Sermon – Luke 2:1-20 – Ordinary and Extraordinary

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard

New Covenant Church

Sermon –  Luke 2:1-20 – Ordinary and Extraordinary

Christmas Eve 10:00 am

December 24, 2017

This is the eve of Christmas.   This is the day each year when we remember the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.   This is the day we remember that God came into the world to be with us.   
We know that God arrived because of a proclamation of the angels to a group of ordinary shepherds saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."  We will get to this extraordinary event on an ordinary day to ordinary people, but first, let’s pray.

“Grant unto us, O Lord, to be occupied in the mysteries of thy heavenly wisdom, with true progress in piety, to thy glory and our own edification. Amen.” (John Calvin)

Luke 2:1-20  NIV Luke 2:1 In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world.  2 (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.)  3 And everyone went to his own town to register.  4 So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David.  5 He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.  6 While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born,  7 and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.  8 And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night.  9 An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.  10 But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  11 Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.  12 This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."  13 Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,  14 "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."  15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."  16 So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger.  17 When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child,  18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.  19 But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.  20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

In our Christmas story, we have some shepherds.   They were doing very ordinary things.   They were doing what shepherds do, “living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night.”  Shepherds have done this for thousands of years since we began raising animals.   A young David had lived in this field a thousand years before Jesus was born.   For the shepherds, it was just another ordinary day.

Also in our Christmas story, we have a young couple with a newly born baby.  They too were doing very ordinary things.  The mother “gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn.”   There were no maternity hospitals two thousand years ago.   Women had babies wherever they happened to be.  They might have a baby out in the field, or maybe in a barn with animals.   They might even use a feeding trough or manger as a makeshift cradle for the baby.    Giving birth this way was very ordinary, nothing special.  

We all know what it is like to live an ordinary day.  Every day I wake up around 6:30.   I shower and have breakfast.  At 7:30 Grace and I read the Bible together.   Then I come to the church to read and write, I visit people and go to meetings.   Along the way, I eat lunch.   I usually go home for dinner, and then either rest or come back to the church for a meeting or Bible study.   I live many ordinary days just like this.  

But some days are extraordinary.    We remember days when we got married or when a child was born.   We remember graduations and first jobs.   And we celebrate the anniversary of our birthday every year.   We have many ordinary days and a few extraordinary days now and them.

One character in our Christmas story had an extraordinary day.   This was Caesar Augustus.  Caesar was the most powerful man on earth, leading the Roman Empire.  He wanted to demonstrate his great power to the world by forcing immigrants, living all over his empire, to return home and be counted.  Though this extraordinary event Caesar hoped to demonstrate his power to the world.  His motivation was to be glorified.   He wanted to receive the glory that comes with a display of supreme power.  Caesar wanted fame, recognition, honor, and prestige.

We would expect that God would also glorify himself with an extraordinary display of power.   Maybe a savior would come leading an army of angel warriors to bring the Kingdom of God from heaven to earth.  An extraordinary event like that would certainly bring great glory to God.  God too would receive fame, recognition, honor, and prestige. But that is not what God did.  Rather than sending a mighty warrior leading the angelic hosts God sent a newborn baby and an angel choir singing, "Glory to God in the highest.”

The Glory of God came not to extraordinary Caesar leading the Roman Armies.    Rather it came to some ordinary shepherds in a field and a young couple who had just given birth.  They saw the Glory of God shining in its magnificent radiant splendor.  The Glory of God comes not to the extraordinary but to the ordinary.

This is good news for us.   We will experience the Glory of God during the ordinary moments in our lives.   God will come to us in our ordinary daily prayers.   God will come to us in our ordinary Sunday worship.   God will enter into our ordinary lives with an extraordinary gift.   The Christmas gift we receive from God is nothing less than, “peace to men on whom his favor rests."   Caesar forces us to obey his will.   But God comes into our lives with the message of peace on earth.

When the Glory of God entered into the ordinary lives of common shepherds they felt a call to leave their fields and go into town to find this savior the angels were talking about.   I have experienced that same thing.   As God came into my life I found myself desiring to know more and more about him.   I took as many classes at church as I could including the Bethel Bible Series.  Then I went to seminary.   And now I spend as much time as I can getting to know this savior who came at Christmas.   My prayer for you is that you too will experience the Glory of God coming into your lives this Christmas.   And as you experience God’s glory for yourselves I pray that through my preaching and teaching your desire to know more about God will be filled.

After encountering Jesus, the Shepherds experienced another call.   They felt God calling them to tell others what happened.   My guess is that they went back to the field and woke us the other shepherds with an extraordinary story of God’s Glory coming into our ordinary world.  As they shared their testimony other shepherds began experiencing God’s glory for themselves filling them with a desire to know more and more about God.  My prayer is that all of us will leave here today with a desire to tell people about Jesus to fill them with God’s glory in their ordinary lives.

The Glory of God also came to an ordinary person named Joseph. Joseph just obeyed the rules.   He did what he was supposed to do.   He went to Bethlehem as the government instructed.   He took care of his wife to be as he was morally obligated.    He did what he was supposed to do and the Glory of God entered his life.   We can expect this too.   As we do what we have to do day by day expect the extraordinary as God comes to interrupt our lives.   

There is another person in the Christmas story.  Her name is Mary.   Mary was an ordinary young woman who had just given birth.   But she was also the extraordinary young woman chosen by God to bear his Son.  After nine months of angelic visits, consultation with family, travel to Bethlehem and giving birth she lay exhausted in a bed of hay.   She was in no condition to go and tell anyone anything.    All she could do was to “treasure (d) up all these things and ponder (ed) them in her heart.”  She kept all that had happened to her in her memory.

And this is my hope for you this day:  That the Glory of God would come into your ordinary lives and you will remember and ponder what happens.   Christmas is not an ordinary day.  Christmas is an extraordinary day when God himself decided to come here to be with us.   

So the Glory of God came on an ordinary day to ordinary shepherds, an ordinary man just doing what he was supposed to do, and an ordinary mother giving birth.   Everything seems pretty ordinary in this story.   But there is one more extraordinary character in the Christmas story.  His name was Jesus.  According to the Angel messengers who said, “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  11 Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.  

This extraordinary baby came to bring the Glory of God to all people on earth.   He has come to save us from the evil one, forgive our sin, and promise us eternal life.    This baby is the anointed one, the descendant of King David who the prophets had foretold.  And he was the son of the living God.   The Glory of God came as an extraordinary baby into an ordinary world.     

Angels announced his birth.  Shepherds spread the good news.   Joseph did what he was supposed to do.   Mary pondered all this in her heart.   And Jesus, the Glory of God, was born.   Let’s pray.

Father in heaven prepare our hearts for the coming of a savior this Christmas.    Let your Glory come into our ordinary lives.   And lead us to proclaim the extraordinarily good news of your coming to an ordinary world.   This we pray in the name of your newborn son, our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.