that demonic prince of Persia, and Michael the Archangel comes to help him so that he can deliver Daniel the message. "I looked up and I saw a man dressed in linen clothing, with a belt of pure gold around his waist. His body looked like precious gem, his flayed face flashed like lightning, and his eyes flamed like torches. His arms and feet shone like polished bronze, and his voice roared like a vast multitude of people." And in verse 9, we read this: "When I heard the man speak and when I heard the sound of his voice, I fainted." Same kind of response. Verse 10: "Gabriel comes and sets him on his feet." All that to say, Gabriel's a powerful, possibly archangel being, who comes to deliver God's Word to people whom God has great respect for. He loves all people, he just certainly respects those who set their heart on seeking him. I mean, the angel says, Gabriel says, "Daniel, you are highly esteemed."
And then we come to Luke chapter 1. And in Luke chapter 1, it opens with the story of an elderly priest by the name of Zachariah, and he has a wife named Elizabeth. And the Bible tells us that she was barren, that they couldn't have children. And there had been the prayer of their heart that God would give them a child, but it hadn't happened. And at the end of his priestly ministry, he was given a very great honor. Historians tell us that in the time of Christ, there would have been 24,000 members of the priesthood. And so what they did is they divided them up by groups of 2,000, so that every month, 2,000 priests would come from their homes, they would stay in Jerusalem in the temple area, and they would carry out the activities of the temple, offering the sacrifices, and, and, and interacting with the people, and, and keeping up the temple, all the things a priest might do. Because the temple, you remember, was massive.
And what would happen is that because it would be such an honor, every morning and every evening to go in and to offer incense on the table of incense. And the priest would, would take coals off the altar outside, and he would go in to the, what was called the holy place, and he would take and he would put those coals on, on the table of incense, and then he'd put incense on it, and smoke would rise up. And they would do it at 9:00 in the morning, they'd do it 3:00 in the afternoon. And, and as that smoke was rising up, symbolic of the prayers of the people, the smoke could fill the front part of the holy place, that area near the most holy place. And the priest would do that, and then the priest would come back out. Zachariah is given the honor that comes once in a priest's lifetime. They're chosen by lot to get the privilege of either going in the morning or going the evening. Because you can imagine, with 2,000 there every month, only 60 would be given the honor in any given month of, of doing that. And so you may serve your whole lifetime and never get the opportunity. Zachariah, at the end of his career, is chosen to go into the holy place to offer the incense on the table of incense. And it's, it's a great day for he and Elizabeth. It's, it's like the, the cherry on top of his career as a priest, his calling, and his service as a priest.
And as he goes in there, and he's offering the incense there on the table, suddenly an angel appears to him. Not just any angel, though. Any angel would be fantastic. It's the angel Gabriel. And the angel Gabriel comes to him and says, "Zachariah, your prayers have been heard. God is going to give you a son. Your wife's going to conceive." We'll pick it up there. I'm actually verse 11. "Now Zechariah was in the sanctuary. An angel of the Lord—this is Gabriel—appeared to him, standing to the right of the incense altar. And Zechariah was shaken and overwhelmed with fear when he saw him." We go on and read this in verse 18: "And he said to the angel, 'How can this be?'" After the angel says, "You're going to have a son," "I'm an old man now. My wife is also well along in years." Can I just say that what he says and the way he responds is so typical of humanity? We pray for something, we ask God to do the impossible, and then God comes and speaks to our heart, as it were, or makes us known, "I've heard you, I'm gonna do it." And all of a sudden, like, "I don't know how that could ever happen. Zechariah, I'm an old man, my wife..." He uses this very nice, husbandly language. He doesn't, God knows he doesn't. He says, "My wife is well along in years."
Then the angel said, "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of the Lord." Mic drop. I mean, that's the end of the discussion. That is it. "It was I who sent me to bring you this good news. But now, since you didn't believe what I said, you'll be silent and unable to speak until the child is born, for my words will certainly be fulfilled at the proper time." Can I suggest to you that Gabriel is doing what I would call a harsh mercy, but a mercy nonetheless? What hurts so many people when it comes to receiving the impossible from God is that they undo with their lips what they've tried to accomplish with their prayers. And there comes a place in our life where if you can't speak words of faith, don't speak at all. This is what he's saying. Listen, you've prayed, God's heard, and we don't want to hear any doubt out of you. It won't help your wife, it won't help your friends, it won't help your family, because you can't speak words of faith. Literally, it's as if he's saying, "You have nothing worth hearing." That's such a sobering word on the one hand, such an encouraging word on the other, that God would call you and I, in the midst of believing him for impossible things, to be people who not only have a faith-filled heart, but speak a faith-filled vocabulary.
Well, six months later. I mean, Gabriel is a very busy angel. Luke chapter 1, verse 26: "And in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God's faithful, impossible things happen. Mary is going to see Elizabeth because in, you will read that later in the chapter, because Mary's going to get some miraculous news about a miraculous conception herself." "God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth—probably a village of maybe 300 people at most, maybe closer to 150. Nothing fancy about the village—to a virgin named Mary. Not just a virgin, but let me just, you know, add into this that she's probably given the age of girls at a first marriage in that time. Today, I think the average age of a first marriage for women in the U.S. is 28 years old. And that day, the average age of a first marriage was somewhere between the ages of 12 and 14. So here is a teenager, and the angel Gabriel appears to her. Can you imagine?" Look at it, verse 28: "Gabriel appeared to her and said, 'Greetings, favored one, the Lord is with you.'" "Confused and disturbed," which at times can describe a lot of teenagers. I'm sorry. Okay. Mary tried to think what the angel could mean. "Don't be afraid, Mary," the angel told her, "for you have found favor with God." And then he gives this amazing prophecy. And everything happens exactly like you said.
I want to give you, just as we wrap this up and head to the table of the Lord, I want to give you five lessons from Gabriel's ministry on this Christmas Sunday, or this Sunday before Christmas.
Number one: Don't be afraid of what God has for you. As you look ahead to this coming year, this coming decade, what's your heart like? Are you dreading it? Are you saying, "What you're saying, if you knew my circumstances, you'd be..." No, no. "I'm just where you have..." I mean, Gabriel's message is repeatedly, "Don't be afraid." Look at it. He says this: "He said, 'Don't be afraid'" to Daniel. He said, "'Don't be afraid'" to Zechariah. He said, "'Don't be afraid'" to Mary. Calls each of them by name. God knows your name. God knows what you need. God knows what you've asked. And we certainly could primarily apply that, that word of not being afraid, to not being afraid of Gabriel's presence. But Gabriel's presence is not the only thing that fears. Honestly, fear is momentary. The other fear, and perhaps the greater fear, is the words he announces. "Your, this is what's going to happen to you. This is what's going to happen to God's people. This, this is what the future holds." How do you view the future God has for you? Are you afraid? Me? On this Christmas Sunday, the truth of the matter is, we don't ever need to be afraid. It's such an encouragement to know that you don't have to fear what God is doing. Well, what if I don't like it? You'll love it if it's God doing it. Well, I don't know if it's good. That's okay, He does. It's gonna be awesome. He's the good God who does good things to His people and delights in the doing of it. You say, "But I don't deserve it." That's a given. We understand that. If God is the one doing it, you can trust Him, and you can know it's going to be good. And there is, as I was preparing for the lesson, thinking about this and thinking about the message, I felt certain in my heart that there's someone today, either at this campus or at the Joplin campus, or the North Campus, or the West Campus, or maybe all of them are watching online, and God has been speaking to you about your future. You've been concerned about your future, and God is simply saying, "The word of the Lord to you is today, today's: Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. God is going to do something that if you could see it now, you'd be blown away by the way He's going to resolve the things you fear."
Number two: God hears your prayers. If we learn anything from angel Gabriel, it's that God hears prayers. Look at it, Daniel 9:23: "The moment you began praying, the very instant a command was given." You realize that the instant you and I start to pray, it releases things in the spiritual world. Do you realize that? That prayer is not just some empty ritual? That prayer isn't a waste of time? At any time you and I go before the King of Kings and we ask Him to help us, that there are things that are happening in the spiritual realm. And if we can't see it, and if we can't feel it, it doesn't matter. God is at work because you prayed. Chapter 10 and verse 12: "Then he said, 'Don't be afraid, Daniel, since the first day you began to pray.'" How long did he pray? 21 days he was fasting, 24 days in total. "Since the first day you began to pray for understanding and humble yourself before your God, your request has been heard in heaven, and I have come an answer to your prayer." And you can read this story in Daniel 10 and find out that the answer was delayed because there was a spiritual battle Daniel could not see, but it was a spiritual battle that was won in Jesus' name. I'm just saying that you can't see it, you can't feel it, it doesn't matter. Your prayers have been heard.
Some of you today, and you're saying, "Okay, well, God hears prayers, but it's too late for me. If He was gonna answer my prayer, He should have done it a long time ago, because that's when I really needed it." All I love what He says to Zechariah in Luke chapter 1 and verse 13: "But the angel said, 'Don't be afraid, Zechariah. God has heard your prayer.'" Zechariah and Elizabeth had long since quit believing for an answer from heaven. They'd long since stopped asking God for the thing that very likely they wanted most in their life, a son. But the fact they had stopped asking and they'd stopped believing didn't mean God wasn't at work answering. And I'm not suggesting you stop asking and stop believing. I don't think that's helpful to anybody who wants to receive from the Lord. But I am simply saying that even when you don't feel it, and even when you can't see it, God has heard your prayer. Luke chapter 1, the angel says to Mary, "You've found favor with God." Why would a person find favor with God without faith? That is impossible to do what pleases God. Hebrews 11. And that's interesting, that word. You know, it talks about Enoch, for before he was taken, he was one who pleased God. And the word "pleased" and the word "walked" are used almost interchangeably. That, that idea of pleasing God, walking with God, pleasing God, walking with God. Here's Mary, she walks with God. Some of you needed to hear that today. God has heard your prayer. God is at work. Angels are working on your behalf. You said, "I can't see any difference." Neither could Zechariah, and neither could Daniel. But it didn't mean things weren't happening. We got to have a change of perspective. That's what this, this angels and demons series is about, is that we get our eyes off of just the natural world. That you will not live a life of victory if you confine your sight to what you see with your eyes physically. "For the things which are seen," Paul said in 2 Corinthians 4, "are temporary, but the unseen things are eternal." So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen. That's what he says. Throughout the Christmas story, God answers prayer. You have to believe Joseph when he hears his fiancée, who he's never had sexual relationships with, is pregnant. You have to believe Joseph's like, "God, what do I do? I, you know, if I, if I don't handle this right, it'll really damage it, it'll really hurt her. They could kill her. What do I do with this? How do I handle this? I want what's best for her, but I'm out on the marriage. Help me to know." And in answer to that prayer, God helps him. God answers prayer.
Number three: God's will is discovered in God's presence. "Then the angel said, 'I am Gabriel.'" And I love this because in the original, it's kind of this way. All right, Zechariah said, "I'm an old man." And Gabriel, with the same emphasis, says, "I'm Gabriel." And on top of that, "I stand in the presence of God." Gabriel knows God's will because he stands in the presence of God. That's such a, that's such a poignant thing to remember, that if you want to know God's will, you have to be in God's presence. If you want to know God's will for anything you can name in your life, where you and I might want to know what God thinks, what God's going to do, how God wants us to, to plan, or or to spend, or or whatever it is, we have to be in God's presence. Because it's in God's presence that we come to know, we come to understand, we come to believe, we are, our heart is energized with a supernatural faith to believe the impossible thing that is God's will for our life. As soon as we stand on the threshold of 2020, as you think in those days between Christmas and New Year's Day, I pray your heart is crying out, "What will this coming decade be like for me, God? What is it that You want to do? What is it that You have for my life? What is it You have for my family? What is it that You want to do in the place where I work, in the neighborhood where I live? God, show me Your will. Let me know what You have for me." And the record of scripture is, He will delight in doing that. In that, He delights in it.
Number four: Nothing is impossible with God. This is a lesson straight from the lips of the angel Gabriel. Mary gets the word from Gabriel, "You're going to conceive, you can have a child." And Mary's response is, "How can this be?" And Gabriel's answer is, "Nothing's impossible with God." Would you notice he doesn't really, he explains some, but not much. Not in a way that makes sense, probably, to her. Certainly not in a way that we can completely understand, even in our own day. But the answer is not that you and I understand God's will or God's working in our life. The answer is that we believe He is at work, and He's working for our good and His perfect will, and that we can trust Him. And that even if something looks impossible, He's a God who delights in doing the impossible. And here's Gabriel, and he says, "Listen, Mary, let me just put it to you this way. There is not anything He cannot do. Nothing is impossible with God." This is a being who has watched Him from the beginning of time. This is a being who's watched Him take nothing and speak everything into existence out of nothing. This is a being who watched the fall of mankind and watched God promise a redeemer. This is a being who watched God work time and time again to deliver where it seemed there was no way. When the children of Israel were in Egypt and bondage, He sent a man named Moses and used them to deliver a nation out of bondage. He saw every promise God made in the Old Testament to send a Savior, and He saw God getting everything ready. He saw that when, for 400 years between the ink drying on Malachi's parchment and Matthew picking up his pen, He saw that at that time. He saw those 400 years, and He saw God working when, to humanity, it seemed nothing was happening. An angel, Gabriel, when Mary says, "How can this be?" draws this conclusion: "I've seen Him work. I've stood in His presence. I've marveled at His wisdom, and I'm just telling you, He can do anything. He can do anything." For nothing is impossible with God. How can God come in the flesh? Nothing's impossible with God. How can God forgive all of my sin? Nothing is impossible with God. How could God adopt me as His child? Nothing is impossible with God. How can I, with this human body, someday have a heavenly body that will, will reflect His glory in a way I can't begin to imagine? Nothing is impossible with God. What's your impossibility? Give it to Him.
Number five: Jesus is God's Son, the forever King, sent to save us. That's Christmas. Gabriel appeared to her, and he said, "You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus, which means Savior. You're gonna call him the one who saves, because that's what he will do. He will save people. And he will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. He's gonna be called the Son of God. He's the Savior, Son of God. The Lord will give him the throne of his ancestor David, and he'll reign over Israel forever, and his kingdom will never end. He'll be the forever King, the ruler of the ages, for all eternity." And that's Christmas. There's nothing wrong with all the other things that society can do with Christmas and the world in which we live, but Christmas is about God sending a Savior. It's about God sending Jesus. That's why to every one of our campuses, I can't wait 'til we have it in Joplin, on the Main Street there, we have the words "Jesus" out front in big letters so nobody can miss it. Christmas tree, Jesus. Tiny Christmas tree, Jesus. Because we want everybody to understand Jesus is what Christmas is all about. A Savior, God, the forever King, who is given to us as a gift.
[Music]
Have you received that gift? Have you opened your heart to that gift? That's what Christmas is about. Let's pray for just a moment. Heavenly Father, I thank you.