His Name Shall Be Called

If you have your Bible, and I hope you do, turn to Isaiah chapter 9 with us this
morning. We're going to talk about four titles that are found in Isaiah chapter 9
that refer to the Messiah. So if you work outside the home, you probably have a
title. If you work inside the home, you have a title. You're a mom, you're a
housemaker, you're a homemaker, you have a title. But if you work outside the home,
you probably have a title at your job. If you have a business card, your title is
printed on that. Titles are given to employees to describe what they do. It's a
shorthand way of saying this is your job. And in the military, in particular, titles
and ranks are handed out to primarily communicate to the person who has the title
where you fit in the hierarchy of things. Who salutes whom. Some titles are
descriptive.
Being a captain communicates, it may not communicate anything to people who don't
know anything about the military, but if you're in the military, you know where a
captain ranks above a lieutenant and below a colonel. Chief financial officer
indicates to people that you oversee the finances in a business. Chief technology
officer says that you oversee the technology. So you understand how titles can be
helpful and important, and this morning I want us to see four titles that were
given to the Messiah 700 years before Jesus was born, four titles that are familiar
to us from this passage in Isaiah 9 .6, probably familiar to us because of this
passage, but also because George Frederick Handel put this passage to music in what
is maybe the second best -known selection from Handel's Messiah.
You know the Hallelujah Chorus, "But you probably also know for unto us a child is
born." That's as well known as almost any of the Messiah pieces.
And as you probably know, all of the passages from Handel's Messiah were taken
directly from scripture. So "For unto us a child is born" comes from Isaiah 9 .6.
And this verse gives us four descriptive titles for Jesus. This is the prophet
saying that the Messiah who will come, here is who He is,
here is what He'll do, here's what His titles will be. This is one of the
Christmas prophecies in the book of Isaiah. You go back to Isaiah Isaiah 714,
there's a prophecy there that says a virgin will conceive and will give birth to a
son and you'll call his name Emmanuel which means God with us. You skip ahead to
Isaiah 11 and there's a Christmas prophecy there that talks about the stump of
Jesse, that's the line of King David, the stump of Jesse which is a stump now
because there are no kings coming, there's a season when there are no kings coming,
but out of that stump will come a shoot. From the root of Jesse will come a stem.
So that's another of the Christmas prophecies. Isaiah doesn't just have prophecies
about the birth of Jesus. He has prophecies about the life of the Messiah. In fact,
some people refer to the book of Isaiah as the gospel according to Isaiah. It's
probably the most, it's the Old Testament book that points most to the coming of
the Messiah. And so these four titles that are in the middle of Isaiah 9, we're
going to see how Jesus fulfills these titles and how they pointed directly to him.
We're just going to read two verses. Let me give you the context for the verses
we're reading. Isaiah is speaking at a time when the southern kingdom of Judea.
So you remember Israel had broken into two kingdoms. So when the North was the
Kingdom of Israel and the South was the Kingdom of Judea. So Isaiah is in the
Southern Kingdom. The Northern Kingdom has already been captured by the Assyrians. The
Southern Kingdom is still independent, standing alone, but they're afraid of the
Assyrians coming and attacking them. And in Isaiah 8, we are told that the leaders
and the people of Judea, fearing the Assyrian attack or starting to look around and
say, "What can we do to protect ourselves from the coming Assyrians?" And they're
wondering about turning to pagan gods or forming an alliance with the Egyptians or,
"What should we do?" And Isaiah says, "These are people who are walking in
darkness." In the midst of the adversity they're facing, they're walking in darkness,
they're not looking to God for the answer, they're looking any place else for the
answer. And it's in this context that Isaiah says these people who walk in darkness
will see a great light. And the great light they will see is a child who is born,
a son who is given, and the government will be upon his shoulders. And God
eventually raised up in Judea a king named Hezekiah who God used to deliver the
nation. But Hezekiah was a type of the greater coming king who would be the
ultimate deliverer of his people. King Hezekiah rescued Judea from the Assyrian
attackers temporarily, God was going to raise up one like Hezekiah,
a greater king who would rescue his people forever and ever. So this prophecy in
Isaiah 9 has a short term fulfillment in Hezekiah and a longer term fulfillment in
the Messiah. So let me read these verses aloud to you. Let me pray first. Father,
again we acknowledge that we need your help.
We, as we come to your word, we come weak and frail,
and we ask for your illumination, for your enlightenment, we ask for your spirit to
be the one who teaches us, And I pray you would speak through your word to each
of us and that we would not just be hearers of your word but doers of your word.
I pray it in your name. Amen. Isaiah chapter 9,
starting at verse 6, you follow along as I read, "This is the word of God for the
people of God, for a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us and
the government will rest on his shoulders and his name will be called wonderful
counselor mighty God eternal father prince of peace there will be no end to the
increase of his government or of peace on the throne of David and over his kingdom
to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and
forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this." Amen.
May God bless this reading of his word. The grass withers and the flower fades. The
word of our God will last forever. So our focus this morning is going to be on
those four titles that are found in these two verses that are describing the child
who is coming. Let me just say, as we come into these vases,
again, as we come to this passage, this is being spoken in a time of adversity
that God's people are facing, and he says the answer to the adversity you're facing
is a baby who's going to be born. Now, most of us would not imagine that if we
had a problem facing us that a baby would be the answer. Ray Ortland in his
commentary on this passage says, "This child, this liberator who got his sending,
would not only defeat all the forces of evil, he will put a final end to conflict
itself. But who is this all -powerful new figure striding across the world stage?
through what magnificent person does the zeal of the Lord renew the world forever?
God's answer, Orlan says, to everything that has ever terrorized us is a child.
The power of God is so far superior to the Assyrians and all the big shots of
this world that he can defeat them by coming as a mere child. His answer to the
bullies swaggering through history is not to become an even bigger bully. His answer
is Jesus.
A child is born. A son is given. A child and a son,
born and given. One aspect of this points us to the humanity of the child. A child
is born. That's humanity. A son is given.
That's divinity. Whose son, the son of the father, given, not born, sent from the
father. And he's given that the child is born to us.
The son is given to us. Most of the time when we think about kids being born, we
think those kids are born to their parents. When you get a birth announcement from
somebody, this baby's been born, he is born to mom and dad,
born to that family. We don't think of kids being born to a community or to a
people. But this is a child who is born to us, according to this passage.
In fact, this is the same thing that the angel said to the shepherds on the night
Jesus was born. Remember, he said, "For unto you, shepherds, is born this day in
the city of David, a Savior who is Christ the Lord." I'm sure the shepherds were
looking around and going, is this your kid? Your kid? Unto you is born this day?
What's he talking about? This child who is being born is not just born to his
parents, he's born for the whole world. God is giving forth his son for the world.
And Isaiah notes here that this child who will be born, the son who will be given,
the government will rest on his shoulders. That means he's going to be in charge of
everything.
The shoulders, it may be that there were royal insignias that were worn on the
shoulders, that may be what this is a reference to, or just the weight of the
world being on the shoulders of the one who is governing. But in either case, this
child who is born, this son who is given, will have the weight of governing on his
shoulders. He will rule and reign. And in his rule and reign he'll be fulfilling
four titles that include in each of these titles there is a noun and there's a
modifier. There is a noun that says here's what he will be and a modifier that
says here's what kind of that person he will be. He will be a counselor,
he will be God, he will be a father, he will be a prince.
And here's what we'll see as we look through these four titles. As a counselor, he
will counsel and inspire wonder and amazement. He is a counselor who inspires wonder
and amazement with his counsel. As God, his divinity will demonstrate his power and
his might. He will be the mighty God. As Father,
His care, His provision, and His protection will be eternal, will be everlasting.
And as a prince, His kingdom will be a kingdom of peace. So that's the description,
that's the overall of these four titles that we'll see. So let's walk through them
one by one. The Messiah who is coming, Jesus will be a wonderful counselor.
Now you hear the word counselor in our day, we think of a therapist. We think of
someone you go see when you have difficult emotions or conflict in relationships or
your personal life is is overwhelming and you need someone who can give you wise
counsel. Isaiah's readers would not have had a category for therapists. In ancient
Israel they didn't have therapists. When Isaiah is talking about a counselor,
they're thinking about royalty because kings had counselors in the same way that as
a president -elect today is putting together his cabinet and his advisors, his
counselors who will be around him to offer him insight and wisdom about what course
of action he should be taking, this Messiah who is coming, will be his own
counselor whose counsel is full of wonder, who inspires wonder.
This will be counsel like counsel nobody has ever seen before. In fact,
the word "wonderful," again, we think it means, "Oh, that's wonderful. That's better
than average. That's special." This word "wonderful" means supernatural,
wonderful. When we talk about God doing something that is full of wonder, you pull
back and go, "Never seen anything like that before." It's not just above average,
it's supernatural. By describing His counsel as something wonderful, Isaiah is saying
His wisdom, His decision -making, His plans, they will be like nothing you've ever
seen before. You will see something only God is capable of with this kind of
wisdom. And of course this was worn out in the life and ministry of Jesus. When
Jesus was 12 years old, do you remember? His family had gone up for the feast and
they left to go back home and they looked around after being gone for a couple of
days and they said, where's Jesus? I don't know, I thought you had Jesus. I don't
have Jesus, I thought you had Jesus. So they all round up, they go back to
Jerusalem looking for their lost boy. And where do they find him? In the temple
conferring with the elders, the scribes, the Pharisees asking questions. And when they
get there, Luke says all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his
answers. Never seen a kid like this before. He's 12. And he's got this kind of
Insight this kind of count he knows this kind of stuff in
Mark chapter 1 at the very beginning of Jesus ministry mark says he entered the
synagogue and He was teaching and here's those who were in the synagogue were
astonished as his teaching For he taught as one who had authority not like the
scribes you sat under his teaching and you said This is different We've never had
anything like this. In John chapter 7, well, let me back up. In Mark there was a
man who was demonized, and Jesus cast out the demon, and the crowd who saw it,
they were amazed. They questioned themselves saying, "Who is this? A new teaching
with authority. He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him. And at
once, fame spread everywhere throughout the surrounding region of Galilee. Now you
jump ahead to John 7. It's one of the feasts. Jesus is there for one of the
feasts and the guards, the Sanhedrin, they send out their temple guards to arrest
Jesus and bring him in. They've had enough of Jesus. We want you to go arrest him
and bring him in. The guards come back empty -handed and they say, "Where is your
prisoner?" And the guards say, "No one ever spoke like this man." You get the
point.
One of the characteristics of the ministry was of Jesus was that there had never
been a prophet like this before. There had never been a teacher who taught like
this before. His counsel was nothing anyone had ever heard before. It was,
it inspired wonder. It caused people to pull back and go, "Who is this person.
They marveled at his teaching. He was the wonderful counselor.
One commentator says it this way, "The wonderful counselor, his every instruction is
wonderful. His opinions are extraordinary. His recommendations are impressive.
His advice is phenomenal. He's the only one worth listening to." So here's a
question for us this morning. Is that how we approach the Lord's counsel in our
day. When you read the scriptures, do you read it with eyes of wonder saying,
"There's never been any wisdom like this "anywhere in the world before." Do you see
his ways as being true and right and perfect?
When your ideas of what ought to happen don't line up with what the Bible says.
Do you think I better fix my way of thinking or do you think well I need to
adjust the scriptures here? They certainly can't mean that. We got a lot of that
going on in our day. We got a lot of people who come to the scriptures and when
something doesn't make sense to them they try to figure out a way to modify it so
it makes more sense. That's somebody saying my counsel is wonderful I need to adjust
the scriptures to fit my way of thinking. The Bible says just the opposite. God's
counsel is wonderful. You need to adjust your way of thinking to fit what His word
says.
I think today we tend to doubt that Jesus is a wonderful counselor when what Jesus
says clashes with what the world says. If we believe that Jesus is indeed the
wonderful counselor that Isaiah was telling us about 700 years before he was born.
The right response to that is to align your thinking with the wisdom of Jesus.
Do we treat God's counsel his word with reverence? Do acknowledge that he is in
fact the wonderful counselor? Do we see his counsel and his teaching and his ways
as amazing? Or do we weigh it, Consider our own insights and wisdom and think,
"Well, maybe, maybe not." The Messiah, Jesus, the one God would send to bring
deliverance, is the wonderful counselor, and he demonstrated the uniqueness and the
wonder of his counsel throughout his life. Isaiah says he will be the wonderful
counselor, then he says he will also be the mighty God. So this is interesting,
that the son who is being born, the son who is being given, would be El -Ghobor,
that's the Hebrew word for the mighty God. There's no question about what the
prophet has in view here. He is taking a name reserved for the God Most High and
assigning it to a human being. El -Ghobor, the mighty God. He will not be God -like,
"He will be God." Some have tried to make this phrase mean "mighty and God -like,"
but Isaiah uses the same phrase to refer to the God of Israel later on in the
book. In Isaiah's mind, the God of Israel is coming as a baby. When he calls him
"the mighty God," he's making that claim. The focus of the previous title,
calling him the wonderful counselor, that's focusing on his wise counsel. Here Isaiah
is focusing on his divine might, his divine power. He will be omnipotent. There is
no ruler in the universe whose might compares to this mighty God.
No one will be able to challenge his rule or his reign. Of course throughout
history Jesus demonstrated that he had the power of God in his person.
When we went through the Gospel of John a couple of years ago, it was clear, in
fact John wrote to make it clear, that Jesus' claim to be God was backed up by
his actions. The "I am" statements that he makes where he's taking the divine name
and applying it to himself, "I am the bread of life, I am the light of the world,
I am the resurrection in the life, all of these IM statements are Jesus making the
claim of divinity for himself. The Jews understood that. That's why they took up
stones to try to kill him. But he didn't just make the claim, he backed it up by
turning water into wine. Who does that? He backed it up by coming to a man who
had been lame for 38 years, lying by the pool of Bethesda and saying, "Take up
your mat and walk. And the man does it. He demonstrated it by feeding 5 ,000 people
with a couple of fish and some loaves. He demonstrated it by calming the weather.
The wind and the waves obey him. He demonstrated it by coming to a man who had
been born blind and giving him sight that he'd never had before. He demonstrated it
by standing outside of a tomb that had been filled with a body put in there four
days ago that was starting to stink and he said Lazarus come forth and Lazarus
walked out alive.
That's something only a mighty God can do.
That's El Gabor, the mighty God, the Messiah, Emmanuel, God with us.
Never get too old to remind yourself of this. "My God is so big,
so strong and so mighty, there's nothing my God cannot do for you." Right?
Let's say it again. "My God is so big, so strong and so mighty,
there's nothing my God cannot do for you." More than 40 years ago,
Scott Wesley Brown wrote and recorded a song that makes that same kind of claim.
Here's what he said, "There is no problem too big, God cannot solve it. There is
no mountain too tall, God cannot move it. There is no storm too dark, God cannot
calm it. There is no sorrow too deep, God cannot soothe it. If he carried the
weight of the world upon his shoulders, I know my brother that he will carry you.
If he carried the weight of the world upon his shoulders I know my sister that he
will carry you. This child who is born the son who is given is El Gabor the
mighty God Wonderful counselor mighty God. He's also the everlasting father.
Literally. He is the father of the everlasting He's the father of eternity. Now
we've got to be careful here because this this title for Jesus for the Messiah has
been misunderstood and misapplied by some throughout church history. There are those
who deny the doctrine of the Trinity and use this verse to try to point to the
fact that Jesus the Messiah is also the Father. So maybe you've heard of oneness
theology. Oneness theology is the idea. Here's how they say it.
They say there is one God, his name is Jesus, and he manifests himself in three
ways, as Father, Son, and Spirit. That's an ancient heresy known as modalism.
And I don't want to get too technical with you here talking about heresies, but
it's a wrong way of thinking about the Trinity. It's not that there's one God whose
name is Jesus who manifests himself as Father, Son, and Spirit. The right way to
understand what the Bible teaches us about the Trinity is that there are three
persons who make up the Trinity who are of one essence. That's the right.
Three persons, one essence. Just memorize that. Three persons, one essence. Say that
with me. Three persons, one essence. You just need to get that locked away. There
are, there's God the Father, there's God the Son, there's God the Spirit, there are
three distinct persons who are one essence. That's the idea about the Trinity. So
now when you come to Isaiah 9 .6 and you see the Messiah will be the everlasting
Father, you have to ask the question, no wait, is that saying that he's God the
Father? No, that's not what this is saying. Well if that's not what it's saying,
what does that title mean? Well I think it means two things. First of all, it
means that he is one of the persons of the Trinity who created eternity.
He's the father of eternity. So when Jews would understand the title father,
they mean the one from whom something comes forth. A child comes forth from the
loins of the father. So the father of the eternal or the father of eternity, that's
what this is saying about Jesus. All eternity originates with the Messiah.
Think about how we describe Satan as the father of what? Lies. All lies come from
his first lie. Jesus, the Messiah, is the one from whom eternity springs forth.
Jesus said that about himself when he was talking to the Pharisees and he was using
these I am statements and he made the statement before Abraham was, I am.
He said, eternity comes from me. I exist outside of eternity,
I'm the creator of eternity. There's a paradox here that a child who will be born
is one who dwells outside of eternity. Songwriter Michael Card said, "This is
eternity stepping into time."
Charles Spurgeon says, "We should not hesitate to think of the Messiah coming as an
everlasting father." He says, "It is not straining truth to say that the Lord Jesus
Christ exercises to all his people a father's part." According to the old Jewish
custom, the elder brother was the father of the family in the absence of the
father, the firstborn took precedence of all and took upon him the father's position.
So the Lord Jesus, the firstborn among many brethren, exercises to us the father's
office. He's the stand -in for the father. He's the one present manifesting the
purposes of the father. I think this title also tells us about the father, the
Messiah being a father, that he will have father -like care for those who he
delivers, that he will not just deliver his people, he will care for them the way
a father cares for his children. There will never be a time, this will be for
eternity, that the love of the Messiah for his own will go away.
There will never be a time when he does not have father -like care for those whom
he rescues. Isaiah is saying the same mighty God who rules in power is a loving
father who rules in kindness and compassion for his own just as a father has
compassion for his own. Psalm 103 says, "Just as a father has compassion for his
children, so the Lord has compassion for those who fear him. For he himself knows
our frame, he's mindful that we're of dust. The mighty God who is to be It also
has a Father's heart for those who follow Him, and He will manifest that in
compassion. Messiah is all -wise. He's all -powerful in His ability.
He always was. He always is. He always will be. He's eternal. He's the source of
eternity. He will take care of His own like a Father takes care of His children.
So wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, the last title is Prince of
Peace, the Hebrew there Sar Shalom. He is the governor or the ruler of peace.
Albert Barnes, who was a Presbyterian pastor in New Jersey in the 19th century, said
this. He said this is a Hebrew mode of expression, demoting that he would be a
peaceful prince. The tendency of his administration would be to restore and perpetuate
peace. The expression is used to distinguish him from the mass of kings and princes
who have delighted in conquest and blood. In contradistinction from all these,
the Messiah would seek to promote universal concord and the tendency of his reign
would be to put an end to wars and restore harmony and order among the nations.
He's not a warring king. He's not looking to conquer with the sword. He is a
prince of peace who will conquer with his love. But we're not just talking about a
ruler who rules in peace and harmony with neighboring nations, we're talking about a
prince who comes to restore peace when peace does not prevail in our world.
Now think about it, we live in a world that has never been characterized by peace.
There have been pockets of peace amid centuries of warring.
When you think about the history of the world, I've been listening recently to an
audio book about Ulysses S. Grant. I just heard about the Battle of Shiloh.
No, more people died in the Battle of Shiloh in the Civil War than died in the
American Revolution, in the War of 1812, the French and Indian War, combined. one
battle in the Civil War. We are immune to the fact that warring has been the way
of the world for centuries.
So to be promised a prince of peace is somebody who will come in a world that is
characterized by animosity, hostility, greed, corruption, and he will bring peace to
all of that. When I was in high school. I took an English class that talked about,
we were reading existential writers, and existentialism is that philosophy that says
you find reality and truth inside yourself. And in this class,
we started off by learning about what they called the fourfold alienation of man.
I've never forgotten this. They said man is alienated four different ways in four
different directions. We are alienated from God, our Creator, whatever you think of
that being, they said. We are alienated from one another. We are alienated from the
creation in which we live, which is decaying and breaking down. And we're alienated
from our own selves. We're at war with our own selves. Fourfold alienation. We're
alienated from God, from one another, from the creation, from ourselves. So what is
the solution to our fourfold alienation? Well, the existential writer said the
solution is admit that life is absurd and live accordingly. That's how you solve it.
It's never going to work out. You might as well just live however you want because
it's all absurd anyway. The Bible says no, there is a solution. The reason for the
alienation is the sin inside your heart. The solution to the alienation is to have
the sin in your heart dealt with by the Prince of Peace who can come and deal
with that sin. God sends the Prince of Peace who is the cure for the alienation,
who brings us peace with God, peace with one another, who will restore the creation
to a new creation one day, and who can restore a sense of peace in your own soul
when you feel alienated from yourself. He's the one who tears down the dividing wall
that separates us from one another. He's the one who offers peace in the midst of
existential turmoil. When you're anxious or troubled or fearful or depressed,
he can bring peace. Remember Jesus said this to his disciples on the night before
his crucifixion when he said peace I leave with you my peace I give to you not as
the world gives do I give to you don't let your hearts be troubled don't let them
be afraid I've said these things to you that you may have peace he is the prince
of peace we sing about it every Christmas when we sing God and sinners reconciled
That's the starting point for peace. If you want peace in your heart, if you want
peace with other people, if you want peace in our world, the starting point is
peace with God.
You start by reconciling yourself with God, you can't reconcile yourself. You start,
let me say that again, rewind. You start by being reconciled to a holy God through
the work of Christ, and from that can flow peace on earth to one another,
peace in your own soul, eventually peace throughout the world. That's the starting
point for peace. The only reason we can even experience peace is because Jesus went
to the cross, despised the pain so that we could have peace with God and be
reconciled. He is the Prince of Peace because peace is found in him.
So look back at these four titles that we've looked at. "The child who is born
will be all wise. The child who is born will be all powerful. He is a
compassionate ruler. He is the father who created eternity He is the one who brings
peace to our alienation and our conflict these four Titles not only identified Jesus
as the Messiah, but they also preach the gospel These four titles tell us what God
is doing He is coming in wisdom and power to bring peace so that we can be
reconciled. And, of course, verse 7 says, "There will be no end to the increase of
his government or of peace on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish
it, to uphold it with justice and righteousness, from then on and forevermore, the
zeal of the Lord of host will accomplish it." The one who is coming to rule and
reign will not be a temporary ruler. He will be an eternal king. His reign will be
eternal. It's a reign of righteousness and justice, both now when he reigns in us
and in the future when he puts an end to sin once and for all. And the last line
here, "The zeal of the Lord will accomplish this." It means God is passionate about
accomplishing this. He will bring it to pass, and we should be passionate about it
as well. We should be passionately telling others about the one who has come to
bring peace to our world and peace in our hearts.
Two final thoughts before we come to the Lord's table this morning. First, when God
sees that His people needs a deliverer, that they're lost in darkness, that they've
lost their way as they were in Isaiah's day, God sends them a deliverer who is a
king.
They thought what they needed was someone who would get them out of a jam. God
says, "No, what you need is someone who will rule over you." We tend to think that
what we need from God is a helper. We need a record that gets us out of the
ditch. We need an aid to assist us. God says what you need is what I will send
you, a child, a son who will rule over you. The deliverer you need must ultimately
rule over your heart and rule over your passions, rule over your appetites, your
desires. You can't have a deliverer who is not your king.
You can't have someone who rescues you who does not also rule over you. The only
way to be rescued is to be ruled over.
God did not send his son at Christmas so that Jesus would run a few errands for
you or clean up some occasional messes you make. God sent his son to rule in your
heart to conquer you, to be your king, your lord, your master.
God knows what you need better than you know what you need. You need someone who
will come to you, reveal your sin to you, deal with your sin for you, die for
your sin, cleanse you from your sin, and bring peace to your soul, the peace for
which your soul longs. You think you need your circumstances to change, God knows
your heart needs to change. So He sends a deliverer who will be a conqueror,
a king. Here's the second thing for us to remember. Isaiah tells us that this child
who is born, this son who is given, is a gift. He's given. He's given to you as
a gift. He is the greatest Christmas gift ever given. I'll close with this thought
from Tim Keller who says this. He says, "A Christian is somebody who says, 'Lord, I
wanted power. I thought my real problem was I didn't have enough money, I didn't
have enough connections, I didn't have the right relationships in my life, I'd be
happy if you changed conditions. Now I see the real problem is I'm not so much a
sufferer who needs a heavenly sugar daddy, I'm a sinner who needs a savior. I'm not
somebody who just needs somebody to deal with the problems out there, "I need
someone in here. "I need to lay down the melancholy burden of myself.
"I need to be freed from my self -centeredness "and the guilt that goes with it. "I
need to have my sin dealt with." Keller says, "This is the message of Christmas,
"and indeed it is." Pray with me, will you?
Father, we thank you that you know our need and that you have sent exactly what we
need, a child and a son whose birth we celebrate during this season,
who was sent to be the wonderful counselor, who was sent to demonstrate the power
and might of God,
who was sent as the father of eternity and who will care for us as a father
eternally and who is the one who brings peace with you and peace in our own soul.
Father, I pray this morning for anyone here who is preparing to celebrate Christmas,
who has never understood or believed this gospel.
I pray that you would this morning, by your spirit, enlighten them to see what
they've never seen before. Their need for a Savior and your gracious gift of sending
your Son to be that Savior. Rescue us, Lord, from a sentimental view of Jesus
during this holiday season.
Give us a biblical view of the one who came,
the wonderful counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.
We pray it in your name. Amen.