Lessons from the Birth of Jesus

Matthew 1:18-25

¹⁸ Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. ¹⁹ And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. ²⁰ But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. ²¹ She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” ²² All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:

²³   “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
       and they shall call his name Immanuel”

(which means, God with us). ²⁴ When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, ²⁵ but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus. (ESV)

1. A lesson about .

⁴ He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, ⁵ and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? ⁶ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” (Matthew 19:4-6, ESV) 

2. A lesson about .

³ For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; ⁴ that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, ⁵ not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; ⁶ that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. ⁷ For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. (1 Thessalonians 4:3-7, ESV) 

3. A lesson about doing the thing in the right .

“When we have to do a severe thing, let us choose the tenderest manner.
May be, we shall not have to do it at all.”
(C. H. Spurgeon) 

4. A lesson about for God’s . 

5. A lesson about God’s to fulfill his .

6. A lesson about .

7. The main lesson is to teach us Jesus is and he came to do.

• Jesus’s conception was miraculous – born of a virgin.
• Jesus was fully human and fully God – “God with us.”
• Jesus came to us from our .