If you struggle to keep your Christmas celebration focused on Jesus, just remember the word that shows how He keeps His love focused on you. Savior. Today, on Turning Point, Dr. David Jeremiah explains why this special word stands apart from the hundreds of other names and titles given to Christ. to introduce the conclusion of his important message.
Why call him Savior? Here's David. Do you know in the Old Testament, people had names based upon what they did. And if ever there was a name that was based upon what someone did, it's the word Savior. Because he came to save us from our sins, from ourselves, from eternity apart from him.
And one of the best names that was ever given to Jesus was the word Savior. He's your Saviour. And we're going to talk more about that today. As we continue our discussion of why the Nativity, let me remind you that during this month you can receive a copy of the book, A Closer Walk with Jesus. It's a devotional for the New Year.
three hundred and sixty five days' worth of devotions. The book is actually three hundred and ninety two pages. It is beautifully designed with incredible photography in between the months and silver embossing on the front cover. You will love this book and you'll want not only to have one for yourself, but you may want to give some away. Let me just tell you, you can get your copy of this book for a gift of any size.
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Well, we are talking about the names for Jesus. We've called him Emmanuel, but now today we're going to call him Savior. Let's begin our discussion. Jesus did not come down here primarily to save us from our marriages or from our businesses or from our personal physical failures. He came to save us from our sins.
And when we are saved from our sins, those other things begin to flow out of that. But you can go to churches sometimes now, week after week, and never hear anything about being saved from your sin. What you hear is how to be saved from your problems. My friend, if you are not saved from your sin, you will never be saved from your problems. Jesus did not come to make our lives better.
He came to save us from our sin. And in spite of the fact that we know that, we are easily swayed by. Feel-good messages about how Jesus can make it all better. The Savior came to save us from our sin. And the Bible says, in order to do that, according to Luke 19:10, he had to seek us first.
He came to seek and to save that which was lost. I remember growing up, we used to sing a little chorus in our youth group that went like this: I found what I wanted when I found the Lord. And that's a beautiful little phrase, and it was a great tune, but it's bad theology. Because we weren't seeking the Lord, He was seeking us. You say, well, I'm here, I'm seeking the Lord.
Well, if you're seeking the Lord, it's only because He sought you first. He put you in a seeking mode so that you would hear the gospel. And the Bible says that man will not come to God unaided. In Luke chapter 15, one of my favorite passages, we are told about the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son. All of them had to be sought.
By the Saviour. Just as today we must be sought as well. Oh my friends, there is music and majesty in Jesus' statement. One focus, the lost. Two actions to seek and to save.
Jesus came to this earth. Listen to me. on a rescue mission. The Savior is needed to seek the lost, and the Savior is needed to save the lost. He came to seek And to say If he found us and didn't save us, we'd be in the same position we were before.
But he came to save us.
Now I have to tell you that word has fallen on hard times. We use every word that we can come up with from the dictionary except the word saved. I remember growing up as a boy, it was a common thing to ask somebody if they'd been saved. I remember one little foray into the witnessing arena when I was a student at Dallas Seminary. I was taking some courses at North Texas State University.
Some graduate courses, and I was going through a period of time.
Now, you've probably never been through a time like this, when I was feeling very guilty that I was so busy about doing the Christian thing that I wasn't witnessing. I had probably heard a message on witnessing that had put me under a guilt trip. And so I determined I was going to witness, and I went to my class and sat next to a friend, and I'll never forget this. I asked him, Are you saved? And he said, I'm not interested in being saved from anything except from nuts like you.
Yeah. That's what he said. It sort of set my witnessing program back a few weeks. It was very discouraging.
Somebody would say to me, Well, you shouldn't have asked him that question. There's a better way to ask it, and perhaps there is. But the Bible's term for it is to be saved. When we think of being saved, We think of pictures of sailors clinging to the wreckage of a ship. Helicopters hovering in the night sky, shining their beacons on the sea in search of the living who must be saved.
Don and I were in a condo, and it was a very quiet day, uneventful, and all of a sudden we heard helicopters, five of them, right out in front of where we were staying, going up and down in front of this thing, and it went on for hours. I knew something was going on, and so I walked down to the pier and asked some of the people who had gathered there what was happening. A surfer had disappeared. And they feared he had drowned, and ultimately he had. but they couldn't find his body, and so they were searching for him.
And they never stopped until they found him. We think of a collapsed mine where workers are trapped far beneath the earth. Their oxygen runs low, and men crouch in darkness, wondering. if they dare hope for salvation. We think of a little girl at the bottom of a well, or even the favorite word picture of a single stray sheep trapped on a perilous slope.
The Coast Guard will find those lost sailors, and no taxpayer will ever complain about the expense. The miners will not be abandoned. The little girl must see the sunshine once more, and the one sheep must be rescued from danger. These situations are urgent, and when we see them on television, We stop and we pray and we wait. We may not even know any of the people, but instantly we find ourselves identifying with them and praying that somehow they will be rescued.
They are lost. And they need to be saved. But ladies and gentlemen, these temporal situations are transcended by the true tragedy of men and women who are lost in their own rubble of sin and darkness and pain. And often, even without knowing what they are longing for, our world's inhabitants are crying out to be rescued. We don't need to be saved from the sins of others.
We need salvation from our own sin. Until we are willing to acknowledge that no matter what the Savior may have done for us, it will not connect with us at all. Until we are willing to say, it's not their sins that is the problem, it is my sin. It is not my situation that's the problem, it's my sin that's the problem. Until we are willing to stand up before God and own up to the fact that we have failed Him.
And we are falling short of His glory, and the only hope we have is a Savior. Until then, whatever the Savior may have done for us, it will not make any difference because He does not force Himself upon us. He paid the penalty for our sin, He paid all that needs to be paid, but He waits for us to accept it by faith. The promise of the Savior. And the purpose of the Savior.
Notice the provision of the Savior in the same verse. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. Please notice the fact of this Savior coming to this earth. This is a fact of history. It's very interesting that this verse, while it is so very short, contains everything we need to know.
It says, For unto you is born this. Day. A saviour. Jesus did not just gradually come upon this earth. There was a day when the Lord God was born into humanity.
When he came through Mary, and on a certain day, in a certain place, at a certain time. He was born into humanity. The Bible makes it very clear this is an historic event. On this day, Jesus was born. The birth of Jesus is not the beginning of a spiritual force, but the historic record of a person who had an actual birthday.
A fact of history. But it is also a fulfillment of prophecy. Once again, in this one little verse, here we see it. For unto you is born this day in the city of David. The city of David, as you know, is the city of Bethlehem.
And the Old Testament is filled with prophecies of the coming of Messiah in such a specific way that most Jewish people had a tendency to read right over the prophecies and not even understand them. Micah, for instance, had prophesied. that Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. Micah 5.2, for you Bethlehem Ephreda. Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to me the one to be ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting.
Now that's a wonderful verse, but it becomes a miracle verse when you recognize that it was written 700 years before Jesus was born in Bethlehem. The prophet Daniel in the Old Testament actually gave a timetable for the birth of Jesus. Isaiah said that Messiah would be virgin-born. Jeremiah said that there would come a time when, because of Christ's birth, There would be a slaughter of many children. And Hosea the prophet revealed that at a certain time Mary and Joseph would have to go into Egypt to spare the life of the child.
All of these prophecies, men and women, were given 500 to 700 years before the birth of Christ. And there were devout Jews who every day would read the scripture and wonder: will these things happen in my lifetime? The birth of Jesus was not only a fact of history, it was a fulfillment of prophecy. But notice it is also a foundation for eternity. Unto you is born a Savior.
Listen carefully. Jesus Christ is our Savior. God came down. And entered into humanity so that humanity would be able to enter into eternity. This birth of Jesus, while it began at a point in time, began something that will never end and can never end because when He was born into humanity, He opened the door for us to eternity.
So, don't discount this one simple little verse that records an event that happened. When the Saviour was born. There are so many people. who celebrate Christmas. without celebrating Christ.
I always get kind of a kick out of that at this season of the year. All these people. Who don't believe in Jesus. Go into debt to celebrate his birth. Can you understand that?
They don't believe in him. but they celebrate his birth religiously. Perhaps that is why There are so many who feel depressed on Christmas Day. The Christmas blues, it's sometimes called, the SAD syndrome. Seasonal affective disorder, it's called.
SAD. Season affective disorder. Whatever it is, if you happen to be down in the dumps during this season, let me give you some great counsel. Stop thinking about Christmas and start thinking about Christ. He is our prophet and our priest and our king.
He is the master and the bridegroom and the good shepherd. He is the holy one of God. He is Emmanuel, God with us, and his name is called Jesus. John introduced him as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The Magi recognized him as the King of the Jews, and even the demons called him the Holy One of God.
Is this not the carpenter? asked the people of Nazareth. Could this be the Christ? asked the woman by the well. Thomas called him my Lord and my God.
No, ladies and gentlemen, this time of year isn't about Christmas, it's about Christ. It isn't about presence, it's about his presence. You may not have family nearby, but your father is close at hand. Your faith is more important than your feelings. And He sets us free from chains we could never remove ourselves because He is our Savior.
He is our hope. When you get all depressed and discouraged about things that you have no control over in your life. Let me ask you just to sort of push those away. and refocus your attention on the one who loves you. more than you can ever imagine.
who came to this earth specifically. to be your Saviour. I know What a task I have. as I approach Christmas each year. How do you break through the veneer that we have created around this season and even around ourselves?
How do I tell you about the Saviorhood of Jesus? I pray that God will give me a story that will help me to do it, a metaphor or some parable. That will compare what we don't know with what we do know. My story today is a story that was told for many years by a great pastor of another generation by the name of R.G. Lee.
R. G. Lee, for many years, was the pastor of what is today the Bellevue Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee. He was at one time the president of the Southern Baptist Convention and was known across this land as one of the great orators and Bible preachers. Whenever he would preach on the Saviorhood of Christ, he would often tell this story.
The story takes place in the mountains of Virginia. in a one-room schoolhouse. That was so tough, no teacher ever lasted there more than a few weeks. It was a school populated with mean-spirited mountain boys who thought their main objective in life was to run off every new teacher who dared to enter their classroom. One day, a very young teacher applied for the job.
The director of the school actually tried to talk him out of it. He said, Son, he said, you don't know what you're going to do. You're going to take on an awful beating because you're so young. He said, Son, even the most experienced teachers in the entire state never last here more than two months.
Well, said the young teacher, I'm going to risk it. And he took the job. On his first day, he walked into the classroom and he noticed that the kids were gathered in the back of the room, and they were sort of gathered around this one huge young man, who he found out later was a guy named Tom. In fact, they called him Big Old Tom. That's what they called him, and he was the bully of the class.
Loud enough so that the new teacher could hear him, big old Tom said, I'll take care of this one. Mm-hmm. I'll do it all by myself. I won't need anyone's help. He'll be gone by the end of the day.
When the young teacher got up in front of the class, He said, I have come to conduct this class. But I must confess I cannot do it without your help. I think what we need is a few rules. And I'm going to ask you to help me make the rules for the class. What rules do you think we ought to have?
This was the new one on this class. This had never happened before. As the teacher went to the blackboard, one kid hollered out, No stealing! And the teacher wrote it on the board. Nobody can be late.
And he wrote it on the board. And by the time he finished, the teacher had ten rules for the classroom, the ten commandments of his class. Everybody agreed, and yet as they were agreeing, they were all laughing out loud.
Now, said the teacher, There is no such thing as a good rule without a penalty if the rule is broken. What should be the penalty if a rule is broken? And big old Tom stood up and he said, Whoever breaks one of these rules gets 10 licks across his bare back. And the teacher thought the penalty a bit severe and Obviously this story is dated. Mm-hmm.
But he reluctantly agreed.
So they went to school the next day, and as you can well imagine, the morning had not ended before a rule was broken. Big Tom showed up at the teacher's desk and said, Somebody stole my lunch.
So the teacher held court and said, class, one of the rules is no stealing, and somebody stole Big Tom's lunch, and I want to know who. After everyone had been questioned, a little 10-year-old boy stood up and said, I stole his lunch. I was so hungry I couldn't help it. I stole the lunch.
Well, the teacher said, you know what the rule is. You know that you get 10 licks across your back without your coat on. And the little boy began to beg, Teacher, please don't do that. And whatever you do, don't make me take off my coat. Finally, the teacher knowing he was on trial at this moment.
made the young boy unbutton his coat. and underneath there was no shirt. just the suspenders that were holding up his pants. And the teacher was thinking, how in the world am I going to whip this child? How can I do that?
But if I don't, I will have forever lost control of this classroom. What shall I do? He said to the boy, Son, how is it that you don't have a shirt on? The boy answered, My father died, and my mom's real, real poor. and I only have one shirt.
And on the day that she washes my shirt, I wear my brother's coat so I don't get cold. I'll have my shirt tomorrow. But I don't have it today.
So the teacher slowly got the paddle, and as he was hesitating, trying to get the courage to inflict the punishment. Big Tom stood up. Jumped over everybody in his way, walked over to where the teacher was, and said, If you don't object, I'll take Jim's licking for him. The teacher made some philosophical statement about there being the right for substitute punishment. And off came Tom's coat.
After five hard strokes, he paused. the teacher did and realized that everyone in the classroom was crying. Especially Little Jim. who by this time had run to Tom and had him by the neck. Hanging on for all he was worth, and he was saying, Tom, I'm awful sorry I stole your lunch.
I was so hungry. I will love you till I die for taking my licking for me. And it broke the heart of all those hard-nosed kids, and it broke the heart of the teacher. Because on that day, Tom. had become his brother's saviour.
And you and I have broken the rules, haven't we? I have broken the rules. One day the Lord Jesus came into my classroom. And he took off his coat. And he stretched himself out on a wooden beam.
And he took the stripes. which I deserved. And that day. He became. My savior.
For unto you is born this day. in the city of David. A Saviour Who is Christ? the Lord. Do you know him?
Is he your Savior? You know, it's not enough to believe he's the Savior of the world. The Bible says even the demons believe that and they tremble. In order for you to receive his salvation. You have to, number one, acknowledge that it's not your neighbor's sins or somebody else's sins, it's your own, that deserves punishment.
And then you have to come and say, Lord Jesus. Thank you for what you did when you died on the cross for me. That's what I deserved, and I know it. And I accept today Your punishment for my sin. And I receive your forgiveness, and I accept you into my heart and into my life to be.
My Saviour. And when you do that, according to the scripture, you have been saved. Saved. Have you been saved? Have you accepted Christ as your Savior?
At this Christmas season, the great message of Christmas is the gospel of Jesus Christ. And I urge you today, if you have never done it before, to let this day be the day. when you invite Christ to be your own personal Savior and Lord. I hope you will do that while this message is fresh upon your heart. You do not often get many opportunities to be sensitive to the scripture or to the gospel.
When those times come, you need to listen and you need to act. If God is calling you to Himself today, find a quiet place where you can pray. Ask God to forgive you for your sins. Tell Him you want Him. To send His Son Jesus Christ into your heart so you can be saved and then you can go to heaven.
He's your Savior. Only if you let him save you. And I hope you will do that today. As we look forward to the next couple of days, we're going to be talking about the fear knots of Christmas. As we move toward Christmas Day itself, one of the things that happens during the holiday season for many people is they are filled with fear.
Many people feel lonely, they feel lost, they don't know what to do. And the Bible is filled with instruction to us as Christians not to fear. We are to go through our lives without fear of what's going to happen. As believers, we can do that. Here's some fear nots from the Bible for your Christmas.
Today's message came to you from Shadow Mountain Community Church and senior pastor Dr. David Jeremiah. We love hearing how God is using this ministry in your life.
So please write to us at TurningPoint, P.O. Box 3838, San Diego, California, 92163. Visit our website at davidjeremiah.org/slash radio or call 800-947-1993. Ask for your copy of David's helpful new 365-day devotional for 2026, A Closer Walk with Jesus. Yours for a gift of any amount.
You can also download the free Turning Point mobile app for your smartphone or tablet, or search in your app store for Turning Point Ministries to access our content. Visit davidjeremiah.org/slash radio for details. This is David Michael Jeremiah. Join us tomorrow as we continue the series, Why the Nativity? on Turning Point with Dr.
David Jeremiah.
