JESUS WAS BORN TO CHANGE THE WORLD

Bible: Luke 2: 1-21

Main verse: 1JOHN 4: 9 part B – God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.

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Every time Christmas comes, we are all reminded of God’s love for mankind when He took the human form and came down to the world to save us from sin. This is the main purpose, but there are others reasons that made Him come to Earth.

He also came to the world to change our lives. This is important because it will help us to achieve peace, happiness and a content life.

Adults understand that life is full of misery. It happened because of the human heart, and although mankind tried to change that, sadness and sorrows are still there. They do not go away even if we have tried.

We left Vietnam because of the Communist’s persecution in hope for freedom and a better life, but in this land we have found another problem that affected our lives, even to our children of the younger generations.

We thought that if we changed the circumstances, then our lives would be better, but it is not true. Some people even thought that if others changed for them, then they would be happier, but they don’t have the power to change others. What we can change is us in order to make our lives better.

For this, we can use the example of students going to school. The workload is the same for every student, but the results are different depending on how hard they studied. They can’t say that the teachers should decrease the workload for them to get a higher score. The important thing is they have to try harder and spend more time studying.

In the same way we can apply this principle to human life. We can’t expect others to change in order for our lives to be better, like a woman who can’t expect her food to be better if she keeps using the same cooking method over and over again. Sometimes, I heard people say that if the world has more good people then they will have better lives. That’s not true. Instead we, as an individual, must change for ourselves. During the night that Jesus was born, the angels had come and sang this:

LUKE 2: 14 – Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Many people have questioned this: If Jesus had come, why is the world still a miserable place? They forgot that it’s the human heart that makes the world so horrible, not God.

Therefore we will consider three aspects that the birth of Jesus can do for our lives.

Firstly, Jesus was born to change the world’s history. Before Him the world just went in the direction of individual’s interest, but after Him, we have a standard for all mankind to find true happiness.

An example of the change in world’s history is the calendar that we use today. Before that humans used the local calendar of each nation, especially based on the reigning years of a king, like the time that was recorded for the starting of building the Temple under Solomon’s reign:

1KINGS 6: 1 – And it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month Zif, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of the LORD.

Secondly, the birth of Jesus Christ changed the way humans approach God. Before Him, people must depend on priests, like the Israelites did:

LEVITICUS 9: 7 – And Moses said unto Aaron, Go unto the altar, and offer thy sin offering, and thy burnt offering, and make an atonement for thyself, and for the people: and offer the offering of the people, and make an atonement for them; as the LORD commanded.

Priests must be replaced from time to time because of their short life spans, but after His birth, Jesus has become a High Priest that lives forever because He is God:

HEBREWS 7: 23-24 – And they truly were many priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death. But this Man, because He continueth ever, hath an unchangeable priesthood.

Therefore humans can come to God through Jesus, because He is our Mediator and God Himself:

1TIMOTHY 2: 5 – For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.

JOHN 14: 6 – Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

That’s why today we can pray directly to Him, and always remember to do that in the name of Jesus so that our prayers can be heard by God.

Finally, the birth of Jesus Christ can change our hearts toward God and makes it more acceptable to Him to ask for a life of joy, happiness, peace and contentment. We can use the story of an owl and its voice to illustrate for it.

We all know the world is a terrible place because the heart of mankind is full of greed and hatred. We can only change that when we change and abide to the standards in the Bible.

EPHESIANS 4: 23-24 – And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

We cannot change ourselves by mere personal determination. We must ask God for the power to be changed without struggles. The change will be easy and permanent when we have the power of God within us:

2CORINTHIANS 5: 17 – Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

Jesus was born more than 2,000 years ago and today He is still waiting to change us for the better. Even Christians still need His power to change themselves. If we did not have it, we were just Christians in name only and we would have failed bitterly before Satan’s temptations. Let Him be born into your lives and make your lives become happier, with more joy and full of peace in this Christmas season.

However, it is up to the person if they want to change or not. We can’t make a student love studying, only they can do that. It’s the same with us. We have to make up our mind if we want Him to change us.

May God be with you in this Christmas season and bless you much more in the New Year. Amen.