Matthew 1:18-23

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. 19Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

20But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."

22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us."

Philip. 2:9-11

Main Idea: A Christian believes that Jesus Christ is exclusively unique.

These Sundays we are talking about what Christians believe. This morning we come to the very core belief of Christians and the focus of the Apostle’s Creed and that is the person of Jesus Christ. What do Christians believe about Jesus Christ? A Christian believes that Jesus Christ is exclusively unique.

In 1984 Steve McCurry, as a photographer for National Geographic was photographing Afghan refugees in Pakistan. As he photographed different people, the eyes and face of a young girl caught his attention. She was wearing a red shawl and looked to be 13 or 14 years old. He made several photographs and didn’t think at the time that her photograph would be any different from the rest that he had made. Yet, when he processed the film one picture of the young girl with the red shawl seized his mind. Her face had no expression, striking in appearance but without emotion. However, it was her eyes—sea green, piercing and unforgettable. One year later, in 1985, National Geographic would use the picture of the unknown Afghan girl on its cover. Yet for 17 years Steve McCurry couldn’t forget the eyes that were unlike any other.

For 17 years the Afghan girl was nameless, then, in 2003 Steve was able to return to Afghanistan and try to find the girl. After weeks of searching and following every lead he could, she was found in the Bora Bora area. Under the strict rules of Islam they were allowed to meet and when she walked into the room McCurry said he knew it was her. The face was familiar but the eyes still burned with the same intensity they had 17 years before. Her name is Sharbut Gula and she is now nearing 30. McCurry was allowed to photograph her again. The current photo shows no expression or emotion—but the eyes are the same, unlike any other.

How could he be sure that the "Afghan girl" of 1984 was Sharbut Gula of 2003? The only way to know was to examine the eyes from both photographs. McCurry took the photo to the FBI and a forensic examiner who was 100% sure it was the same person, based on a facial comparison. McCurry, though, took it one step further and asked the opinion of John Daugman, the inventor of iris recognition. Daugman determined mathematically that it was the same person. How? Because iris patterns in our eyes, like fingerprints, are totally unique, no one else has the same. (Selections from National Geographic)

That’s what we mean when we say that Christians believe that Jesus Christ is exclusively unique. There never was or ever will be anyone like him. Why? As the words in the creed say, "I believe in Jesus Christ, His (God’s) only Son, our Lord. Conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary…" Jesus Christ stands alone in history and eternity as the central figure as the one in whom Christians believe. How is Jesus Christ exclusively unique? The words of the creed remind us that he is unique in his identity with God, his claim on his followers and his connection for people.

Christians believe that Jesus Christ has an exclusively unique identity with God (Matt. 1:23). The words of the creed say that Christians believe that Jesus Christ is God’s only Son. That statement defines the relationship that Jesus Christ and God share. What is that relationship? It is exclusively unique. What does that mean? It means that there is an identity that Jesus Christ has with God that no one else has, shares or knows.

To understand what we mean by that we need to ask the question: Who do people say that Jesus is today? Essentially, today you have a Jesus for every taste: There’s the Jesus who is the arch enemy of a male-dominated culture, the Jesus who is a wise sage, the Jesus of the DaVinci Code, who eloped with Mary Magdalene, the Jesus who is a First Century magician, the Jesus who is a poor Jewish cynic and the Jesus of the Gospel of Thomas, who commands his followers to discover "the light" within you. Each of these portraits of Jesus is the result of someone’s quest to get rid of the creeds and dogmas surrounding Jesus and find the truth. U.S. News and World Report cited the reason for the interest in Dan Brown’s DaVinci Code as being because it taps into "a persistent American desire to recapture the true original Jesus." (US News, p. 49, 12/22/03) The only problem when we try on our own to get back to a "stripped down" Jesus is that what we end up with is a Jesus who is like the one doing the searching.

Christianity, on the other hand, accepts what Jesus said about himself and Jesus identified himself in an exclusive relationship with God—He was his Son. Christians believe that Jesus was a historical reality. Lee Strobel, in his book A Case for Christ, notes 39 sources outside the Bible documenting the life of Jesus that enumerate more than one hundred reported facts concerning Jesus’ life, teachings, crucifixion and resurrection. Christians reject the belief that Jesus is some individual created by the early Christian church to explain its own existence. Instead, we believe that Jesus was a historically real individual as the Gospels explain.

Christians also believe that Jesus was uniquely God’s Son. Matthew says that the birth of Jesus was the fulfillment of the prophecies of the Old Testament that Jesus was "Immanuel"—"God with us." As Jesus entered into ministry he never hesitated to identify himself with God. On many occasions, Jesus dared to declare his unique identity with God. In John 8:56 Jesus said to the Jewish leaders who questioned his claim, "I tell you the truth…before Abraham was born, I am." Meaning God said about Himself, "I Am" and Jesus said about himself, "I Am." They are one and the same. Jesus said directly, indirectly and in his actions demonstrated that he was the one unique, exclusive Son of God.

Why is this important? Because if Jesus wasn’t who he said he was, then all we believe is worthless. Presidential candidate Howard Dean said that Jesus was, "A person who set an extraordinary example that has lasted for 2000 years, which is pretty inspiring when you think about it." If all Jesus was was a good example then we are all in big trouble. C. S. Lewis said in his timeless book Mere Christianity: "I’m trying here to prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing that people often say about him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I can’t accept his claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God—or else a madman or something worse." Christians confess that Jesus Christ is God’s only Son!

Another thing that Christians believe about Jesus Christ is that Jesus has an exclusively unique claim on his followers. (Phil.2:9-11) Christians call Jesus Christ, "Our Lord." What do we mean when we say that? The Old Testament used one unique word for God when he was referred to as Lord, "YHWH." The Greek translation of the Old Testament uses the word kyrios, which, again, means Lord. When you come to the New Testament after Jesus was resurrection, Peter would proclaim, "Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ" (Acts 2:36). That says to us that Jesus was given the same status as God himself. Paul would then declare that this identity and authority would be one that all creation would recognize that "Jesus Christ is Lord."

To claim Jesus Christ is Lord is to proclaim his equality with God. However, if you’ll notice the words of the creed say that Jesus Christ is "our Lord." This claim of his being equal to God suddenly becomes very personal. His claim to be Lord extends to "our" life. He is the one who has sole ownership of my life. He is the only ruler of my life. There is nothing in my life that doesn’t fall within the limits of his claim on my life. To say Jesus is Lord is to say that Jesus Christ has made an exclusive claim on me personally.

In the first century allegiance to Rome was made clear by a person saying, "Caesar is Lord." Christians who refused would say, "Jesus is Lord." The result cost them their lives. There will always be someone who wants to claim his or her will over your own conscience. It is interesting that today in France a law is being proposed that children in school will be prohibited from wearing a veil, which is a sign of faith for a Muslim woman, a yamakuh, which is a sign of faith for a Jewish man or the wearing of a cross that would identify a person as a Christian. Each of those symbolizes the belief that another has claim on their life and the state always is uncomfortable when anyone gives their absolute allegiance to another. Saying, "Jesus is Lord" may cost you more than you expected.

Not only does it mean His exclusive claim on me personally, it means his exclusive claim on the church. The church as well says Jesus Christ is "our Lord." Again, that we serve no other human institution with the devotion that we reserve for Jesus Christ. There have always been those from Rome’s Caesar to current religious and political Caesar’s who would desire the allegiance of the church of Jesus Christ. Yet the church says at every incursion, "Jesus Christ is Lord."

During the 1930’s as Hitler rose to power in Germany, he demanded that he and the government of the Nazis should have authority over the church and its preaching. On May 29-31, 1934, the leaders of the Protestant churches met at Barmen. They issued one of the finest statements of the Lordship of Jesus Christ over his church outside the New Testament. They said: "Jesus Christ, as he is attested for us in Holy Scripture, is the Word of God which we have to hear and which we have to trust and obey in life and in death. We reject the false doctrine ,that the church would and would have to acknowledge as a source of her proclamation, apart from and beside this one Word of God, still other events and powers, figures and truths, as God’s revelation." ("I Believe," p. 50-51 by Alister McGrath) The church of Jesus Christ says boldly that none other than Jesus Christ is Lord. Christians believe that Jesus Christ is our Lord – Lord over our lives and Lord over our church.

Christians believe that Jesus Christ has an exclusively unique identity with God, claim on His followers but we also say that Jesus Christ has an exclusively unique connection for people. (Matt. 1:21) The creed shifts from speaking about the exclusively unique nature of Jesus Christ to the events in the life of Jesus that are the foundation of our faith. We confess that Christians believe that Jesus Christ’s entry into this world happened in an exclusively unique manner: "Conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary." In Matthew’s Gospel it is not hard to figure out that to Joseph the news of Mary’s pregnancy was not a welcome event. Those who deny this miraculous birth of Jesus foolishly say that first century people didn’t understand biology. Yet Joseph understood enough biology to know that Mary must have been "biological" with someone and it wasn’t him. Even Mary dismissed the Angel Gabriel’s words to her that she would have a baby. She knew enough biology to say that’s not possible.

What Christians believe about the entry of Jesus Christ into our world was that, first, Jesus was born through a human mother. He really was a human being. Everything that makes you and me human—biologically, mentally, emotionally and ultimately Jesus was just like us. He didn’t appear to be human, seem to be human, look only human—Jesus was human. Also, we say that Jesus’ entry into this world was the result of the conception of the Holy Spirit. What we say in this again is that the mother of Jesus and her husband knew enough biology that neither of them had exchanged the essential elements that could create life. We say what the angel told both Joseph and Mary that the baby Mary carried was the result of God’s work. When it came to the entrance of Jesus into the world, God took a shortcut! This means, then, that Jesus was fully divine from the beginning. It wasn’t something he became later. He didn’t start out as a man and God decide to make him divine. Jesus Christ was fully and really human as well as fully and really divine, both at the same time.

Why is this so important? Because it explains everything else. It offers to us a connection for us to him and a connection through him to God. Joseph was told that the name that Mary’s baby was to have would be Jesus, "because he will save his people from their sins" (Matt. 1:21). Jesus came to provide a way that you and I might be connected to God. Paul said in I Timothy 2:5-6 "For there is only one God and one Mediator who can reconcile God and people. He is the man Christ Jesus. He gave his life to purchase freedom for everyone…" Unless he is completely human and at the same time completely divine, then the connection isn’t possible! Why? Well, if we say that Jesus was a man and just a man then he shares the same problem we have. He is part of the problem not the solution. So there must be some essential difference between Jesus and every other human being if he is going to connect us to God.

The other side of this is that if Jesus is God and only God then he has no connection to us. He can’t relate to us and we can’t relate to him. He can’t understand us or we understand him. So his being human is our connection to him and his with us. The conclusion is that if Jesus Christ is going to connect us to God, then he must be fully, really human and fully, really God both at the same time.

Here is what is so critical about the other theories about who Jesus Christ is. For example Elaine Pagels quotes in her book Beyond Belief this passage from the Gospel of Thomas, "Jesus said: ‘If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.’" She writes, "The strength of this saying is that it does not tell us what to believe but challenges us to discover what lies hidden within ourselves." (Beyond Belief, p. 32). That, my friends, is our whole problem—we have always wanted a way to fix ourselves. I can say to you I know what lies hidden within me and it’s not something I want exposed. I want it removed!

If you choose to believe anything less than the exclusive uniqueness of Jesus Christ then you are left with struggling to find your own way to God. The only problem is there is no other way. This is true because of his exclusively unique identity with God, his claim on his followers and his connection for people.

"I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord. Conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary." That, my friends, is what Christians believe.

Sunday, January 25, 2004

Dr. Bruce Tippit, Pastor

First Baptist Church

Jonesboro, Arkansas

btippit@fbcjonesboro.org