Advent 2017 – Week II


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Sermon Notes

Themes: (Purple – personal preparation, repentance, godly conduct, spiritual discipline)

  • Personal preparation – deliberate, focused, significant effort to achieve personal/spiritual time for intimacy with God for the setting of our thinking, our heart’s attitudes, our values, priorities and loves all toward God!!!!
    • Realization of how easy and common it is for Christians to allow the holiday activities to choke out virtually all of the time that should be given to God — John 1:11 He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him.
    • Welcome Christ into our lives and our homes — John 1:9 There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man.
  • Repentance – I John 1:9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (Psalm 51:1-19)
    • John 2:1-11 In preparation for Christ’s second and final coming. Penitent, yet joyfully expectant of the Great Marriage/Great Banquet Celebration of the Lamb and the Bride of Christ, where the New Wine in the Kingdom of God will be the best reserved for the last (now/eternity).
    • Reconciliation is what God does. It is God who forgives sins. And God forgives us the very moment that we come to the place where we realize that we need forgiveness (which itself comes through God’s grace). At that moment, we feel sorrow and a desire for forgiveness and healing. At that moment we have full confidence in Scripture, in God and in the sufficiency and satisfaction of the finished work of the Cross of Christ. In that moment, we are reconciled with God. The reunion, the bond, the connection, the joy are all there.
  • Godly conduct – Following Christ’s example, the selfless giving of ourselves first and good gifts second to God then to others, especially those who can never return/repay the kindness.
  • Spiritual discipline – what is practiced, what is refrained from, safeguards and reflection in the Scriptures/prayer/fasting

{Isaiah 53:1-12, 1 Timothy 2:5-6, 1 Peter 1:18-23}
Isaiah 53:1-12
Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

  • Acts 13:47-49 “For so the Lord has commanded us, ‘I HAVE PLACED YOU AS A LIGHT FOR THE GENTILES, THAT YOU MAY BRING SALVATION TO THE END OF THE EARTH.'” When the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord; and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed. And the word of the Lord was being spread through the whole region.

For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, And like a root out of parched ground; He has no stately form or majesty That we should look upon Him, Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him. He was despised and forsaken of men, A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; And like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.

  • 2 Corinthians 5:21 He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
  • 1 Peter 2:24 and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness for by His wounds you were healed.

He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth. By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered That He was cut off out of the land of the living For the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due? His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth. But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief;

  • Matthew 26:39-44 And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.” …He went away again a second time and prayed, saying, “My Father, if this cannot pass away unless I drink it, Your will be done.” …And He left them again, and went away and prayed a third time, saying the same thing once more.
  • 1 John 4:10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
  • Matthew 27:45-46 …Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, …”MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?”
  • 2 Corinthians 4:6-11 For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ…we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body…

If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities. Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, And He will divide the booty with the strong; Because He poured out Himself to death, And was numbered with the transgressors; Yet He Himself bore the sin of many, And interceded for the transgressors.