The Christmas Story

In one paragraph

Colson, one of the leaders in Tribe's young adults ministry, brought the message on the Sunday after Christmas. He argued that the Christmas story does not begin in a manger but on the first page of Genesis, and that the entire Hebrew Bible is building toward the birth of Jesus. His aim was to help the congregation read the Old Testament the way an ancient Israelite would have, so that the arrival...

Read together

1. Psalm 1 read in full to open the sermon before prayer
2. Psalm 2 read in full to open the sermon before prayer
3. Genesis 1:1-2 read to introduce God as creator at the start of the Christmas story
4. Genesis 3:15 read as God's first promise of an offspring who will bruise the serpent's head
5. Genesis 12:1-5 read to show God's call to Abram and the covenant promise of a great nation
6. Genesis 15:1-6 read to show God reaffirming the promise of offspring to the childless Abram
7. Genesis 17:15-21 read to show God promising a son through the elderly Sarah and establishing the covenant through Isaac
8. Genesis 21:6-7 read to show Sarah's laughter and wonder at bearing a son in old age
9. Exodus 34:6-8 read to reveal God's character and name Yahweh to Moses on Sinai
10. 1 Samuel 16:6-13 read to show God choosing the lowly shepherd boy David over his brothers
11. 2 Samuel 7:8-16 read to show God's promise to David of an everlasting kingdom through his offspring
12. Isaiah 9:6-7 read as prophecy of a child born whose government and peace will have no end on David's throne
13. Daniel 7:13-14 read as Daniel's vision of one like a son of man given an everlasting dominion
14. Matthew 1:1 read as the opening of the New Testament genealogy tracing Jesus to David and Abraham
15. Matthew 1:18-25 read as the account of Jesus' birth from the Holy Spirit and the angel's message to Joseph
16. Matthew 1:21 referenced again specifically to break down the meaning of the name Yeshua
17. Luke 2:1-20 read as the nativity narrative including the shepherds and the angels
18. Isaiah 7:14 quoted as the sign of the virgin conceiving and bearing Emmanuel
19. Micah 5:2-5 quoted as prophecy that a ruler would come forth from Bethlehem to shepherd Israel
20. 2 Corinthians 1:20 quoted to show that all God's promises find their yes in Jesus

Talk about it

1. Colson asked us to imagine ourselves as ancient Israelites hearing these stories passed down by word of mouth rather than reading them in a Bible. How does thinking from that perspective change the way you read a familiar passage?
2. Colson described a repeating pattern throughout the Old Testament: an Eden-like setup, some violence or transgression, a chosen person rescued, intercession, and a covenant. Where have you noticed that pattern in your own life or in stories you know well?
3. Colson talked about Felix Culpa, the idea that the fall of Adam and Eve, while not good, made the coming of a rescuer possible. How do you sit with that tension between something being genuinely bad and God working through it anyway?
4. Colson pointed out that God consistently chose unexpected people: a 100-year-old man and his 90-year-old wife to start a nation, a stuttering man raised in Pharaoh's house to free the slaves, a scrawny shepherd boy to be king, and shepherds who could not even testify in court to be the first witnesses at the birth of Jesus. What does that pattern tell you about how God tends to work, and where do you see it showing up today?
5. Colson ended by saying the same God who did all of those things throughout the Old Testament is the same God who seeks you out now and promises rescue from the weight of failure and sin. What does it mean to you personally that the story of Christmas starts on the first page of Genesis rather than in a manger?