Turn back to Matthew chapter
one. Try to keep this a little short.
I heard Joe Terrell preach a message
the other night on Sermon Audio. He preached a radio message. And it's amazing how much you
can put in about 12, 13 minutes. He couldn't have said any more
if he had preached for an hour than what he said in those 12,
13 minutes. And I sent him a text and told him how much I was blessed
by it and how easy it flowed. And I told him, I said, I hope
I can only preach so well someday. In 12 minutes. in 12 minutes. I do remember the first time
I preached at 13th Street, I preached 10 minutes. And it took me a
while before I got up to 15 to 20 minutes. And I felt like it
was forever doing that. I just couldn't wait to shut
up and sit down. Matthew chapter one, A couple weeks ago, we looked
at the first part of this chapter, all those names, the genealogy
of Christ. And we see in that genealogy
that He is truly the Messiah. He is truly the Savior. He is
the one that God promised in the garden, the seed of the woman.
He's it. He's it. The Jews, they denied
him a lot of things. They couldn't deny his genealogy.
They could not deny his connection, his lineage to David, King David
and Abraham. They couldn't deny it. Most people
can only trace their genealogy back for a few generations. But at this time, His was traced
back for 42 generations. I was talking to Don Fortner
the other day about this, and he said, right now, they can't
trace their genealogy back early any, since they were destroyed
way back there, and all that records and stuff was destroyed.
But it was protected. It was protected until the Messiah
come. Now, after giving his genealogy,
and one of the things you'll notice that the genealogy stops
with him. It doesn't go on. It stops with
him. The reason the Lord God had it
kept so meticulous is for him and fulfilling the scripture.
Now, Matthew says in verse 18, now the birth of Jesus Christ
was on this wise, is after this matter. When as his mother, Mary,
was a spouse to Joseph, before they came together to consummate
their marriage, that's what it's saying, before they came together,
she was found with child of the Holy Ghost. He was, the human
nature of Christ was begotten of the Holy Ghost. So Matthew
starts here with his virgin birth. It's written in Isaiah 7, 14,
a virgin shall conceive and bear a son
and shall call his name Emmanuel, God with us. That's who he is. That Christ
was to be born of a virgin. First of all, God said over in
Isaiah, I'll give you a sign. This will be a sign. A virgin
shall conceive and bear a son. That's a sign. Who ever heard
such a thing? Only God can make this happen.
Nicodemus said, how can a man be born when he's old? Can he
enter the second time into his mother's womb? How can that be?
Well, here's another one. How can a virgin bear a son? There's only one way that can
happen. And that's for God Almighty to create that son in her womb,
that child. The son was given, the child
was born. It's for Him to create the human
nature of the Lord Jesus Christ. But I thought of this, Christ
in her was by the same power as Christ in you. Same power. No man had anything to do with
Christ in her womb. No more than a man has anything
to do with Christ formed in your heart. That's the power of God. That's
the work of God. Christ in you is the work of
God, is what it is. Now this happened when they were
espoused. They had already committed to
each other. They'd already signed the papers. They were husband
and wife. They had not yet come together,
but as far as the Jewish laws and stuff were, they were husband
and wife. And I see the wisdom of God in
this. God protected her name this way. What was the Jews said
about Christ? We know you, you are the carpenter's
son. He protected her. He protected
her reputation. No, He's God's Son. He's God's
Son. The human nature of Jesus Christ
was begotten by the Holy Spirit. The sinful seed of man did not
enter into His person. He was spotless. He was without
sin. He's the Lamb of God. This is
God's Lamb. He used Mary's womb to bring
forth His Son into this world, the Savior. Our Lord could not
be born of a sinful seed. If He's to be the Savior of sinners,
it has to be perfect. He has to be perfect. For God
said, God said it must be perfect to be accepted. God cannot and
will not accept anything short of perfection. And Jesus Christ
is that perfection. Jesus Christ is our righteousness. He is our acceptance. He is. Can I explain this? I can proclaim it. If I start
explaining it, I'm gonna confuse you, and I'm gonna mess it up.
We are called to proclaim the gospel, not sit around and try
to explain it, define it. And to find the life out of it
is what we end up doing. I want you to notice Joseph's
conduct here before we get into this verse 21. Then Joseph, her
husband, Being a just man, and not willing to make her a public
example, was minded to put her away privately, discreetly. He's in a real quandary here.
His wife is pregnant, and he's not the man. Do you ever realize
what a dilemma this man's in right now? You know, when the
angel appeared to Mary and told her about the Lord being born
of her and that seed in her is going to be of the Holy Spirit,
he didn't get them together and tell them. He told her a separate. And here Joseph, I can only imagine
how devastated Joseph felt when he found out his wife was pregnant. When she said, Joseph, I'm pregnant. You are. Yes. By God. Really? Really? Can you imagine? I'm just imagining it. Yes. And
he's going, really? That can't be. Now, according
to the law, he had three choices. Make a public example of her
and stone her to death. Or he could privately divorce
her and put her away. He could do this quietly. Or
he could go ahead with the marriage. He was thinking and he was going
to put her away privately. He loved her. He didn't want
to make a public example out of her. And this says volumes about his
character. It says he's a just man. And that's more than just a legal
thing about being just here. He was just in his heart. He was a man, I think, who had
tasted of the Lord's mercy. Spurgeon wrote this. When we
have to do a severe thing, let us choose the tenderest manner.
Maybe we should not have to do it at all. Joseph sought to hide what he
thought to be sin, a real evil. He thought the best of her, and
he sought the best way to deal with it. The scripture says,
love hideth a matter. This tells me how much this man
loved his wife. And now the angel appears to
him. After letting him go through this, after letting him go through
this wrestling and, how am I going to deal with this? My wife's
pregnant and that's not me. And he says, but while he thought
on these things, and I have no doubt he's been praying about
it, Lord, how am I going to handle this? So behold, the angel of
the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David,
fear not. Fear not to take unto thee Mary,
thy wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. This is of God. I have no doubt Joseph was seeking
the Lord's will on how to handle this matter. And the Lord sent
him the answer. He sent the answer. Someone said
that man who cast his care upon him will not be disappointed.
Will not be disappointed. Cast all your care upon him,
for he careth for you. We must learn to trust our Lord
under all circumstances. I think you can only imagine
Mary's relief when Joseph told her what the angel had said to
him in a dream. That the angel had appeared to
him. Boy, you know the relief that had to come over her. Good news, good news. And the angel's message was fear
not. It was a message of comfort. Those who have the Lord Jesus
Christ, if Christ is in you, fear not. We have no need to fear anything
or anyone. Now the angel, notice here the
angel called him son of David, royalty. You know, over in Isaiah
53, it says he's like a root out of dry ground. It's like
the house of David was all but forgotten. All but forgotten. It just looked like a little
root out of dry ground. Have you seen a root out of dry
ground? Cracked and scarred up and scuffed up. That's what,
that's basically the house of David at this time. But God knew
them. God knew him all the way through.
Son of David. Take unto thee Mary thy wife.
Take her home with you and take care of her and raise the Messiah. That which is conceived in her
is of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Spirit is the creator
of the sinless human nature of Jesus Christ. This tells me also here that
he is a real man like you and I, except for sin. He hungered,
he thirsted, he felt pain, he wept. He wept over Jerusalem,
he wept standing there at the grave of Lazarus, he wept. He's
a real man. He's a very real man. He said,
a body hast thou prepared me. A body in which to live on this
earth, a body in which to serve God, a body in which to keep
the law, a body in which to die, a body in which to sacrifice,
a body has God prepared me. He knew what he was prepared
for. And it says here in verse 21,
and she shall bring forth a son. And thou shalt call his name
Jesus. For he shall save his people
from their sins. That's so clear. That's so clear. The message
was a message of grace. He's gonna save His people from
their sins. That's a message of grace. It was a message of redemption,
because that's how He's gonna save them, He's gonna redeem
them. He's gonna buy them back, purchase them back. And thou
shalt call His name Jesus. You know what that name means?
That name means Savior. It can be read like this, Thou
shalt call His name Savior. Savior. He came to save sinners
chosen by the Father, given to Him to save. And it's a multitude
of sinners that no man can number. A multitude of sinners. He was
born to save. Jesus Christ was born to save. That was his mission. He said,
I came to see and to save that which was lost. I came to save. And how's he gonna do this? How's
this one man gonna save so many? How's he gonna do this? Well,
here's how he's gonna do it. In the flesh, he's gonna live
a perfect life for them. He's gonna keep God's law for
them. He's gonna stand before God for
them. He's gonna be their mediator.
He's gonna be their high priest. He's gonna be everything that
God Almighty demands for them. That's what He's gonna do. And then He's gonna die. The soul that sinneth shall surely
die. And Jesus Christ is gonna die
in their stead. He's gonna die under the justice
and under the wrath of God in their place. Now, if Jesus Christ
died in my place, if He took God's wrath in my place, I don't
have to. I do not have to. Death is a welcome thing to a
believer. It ushers us into the presence
of our Heavenly Father. He's gonna die for them. He lived
for them. He died for them. And it says
over in Romans that he rose again for our justification. He rose again for our justification. This one who is born to save
is none other than God Himself. It is none other than God Almighty
living for me, dying for me, rising for me. None other than
God. And notice here it says, He shall
save. He's not attempting to save sinners.
Jesus Christ is not attempting to get people to accept him as
their personal savior. He's not doing that. It says
he shall save them. He shall save them. It's not
a cooperative effort on my part and his part. He shall do it by Himself. He shall purge their sins by
Himself. He shall justify them by Himself. He shall make them righteous
by Himself. It's not me and Him doing it,
it's Him. He's the Savior. I'm the sinner. What can I do? What can I do? And then this name Jesus identifies
him with us. It identifies him with us. He
is our savior, our savior. He's our mediator. He is our
high priest. He was created for us. to save us from our sins. And
who's He gonna save? It says here, His people. There is a spiritual genealogy
that belongs to Him. And everyone in that genealogy
shall be saved. Everyone of them. And He's gonna save them from
their sins. They're sins, not just, listen,
not just sin, but they're sins. They're sins. Sins belong to
someone. It's not just something floating
in the air. No, sin is what I am. Sins is
what I do because what I am. And he died for our sins, to
put them away. And they're gone. In Jesus Christ,
I have no sins. They're gone. He died and put
them away. He died for their injustices. He died for their
iniquity. If you're not guilty, if you
have no sins, he didn't die for you. He died for sinners. Well, everybody's a sinner. Well,
you just find one. You just find one. It takes the Holy Spirit
to make a sinner. It takes the Holy Spirit to bring
a man to the point of saying, I'm guilty, without blaming everybody
else for it. When you quit blaming your parents,
you quit blaming the environment, you quit blaming everybody else
for it. Adam said, the woman you gave
me, that's the problem. And she said, no, the problem
is that serpent. David said, against thee and
thee only have I sinned and done this evil and I sigh. When we quit making excuses,
it's pretty good evidence that God's done something in you. When we quit blaming everybody
else, When the finger goes from this
direction back to this direction, we point at ourselves. Our Lord did not come to perform
physical healings. He did not come to set a moral
example. He came to save His people. Now, all this was done that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken of the Lord by the prophets, saying, Behold, give
attention to this, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring
forth a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel. Immanuel. Which being interpreted,
you know, I never really thought about this, but if the Gentiles
were not gonna be included, it didn't need to be interpreted.
Written in Hebrew, they didn't need to know, it's interpreted
for me and you. Emmanuel, God with us. God is with us. If I have Christ,
if I believe on Christ, love Christ, God is with me. God is with me. Here is the fulfillment
also of that prophecy in Isaiah 7, 14, where the prophet said this,
a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. Thou shalt call his name
Immanuel. Here is his union of two natures,
God and man. That's who Jesus Christ is. Jesus
Christ is almighty God. Jesus Christ is God in Genesis
1.1. In the beginning, God created
the heavens and the earth. And Jesus Christ is a real human
being. He's a real human being. He's
God who justifies and a man who satisfies. He's the man who satisfied
God's justice. The scripture says, all the fullness
of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily. And you, you who believe,
are complete in Him. You're complete. You lack nothing. Nothing needs to be added. You're
complete. I can't give you better news
than that. I cannot give you better news than that. The best
news any sinner can hear is this, Emmanuel, God with us. It could have just as easily
been written, God against us. God has every reason to be against
me. But by God's grace, God in Jesus Christ is with us. He's with us. Jesus Christ is all we need. I don't need
anything else. Don't need anyone else. I stand
in Him. You who believe, you stand in
Him perfect. Not only do you stand perfect,
you stand accepted. He hath made us accepted in the
Beloved. There's no better noose. I can't
give you a better noose than what I just gave you. That's it. And you know, I really, I can't
wait till it's over. I can stand in his presence. And the reality of it will bring such worship. And
I won't feel like I'm about to fall asleep. I won't feel like
it's just, you know, How we feel now with all this sin and flesh. But boy, to worship Him. To worship
Him in spirit and truth. To be able to do that one day.
Alright.