Hope Community Church
December 29 2024

      • John 1:14–18ESV

      • John 1:14–18ESV

  • Sermon: “The Word Became Flesh: A Christmas Reflection”
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    Scripture Reading: John 1:14
    “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
    Introduction
    This Christmas season could be one of the most significant in light of the approaching human events within the next month.
    Many may question their faith, or give up totally based on the influence of the political world and its God and country ideology.
    Not just that, but when you and I try to share our faith, we will be approached with hostility.
    Why is it that you can talk about God and nobody gets upset, but as soon as you mention Jesus, people often want to stop the conversation? Why have men and women down through the ages been divided over the question, Who is Jesus?
    Draper's Book of Quotations for the Christian WorldJosh McDowell
    Many of us may know who Jesus is, but is possibly afraid of:
    being rejected,
    worried about what your friends might think;
    I don’t think I can share with my co-workers
    I don’t know enough
    afraid of losing friends and relatives,
    just don’t know how to do it.
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    William Fay and Linda Evans Shepherd, Share Jesus without Fear (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1999), 15.
    One day, (William Fay)had a layover at an airport, so I went to the Red Carpet room to wait for my flight. While I was there, I saw Mohammed Ali, sitting at a table with a briefcase full of tracts about the Moslem faith.
    I stopped to visit, and he gave me a couple of his pamphlets. Because of his illness, Parkinson’s disease, it took a long time for him to sign his name at the bottom.
    As I watched him, I thought, Here is a man, giving his all with what little physical and mental abilities he has left, to share a lie. Yet too many Christians sit back, too afraid to share the truth.
    Yes we agree with the muslims that Jesus
    is a prophet; born miraculously; performed miracles; will be honored as messiah, and will return, but they reject that Jesus is God incarnate….an egregious error that will cost them and everybody else who deny that Jesus is God in Flesh!
    Hebrews 10:5 (KJV 1900)
    5 Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me:
    As we gather in this season of Christmas, we celebrate an extraordinary truth—And the Word became flesh. These five words carry the weight of the entire Gospel and reveal the heart of the Christmas message. This is no mere poetic expression or theological abstraction. It is the declaration of a divine mystery: that God Himself, the eternal Logos, entered into the frailty of human life to save us.
    Today, we will meditate on three aspects of this profound truth: the incarnation, the dwelling, and the glory.
    1. The Incarnation: The Word Became Flesh
    John writes, “The Word became flesh.” This is the controlling utterance of the verse, a truth so astounding that it requires our full attention. The Word—eternal, infinite, and divine—entered into human history and took on flesh. Not as a temporary appearance, not as a mere semblance, but fully and truly.
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    The verb ἐγένετο (became) speaks of a transformation, a stepping into a new condition that did not exist before.
    The Logos, who existed from all eternity, became what He had not been—flesh.
    And here, the biblical meaning of “flesh” is significant. It signifies human weakness, frailty, and mortality.
    The eternal Son of God embraced our creaturely limitations, not from afar, but by becoming one of us.
    Gnostic teachers taught, for example, that matter could not be saved or redeemed; it was by definition evil. If so, Christ only seemed or appeared to be human, the early heresy doceticism (from the Greek verb dokeō, to seem); Christ’s body only seemed to be like ours.
    Christopher A. Hall
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    This excludes any notion of Docetism, the heresy that Christ only appeared to be human. No, Christ truly and fully entered into our human condition. This is a staggering truth: that the Creator became part of His creation, the Infinite clothed Himself with finiteness, and the Almighty took on the vulnerability of human life.
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    2. The Dwelling: The Word Pitched His Tent Among Us
    The phrase “made his dwelling among us” is eskēnōsen in the Greek, literally “tabernacled among us.”
    This pictures the Old Testament Shekinah, the glory of God dwelling among his people in the tabernacle and temple.
    This presence of God with his people was seen in the pillar of fire by night and the cloud by day in the exodus (Exod 13:21) and then filled the tabernacle, making it the most sacred object in the universe, the physical manifestation of God’s holy presence Exod 25:8–9
    Exodus 25:8 KJV 1900
    8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.
    In Jesus as the Word, the Shekinah walked planet Earth; he was a walking holy of holies.
    Ezekiel 43:7 KJV 1900
    7 And he said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever, and my holy name, shall the house of Israel no more defile, neither they, nor their kings, by their whoredom, nor by the carcases of their kings in their high places.
    Zechariah 2:13 KJV 1900
    13 Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord: For he is raised up out of his holy habitation.
    The Tabernacle was a sign of God’s nearness, His desire to be with His people, even in their wandering and sin.
    But here, in the Incarnation, God’s dwelling among us reaches its ultimate fulfillment. He did not simply visit humanity; He became one with us. Like a tent pitched in the midst of a campsite, Christ entered into the heart of our human experience, not as a distant observer but as an active participant.
    Isaiah 7:14 KJV 1900
    14 Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, And shall call his name Immanuel.
    This reminds us that Christmas is not just about God coming to us—it is about God staying with us.
    Emmanuel, “God with us,” means that in Jesus, God pitched His tent not only in history but also in the depths of our hearts, offering us His abiding presence.
    How many of you need his Presence this morning?
    And He walks with me, and He talks with me, And He tells me I am His own,
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    3. Testify about the The Glory:
    The Word Revealed His Glory
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    μονογενής, -οῦς, ὁ monogenēs
    Thus the word means “one-of-a-kind” and is reserved for Jesus in the Johannine literature of the NT. While all Christians are children of God, Jesus is God’s Son in a unique, one-of-a-kind sense. The word is used in this way in all its uses in the Gospel of John (1:14, 1:18, 3:16, and 3:18).
    Hebrews 11:17 NET
    17 By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac. He had received the promises, yet he was ready to offer up his only son.
    1 John 4:9 NET
    9 By this the love of God is revealed in us: that God has sent his one and only Son into the world so that we may live through him.
    Can you testify that there is NONE LIKE HIM…..
    The world testifies this holiday season about Santa Claus, Father Christmas, Kris Kringle….The world will testify about black Friday and monetize its God but I’m asking any body in here can testify like the saints in this verse “ and we have seen”
    How can you and I have accessability to this glory when at one time unapproachable?
    1 Timothy 6:16 NASB95
    16 who alone possesses immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and eternal dominion! Amen.
    Psalm 104:2 NET
    2 He covers himself with light as if it were a garment. He stretches out the skies like a tent curtain,
    In the Old Testament, God’s glory was often associated with majesty and unapproachable light—the kind of glory that caused Moses to hide his face and the people of Israel to tremble.
    But here, John speaks of a glory that is accessible, a glory that we can behold in the face of Jesus Christ. This glory is not just power and majesty; it is the glory of grace and truth.
    It refers to God’s character as seen in the life and acts of Jesus
    The ‘glory’ of Jesus was seen in God’s presence in him revealing itself in miraculous signs
    John 2:11 NET
    11 Jesus did this as the first of his miraculous signs, in Cana of Galilee. In this way he revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him.
    Did Jesus show his Glory when he changed something in your life?
    John 11:40 NET
    40 Jesus responded, “Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you would see the glory of God?”
    John 11:4 NET
    4 When Jesus heard this, he said, “This sickness will not lead to death, but to God’s glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”
    Fullness is defined as: a quantity of space completely occupied by something—‘full.’
    The eternal God, Jesus is completely filled with His Grace and Truth
    Grace is God Unmerited favor ….His kindness though we don’t deserve it. His covenant love, His merciful love
    John 1:16 HCSB
    16 Indeed, we have all received grace after grace from His fullness,
    I don’t need for Christmas is my two front teeth, but I need His Grace…
    He never runs out…’We have to remain empty so he can fill us with his grace…
    2 Corinthians 8:9 NET
    9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that although he was rich, he became poor for your sakes, so that you by his poverty could become rich.
    Ephesians 2:8–9 NASB95
    8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.
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    1 Peter 4:10 KJV 1900
    10 As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
    Testify about what the Lord has done for you…did he save you …
    His Grace, His kindness, His love for you and me led Him to a bloody cross, He died , but He got up! (3x’s)
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    Romans 16:27 NASB95
    27 to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, be the glory forever. Amen.
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      • Exodus 25:8NKJV

      • Ezekiel 43:7NKJV

      • Zechariah 2:13NKJV

      • Isaiah 7:14NKJV

      • Hebrews 11:17NKJV

      • 1 John 4:9NKJV

      • 1 Timothy 6:16NKJV

      • Psalm 104:2NKJV

      • John 2:11NKJV

      • John 11:40NKJV

      • John 11:4NKJV

      • John 1:16NKJV

      • 2 Corinthians 8:9NKJV

      • Ephesians 2:8–9NKJV

      • 1 Peter 4:10NKJV

      • Romans 16:27NKJV

Hope Community Church
hopeccchurch@hopecchurch.org
(443) 759-9277
http://hopecchurch.org
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