Well, welcome to Calvary Chapel. I want to invite you to stand with us. I'm going to go before the Lord in prayer. We're glad you're here today. Lord, we thank you so much for this opportunity to come together like this. Lord, we have the freedom to worship you publicly. And we do just pray, Lord, that you would have your way this morning, be exalted in both the worship and the word.

And we ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Let's worship together. God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength. Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength. With all your heart With all your, dear God With all your, with all your With all my soul With all my, with all my

All my, all my We give you praise for who you are We just ask that you would be exalted In Jesus' name we pray, amen You can be seated I cast my mind to Calvary Jesus bled and died for me I see his wounds His hands, his feet My Savior on that cursed tree His body pinched and teared Made him down in Joseph's tomb Entrance sealed by heavy stone Messiah still is his name The Son of Heaven For Christ eternal The robes of the rising sun Shall pierce the saints My gaze transfixed On Jesus' face I don't know what everybody's going through today But I know that God can deal with any problem you have Just, uh He's proven himself in the past He can do it again I just, uh, I look to him So whatever you're going through Don't give up Keep on praying

And he will do it again He'll do it again Walking around I thought by now they'd fall But you have never failed me Waiting for change to come For you have your faith This is my confidence You've never longed to We'll sing your praise You're still living within your We'll sing your praise This is my My still stands Great is your grace Your faithfulness Faithfulness This is my confidence You've never failed me yet And I never

In the darkness we were wet And without light Till from heaven you came running There was mercy To fulfill To a virgin came The one of endless glory To redeem You did not despise You did not despise The cross For even in your suffering You saw to the other side Knowing this was our salvation Jesus for our sake you died That stone was moved And the dead rose from their tombs And the truth of all has resurrected It's so wonderful how it is, Lord, that you've done it. We just glorify your name. Thank you that you are in charge of every aspect of our lives. We just lay ourselves before you right now, Lord.

We have this time as Pastor Ryan comes up and brings the word, Lord. We just pray you'll open our hearts, our spiritual eyes right now, as we'll see and hear what you want us to see. In Jesus' name. You can be seated. Wait, take a minute at the fellowship first. But you can be seated if you want to. Good morning. I'll have to talk louder than that this time.

Good morning, everybody.

Half of them still haven't heard yet. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Hey, if you would locate your seat. Grab a bulletin. We'll go over a few announcements.

There's nothing better than the indiscriminate chatter of God's people.

We'll go over a few announcements here. First of all, on the left-hand side of your bulletin, lots of places to get plugged into. We talked about a couple of them last week with the men's and women's studies. So locate one of those. We'll talk about a couple of more here in just a minute. But before we get to those, we're kind of in a little bit of a lull of activities.

There'll be some things. It's coming up in September that I'll start announcing soon. But I wanted to take the next few weeks to kind of talk about some of the things that we have going on throughout the week here at church. So first of all, I want to remind you that on Sunday mornings at both 8 o'clock and 10 o'clock, we have a time of prayer where we gather back in the agape room.

We take about 15 or 20 minutes and we pray about the things going on in the church and just praying for the service and the things going on in the world. So if you have the opportunity to come, join us for that. And then the other thing is I wanted to point out the ministry spotlight for today are both the college group. So if Lewis, you want to start coming up.

Both the college group and then the Tuesday night group. So I'm going to have Lewis come up and share about the college group. And then I'll have Alan come up and share about the Tuesday night home fellowship.

Hey guys. So the college group, we're existing to minister to young peoples, right? We want to have a Bible study. An opportunity for young people to fellowship, build relationships, not just with each other, most importantly with Jesus Christ. Like we want to see this community full of young people on fire for Jesus. That's my goal. That's my desire. So right now we've been going through the book of Philippians.

It's been pretty awesome for me. I love the book of Philippians. We finished Ephesians. We'll be finishing Philippians actually this Tuesday night. But we just, have a time of worship. We open up the word. We talk about it. Then we worship and then we fellowship and hang out. And it's been pretty cool so far. And if you're a young person that wants to learn more about Jesus,

wants to find a community, you're more than welcome to come. Yeah, that's about it.

Okay. And we'll have Alan come up and share about the Tuesday night home fellowship.

There we go. Yeah. Tuesday, we get together. Um, and have a good Bible study right now. We're working through second Samuel. I think chapter eight, uh, will be this week. Um, we meet at my folks house and, um, at Dan and Marge Brooke and it one 12 Malwood court. And we'd love to have you join us. If, if, if you're not involved in a study on Tuesday night, um,

but we, we get together both just to dig into the word to fellowship, but also, um, what we do is we have a zoom meeting for, for those who aren't able to make it. Um, we have some folks that join us from New York and, uh, in towns, you know, Winfield. So if, if you're, if you're interested, you can join us either way. Um, we'd love to have you. If you need to know about the zoom information,

let me know. We're going to probably start putting it in the, uh, bulletin so you can find the time. And if you've never hooked up to a zoom meeting, then give me a call. Let me know. I'll help you. So love to have you. Very good. Okay. So those are the things that are going on. If you would make sure that your mobile device is silenced. And then, uh, for our responsive reading this morning,

we're going to be in Psalm 142. Psalm 142. We'll be looking at the new American standard. Just so we sound the same should be one of your row. If you don't have that translation with you. And as you're turning to Psalm 142, if you would stand in the honor of the reading of God's word,

Psalm 142, I will read the odd verses. If you will follow along with pastor Allen and the even verses, a mascal of David. When he was in the cave, a prayer, I cry aloud with my voice to the Lord. I make supplication with my voice to the Lord. I pour out my complaint before him. I declare my trouble before him. When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, you knew my path in the way where I walk.

They have hidden a trap for me. Look to the right and see, for there is no one who regards me. There is no escape for me. No one cares for my soul. I cried out to you. Oh Lord. I said, you are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living. Give heed to my cry for I am, brought very low. Deliver me from my persecutors for they are too strong for me. And if you'll read verse seven with me,

bring my soul out of prison so that I may give thanks to your name. The righteous will surround me for you will deal bountifully with me. And father, we do thank you for being our refuge. And so Lord, I pray that as we get ready to spend time in your word this morning, that your Holy spirit would just be at work in our hearts. Father, I thank you for the truth of who you are.

I thank you for the story of Jesus. And I pray that you would make yourself more real to us today in Jesus name. Amen. You may be seated. And if you would open up in your Bibles to the book of Matthew chapter one,

Matthew chapter one. Last week, as we were together, we discussed the genealogy. We went from Abraham down to the birth of Jesus. And so today we look a little bit deeper, into the birth of Jesus Christ. And really we look at it from Joseph's perspective. And so as we pick up in chapter one, verse 18, it says this. Now, the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows.

When his mother, Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy spirit and Joseph, her husband being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her planned to send her away secretly. But when he had considered this behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream saying, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife for the child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy spirit. She will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save his people from their sins. Now, all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet.

Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which translated means God with us. And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a son and he called his name Jesus. And so as we begin this, again, we tell this story from the perspective of Joseph. Remember, Matthew's goal is to, to present Jesus as the king, as the anointed one, as the Messiah.

And so he gives this line, this name from the line or this story from the perspective of Joseph. And so this morning, the title of our message is the birth of the king. And it's going to be the first part of a two part series here. As we talk about the birth of Jesus. Now, as we start, we take note in verse 18 and it says, now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows.

I think there's a couple of interesting things to point out in that first little line that's given to us there. The first is the definition of the word birth. That word literally means genealogy or history. Remember, Matthew had given us the entire genealogy from Abraham down to Jesus, but now he wants to focus in on the history of Jesus. He wants to focus in on the story of Jesus because that's the goal he's trying

to get to. But the second thing that I want to point out to you is that he brings about the focus of Jesus Christ. He brings, he brings our hearts and minds back into focus on Jesus himself. I was thinking about this this morning as I was putting this message together, all of the things that have gone on in the world just in the past two weeks and how easy it is to get our focus off of Jesus.

It's funny because two weeks ago I gave a message about keeping our focus on Jesus and then the world blew up again, right? When we think about the things that have taken place, if the things in Afghanistan had not happened the way that they had, we would all be talking about, what took place in Haiti, that there was an earthquake, a 7.2 magnitude earthquake that has killed over 1500 people now in Haiti. And then in the process of them trying to clean that up and find survivors, a hurricane came through that stopped all of that process and the things that are going on in Haiti where the church is concerned and where people are concerned is somewhat awe-inspiring as far as the devastation that they've dealt with.

And sometimes we can find our minds swirling with the devastation that we see in a place like that. Then we look at the fact of what's going on, in Afghanistan, which started last Sunday afternoon, probably started before that, but that's when things, when the poo really hit the fan, right? It was last Sunday afternoon when we all got that little text alert that said that the embassy, they'd taken the flag down at the embassy, the US flag, and it had been overtaken by the Taliban. And when we think about what's going on with churches over there, what's going on with Christians over there, what's going on with people over there, sometimes it's a little bit overwhelming and we can find ourselves a little freaked out about what that means,

not only for the nation of Afghanistan, but what that means for our own nation. Because what is what I call the debacle of Afghanistan? What is that going to mean for us here in the United States? Because friends, things are going to get ugly. You, we can't stop that now, right? We talked about that last week. And then I look at the fact that there's a hurricane heading towards the East

coast hitting that's going to hit places that haven't seen the hurricane in over 30 years and what's about to take place there. And sometimes we can find our minds swirling with all of the things that are going on. But I love what Matthew does, because Jesus, Jesus came into a time that was exactly the same. He came into a time where things were going crazy in the Roman empire.

And yet what does Matthew decide he needs to do after he gives this genealogy? He says, this is the history of Jesus. This is the story of Jesus, because we may look at the world around us right now and think everything's falling apart, but really everything's coming together because what we're, witnessing right now has all been prophesied. What we're witnessing right now is not taking God by surprise.

It's not causing him to be nervous because his plan is being worked out in all of the things that are taking place in the world. As a matter of fact, just like what we're about to read is the story of Jesus. Everything happening in the world right now is the story of Jesus, because we're about to see him come back and rule and reign as King, even though he was rejected as King the first time around. And so, as we come, to this chapter, as we come to this section again, I'm just reminded to keep our focus on Jesus, because that's where we can maintain the proper perspective and the proper view that God wants us to have.

And so he says, now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows verse 18, middle of verse 18, when his mother, Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy spirit. Now, this next section, that we're going to look at verses 18 through 25 of Matthew chapter one, I think break down nicely into three sections. Number one, we're going to see the concern number two, we're going to see the comfort and then number three, we're going to see the obedience and all of these will be of Joseph. And so the first thing that's going to take place is this concern.

And what's given to us is the picture painted of the relationship that Mary and Joseph were in right now, they were betrothed to each other. Now, I feel like this is a really good point to bring up some cultural background so that we can understand a little bit more about how, how marriages worked at this point in time in the Jewish nation. They worked much differently than they do now. You see, at this point in time, there were three parts to a Jewish wedding ceremony.

If you will, the coming together of two Jewish young people to be wed. The first was the engagement. The engagement could really take place at any point in time in a kid's life. We would call it a, an arranged marriage. So potentially at the age of six, seven, eight years old, you could be engaged to another small child, because you had been promised to each other.

Perhaps livestock was exchanged, whatever it was, there was a promise that was made. And so that engagement period would take place until the time that the betrothal began when they became of age and we're ready. The betrothal period would begin. The betrothal period took about one year. And in that one year period, the husband would go and prepare a place for his wife at his house so that she

would have a place to come to. And then at a time when he decided, when the place was prepared, he would go and he would get his bride and he would bring her home to his father's house. Can we, can we just not skip over the subtle nuance of the picture of Jesus in the church here that Jesus has betrothed us to himself. He's made the promise to bring us to himself and he's at home.

As he told his disciples, he's at his father's house, preparing a place for us. And if he went to prepare a place for us, he's going to come again to receive us unto himself. And right now it sure feels like it's time to get those lamps trimmed and full of oil because I think the bridegroom is coming soon. Anyway, that's neither here nor there. But then the third part was once the betrothal was finished,

then would be the actual marriage, the actual wedding ceremony. And then they're married during the betrothal time. There was great commitment. As a matter of fact, they were called husband and wife. The only thing that wasn't the same as the actual marriage itself is the marriage was not consummated and they didn't live together. So the betrothal period was a very,

very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. So the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very,

very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very, very long period of time. And so the betrothal period was a very,

very long period of time. those two was considered adultery and punishable as such. So hopefully that paints a little bit of a cultural background for what we're about to face with Joseph here. Notice what it says. When his mother, speaking of Jesus, when his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit.

So they're in the midst of this betrothal period. And as they're in the midst of this betrothal period, Matthew takes painstaking efforts to point out one truth about Mary and Joseph. They had never come together. There was no physical relationship that had taken place between the two of them. This is really important because Mary needed to be a virgin. That's what we talked about last week.

In order for her to be the one who would produce the child that would be fit to be the Savior, a sinless one, she would have had to have been a virgin because we know that sin is passed through the man. Each of us has a sin nature because each of us has a sin nature. Each of us has a sin nature. Each of us has a father. And each of us has a father that also has a sin nature.

Therefore, sin gets passed on to all of us. So in order for Jesus to have been perfect, he had to be born of a virgin. Matthew takes great effort to point that out. They had never come together. But in the process of them never having come together, I want you to notice what it says. Mary was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. Now, Matthew doesn't give us what happened in Mary's life.

Luke gives us that account, right? And you remember the account of what happens with Mary. Mary is hanging out in her house, loving Jesus, loving the Lord. And all of a sudden, an angel shows up. And what was the first thing the angel said? Don't be afraid because everybody's freaked out when they see an angel. He said, don't be afraid. I bring you glad tidings of good joy.

You're about to have Jesus. You have been chosen by God. You are beloved of God. And you are chosen among women to be the one through whom the Messiah is going to come. And do you remember her answer to that? But I've never known a man. How is that going to be? Is it possible? And what does the angel say? I don't know. No, the angel says, it's going to be the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit will overshadow you and you will produce a son. Now, here's the question I've always thought. When did she tell Joseph? Like, at what point in time was she like, okay, Joseph, I've got good news and I've got bad news and I've got confusing news, right? Like, the good news is I still love you. The bad news is I'm going to have a baby. The confusing news,

is it's from God. And he goes, really? Like, how long did she wait to tell him this, right? We know from scripture that she pretty quickly went and saw her cousin Elizabeth, who also was going to have a miraculous birth. That was going to be John the Baptist. But at what point in time she told Joseph, we're not real sure. Another thing that I brought up during first service

that has always plagued me is when did they tell their parents, right? Can you imagine her conversation with her mom? Mom, once again, I've got good news and I've got bad news. And I've got confusing news, right? Like, that had to have been a difficult situation. Now put yourself in Joseph's shoes. I think Joseph does not receive enough credit for the kind of man that he was.

I think Joseph was an incredible man that we read very little about, but I think would have been a fascinating guy to know. I think he was a hardworking man that loved the Lord with all of his heart. And I'll explain why I think that in just a minute. But put yourself in Joseph's shoes. He loves this girl with all of his heart. I think Mary, Mary had to have been an amazing young lady too, right?

I think she had to have just been an amazing human being that you were just probably magnetically drawn to because God chose her and filled her with the spirit in order to do this amazing thing. And here's this girl that he loves with all of his heart and he's so excited about marrying. He's been working on preparing a place for her. He's been trying to build that room so that he can bring her home and live with him.

And all of a sudden he finds out that she's pregnant. How he found out, we don't know. Did she go tell him himself? Was he just like, hey, what happened here? Did she send a messenger? We don't know how she told him, but he had to have found out. And can you imagine how his heart felt when he found out that she was pregnant? Oh my gosh. But I love her. How could she have done this to me?

I don't know what to do now because all of the plans that I had, they just fell apart. All of my plans for marriage, they may all be crumbling right in front of me. And then she tells him how it happened. Okay, Joseph, I know this seems bad right now, but I promise I didn't cheat on you. I promise this wasn't adultery. Let me tell you about the angel that showed up.

An angel showing up, that's ridiculous. And this is what the angel told me. Mary, I'm just having a hard time believing this story. And he's probably struggling with it. Can you imagine the emotions that he would have gone through to deal with all of this? And so he has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem.

He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. He has a problem. That's what it says in verse 19. And Joseph, her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly. You see, at this point in time, adultery was punishable by death. And if he had chosen to,

if he had followed the law completely, he very well could have turned her over to the ruling elders, and they would have dealt with her. But you see, Joseph was both a righteous man and a righteous man. And he was a merciful man. I gleaned this from John Corson's commentary. He pointed it out. I hadn't thought about it until he pointed out those two words. But it says that he was a righteous man.

Now, what does that mean? It means that he was a man that followed the law in every way possible. I think Joseph was one who not only held the law in high esteem, but didn't just hold it in high esteem, but he obeyed the law. And he obeyed the law in every way possible because he was a very righteous man. Why is that important? Because Jesus would have had to have kept the law

in every way possible, but there would have been a point in time in his life where keeping the law meant that his parents had to be the one that kept the law, right? And so in order for God to have trusted Mary and Joseph with Jesus to be one who would keep the law in every way, then Mary and Joseph would have had to be those who would keep the law. Therefore, I think Joseph was a righteous man that kept the law. And so as he's looking at the situation, he knows what the law is and he holds the law in high regard.

He knows it's the righteous standard of God and he knows he has to do something. But not only was he righteous, but he was also merciful. He was merciful because he did not want to see this happen to Mary. He didn't want to see anything bad happen to her because though she had, in his mind, perhaps broken the law, she was still the one that he loved. And this is the point that John Corson got to

in his commentary that I thought that was really good. Sometimes you find people that are very righteous and sometimes you find people that are very merciful, but God desires us to be both. You see, many of us hold the law in really high regard and sometimes we hold that over people's heads. We say, this is what God says, this is the righteous standard and sometimes we like to club them over the head with what God's righteous standard is.

And then on the other end, some of us are so merciful that we never want to hold people accountable to anything. We never want to hold people to a standard. Therefore, people never truly understand the righteousness of God because only mercy is shown. But in God's eyes and in God's economy, he also is both righteous and merciful. And though he holds, what a righteous standard,

he desires mercy and not sacrifice as Jesus told the Pharisees. I think he found a pretty good combination of those two things in this man, Joseph. And so Joseph is dealing with this decision. He's weighing out the things and you can just imagine how some of the conversations went between he and Mary, right? Joseph, you just have to understand this really is what happened.

The angel really did show up. You can picture it, right? Her saying, I just wish an angel could show up to you. I wish you could have the same kind of vision that I did so that you could see me. I wish you could have the same kind of vision that I did so that you could see me. I wish you two could understand this really is what happened. You know what I think?

I can't prove this scripturally, so if you want to say it's not true, whatever. But I think Mary prayed that God would give him a vision. I think Mary prayed that God would allow Joseph to see the truth so that this thing could continue to happen. Because right now, sure felt like everything's about to fall apart. And so we go on from there because the concern

was met with comfort. Notice what it says in verse 20. But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.

Man, I love when God comes through. And that's exactly what I'm talking about. That's exactly what he does. Always, right? Like, I love that song, His Promise Still Stands. He's Never Failed Me Yet. Because that's who God is. He doesn't fail us in these situations. And God came through. God answered Mary's prayer. I believe God answered Joseph's prayer. And God showed up by sending an angel to Joseph.

Take note of the first thing that the angel says to Joseph. He says, son of David, do not be afraid. Now, I think anytime we see any messenger from God, or God himself say that to someone, we have to understand that that's the exact position that they're in. They're afraid. You see, Joseph is afraid to obey God and what the law says, but he's also afraid to be merciful.

He's gonna be afraid to do what the angel's gonna tell him to do. You see, fear is something that we deal with. Fear is driving our culture right now. Fear is driving our world right now. And quite frankly, I think it's creeping into the church a little bit. Sometimes we can get a little bit afraid. Sometimes God is calling you to do something in your life,

and you're a little bit afraid because it's gonna be hard. And it's gonna mean personal sacrifice. And it's gonna mean that life is not gonna go as pleasantly as you thought that it would. Matter of fact, it may mean some of your plans will fall apart. You know that's what obedience means, but God still is calling for obedience. And in the process of that obedience,

he wants you to know, don't be afraid. We don't have to fear all the things of the world. We don't have to fear all of the things that are going on around us. We don't have to fear what's gonna take place. With our southern border or in Afghanistan or all those other things. Why? Because God has us taken care of. When I was a little kid, I used to have bad dreams all the time.

My daughter has them now, and I'm always like, sorry. Vivid imaginations do that to you. And so I would be kind of scared to go to sleep at night because that's when bad dreams were coming. And so I remember we had to memorize verses for every letter of the alphabet in the little Christian school that I went to. And I will always remember F. Fear not, for I am with thee.

That has stuck in my head my entire life. And I think that that's kind of what the angel was doing for Joseph here. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. I'm with you. God is with you. So he says, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. Now, if I was the angel and I was delivering this message,

I would have said, you should have listened to Mary, right? Like, I mean, that's essentially what the angel says. Mary was right, right? Like, guys, how many times have we eventually said, you were right. I'm sorry, what was that again? You were right. I should have listened to you, right? Like, that's what he tells them. He says, he says, listen, that child in Mary

really was of the Holy Spirit. She was telling you the truth. Can you imagine Joseph at this point in time? How? Never really gets explained how. But I want you to think about what Joseph now has just signed on for, which is why the angel started off with, do not be afraid. Joseph has just signed on to be the father of who will always be called an illegitimate child.

He just signed on to be the father of the child where there will be whispers every time he leaves the room. Can you believe Joseph believed her story? What a loser. She just made a sucker out of him. I cannot believe he believed that that story was true. He signed on to have rumors told about him. He signed on to have whispers every time he left the room. He signed on to be ridiculed

by the people that were around him all the time. That's why the angel started off by saying, don't be afraid.

And so as he signs on for that, the angel says, you don't need to worry. The child that's in her is conceived of the Holy Spirit. But then he goes on to begin to speak to him about the importance of it. He says, she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus. For he will save his people from their sins. Jesus. What a beautiful name. The name means Yahweh is salvation.

Yahweh is salvation. That's why that's what they were to name him because Jesus would be the one who would save his people from their sins. He says, this is an important job I'm giving you. Don't be afraid because this is an important role you're going to have because this Jesus, this is the one who had been promised. This is the one who would fulfill the covenant of Abraham.

This is the one who would fulfill the covenant of David. This is the one who would fulfill the promise that God made in the garden that though the serpent would bruise his heel, he will crush the serpent's head. That's who this is. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid to take Mary as your wife. Her story was true. She's going to have a son. You're going to name him Jesus

and he will save his people from their sins. And then we move on to verse 22 where it says, now all this, all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which is translated God with us. Now, this is the first time that we see this, but it's not going to be the last time that we see this particular phrase.

Now, all this was done to fulfill what was spoken by the prophets. Remember what the goal of Matthew is. Remember what his, his goal in writing this gospel account is, is to prove to the people that God is with us. That Jesus is the king, the Messiah, the anointed one. Therefore, he brings up more Old Testament scripture to prove this. And the Old Testament

scripture that he brings up is out of the book of Isaiah, chapter seven, verse 14. It was a prophecy that was given to Isaiah that had both a near fulfillment and a future fulfillment. The near fulfillment was taken place in Isaiah's time, but the future fulfillment of Isaiah 14 was Jesus himself. The virgin shall conceive and bear a son. You see, it was miraculous.

It was something that had never been done before. That's why it was a sign because this had never taken place before. It was completely impossible. I was sharing with somebody in between the services that if you ever want to hear a good teaching on this, there's a guy by the name of David Hawking who does a teaching on the virgin birth and you'll stop it and rewind it about 300 times because you have to go, do what?

Have you ever thought about the promise that was made to, to Eve after the fall of man? Remember what happened? God told Adam, hey, work is going to suck. God told Eve, childbirth is going to be a bummer. But then God said, but all the earth will be blessed through your seed. Well, the woman doesn't produce seed. So why on earth does he say that? Because it was a foreshadowing

of the virgin birth. It was to be something impossible and miraculous that would take place. And so Isaiah gives this prophecy. Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and shall bear a son. And what are they going to call his name? They're going to call his name Emmanuel. Now I don't know about y'all, but I've never called the name of Jesus Emmanuel. I've never been like,

dear Emmanuel, while I'm praying, right? So why does it say, we'll call his name Emmanuel? Because the name would be indicative of who he was. It wouldn't be the name he would go by. It would be the character of who he is, that he is God with us. Amen. Amen. And so, and so he gives this prophecy. And so now, Joseph is going to have to make a decision. Verse 24, notice what it says,

because now we see the obedience. And so Joseph awoke from his sleep, and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a son, and he called his name Jesus. Now I appreciate this, because Joseph wakes up from the dream, right? I wonder how Joseph felt when he woke up from the dream. Right?

I don't know. I think he probably felt like a huge weight was lifted off of his shoulders. And yet at the same time, a new weight of responsibility was laid upon him. But Joseph was faced with the exact same thing that you and I are faced with every time we hear a word from the Lord. Every time we get into God's word, every time we hear a message, every time we hear something

that is directed towards us from the Lord, he has a decision to make. I can either A, ignore that, go back to doing what I was going to do, and not live a blessed life, or B, I can take the hard road of obedience and trust that God will be with me every step of the way. Friends, the same thing that Joseph faced when he woke up from that dream is the same thing you face every day of your life. What will I do today?

Will I decide that obedience is the path that I take, or will I decide I'm going to do what I want to do? I'm going to do the easy thing. I'm going to do the convenient thing. The world around us right now, continues to tell you over and over again, do the convenient thing. Do what's going to cause the least amount of waves. Do what's going to cause you the least amount of issue.

Do what's going to be easy. I'll tell you this, God has a word for all of us, and it's do the hard thing. Do the thing nobody else is doing and obey what God has to say. You may think it seems impossible. I bet Joseph thought this seemed impossible, but what prayer? He promised that he'd been given, that he would be God with us, right? And so Joseph has to make a decision,

and he, of course, makes the right decision. It says in verse 24, Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord told him, and took Mary as his wife. I kind of wonder what the conversation was like when he went back and talked to Mary. I wonder if he was like, so Mary, you're never going to believe this. She goes, let me guess, an angel? How'd you know?

Because I've been praying. I don't know if that's actually how the conversation went. That's just what I think. But I do know how this conversation probably went, is he probably said, turns out you're right. Hardest words he'd ever said. Turns out you were right. I still don't understand it. It still doesn't make sense, but it turns out you're right. And she was like, I mean, good.

So I don't know. She's a gracious girl, right? So finally, they deal with this. They deal with this whole thing. But again, I wonder when they told their parents and how that conversation went. We're never told that in scripture. But he decides to take her as his wife. Only, I want you to take note of the fact that he doesn't change the way the betrothal works.

He didn't speed things up and say, hey, you're pregnant. We may as well just go ahead and consummate the marriage and get married now and start living together, right? No. You know why? Because Joseph was righteous. And he still did it the right way. He finished the betrothal the way that he was saying. And notice that it says he kept her a virgin until after Jesus was born.

Because he was a righteous man. And he was going to do things the way that God called him to do. He was going to obey in every part of his life, even though he could have justified just about anything at this point in time. And so Joseph obeys. And notice what it says. She gave birth to a son and called his name Jesus. Very little fanfare with Matthew. Very little picture of what actually took place

in the birth. We know from Luke that it was a difficult situation. They had to go and be registered down in Bethlehem, their hometown. They had to go and be registered. And the long journey to get to Bethlehem and then getting there and nowhere to stay. And because there was nowhere to stay, they had to find a stable. And as they found this stable, the days were completed for her to give birth.

And she gave birth to a son. I'm always amazed in all of the gospel accounts that talk about the, the birth of Jesus. None of them go into any detail because it's just amazing enough to know that Jesus came down and was born as a man and dwelt among us. Now, as we wrap up this story this morning, there's four things that I think that we can learn about Jesus from these verses that we looked at here in the book of Matthew.

Four lessons about Jesus that I think that we can glean from this that I think are really important for us. Number one, Jesus knows what it is to be judged for the wrong things. Jesus knows what it is to be judged for the wrong things. We've already talked last week about Jesus's rough family tree, right? The fact that there were murderers and thieves and adulterers and incest

and all this kind of stuff in Jesus's family tree. So he knows what it's like to come from the wrong family. He knows what it's like to come from the wrong side of the tracks. But not only that, Jesus knew what it was to have rumors told about him as an entire family. He knew what it was to have rumors told about him as an entire family. To be, if you will, a part of a scandalous birth.

There's a book I'll recommend to you. It's called The Jesus Style by Gail Irwin. It's an amazing book. I've got a bunch of copies in my office. If you want to borrow it, it's absolutely available to you. But one of the things that Gail Irwin points out in his book is all of the things that caused Jesus to not really be the Savior you and I would look for. The fact that he came from this rough family tree.

The fact that he had a scandalous origin, if you will. He was from a family tree. He was from the wrong town. He chose the wrong guys to hang out with. But not only that, Jesus is literally the most common name you can think of. A lot of us don't realize this, but you and I think of the name as Jesus and we go, Jesus, right? Like I have t-shirts with the name on it

because I just love the name of Jesus. At the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue confess, right? That's what we think of. What we don't always realize is that at this point in time, the name Jesus was actually an overly common name. You see, we pronounce, the Greek version of Yahweh or of Yeshua, we call it Jesus. But the Hebrews would have called it Joshua.

So if you will, what did they name Jesus? They named him Josh. Now, if your name is Josh in here, I don't think you're a common human being at all, right? But if we're thinking about names of God and average names of guys, right? I mean, that's kind of what we're thinking. I think Jesus was the most average guy that anybody could have looked right past him.

That's why everybody referred to him as Jesus of Nazareth. Why? Because there was more than one. There were lots of them at that point in time. You see, Jesus knows what it's like to be like, what do you mean a savior? He's the most common guy I've ever seen before. What do you mean a savior? He came from the wrong town. What do you mean a savior? I've heard all of the rumors about his birth.

Do you know one of the rumors that went around that Mary would have had to deal with is that Jesus was fathered by a Roman soldier? That's one of the rumors that went around about Jesus that Mary had to deal with all the time. He knows what it's like to be misjudged. He understands what it's like to have rumors told about him. And he knows what it's like to feel like someone

who's so common that if you didn't introduce yourself, nobody would ever find you. See, I think there's many of us that feel like our lives don't matter. We're just common. Nobody even knows that we exist. I want you to know right now, God knows. Not only does he know, but he even understands how you feel. And you're not common. You're created in the image of God.

Jesus knows what it's like to be judged for the wrong things. Now these next three things have to do with the ministry of Jesus that we see given to us here in chapter 1, verses 18 through 24, excuse me, through 25. So number two is Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus is the Messiah. Take note of what it says in verse 18. Now the birth of Jesus, Christ was as follows.

The word Christ is Messiah or anointed one. Now, all of the children of Israel would have known that this Christ, this Messiah, this anointed one was particularly special. Particularly special because he was the anointed one, not an anointed one. But as I was thinking about this, I thought, so who all was anointed for different things as far as the Jewish nation was concerned?

So I came up with three of them because there are three of them. Prophets, priests, and kings. Were all anointed by God. Prophets had to be anointed by God because the anointing showed that God had put his blessing on them. Priests had to be anointed by God as well as kings. So how does Jesus fit into all of those things? Jesus fulfills all of those things.

If you were to turn right now to the book of Deuteronomy, you don't have to, just write it down. Deuteronomy chapter 18, verse 15. I can't remember if I put that up there or not. Deuteronomy 18, 15. It would say this. Moses says, After me, there will come a prophet from among his own people, him you will listen to. As Moses is giving his final remarks, his final words to the children of Israel,

he says, there's going to come another prophet. He's the one you'll listen to. He'll come from among his own people. He'll speak God's words. He's the one that you will listen to. Now we all know because this is what Bible scholars all agree on that Jesus is that prophet. He is that fulfillment of what Moses had to say. Well, what was the role of a prophet?

The role of the prophet was to explain God to the people. He would receive messages from God. Then he would deliver that message to the people. What are we told that Jesus' job was in the book of John chapter 1? Do you remember? It says in John chapter 1, no one has seen the Father at any time. But his only begotten Son, who's in the bosom of the Father, has explained him to us.

Or if you will, declared him to us. You see, what does it mean that Jesus is the Christ? Well, first of all, it means he is the anointed prophet of God who gives us the perfect explanation of who God is. Do you realize that if you ever want to wonder, if you ever ask yourself, what would God do in this situation? All you have to do is read in the Gospels and see what Jesus did

and you'll know exactly how God would react. Because remember what Jesus told his disciples? There towards the end of Jesus' life, in those last couple of weeks of his life, Simon said, we would be content if you showed us the Father. And Jesus says, oh, Simon, have I been with you so long and you don't realize that if you're looking at me, you're looking at the Father?

Because I and the Father are one. I, as the anointed prophet, perfectly explain to you who the Father is. And so he's the Christ because he's the Christ. He's the anointed prophet. But not only that, he's the Christ because he's the anointed priest. He's the anointed priest. In a couple of weeks on Wednesday night, we're going to be going through the high priestly garments

because we're there in the book of Exodus and we're talking about that. And I love going over this stuff because it all points to Jesus. Everything that the high priest wears points to Jesus. Let me give you one little snippet, okay? A little teaser. So one of the things that the high priest was supposed to do is he was supposed to wear 12 stones on his chest.

Those 12 stones represented each of the 12 tribes of the nation of Israel. Now there was one other place where the high priest was to wear stones and that was to be on tops of his shoulders. One had the names of six tribes of the nation of Israel. The other had the other six names of the tribes of the nation of Israel. Do you know what that means about the high priest?

The high priest bore the nation of Israel on his shoulders and always kept them close to his heart. What do we know about Jesus? He bears us up on his shoulders. And he holds us close to his heart. Is that not the most beautiful thing you've ever seen? Because Jesus is the anointed high priest. What was the high priest's job? The high priest was to be a mediator

between God and man. What are we told Jesus is in the book of Hebrews? He's the mediator between God and man. We no longer need a priest because we have Jesus, the anointed high priest. But not only that, kings were anointed. And we know that Jesus came as king. And when he came first time, he was the rejected king. Which is why the book of Matthew, right towards the end,

has the sign that was hung over the cross signifying the rejection of the king of Israel that said, here is Jesus, the king of the Jews. And though he came the first time as the anointed rejected king, he's coming a second time as the anointed conquering king. And my friends, our hearts had better be ready for that. I've never ever in my life thought more that Jesus could really come at any point in time now.

And that he's ready to deal with us because of the way that things are shaping up in our world. And so Jesus is the Messiah, the anointed one. Number three, Jesus is the savior. Notice what it says down here in verse 21. She will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save his people from their sin. What does he mean by he'll save his people from their sin?

Well, one of the beautiful things that we know about Jesus is Jesus doesn't do things halfway. He offers us complete salvation from beginning to end. So what does that mean? Well, number one, it means that Jesus saves us from the penalty of sin. What is our penalty for sin? The wages of sin, as it tells us in Romans is what? Death. What did Jesus face for us?

He faced death. So when Jesus was up on that cross and God had to turn his back on him, not only was all of the wrath of sin poured out, all on him physically, but he was separated from God spiritually. Therefore, he faced death for us. That's why when he cried out from the cross to tell us die, which means paid in full, that's exactly what it meant. The penalty for sin was paid in full.

And so you and I, when we come to Jesus as our Lord and savior, he completely pays the penalty for sin. But not only that, number two, he saves us from the power of sin. He saves us from the power, because you know as well as I do that the day that I got saved, it didn't mean I stopped dealing with temptation. As a good friend of mine once told me, temptation is only tempting when it's tempting, right?

Because that's what temptation is. We face that every day because we still wear a body of flesh that is still drawn towards sin. That unfortunately, as much as we love Jesus with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, our flesh still says, but I like to do things, right? I want to do the bad things. And so we have to fight against that temptation. How do we have that power?

We have that power because the same power that raised Christ Jesus from the dead, as we're told in Romans chapter 8, is flowing through you and gives you the ability to walk in newness of life as we yield ourselves not only to obedience to the Spirit, but to the power of the Spirit. We put to death the flesh and we walk in newness of life. You see, he delivers, he's our savior because he delivered from the penalty of sin. He's our savior because he delivered from the power of sin.

Oh, but it doesn't stop there. He's our savior because he will deliver us from the presence of sin. That happens the day we go home to be with him because when we go home to be with him, all of a sudden now, this body of sin that I wear that's still attracted to all the sinful things of the world, I will shed this body like an old pair of clothes and I will be clothed with a brand new body that is no longer subject to the things of this world and I will no longer deal with not only the penalty of sin, or the power of sin, but I will no longer deal with the presence of sin because Jesus saves completely. It puts a whole new spin on that verse out of Philippians.

It says, he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus because when he began the work in you, you have been saved. He's doing the work in you, which means you're being saved, but he will finish the work when he takes you home to be with him and then you will finally be saved because Jesus is our savior. And then number four, the last one, Jesus is Emmanuel, God with us. Jesus is Emmanuel, God with us.

Now, one of the truly amazing things to me is that the presence of God is with me all the time and it's because of Jesus Christ. If you were to look into the Old Testament, you would take note of the fact that many times there's an angel that's mentioned and it's called the angel of the Lord. It's always with that definite article, the, the angel of the Lord. We know, according to 1 Corinthians chapter 10, that in the wilderness wanderings and lots of other places, Jesus followed the nation of Israel throughout their time as the angel of the Lord, the commander of the armies of the Lord, right?

And so Jesus was with them, but he was only with them periodically when it was time for them to do something. But now in the New Testament, we see that Jesus was born as a man and dwelt among them. He lived among the people. He was the average guy that you would go have coffee with. He was the average guy that you might have fish and chips with, right? He was just a guy who dwelt among them.

So how does he live amongst us now? Well, he lives amongst us now because of the power of the Holy Spirit. He is God with us. Remember what he told his disciples? He said, okay, boys, here's the deal. I gotta go. I gotta go be with my father and prepare a place for you. But don't worry. I'm not gonna leave you all lonely and whatnot. I'm gonna leave a comforter for you.

I'm gonna leave a comforter for you. I'm gonna leave a comforter for you. I'm gonna leave a comforter for you. And that comforter will explain everything about me. And he will dwell in you because he will be with you. And so now God is with us through the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. But God is also with us through the presence of the Holy Spirit

in the lives of other people. I shared this story first service. When I was in Bible college, we were in a really cool worship time one night. I just remember thinking, man, sometimes I wish I could just give God a bro hug, right? Like sometimes you see your boy, you're like, hey, what up? And you give a good little bro hug. You're like, man, sometimes I wish

I could just see Jesus face to face. Give him the bro hug. And so I was like, Lord, I wish that could happen. And I'm praying and I'm on my way out. And there was this guy. I didn't really know him very well. We were acquaintances because it's a small Bible college and you know everybody. But as I'm praying this, I'm walking by and he steps out and he goes,

he gave me a bro hug. And God goes, that's how I'm with you. Now, it's through the presence of the Holy Spirit in the lives of other believers. And I thought, God with us. Because there's points in time in our lives where we don't always sense that God is with us, right? We're like, Lord, where were you then? Where have you been through all this time? There's a great David Crowder song

where he basically asks all those questions. And at the end of this David Crowder song, it goes like this. It's from the album, All I Can Say. So you can look it up on that album on your Apple Music or whatever. But at the end, it says this. It says, I didn't notice you were standing there. I didn't know that that was you holding me. I didn't notice that you were crying too.

I didn't know that that was you washing my feet. And I think sometimes that's how it is with us in our walks with Jesus Christ. As we go, Lord, I don't know where you are. But as we get through a really difficult time, it's like we can look back and go, that was Jesus the whole time. He was right there with me. Because that's who he is. He's God with us. So whatever it is that you're going through

right now, whatever thing is happening in your life right now, trust and understand that God is with you. And just like sometimes when the sun comes out, but there's clouds in the way and you can't see the beauty of the sun because the clouds are there, it doesn't mean the sun's not there too. It just means you can't see it. But God is with us.

It's one of the neatest things that I know about God. And it's one of the things that continues to give us hope. And so we know that Jesus understands what it is to have rumors told about him. We know that Jesus is our Messiah. We know that Jesus is our Savior. And we know that God is with us. And because of that, we can have a perspective. They can say it doesn't matter what's going on in the world

because everything's all right in Christ. Amen? Let's all stand.

After that, I want to make sure that you understand that I don't think things are going to get any easier in our world. I've seen what's happened in the last eight months, and that's just the first eight months. I can only imagine what's going to happen over the next three months. I can only imagine what's going to happen over the next three months. I can only imagine what's going to happen over the next three and a half years.

And so the good thing is that God is in charge, and he already knows what's happened because he sees it from beginning to end already, and we can rest in him. And so my prayer is that we keep our focus on him and that not only are our hearts right with Jesus because we don't know when that time's coming, but that we're taking that same hope to the world that's around us. Father, we come before you and just thank you for the time that we have here this morning in your word. And I just ask that you would continue to do your work in our lives.

Lord, that you would continue to do your work in our lives. Lord, that you would continue to fashion in us the hearts of men and women of God. And Lord, that you would continue to give us hope in you and the ability to share that hope with the people that are around us. Thank you for who you are, and just pray that you would continue to do your work in Jesus' name.

Amen. Be blessed. You know, Isaiah 55 talks about God's word will not return void, and then goes on to say one of the coolest things, that you'll go out with joy and be like, the mountains and the fields will break forth before you. You know, the trees of the field will clap their hands. You know, if creation can do that and praise the Lord like that, I know we kind of culturally,

we used to clap our hands when we sing a song. And if you feel like it, do it. We're going to sing a song from Isaiah 55. It goes like this.

Shall go out mountains and the hills shall break forth the feet of the field. All the trees of the field will clap their hands. The trees of the field will clap their hands. The trees of the field will clap their hands. Shall go out with joy.

All the trees of the field will clap their hands. Lord, we just pray that you'll help us to go out with that joy that only you can give, Lord. Help us to share that with people we're in contact with. Be glorified in Jesus' name. Amen.