This morning, as I read from God's word, from the gospel of Luke, in it we see birth of our Redeemer, the rejoicing of the angels, even as they visited this earth with their glorious song, and the calling of the shepherds to come and see what the good shepherd of all souls will do as the king born of men. Luke chapter two, beginning in verse one. And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This census first took place while Quirinus was governing Syria. So all went to be registered, everyone to his own city. Joseph also went up from Galilee out of the city of Nazareth into Judea to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem because he was of the house and the lineage of David. to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. So it was that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn. Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night, And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid. And the angel said to them, do not be afraid. For behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people, for there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you. you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly hosts praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, goodwill toward men. So it was, when the angels had gone away from them into heaven, that the shepherds said to one another, let us now go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us. And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the babe lying in a manger. Now when they had seen him, They made widely known the saying which was told them concerning this child, and all those who heard it marveled at those things which were told them by the shepherds. But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. Then the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen as it was told them. Thus far the reading of God's word, you may be seated. Let me pray now for the blessing of the preaching of God's holy word. Lord, we come to you this morning, and our hope is that through the meeting with you, through your word preached, that we would marvel again, as we have countless times in the past, in meeting with you, our holy God. And though we have not seen angels, though we have never received a message quite in this fashion, your word has gone out to the nations. And by your own mighty power and saving arm, you are winning the nations for Christ. For even as the crown rights of King Jesus take over this world, It is right for us on occasion to come back to the place where for us as men, and for you as a man, it began. Born of a woman, conceived by the Holy Spirit, in humble human form, Jesus, the Messiah, the Lord, Yahweh, wrapped in flesh, came and died that we might be forgiven. Lord, may we not graduate from these simple things, but may we, like Mary, lay them up in our hearts as the very means of our hope and the message that will alone transform people to salvation. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. If there was ever a text that we are all familiar with, it is this one. It is the chronicling of the birth of our Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ. We see in it the preface in the context of the situation in which Israel was already, again, invaded and taken captive, as it were, by another foreign nation. This is a long, sad, repetitive cycle for a people who had, time and time again, been promised freedom and deliverance had they kept covenant with God, but they had not. And like times past, like the generations of Israelites before, through their disobedience, God gave the land into the hands of their enemies. And as we read even in the book of Judges, God in his mercy time and again raised up deliverers, but there was something distinct about those deliverers and this deliverer, Samson, was born of a man and a woman. Samuel, though born in miraculous circumstances, was born of a man and a woman. David and others all had a father and mother born of natural generation, all of whom had a father in Adam. question would be, how would God do the thing he promised he would do in Genesis chapter 3? How would he deliver his people through the crushing of the head of the serpent? How would he quiet his own wrath against them as sinners? And all of this is answered here in the Gospels revealed to us, and in particular, the story of Christ the Redeemer. And it is in these days we read in Luke chapter 2 when the authority of Rome was felt by census and taxation, that Christ was born in a very different kind of circumstance, not an emperor decreeing from his throne, but a king leaving his home in heaven, taking upon himself flesh, humbling himself to the point of obedience, even to death. We see even here two types of kings, and for that reason, two different types of people. That's what I wanna focus on this morning under three headings. You ready? The taking human king, or maybe you could even say the taxing human king, the giving cosmic king, second point, the giving cosmic king, and then thirdly, a new kind of king possesses new kinds of subjects. A new kind of king possesses new kinds of subjects. Let's look at the first point, the taking or taxing human king. Now we know much of the history of Rome. It's apparently at some point this year we were told that every man thinks about the Roman Empire at least once a day. Have you heard this rumor? Think of the power and the might. There are many benefits. There are many developments in that ancient, great historical empire, but the empire, like all empires of men, waste away and they become nothing. And this is because they are human institutions. Though they are derived from God, all civil authority is, and given by God to govern men, to uphold righteousness, to punish the wicked, oftentimes what happens, certainly, in the formation of pagan empires is the coming to power of pagan men who wield that power wickedly. At the very least, they're human in the wielding of their power. At the worst, they are tyrants, they are wicked, and they are a burden. Now, what I want to focus this morning on is not just the sort of presence of a wicked king, but the reality of all kings. In the beginning of chapter 2, we read in verse 1 and 2, it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. It's a census. How big is Rome? In fact, in the Old Testament, we find King David doing this, and he is rebuked by God for the reason for which he did it. You could say that the whole book of Numbers is God doing this very thing. The distinction is God gets to think about His power righteously because He is the King of heaven and earth. It is not immoral or unvirtuous for God to look around and say, man, look at all that I've done. But we see this weakness in men. We would say that it comes from a heart of pride. Now, I'm not saying that all taxation is inherently immoral. I think we can rightly draw the line somewhere. The point that I'm not making this morning, though, primarily, is that this census and registration and therefore the coming taxation of the citizens, not all were citizens, but the people who belonged to and used the roads of Rome and all of these various civil services, they were taxed. The point that I wanna make is this. that all human authority derives its power from others. And so there is a bit of a misunderstanding even today in a large state system that the government produces things. The government doesn't produce anything. The government takes from its citizens that which funds it that which it authorizes and establishes its authority. And so if all of a sudden every US citizen said, you know what? There are not enough prisons in this country to house us, we're done paying taxes. What would happen? Well, the government would shut down. Now, I want you to see this as inherent in all human relationships between superiors and inferiors, that this is how all of human life works. Revolt, destroys authority. And that all authority, ultimately, whether it is by compulsion or it is voluntaristic, scare quotes, is required in order for anyone to have consistent authority. And that, I think, is the distinction that Luke is painting here. This is not just historical context, though the historical context is essential. There is a polemic. There is a point here. While one king taxes, while one nation has invaded another nation, the king of all nations is born. There is irony here. There is contrast that Luke is injecting into this gospel story. Caesar Augustus, emperor of all the world. Now we know that that's not true. Rome was the center of the world in every respect, but there were lands that lay far beyond the grasp of the Caesars and of Herod and all of these other political figures The world? Even here, there's a little, in my opinion, a little dig that while the king of all the world is being born in a stable because there's no room in the inn, the supposed emperor of all the world is establishing his power in the ways that men must. They must. In order to have an organization, you must have a census, you must have a tax, you must do all of these things. There must be monies flowing into the capital, whether it is a federal capital or a state capital, or it's just a local magistrate in a county. The power of men is contingent upon other men. And for this reason, your power is limited. And we have to live as though that's true. Sometimes fathers become tyrants. Sometimes pastors become tyrants. And sometimes it's the misuse of family funds, or sometimes it's the youth's misuse of tithing. We see this all the time. It is not only just the way things are, but it is the way things are while weak, sinful, selfish men exercise authority on earth. And this was the great burden, not only of Israel, it's the burden of every man, woman, and child that has ever lived. But divine power is not like this. Now there's a theological word. in relationship to the being of God. We speak of God and his aseity, A-S-E-I-T-Y, aseity. And the aseity of God is God in his completeness within himself, and he has no need of the creature, no need whatsoever. And so when God made all things in the beginning, he did not create man because there was something in him lacking. because God in the fullness of his three-person nature, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, has always dwelt in eternal fellowship between the persons of the Godhead. And when God said, let us, the three-person God, make man in our image, God was not saying, I'm bored, I'm lonely, there's something lacking in me. No, man and the creation of man is out of the overflow of the fellowship and joy of the persons of the Godhead. You and I were not necessary, which to me speaks more of the beauty of our relationship with God than anything else. Though we were not necessary, God made us. And this should cause us to exalt and appreciate him all the more. He made us nonetheless. And so we ought not look for something in ourselves either for the reason that God made us or for the reason that God came to recreate or redeem us. All of this is the product of the moves of God to men in creation and redemption because God delights in his creatures. And when God saw His people made after His own image fall into sin and fall under the weight of the wrath of God and the misery of our enemy who is Satan, He chose out of His own good free will to redeem us. Christ shows up not because God's saying, I need worshipers. I'm not, you know, the whole, Peter Pan and Tinkerbell, the worst part of the whole story for me, you know, Tinkerbell drinks the poison to save Peter Pan, and she's sick. And in the old sort of play, the actress turns to the camera and breaks the fourth wall, whatever wall that is, and says, clap for Tinkerbell, as though somehow Tinkerbell will hear you, and you're just clapping, yes, Tinkerbell, don't die, clap, clap, clap. God is not coming to us saying, I need, I need worship, as though he is dependent upon the creature for something. No, Christ came into the world as a very different kind of king, not as a taking, taxing human king, but as a king who gives freely out of the repository of what he will accomplish as a human. And so we'll be finding Luke's gospel, and in all the gospels in which the birth of Jesus is recorded, is the birth of the future king of the church who has something to give them. First, he is the king of the cosmos. He is the king of the cosmos. He has it all. And here we find him in a stable. And so we've looked at the taking, taxing human king, Caesar Augustus, or any other king like Ozymandias, whose empire is now sand washed away by the wind and the dirt. But we also see the giving cosmic king. Now we ought not be distracted to the point of focusing on the humanity of Christ that we forget his divinity. We can make that error. And we can make the error on the other side, that we think of His divinity because we wish to exalt Him and we neglect His humanity. Christ is, in the one person Jesus, that's the name of the human person, fully God and fully man. We refer to the union of the human nature and divine nature as a hypostatic union. Children, If you have some time today, you can look that word up. Tonight, if you come back, I'll ask you, can you define for me in two sentences, or one, the hypostatic union of the two natures of Jesus Christ in the one person? Maybe I'll have a reward for you. It's difficult. It is quite difficult for us as persons to understand the relationship of the natures of human and divine in the one person Jesus, given. And the reason why this is given is because though we share some things in common with God, we refer to those things as the communicable attributes that God and man have together. There are some that are incommunicable. That means we do not share them. And one of those is God's aseity, that he's in need of nothing. We are in need of God and each other. In fact, children, your lives Sometimes as you get older, you don't wanna think about it. You are here because of your parents. And as some fathers have maybe threatened their boys before, I brought you into this world, dot, dot, dot. We rely upon the goodwill of others, but not the ancient of days. For even as the second person of the Godhead, the eternal Logos, the Word made flesh, lay in a trough, in a stable, he was also, in his divine nature, upholding Jupiter and making sure the rings of Saturn stayed in order, and was watching the sparrow. In fact, materialistically, He is keeping together all of the atoms and they're joining together of the very stable in which He lay. These two things cannot be forgotten. And it begins to, you know, maybe you see a little puff of smoke coming out of your ears as your processor tries to deal with that kind of information. What in the world? How is this possible? It is possible because God can do that which man cannot. And here we find the cosmic king of heaven and earth laying aside for a time the comforts of heaven solely for the miseries of humanity being born under the law as we confess, suffering under the weight of the wrath of God for our sins, and dying and being buried. We refer to this as the humiliation of Christ. And what prepares us for the humiliation of Christ is the humble beginning of Christ in the stall, in the manger, in the trough, as it were. And that all of Christ's incarnational ministry is a mixture both of humility and glory. So that when we come to the cross, we see shame, but joy. When we come to the Lord's table in a moment, we are exhorted by Christ and Paul and 1 Corinthians to remember Christ's death until He comes. And we remember the death of Christ, it's a shameful moment. It should cause us to look down in a sense that He died for me and the sins that I hold onto, I should be ashamed for those things. But it also raises up our head in the same moment because it reminds us that the shame of our guilt has been dealt with through the death of Christ. That whole Rehearsal, like going back and watching game film or the video of your wedding or whatever, this moment, it's going back and watching it all again. The manner in which Christ was born says something of the nature of his entire human life and ministry as the Messiah. And though there is humility, There is juxtaposed to that beginning in verse eight, this announcement, because the angels know exactly what is happening. What we find in Luke chapter two, verse eight, is eschatological apocalyptic language that is brought into our world. And so when you think of heaven and earth, You think of the seen and unseen or the unseen and seen. And we see glimpses of the glorious realm that lies just adjacent and connected to our own that we can see and taste and touch and experience with our senses. There is the heavenly realm. Jacob sees it when God visits him in Genesis chapter 28. And he shows them the one upon whom angels ascend and descend, who is the eternal son of God, the one who will become Jesus, the savior of our sins. John the Baptist, we'll see this later when Jesus goes down into the Jordan River so that he might baptize him. And we see this word schizo or tearing and the fabric of our reality is opened so that heaven might come through into our reality and it is there that God speaks through that hole as it were. And the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove comes and descends upon Jesus. Daniel sees this in dreams. The prophet Zechariah, John the Baptist on the Lord's day in the book of Revelation, this is what he sees. He sees a realm that is real. It is as real as our realm. There are inhabitants of that realm who dwell there by spirit, except Jesus, who is still in his human flesh. But the heavenly and the earthly, they exist simultaneously together and they affect one another. And here the angels, one to begin with, You'll see this oftentimes even in the Scottish Presbyterian Church, the presenter begins the song and then the whole congregation joins in. And this angel comes into the world, our world, visible to human eyes, and he makes an announcement to shepherds of all people. Why shepherds? Well, I think it has to do with the nature of their occupation, not just as those who will prefigure that Christ is the shepherd of the sheep, but they're humble people. They have a humble responsibility and they're nearby. There is a kind of reverberating effect of this glorious occasion of the birth of the royal king born of David in David's city, Bethlehem, which means city of bread, if you remember from the book of Ruth. And here the bread of life comes. And this is the moment up to this point in the whole of human history that is the greatest moment in the history of the world. Nothing ever like this. And so it deserves a kind of welcome and announcement that is in keeping with the occasion. And so it is not just one angel, but then all of these angels come together and they sing, glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, goodwill towards men. And their song and the revelation of God in their singing is what moves the shepherds then to believe that Jesus is God come in the flesh. And so what do they do? They go to where he is and they worship him. Now, this is one of the things we want our worship to do. And I'm gonna tell you, standing up here today, it was getting to me. To hear you all singing, to hear your loud voices, to be in a room that's big enough but no bigger that would cause our voices to just sort of get lost in the room. It is the only right response to the revelation of Jesus the Messiah to men. And so what we should do is anytime we are given an occasion or the messengers of God say, all right, everyone, let's do this thing, let's sing, we should sing. We should become in that way like the angels in heaven. There is something exemplary in that. And so when the angels had gone away and the worshiping had ended in a sense, the singing had ended, there was worshiping in store. They said to one another, let us now go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us. And then what comes from their worship? Evangelism, the telling of others what they had seen. Evangelism and worship are not distinct disciplines. They are connected disciplines. And in fact, the more faithful you are of doing one, the better you will be at the other. It is just the, it's the dessert at the end of the meal. It is the whole course of a faithful Christian life. But distinct even from the worship and the testimony of the shepherds is what we see with Mary. She does this, this is the second time we read this of Mary. In Luke chapter one, when she hears and is visited by the angel, she lays all these things up and ponders them in her heart. I think she's a Presbyterian. Because while everybody else is singing, she's quiet. The weight and the enormity of what is coming is hitting her. She ponders these things. I would imagine that Mary, when she sees her son hanging on the cross, she's there with just a handful of the disciples, the others had fled, that she calls these things to mind. The glory of the son's birth and his announcement, 30 years. of him most likely in or very near the home as a carpenter, and then beginning his earthly ministry, and all of that heading towards the suffering of the cross. I would think she recalled those things as she's standing there weeping. And she's thinking, a glorious beginning, I just need to get through this day. And then Jesus is raised from the dead on the third day. And the cycle, as it were, of glory mixed with humility and the suffering under the law of the coming in human flesh, all of that is made manifest ultimately in the glory of Christ's resurrection and ascension. And what Christ has come then to do is not as a king who needs something from us, but as a king who comes to give us something. He's not coming looking for, well, the worship that the shepherds gave, he didn't need it to sort of, right, feed his energy like Godzilla has to eat nuclear reactors, right? He didn't need it. No, everything, well, he didn't need of nothing. He came to give. And so lastly, this new kind of king possesses new kinds of subjects, subjects who bring their gifts and offerings to him, but not out of compulsion for the sake of fueling the engine that is the church, because without it, God cannot do what he has promised he would do. No, what does God do? He has always said, in response to my lordship, bring your offerings to me as an act of devotion, humility, of allegiance. And the beauty of the tithe or the gifts and offerings that we bring to him is that he can multiply those things without inflation. Have you thought about that? He can multiply the things that we give him without needing to print more money, if I can put it that way. This is the kind of king we worship. This is the kind of people we belong to. This is the kind of nation that he has established. And so we are a different kind of citizen or subject. We have a king, he is our king. We are in essence enslaved to his lordship, but it is a blessed kind of enslavement. We are set free from the law of sin and death. He, by His Spirit, grants us new hearts, and out of not guilt and compulsion, though there are times where this element of delight can distort into duty, which is where we wanna get out of that by praying and asking the Lord for new hearts, He takes what we bring to Him, gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Worship, words, we're just saying words, we're singing to the Lord. He takes those things and He builds a kingdom that cannot be shaken with them. Because He is the Messiah, He is the Redeemer of His people, and because He is a King. He's the King of Psalm 113, who is transcendent above all things, and He meets with the lowly, those who are on the dust, the ash heap, the dust heap, the place of grieving and mourning, and the barren woman, He gives her a home. Christ has come to set us free and to bring us into the house of Almighty God. And the way that he does this is he calls. How did the shepherds know to go? Well, they didn't. They had no idea Jesus was in Bethlehem. They didn't even know who Jesus was. We don't know anything about the shepherds except that when God announced to them through his messengers that the Messiah was born, they went. And this is how every occasion of coming to Jesus, who is God and man, happens. An announcement is sent out. And sometimes that announcement is a sermon on a Sunday morning or Sunday evening, or sometimes it is through the fateful parenting and bringing your children to know and believe and love Christ through the gospel by reminding them, I'm a sinner too. And if it were not for Christ, I would be an even worse father than I am. And then not just shepherds, but kings from another country, from the Orient, Where? How do they know? Well, we know they followed a star. Where did that star come from? Well, God put it there to direct them. Well, how do they know to follow it? Well, how are you made new? Why are you a Christian? Well, we have, we can speak of the means, right? I'm a Christian because my mom is a Christian, my dad is a Christian, but it's not something that's passed on in the DNA, it's something that's passed on in the discipleship. It's something that's passed on with the mouth. By the mouth, there is proclamation, and with the heart, one believes and is saved. It's through calling. And here is a babe born in a manger, and while he's there, There are people brought to Him, even in that lowest state. And for me, this should make us very optimistic about the reality of the building of the church now that Christ is seated on the throne of heaven and earth. God can and does call all types of people, shepherds, wise men, kings, rulers of men, but not a single one of them have any offering to offer Him that He needs. We are in need of what He has to offer us. And that is the gospel according to the scriptures. He is in the business, as it were, of making worshipers. And this is why when they are asked about taxation, Christ says, render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, but render unto the Lord what is the Lord's. And what does he do? Takes a coin out and goes, see the picture? Who is that? Whose image do you bear? you render yourself under the King of heaven and earth. Yeah, give Caesar your coin. And if it's too much, well, dump some tea into the harbor, I guess, I don't know. But you bear God's image. What ought you do with everything you possess, all of the resources? And the fact that Christ says, I just want a little bit to build and fund the work of the proclamation of the gospel through men called to ministry, Everything you have is meant to be used in devotion to Him, not out of compulsion and not because He needs it, because God makes of very little things a magnificent kingdom that will never perish. And this is our King. And we can observe then in closing how different the righteous and holy God is from us sinful and pitiful creatures. As Luther would say, I'm but a worm. I'm but a worm. Oh, self-deprecating Martin Luther, but he's right. I am but a worm. And we play with power and control and influence. We build thrones, towers, castles, statutes. We write volumes upon volumes all to honor men. But Christ has come to free us from our sins. And it's so fitting then that the Lord chose to enter into our world in this way as a person, a human person. It shows us that God's weakness is infinitely more capable than all the man's power. Caesar, king of the world. Funny, isn't it? And here is the king that has danced on Pluto, who every day says to the sun that heats and gives light to this earth. Let's do it again. And with joy rules and reigns. His weakness is infinitely more powerful and capable than all of our power. And so therefore we ought to look to Him, not only because He is powerful, but because He was willing to take upon Himself a low estate, because He is worthy of worship, not only for His highness, His glory, His transcendence, but also His weakness and His work of redemption as a man. Amen.