Matthew 1
12-2 and after the deportation to
Babylon Janiah was the father of shiel
and shtil the father of zerubabel and
zerubabel the father of abud and abud
the father of elim and elim the father
of Azor and Azor the father of zadok and
zadok the father of Akim and aim the
father of elod and elod the father of
elad AR and elazar the father of Matten
and Matten the father of Jacob and Jacob
the father of Joseph the husband of Mary
of whom Jesus was born who is called
Christ so all the generations from
Abraham to David were 14 generations and
from David to the deportation to Babylon
14 generations and from the deportation
to Babylon to the Christ 14 Generations
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 and her
husband Joseph being a just man and
unwilling to put her to shame resolved
to divorce her quietly 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 she will bear a son and you shall
call his name Jesus for he will save his
people from their
sins all this took place to fulfill what
the Lord had spoken by the
prophet behold the Virgin shall conceive
and bear a son and they shall call his
name
Emmanuel which means god with us when
Joseph woke from his sleep he did as the
angel of the Lord commanded him he took
his wife but knew her not until she had
given birth to a son and he called his
name
Jesus hey everybody good morning and
welcome to CCC uh really really glad
you're here so uh thanks for coming uh
before I get started I want to tell you
about a Ministry that my wife Karen and
I are really excited about it's actually
a Ministry that Jim College started
before he retired and we feel so
strongly about it that we decided to
take it over and this ministry has one
goal we only want to do one thing and
this is what we want to do we're going
to make grandparenting great again okay
that's it that's it all
right uh in all seriousness we uh have
what we call the grandparents huddle and
we meet uh once a month the first Sunday
of the month over in the gym at the
10:00 hour and we do it for a serious
reason one we want to make we want to be
intentional about grandparenting and the
reason I'm so passionate about it is
because it finally hit me that being a
grandfather is my last big role and I
want to do it well so if you're a
grandparent I want to invite you to the
grandparent huddle if you have a
grandparent that goes to this church or
that lives in this area invite them you
can get more information out at the next
steps area but uh let's do it together
let's make grandparenting great again
all right thanks for letting me have a
little fun with that all right we are in
the third week of our Advent series and
the word Advent implies
anticipation waiting and waiting can be
hard that's why we have this mock
waiting room set up here and if you've
ever been in a waiting room and and I
have one of things that makes it hard is
that you you don't know what's going on
on the other side of the door and when
I've been in a waiting room there have
been times where I've just been longing
for somebody to tell me something tell
me anything because silence can be the
toughest part about waiting the title of
this message is waiting in
silence waiting in silence we're looking
at Matthew chapter 1 if you want to turn
there if you have your Bibles you can
turn to Matthew chapter 1 if you want to
use one of our Bibles it's on page 757
or you can just wait for the verses that
come up on the screen in Matthew chapter
1 the passage that we had read to you uh
is really the story of the birth of
Jesus but before it gets to the story of
the birth of Jesus there's a
genealogy a list of names and we
actually spared you the first 11 verses
of the genealogy you know uh the Old
King James Bible which is the Bible I
grew up with uh doesn't say
that like Abraham was the father of
Isaac Isaac was the father of Jacob it
it uses the word begat like Abraham
begat Isaac Isaac begat Jacob there are
a lot of begats here there are 42 to be
exact 42 Generations
42 names and we we left out we left the
last 14 and read those 14 to you not
just to give you a taste of the
genealogy
uh but during that those 14 Generations
there were no prophets in Israel now if
you remember a prophet is somebody who
stands between God and people and the
prophet would give the message of God to
the people with no prophets that meant
God went silent and he was silent for
400 years through all 14
Generations now you have to be careful
with the Silence of God because it's
easy to think when God goes silent
whether it's in the Bible or in your
life that he is not paying attention
that he he doesn't really care but I
always think of the Book of Job you know
the Book of Job is uh known as a book
about suffering and it is but it's not
just a book about suffering it's also a
book about waiting and waiting in
silence because the Book of Job starts
with like a peak behind the curtain at a
conversation that job is not privy to
it's a conversation between God and
Satan and now God says to Satan have you
seen my servant job it's obvious that
God loves job and Satan says to God does
job love you for nothing you have filled
his life with blessings you've made his
life easy if his life ever gets hard he
will curse you to your face and what
Satan is saying is God no one loves you
for you you're like a rich man who has
to buy his friends like as long as you
are piling on blessings to somebody they
feel like they love you but if you ever
remove those
blessings they will hate you and God
says job loves me for me and Satan
says want to bet and I'm paraphrasing
that all right and then what happens is
that God gives permission for Satan to
make job's life hard and if you know the
story you know that's a gross
understatement his life gets incredibly
hard The Book of Job is 42 chapters long
God does not speak until chapter
38 for all that time he is silent and
job thinks that God is not paying
attention that God doesn't care but he
couldn't have been more
wrong because when you're reading the
story you realize that all of Heaven is
like on the edge of their seats watching
everything job does wondering if job
will be the one who loves God just for
being
god listen waiting is hard and if you
are here right now and you feel like you
are waiting in
silence then I want you to know this
message is for you I told you last week
that God loves patterns and there's a
pattern In this passage we're looking at
all right here are my three points and
they're pretty simple so you know where
I'm going I want to talk about when why
and how when God goes silent why God
goes silent and then finally how God
breaks his silence first when God goes
silent when I was a kid and I would uh
read the gospel of Matthew when I
started Matthew chapter 1 I would just
blow through all those names I wouldn't
even really look at them because they
seem completely irrelevant at least to
me but the Bible's inspired by God so
that means everything's in here for a
reason and that means the genealogy is
there for a reason if for no other
reason to let you know that you aren't
the only one who has waited on God and
waited in
silence but Zach told us in the first
message that he gave in this series that
waiting on God is that gap between god
making a promise and God keeping that
promise however long that time is that's
waiting all right in in Genesis chapter
15 God makes a promise to a guy named
Abraham who is the first name on this
list and the promise to Abraham was that
someone was going to come from Abraham's
bloodline and through that one person
all the world would be blessed and that
promise was fulfilled with Jesus but in
between Abraham and Jesus is 2,000 years
42
Generations that were
waiting now there are times in my life
where I have been desperate for God to
to break his silence to let me know what
was going on to let me know what he
wanted me to do
but waiting on God particularly waiting
in silence is also
trusting because the gap between god
making a promise and God keeping a
promise isn't just
waiting it's
trusting one of the things that Zach has
mentioned uh that I don't know if I ever
heard anyone else mention before Zach
talks about God's
resume uh and The more I've thought
about it the The more I've loved that
idea because a resume is something you
put together that tells somebody what
you have done in the past so they know
what they can expect in the
future God has a resume and when I am
waiting for God particularly waiting in
silence I need to go someplace where I
can look at his resume and one of the
places I can go is this list of names
these 42 names of people who some of
them some of these names I can't even
pronounce some of them I know I
pronounce wrong and they all these 42
names until God fulfills his promise to
a man named
Joseph and that's my
name Joseph A man whose friends might
have called him Joe like my friends call
me Joe and I'm reminded that when I'm
waiting on God I'm waiting in between
when God makes a promise when he keeps a
promise
and I can trust him because of his
resume because the greatest promise he
ever made he fulfilled in the coming of
Jesus that brings me to my second point
is why why God goes silent I can think
of three reasons why God makes us wait
waiting does something inside of us
waiting does something inside of others
and waiting does something for the world
first waiting does something inside of
us I've been had the privilege of being
a father of three I have a son named
Jeremy and two daughters Rachel and
Becca and I got to watch them go through
all the stages from infant to toddler to
teen to young adult now to full-fledged
adults with their own families and I'm a
grandfather watching my grandchildren go
through the same stages and at every
stage there are crucial things for
someone to learn and there some of those
lessons have been I've been able to
apply to my spiritual life as well I I
think of when my son Jeremy when he was
about two or three he fell and needed to
go get
stitches he actually fell because he was
trying to fill his squirt gun and the
only water source he could reach was the
toilet which I applaud his Ingenuity but
that's about all I applaud there but
while he was trying to fill it he
slipped and he hit his head on the
porcelain and I had to take him to the
emergency room to get stitches and
because he was so young they put him in
what they called the papoose where they
just strapped him down like this and he
was scared and I remember looking at him
and trying to calm him down just saying
Jeremy it's going to be okay it's going
to be okay it's going to be okay but
when that doctor uh put the shot of
Xylocaine into his eye and it stung
Jeremy looked at me with eyes full of
betrayal and he said Daddy it's not okay
it's not okay right it broke my heart
because there's no way I could get him
to understand that what was happening
was for his
good it was for his
benefit I've watched uh my toddlers and
my grandchildren go through the the
painful process of learning to wait you
know toddlers are uh
they want everything like right now like
if they don't get their snack now they
lose their mind right no toddler is born
with
patience but if a toddler doesn't learn
to wait to develop patience they don't
become like well-rounded adults with
just a little bit of lack of patience
humans are are way too complex for that
patience is connected to all kinds of
stuff if they don't develop patience
they won't don't develop trust or
gratitude or unselfishness or the
ability to love or hope or perseverance
there are all kinds of things that are
connected to waiting learning to wait
and I I was thinking about myself and
that I think technology has not done me
any favors with my patience because
technology puts things immediate again
and when like what if I'm working on my
computer and that little spinning like
wheel comes up that's multicolored I
have to fight my toddler urge to lose my
mind while I'm waiting for my computer
to start working again if I'm driving
around town and I'm stuck behind
somebody who's driving below the speed
limit I always say something like I
don't roll down my window and say it I
just say it to myself you know like if
if you are someone who drives below the
speed limit and town and I've been stuck
behind you I've I've talked about
you but I wonder if when God makes me
wait even in silence I wonder if it's
not unlike Jeremy with
stitches that God just cannot make me
understand that what is happening is for
my good and for my
benefit and I just don't get
it waiting does something inside of us
waiting also does something inside of
others you know it's hard to have
perfect timing for anything uh the one
time I remember wanting to have per the
timing to be perfect was when I was
getting engaged uh to my wife Karen and
I had it all planned out in my head and
it was going to be a surprise to her and
we the idea was that we're going to
drive from the college we were going to
to her parents house I'd asked her dad's
permission and IID told them that I was
going to uh ask her to marry me that
night when we got there and so I had
that in my mind we're driving it took
about five hours to drive from our
College to Karen's parents home and uh I
made a couple of bad turns and so we
were running late at least for my
schedule and then uh Karen leaned over
cuz she saw our gas my gas gauge and she
said hey should we stop and get gas and
I said I know when I need gas right and
I could just see my perfect night
crumbling around the edges because I had
hurt her feelings I had to try to make
up to her because I was trying to make
this night perfect we ended up getting
we got engaged we made it I didn't need
gas right I will finish that story
though that uh the next morning my
future father-in-law decided to do
something nice for me and he uh took
took my car to go get gas he ran out of
gas a half mile from his from his I had
to walk back that's the way my
relationship started with my
father-in-law it's hard to have perfect
timing right all I had to do was I was
trying to have perfect timing for just
two people me and Karen there's a
passage in Galatians Galatians 4:4
listen to this it says but when the
fullness of time had
come God sent forth his son born of
woman born under the
law but when the fullness of time had
come God sent his son at just the right
time with perfect time for Who and the
answer is for
everyone for
everyone I mean it's it's incredible all
the the complexities that God has to all
the variables God has to take into
consideration when he does anything I I
always think of a of a Rubik's Cube I
like this even though I I can't solve it
and I know some of you can solve it and
are itching to get up here and solve it
but uh one of the things I like about a
Rubik's Cube is because it reminds me
that things are more
complex than I think like I if I think
of one row and I move it it actually
impacts everything else I think that's
the way God has to he's not just
concerned about you he's and he's not
just concerned about the people that you
know but everybody around you and then
for multiple Generations right because
the only reason you even exist is
because you're great great great
grandfather ran into your great great
great grandmother in some weird way and
they made a connection and they decided
to get married and have kids and then it
happened again and again and again and
then you're here right because even the
smallest things in the past have
impacted the present and the Very
smallest things that are happening right
now are impacting the future you realize
that so when God is making you wait is
not just doing something inside of you
it's actually doing something for
everyone around you people you know and
people you don't and generations to come
who don't even exist
yet listen when when God makes you wait
one of the reasons he does it is it's
it's doing something inside of you but
it's also doing something inside of
others and finally God is doing
something for the world one of the
things that theologians and
historians who Ponder Galatians 4:4 that
in the fullness of time at just the
right time God sent his son into the
world one of the things that historians
have noticed is that there are some
things that happened in the first
century that had never happened before
in the history of the world the first
was peace the Roman Empire had
established peace across the entire
Empire was one of the only times the
entire known world was at peace they
called it pox Romana right the Peace of
Rome second thing is that Rome decided
to build a network of roads to connect
the empire unlike anything that had ever
been done before that's where the phrase
comes all roads lead to Rome and finally
there was a universal language where
Greek had infiltrated the entire Empire
so that everyone knew Greek here's a
question how are people going to know
that
Emmanuel God With Us was born in the
Backwater Town of
Bethlehem I'll tell you
they'll travel roads that go to the
furthest reaches of the Empire they're
going to speak in a language that
everyone knows and they're going to do
it when the world is at peace for one of
the only times listen when God is making
you
wait do not
underestimate all that he is doing in
that time all right that BR brings me to
the last point which is uh
what happens when God how God breaks his
silence look at this this is the story
of jesus' birth let me read it this is
verses 18- 25 I love this passage it
says 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 a
child from the Holy Spirit and her
husband Joseph being a just man and
unwilling to put her to shame resolved
to divorce her quietly 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 she will bear a son you shall
call his name Jesus for he shall save
his people from their sins all this took
place to fulfill what the Lord had
spoken by the prophet behold the Virgin
shall conceive and bear a son and they
shall call his name Emmanuel which means
god with us when Joseph woke from sleep
he did as the angel of the Lord
commanded him he took his wife but knew
her not until she had given birth to a
son and he called his name
Jesus so when God breaks his silence he
does so
suddenly suddenly he he's not like you
know I I get notified by ups that a
package is coming sometime between 10
and 3 kind of to give me an idea of what
that's not the way God does does it 400
years of silence and all of a sudden a
young woman named Mary turns around and
there's an angel who has a message for
her from God 400 years of silence and a
man named Joseph goes to bed and dream
in his dream an angel appears to him
with a message from God this is the
thing if you are waiting for God in
silence one moment you will be waiting
and the next moment you won't be when
God breaks his silence he does it
suddenly the second thing is when God
breaks his silence it is unexpected this
this whole story is full of surprises I
if you noticed but it's crazy it's it's
full of of dreams and angels and a a
virgin and a baby and a star and wise
men and Shepherds I mean no one expected
any of those things it wasn't what
people were expecting it wasn't what
people were praying for and this is the
thing when God breaks his silence he may
not give you the answer that you were
expecting or even that you were praying
for and that's okay because when God
breaks his silence it is
absolutely
wonderful because it's beyond anything
you could
imagine look at verse 23 he says behold
the Virgin shall conceive and bear a son
and they shall call his name Emmanuel
which means god with us God didn't just
speak he came and Jesus came he said
call his name Jesus for he will save his
people from their sins listen if you are
waiting for God to do something in your
life and you feel like you've been
waiting in silence for a while don't
miss what God wants to do in you and
through you in the midst of this time
but also remember that in between god
making a promise and God keeping a
promise is when you are waiting and
sometimes that's in silence but when God
breaks his silence it will happen
suddenly it may be completely
unexpected but it will be more
wonderful than you can imagine because
when God breaks his silence it's always
always worth the wait would you pray
with me
Father in heaven we come to you and I'm
so grateful for this passage even for
these names that I can scarcely
pronounce because they remind me of
people that waited in silence but you
had not forgotten them just as you have
not forgotten us I pray for every person
here that you would remind them of Your
Love of your resume
that you are
faithful and I pray that you would speak
and break your silence soon for them
pray this in Jesus name amen