The Mystery Of The Manger – 2 of 3

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. When Joseph beheld the newborn Christ child, he knew he was not looking at his own flesh and blood. As we'll learn today, his relationship to Jesus was that of a father to an adopted son.

These dynamics have far-reaching implications for you and for me. Stay with us as we learn more about the family of Jesus. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, seeing Joseph as an adoptive father is something I don't think many people have considered.

Dave, of course you're absolutely right. Jesus was born of a virgin and Joseph adopts Jesus even though Jesus obviously was not his biological son. And isn't that a wonderful picture that we have in the Bible of the fact that we are adopted into the family of God?

And that adoption of course is permanent and we end up having all of the blessings that Jesus Christ has because we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. Let me ask you a question. Are you ready for Christmas?

It's kind of a nebulous question, isn't it? Because what do you mean about being ready for Christmas? Well, one way that we can be ready for Christmas is to make some spiritual preparations for the new year. And I'm holding in my hands a beautiful book entitled God's Best for My Life. It's a devotional that we want you to have. We think it will help you on your spiritual journey. For a gift of any amount, it can be yours. Here's what you do.

Go to rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337. Let us make sure that we receive all the blessings that God has for us, given to us in his blessed Son. It would be interesting to know how many of you, and I do not expect you to raise your hands, but how many of you who are listening here at the Moody Church or on the internet or on the radio, how many of you have been adopted?

Be interesting to find out. But I don't ask you to raise your hands because I know that for some of you, you might not want people around you to know that you've been adopted. There might be a stigma connected with it or even some shame. Well, the intention of this message is to rid you of that stigma and to forever rid you of that shame once we understand the doctrine of adoption. Because we shall discover that adoption lies at the heart of the Christmas story and adoption lies at the very heart of the gospel.

As you may know, this is a series of messages, the fourth and last actually. In the family of Jesus, we considered his genealogy. Because, you see, when Jesus came to earth, he had grandparents. When he entered our world, he had a family. He had brothers and sisters, as we shall see.

He also, in that experience, no doubt had cousins and uncles and aunts and on and on it goes. So we looked at Jesus Christ's genealogy. Then in the second message, we considered his mother Mary. And today, actually, I should say, and last time, his father Joseph. And today, all of his relatives and the wider body of Jesus Christ that are a part of his family. In order to get us into the text, and we will be doing that in just a moment, let's begin by talking about Jesus Christ the son.

Jesus the son. To rehearse the story that we all know so well that we've heard many times, the angel comes to Mary and says, Mary, you are with child of the Holy Spirit. Joseph doesn't understand it. And because they are betrothed, and in those days that was almost equivalent to marriage, he was going to divorce her, which would have been necessary under the law. But he has a dream and the dream says, Mary, Mary.

And so he does. And they go to Bethlehem. And when Jesus is born, he is presented to Joseph. I can imagine Mary saying, Joseph, this is your son. Joseph takes him in his arms and looks at him and knows that as he looks into the eyes of that little baby, he will not be seeing his own image. The curvature of his mouth, his jaw, his eyes will never resemble that of Joseph because Joseph is going to adopt him. Joseph becomes only his legal father. I say only.

Let me ask you this question. How strong was the bond? How strong was the bond between Joseph and Jesus? Well, biblically, it was entirely strong and as strong as if Jesus had been the earthly son of Joseph.

Let me prove that scripturally. You remember in Matthew chapter one where you have the genealogy of Jesus, the intention of Matthew is to show that Jesus has the right. Jesus has the right to rule on the throne of David because his genealogy can be traced back to David. But it's the genealogy of Joseph. And in Matthew's mind, if he can prove that Joseph is a descendant of David, then Jesus himself is a descendant of David and has the right to rule on the throne of David because adoption was such an engrafting experience. It was such a bonding experience both legally and emotionally and in every other way that Jesus is today the son, ultimately, of course, the great-great-grandson of David because it was true of Joseph and it's true of him. Let's think for a moment about Jesus Christ's relationship with Mary. It's interesting. Could you imagine raising Jesus?

I mentioned this last time. You have this very precocious child. He's 12 years old and they leave him in Jerusalem not knowing that he is left there. They think that he's with some relatives as they're coming back from the feast. And there he is. He's having discussions with the doctors of the law and they marveled. They marveled at his knowledge and the questions that he was asking. Jesus Christ was constantly, however, distancing himself from Mary.

He loved her. But look at the wedding feast. Mary says to Jesus, they have no wine.

Hint, hint. Maybe you could do a miracle here and help them. And he says to her, woman, what have I to do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come. Wasn't disrespectful but Jesus was saying, Mary, you can't connect with me on an inside track. I am here to do the will of my father and the will of my father I will do and you have no special appeal to me. Then we think also of the time that the Gospels record that Jesus was teaching. And a man ran from the crowd and shouted at Jesus and said, blessed is the woman who bore you. Blessed is the one who nursed you. And remember Jesus said, oh no, no, you got it wrong. Blessed is the person who does the will of God who hears it and does it.

Wow. And then we see it at the cross. Woman, behold thy son. What Jesus was saying to Mary was this that when it comes to these kinds of relationships you must recognize that I am your earthly son but I am a heavenly son and I have an agenda to complete with my heavenly father and I love you and I appreciate the fact that I was born of you but I belong to the father and I must do the father's will and remember Mary our relationship is earthly whereas I'm committed to the heavenly relationship with my father. Now Jesus having been adopted by Joseph now later on becomes one who himself adopts others. And for that I do want you to turn to the third chapter of the book of Mark, Mark chapter 3.

Mark chapter 3, we have an interesting story. Jesus has begun his ministry and he's being questioned and probably misrepresented but he caused a frenzy because of his miracles because of his teaching and so even his family now in context his enemies said that he was demon possessed. But even his family said in chapter 3 verse 20 of Mark and thank you for turning to that you can also find it in your pew bible it says then he went home and the crowd gathered again so that they could not even eat and when his family heard it they went out to seize him for they were saying he is out of his mind. Wow not even his family was getting the message of the full import as to who Jesus was. So now there's a crowd gathered and now we pick it up at verse 31. And his mother and his brothers came and standing outside they sent to him and called him and a crowd was sitting around him and they said to him your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you and he answered them who are my mother and my brothers and looking about at those who sat around him he said here are my mother and my brothers whoever does the will of God he is my brother and sister and mother.

Wow a couple of comments first of all his family probably wanted to get to him so that they could take him away and give him some rest. They maybe thought that because of his exhaustive schedule that some things were happening that they couldn't explain and so you can visualize very easily the crowd that is around Jesus and his mother and his brothers don't know how to get to him they don't know how to pierce the crowd and so they give a message to someone and they say you know you can get closer to Jesus tell him that we're looking for him. Notice by the way that Jesus had brothers and it's very clear that he had sisters too.

I'm turning just one page in my bible to the sixth chapter of Mark. It says in verse three is not this the carpenter the son of Mary the brother of James and Joseph with us and I should say Judas and Simon. Jesus had four brothers and they are all named and are not his sisters here with us.

Now his sisters are not named but he had brothers and sisters. The idea that these are children from Joseph's first marriage has come up because of the belief in the perpetual virginity of Mary but that's not taught in the bible. In fact in Matthew chapter 1 it says that Joseph accepted her as his wife but knew her not you know that that's a euphemism for a sexual relationship. He knew her not until she gave birth to Jesus her firstborn son. But here our family members they are coming and they're saying we want to talk with you and your mother's here and Jesus waves them off and he says very clearly that the relationship of flesh and blood really means nothing in comparison to the spiritual relationship and he would not allow Mary and his brothers to divert him from the task that God had given him.

No he was very concerned that he kept doing the will of God and he did not respond to their plea. What he was saying even to Mary is Mary you don't get any first dibs here. Your spiritual relationship with me is more important than the physical and you must also believe on me as becomes very very clear later on and so Jesus is saying of course there's blessing for my family of course there's blessing for Mary there's blessing for my brothers if they do the will of God but they must do the will of God just like everyone else must do the will of God. You say well pastor Lutzer how does this relate to Christmas how does this relate to us and why should our lives be different because we've heard this message. By the way whenever I prepare a message like I did yesterday afternoon I always ask myself why should anyone be changed forever because they've heard this.

I hope that God answers my prayer. First of all a couple of lessons spiritual adoption spiritual adoption is much more important than physical lineage. Spiritual adoption is much more important than physical lineage. The heavenly is more important than the earthly. A personal relationship with Jesus Christ is absolutely important and necessary if you're to belong to the family of God.

Think of his brothers. You know what the Bible says in John chapter 7 verse 5? Jesus is on his way to the feast and it says not even his brothers believed on him.

Can you believe that? I mean they grew up in the same home as Jesus. They saw his perfection.

They saw that he did not fall into moral temptation. They recognized that our brother is very unique but they never even got the full import of his messiahship or mission. They needed to come to grips with their own brother that he was their savior too. Did they?

The answer is yes. Acts chapter 1 when Jesus asked the 120 to gather in the upper room to receive the holy spirit it says that Mary was there and his brothers and by the way in a context like that the word brothers could mean siblings. It's possible that his sisters were there too.

We trust that they were. So Jesus here is saying in no in very clear terms that your relationship with me is paramount. You can be my mother. I'm not making it up.

I just read the text. You can be my brother. You can be my sister. If you do the will of God I will adopt you into God's family but your lineage your physical lineage doesn't give you any advantage. You can't say well you know my great grandfather was a Methodist circuit rider in Kentucky or my great great grandfather was and God's will say in heaven well you know you come from a very spiritually inclined family. I remember talking to a man about his eternal salvation and he said well he said my wife is a Christian and so that should give me some pull shouldn't it and the answer at that point is you take off your glasses and you say no.

Billy Sunday whose funeral was here at the Moody church said that just like if you think that you can become a Christian by attending church he said that is the same as saying that a wheelbarrow will become a car if it's put in a garage and you can't become a Christian because of your heritage. God has no grandchildren. God doesn't say well I saved your parents and so you kind of get factored in because you happen to have such wonderful Christian parents.

No the relationship is always personal it is always direct and the spiritual relationship ultimately is more important. Now my heart goes out to adopted children because they oftentimes struggle with their past and who their parents were and all that but if they've been adopted into God's family and become the brothers and the sisters and the mother of all things of Jesus that has eternal significance and it gives you a stature that no family even a royal family could never give you. The primacy here clearly of the spiritual adoption more than physical lineage. Second lesson is that spiritual adoption has greater privileges.

It has greater privileges. You know it's interesting that the apostle Paul nowhere refers to the virgin birth. He nowhere refers to Mary directly. Well yes he does he doesn't call her Mary but he says in Galatians that Jesus was born of a woman. That's the closest he comes to Mary and the virgin birth because what Paul is really interested in is the whole concept of adoption and if you read the book of Galatians where he says that what he says is that when we give ourselves to God when we become God's children he says we cry up and we say Abba father Abba father.

It's been translated and you don't want to be irreverent here but it's been translated daddy to be able to say that God is your father that you walk with God and that you belong to the spiritual family. There's something within us that cries up by the power of the Holy Spirit and says yes Abba father and of course if Jesus is the son of God and we are also now sons of God in a different sense but a very profound sense we share the same father. That's why as I mentioned in the book of Hebrews chapter 2 it says that Jesus is not ashamed to call you his brother. Fact if you were to read the story that I referred to here in the third chapter of Mark if you were to get the Matthew version it's very interesting it's telling the very same story but it adds a detail that Mark left out. Doesn't mean that the accounts are contradictory it just means that you have two writers talking about the same event and Matthew adds the detail. When his mother and brothers wanted to get through to them Jesus said who is my brother and my sister but the Bible says stretching out his hands to those who were to those who were present he said who is my mother and my brother and my sisters but the person who does the will of God. Wouldn't you like to have been sitting there by the way those of you in the front seat you know God bless you I have a special relationship with you and there's no doubt that front seat on earth is front seat in heaven so thank you which says something about those in the back row but wouldn't it be wonderful to be in the front row with Jesus speaking and then to have Jesus go like this and say who is my mother and my brothers but those who do the will of God namely you I can adopt you into my family and furthermore adoption means that you inherit all the same privileges as the son that's why the apostle Paul says we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ when the title deed of the universe is opened and when the inheritance of Jesus is laid out you and I share and we are joint heirs it's not that we get the crumbs we get the real deal because of God's incredible grace yeah you can clap at that point if you want. As I was thinking of the matter of adoption it dawned on me that adoption always takes place because of the brokenness of sin it would be wonderful and it would be the case in a real world where parents would always want their children and love their children and be able to care for them but that's not the real world we have some parents who maybe don't want their children others would like to have them but can't care for them and so because of sin all of these relationships get entangled and the pain of a mother giving up her child for adoption by the way I've often thought about that I thought of the pain that must be in her heart to give up that little one knowing that she will never see him or her again but the pain that she goes through is the joy of someone else some other couple that delights in receiving the child and you know the reason that God has to adopt us into his family is for the same reason the brokenness of sin our parents can give us physical life what they cannot give us is spiritual life our parents can give us a good home and a good upbringing but they cannot make us members of the family of God my parents made me a lutzer but they could not make me a child of God and that's why I need to be adopted and my friend if you are unsure that you have been a doctor that you have been adopted by God this would be a wonderful time for you to cry up to him to ask for forgiveness to become his child and as many as received him to those he gives the authority to become the children of God even to those who believe on his name that message is the heart of the ministry of running to win we delight to shout that as far as we can thanks to technology this ministry does go around the world and as you think about the end of the year and your end of the year giving would you consider a gift to the ministry of running to win we have a very special gift for you it's a devotional entitled God's Best for Your Life by Lloyd John Ogilvy every single day you'll be encouraged as you begin the day with God as you read this devotional for a gift of any amount it can be yours and I want to thank you so much for the many of you who support us generously and even as you're thinking about your Christmas giving as I mentioned a moment ago thank you for praying and considering the ministry of running to win go to rtwoffer.com or call us at 1-888-218-9337 go to rtwoffer.com you can write to us at running to win 1635 north LaSalle boulevard Chicago Illinois 60614 running to win is all about helping you find God's roadmap for your race of life next time on running to win Erwin Lutzer will expand on the idea of spiritual adoption and how it confers spiritual life on all the children of God make plans to join us for pastor Erwin Lutzer this is Dave McAllister running to win is sponsored by the moody church