Good evening church, it's good to see you. So we are going through Isaiah 9 tonight, so if you'll flip back there with me in the copy of your scriptures. I think it's page 573 if I wrote that down right in that Bible in front of you. So as I was reading through this passage for the first few times, I kept thinking of a clip from the Batman movie, The Dark Knight Rises, if anyone's seen that before. So it's the Christian Bale, I think it's the latest Christian Bale Batman movie. And at one point in the movie, he's found in this prison, which is basically this huge hole in the ground. And there's a way to get out. You can get out by climbing up these protruding rocks out of the wall. But he can't do it. He keeps trying, he continually keeps failing. So when he's reached literal rock bottom, he gets a message of hope from the other prisoners with him. So they give him a message of hope, and the message is that someone has done this before. This is not impossible. And of all the people that have gotten out of this prison, the one person to do it was a child. And so the movie creates this amazing sense of awe and mystery for who this child was. Like this child could do something even the great Batman couldn't do. Well, that movie relates to our passage in two main ways today. So the first way is that the Israelites find themselves in a dark, dark pit, similar to the one that Batman is in. And then the second point is that the Israelites' hope is through a child, in the same way that it was in the movie. Now in the movie, the child rises out of the darkness into the light. But in our passage, we're going to see a child enter into the darkness and he himself be the light that comes into the darkness. So in our passage today, we're going to look at the child who is the light of the world come to bring joy, liberty, and peace to all who believe in him. We're going to do that by first walking through this passage, and then honing in on the child in particular, and then talking about those three results or benefits of the child coming. So if you'll look with me in the copy of your scriptures, we're looking at verse 1, so chapter 9, verse 1. You see a but initially there. Whenever you see a but in the Bible, you know that it's contrasting what comes before it. So we've gotta look at the end of chapter eight to kind of understand contextually what's going on. So if you look up into chapter eight, we see that there are a group of people that are inquiring of mediums and necromancers for their hope. So they're inquiring of mediums and magicians for their hope. They've turned away from the Lord and that's what they're seeking. And because of that, so in verse 21, they pass through the land, greatly distressed and hungry. And at their hunger, they turn their faces up toward their king and their god in anger. And then when they look back down to the earth, verse 22, behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish. And it goes from bad to worse. So, and they will be thrust into thick darkness. So for a group of people that have turned away from the Lord, they are experiencing deep, deep darkness. And for experientially, we know that the worst form of suffering is a hopeless suffering. So we've all been in situations that were really, really hard, but if you had a hope, it was bearable. We know that the worst circumstances are when you feel hopeless, when you feel stuck in darkness. And this group of people have turned from the only source of hope. So they are in the deepest form of darkness. And that's when we come to the but. So but in verse 1. But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. So her is also referring to another group in chapter eight. And those are a group of people that are still trusting in the Lord and waiting on him for their hope. So for her, they were also in darkness, but they have a hope. The gloom will be released from them. So both groups experience that, but one has a hope and one doesn't. And this hope, as we keep walking through our passage, in verse two, is described as a great light. So the people have seen a great light, the light on them is shown. And then as a result of this great light, the people have joy, which is verse three, they have liberty, which is verse four, and they have peace, which is verse five. And all of those results are going to come through verse six, the child's to come. And that child of his government and peace, there will be no end. And then finally, verse seven concludes by saying, all of this will be brought about by the zeal of the Lord of hosts. So the Lord is going to bring a child, and that child will bring joy, liberty, and peace, and that child will be light in the darkness. That's kind of what this passage is drawing us all the way through. Now if anyone is skeptical about who this prophecy is referring to, we just sung that hymn, what child is this? So this is someone that will be a source of great light. It is someone that will be in the line of King David, whose reign will never end. It is someone who is called Mighty God, who will bring joy, liberty, and peace to the world, and will have a particular impact on the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, which is also called Galilee. So who is this child? Who are we talking about? This is one of the clearest prophecies in the Old Testament about Jesus. We are talking about Jesus. And if there were any doubt about that, Matthew in his gospel in chapter 4 shows that Jesus did most of his ministry in the region of Galilee to fulfill what this prophecy is talking about in Isaiah 9. So it's a super cool illustration of 700 years before Christ came. This is a super clear picture of who he was going to be. As a point of clarification, you might be kind of confused by this, I was. Isaiah here speaks of a future event, but sometimes he uses past tense verbs. So if you saw that, people walked but they have seen a great light. So it's acting as if they've already seen it. So Isaiah is so certain that God will do what he has said he will do, he can speak of it as if God has already done it. So he's so certain of the sovereignty of God that he can speak of a future event as if it had already happened. And so he does that here in our passage. So now that we've been through the overview, I want us to hone in particularly on verse six, which is the child to come. If you remember nothing else from this sermon, go home and read verse six until it warms your heart. I mean, it is an amazing verse. To us, a child is born. To us, a son is given. So our English version there really emphasizes the to us aspect of it. But in the Hebrew it's interesting, in the Hebrew it actually emphasizes the child. So the Hebrew reads as a child born to us. Which is an interesting thing that the author is doing there and I think it relates well to that dark night clip. That they're both emphasizing that this was a child. All these things are coming through a child. Now why would that be the emphasis? Why would the emphasis be on a child here in Isaiah? Because all throughout the Old Testament, God has promised that his salvation is going to come through a child. It's going to come through a seed, through an offspring. So if you remember right after Adam and Eve sinned, God promises that out of the offspring of Eve, he will crush Satan. So evil will be destroyed from the seed of Eve. And then in Genesis 12, Abram is told that the blessing of the nations will come in his offspring. And then later on, David, so David is told that a king, a son in his line, will establish an everlasting kingdom. And then lastly, maybe even most clearly, two chapters earlier in Isaiah, and Isaiah is that famous passage where it says a son will be born to a virgin named Emmanuel, God with us. And so a child is emphasized because God, all throughout the Old Testament, has promised that salvation is going to come through a person. It's going to come through a son, through a child, through a seed. Now, even though the emphasis in the Hebrew is not the to us, it's the child, the to us is still really important, right? The child is given to us. As a reminder, that to us is referring to the true remnant in Israel, so the people that were continually hoping and waiting on the Lord. And today, we can include ourselves in this to us if we trust in the same Lord. So the Jesus that they trusted in that was coming in the future, we trust in the same one on the other side of history. And if we trust in him, we can include ourselves in the to us and claim all the benefits and promises and results that come from that child. I love this truth displayed when we take communion. So when the minister holds out the bread and says, the body of Christ given for you. I think sometimes it's easy to think that Jesus was just kind of on this mission to earth and then thought to himself, oh, maybe I'll save some humans while I'm here. It's like, no, his main mission, his main goal was to come for us. He took on our flesh. He didn't take on anyone else's flesh. He didn't take on any animal's flesh or any other angelic beings. He took on our flesh. He came for us. There's an incredible intimacy here with this passage that the Son of God came for us. And that should penetrate our minds and our hearts that God would do something like that for us. A people that are naturally in darkness and deserve to be there. That God would do something like that for us. So the greatest gift as we rally around the tree next week at Christmas, the greatest gift is the fact that God has given his one and only son for us. And that's an amazing truth that should never get old for us. And that child shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. So he gives the best wisdom. He is God in the flesh. He acts toward us in fatherly ways, and then he is the ultimate peacemaker in our lives. So in this last section, I wanna walk through the three benefits or the three results of this child coming. And the first one is in verse three, and that is joy. So if you look there with me. They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. So picture the harvest. You've spent all season toiling the field, kind of working in the field, doing everything you need to do, planting the seeds. When the harvest finally comes, what joy, right? You're just reaping the reward. Well, the story of Christianity is that we get to reap that reward, but we didn't do any of the work. Right, Christ did all of the work in the field and we just get to enjoy what he has done. How much greater joy for that situation when we can do the work and we get to reap what was sown for us. And so much has been made about the church's call to be loving, rightfully so, we should be loving. I don't know if enough has been made of our call to be joyful. So 1 Peter talks about the salvation of our souls should kind of foster in us an inexpressible joy. Joy that you can't even express, like you can't express, it is so deep rooted in us. And so when people say that we are joyful, our church corporately, when visitors come in, do they remark, man, these are a deep-rooted, joyful people in the Lord. And yes, joy is going to look different based on our season of life and potentially even our personality, but we should all be deeply-rooted, joyful people because of what this child has done for us. bringing us out of deep, deep darkness and into his marvelous light. So let us be a joyful people because we have hope, we have purpose, we have meaning. We don't have to get bogged down in the things of this world as much as others would because we have such a source of hope and light in our lives. So that's the first one. The second one is verse four, and that is liberty or freedom that Jesus brings. So verse four talks about burdens being lifted, so the rod of his oppressor being broken. We're not entirely sure what situation in particular this is talking about in Israel's history, but we can confidently say this is talking about a foreign power, so a foreign power, their bonds being released from the Israelites. But it's also deeper than a foreign power. It's also spiritual. Because we know from the New Testament, we're called slaves to sin. So we have a spiritual bondage as well as a political one, and the Israelites would have had the same. And so in a political sense, a new king to come reigning in justice and righteousness forever is incredible news for Israelites who didn't see very many kings like that. And also the fact that this king is going to reign forever and have a stable nation. Again, it's incredible news for Israelites who constantly had the flux of kings and foreign powers coming in and taking over them. This is amazing news for them. And for today, for people that live in countries that have oppressive regimes, this is hope for them. They might not ever have political freedom in this life, but they have a guarantee in Christ that they will live in political freedom in all eternity under the best king. So this is great news politically, but also spiritually. So if you live in the freest country in the world, Switzerland, case you're wondering, it's the freest country in the world. If you live there, that doesn't necessarily mean you have true freedom. Because there is that spiritual sense. And Jesus frees us from both of them. And he did it by taking on that burden himself. He fulfilled the law on our behalf and paid the penalty that we owed so that he might free us from the burdens that were over us. There's no way we could obtain that on our own, which is illustrated really well in the last reference in verse four to the day of Midian. So the day of Midian refers to a scene from Judges 6 and 7 and it's honestly kind of a comical scene. So Midian is being, Midian is severely oppressing Israel and God raises up Gideon to help them. And what happens is Gideon has 300 soldiers with him. They're carrying trumpets, empty jars, and torches. And they go up to the thousands of Midianite soldiers and literally all they do is blow their trumpets and drop the glass jar. And then the Midianites freak out. They like turn their swords against each other and they flee. And so the moral of that story is that the people, the Israelites didn't do anything. That was solely won by the Lord. Blowing trumpets and dropping empty jars isn't gonna defeat thousands of soldiers on your own. And it's the same with us, that our freedom comes solely from God. We don't do anything in order to obtain it. So for my skeptics out there, if there are any, you might be hearing, okay, Jesus brings freedom, he brings liberty, but aren't there a lot of restrictions in the Christian life? Aren't there a lot of things that you're not allowed to do as a Christian? How is that freedom? How is that liberty? So first I would say you have a little bit of a point. In Matthew 11, Jesus says, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. So Jesus tells us to give our burdens to him and he will give us rest. But he still says, take my yoke upon you. So there is still a yoke and a burden to be taken in the Christian life. Yes, it's easy and it's light, but it's still a yoke. It's still very much a yoke and very much a burden. Like we are not free to do whatever we want to do in this Christian life. And Tim Keller has a great quote on this topic. He says, freedom is not so much the absence of restrictions as much as it is finding the right restrictions, the liberating restrictions. So I grew up in a theological tradition where we say that the Sabbath was fulfilled by Jesus. So you no longer have to observe the Sabbath day, you can work on Sunday. And so when I came into Presbyterian reform circles and people told me I can no longer do some catch-up work on Sunday afternoon, it's like, you gotta be kidding me. Like, this is really restrictive. Because if you can't do it on Sunday, when are you gonna do it? You're telling me now on Saturdays I have to do work because of this Sabbath law? So I've been in these circles for four years, since I've been observing the Sabbath. It is so freeing, right? It is so restful. I have never once thought, man, I wish I was working today. It's an amazing restriction. It is a freeing restriction, as much of a paradox as that sounds. So in the Christian life, yes, we have restrictions, but they are freeing. They are for our ultimate freedom. And so Jesus removes the burden of the law so that we might live in the blessing of the law, so that we might know true freedom in him. So the last point, Jesus brings peace, which is verse five. So Jesus is the Prince of Peace. He is the ultimate peacemaker, not only between God and man, but also between Jew and Gentile. I love that Christmas, peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinner reconciled. So in our passage, verse five, uses military language to teach that war will cease with the coming of this king. There will be no war in heaven because Jesus' kingdom is a kingdom of peace. And it's ultimate peace and rest for our souls. Again, what an amazing truth that there is ultimate peace and tranquility in Jesus. Because he has brought us peace, he calls us to be a people at peace, and he calls us to be peacemakers out in the world. So there's a way that looks like being a peacemaker that's not at all. So someone that hates conflict, just wants to do whatever they can to avoid conflict, may look like a peacemaker from the outside. They're not, they're simply a conflict avoider. Sometimes when we want to be a peacemaker, that means we have to step into situations, we have to step into conflict as opposed to running from it. Like peacemaking can be really, really costly. And those of you that have broken up a fight before know this, right? When you step in between two people that are fighting, you know there's a very real chance you get popped in the mouth stepping in there. Or if you decide, I'm gonna help out with the people struggling relationally, I'm gonna step in and be a peacemaker. There's a very real chance they both turn on you and you end up being the bad guy. And look what Jesus had to do to be a peacemaker. He had to go to the cross ultimately and die a death so that he might make peace. So peacemaking is costly but it's worth it. So Jesus again in the Sermon on the Mount says, blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children of God. It's hard but it is the most blessed way to live to be a peacemaker. And so in our families this Christmas, in our communities, in our workplaces, let's not run from conflict. Let's also not be the people causing the conflict. Let's be peacemakers. Let's step into hard situations and take some shots in the name of Jesus if we have to. And hopefully people will see the way that we patiently and boldly seek to make peace and they will wanna glorify our Father in heaven because of it. So in closing, this Christmas season, let us be in awe of this child Jesus, who gave everything for us, who entered into our darkness, put on our flesh, so that we might have light, so that we might have joy, might have freedom, and might have peace in his name. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we lift your name up tonight, Lord. We just pray that as families come together over this next week, God, that your name would be lifted high. God, that family traditions would point to you, that relational problems that we all have, God, would be eradicated, and your peace, your joy, and your freedom would be on display in our families, God, and in our church. Would you move this week, God, would you move in our hearts? Would you use us in the places in which you have put us, God? And would we rest in you, knowing that you are an amazing king? Father, we thank you for who you are. In the name that we pray, amen.