Isaiah 63:1-9 The day of God's vengeance and redemption

Who is this coming from Edom, from Bozrah, with his garments stained crimson? Who is this, robed in splendor, striding forward with tremendous strength?

"It is I, speaking in righteousness, mighty to save."

Why are your garments red, like those of one treading the winepress?

"I have trodden the winepress alone; from the nations no one was with me. I trampled them in my anger and trod them down in my wrath; their blood spattered my garments, and stained all my clothing. For the day of vengeance was in my heart, and the year of my redeeming work had come. I looked, but there was no one to help; I was appalled that no one gave support. So my own arm worked salvation for me, and my own wrath sustained me. I trampled the nations in my anger; in my wrath I crushed them, and poured their blood upon the ground."

I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord, the deeds for which he is to be praised, according to all the Lord has done for us--yes, the many good things he has done for the house of Israel, according to his compassion and many kindnesses. He said, "Surely they are my people--children who will not deal falsely." So he became their Savior. In all their distress he too was distressed, and the angel of his presence saved them. In his love and in his pity he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.

Luke 1:26-38 The angel Gabriel foretells the birth of Jesus

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you."

But she was very perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end."

Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I am a virgin?"

The angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God."

"I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May it be to me as you have said." Then the angel left her.

True Christian Religion #92 The Son of God

The Lord said on many occasions that the Father sent him and that he was sent by the Father . . . . He said this because "being sent into the world" means coming down and associating with human beings. He did this by means of the human nature that he took upon himself through the Virgin Mary. And this humanity really is the Son of God, because it was conceived from Jehovah God as the Father, as is stated in Luke 1:32, 35.

The Lord's human nature is called "the Son of God," "the Son of Man," and "the Son of Mary." "The Son of the God" means Jehovah God in his humanity; "the Son of Man" means the Lord as the Word; and "the Son of Mary" means the actual human nature that he took upon himself.

I looked, but there was no one to help; I was appalled that no one gave support. So my own arm worked salvation for me. (Isaiah 63:5)

At our Christmas Eve service on Wednesday, I responded to the question "What child is this" by saying that this child Jesus was and is "God with us," as the prophet and the Gospel say. With that as a preface, this week I would like to introduce the new series we are now beginning on the inner life of Jesus Christ.

I was inspired to this theme by the beautiful little book A Life of Jesus Little Known, by the Rev. William L. Worcester, originally published in 1905, and still available in a 1980 reprint edition. In this series, we will follow the Lord's life as told in the Gospel stories, together with the deepest level of meaning in the Bible story as illuminated by Emanuel Swedenborg in his great work Arcana Coelestia, or Secrets of Heaven.

For today's introduction, I would like to look a little further into the question of who Jesus was, where he came from, and why he came to earth. Without knowing these things, we cannot possibly understand what was going on within the Lord's mind and heart during his life here on earth.

Of course, we limited humans can never do more than scratch the surface of the divine depths of the Lord's mind and heart. And I don't expect to do any more than that in this series. But on our own human level, we can, with the help of the Bible and Swedenborg's writings, gain some understanding and appreciation for who the Lord was, what he went through during his life here on earth, and why. My hope is that this will help all of us to increase our understanding of the Lord, and our love for the Lord, so that we may have a closer and deeper relationship with the One who is both our Creator and our Friend.

Our starting point this morning is where we left off before: that Jesus Christ was "Emmanuel," which means "God with us." And as I mentioned before, even this has been a matter of debate among Christians ever since the Christian era began. Traditional Christian theology holds that Jesus represented the second Person of a three-person God. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are each seen as distinct persons . . . and yet, in contradictory fashion, God is said to be one God.

One of the problems that may have led to this irrational belief is a confusion between names and persons. There is a science fiction short story by Arthur C. Clark called "The Nine Billion Names of God" in which a group of monks in a remote monastery buy an advanced computer in order to list all the names of God, believing that once they do, the purpose of Creation will have been fulfilled, and the universe will come to an end. I'm not sure there have been nine billion names used for God. But without too much exaggeration, I think I could say there have probably been a million. And in some parts of the world at some times, each of those million names was considered to be a separate deity.

The Bible, too, has many names for God--Jehovah, God, Lord, and so on--including the ones we read last time: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. If each name that the Bible gave for God were a separate person, we Christians would be polytheists with the best of 'em. Traditional Christianity has gotten it down to three. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each considered God by themselves. The New