John 1:14 (ESV)
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.
Dear Friends in Christ,
I came across an incredible story recently about a little girl named Molly. Picture the scene for a moment. Molly is in the hospital because she’s sick – very sick. She suffers from a genetic disorder. Most children born with this disorder die by the age of 7. Well, guess what? Molly is now 7. Her parents, as you might well imagine, are desperate. The best hope they have of saving their daughter is an infusion of healthy blood cells into her body that would come, ideally, from a brother or sister. Unfortunately, Molly is an only child. But with Molly growing weaker by the day, they come across a possible solution – granted, it’s a risky solution, an uncharted solution, but a solution nonetheless. Using an egg from Molly’s mother and sperm from her father and the process known as in vitro fertilization, a healthy embryo is conceived in a laboratory dish and that embryo is implanted in the womb of Mollie’s mother. And Mollie’s mother ultimately bears this baby whom they name Adam and who comes into the world to save Molly. Adam is the perfect baby. Not physically perfect. Not morally perfect. Not spiritually perfect. But when it comes to what his sister needs to survive, Adam is indeed the perfect baby. For when the blood is taken from his umbilical cord and placed in the body of Molly, she begins to recover immediately.
Ask the mother of Molly what was the most touching moment in this whole nerve-wracking ordeal and she’ll tell you that it occurred the first time Molly held little Adam in her arms. And if we could just envision that moment, we might want to ask her: “Molly, do you know who you’re holding there? Do you have any idea that resting in your arms is the one who came to save you?” Molly’s mother described that scene as “the most passionate, awesome, magnificent scene of her whole life.” But as remarkable as that must have been, even it must pale in comparison to another similar scene that unfolded centuries before – not in the sterile environment of a hospital, but in a place where farm animals were kept. For there a young Jewish peasant girl named Mary held in her arms the One who came to save not just her but all mankind.
John describes that poignant moment in our text with these words: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Has a more powerful or profound statement than that ever been written? I don’t think so. Ponder for a moment the meaning of that one sentence. God becoming flesh. The One who fills the heavens and the earth squeezing himself into the tiny form of a human embryo. That’s like the artist stepping into his own painting…the writer entering his own story until he, like the other characters, becomes an actual part of the story.
And yet as mind-boggling as all this is, there’s more. In 2 Cor. 5:21 we find something written about Jesus that could never be written about any other human being when it says, “Christ never sinned.” You see, God didn’t just become a baby, he became the perfect baby. Now I know we use that term loosely when we’re talking about other babies, especially our own. When they’re born we check to make sure they have all their fingers and toes, 2 eyes, 2 ears, a nose, a mouth, and then we proudly declare, “Oh, what a perfect baby!”
But we know that that statement needs to be qualified. We know that it’s only a matter of time before those tiny feet are going to learn to stomp in defiance and those little hands are going to learn to take things from others and that cute little mouth with its rosebud lips is going to learn to selfishly proclaim, “Mine!” We know that no baby is truly perfect in every sense of the term. And yet according to the Bible, when Mary looked at her tiny infant and said, “Oh what a perfect baby!” she spoke the truth in every sense imaginable.
And those who knew him best during his life agreed with her. Peter, who walked with him for 3 years, wrote these words about Jesus: “He committed no sin and no deceit was found in his mouth.” The writer to the Hebrews states that Jesus was “tempted in every way, just as we are, yet was without sin.” Yet the most brazen declaration of his perfection came not from his friends, from those who knew him best. Rather it came from the lips of Jesus himself when he challenged people in John 8:46 with this question: “Can any of you prove me guilty of sin?”
How many of us would dare to issue that challenge to others? Is there anyone here this morning who would stand up in front of your family and friends and say, “Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? Can any of you think of any time in my life when I did something wrong?” You would not say those words because you know they could. Jesus said those words because he knew they couldn’t.
Now what I have shared with you so far this morning, most of you probably already knew. It’s not news to you that Jesus was the perfect baby who went on to become the only perfect person to ever walk this earth. And I’m sure you didn’t need me to remind you that you are not perfect, that you have made your fair share of mistakes and committed your fair share of sins over the course of your lifetime just like I’ve done. But what you may not know and what you really need to know before leaving this world behind is this: In order for you to go to heaven, you need to be perfect. Hebrews 12:23 describes the assembly of heaven as consisting of “the spirits of righteous men made perfect.”
Contrary to what you may have been taught or told and contrary to what you may have thought, heaven is not a place of just decent people. It’s not a place of just nice people. You may have heard somebody say or you yourself may have said, “Oh, if anybody is going to heaven, she is because she is such a good person.” Listen, my friends, heaven is not a place of nice folks. Heaven is not a place of good folks. Rather heaven is a place of perfect folks. That is the standard God has set. That is his entrance requirement for heaven, not just that we be good, but that we be perfect. Like Jesus himself said in his Sermon on the Mount, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
And yet we’ve already established that we are far from perfect. So we have a problem, don’t we? What are we imperfect people to do then? Where are we imperfect people to turn? What solution and hope do we imperfect people have? I would suggest to you that our solution lies in doing exactly what 7-year-old Molly did whom we heard about in the introduction to this sermon. And what did she do? She relied upon the gift of her brother to save her. You see, my friends, the only hope that you and I have of ever being saved is that somebody from the outside who is perfect can come into our world and into our lives and solve the predicament that we imperfect people find ourselves in. And that’s what Jesus did. Please understand that Jesus did for you what Molly’s brother did for her, only on a much greater and grander scale. You were diseased, just like she was, only your disease was not physical in nature but spiritual. Your disease was sin. You had no hope, just like she had no hope. You had no cure, just like she had no cure. But thankfully what you did have was a father like she had, a Heavenly Father who loves you and was willing to do whatever it took, whatever was necessary to save you. So he sent his Son to do just that, the perfect Son, the perfect baby with the perfect blood. And when you receive that Son by faith, when you by the power of the Holy Spirit reach the point where you trust him as your heaven-sent Savior, you become, in God’s eyes, perfect. How can that be? Well, listen to how the Apostle Paul puts it in 2 Cor. 5:21, and I’m going to read this to you from the J.B. Phillips version of the New Testament. He says: “For God caused Christ, who himself knew nothing of sin, actually to be sin for our sakes, so that in Christ we might be made good with the goodness of God.” To be made good with the goodness of God means to be made absolutely perfect, not because that’s what we are in and of ourselves, but because God out of his amazing grace gives, or imputes, to us and all believers in Jesus the perfect goodness, the perfect righteousness, the perfect holiness of Christ. And let me tell you something, my friends, no other gift you get or got this Christmas season can come close to comparing to that.
All of which takes us back to little Molly one more time. Remember how before we talked about what it would have been like to ask little Molly while she was holding her baby brother, “Do you know who you’re holding, Molly? Do you know you’re holding the one who came to save you?” But as much as we’d like to ask that question of Molly, how much more would we like to ask the same question of Mary. And that’s how we’re going to close this sermon as Mimi Meyer sings for us the beautiful song, “Mary, Did You Know?”
Let’s bow our heads for prayer: Heavenly Father, how could we ever begin to thank you for the gift that you have given us in the perfect Babe of Bethlehem? You saw our need. You recognized our desperate plight. And you had mercy on us and did what was necessary to save us, even when it meant that that perfect Baby would one day have to shed his perfect blood for our sins and imperfections. Father, if there are any here today who have not yet received this gift by faith, please bring them to that point this morning. And for those of us who have, may you help us to never take that gift for granted, but instead to cherish it, to treasure it, and to openly share it with others so that they too might know the joy and assurance that this gift brings with it. For we ask it in Jesus’ name. Amen.