The Birth and Life of Jesus - God Shows us His Son

Bible texts: Matthew 1; Luke 2; John 14
Memory Verse: John 14:6 “Jesus saith unto him, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no man comes unto the Father but by me.”

Welcome boys and girls! Are you enjoying our series “God’s Greatest Show On Earth?” I hope so! But it only gets better and better as we go on with each lesson! Today’s “Show” is very special! Today we learn how God Shows us His Son! We’ve talked about God’s Son in the last two lessons, and I’m sure you already know that God’s Son is Jesus, but today we are going to talk about when God REALLY showed us His Son, in a very BIG way! When God shows us His Son, God is showing us Himself, because Jesus IS God. The God we worship is One God, but three persons: God the Father, God the Son (Jesus), and God the Holy Spirit. That is called the Trinity, and Jesus is called the second person of the Trinity. Jesus has lots of names in the Bible. Each of those names teach us something special about Him. One of those names is Immanuel. Immanuel is a special name that has a special meaning! It means “God with us.” Today’s story is when God came down from Heaven to be with us!

It all started when the angel Gabriel came down to give a message to a young girl named Mary. Mary was a virgin who was engaged and was going to be married to a young man named Joseph. But Gabriel had a very special message from God just for Mary. God was very pleased with Mary! God could see that Mary loved God very much; with all of her heart and soul and strength and mind, like God wants us all to do. And because Mary loved God so much, God had chosen her to do a very important job. God had chosen her to be the mother of God’s own Son, Jesus. Mary was going to be pregnant, and the baby would be Jesus!

“How can this be, since I am a virgin and am not married?” Mary asked the angel Gabriel.

“The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and you will conceive and the baby you give birth to will be the Son of God!” Gabriel answered her.

“I am the Lord’s willing servant! I will do whatever He asks.” Mary responded.

Gabriel also sent a message to Joseph, the young man that Mary was going to marry. This message was given to Joseph in a dream. “Don’t be afraid to take Mary to be your wife!” Gabriel told Joseph. “She is pregnant in a miraculous way with the Son of God! When the baby is born, you are to call his name Jesus, for He is the one who will save people from their sins.”

All of this had been prophesied in the book of Isaiah over 400 years before. Isaiah says in chapter 7, verse 14 “Behold, a virgin shall conceive and give birth to a son, and you shall call his name Immanuel.” Remember, I told you the name Immanuel means “God with Us,” and that is what happened when Mary gave birth to the Baby Jesus! God, who was always in existence, meaning He’s always been there, was now with us in a human body; the body of a baby! That baby would have to grow up just like we all do! Baby Jesus was going to have to be taken care of by his parents, Mary and his adopted earthly father Joseph. (God the Father is Jesus’s real Father.) He would have to be changed when his diapers got dirty, and be fed baby food, and learn to crawl, and walk, and talk! You see, even though He was God; the All-Powerful God, who created all the world, He had chosen to confine Himself in the body of a tiny little newborn baby who would need to be taken care of, and who would have to grow up in the same way that we do! Day by day, month by month, and year by year!

Jesus would have to learn how to feed himself when He was old enough, and He would have to be potty trained! He would play with toys, and play with his younger brothers and sisters; Mary and Joseph’s children together, who were born after Jesus. Jesus would have the limited abilities of a toddler when He was 3, and the curiosity of a 4 year old, when He was 4. He would have to learn how to read, and do math as He got older. Joseph, who was a carpenter, taught Jesus how to work with wood, and how to do carpentry. Jesus had chores to do as He grew up, like sweep the carpenter shop, and help Mary with the younger children. Jesus would have to learn the same things that you learn as you grow. The Bible says that “Jesus grew in wisdom and stature (body), and in favor with God and man.” -Luke 2:52 That means that He grew up physically, and He learned more mentally, and He was loved by God, and everyone who knew Him!

Boys and girls, there was one thing that was different about Jesus as a baby, and as a toddler, and as a child, and as a teenager, and as a man. Jesus, never – not ever, did anything wrong. He never sinned like you and I do. You see, even though He was completely human, He was also still completely God. God is Holy and Perfect, and God never sins or does anything that is wrong or unholy. So as Jesus grew up, and when He was grown, He never sinned. He was always perfect! The Perfect Son of God! That’s why everyone who knew Him, loved Him.

Jesus was always kind. Are you always kind? Jesus was always helpful. Are you always helpful? Jesus was always truthful. Are you always truthful? Jesus was always obedient to His parents. Are you always obedient to your parents? Jesus was always loving and good. Are you always loving and good?

No. Neither am I.

When Jesus grew up to be a man, He was still always kind, helpful, truthful, obedient to God, loving, and good. All these good things that Jesus was, help us to know how we should be. They help us to know the right way that God wants us to live.

When Jesus had grown up to be a man, at the age of about 30, He started his special Ministry that God the Father had sent him to do. It was when He started to preach and teach about Heaven and the way to God, and about the right way to live. He taught the people all around him about how much God loves them, and that God wants us to love Him too, the way Jesus did, and the way Mary tried to do, with all our hearts and souls and strength and mind. Jesus said that was the most important commandment in the whole Bible! We should love God completely! Jesus taught us that the next most important rule was to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. That means to treat other people the way that you would like for them to treat you, with love and kindness. Jesus was kind to people no one else was kind to! People that other people made fun of, or even hated. People that were very bad sinners, and people that had very bad sicknesses. Jesus showed them love and helped them follow God. Jesus healed many people from their sicknesses, and He healed many, many people from their sinful ways too.

All of these things that Jesus did, He did to show us that God loves us. Jesus showed us the way to have our sins forgiven, and the way to become God’s children. Jesus came to show us God Himself! In John 14:6, Jesus said “I am The Way, The Truth, and The Life. No one comes to the Father except by Me.” That is our memory verse for today, boys and girls. It means that we can only become God’s children through Jesus. You see, Jesus didn’t just come to show us the way; He WAS the Way. Jesus would soon shed His blood and die on the cross for our sins… the Perfect One dying for the sinful ones. God Himself dying for the ungodly. He had to do it to take our sins away.

Three days after Jesus died on the cross for our sins, He rose again from the dead! Soon after that, He left to go back up to Heaven to make a place for us to live with Him. This is the free gift that Jesus came to Earth to give us. Salvation, and eternity in Heaven with Him!

But, boys and girls, when someone gives you a gift, you have to reach out and take it, or receive it, or its not really yours. That’s what we have to do with Jesus’s gift, the gift of salvation. We have to reach out and take it! We do that by being sorry for all the sins that we have done; by being sorry that we are sinners, and wanting Jesus to forgive us and take away all our sins. We must believe that Jesus really did die on the cross for us, and that He rose again (came alive from the dead) 3 days later. Then we ask Jesus to forgive us and to come into our hearts and lives.

Have you received the free gift of salvation from Jesus? You can today!