For He Will Save His People From Their Sins

Matthew 1:18-21 (ESV)
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."

I suppose the story is fascinating. And everyone hangs on what a noble and just man Joseph was to not divorce Mary. Of course things would be different if Joseph were our son and we had it on good knowledge that his fiancé was pregnant with someone else’s child. But then that isn’t exactly what this story is about. Fascinating as it all is about Joseph and Mary, it all comes down to “for he will save his people from their sins.” This is where the focus needs to be above all else. Everything about the birth of Christ, everything about his conception, (and notice all lurking Mormons, that he is here conceived by the Holy Spirit, not the Father!) everything is about Jesus coming to save his people from their sins.
Which might be why the rest of the details are so important, that he is not Joseph’s son biologically, he can’t be the offspring of mere man, this would mean that he inherits our sin. It is also a peculiar fulfillment of Genesis 3 in that he is her seed and not his seed. That he is conceived by the Holy Spirit and not the Father, here you see all three persons of God working together to redeem the creation they brought into being together. Jesus comes to save his people from their sins.
His people, who are they? The people he created, you and me. This isn’t about saving some ethnicity this is about saving his people. We belong to him. But we need to be saved from our sins. This is peculiar. He saves us from our sins, and yet we are still sinners. There isn’t any getting out of this. Saving us from our sins is not a matter of handing us more laws, or watering down the law. The law can’t do it. It isn’t that we need something stricter than the Ten Commandments, or lighter. Don’t try this just love each other watered down law to save yourselves, you can’t love one another without keeping the commandments. What love is it that cheats on one’s spouse and commits adultery? What Love is it that murders or beats his neighbor, doesn’t provide food and clothing? What love is it that steals from our neighbor, what kind of love lies about one’s neighbor, what love is it that lives in envy of his neighbor’s wife, house, ass and ox or even his Maserati? And he definitely hasn’t saved us from our sins if this means that we don’t ever do the above mentioned things again in thought word or deed. Take a look at the most pious Christian you know, the one you think is a prick, a prude, or pill joy for his adherence to the law, and ask yourself if that one has really managed the Ten Commandments?
No the only way that Jesus is going to save his people from their sins is to pay the price they demand, death, and then forgiving them all their sins with that payment. And this is perhaps more than anything the reason he must be begotten of the father from all eternity and conceived by the Holy Ghost, that he can be fully divine fully God as only an eternal being can be. You can’t become God, either you are God from all eternity or you are not God at all, God is eternal. Second it is why he had to become man so that he could die in our place and shed blood for us. So he is born of a woman so that fully God and full man his eternal divine blood would have the infinite value needed to save you from just the sins you committed this morning, not to mention the rest of them.