Date: December 4, 2019
Text: Genesis 3:15
One of my favorite Christmas movies has always been A Christmas Carol. With all the versions of the story that you can find, it is not a stretch to say that it is one of the most beloved Christmas stories of all time. I like the idea that Ebenezer Scrooge became a changed man when he saw glimpses of the past, present, and future. My favorite version growing up was the Micky Mouse version with all the Disney characters. Perhaps you already realized that our themes for our midweek services will have a little bit of an influence from the idea of the Christmas Carol Story. We’ll look at the Spirits of Advent – past, present, and future. Unlike Ebenezer Scrooge, we are not going to be visited by three ghosts. Rather when we talk about three spirits, we are talking about three important messages that we receive from God’s Word. Today we focus on the Spirt of Advent Past: God’s Promise of a Savior.
Part 1: Our past can bring to mind memories of sin
Our text this evening takes us all the way back to the very beginning. We are back at the Garden of Eden after the fall into sin. Before we look at the positive of verse 15, I want you to think about what had happened. In some ways, from our perspective, it might not seem like a big deal. Adam and Eve just ate a piece of fruit that they weren’t supposed to eat. And now, because of that one little sin, all of humanity is cursed. All people inherit a sinful nature from Adam and Eve. We will all die a physical death because they ate that fruit.
But the sin wasn’t just a small sin. It was disobedience toward their wonderful creator God. God had given them so much and only asked them not to eat from the tree. It was their opportunity to serve him. It was their opportunity to love God above all things. And they rejected God in favor or Satan’s lies. They were selfish rather than loving. They lost their perfection and now the entire world is contaminated by sin.
Do you think that Adam and Eve ever thought back to the Garden and hung their heads in shame about what they had lost? I think they probably did. Think about your own life. Do you have times when you are racked with guilt thinking about the sinful things you have done? You wonder how you could have been so foolish to sin in that way? You wish you could take back those words or actions but you can’t? You have to live with the consequences of your sin? If we aren’t careful, we might even fall into despair because of those thoughts. We wonder, how could God possibly love me? What I did was so terrible.
In some ways, I think the guilt was worse for Adam and Eve. They knew what it was like to be perfect. They knew that they had lost the ability to live without sin and a sinful nature. And they lived on earth much longer than we live today. They could tell their children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, and many more generations about what it was like before the fall into sin. There were probably times when they wished they hadn’t been so foolish. Why had they listened to the devil’s lies? But they did and now we all have sin.
In the Christmas Carol story, Ebenezer Scrooge starts to realize the error of his ways when he gets the visions of his past. He sees some of the joy that he has lost over the years. He sees that he has allowed his own bad circumstances to shape his bad attitude toward others. Rather than valuing other people, rather than showing love to others, he fell into the trap of thinking that money and business was the way he should go in life. Ultimately this led to an entirely selfish existence. He didn’t care about others. He only looked out for himself.
I don’t think many of us would end up in the extreme circumstance of someone like Ebenezer Scrooge. And yet, some of the core issues are real temptations for all of us. He focused on himself and what he wanted rather than doing what was best for others. That is basically the heart and core of every sin. Adam and Eve gave into selfish temptations rather than trusting God. They thought that they should eat the fruit to get more blessings for themselves. This was wrong and showed that they didn’t fully trust that God’s command to not eat was for their good.
It is easy for us to fall into selfish behavior. The way we celebrate Christmas in our world today makes it incredibly easy to be selfish. It is easy to make the holiday all about the presents that we want to get for ourselves. Have you ever seen someone open all their presents on Christmas morning and then get disappointed because they didn’t get that one present that they really wanted. How selfish can we be? Rather than celebrating the generosity that gave us anything at all, we get disappointed when our specific desires are not met.
Selfishness is the root of so many sins. We think we know better than God. We think it is ok for us to break this or that commandment because, we rationalize, God certainly wants me to be happy. My happiness should trump everything else. But that is not true. Earthly happiness is not our goal. Again think about some of the guilt we might feel over past events. Did getting our way really make us happy or did it lead to other problems? The devil knows how to deceive us. Sin doesn’t actually lead to happiness. Sin leads to problems.
Part 2: God’s Promise takes care of all of our sin
How fantastic it is that God knows best. He knows the solution we need. That is why he didn’t wait very long to announce that he was going to send a Savior. Shortly after sin corrupted the world, God said, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers. He will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” God is talking to the devil but Adam and Eve heard every word of it. They heard the gospel promise. This offspring would be Jesus. He would take care of sin and the devil. The devil would strike out at him as we know. Good Friday was brutally painful for our Savior.
But his suffering and death was necessary to save us. The best part about Jesus is that he did everything necessary to save us. We don’t have to do anything. When God made the promise in the Garden, Adam and Eve could cling to that promise for their entire life. God’s promises are sure and certain. They are not just a possible outcome. They are exactly what is going to happen. It was guaranteed to happen. By trusting in that promise, Adam and Eve were saved from their sins.
God’s method is much more positive than what the spirits do with Scrooge in a Christmas Carol. The spirits torment Scrooge. The spirit from the past torments him with the troubles of his youth and the sins that he committed. Scrooge does eventually change but it is because he is scared straight. He realizes how bad he was and he wants to be better.
Even though that might be a way to make someone better in this world, it will not save their soul for eternity. Scrooge never actually learned the true meaning of Christmas. Scrooge learned something that many people think is the Christmas message. Many people think that Christmas means it is the time of year that we should be generous to others. While I fully support generosity, if it is not motivated by a Christian heart, it is missing something.
God motivates us by his grace. He doesn’t frighten us into being better. He gives us our Savior. While we were still sinners, God saved us. He comes to us when we are little sinners and works faith in our hearts through baptism. He connects us through faith to Jesus. He promises us forgiveness because Jesus paid for all our sins. We are not saved because of our good deeds. We are saved because of Jesus.
Through faith in Jesus we have the best kind of generosity. We can give to others because God has done so much for us. We can give others the best gift – help them see Jesus. Help them see the true joy of Christmas.
Conclusion
Even though I think A Christmas Carol is a wonderful story, it ultimately does not give the actual Christmas message. We always need to come back to Christ. That is why we take time to have these special worship services. We live in a world that has changed much about the meaning of Christmas. We can certainly enjoy many things about the celebrations around us but it is good for us to keep coming back to the promises of God. He loved us so much that he sent Jesus to save us. He planned this way back at the Garden of Eden. At just the right time, Jesus came and lived among us. Because of that first Christmas, we understand true Christmas joy.