We turn now to the reading of the Word of God. And I would ask you to stand as we read this Word of God together. Stand turning to Genesis 3. Genesis 3. And as Dr. McGraw did recently, we will begin at the beginning of Genesis, and then move to the end in the book of Revelation. Genesis 3, beginning in v. 14, this is the Word of the Lord. To the Lord God said to the serpent, because you have done this, you are cursed more than all cattle and more than every beast of the field. On your belly you shall go and you shall eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. To the woman, he said, I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception. In pain, you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you. Then to Adam he said, Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, You shall not eat of it. Cursed is the ground for your sake. In toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread. You return to the ground, for out of it you are taken. For dust you are, and to dust you shall return. Turning now to the book of Revelation, picking up this strand of Holy Scripture to Revelation, chapter 12. We will read verses 1 to 17 for context, although later we'll be taking only the first six verses as our text. This again is the Word of the Lord. Now a great sign appeared in heaven. A woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of twelve stars. Then being with child, she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth. And another sign appeared in heaven. Behold, a great fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns and seven diadems on his heads. His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her child as soon as it was born. She bore a male child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up to God and His throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness where she has a place prepared by God that they should feed her there 1,260 days. and war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought. But they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out. that serpent of old called the devil and Satan who deceives the whole world. He was cast to the earth and his angels were cast out with him. Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, now salvation and strength and the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ have come for the accuser of our brethren. You accused them before our God day and night has been cast out. and they overcame Him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. Therefore, rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them. Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and the sea. The devil has come down to you having great wrath because he knows that he has a short time." Now when the dragon saw that he had been cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. But the woman who was given two wings of a great eagle that she might fly into the wilderness to her place where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time from the presence of the serpent. So the serpent spewed water out of his mouth like a flood after the woman that he might cause her to be carried away by the flood. But the earth helped the woman. And the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the flood which the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. And the dragon was enraged with the woman. And he went to make war with the rest of her offspring who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. Grass withers. Flower fades. Word of our God endures forever. Before we begin, let's briefly go to our Lord in prayer asking for His illumination. Father, as we come to this time, we do long to hear the voice of Jesus speaking through me in Your Word. And we ask, O Lord, we might sense Your presence and be changed into His image. For we confess, O Lord, that it is not by might, nor by power, but by Your Spirit that You do this. O God, help us not to rely on the flesh, but to rely on Your Spirit who does all things well. We pray this in Jesus' strong name, Amen. Why did Jesus come into the world? Why did Jesus come into the world? Basic question. But is it possible we are so familiar with the account of Christ's birth? That we've perhaps recited Luke 2.7-11 over and over again. That we've taught our children the nativity. But that answer to that question proves elusive. We have the baby in the manger. The shepherds. Mary and Joseph. The wise men. This whole scene. So familiar. but somehow its significance never really registers with us. We can hear Matthew's account, Luke's account, John's prologue, and somehow why Jesus came washes over us. We take it for granted. We can become comfortably numb, calloused, deadened, for the very reason that Jesus took on flesh and dwelt among us. At best, our devotion can become a sort of sentimentalism. We see the baby in the manger and we think, that's so sweet. But at worst, this sort of attitude can become complacency, a worldliness, an idolatry, where we have the account of Christ's birth, but its purpose totally evaporates in our minds. Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ. What we need when it comes to the birth of Jesus is something akin to spiritual shock therapy. That's exactly what we get in Revelation chapter 12. Book of Revelation. Its grand theme has been noted by William Hendrickson as being the victory of the Christ and of His church over the dragon and his helpers. It's this great Gospel theme of the victory of the Son of God. And the way John does this is over and over again, he recapitulates this Gospel story. He begins at the beginning and retells it from a different angle. And here in chapter 12, we come to the midway point in the book. In between the seven trumpets and the seven plagues, there are seven signs in chapters 12 to 14. And in chapter 12, in our text, the first six verses, we have that first sign, an account of the birth of Jesus. In the Gospels, we have a sort of prose version of this account. sort of black and white documentary. When you come to Revelation 12, we have what you could call the epic poem version of the Nativity. It's not a black and white documentary. No, it's something more akin to a 3D glasses, full color, IMAX experience. It is stunning. It's in high definition. It's what we call apocalyptic literature. Now a lot of commentators come to apocalyptic literature and they think, this is a puzzle book that I've got to puzzle through with a lot of complex charts and different tables and graphs. As Vern Poythress helpfully points out, the Book of Revelation is not a puzzle book. It is a picture book. They are pictures. They are images that have a spiritual purpose. Commentator G.K. Beal says this, the symbols in Revelation have both a hardening effect on the unbelieving and a shock effect on genuine saints caught up in the church's compromising complacency. Beal goes on, when we begin to resemble the idols of the world and spiritual harm is set in motion, we need pictures to shock us out of our paralysis, spiritual shock therapy. Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ, this evening, even as you perhaps even recently read through the account of Christ's birth, and you thought on his nativity, his coming into the world, ask yourself, are you deadened, calloused to the birth of Jesus? Does it register with you? Or does it simply wash over you and you take it for granted? Well, if the latter is the case, hear the message of Revelation 12. The high definition, the shock therapy message of Revelation 12, and it's simply this. Why did Jesus come into the world? Jesus came. to slay the dragon and save his people. Jesus came to slay the dragon and save his people. The baby in the manger is a dragon slayer, a warrior king. This is the message of the birth of Jesus. This evening, by God's grace, we're going to look at this theme of Jesus slaying the dragon and saving his people under three heads. You can almost think of them as three chapter heads in a grand story that God is telling. Three chapters, each of which focuses on a different character. First, in verses 1 and 2, we'll see the woman in distress. The woman in distress. Second, in verses 3 and 4, we'll see the dragon at war. And finally, in verses 5 and 6, you'll see the child in victory. The woman, the dragon, the child. Three chapters in this Gospel story. Let's begin with the first. The woman in distress. A woman in distress. If you look at her, there's a very powerful description in verse 1 of chapter 12. Now a great sign appeared in heaven. A woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of 12 stars. Put this image in your head. Enter into this picture. There's a woman who's in the sky. She has 12 stars on her head, a crown, a festive wreath, the sort of victor's crown that would be given to an athlete in the athletic games of Greece and Rome. Not only that, but she's clothed with the sun, her garment. The fabric of her garment are the rays of the sun. And beneath her feet, like a royal footstool, is a moon. the picture, emblem of the Queen of Heaven. That's what she looks like, but who is she? Who is this woman? And I think we have a clue to her identity by looking at the only other place in the Bible where all of this imagery comes together, and that's in Genesis chapter 37. In Genesis chapter 37, in the story of Joseph, We have a powerful coming together of this imagery. Genesis 37 and verse 9, the Bible says this, The moon and the eleven stars bowed down to me. So he told it to his father and his brothers, and his father rebuked him and said, What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall your mother and I and your brothers indeed come to bow down to the earth before you? And his brothers envied him, but his father kept the matter in mind. We're using Genesis 37 as a sort of rubric. We have the sun as Jacob, the moon as Rachel, and then the 11 stars add one more star, that's Joseph. You have 12 stars, 12 tribes of Israel. This imagery is that of Israel. the church in the wilderness, the covenant people of God. You'll notice that throughout the book of Revelation, there really are two women contrasted. On the one hand, you have the people of God, this radiant bride, this glorious mother in this passage. On the other hand, you have that great four of Babylon in chapter 17 through 18. But here we have Israel, the covenant people of God. This woman, as you've noticed, is a woman in distress. Like many other stories, there is a damsel in distress. She's very much under travail. Look at verse 2. Then being with child, she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth. She literally is crying out. She's screaming. She's screaming. She's crying out in agony. In labor. She's expecting a baby, and not only that, she's in active labor. The pain has come upon her, and she is in great distress. That word pain, in pain, that second descriptor is used of torture elsewhere in the New Testament. It's used of a boat being tossed to and fro in a storm. We have Israel, the people of God, in labor, waiting for the coming of Messiah. You might wonder, how does this image of the woman, the sun, the moon, and the stars, how does that connect to the larger story that God is telling from Genesis to Revelation? I want to draw your attention to several women that echo this pattern. In the beginning, there is a woman. And her name is Eve, the mother of all living. And she is told, because of the fall, because of sin and pain, And in suffering, she will give birth. That the good gift of children will come through the travail of childbirth. We move 2,500 years later, and there's another woman. Her name is Jacobet, and she's living in Egypt in slavery. She's surrounded by midwives, and she's on the cusp of giving birth. She's crying out in labor, in pain. You move again, this time 1,000 years later. The story continues with another woman, a woman living in Judah in the divided kingdom. Her name is Zibiah, and she's married to the king, the king of Judah. And even as a queen, the pain comes upon her, and she cries out in labor, in pain, about to be delivered. There's one final woman in this pattern, and that's Not a queen, but a peasant girl named Mary, who in Matthew's gospel and in Luke's gospel we learn takes a great journey from Nazareth all the way to Bethlehem. There's no room for her in the inn. She's great with child. She goes to a stable. And there among the animals, she cries out in labor and in pain to give birth. the woman in distress, ultimately in this passage, Israel in labor, about to give birth. From this passage, there's a few practical things we can learn. On the one hand, this is, in some ways for me, a chilling reminder of what it means to live in a fallen world. We live in a world that's full of life. But life comes to us through pain and through suffering. I've had three sons, Isaac, Noah, and Josiah, and each time you go through that period where you're waiting, and you're waiting, and you're waiting for nine months, and then finally one day, It's real. You've gone through the drill, I don't know how many times, and this time, it's actually come upon your wife. And it's ready to come. And maybe for you, you jump in the car and you run to the hospital. Maybe you go to the birth clinic or you call the midwife to come to you. But your wife, or maybe it's you yourself, you're crying out, you're in labor, you're in pain, and you're reminded. We live in a fallen world, where even good things often come through suffering. There's something else beyond this that I think we learn from a passage like this. This woman in distress, this woman who is truly a glorious sight, clothed with the sun, the moon, her footstool, a crown of 12 stars. This is really a description of the church. And I would ask you, do you think of the church this way? of the church with all her problems, her errors, her divisions, her spots and her wrinkles and her garments. If you think of the church this way, I would encourage you to think of Jesus when He was asked, who is your mother? He pointed to His disciples. Think of the Apostle Paul who pointed to the Jerusalem above, who is your mother. Think of the church, the corporate people of God, Your mother, behold your mother. And as Calvin puts it, you call God father, you should call the church mother, outside of which there's ordinarily no possibility for salvation. This is a view of the church, this woman in distress. At this point in the story, the camera pans out and reveals another character who's been on the scene the entire time. Not just the woman in distress, but a second chapter in our narrative, the dragon at war. The dragon at war. And we see a very chilling description of him in verse 3 of our text. And another sign appeared in heaven. Behold, a great fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns and seven diadems on his heads. He's fiery red. Think of fire, blood. Anger. Rage. He has seven heads. He's like that multi-headed Hydra in Greek mythology who is so hard to kill. He has seven heads. His power is distributed, manifested throughout the kings of the earth. He has ten horns, this number of completeness, of perfect power, rage, and destruction. And he has seven diadems upon his head. This time, not the victor's wreath of the woman, but a diadem, an emblem of seized power and destruction, of hideous strength. If you think of it, even these numbers 7 and 10, which are so often used of God in the Bible, We're reminded that the dragon is really a counterfeit, a forgery of the one true and living God. We have a compelling contrast between the dragon and the lamb. The dragon is red. The lamb is white. The dragon is fierce and angry. The lamb is kind and tender. The lamb has one head and seven horns. The dragon has seven heads and ten horns. He's a counterfeit, a forgery of the lamb, that he who sits upon the throne. Who is this dragon? He's fierce, he's strong, he's powerful, but who is he? And we learn that very clearly in verse nine later on in the chapter where it says, so the great dragon, was cast out, the serpent of old, called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world. This dragon is none other than Satan, our adversary. The devil, our accuser. The serpents, who tempted our first parents in the garden. That angel, who in pride fell from glory. But he's not just a dragon. He is a dragon at war. A dragon at war. Note the language of verse 4. His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth to devour her child as soon as it was born. He's a dragon at war. Note that his tail drags. It draws a third of the stars from heaven. It's probably a reference to the fact that many, many years ago, this devil drew, persuaded a whole host of angels to fall with him. Those became the demons. But his tail has, as it were, a magnetic power. a gravitational pull, a destructive dragnet, a tractor beam, a black hole in which he pulls everything else that he can down with. It reminds me of a story that I heard of the painter Pablo Picasso, a very, in some ways, wicked man who had a devouring personality. And it was said that when he died, anybody who was close to him either committed suicide or was totally devastated. He pulled everyone down with him. And that's the same thing the devil does. He wants to pull the whole world down to his own destruction. That's not the only thing that's descriptive of him. Perhaps the most important feature is that he is standing, waiting to devour the child about to be delivered. So get this image in your scene. You have Israel in labor, this woman in distress. And in her distress, that is totally accentuated by a great fiery red dragon standing there, waiting, whenever the time comes for that child to be delivered, and he will eat and devour it. Commentator D.A. Carson puts it this way, the scene is grotesque. The dragon stands in front of the woman. She's lying there in labor. Her feet are in the stirrups, writhing as she pushes to give birth. And this disgusting dragon is waiting to grab the baby and then eat it. The scene, according to D.A. Carson, is meant to be grotesque. It reflects the implacable rage of Satan against the Messiah. Where have we seen this pattern before in the larger story of God's town? Let's go back to the beginning again. In the beginning, there is a serpent. not only causes our first parents to fall, but then God says that serpent is cursed to go on his belly and to eat the dust. And he says, I'll put enmity between your seed and the seed of the woman, and you will attempt to bruise his heel. And there's a sense in which everything after that reflects Satan's desire to bruise the heel to kill the Messiah. You skip ahead 2,500 years, and there's another figure, another manifestation of Satan's power, and that is Pharaoh. Pharaoh, whose headdress has a serpent at the centerpiece. Pharaoh, the leader of a great nation, Egypt, that Ezekiel calls and refers to as a dragon. What does Pharaoh do? A Pharaoh who does not know Joseph. And he has the people of God in slavery. He makes a decree that all of the Hebrew sons, the infant sons, are to be taken at birth and cast into the Nile. He stands waiting to devour them. Skip ahead 1,000 years. It's the time of the divided kingdom. And there's another figure who stands in opposition to God and of his Christ. It's Athaliah. That wicked woman descended from Ahab and Jezebel. And once she learns that her son is dead, she decides that she's going to annihilate all the royal seed. She commits large-scale regicide. And she's after that son, the son of Zibia, who's just about to give birth. Skip ahead another 500 years. We're in the city of Bethlehem, and there's another figure. This time it's Herod. And Herod, jealous, envious of the worship given to the infant Jesus, says to the wise men, tell me where he is. Of course, the wise men go another way. But Herod isn't done. He puts out a decree that all male children, two and under, are to be killed. He stands, waiting to devour. the dragon at war. As we look at these figures, as we look at the serpent, the pharaoh, Athaliah, Herod, we, in the words of Leon Morris, learn that the evil we see on earth is made in the image of Satan. When you look out on the evil of this world, like Elijah, when we look at this passage, the veil is taken away and we see the spiritual realities behind that evil. What is behind the abortion holocaust in this country where infant children are killed in their mother's womb? It's the dragon at war against life. What is behind the persecutions that take place right now all over the world? What's behind the persecutions in China? What's behind the imprisonment of Pastor Wang Yi and the arrests of Christians all over the place in Chengdu? What's behind that? The dragon at war. When you think of your own life, and you think of the guilt that you feel over sins that you've already confessed, and you feel that accusatory finger pointing in your direction, The dragon at war. And you think of the indwelling sin you still wrestle with. And you strive to mortify that besetting sin. The dragon at war. And so my exhortation to you on the basis of this second chapter heading, the dragon at war, is really very simple. And that's face up to the reality of spiritual warfare. Behind your own temptations, behind persecution, behind social evils, we have a very deadly enemy. We have a dragon. This is not a game. It's a war. Think of people playing around on their computer, stumbling into internet pornography. It's not a game. It's a war. It's the dragon at war trying to kill you. And that's what the devil wants to do. He's like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. As the old maps in the Middle Ages used to say, there be dragons. So take heed. Watch out. Watch your step, lest you fall. There's a dragon, and he's hungry. Well, on that note, it's pretty dark. It's a pretty desperate scene. We have a woman in labor. We have a dragon ready to kill the child. But as so often is the case, the night is darkest just before the dawn. We come to our third chapter, and really our third character. Not just the woman in distress, not just the dragon at war, but the child in victory. The child in victory. As I said before, why did Jesus come into the world? Why did Jesus become an infant child? Well, there are two purposes for the incarnation in our text. First, Jesus came to slay the dragon. Jesus came to slay the dragon. We have a description of Jesus in verse 5, where it says, she bore a male child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. It's a son. It's a male child, and not just any son, but a royal son. It says that he is to rule, that he is destined to rule the nations. The word rule there literally means he's destined to shepherd the nations. And not just shepherd them, but to shepherd them with a rod of iron. We have that language of Psalm 2, speaking of our Lord Jesus Christ, that at the resurrection, God declared him to be the Son of God with power. This day I have begotten you. And he gave him the nations to rule them, to judge them with a rod of iron. Here we have the child in victory. He's a shepherd, and he rules with a rod of iron. He's a lamb, but he's also a lion. He's tender, but he's also tough. He's meek, but he's also majestic. This is the child in victory. And who is he? We know that the woman is Israel. We know that the dragon is Satan. And clearly, this child is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. The One who was prophesied to be born in Bethlehem to the woman Israel in travail. This is Jesus Christ, the Messiah. Jesus Christ, the second Adam. The new Moses. The Son of David. The Shepherd King of Israel. I said he came to kill the dragon. How does he do that? Why is Satan so worried about the birth of this child? Well, he does that in a couple of ways mentioned in our text. First, he became incarnate. He became incarnate. Look again at verse 5. It says, she bore a male child. She bore a male child. Jesus, the Word of God, took on flesh and dwelt among us. He was born of a virgin. born under the law. He's the image of the invisible gods. Great indeed is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh. He became incarnate. But then John adds a second feature, and that is that he ascended into heaven. Look again at verse 5. It says, she bore a male child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron, and her child was caught up to God and His throne. He was caught up. He ascended into heaven. And at first, at least when I originally read this passage, I felt like a lot of the story got skipped. Like, I was watching a movie, and it was the beginning, and I turned away, and I looked back, and now we're at the ending credits. It's all over. Well, I think what John is doing here is he's telescoping the entire work of Christ, from his birth to his ascension and everything in between. It's this work in which Jesus will slay the dragon. And what are the results of that work? We don't have time to read them again. We read them earlier. But in verses 7 to 12 of our text, the work of Jesus results in something absolutely stunning. Although we know that in the book of Job and in Zechariah, Satan has a place given to him by God to accuse the brethren after the cross work of Jesus. He is cast down, and there is no longer any place for him anymore. That the God of this world is cast down. That Satan fell like lightning at the coming of Jesus. That the strong man has been bound, and therefore, who shall bring any charge, any sort of attack on God's spirit? It is God who justifies. And so we see that wonderful truth that Jesus came to slay the dragon. According to Hebrews 2, He partook of flesh and blood to destroy him who had the power of death. He came to destroy the works of the devil. He came on His cross to put the enemies of God to open shame to the child in victory. The child who slays dragons. It's a second purpose, however, that Jesus comes into this world. It's not simply to slay the dragon. It's also to save His people. And we see that in verse 6. Then the woman fled into the wilderness where she has a place prepared by God that they should feed her there 1,260 days. God in His grace and Jesus in His love for His people prepares a place for her between the first coming and the second coming of Christ. You read later on in the chapter, it's clear that Satan is still around. He's on a chain. He's bound. He can no longer deceive the nations. He's been, in many ways, definitively crushed at the cross. But he continues to harass the church and persecute those who belong to Jesus. And yet God so graciously protects and provides for his church. He nourishes her in the wilderness between the first coming of Christ and the second coming of Christ. Now, the child in victory. This Jesus coming to slay the dragon. This Jesus coming to save His people. How does this tie into the rest of the Bible story? Let's begin again at the beginning. In Genesis 3, verse 15, that great thesis statement of the Bible. God puts enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. As we said earlier, that serpent will attempt to bruise the heel of Messiah with the promises Messiah will crush his head. We skip 2,500 years to Egypt. And there, Jochebed does give birth to a son named Moses. And Pharaoh, true to his word, is out to kill all the infant seed of Israel. And God, in His mercy, has the infant Moses put in a little ark. watched by his sister Miriam in the waters. Eventually, he grows up in Pharaoh's house. He's protected from the dragon, from the serpent, until that day when God raises up Moses to lead his people out of Egypt through the Red Sea. And as they go through those waters, those same waters crush the head of Pharaoh and his soldiers. He is the child in victory. We skip ahead again to 1,000 years, to the time when Zibia is about to give birth to a son. And she does give birth, a son named Joash. And Athaliah is out to kill all the royal seeds. But God, in his mercy, raises up a woman named Jehoshabiah. And she hides the infant Joash in the temple for six years. Six years, and in the seventh year, Jehoiada the priest gathers all the people together, and they have a coronation. They crown the infant, now child king, Joash, a monarch. Athaliah comes into the courtroom, into the throne room, and says, treason. And they execute her outside the gates, and Joash is crowned king, the child. All of these, however, are but a foretaste of what is to come 500 years after Joe Ash. Mary gives birth to a son named Jesus. And Herod is out to kill him as he's killing all the infant seed of Israel. And Rachel's weeping for her children because they are no more. But God does something remarkable. He warns Joseph in a dream. And he takes Jesus to, of all places, Egypt to be rescued from the hand of Herod and tell Herod is dead until the serpent is crushed and then he can come back We see all of Jesus life plays out, but after his baptism Satan confronts him in the wilderness and Jesus prevails in victory by the power of his word time and time again, he encounters demons and he casts them out and establishes his kingdom Eventually, he comes to the Garden of Gethsemane. And there, like the first Adam, tempted to short-circuit the path that leads from suffering to glory, he says, Father, not my will, but Thine be done. He goes to the cross. And at the cross, Jesus becomes the definitive, the ultimate snake crusher. He crushes the head of the serpent. It is finished. And in the resurrection, he is declared to be victorious. And then he's caught up. We use language of our text. He's caught up to God and to his throne. He ascends like a victory parade. The child become a man in victory to the throne room of heaven before the Ancient of Days and all the angels singing praises. And there he's crowned. in festal coronation. Long live the King. And He sits down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, and there He rules until He makes His enemies His footstool. And from thence, He will come again to judge the living and the dead. This truly is our Lord Jesus, the Child in Victory. How do we bring these things together? On the one hand, this passage teaches us two great truths. That Jesus came, on the one hand, to slay the dragon like a knight of old, but also to save his people. And that reminds us that in this life, There's a sense of tension. On the one hand, we are more than conquerors. We participate in the victory of King Jesus. The same language of ruling the nations with a rod of iron is applied to us in Revelation 2. In fact, in Romans 16, it says that God will crush the serpent with our feet, under our feet. We are more than conquerors. On the other hand, we're like that woman in the wilderness. Still harassed by Satan, pilgrims on our way to Zion. But I assure you that even in your darkest hours, God, by his word, will nourish you and take care of you and lead you all the way home. More than conquerors, citizens of heaven, pilgrims in the wilderness being nourished by the water and the word. The congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ. Is the birth of Jesus something that is so familiar to you that it simply washes over you? Is the nativity account so familiar that you take it for granted? That you're almost deadened to it? Calloused to it? It doesn't really register with you. And if someone asks you, why did Jesus come? You don't know what to say. Jesus came to slay the dragon and save his people. In the words of Heidelberg, Lord's Day 1, his precious blood has fully satisfied for all our sins. He's saved us by his blood. delivered us from all the power of the devil. He has slain the dragon. And one day, in that great, glorious day of judgment, he will cast him into the lake of fire that burns forever and ever. This is the epic poem version of the Nativity. And in summary, it's very simple. Jesus wins. and we live happily ever after. Let us pray. Father, we rejoice that we can overcome by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of our testimony. We can rejoice with the heavens and with the angels in heaven that the child the man-child, the Lord Jesus, entered this world to slay our great foe. To crush His head, but also to deliver us and save us. To keep us, even as we walk through the wilderness, until that great day when we're raised up in glory in Zion. Lord, help us now as we live our lives this week to live in light of the reason you sent Jesus. to live with a sense of purpose and a sense of joy. Thank you, Lord, that we participate in his grand victory. It's in his name we pray. Amen.