OPENING ILLUSTRATION:
I remember the day I became a father for the first time.
Jenni had been in labor for quite a while. The monitor on Peter kept showing his heart rate drop to almost nothing, they would roll Jenni over on her side to get it to come back up. What we didn’t know was that the umbilical cord had been around his neck. We would find out soon. As he came out, his body was blue and limp. I will never forget the doctor pulling him out and holding his little body. It was that moment I became a father, because in that moment I felt a wave of fierce pulse through my body I had never felt. It took everything in me to hold me back from grabbing that doctor, shaking him, and forcing him to fix this. That’s all that kept running through my head, “fix this, fix this…”
From the earliest moments in the story of God there has been a voice whispering, “Fix This, Fix This…”
We’ve heard the echos of this throughout the story, whether it’s Adam and Eve eating the fruit and God sacrificing an animal to cloth them or it’s God calling to Abram to be a blessing to all Mankind or God reaching back out to humanity through Moses and the Jewish people.
Over and over again God has been rumbling towards humanity and over and over again humanities heart beat drops as we turn away from God.
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And God has been whispering “Fix This, Fix This…”
Listen, I know for some of you the idea of a good Father is a messed up idea
But surely you knew someone who had a Father that you wished was your Father.
The kind of person who was fun, loving, kind, fiercely strong, but unyieldingly gracious.
Good Fathers will do anything to rescue their children…
Can I read to you the Father’s rescue story for us?
[shut off all lights in the room except a very soft spot light on Kent in center of stage – almost no light]
John 1:1-18 (NIV)
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome[a] it.
John looks at the story of humanity and he takes us back to where it all started
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“In the beginning…”
This is how the book of Genesis starts “In the beginning the earth was void and formless and the spirit of God hovered over the waters…”
John says at the beginning, the creative force of God was His word and that word was God and was with God.
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it…
ILLUSTRATION:
I love going to tour caves. Jenni and I went and did the underground kayaking at the gorge a while back. Have you done that? They are floating us around in this giant cavern with HUGE fish, next time I’m bringing one of those pocket fishing poles ;). But all of the sudden they turn off the lights and you are just floating in pure pitch black – the kind that’s thick. You could put your hand in front of your face and not see a thing.
Darkness is pretty powerful, it’s scary, it’s disorienting
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But no amount of darkness can overcome even the smallest bit of light…
The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.
“But Kent, what does this have to do with the story of God? What does this have to do with a Father rescuing?”
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It’s everything!
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John starts takes us back to Genesis because that is where the story began and went off the rails. It’s where sin entered the world. It’s where darkness took over.
Listen
9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
ILLUSTRATION:
I know some of you don’t know the bible super well and that’s ok. But what John is telling us is the story of Christmas. He’s telling us of the time when God Himself came into the world… “The word became flesh”… Remember the word is the creative force of God – it is God.
And God became Flesh and made his dwelling among us.
The word in the Greek for “made his dwelling” is literally, “pitched a tent” among us…
God saw the predicament we were in due to sin entering the world.
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We had abandoned a relationship with God and were paying the penalty for it – death, the sting of sin.
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And He came to rescue….
He came to fix it..
I know lots of you weren’t here when we talked about Adam and Eve, but Adam and Eve weren’t just eating a fruit because they were hungry. The lie they were eating was that they could be like God, that the didn’t need Him anymore, they could be in control of their own destiny. The problem was, when they took that gamble, they lost everything. They abandoned their relationship with God and death entered the world.
Did you hear what John said about this word that became flesh, flesh like you and me? He said that when God came into the world, that light came into the darkness…
[all lights come on]
Even though those who should have known him didn’t receive Him, to those who do, to those who believe in his name, he gave the right to become children of God..
Jesus came to rescue you from the story of mankind and allow you to enter into the story of God.
He came to “fix this…”
CLOSING:
That day with Peter, the doctor holding his little lifeless blue body. I was screaming inside, holding myself back from beating the doctor up and shaking him till he fixed it. The doctor took a rag and rubbed Peter’s body hard. All of the sudden the most beautiful sound in the world happened. This little baby’s body responded and he gasped for breath and let out a blood curdling cry. Some of you are dead in your sins this morning. You have been chasing the story of mankind over the story of God your whole life. “I’m in charge” “I can fix this on my own” “I don’t need anyone” But what you don’t know is it doesn’t have to be clawing, scratching, and fighting. You have a father that came to rescue you. This morning, I’m here to rub you and rough your soul up to try and get you to take a breath and live! God came down to rescue you. He answered your prayer of “God, if you’re real, why don’t you come down here and show us?” The problem is, you just don’t live during the time when He did it… God pitched a tent in the world and He did it for you. So he could bring you back into a relationship with God. The way you do this is by believing in His name – that means becoming intimately involved with Him, loving Him, accepting His leadership in your life.
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Jesus – Jesus enters the world to redeem and restore all of this story of God and to start writing a new story in your life, one that will change all of eternity. He is the perfect representation of God and He came to bring all of mankind out of the delusion of sin and death
Hebrews 1:3
3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.
John 1:1-18
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome[a] it.
6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
15 (John testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’”) 16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and[b] is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.
