We read from Micah chapter 5, the second
verse.
But you, Bethlehem, Ephrata, though you are small
among the clans of Judah, out of you
will come for me one who will be
ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of
old, from ancient times.
We'll end reading there.
In this book of Micah, they say there
is no other verse as important as this
verse, which declares the coming of the Messiah.
And it starts like this, but you, Bethlehem,
Ephrata, though you are small among the clans
of Judah.
Let's end there.
Firstly, it says, you, Bethlehem.
Now, if we would translate that, it would
mean, house of bread.
And, Ephrata, Ephrata meant abundance or wealth, and
that was the region in which Bethlehem was
situated.
It was a very fertile region, and that
is why Bethlehem was known as the house
of bread.
And it was fitting that Jesus should be
born in a house of bread, him being
the living bread.
But let's continue from there.
You, Bethlehem, Ephrata, though you are small among
the clans of Judah.
There was probably no other village in
Judah like Bethlehem.
It was a very small village.
And another one says that it was the
smallest amongst a thousand villages in Judah.
Now, that is something very significant.
Now, this Bethlehem, which was such a small
village, the smallest among the clans of Judah.
Small and
insignificant.
But today, there is no village as important,
as exalted, and as significant as Bethlehem.
For what reason?
Because our Lord was born there.
That is where he was born, and where
his origin was.
And so God had determined and ordained, in
that small, insignificant village, he should be born,
who would be the bread of life for
all nations.
And I would be happy if that would
stir us in our hearts.
That village, Bethlehem, the smallest amongst the clans
of Judah, insignificant.
It wasn't even considered a village or a
town.
But that is where our salvation, where light,
where that bread of life came from.
Now, we would like to be a blessing
to people.
We would like others to find Jesus through
us.
You would like others to live because of
you.
Or to receive life through you.
That would only happen if you become the
least of everyone.
That is a great spiritual lesson.
The one who thinks himself great, and who
considers himself to be someone, must realize that
is of Satan.
That is how Satan will get into your
life, and he'll get you out of God's
way.
God doesn't work through a great person, or
through a great place.
But he starts there, where it is small.
I don't know whether you've ever come to
the realization that you're small.
Now, a person can bear a grudge and
get irritated and angry and upset.
Why?
Because that person isn't small in his own
eyes.
Paul says of
himself, I, the least of all the apostles.
Now, humanly speaking, I don't know of anyone
else whom God worked through as much as
Paul.
Until today, the whole world is blessed and
helped through him, and through the letters and
books that he wrote, many of them which
have been taken up in the Bible.
Why?
Because he was greater than anyone else?
No, because he was the least.
When you pray, pray and say, Oh God,
make me to be small, to be the
least, so that he that is the bread
of life might be made manifest through me.
The Bible says, he who is exalted in
the eyes of people, that one is despised
in the eyes of God.
That one who is exalted in the eyes
of men is despised by God.
Very often in the Bible we find that
rivers are symbolical of the Holy Spirit, where
it even speaks of rivers of living water
that will flow from the innermost being.
I've never seen a river flowing uphill.
No, water will always seek the lowest place.
You will never find the Holy Spirit there
where it is exalted.
And I would say, the greatest sin of
all sins is the sin of pride.
And that sin very easily infiltrates into people.
And there where there are high places, without
fault or without mistake, you will find sin
there, without exception.
Jesus said, whenever you go to a banquet
or a feast or a wedding, don't go
and look for the front seats, no, go
and look for the seats that are the
furthest to the back.
Until the master of the banquet then comes
and says, friend, don't sit there at the
back in that insignificant seat, come to the
front.
And Jesus said, he who humbles himself will
be exalted, but he who uplifts himself, that
one will be humbled.
Because you will go and look for that
very good position, and you go and sit
in the front of the banquet where important
people sit, and then the owner of the
banquet, the master of the banquet will come
and say, friend, would you mind vacating that
seat, going somewhere else, because there's somebody else
that needs to sit where you are sitting
at the moment, and then you are embarrassed
and humiliated in front of everyone.
The Bible says pride goes before a fall.
Those two things go hand in hand, they're
inseparable, you'll always, when you've got pride, a
fall will go together with it.
Jesus says, he who humbles himself, that one
will be uplifted.
You my friends, oh God, I want you
to work through me, make me something in
this world.
You just playing the fool, it's not God
that will work through you, it's Satan himself.
Jesus said, learn of me, I am
meek, and lowly in heart.
If we haven't yet learned that lesson, then
we haven't learned anything at all.
To humble yourself.
We learned it from Jesus.
And if you are humble, you will never
fall.
But if you uplift yourself, the sun won't
set before you having sinned and fallen.
For that way in which you find yourself
leads to destruction, it's an abomination to God,
if you want to be great in the
eyes of men.
The Lord Jesus said, the greatest should become
the least of all.
The first, the last.
And the one who is the least, that
one will become great.
Jesus said, learn of me, and he got
up and he wrapped around himself a towel
and he did the work of a slave,
going about washing the feet of his disciples.
The Lord Jesus said, learn of me, and
he did the work of a slave, going
about
washing the feet of his disciples.
There is no task as lowly as that,
and as looked down upon as that, where
a person washes the feet.
Especially if that person has got athlete's foot,
and there is some toe jam in between
the toes, because the person hasn't been washing
his feet properly, and all that athlete's foot
starts, the fungus starts to grow.
And nobody wants to do that job, washing
the feet of someone else.
But Jesus said, learn of me, I am
lowly in heart, and not in some pharisaical
way, indeed he was lowly in heart.
Even amongst the Lord Jesus' disciples, there were
two young men, and there was their mother
as well, and she came and she said,
Lord, I would like my two sons to
sit on either side of you in heaven,
one on the left, and one on the
right.
Oh, we love to be great, we love
to be exalted and lifted up, but let
me tell you, you will die without having
been blessed.
Where are many of the preachers, the mighty
preachers of the gospel today?
Many of them have fallen into sin, sin
with women, immorality, and things of that kind.
Where did it all begin?
Because of pride.
And many of these preachers were orators, they
could preach mighty sermons, and very eloquent.
And where those people started seeing themselves as
someone who is better than others, and deserving
of something, and that's how Satan comes into
them.
Uplifting yourself, pride is a terrible sin.
When we were busy praying to God to
send revival amongst us, that was the first
sin that God showed to me, that sin
of pride.
If you have pride in your life, even
if God should send revival, and the Holy
Spirit should come, He would flee from you,
and you will even deny the fact that
there is revival, because you've got no revival.
And revival will run away from you.
Because...
Because of pride coming in, thinking that you
are somebody, thinking that you deserve something, and
you count up all your qualifications, that you
are now already so old, all your degrees,
everything that qualifies you for something, not realizing
that Satan has entered into your life.
And you number the things that you've accomplished
and done, you say, well I've done this
already, and I've done that, and you think
that you're someone, whereas the Bible says, you're
nothing.
The Lord Jesus said, even though you have
accomplished something, you should say, I'm an undeserving
servant.
That which is there, and which has been
accomplished, was only done through God.
I am His undeserving servant.
There's someone whom I know, who was invited
to great conferences and meetings.
To a great gathering.
There were ministers, magistrates, high up exalted
officials, and
they were gathered in a very posh
place.
And so he said, what should I do
Lord, for these people to be blessed?
And the Lord said, take a tray, and
pour tea and coffee into some cups, and
go and serve all of the dignitaries there.
And he did that.
And he was like a servant to them,
and he was the only one who did
that.
He didn't complain and say, well, why have
I got to be the only one doing
this, they leave all the work over to
me, I've got to be like one now
that wears an apron and is like a
waiter here.
And when they were together there, at the
tables, and they were having this wonderful meal,
the magistrate who had arranged that meeting, that
gathering, The
organiser got up and said, I'll ask someone
now to pray for us, and to open
and pray and to ask the Lord to
bless the food.
And whom did he ask?
That one who was the least of all
of them going around and serving everybody there.
Now someone might say, what has this got
to do with Christmas?
After all, we're celebrating Christmas at the moment.
What kind of a Christmas sermon is this?
But I don't see any Christmas better than
this.
Where we read of Jesus born there in
Bethlehem, the least of a thousand cities or
villages in Judah.
The least, the most insignificant, and that is
where Jesus was born.
And that, the least of all these villages
or cities in Judah, that is where our
salvation came from.
A person might say, well, how can I
be treated like this?
People don't take note of me, they don't
greet me, they don't invite me.
Realize, if that is your attitude, you're a
child of Satan.
Why am I given such a low down
task?
And Jesus said, he who is the greatest
should become the least and the servant of
all.
You expect Jesus to come down and to
come to you, but you haven't yet become
a Bethlehem.
You're not a Bethlehem.
You're not the least of all.
You expect Jesus to come to you, but
you're not the least of all.
A person doesn't want to be sent.
Doesn't want to obey, doesn't like it if
he's not noticed.
Realize, if that is what you are like,
you're not on the way that leads to
heaven, but that leads to another place.
A child that grows up and doesn't want
to listen to the parents anymore and to
be told by the parents what to do.
Why?
That child now thinks he or she has
something.
The devil has come in.
Let me now mention the last point, because
the time has gone.
That Satan is Satan today, whereas he was
Lucifer.
One of the archangels walking amongst flaming stones,
it's because of pride that entered into him
and then he became Satan.
Most probably he was the greatest angel, but
he turned into a devil because pride got
into his life.
Never forget that.
And you're of no use, you're just a
tool in the devil's hand, if you aren't
the smallest of all of them.
I'm
closing the scripture.
I'm closing the service now.
I hope and I trust that that has
been sufficient for you.
And that that point has gone home and
that you'll never ever allow that pride to
come into you and realize if you're not
the least, then you belong to Satan.
I'm
closing the
sermon now.
And all these rights, it's all work of
the devil.
Children's rights and women's rights.
And where a wife will even back chat
to her husband and even slap him.
Well, if you do that, it's only because
your husband is a good for nothing, otherwise
he'd return you one that you'd fly through
the air and never try to do it
again.
So let us learn from him, for he
is lowly in heart.
And maybe you as the man, you say,
well, I'm the man in the home.
I'm the boss here.
I'm not going to listen to anybody.
I'm not going to listen to a child.
I'm not going to listen to my wife.
Not realize that you've already become a tool
in Satan's hands as well.
Well, you
Bethlehem smallest amongst the clans of Judah, the
smallest amongst the thousands of a thousand cities
in Judah.
But from you will come the savior of
the world.
When Paul speaks about himself, he says, I
saw who became Paul, Paul meaning small.
And when he says, I'm not even fit
to be called a servant of God or
an apostle because I persecuted the church.
I am the least of all.
There's a man who heard about God's working.
That God spoke and that the Holy Spirit
came down.
And he said, Oh God, work, come down
through your Holy spirit that I might speak
in tongues before the church.
And then when everybody's quiet that I translated
as well, that I'll be something in the
church.
And then the tongues did come down.
And he spoke in tongues.
When he wanted to stop, he couldn't.
Day and night, he couldn't even sleep anymore.
All the time, his tongue was just going,
speaking in tongues.
If you'd meet with anybody, when he opened
his mouth, you would speak in tongues.
Eventually the pagans, the heathen laughed at him.
If you wanted to keep quiet, you had
to take hold of his tongue.
And the only way he could keep quiet
is if he would physically take hold of
his tongue.
And that would be the only way he
could keep quiet.
And if you'd let go of his tongue,
he would continue speaking in tongues again.
After three days, he cried out to God.
He said, Oh God, please forgive me.
My motive for wanting that gift was because
I wanted to be something.
I wanted to be looked up to in
the church, not that I would be the
least.
I can give you so many examples, real
examples, and even people that were amongst us,
but that went off the way because of
pride.
And you too, if you are not the
least of all, you will follow in their
footsteps.
You, my prince, oh God, come down, come
and work in my life.
And he doesn't come.
Why?
Because you don't yet see yourself as the
least of all.
You don't see yourself as the greatest sinner.
You say, well, yes, I'm a sinner, but
I'm not as bad as so and so.
But the day that you see that you
are the worst of sinners and the chief
of sinners, that is when the Holy Spirit
will come down and start working in your
life.
The Pharisees said, Lord, I thank you that
I'm not as bad as that publican.
I'm not as bad as he is.
But the tax collector there at the back
in the temple didn't even raise his eyes
up to heaven.
He didn't feel worthy to do that.
He just beat upon his breast and he
said, oh God, have mercy on me, a
sinner.
He was the least of all, not even
counted amongst any.
He said, Lord, I thank you that I'm
not as bad as he is.
But the day that you see that you
are the worst of sinners and the chief
of sinners, that is when the Holy Spirit
will come down and start working in your
life.
And he doesn't come.
Why?
Because you don't yet see yourself as the
least of all.
You say, well, yes, I'm a sinner, but
I'm not as bad as he is.
But the day that you see that you
are the worst of sinners and the chief
of sinners, And so if you want God
to work in your life, don't ask him
for many things.
Don't tell him to do this or that.
Just pray and say, Lord, teach me and
help me to learn from you, to be
lowly in heart, to be the least of
all, the servant of all, and then God
will work.
Not even that you say, Lord, work through
me that many will get converted.
Forget about all of that.
Pray and say, Lord, make me to be
the least, the smallest of all.
When God created the heavens and the earth,
he created it all out of nothing.
And if you want God to work in
and through you, then I ask the Lord
to make you to be nothing.
Let's bow our heads and pray.
Lord, work in an amazing and a wonderful
way, in our hearts, that we might have
lowly and contrite hearts.
That each one will see himself as the
least of all in the world.
That the bread of life might come forth
and that people might be helped.