Christmas is for Troubled People - 12/18/2022 Sunday Sermon

The Tabernacle Today

Christmas is for Troubled People

The word Hanukkah means “Dedication” in Hebrew. The holiday celebrates the heroic recapture and rededication of the Jewish Temple (December 25, 165 B.C.) after it had been desecrated by Greco-Syrian forces under Antiochus IV. Antiochus IV called himself Theos Epiphanes (the visible God). His opponents called him Epimanes (Madman).

It is fitting that December 25th was the day they had cleansed the Temple – because the Temple represented the place you could go to and experience God (Even Non-Jew Gentiles – see Solomon’s dedication in 2 Chronicles 6:32-33).

Read Matthew 1:18-25 Christmas is for troubled people Let’s Pray!

There are about a dozen scenes in the 5 chapters in Matthew and Luke’s gospels that tell the Christmas story.

As we look at the Christmas passages, we hear a lot about salvation, peace, joy, commitments to live righteously and serve God. But many references also tell us that those who experienced the first Christmas were troubled and fearful.

Why was all Jerusalem troubled with Herod?

Many of them had already compromised to gain Herod and Rome’s favor – If the real Jewish God-King Messiah showed up right now, they were not spiritually ready!

The message of Christmas is meant to turn our lives upside down and bring us from fear to faith, and from troubled hearts to hearts filled with peace and joy!