The Weary World Rejoices: Part 4

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 4

1 kings 18, Matthew 17:12

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

I hope as we've continued in our Advent Series, you can now see how it all makes sense and we've addressed different things throughout our series. We're wrapping up this morning and I want to begin by asking you guys a question, which is this, in our noisy world today, what is it that you are hearing? We live in a information age, more recently, which morphed into a digital revolution where the Internet, the invention of the Internet enabled rapid sharing of information and data. And we're all used to this at this point in our lives. The Internet has only been around publicly since the 90s. And so, when we look at all of history, this digital era is still in its infancy, really, just 30-something years old. It's a shift in our world to an information-based economy driven by computers, the Internet, digital technology that allows for instant access to information, the sharing of that information and the manipulation of that information. And really what that means is that there's so much noise that we have to cipher through day after day. In the last 20 years with the invention of the smartphone giving us apps and Internet and everything at our fingertips, never before has humanity had to try to process so much information day after day. From the moment we wake up and look at our phones to the breaks that we have at work or right after while something's boiling on the stove and we're just scrolling to right before bed, we can just be taking in more and more and more information. Just look at social media. It's not uncommon. In fact, it's quite regular for your algorithms to have everything from funny videos to music and dance trends to cooking recipes to conspiracy theories and historical and trivial facts to journalistic commentary about today's news and events. And that is just quite the spectrum of information that you can get within 30 seconds of this video to the next video. And so again I ask, in our noisy world today, so full of information coming at us from every direction at all different volumes, what is it that we are hearing? And I want to add to that question, what is it that we are hearing and believing? We may hear a lot, but what is it that we are choosing to believe out of all that noise?

We're wrapping up our series where we've looked at the birth of how the birth of Jesus brought the most complete and fullest picture of certain roles that we needed in life as humanity. We are all born with inherent needs and desires that we cannot fulfill ourselves, though we try. And so we are born needing a king, someone to rule over us. And Jesus came as the perfect earthly king, or sorry, heavenly king. We are born needing a savior. We cannot save ourselves, and Jesus came to save. He is our savior. We are born needing a priest, someone to be that connection between us and God. And Jesus is the perfect intermediary, a perfect priest. And today we'll address how we are born needing to hear the truth. And Jesus is our perfect prophet. A prophet is someone who is sent by God to speak truth and life into a situation. God sends a prophet to cut through the noise of the world so that people may know the truth. There's something inside all of us that yearns to know what is true. And in this digital age, it's getting increasingly harder and harder to know with full assurance what is true. One of the problems we face is that so many people seemingly in positions of authority or influence are addressing our biggest questions and telling us the answers, telling us what they believe is true. Again, you just open up your phone and scroll on social media, and sure enough, at some point you'll find someone peddling their truth. This is what really happened. This is truth. And it can leave us in a position of thinking, you know what, that's a lot. I'm hearing a lot of things. I'll just decide. I'll be the decision maker of what is true. I'll be the judge of that. And all of a sudden, we have become our own authority on truth. So we know as Christians that truth is not subjective. Despite what the world says, it doesn't mean that we perfectly understand or comprehend the truth, but there is an objective truth. And thankfully, we as Christians know the source of truth, and that is God. But even as Christians, the temptation can remain to be our own authority. So I want to ask, what can go wrong when a person becomes the ultimate source of truth? Well, when we define truth, we tend to, maybe not at first, but it tends to devolve into this. We can affirm our own sin. We lack repentance and justify our own sin. We don't just say it's okay, we'll actually tell you why our sin is okay. We avoid confrontation of falsities and injustices, and we'll weaponize whatever happened in what we believe as in I told you so, put other people down.

When we listen to God's truth, something different happens. We are transformed to be like Christ. We are convicted of our sin. We are led to repentance and humbly turning towards God in submission to say, "God, I can't do this on my own. I need you." What we really need is someone to tell us the truth, not just anyone, right? We've been down that road. We need someone who will speak truth in love, someone who has eyes to see clearly the earthly realities but from a heavenly perspective. We need someone who's going to tell us in truth the honesty, be honest about our human condition. We need someone to tell us, to give us guidance and instruction from God's word. We need the truth, someone who will tell us the truth that will call us to repentance and help us to be right before God. Enter Jesus as the perfect prophet. He's the perfect priest, king, savior, and prophet. And Jesus came as a prophet to Israel for the world. And he came to give them the truth, to help them see the world from God the Father's perspective, to address the human condition, and to give guidance and to call them to repent and to restore their relationships with Yahweh, God the Father. Many people at the time of Jesus began to see him as a prophet. They started to pick up on the fact that he was different. And during his ministry, they recognized it. And Matthew 21:10 says, "When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and asked, 'Who is this?' And the crowd answered, 'This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth and Galilee.’"

See, this wasn't the first time that Israel had experience with prophets. In fact, God had sent many, many prophets to Israel over the course of their history as a nation. We have over 15 books in the Old Testament from prophets, all of them trying to get Israel's attention to pull them back to God, call them back to God, to help them understand that the noise that they are listening to in the world is not the truth, that they would, prophets would come and ask them to repent, to turn back in humble submission. You see, just like we tend to do, Israel would listen to the wrong things. And there was a lot of noise in their lives, and it was distracting and pulling them away from Yahweh. Israel was used to and had experience with these messengers. The problem was these messengers weren't always received very well. Oftentimes they were rejected and ignored, and the message, if it was received, didn't seem to last that long. The impacts and the call to change seemed to fade over time.

One of Israel's most influential and memorable prophets was Elijah. God used him to do some amazing things, and as influential leaders go, sometimes the first one is that measuring stick. So often the prophets get compared to Elijah. Is he greater? How does he compare to Elijah the prophet? So I want to get into a situation, if you guys want to turn in your Bibles to 1 Kings 18, or it'll be on the screen. I want to look further into Elijah because I think it helps us better understand the role that Jesus fulfilled and was even better than Elijah. But we've got to understand a little bit about Elijah first. So I want to paint this picture of what's happening in the Old Testament. God is sending Elijah, again, to speak the truth, to cut through the noise of the world. And at this time in Israel's history, there was a famine in the land, and there was a bad king who was leading Israel away from God. And the king's wife, also not great, was killing all the prophets. Not good. Not a good situation. Dangerous time to be a prophet. But Elijah is awesome and full of God's strength and mercy. And so we're going to be in 1 Kings 18. It says this, "After a long time, in the third year, the word of the Lord came to Elijah, 'Go and present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the land.' So Elijah went to present himself to Ahab." So Elijah's going to speak on behalf of God. And God is using these current circumstances to try to get a hold of the king. The famine, the tension that is happening in Israel, this is all like, "Hey, king, are you paying attention? Things aren't good. You should turn to God." Well, Elijah is actually being blamed by the king for a lot of this. And the king's twisted mind. He's like, "Man, Elijah's the source of all my problems." And Elijah's like, "Well, king, I'm about to set you straight. That's not how it is. It's actually your fault. And let me tell you, and let me call you back to God." So if we skip down to verse 18, he goes and meets with Ahab, and he says, "I have not made trouble for Israel," Elijah replied, "but you and your father's family have. You have abandoned the Lord's commands and have followed the Baals.”

Now Baals are false gods. It is a false god, but it's also this umbrella term for all the other little false gods that were under that false god. "Now summon the people from all over Israel to meet me on Mount Carmel, and bring the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal, and the four hundred prophets of Asheroth who eat at Jezebel's table." All right, so Elijah's calling for this showdown between the God of Israel that they abandoned and the gods that they had turned their attention to, that they were listening to now. And Elijah makes it very clear to them, he's like, "This is going to be a showdown, and at the end of this, follow whoever wins. If it's Yahweh, then follow Yahweh. If it ends up being Baal and the false gods, then follow them. But this will be the deciding factor. We're going to make it clear who is God.

Jump down to verse 22, and this is what the showdown is going to look like. "Then Elijah said to them, 'I am the only one of the Lord's prophets left, but Baal has four hundred and fifty prophets. Get two bowls for us. Let Baal's prophets choose one for themselves, and let them cut it into pieces and put it on wood, but not set fire to it. I will prepare the other bowl and put it on wood, but not set fire to it. Then you call on the name of your God, and I will call on the name of the Lord, the God who answers by fire. He is God.' Then all the people said, 'What you say is good.'" All right, so we have two altars of wood, two bowls cut into pieces for a sacrifice, which was a very common way to worship whatever God you worship back in that time. And he says, "You guys call out to your God, I'll call out to my God, and whoever lights the altar on fire, divinely, supernaturally, then we know who is God." And all the odds from the human perspective are with Baal. He's got four hundred and fifty prophets to call out to Baal, to one Elijah. And Elijah tips the scales even further by pouring water. He says, "Grab a bunch of buckets of water and just douse my altar with water so that the fire, it's even harder for the fire to catch." And so they do it. There's a little trench that they build around it, and they just keep dumping water and water and water. And then they start calling out. And the prophets to Baal, they're calling and it's taking hours, and nothing's happening, and hours. And Elijah's sitting there, kind of with like a holy smugness. I would say holy smugness. And he's like, "Yeah, is your God there? Is he home?" He starts taunting them. And these priests, these false priests are going to extreme lengths to try to get their God's attention, and just nothing. And then we read, Elijah, what happens next?

Verse thirty-six says, "At the time of the sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed, 'Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel, that I am your servant, and have done all these things at your command. Answer me, Lord, answer me, so that these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.' Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones, and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, 'The Lord, he is God, the Lord, he is God.'" I love it. This is incredible. And so we see Elijah being the messenger of God, calling people back, invites them to repentance, and at the end, the people respond well. They bow down and they worship God. Talk about cutting through the noise with the truth and being able to have this great moment for Israel's history, say, "Yes, yes, we messed up, but God called us back and we responded." So you can see why people like Elijah. They're like, "Yeah, Elijah was good. Helped us out, really good guy." But unfortunately, their worship was short-lived, and their hearts and minds, again, strayed from God, even as impactful and amazing as Elijah was and how God used him, they still didn't stay with God for very long. And they would drift away. And what they were hearing and believing was no longer God, but the things of the world. And God sent more prophets and more prophets to try to get Israel back, till finally he said, "You know what, I'm going to put a pause on sending prophets." And there was a time of silence from hearing from God, until John the Baptist.

John the Baptist, as you may know, was tasked with preparing the way, preparing the way for Jesus. Even John the Baptist, though, was compared to Elijah. It says in Matthew 17, Jesus replied, "To be sure, Elijah comes and will restore all things. But I tell you, Elijah has already come." And they did not recognize him, but have done to him everything they wished. In the same way the Son of Man is going to suffer at their hands, then the disciples understood that he was talking to them about John the Baptist. See, Jesus was addressing the fact that a prophet came, because the last prophet that Israel had ever heard of, Malachi in the Old Testament, says in chapter 4, verse 5, "I will send the prophet Elijah to you." So Israel's been waiting. They're like, "This prophet, some prophet is going to come, like Elijah." And they're waiting. And John the Baptist shows up, but not everyone believed. And in fact, it says, "They have done to him everything they wished." And Jesus is referring to the fact that they beheaded John the Baptist. A prophet came preparing the way for Jesus, and they killed him. And Jesus says, "The Son of Man is going to suffer in the same way. He's going to die." So the question remained for Israel, who are they listening to? Who will they believe? And sometimes we think we want to hear the truth. We think we do. We think we're ready to accept the truth. But when the truth actually comes, our response is one of indifference, or blatant disregard, or even hatred to the message, or hatred to the messenger. And this is most true in the life of Jesus, who is the most perfect prophet. So God said, "The time has come, enough with prophets, I'm going to send my Son, the perfect prophet.”

And Hebrews chapter 1 says this, "In the past, God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days, he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through him also he made the universe." So God said, "All right, you ignored my other prophets, the messengers that came on behalf of me, now I'm sending my Son, and he's going to speak the truth. And I want him to cut through the noise of the world." And Jesus came to fulfill all the things that we need from a prophet, and he does these things so perfectly. Jesus speaks truth in love. John 18:37 says, "The reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me." Jesus speaks the truth. Everything that comes out of his mouth is truth. As a prophet, Jesus helps us see earthly realities from a heavenly perspective. Just read any of the Beatitudes. Go to Matthew 5:6-7, and just read how Jesus is calling us to live in this world, but with a heavenly perspective. That the realities that we face, that everyone faces, are still true, but how we go about them, our approach, our mindset, is different when we have that heavenly perspective.

So we call it the upside-down kingdom. It's kind of a nickname we have for God's kingdom, because it's so upside-down, it's so inverse of what the world would say makes sense. You need these things in life. You need shelter, you need clothing, you need food. And the world would say, "Prioritize that. Make that the number one thing in life. Make sure you have those things before everything else." But Jesus says, Matthew 6:19, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, for where your treasure is there, your heart will be also." Or Matthew 6:31, says, "So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. So take first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." Jesus helps us see the heavenly perspective of our earthly reality, saying, "Those things are important. You do need them, but it's not number one. The first thing is to love God, to pursue God, to give God your everything, and he will take care of you." Jesus as a prophet speaks truth and love, helps us see it, earth's realities from a heavenly perspective, and he's also honest and addresses our spiritual condition. John 8:34 says, "Jesus replied, 'Verily I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.'" We are all sinners, all of humanity, and he came to save us. He didn't come down from heaven to comfort us and say, "Oh, you're doing great. You just do you. I totally understand." He didn't come to coddle us. No, he told us, "You guys are sinners. You're enslaved to it, and I'm here to set you free." He came to free us from sin through his sacrifice. So he gives us, he addresses our spiritual condition, and he also gives us instruction from God's word. He gives us guidance. It says in Luke 24:27, "And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the scriptures." He took time with his disciples and said, "This is what it means to follow God. It says all this. This is a lot to work through to understand. Let me help you. Let me give you some instruction. Let me give you some guidance for your everyday life and help you understand what it means to live righteously." He summarizes it concisely with the command that you've probably heard. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment, and the second is like it. Love your neighbor as yourself.”

So we want to sum up all of Jesus' teachings. Maybe we take that as the most important thing. But he gives us those instructions for us today. This is what Jesus does as a prophet, speaking truth. He also calls us to repentance and restoration. Mark 1:15 says, "Jesus went to Galilee proclaiming the good news of God. The time has come," he said, "The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news." He wants us to turn away from sin and be in right relationship with God the Father. John 3:17 says, "For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." I love that Jesus was sent in order that we would repent, that we could have right relationship. He didn't just come to punish and say, "You guys are all sinners. You deserve hell. Let's make this happen." No. He wants us to be in heaven with God the Father, and he provides the way for that to happen. And so he calls us to repent and then to follow God with our lives. So he calls us to repentance and restoration. But it gets even better. Because not only does Jesus speak the truth, but church, Jesus is the truth. Says in John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." To know Jesus, to have a personal relationship with him, is to know the truth. What better way to answer that question that people ask today, "Hey, how do I know what is truth?" And respond in a way, it's actually more, "Who is the truth?" And it's Jesus Christ. John 1:14 says, "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

This is what Christmas is all about. The Word becoming flesh. The truth wrapped in flesh, born a priestly king, born to save the world. Jesus come down as a baby who is the truth. I asked a question at the beginning, "What is it that you are hearing and believing?" And so I want to ask you now, do you hear Jesus today? And do you believe him? Are you listening because Jesus is calling out to you? And he does this in different ways. He calls you to himself, who is the truth. And he calls you to live in the truth through the Holy Spirit. He does this through his Word, as we read through prayer, through his voice, through the Spirit in our hearts, through people in our lives speaking exhortations to us. And are we listening? So are you able to hear Jesus? And if you are ready to listen, do you believe and follow that call? Because the way that we respond to hearing the truth reveals where our hearts are at. If we are ready and we're able, then we will listen. But if we're not, then our hearts are closed, and that kind of reveals where we're at in our relationship with God.

Are you able to hear Jesus? If you're sitting and you're like, "I try. I'm trying to hear Jesus, but I just, I don't, I can't." And I would say maybe there's too much noise in your life. Maybe you're struggling with some noise pollution. There's just too much going on, too much that you're paying attention to. And maybe you need to turn the volume down on some things. Maybe you need to turn the volume down on the time that you spend on your phone, scrolling, social media. Maybe you need to turn down the volume on listening to talk radio or podcasts or how much time you spend watching movies or shows, playing video games, watching the news. If you're saying, "Man, I can't hear God. It might be time to evaluate what is it that I'm spending my time listening to, though? And maybe that's the reason why I cannot hear God." If you are hearing his voice, then are you ready to receive his truth, to follow and obey? I want to ask, what is he calling you to do? Those things that a prophet fulfills, that a prophet does, that he fulfills, what is he calling you to do? Is he calling you to see your world through a heavenly perspective? Maybe you're going through stuff right now and you're facing some greed, some selfishness, and he's saying, "Hey, I need you to understand this from my point of view." Is he calling you to look at your spiritual condition? Is there some sin going on in your life that he wants you to look at and say, "Hey, I need you to surrender this over to me"? Is he calling you to repentance and restoration? Say, "Hey, you know that you've been living with this sin, but I need you to turn away from it, to surrender it to me, to follow me"? Your relationship with God isn't what it's supposed to be, so let's address that. Or is he calling you to heed his words and instructions? Maybe he's saying, "Hey, I've got a word for you. There's some things in this Bible. I've sent some friends that were trying to talk to you and you're not listening. I've got some instruction for how you should be living your life and I want you to follow it." Whatever it may be, church, listen to God this Christmas season. Treasure his words. And remember that Jesus speaks truth to set us free, not to condemn us, not to shame us, not to cast us out as failures, but to prepare us for his kingdom, to transform us into the likeness of Christ in order that we can love him better and love others like Jesus.

So this Christmas season, as we approach the final days before Christmas, I can't, like Pastor Lauren said, it is just days away that hits me like every morning. We're, "Oh my goodness, I still got to wrap things. I got to buy things too. Oh my God. Okay. I just thought of two more people that... Okay. See, God, I hear you. You heard me. Tell me. Yep." As we approach the final days before Christmas, I want us to be aware that the noise around us will only increase. The stress and hectic schedule will only get more stressful and more hectic. The voice of the consumer within us will only get more selfish and greedier. Or for some of us, the silence of loneliness and despair and isolation around the holidays will ring even more loudly. But church, we have the truth to cut through the noise or the silence because we have Christ. We have Christ to speak truth into our lives and into our hearts, guiding us to what truly matters. We have Christ to speak truth over us, to protect us and ensure that we remain with him. And we have Christ to speak truth through us, encouraging us to share the love of Jesus with the people that we come in contact with this Christmas season. So this Christmas, we pray that you know the truth, that you hear the truth from God above everything else. We can't completely turn off the noise from this world, but we can try and make sure that Jesus is the loudest thing that we're hearing around this season. And in moments that the Spirit ordains, we pray that you would share that truth for the real reason for the season. The incarnation of our perfect prophet, priest, king, our Savior. And so in that, we, church, the weary world can rejoice. Amen?

Let's pray. God, thank you again for your word, for sending your son, for sending the truth wrapped up as a baby, because God, without your son, Jesus, without the truth, we are lost. We have no hope. But this Christmas, we rejoice because through you, we have hope, we have assurance of eternity with you. God, I pray that you would help our hearts and ears to be sensitive to your voice this Christmas. And God, however you are trying to speak to us, through your word, through prayer, through times of silence, maybe an audible voice through our friends and loved ones. But God, I pray that you would make us attentive to your spirit. Tune our hearts to follow you. And God, may we be encouraged to give you everything that we have, that we would see the world we live in through your eyes, that we would love others the way that you have loved us, that we would take our sin and lay it before you and say, "God, take this. Make my heart clean again." God, thank you for your truth. And God, I pray that our attention would not just be given to you for an hour on a candlelight Christmas service, but every day through whatever we're going through, all the parties and gatherings and times at home, watching a Christmas movie, walking the neighborhood for Christmas lights, God, that we would be open to what you are doing in that very moment. Because we know that you work through all things in every situation. So God, we give our lives to you, we give our hearts to you, and we look forward to celebrating the birth of our Savior this Christmas. We pray this in your name. Amen.

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 3

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 3

Exodus 20:1–3, Hebrews 4 & 7

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

We are in week three of our Weary World Rejoices series. I have been loving this series, I don't know about you, but even before we started, when we were planning this, and we were talking to the staff, we were just kind of working through it. And I was just hit by the poignancy of it, and I love the idea of getting to talk about how we as a people are weary. We are tired, we work hard, we strive, even trying to just walk the Christian life can be tiresome sometimes. And so I thought it was such an important topic for us to talk about and acknowledge that we are weary. And this can be a weary season, but we still get to rejoice. We still can rejoice in Jesus. So, so far in our series, we've talked about Jesus as King. And then last week we talked about Jesus as our Savior. And this week we'll be talking about Jesus as Priest. And really, each week we focused on the need, or something that we as humanity desire or need, and then how we have, in our own striving, have distorted that or perverted that in some way. We've tried to fix the problem ourselves. And then how Jesus, in the person and character of who He is, is truly the answer to what we need. As we look at the biblical examples each week, we see how we've been weary since the fall. We have strived to fix our problems. We've all had things, humanity, since the beginning of time, has longed for things and tried to meet that need on our own. But we couldn't do it. We couldn't do it in our own strength. We've messed up the real answer, what we thought was the answer to our problem. We screwed it up. But we get to rejoice. This is the weary world rejoices, and we get to rejoice because of who Jesus is and how He meets that need in our lives. So, again, today we are going to be talking about Jesus as Priest.

Throughout Scripture, and specifically with the nation of Israel, we see the role of priests. We see the priesthood. Now, maybe for some of you, we might all have different responses to this idea of priests, especially maybe if you have a Catholic background or have experience with that. And there are many religions and faith beliefs that have priests that serve in that faith. We here in Spring Valley, in a Protestant belief system, we have pastors or ministry leaders. And so some of the roles and responsibilities have some crossover, but we see in Scripture what a priest was meant to do. And their role, their main role, they had many responsibilities, but their main role was to be the connection between God or Yahweh and the people. They were the go-between. They were the intermediary between Yahweh and the people of God. Today, the human desire and need we're going to talk about is connection. We all have this innate need to be connected. God actually put it in our DNA. We all need to feel connected, both to God and to humans, but He gave it to us. But God being perfect could not be in relationship with an imperfect people. And the Israelites were not perfect. We are not perfect. So He created a system that would allow an imperfect people to be connected to God.

And the priesthood that we'll see here was part of that plan, that was part of that system. So the priest represented the people to God and God to the people. And one person that we see exemplify this role is Moses, who actually wasn't officially a priest. He led the people of Israel. He helped establish them as a nation. He was the guy who went into Egypt. God used him with all the plagues. They got out of Egypt, divided the Red Sea, crossed through, wandered around for a while. Right, that guy, that Moses. He was the leader and God used him to establish the nation of Israel, to learn about God, to learn who He was and that they could trust Him. And although the priesthood hadn't been created officially yet, he served in that role. He offered sacrifices on behalf of the people. He would pray for them. He would communicate with God and bring the people, metaphorically, to God, and then bring the message of God back to the people. So he really was a priest in his role. And then later, he actually implemented the priesthood through his brother, Aaron. We see the formal establishment of the priesthood in Exodus. We're actually going to be in Hebrews mostly later this morning. But real quick, I want us to look at Exodus 40. It'll be on the screens. You're welcome to turn there. But I want to see how Moses established the formal priesthood for the Israelites. So Exodus 40, verse 12, it says, "Bring Aaron and his sons to the entrance to the tent of meeting and wash them with water. Then dress Aaron in the sacred garments, anoint him and consecrate him so he may serve me as priest. Bring his sons and dress them in tunics. Anoint them just as you anointed their father so they may serve me as priest. Their anointing will be a priesthood that will continue throughout their generations. Moses did everything just as the Lord commanded him.”

So although Moses kind of acted as the priest for a long time, God had him establish the priesthood through his brother, Aaron, and it would continue through their lineage. It was specifically from the tribe of Levi. And the priests had many responsibilities. They would make sacrifices on behalf of the people to atone for their sin. They didn't have--Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet. They needed a system to make them right again with God after they sinned, so they would offer sacrifices. They would keep the lamps burning in the tabernacle and later in the temple as a symbol of God's presence with them. They would bring offerings and burn incense and say prayers. They would lead worship and fast and national repentance. They would preside over their worship. But ultimately, all of these responsibilities were them interceding on behalf of the people of God. And if you'll notice here in this verse, they lived by different standards. They had different practices. They had rituals and cleansing practices that they had to follow because they were going into the presence of God. Now, they were still human. They were still imperfect, but they had these guidelines that God gave them in order to get them as close to perfect as possible so that they could enter His presence and represent the people. The people of Israel wanted to be connected to God. They wanted to have a relationship with Him. They wanted Him to be present, to lead and guide and protect them. But the best way that they could do that was through being connected by the priests. As I said, humans have this innate desire for connection.

Even now, not just the Israelites, but us too, we want to know God and be known by Him. He's our Creator. He's the one who made us. We want to be known by God. And unfortunately, we as humans often try to do this in our own strength. We try to push and manufacture and make it work for us, and we usually mess it up. So that's the problem that we face, that our own way causes disconnection. Even in our striving to bring about some sort of connection, it can usually end up causing more disconnection. I think there's a few ways or a few reasons why we do this. We're going to talk about a few of those. The first one is I think that often it's because of our own impatience. We don't want to wait on God's timing. We want to feel connected right now. The Israelites were also impatient. We'll see that here in a minute. They also had impatience. They didn't even have microwaves. We have microwaves and fast food, and so we're really impatient. So we want to move things along faster than God's timing. The second one is that we have a need for control. We're not willing to trust in God's sovereignty because we think we know best. We want to have control. Or maybe it's because we want something that we can see, feel, touch. Something tangible, something earthly, something this side of heaven that we can feel tangibly connected to. We can't see God, so maybe it doesn't feel very connected. We want something tangible, but in striving for these things, we mess it up.

There's a story in Exodus 32 where the Israelites grew impatient. They tried to take things into their own hands. Moses had gone up on a mountain to talk with God, and God even told Moses, "You cannot let the people touch the mountain. "That's too close," because God's presence was on the mountain. So the people were down waiting for Moses to come back, and apparently he was taking longer than they liked. So they got Aaron, yes, the priest, to build them or create for them a calf. They gathered their gold, their jewelry, and they created a golden calf to worship. Interestingly enough, when they left Egypt, God allowed them to plunder the Egyptians so that they would have resources to build the tabernacle one day. But instead of waiting on God's timing, they used that to create a golden calf. They weren't willing to wait on God's timing. They weren't willing to wait for Moses to come down the mountain. They wanted control of the situation. They wanted to be able to see. They wanted something tangible that they could see and touch and they couldn't even touch the mountain that God was on. So they wanted to have something that they could worship and they could touch with their own hands and see with their own eyes. And often we do the same thing. This endeavor to manufacture connection out of our own ideas, our own strengths, our own need for control or impatience. It can lead to disconnection or worse, sin. It can lead to sinful behaviors, selfishness, idolatry. We begin to idolize and worship other things. In our desire to create connection, we pervert it and put other things above God. It could look different for all of us. Maybe it's your work. Maybe you think if I work hard enough and I see so much success, I will be appreciated, I will be seen. I will experience connection in that way. Maybe it's your relationship with things or items like your phone or food or shopping, things you can consume like content, Amazon purchases. Perhaps it's elevating pastors or speakers or influencers on the internet, on YouTube. We think if I just listen to one more teaching on YouTube or one more podcast, I will feel more connected to God. Now hear me, there are really great preachers and teachers out there that have good biblical things to say. But when we elevate them too high and we put them above God and we don't even open our Bible, that becomes a problem. Maybe it's human relationships that we idolize. Again, God gave us relationships.

Those are good things, but they can be distorted. We could put unhealthy relationships above God. We could put a lack of boundaries with someone above God. We could put expectations on a relationship and expect this person to meet our need for connection that only God can meet. And it becomes a problem. There are good things. Some of these are really good things that do actually bring connection in a lot of ways, but they don't replace our connection to God. We think that if we feel disconnected or we don't feel like God's close or hearing us, that we can force it, we can manufacture it with earthly means. But the problem is our connection with God is not an earthly thing. We can't have earthly answers to spiritual problems. There are no earthly solutions to our spiritual questions. We need an intermediary. What we actually need to solve this problem of feeling disconnected is a true intermediary who never fails, who forgives and cleanses us from our sin, who brings reconciliation and peace both with others and with our relationship with God, and who facilitates an ongoing connection with God. We need Jesus as our priest. So let's look at that here.

We need Jesus as our perfect and eternal priest. We're going to look at Hebrews 4. We're going to start with verse 14. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are, yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. The priests in the Bible were simply temporary shadows. They were foreshadowing of what was to come of our great high priest, Jesus. They were broken humans, too. They did their best, as far as we know, but they were still broken humans. They could offer sacrifices for sin according to the law, but they couldn't take anyone's sin away from them. They couldn't redeem them permanently. They had a role to bring connection, but they could not do it in a perfect way. It was temporal. It was imperfect. But we have Jesus who can do it perfectly, and it will last forever. Turn in the page into chapter 7, verse 23. It says, “Now there have been many of those priests since death prevented them from continuing in office, but because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore, he is able to save completely those who come to God through him because he always lives to intercede for them. Such a high priest truly meets our need, one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens.” He's sinless. He knows what it means to be human. He experienced that, but he remained sinless. He can empathize with us, but he maintained his righteousness. His priesthood will never end because he reigns forever. He won't die. He won't have some moral failure that we'll see on social media or the newsfeed. His priesthood will last forever. He offered himself as the ultimate sacrifice. He does not need to offer sacrifices day after day after day every time we mess up because he was the ultimate sacrifice.

Going on in chapter 7, verse 27, it says, “Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself. For the law appoints as high priests men in all their weakness, but the oath which came after the law appointed the son who has been made perfect forever.” So not only was he the perfect priest, but he was also the sacrifice. John 1:29 says, "The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.’" He was or is the perfect priest who offers the sacrifices and the Lamb who is the sacrifice. No priest in history could ever do that. He can never save humanity. But he made a way for us to get back into connection with God and put us in right relationship with him.

The second thing I want us to understand is that Jesus' priesthood actually makes us a royal priesthood. 1 Peter 2:9 says, Back when we talked about relationships, I mentioned that they're good. They're gifts from God. They're beautiful. We need people. We need to be in community. He created us for that. And for those of us who have chosen to follow Jesus, he has made us into a royal priesthood. He has chosen us. He has set us apart to do his kingdom work. We model our priesthood after our great high priest. We do this through spiritual conversations, through making decisions differently than maybe the world would expect us to, living with integrity, looking different than the culture around us. That is us representing God to the people. 2 Corinthians 5:20 says, “We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.” Our actions, our behaviors, our words are us being the royal priesthood and representing God to the people, pointing them to Jesus, encouraging them to be reconciled back to God. We can't do that work because we are also imperfect, but we can point them to the high priest who is.

We are Christ's ambassadors. It's a high calling. It can feel like pressure. And truthfully, it can be distorted too. We can elevate ourselves. We can think we've got it figured out. Once again, we can cause more problems. But if we are modeling after our great high priest, we can be used as ambassadors and priests for the kingdom, allowing God to use us to create that connection between God and his people. I want us to go back to Hebrews 4 and just look at verse 16 real quick. I think this is important, and I don't want us to miss this part. Verse 16 says, "Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." As the royal priesthood, we represent God to the people, but we also represent the people to God. We do this through prayer, through interceding, through bringing people to the throne of grace. We bring them to God on their behalf. This is why we pray for each other. This is why we take care of each other. We operate in community as best we can so that we can bring each other. Galatians talks about bearing each other's burdens. We do that by taking each other to God. But here in verse 16, we see that it's not just for others. It is also for ourselves. That we can approach the throne with confidence. Some of us want a connection with God, but maybe we don't think that we are good enough. We haven't done enough. We know intellectually that He loves us and that He wants us around, but not that He wants a close, intimate relationship with Him. We try. We read our Bible. We go to church. We pray. But we think that God is putting up with us. He's allowing us to sit nearby or follow Him around like a puppy dog. We know He loves us, but He wouldn't want a close relationship with me. He doesn't actually care about knowing me. So we're resigned to just be near, see Him from a distance, and not have any expectations of any sort of reciprocated relationship or connection. But church, Jesus is our high priest. And we, the Bible says it, so we believe it. We approach the throne of grace with confidence. We're not sneaking in. We're not crawling on our hands and knees. We are walking in to the throne of grace with confidence. Who walks into a throne room with confidence? The king's kids. The sons and the daughters. He may be the king, but he's still dad. And they can walk in with confidence because they are sons and daughters. They are heirs. We, too, can approach the throne of the living God with confidence. We go to His throne for grace and mercy in our time of need because He does want a connection with us. He wants that connection to be restored. It's so much more than taking the leftovers or the scraps.

There's a scene in "The Miracle on 34th Street," at least in the '90s version, where a mom brings up a little girl to sit on Santa's lap at the department store. And I get choked up every stinking time I watch this scene because the mom puts her on Santa's lap and said, "She's deaf. You don't have to talk to her, but she just wanted to see you." And so she's happily sitting there getting to see Santa. And Santa starts to talk to her through sign language. And her face just lights up, and she's so excited. He asks her her name, and they sing jingle bells, and he asks what she wants for Christmas, and he connects with her. She was resigned to just seeing him, just sitting on his lap. She had no expectations of any sort of reciprocated relationship, of any sort of connection. But Santa saw her. He knew her in a different way and connected with her in a different way than probably most people had. God isn't simply putting up with us. He isn't just letting us be in His presence, although that would be enough. He's saying, "I want a relationship with you. I want you to have this need for connection met in me." And because He is our great high priest, we get to have that. We get to have this connection, and we get to go tell other people about this connection too.

So this Christmas season, if you are feeling lonely or isolated or invisible, I want you to know that our perfect and eternal priest sees and knows you. He meets you where you're at. He fulfills that desire for connection and wants to have a relationship with you. If you've never received Jesus' gift of salvation, I would encourage you to consider that today. I invite you to receive and accept His gift of salvation and connection with Him. I invite you to consider surrendering your life and making Jesus your Lord, your high priest. We're going to have a prayer up on the screen, and I'm going to pray it out loud for us. But if you've never prayed this prayer and you feel like you are ready to accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, would you just pray along in your hearts with me? Let's all bow our heads and we'll pray together. Father in heaven, I know that I have lived for myself instead of you. I have sinned against you, but I believe Jesus died for my sin. I confess my sin and ask you to forgive me. I bow to you as Lord and leader of my life. Help me to live for you from this day forward in Jesus' name. If everyone would just keep their eyes closed, if you prayed this prayer for the first time, would you just raise your hand and declare that today so that we can celebrate with you? That you decided that you want that connection with Jesus? Thank you.

Father, we thank you that you are our great high priest, that you are the one who made the way for us to be connected back to you, that you saw our problem, you saw the disconnection, and you made a way. You didn't leave us in our sin and our brokenness. You didn't leave us to our own devices. God, you made a way for us to be back into right relationship with you. Thank you for that, Jesus. Thank you for those today who have decided to allow you to restore that connection in their lives. We praise you for that. We thank you. God, this Christmas season, help us to walk with joy and confidence because of who you have made us to be and that we are connected to you, our great high priest. We love you, Jesus. We praise you for who you are. In Jesus' name, Amen.

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 2

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 2

Isaiah 7, Matthew 1:22-23

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

I'm excited for today. Today is going to be fun. We're doing our Christmas Sweater Sunday. It's just for the fun of it and we have some enjoyment with each other. I want to continue in our Christmas series today. We've been in now week two of the series called The Weary World Rejoices. Say that 12 times fast, right? I'm excited because this is a little bit of a different take on Christmas maybe than what you might be used to or what you might seem as a regular Advent series. But we wanted to take a moment and to really focus in on and look through the four aspects of what Jesus fulfills when he came as a baby all those years ago. And Pastor Andre started us off last week and we began to walk through of understanding who the fulfillment of Jesus is. And I love this because sometimes we think about Christmas and it's just one aspect. We just see like baby Jesus in the manger, right? And we think, "Oh, that's so cute. That's so sweet." But there's so much more that came with Jesus' arrival.

And so I got a question for you this morning and that is have you ever found yourself in a place where you needed to be rescued? Maybe it was a situation, maybe it was a tragic moment. Maybe it was an accident, a car accident or something. Maybe it was more of a situation that was financial. Maybe it was an illness or a health crisis that you walked through. Maybe it was a relationship, maybe your marriage. Maybe you lost your job or you were trying to find a job. Maybe it was a family hardship or a depression or an addiction. And sometimes, especially when we think about and being in a place of that tragedy, Christmas and the holidays are an even greater weight. But what if I told you that what you might see as a burden in the holidays in the midst of your situation or whatever you're going through is actually exactly what you needed to be rescued? In this season that we call Advent, it's a quiet buildup to Christmas where we read specific scriptures, we celebrate special moments, we sing songs that we only sing during this season about a baby who changed absolutely everything. But I want to cut through the tinsel a little bit and Christmas isn't the story about a big guy in a red suit. Sorry to bust the news there for you, but it's about a savior showing up for the very first time to rescue the mess that we're in.

And from the very first pages of the Bible, Genesis in the beginning, we see about this humanity that's been crying out to be saved or ignoring the cry within their souls. And the reality of the deliverance needed from sin, death, and the chaos that the world finds themselves in. And yet either we hide from it or we try to fight it. We bury our head in the sand or we think that we've got this. This is where today's message starts, talking about Jesus as our savior. If you would with me, let's pray before we continue moving on. Jesus, we recognize who you are. You are our savior. And God, we celebrate the fact that that very first Christmas you showed up in a super unconventional way on this earth to walk a humble path, to live a life as a servant, and to show us that Jesus, what it ultimately means to love one another. So God, this morning I pray that our hearts would be open, we'd be recognizing of who you are and you with the title of savior in our lives, Jesus. Open our eyes, show us the need that we need to be rescued. In Jesus' name, amen. There's a myth in this world that's been around since the garden. And that myth is that we can provide ourself salvation, that we can take care of it, that we can be the one that's got it all under control. Picture this, ain't nobody but a sharp guy, takes big risks and bam, he makes it. He built his career from scratch, no handouts, just hustle, all him. We love those stories, right? How many Hollywood stories and movies have we seen of that being the case? A theatrical storytelling of somebody who came from nothing to everything, right? And yet though in the middle of that, the lone ranger who pulls himself up or the one who conquers the dragon solo, it's the dream that we chase, it's the real that we scroll until one day, cracks begin to show, sleepless nights come, they begin to snap at the ones that they love, wondering why this quote, self-made life feels so empty. But the gospel tells a different story. It says that no one is the hero in this fight. Not you, not me, only one person.

And it all began when it went sideways in the garden back in Genesis chapter three. And he says this starting in verse six, "When a woman saw the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate it. And the eyes of both of them were open and they realized they were naked. So they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves." One choice, one moment, paradise broken. They grab for wisdom, for control, thinking that they could save themselves from whatever better looked like. And yet, it left them feeling exposed, hiding from God, stitching up shame with leaves that wouldn't hold together. It's this myth that we inherit. We'll just cover it up. We'll figure it out. I'll be fine. Fake it till I make it, right? That's the world tells us. That's what they say. Just fake it till you make it, you'll be all right. But that's not true. An advent flips this on its head and it's God's rescue mission launched into our broken world. Think about it. The prophets were told, the stars announced, and the teenage couple treads to a stable because of it. Jesus didn't just come to applaud our bootstraps. He came to carry our load. So here's a question I have for you to think about for a little bit. What do you really need saving from? You probably all have something in our mind right now, right? Of something that we need to be rescued from. Maybe it's a grudge, you're nursing. Maybe it's that anxiety that wakes you up at 3 a.m. Maybe it's the sin that sneaks in and steals your joy during the holidays. Think about that for a moment. Because I think if we're honest, we don't want to face it, right? We don't like what it shows deep down inside of us. But too often, we just skip it and we chase something else completely different. We go after something that helps us forget what's truly going on inside.

And I call this the me syndrome. It's what we want instead. It's our perverse deep desire down inside of us that we can't just overlook rescue. We want to rewrite the script. Maybe we say, "I can be my own savior." It's that inner voice whispering to us, "Just try harder. Just plan better. Just work your way out." But remember Adam and Eve? That fruit grab was the original DIY kit, the do-it-yourself kit, where they thought they knew better. They thought they could figure it out better than God had set up paradise to be. And it echoes within us to this day. As it says, Paul, he writes in Romans 3:23, he says, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." Or maybe we think of it like this. I'll be somebody else's savior, the hero complex. We pour ourselves into maybe fixing our spouse or our kids or our friends. It's noble, sure, yeah, but it dodges our own mirror deep down inside. The mom running herself ragged playing hero at home, but inside shame eats her alive. She fixes everyone else's lunch but forgets her own hunger for grace. Or maybe you're the, "I'll decide how God will save me." We pray for the promotion. You think about it, "If I could just have this, everything will be good. God, I need fill in the blank." We have our own timeline, our own schedule. We're the director of our own life movie. Isaiah, it throws cold water on that when it says the world is waiting for a flashy sign, a big, strong, manly warrior of a king, but God gives a quiet promise of a child. It's not our script. It's His story. Or maybe you're the, "I don't need saving. I'm all right. I'm fine." This is pride's cruelest lie to us. We scroll past the news and we're convinced that our perfect, tidy little life just proves that we're fine. But deep down inside, we know that's not true. These desires that twist us up because it's not freedom. They're actual chains that hold us down. And as Roman puts it, "We all fall short of the glory." There's no exceptions. Think of it this way. You're caught in a riptide out in the water. The waves are crashing around you. You're doing everything you can to keep your head above water. Your lungs are burning. You need to be rescued. And Jesus comes up in a tiny, little tired, weathered rowboat. And He says, "Hop in." But we're so focused on how we think we're gonna be rescued. It's gonna be a helicopter. It's gonna be the SEAL Team 6 coming in hot. It's gonna be everything, this flashy, big boom of a moment of how we're gonna be lifted out of the water and rescued. But Jesus is right there offering rescue. But it's not the way that we planned. It's just too basic. It's too not enough. So we wave off Jesus and we sit there and continue to struggle. So here's the thing about God's rescue plan. It arrives on His terms, not ours.

And my friends, that's where the trouble lies, is that we will forever be lost until we see our true need. And what we actually need is God's provision. What we're starving for isn't control or applause, but it's truly a rescue from evil, sin, and death. It's the three that kicked off in Genesis when it all broke. See, sin just isn't like this oops moment in our life from time to time, but it's a root poisoning everything within us, turning neighbors into enemies, hearts and horrendous pits of selfishness. We need deliverance from chaos and this inner turmoil that spins us like laundry in a dryer over and over and over and over again. Life's just not these random breakdowns. It's a world groaning under fracture and our souls that feel it first, right? We're restless, we're divided, and we chase peace in all the wrong places. The world gives us these promises of if you just had this, right? Every commercial on TV right now is trying to sell you on the next best thing that will give you peace, it will give you happiness, it'll fulfill your life, it'll give you everything that you need if you just buy blank. We make wish lists out of it. We ask for gifts from friends and family and parents because we think if we could just have that, everything will be right. And yet, next Christmas, we think if I just had that, and we do it over and over and over. There's guilt and there's shame or these like silent chains and they whisper to us that we're too far gone, that we're too broken to fix. And we lug them around in our backpacks full of weights, slowing every single one of our steps. I love what David says, King David, he writes this in Psalm 51. He says, "Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love, according to your great compassion, blot out my transgressions, wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from sin, for I know my transgressions and my sin is always before me." If we were to get real in here, we all have a raw egg deep down inside of us, similar to King David here. That just because he was one of the big three kings of the Old Testament, that he was still a person. He was still a human. He was still someone like you and me struggling in life, crying out for cleansing. And this true salvation that David longed for, the kind that actually sticks, is nothing that we can manufacture. No amount of good deeds or therapy sessions can touch what it actually is. It's got to come from outside of us. It's only from the one who knit us together in our mother's womb.

In this Advent, we see this in Mary and Joseph, who for fleeting rumors and dodging Herod and birthing hope outside in a stall made for livestock, God's provision shows up in the ordinary way, providing he knows our mess better than we do. And it's not these temporary fixes that we hope for, but it is a true, full freedom if we'll receive it. And so who steps into this? Jesus. Jesus steps in as our Savior, our perfect rescue. Plain and simple. There was a Savior figure or character from the Old Testament that kind of foreshadowed Jesus coming himself, but there was a guy by the name of Joseph. And his life plays like a movie. He was one of 12 sons. He was the great-grandson of Father Abraham. And he was betrayed by his family. Maybe some of you have had that happen to you. He was thrown into a pit. He was sold into slavery. He was accused falsely. He was forgotten in jail. And yet he rises to save Egypt and the region from a famine. And years later, after Joseph had been sold, he gets an opportunity to show up in Pharaoh's court and he gives an interpretation of a dream from God of what is to come and how they are to prepare for the famine that will be a long time. And so Joseph oversees a collection of food, of storage, of backups to have when this famine hits. And the famine comes and Egypt is good. They don't have any problems. They've got plenty of food. They've got it stored up. They've got reserves. They're set. But who doesn't have reserves? Joseph's family. And so they hear about Egypt and this guy over there who's got food. And so they travel all the way to Egypt and they show up before Joseph, not knowing it's Joseph Joseph, thinking that their brother is long gone, dead, forgotten, somewhere else, maybe six feet under the ground. And they humbly approach and ask to have food to feed their family. And Joseph recognizes them. And he helps his brother. He saves his family by providing rescue through food. And amazed and humbled, his brothers bow down before him to honor and to show their gratitude. And Joseph weeping, tears running down his face, he says, "Brothers, it's me, Joseph. What you meant for evil, God meant for good." Does that sound familiar? Jesus sold for silver, nailed to a wooden cross, dies for our sins, rises from death, comes out of the grave, saves us from our eternal famine and destruction, the starvation of our soul without God.

Fast forward from that story in Joseph to Isaiah, we hear the prophet proclaim that therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. The virgin will conceive and give birth to his son and they will call him Emmanuel. Matthew, all of this took place for what the Lord had said through the prophet, the virgin will conceive and give birth to his son, they will call him Emmanuel, which means God with us. This isn't a vague hope or a patchwork to just be a temporary. This is flesh and blood rescue from heaven. God crashing down into our lives and our chaos as Emmanuel. God is with us in the dirt, in our doubt, in our darkness. I'm reminded of the life of John Newton. He was a rough dude. He was a slave ship captain and he was hardened by the trade. One night, 1748, he's out at sea and a storm comes along and begins to tear apart his ship. They can see Ireland in the horizon but they know that they can't make it there. The crew's panicking, the ship begins to fail and death is staring them down. Newton himself, he's no saint, he's no Jesus follower, he's no Christian. But he cries out to God anyway and he says, "Lord, have mercy." And the storm begins to let up and the ship limps into port and he starts reading the Bible and he starts wrestling with this life that he's living and the life that he's seeing Jesus calling him to in scripture. And years later, he writes this song that is sung in churches all over the world for generations. It's a song called "Amazing Grace." There's a line in there that says, "For I once was lost but now I'm found." From a chaotic life to a rescued musician. Newton's rowboat in the middle of the night, a plea to God in the midst of winded waves. And Jesus met him there, not in a throne room but in the midst of his rack. That's salvation's reach. It finds us in the middle of life's storm.

Jesus writes, "My command is this, love one another as I have loved you. Your love has no one than this, to lay down one life for one's friends. You are my friends and if you do what I command, I no longer call you servants because a servant doesn't know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends for everything that I learned from my father I have made known to you." Jesus doesn't whisper advice from afar. He swims the riptide with us. And he's betrayed, he's beaten, he's buried, but he comes out from the grave. Isaiah further writes, "Surely he," being Jesus, "took up our pain and bore our suffering. Yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that was brought us peace was on him. And by his wounds we are healed. We all sheep have gone astray. Each of us have turned our own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all." From the lowly manger to the humble cross to the heavenly throne, Jesus is that thread that redeems all of humanity as the Savior. So Jesus paddles up, the boat's ready, but do we climb in? Do we drop our act? Do we first acknowledge the reality of our life and the sin that so entangles us? Not sugarcoating anything. It's real. It's life. It's like the prodigal son hitting rock bottom. But that's where grace floods into our lives. Ephesians says, "For it is by grace you have been saved through faith and it is not from yourselves. It is a gift of God, not by works so that no one can boast." It's not us. It's a gift. It's faith that says, "I can't, but Jesus, you can.”

Maybe you need to stop minimizing the chaos in your life. Maybe you just need to receive Jesus today. Knowing that you're not going to fix whatever you're walking through. Knowing that you can't figure it out, you don't need another self-help book, you don't need another podcast, you don't need another YouTube training series. What you need is Jesus. This Christmas, Jesus comes like he does every single year and shows up and says, "I'm here for you. I want to save you. I want to rescue you. I have a better plan for you than the one that you've been trying to write for your life." David Paul Tripp writes this. He says, "Because we minimize our sin, seeing ourselves as righteous, we don't cry out for the rescuing grace that is ours in Christ." We can't save ourselves. Not even halfway, not even a little bit, not at all. Jesus came that very first Christmas to save completely, start to finish, top to bottom. It may look different than what we had planned, but it is the salvation and the Savior that we all need. So this Christmas, may you pray, "Jesus, Savior, I need you. Pull me close. I say yes to you today. Let me tell you, you'll watch the waves and the wind of your life part, just like Jesus did for the Israelites in the Red Sea. He'll part the waters for you.”

This morning, we're going to be taking communion together to kind of wrap up this reminder of Jesus as our Savior. But maybe for some of us, we've never had that opportunity to accept Jesus as our Savior. And so we're going to put a salvation prayer on the screen, and maybe this morning, as you were thinking, as I was talking, and you go, "Chris, I need rescue. I got turmoil in my life. I got things that aren't right. I got depression. I got anxiety. I got all of these things that are coming at me. Life's hit me hard, and you're talking about a rescue for me. I need that." And there's a lot of us in this room that at some point before, we have accepted Christ into our lives, and it's changed us. And so I want to encourage you this morning, maybe you would want to say, "I need this Jesus, Chris. I want to pray a prayer. I want to invite Him in. I want to climb into His rowboat. I'm drowning." And so I want to read the prayer on screen, and if that is you, would you pray that in your heart? And after that, if that was you and you have accepted that, we celebrate that with you, and we want you to join us in having communed together as a church family. But first, I want to pray. Jesus, we thank you for today. God, we thank you for you who are our Savior. You are our redemption. You are our salvation. And so God, this morning, I pray for someone maybe in this room who would say, "I don't have that Savior Jesus in my life. And I want to accept Him. I want to climb into the rowboat. I want to accept His rescue in my life." And so if that would be you, then I would, as I read this prayer, follow along, pray this in your heart to Jesus. He's there to rescue you.

Pray along. Pray, "Father in heaven, I know that I have lived for myself instead of you. I have sinned against you, but I believe that Jesus died for my sin. So I confess my sin and ask you to forgive me. I bow to you as Lord and leader of my life. Help me to live for you from this day forward. In Jesus' name." God, we thank you for your salvation and your rescue. And God, as the elements come forward and we continue in this posture of prayer, God, I pray that you would be with these elements, God, that as they're passed out, as we accept them and receive them, Jesus, that we would be reminded of the sacrifice on the cross for you as our Savior. Jesus, we thank you for another incredible, amazing Sunday to gather together to worship. Jesus, we continue to worship through communion today. And so as the ushers pass out the elements, I want us to be reminded of Jesus, our Savior. Jesus who came that very first Christmas as a gift, a salvation for our lives. And so as they pass out the elements, take a moment and have a little bit of a conversation with God. We give to him what you need rescue from today. Take a moment, ponder in your heart the rescue that Jesus provides for us. We'll be back in a moment to take the elements together. Thanks for listening. And if you would, please take a moment to subscribe and leave an encouraging review to help others find our podcasts on whatever platform you are listening on. We hope you have a wonderful day. We'll catch you next week. week.

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 1

The Weary World Rejoices: Part 1

Isaiah 9:1-6

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

We are very excited for our Advent Series that we're starting this week. I want to give you just a hint of what is to come. In this series we're going to take a deeper look at how the birth of Jesus surpassed all expectations for those who were waiting for His arrival, and how the frameworks for which they thought He would fit into paled in comparison to who He truly was and is. Through Scriptures we'll see how Jesus addresses humanity's desire for stability, rescue, reconciliation, and truth, and each week we're going to look at how humanity's attempts to address these on their own power always falls short. That's why we called our series "The Weary World Rejoices," because of all of our efforts to attain stability, rescue, reconciliation, and truth all on our own. To find those in the world always leaves us tired and weary. The series is all about how Jesus is the fulfillment for what humanity longs for. In Jesus' birth so many answers were provided, so many promises were fulfilled. It's what Advent is all about, remembering. While we wait to celebrate the day of His birth, we remember what Jesus brought to this earth. In the biblical story, preparation for Jesus is synonymous with bringing our hearts and daily lives into alignment with His kingdom. Waiting helps us slow down and become aware of what we're waiting for and just as importantly how we are waiting for it. That's our goal in this series, that you are reminded each week of who you are waiting for, who you're waiting to celebrate, and as we slow down in the waiting that God would work in us. Throughout our series we're going to look at how Jesus is the perfect prophet, priest, king, and savior. And these frameworks that Israel was expecting Him to fulfill did come to pass, but they weren't able to comprehend just how perfect He was in embodying all of these things.

So today we're going to look at Jesus as the perfect king. I want to start by asking, what are we looking for? Advent is often a season where our attention is drawn towards our desires, our needs, our wants. We want a new appliance for the house. Our kids want, and the list can go on and on and on, a new toy, a new Barbie set, new Legos, new Xbox, the Switch 2, there's already a second one I think. Maybe you have some time off work or extra family time so you want to go somewhere, you want, you need, you desire, maybe it's a trip to the mountains or a trip to Disneyland, both of those sound amazing by the way. We constantly have conversations, what do I want? What do I need? Around this time of year. And there's nothing wrong with that, but I think it's also a perfect time to be reminded of what are we searching for in our hearts. Deep down everyone desires one or more of the following in their lives, and these are what motivate us and drive us our deepest desires, and those are security, we want to know that we are safe, we want peace, we want harmony in life, we want provision, we want to know that our needs are going to be met, and we want some kind of order, we don't like the chaos, we want to know that life is going to be structured to some degree, but we all seek these things, we all want and desire these things. And whether we seek these out from someone or something else or we try to create and provide these ourselves, we want these to be true, we want to have them. And when we pursue security, peace, provision, and order in our lives, we often do that by looking for and pursuing success, control, and influence. We think if we have success, then I'll be able to provide for myself. If we have control, then there will be order in my life, if I can control everything. And if I have influence over my environment, then I'll have the security I look for and the peace that I want. But the pursuit of success and control and influence and even acquiring these things, more often than not, just leaves us more restless and empty. So if we know that we can't provide what we truly desire, then we are left to think of someone else providing that for us. And we're looking for someone to bring us peace, security, provision, and order in life.

Almost since the beginning of time, humanity has lived in a world where there is a leader over a people, whether it's a king, a ruler, some sort, and that ruler and king have been responsible to provide these things for their people. The king has to provide the peace and the security and the provision and the order of life. Unfortunately, that has not always gone well. The execution of that plan for earthly leaders to provide those things often falters. It's looked like some benefiting at the expense of others. More often than not, slavery or corruption and greed have played a role in how a ruler has ruled over their people. Every once in a while, a good leader comes along and stands in stark contrast to the rest, but they too ultimately have their shortcomings. The reality for us is that we continue to search for someone who will rule and reign in perfect love and justice and righteousness. So who can rule over us and give us what we truly desire? The other reality that we have to acknowledge is that we don't always want what's best. Our desires can look like the fact that we want a king, but we want a king that serves our agenda. We want control, but we'll disguise it as surrender. I'm giving up, but really, I still want it to go my way. I want control over this situation. Or we want power, but we don't want to submit. We are selfish people. Our desires can be skewed towards what we think is right, what we think is best, but you know the problem with that, right? We are sinners too. We lack perspective. We can't see everything from everyone's perspective, and sometimes what's best for some may end up hurting others. We lack wisdom. We don't always know how to solve every problem that comes up in the best way possible. We don't know how to love well in every situation or speak truth in every situation. We lack empathy. There are limits to our compassion, our love, our kindness. We lack what it takes.

Every human, as hard as they try and as well-suited as they may seem for the job of leading other people, there is no perfect human leader. Again, we are all sinful, and we live in a sinful world. So what do we actually need? Well, we need true, a righteous leader who reigns with perfect justice and love, who defends and protects everyone from the chaos, whether the chaos that the world brings or the chaos that we cause ourselves. We need someone who will provide provision and flourishing, divine opportunities and environments where we don't just exist, but where we truly grow and thrive. And we need provision. We need someone to take care of us, to look after us, to give us what we need to live to the fullest extent. And we need wisdom and peace, someone who will give us that wisdom and peace that we can't provide for ourselves. We need someone who knows all, who sees all, who can speak truth in all situations and bring peace and wisdom to every circumstance. So who can provide all this? Who can do this all the time, perfectly? If you have that Sunday school answer in your head, you'd be correct. But this question is not a new question, it's a very old one and it's one that Israel had for themselves. And they were asking and wondering this, who is going to lead and rule perfectly? They had human rulers that God had helped put in place, the judges, prophets, kings, but these rulers always left them wanting more. And they were waiting and waiting for a true king. And in their waiting, they received many messages of hope from God.

And one of them is found in our passage this morning. So we're going to be in Isaiah 9. You can turn there in your Bibles if you want, it'll be on the screen as well. But this is a message from God as Israel is waiting and they've received message after message of hope, of a future hope, of someone who would bring all these things that they were wanting, that they were desiring. As in verse, starting in verse one, "Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past, he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future, he will honor Galilee of the nations by way of the sea beyond the Jordan. The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned. You have enlarged the nation and increased their joy. They rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest, as warriors rejoice when dividing the plunder. For as in the day of Midian's defeat, you have shattered the yoke that burdens them, the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor. Every warrior's boot used in battle and every garment rolled in blood will be destined for burning, will be fuel for the fire. For to us, a child is born. To us, a son is given and the government will be on his shoulders and he will be called a wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting father, prince of peace. Of the greatness of his government and peace, there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness. From that time on and forever, the zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.”

Isaiah was a prophet and sent to speak truth, to encourage and to bring hope, to steer God's people back to him, to keep their focus on him and to have them anticipate the culmination of his rescue plan involving a king. Isaiah speaks of this future king in Israel hearing this. They wanted one of their former kings, King David. You see, King David represented the best king in Israel's mind. David defeated his enemies, so in a way he brought peace. David brought provision and enabled the people to flourish in the land. David brought a certain amount of order to the chaos that Israel had been accustomed to. And so, in their minds, David was it. David was the best king that you could get. But it was short-lived. David made plenty of mistakes as well. But still, that's all the people had to go off. So of course, they just wanted another King David. And because they had heard God's promise, great things for David and from David's family, they had this picture that was starting to build of when the Savior would come, when the Messiah would come, it would look like David. There's a verse in 2 Samuel 7:16, it says, "God speaking to David," and he says, "Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me. Your throne will be established forever." So even David's reign was built up by God to say, "This is special. This is different." And the people also hearing that elevated David's reign above all the other kings. And so you imagine hearing this if you're an Israelite, knowing that the king, this future king, is going to come from David's family, from David's descendants. And it starts to frame the image of a king in a certain light. God promised them a king that would lead Israel towards faithfulness and rule over nations forever and ever. But David was not that king, nor was his son Solomon or any of the kings after as it just got worse and worse. And there was a few good ones in there, but Israel kept waiting and waiting. And when we open our Bibles to Isaiah, we're in the part of their history where they are anticipating this promised king from the line of David, who will fulfill all the promises that God made to their forefathers.

And that's the key theme of the book of Isaiah is a future hope in the anticipated king. And so we read our passage today, "For unto us a child is born, to us a son is given, and he will be called a wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting father, prince of peace." And you might be tempted to think just as Israel was thinking, "All right, David 2.0, a little fewer mistakes, but bring back this David figure and we'll have another great leader. So usher in another great time for the people of Israel." But they didn't get it. They didn't get that just imagining David 2.0 was so short and just a glimpse of who Jesus actually was as king. It's like, it'd be like this, it'd be like settling for sparkling water when you can have a drink of real fruit juice. Do you guys know these flavors of sparkling water and how like lights they are? They're so grapefruit, mango, orange, blackberry, cucumber, whatever your favorite is. And you've probably heard the jokes that maybe this can of water was canned in a room that had fruit in it. It's just like the lightest hint or that it was a hint of a hint of fruit that's in the can of sparkling water. I Googled some of these, by the way. People have joked that someone just drops a single skittle in every can and that's what you get is just like a little fruit flavoring or someone put a scratch and sniff sticker on the bottom of the can, scratched it and just left it there and that's what you drink. My favorite is these drinks are just like tasting the memory of fruit. It's just water but you read the label and you're like, "Yes, that is somewhat what grapefruit tastes like.”

That's what these Old Testament kings were. They were just a glimpse. They were the best available taste of what a king could be. They didn't have anything else to go off of. But Israel didn't know that there was a better option to come. Imagine having a sparkling water of lemon or lime, those are my favorites, without ever having tasted a real lemon or lime. And you just take the can and you're like, "Great, this is what lemon or lime must taste like, this very faint, barely tastable thing. Love it. This is fantastic." But then you hear that there's actually lemonade or limeade that will be coming soon, this future drink that you're like, "Okay, that's cool. Don't know what that is, but it must be like my sparkling water 2.0, just a little bit more." You can't know what lemonade will taste like fully. You just have to base it off your sparkling water. And you just imagine it just a little bit more. So imagine how blown away you would be if you had a lifetime of sparkling water and one day you get a cold glass of lemonade. You would flip your lid. That would be amazing. Your taste buds would explode. It'd be incredible. And this is, I'd share all that, that very long metaphor, to say that's what Israel was like with Jesus. And they kind of missed it, but that's who Jesus was. They could not imagine the king that Jesus would be. Whatever flavor you can imagine, those were the kings of Israel's past, some of them good, some of them bad. Even the greatest king of all time, King David, was just a hint, a glimpse, a shadow of the king that Jesus would be. And so what our passage this morning is telling Israel and is also telling us is that Jesus is the real deal. This is the real fruit juice, not just sparkling water. Jesus as king is better than any king that has ever existed. Even the best one that you can imagine, he's better. He is worth waiting for. Jesus is the true king and he's the heavenly king that the world needs. And the prophets try to help people understand over and over again, there is more to come. There is better ahead. Do not settle for what you have right now. It says in verse two of our passage, "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light on those living in the land of deep darkness. A light has dawned." Speaking of the hope that will be in Christ, the prophet is saying, "This is the one that you'll have been searching for. This is the one.”

And in verse six, it says, "For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders and he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." Isaiah is describing a ruler, a king who will provide counsel, order and direction, who will provide peace, who will provide, who will give provision and security like a father for his family does. Isaiah is trying to paint the picture. God is giving words to help Israel understand and connect the dots. That Jesus as king does more, is more, will reign and will not have shortcomings. His reign will not come to an end. Verse seven says, "Of the greatness of his government and peace, there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness." Remember from 2 Samuel 7, Jesus will be the fulfillment of that prophecy from the line of David. And he will reign forever and ever, upholding his kingdom with justice and righteousness. Jesus will be the perfect king, ruling and reigning like no human could. Jesus will not only provide all this in his heavenly kingdom, as he teaches over and over again in his ministry, but he does this for us individually even now. He rules and brings order to our inner chaos. He brings peace to our divided hearts. Under him and through him, we can have provision and we can flourish. We can be who God intended us to be. And in him is found the truest and deepest wisdom and peace. And he also brings one more thing that I didn't mention at the beginning, but I know that we all desire this. On top of security, peace, provision and order, we all desire to be loved. And Jesus came to love us. A kingly love, a royal love where we are seen and known. There's an Advent meditation out there from Practicing the Way and it says this, "For some of us, it's easier to believe that God is coming to establish his rule and restore creation than it is to believe that he is coming to be near to us. But it's true. God is after more than behavior change or earnest activity for his kingdom. His name is Emmanuel, God with us. And so it may be that the most important thing we can do in preparing for the king is to open our hearts to him with vulnerability and trust. The king comes with unexpected kindness, healing and affection and we are invited to submit to this love. The way of this king, the way of Jesus is unlike any other king. And his name, Emmanuel, God with us, speaks so much to his purpose that he wants to come live with us. Not just reign over us and be from afar, but he wants to walk every day with us. What kind of king do you know that would do that? And with all of us individually, take the time and the intention to say, "I want to be in your life." Through his personal presence in our lives, he wants to then also bring the peace and the provision and security and the order. But he wants us ultimately to know that we are loved by him. Jesus as our king is the answer to what we truly desire. And it comes by submitting to him and surrendering to him. Not out of fear, not out of some nationalistic loyalty, not out of selfish greed for what we stand to gain, but out of love and adoration for the king of kings. This is the king that we need. And this is the king our hearts should be fixed on this Advent season.

So I want to take some time to ask some questions of us as we reflect on Jesus being king over our lives. And so that question, what are you desiring this Advent season? And to help us acknowledge that we truly need Jesus as king, I want to first reflect on Jesus as our kingly provider. I want to ask this question of you. If you have an answer, great, don't say it out loud. But if you need this week, I would say think on this. What is a gift that Jesus has provided for you? What's something good that God has given you? And you've seen, you've experienced his kingly provision in your life. I would even encourage you to spend time talking about this question with community, whether it's your family around the dinner table or a group of friends. And simply ponder a gift from God, however big or maybe however small it was. But share that with someone this week. This is a gift that God had given me recently in the past, big, small, and spend time together thanking God for that gift. But it's important this Christmas season to see that Jesus is our kingly provider.

Next I want to reflect on Jesus as our kingly peacemaker. How has Jesus brought you peace in your life? Same similar question, whether now, recently, or in the past. But think of a moment that you were in chaos, that life was hectic, the busyness, the stress, anxiety, brokenness, and Jesus brought peace. You may also be in a place where you need the peace of Jesus right now. And I would ask you to think of this. Think of if you are leaning heavily on forms of peace, however good they may be, that actually fall short of the peace of Christ. When I say forms of peace, maybe that's coping with something, and you have a coping mechanism that maybe it's good. Maybe you go for walks, and maybe you have quiet time, but it's not with God. And so it falls short from the peace that God truly provides. But what are you doing? You are in need of peace right now. Are you getting that peace from Jesus? And then I'd ask, where might the Spirit be inviting you to surrender the self-directed strategies for peace and say, "I need to stop doing this. This is how I'm trying to give myself peace. This is how I'm trying to do it. But God, I need to give this up, and I need to rely on you." This Advent season can be full of joy, but can also be full of things that rob us of that joy and peace. So how can Jesus be the source of peace this Advent season for you?

And then lastly, I want to ask, I want us to reflect on Jesus as our kingly protector and counselor. How can you seek Jesus for wisdom and security? And I would encourage you this week, again, to take some extended time of quiet with God and offer yourself in surrender. Find a distraction-free place and just wait in God's presence and ask, "Father, what do I need to do to surrender to you?" And write down whatever comes to mind, whatever the Spirit reveals to you and says, "This is the thing that is keeping you from getting closer to God to receiving his wisdom and security." And ask that God would help release those things into his gentle care and that you would receive his protection and wisdom. We have to, in order to accept God's protection and wisdom, we have to submit, and submitting to him means surrendering to him. We can't have both. We can't say, "God, I'm going to do it my way, but I'm submitting to you, and you can also do it your way." And we can just, sometimes we live like that. We're like, "God, I'm going to try mine. You do yours and we'll see whichever one works out, and we'll just, hopefully in the end, I have peace, or I have provision, or I have protection." And Jesus says, "This doesn't work that way. You can't do your thing and then also expect me to do it. You need to surrender to me. If you want what I have, which is here for the taking, you have to lay down what you are doing to be able to receive what God gives." So if God is saying something to you through the Spirit, and he's saying, "Hey, I'm here. I have the wisdom. I have security. You can be secure in me, but your hands are full right now with your efforts." Take some time this week to lay that before God and say, "God, I do surrender. I'm going to rely on you fully." The great thing about this King is that submission to King Jesus leads not to oppression, but to the truest freedom and joy that there is. Subsiding to the King is the only way to true peace, to heavenly provision, to divine order and security. So this Christmas season, if you find yourself weary, take refuge in Christ. Take comfort in Jesus. Rest in Emmanuel, God with you, and worship the King. We'll close with this.

We notice that we sing many songs that speak of Jesus as our King. We sung some of them this morning, and they have lines that mention the royalty of Jesus, like "O come all ye faithful, come and behold Him, born the King of angels." Charles Wesley wrote one of my favorites, which is "Come thou long expected Jesus." It's an old hymn. I want to read it for you, and it'll be up on the screens. As you read this and hear this, I want you to notice the kingly tones, the royal words, and see how this hymn captures Jesus as the King that we need, as the King that we're waiting for, waiting to celebrate this Christmas. So it goes like this. It says, "Come thou long expected Jesus, born to set thy people free. From our fears and sins release us. Let us find our rest in thee. Israel's strength and consolation, hope of all the earth thou art, dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart. Born thy people to deliver, born a child and yet a King, born to reign in us forever, now thy gracious kingdom bring. By thine own eternal spirit rule in all our hearts alone. By thine all sufficient merit raise us to thy glorious throne." We the weary world church can rejoice in Christ our King this Christmas.

Let's go ahead and pray. God, we praise you for sending your son to be born into this world, to enter the story. And as we enter into Advent season where we wait to celebrate the birth of Jesus, I pray that we would remember who Jesus is, and he is our King. And God, I pray that through your spirit, you would work in our hearts to submit to God, to submit to Jesus if we need to, if we are struggling because we're trying to live life on our own. I pray that you would help us to surrender and to submit. God, I pray that we would seek you for our provision, our security, for order and for peace, and that we would be able to see that all the things in this earth that say and advertise that they provide any of those things ultimately fall short of you. God, we pray that you would reign in us and over us. And as a response to that, God, that we would praise you with everything that we have. So be with us this Advent season, be with us this week, and may we see and rest and rejoice in the fact that you are King in our lives. Amen.

Unexpected Moments - Part 4

Unexpected Moments

Hope - The Power of Memory

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

Sometimes you don't know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory. Any guesses on who that author might be? Any guesses? I don't know. Dr. Seuss. Dr. Seuss. That's what you were thinking? Yeah, you got it right. Sometimes you don't know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory. Sometimes we have moments in life that we know are big occasions. So maybe it's a wedding day or the day your child is born or maybe for work you've been working on a project for months or years and it comes to completion. And the natural pomp and circumstance of that moment means you will remember that. You know it, you're living in it, you're like, "This is a big moment." There's other times that you go through something and it's not till later that you recognize or realize that that moment was significant in your life. In the moment it was just a normal situation, maybe a difficult situation, and it's not till weeks, months, maybe years later that you look back and see that was significant in what God was doing in me, working, how I got here, where God brought me. Sometimes we don't know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.

In our series Unexpected Moments we've covered several, a few unexpected moments. We started with the angel, the unexpected moment of the angel telling Mary that she would be the mother of the Messiah. And then we had the unexpected moment of Joseph, the angel telling Joseph to stick with Mary and his obedience in that moment. And then last week Pastor Lawrence shared about the angels descending on the shepherds. And that beautiful unexpected moment of the good news of Jesus going to very ordinary people. This is our concluding message of our series. And we're going to be back in Luke 2. We've been here before, but we're going to focus on one verse, but just to get the setting again. Starting in Luke 2:10, I don't know if we have it, but just follow along. It says, "But the angel said to them," this is to the shepherds, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all people. Today in the town of David, a savior has been born to you. He is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in claws and lying in a manger. And suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel praising God and saying glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace to those whom his favor rests."

And we know that afterwards, what do the shepherds do without hesitation? They go to Bethlehem, they visit the baby, and they're telling everyone the good news of the birth of the Messiah is being spread. It's like if today they were to get on like Instagram live or Facebook live or send out the mass text, they're just telling everyone and anyone this is what's happening. We just found out. I got to let everyone know. And everyone who heard was amazed. I love that response too that everyone who heard isn't just like, "Oh, there's some crazy shepherds going around." No, everyone who heard it was amazed. And this next verse is what we're going to focus on today. This little verse that's so important, verse 19, actually a little bit farther down in our passage, it says, "But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart." Again, sometimes you don't know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory. Today we're going to talk about the power of a memory and the hope that we have in Christ. Would you guys pray with me one more time?

God, thank you again for the time to gather. And in this Advent season, when we celebrate and await the birth of Christ and this moment in time that changes the world, God, I pray that you would help us to have our hearts to have a posture of waiting and ready to receive. And God, one that wants to glorify you, that's our goal, is to bring glory to you. And no matter where we're at this morning, caught up in the busyness of the season, or maybe it was just everything we had just to get here, God, I pray that you would meet us through your Spirit, through your Word, and that as we leave, we would be empowered and encouraged and uplifted and drawn near to you. So we pray this in your name. Amen.

So Mary treasured up all these things. She's treasuring up the angels' visit to her, the shepherds visiting, the crowds being amazed at the news of the birth of the Messiah, even maybe the miracle of Elizabeth, her relative, which we didn't cover this Advent season, but her relative in her old age becoming pregnant, that was its own miracle. And then Joseph being visited by the angels, she's treasuring up all these things, pondering them. You know that moment when something happens, you go through something and you know, like, that was probably pretty big. I don't know why it was so big. I don't know why it's so significant, but as time goes on, you look back and you're like, "Oh, I'm starting to understand more." I think that's what Mary knows, there's a lot happening right now. I can't fully grasp everything and what it means, but this is monumental. But Mary, as she treasures these things up and ponders them, what do we think Mary remembered? Well, we can't be certain, but we don't have her exact thoughts, but we can look at these experiences and the conversations that she's had and come to three things. She remembers, one, God's promises from the past, two, God's peace in the present, and thirdly, God's power in the future.

That first one, let's start there, God's promises from the past. Mary has just given birth to a baby, the son of God in a stable, with no epidural by the way, just a miracle, that's amazing. And what could be more memorable than giving birth? She's a new mom, it's been chaotic. The shepherds were there. They finally go, as great as that is, I bet she was looking forward to like, "Okay, I would love to just rest a little bit." She gets a moment to reflect. We know she remembers the encounter with the angel. I don't know if she did this exactly, but how cool would it be if she was able to, in that moment, or maybe over time, just connect some of the promises and prophecies from God over the past centuries about the coming Messiah, about her and her son? Like maybe Micah 5:2, that was prophesied 700 years before, that says, "But you, Bethlehem, Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come from me, one who will be a ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times." See, even them being in Bethlehem speaks to God's promise from the past. You see, at that time, there was a census that had to be taken, so everyone had to go back to their hometown. And Mary is nine months pregnant at this point, and so on top of dealing with pregnancy, they have to move temporarily. They were living in Nazareth, and they had to go to Bethlehem. That is a hundred-mile journey. That's like going from here in Rocklin to San Francisco or Reno, Nevada, on foot over ten days. That's a long, nine months pregnant. There's no in-and-out or Chick-fil-A along the way to make it better. There's no DVD player on the back of the donkey to pass the time. In fact, traveling even had its elements of danger, right? It was winter, and so there might have been some weather elements that they had to face. There's criminals and thieves along the road, also wild animals. It's a very different time than when we think of, "Hey, let's go on a road trip." And so Mary could see that God took them to Bethlehem, and that was fulfilling a promise that God had made pertaining to her. Or maybe she thought of Isaiah 7:14 that says, "Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you a sign. The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Emmanuel." Mary was holding Emmanuel. God is with us. And the truth is that He's with us today every single moment, every step we take, every day and through the night. The truth of Jesus on that night when Mary gave birth is true for us today, that God is with us. I want you to know that today. I just want to stop for a moment. And sometimes we need to do this in our lives, in our days or in our weeks. We just need to stop and ponder and know and remember that God is with us. He is always with us. Mary stopped and she treasured up all these things. She pondered first God's promises from the past.

Secondly, she ponders God's peace in the present. We see that she pondered what was happening in this moment. All these things. And she needed to do that to give her peace. As she did it, it gave her peace. She knows that she was blessed to become the mother of Jesus, but that doesn't mean that life was going to be easy. There's potential for her life to still be chaotic and to still experience the unexpected. We talked about this in the first week, that Mary, upon hearing the news of becoming the mother of Jesus, had some anxiety. But by the end of that conversation with the angel, she was given peace. From chaos to something divine. Despite earthly unknowns, there's a heavenly peace. A peace that surpasses understanding. Whenever she needed to, Mary could pause and be comforted to know that God was presently giving her what she needed to get through each moment. And to go from unexpected moment to unexpected moment with confidence that God was going to be with her through it all. Mary and Joseph would continue to experience unexpected moments and God would continue to give them answers and ways forward and peace amidst the initial chaos. A little bit later in their lives, the wise men visited. It didn't happen that night, despite what every nativity scene looks like. It happened later. And maybe this was God's provision. You know, Joseph was a carpenter. That's not the most money-making career back in that time. And what did the wise men bring? They bring frankincense, myrrh, and gold. It also says in that passage in Matthew 2, it says, "When they had gone, the wise men, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. Get up, he said. Take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." King Herod at that time had heard from the wise men of this king being born. And obviously as present king, he doesn't like that that's a threat. And so he's trying to, he plays it off like, "Oh yeah, I'd love to go worship the new king." When really he wants to go end that threat. And God miraculously comes and tells Joseph and Mary, "You guys need to leave." God gave them a plan and provided for them in that moment. And in so doing that, he gave them peace, that they were going to be okay. In the middle of chaos, God gave peace. Peace beyond understanding. Or how about later in life when Jesus is 12 years old and gets left behind at the temple. Many of you know this story, that Mary and Joseph leave after being at the temple and their days journeys away. And we all think like, "How can you forget a child?" But they leave Jesus behind at the temple and so they have to go back.

And Luke 2:48 says, "When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said, 'Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.' 'Why are you searching for me?' he asked. 'Didn't you know I had to be in my father's house?'" It's a 12 year old by the way. "But they did not understand what he was saying to them. Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. And for the second time in scripture we hear, 'But his mother treasured all these things in her heart.' And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man." So Mary knows that this is a child unlike any other. And it's so interesting, we can get into one day just that dynamic of child and parent relationship but it's Jesus as a 12 year old kid. But she had a habit of treasuring up these unexpected moments that happened. These unexpected moments that turned into holy moments for her. Whenever we see Mary face a moment of chaos, anxiety, uncertainty, we also see God give her peace. And then we see her treasure up all those things in her heart. It's those moments of chaos that we would have never chosen for ourselves. It's not what we really wanted. But when we stop and look back at those moments, we can see how God used them for our good.

I've told this story before, but I also have, I mean just like you, I have some of these moments in life, these unexpected moments. And it's true of how I became a pastor. Full of unexpected moments. I graduated, well my senior year of high school I was ready to be a doctor. I did an internship at Kaiser and I was like going to college, I'm going to be a doctor. And then I struggled my freshman year in science classes. I was working really hard. I wasn't a bad student. And I was working really hard to get C's in my science classes. And I was like God, I don't think I can do four more years of this. Slash after that in the med school, I don't think this is my future. And I was taking that as a sign that God was changing my direction but I didn't know where. And at that time, my freshman year, I was getting involved in a nonprofit and I discovered I loved being a voice for those who didn't have a voice. I served as the director of social justice on that campus for a year. And again, just it grew a love for me to be able to help other people. And so I changed my major to intercultural studies thinking that at the end of my time in college I was going to serve overseas. I was going to work for something like World Vision and go help people who didn't have a voice around the world and provide sustainable ways for them to grow and progress in ways that appreciated their culture. And so I spent the next few summers overseas in preparation for a lifetime of being a missionary. By the time my senior year of college rolled around, I again was left in this place of I don't think this is where I'm going. A lot of people who were in my major had countries that they felt God was calling them to. And I was like I don't know where, I don't think I'm going overseas. And then I was faced with this moment of did I just waste my whole college experience, like you know, all that money and all those years and all those hours studying and I'm not even going to go overseas. I was not good. It was a very pressure situation. And then I remember Christmas of my senior year, I came back home for Christmas break and I had a dinner with my pastor at the BJ's over by the Galleria here. And it's a conversation that changed my life. Where he asked if I would become the youth pastor at the church that I grew up in. There was another unexpected moment. And I look back and there were some more unexpected moments after that too.

But I look back and I see through all the circumstances with all the disappointments really too. Not becoming a doctor, changing my major and then not entering the field in which I studied for. Through all of that, God was faithful. God was at work and he was giving me peace through it that even though I didn't know, I knew I was going to be okay. That God was still with me. And God used all that to bring me here now today with you, Spring Valley Church. I love it. Yes. Praise God. To answer a calling, a gradual calling, one that I feel confident in now, I'm so thankful for. And all those memories, I think back, I tell that story to you and I'm thankful for all of them. In the moment I was like, God, can you please change this? This is the worst. But now I'm thankful to have them, to see them and see how God works in my life. And that way I can look forward and know that he's going to continue to do the same. The power of a memory. I'll say it one more time. Sometimes we don't realize the value of a moment until it becomes a memory. If you were to look back at certain moments in your life, do you have those memories where God gave you peace in that present moment, even though it may have been chaotic, it may have been difficult, it may have been full of unknowns? And are they moments that are you treasuring them up? Are you pondering them? Are you carrying them with you? If you look at your life, I think you'll see that God has been faithful to you. Always present. And that can be monumental in us knowing that he has the power to help us in the future.

So thirdly, we think of God's power in the future. Going back to our story, the birth of Jesus, just eight days after Jesus was born, Mary and Joseph take Jesus to the temple to be dedicated. And they meet a prophet, Simeon, who takes Jesus into his arms and starts praising God, recognizing that Jesus is the Messiah, the bringer of salvation, the glory of Israel. Just imagine as a parent bringing your child there and someone else is prophesying over the life that your child is going to have. That's the first proud parent moment right there. Luke 2:33 through 35 says, "The child's father and mother marveled at what was said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother, 'This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel and to be a sign that will be spoken against so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed and a sword will pierce your own soul too.'" That's a promise that no parent, no one ever wants to hear, a promise of future pain and future heartache. And even with this prophecy and Mary knowing that something challenging was up ahead, there's no way she could have known that the world's greatest blessing in Jesus Christ would be her greatest breaking in her life. That years later, she would be standing at the cross, seeing her son, her innocent son, suffering and dying on the cross. Mary who served and walked with Jesus for years, who knew before anyone else who this child was and the life that he would lead. And at that cross, she knows that he's been faithful. She looks in the past. She knows that he is good up on that cross, dying a death that he didn't deserve. And she knows that she can trust him with her future. And as she does that, just three days after her son died, God raised him from the dead. And I believe just as she had been doing since Jesus came into her life, she was trusting in God, looking back, feeling peace in the present, and then looking forward with even more hope after that moment. Hope and trusting in the power of God. It was the power to raise life from the dead, to overcome sin. In every unexpected moment that she faced, God gave her peace. And that peace gives her hope. Every unexpected moment that we face, however big or small, we can learn from Mary to slow down and reflect and ponder on what God has done and is doing in our lives. So I want to do some of that for us right now. If we could just reflect. Let's first, let's take the past. I want you to look back and think about the work that God has done in your life.

Think about the promises that he has made to you. And if you're saying, I have never heard a promise audible from God, let me point you to scripture. The promise of the Savior is for you. And Paul's words in Philippians 1:6 say, "Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry out to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." Those words are for you. That the work that Jesus starts in you, he will finish. And he is going to keep working in your life until that work is complete when you are in heaven. So take note of your past moments that God has, where God has provided for you, where he has been faithful to you. And see and connect the dots that that is part of the work that he is doing in your life. Some of the hardest moments that you have endured. And I know you have all endured some very, very difficult moments. God is not absent in those moments. He's present. He was present with you. And he's still present with you. Ponder them and treasure them. Next, think of your present situation right now. Whatever season you're going through, know that the peace of God and the peace that is Christ is with you. Emmanuel, God is with us. We know, pastors, Chris, Pastor Lauren, myself, we know that so many of you here at church that it's been a very tough year. It's been a year of upheaval, of loss, of chaos, of pain, of a lot of unexpected moments. But in the midst of it, it has been so good to hear from so many of you that in the midst of it, you felt peace. You felt God being present with you. In some moment, big or small, God showed up. Whether through someone else, through his word, or just you felt his presence with you in the toughest of moments.

And I want you to remember that. Treasure those up in your heart because they're going to mean something in the future. You're going to need those moments to look back on. It may not seem significant now, but the memories from this present situation may be valuable for you in the future. And now I want you to think of the future. 2025 is just around the corner and the years to come. Some of you are looking to the future with anxiety and worry. It's hard not to. We don't know what the future holds. All of us, guaranteed, will face difficulties, challenges. Some of them will completely disrupt our lives. But we have hope. We have hope that is found in the person of Christ. In Christ, we have all hope to endure all things. For those who believe, we too, all that we face will be temporary. We will share a glorious future with him in heaven. Your afflictions, whether now or in the future, however hard and gut-wrenching they are, however heartbreaking they are, in church I know that they can seem impossible to overcome. But they are nothing compared to God's power and what God will do for you and the good that he is working. God has it. It's under his control. He is sovereign over all. And in the person of Christ, we have hope, true hope that is only found in him. This world will tell you of a lot of things that may give you hope, but they all fall short. And they are nothing compared to God and his power and his love for you. So this Christmas, I just want to end. I want to close with this. I want to remind you of who Jesus is, your Savior and your Messiah. When you're hurting, he is your comforter. When we're afraid, we need help, when you're in times of trouble or feeling weak or overwhelmed, he is our strength. When we're feeling rejected and alone, isolated, he is our friend and he will never leave you. He's always present with you. When you're facing financial struggles, he is your provider. When you're facing sickness, he is your healer. And when you are dealing with the sin in your life, he is your Savior. He loves you and he is working good in your life. And he's with you now. Ponder it, embrace it, remember it and treasure it. Even in this moment, he is Emmanuel. He is with us. Amen.

Let's pray. God, we can't do this life without you. And your Son is truly a gift, Jesus Christ. And we need him every moment of every day. And God, as we look back and we think of our lives and all the unexpected moments we faced, I hope that we can see how you have been present in those moments. And as we look at our present situation and we think of all that we're going through, whether it's a season of joy or it's a season of distress, God, I pray that you would give us peace and help us endure. And God, as we look to the future, again, full of unknowns, I pray that you would give us hope, that you would be our anchor, that we can move forward with all confidence that even if we don't know how anything will work at all, you do and you are with us. God, give us your peace this Christmas season. We are so excited to celebrate you. We pray this in your name. Amen.

Unexpected Moments - Part 3

Unexpected Moments

Love - God’s Love Can Reach Everyone

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

We are in our Unexpected Moments series, week three. First week we talked about Mary and the peace that she experienced in her unexpected moment that she was willing to do, as the Lord had said, and the peace that she experienced. And then Joseph was week two and we talked about the faith that he had and his obedience in that, that it took a lot of faith for him to be obedient in his unexpected moment. But both of those situations were unexpected and then turned into holy moments. And so today we're going to look at the perspective of the shepherds and how they had quite the unexpected moment. But again, God used it and turned it into a holy moment. And you know, isn't it just like God that when you are talking about something or learning about something or really focused on it, you see it everywhere and he just like really hits the point home. You know, like when you're like needing to work on patients, you hit every red light on the way to the place that you're late to, right? Like he just is really good that way, right? He just really hits that point home.

Well, this week we had an unexpected moment ourselves. I've been telling friends and family for weeks that this past week was my doozy of a week. Good stuff, but we just had so much planned. We had something almost every night. It was just a big, full week. Well, then Monday rolls around and I'm like trying to mentally gear up for this week. Hey, we got a lot to do. My five-year-old says his tummy hurts. That is not what you want to hear at the beginning of your busiest week of the month, right? So I'm like, all right, buddy, we're just going to, we're going to, hopefully this is no big deal. We're just going to roll with it. And so he just didn't feel it. It wasn't like himself all day long. And he goes to bed that night seeming to do better. But we'll see. And then at 3.38 a.m., yes, I know exactly what time it was. 3.38 a.m., our second oldest, Ellie, who shares a room with her brother, comes in. Mom, this is sick, come on. So I run into there. Thankfully, we had a bucket already prepared. She had given her brother the bucket and it saved the sheets. Can I get an amen? Okay, so save the sheets. So he's, I'm trying to comfort him and make sure he's okay. And I go, okay, buddy, I'm going to get you a wet washcloth. Hold on. I turn around and his big sister already has a wet washcloth ready for him. I'm like, oh, thanks, babe. Okay. And he's like, Mom, I want something to drink. So I go to the kitchen to get him something to drink. By the time I get back, his older sister has rinsed out the bucket for him and brought it back into him in case he needed it again. And this unexpected moment, this unwelcome moment, turned into this almost sacred moment where I got to see my kid, my older daughter, serving her brother. And in turn, she served me. It was the easiest middle of the night sick kid experience. I think I was awake for five minutes. It was great. We were just all, we all went back to bed. But she was so caring and kind and just, she just had such this heart to serve her brother because she'd been there too. She understood what it was like to be sick in the middle of the night. And so she did all the things that she knew would comfort her. And it was just, it almost, I was so proud of her. It really was this holy moment of getting to experience that and see her love her brother that way. And so we're going to dive into that and see how God can take some of these unexpected moments and often unwelcome and turn them into really holy, sacred things for us.

But before we do that, let's pray. God, we just thank you for today. I pray that you will use your word to speak into hearts today. May you be glorified in all we do and say. Amen. Oh, one more thing I promised to say. He was better. He woke up the next day. The week was not derailed. So thankfully, he was good, but he felt much better the next day. Just want to make sure I clarified that on his behalf.

So the shepherds, we don't know a lot about these shepherds. We don't know their names. We don't know how many there were, but they are a crucial part of this nativity story. So we're going to be in Luke 2. If you would turn there in your Bible or in your phone app, or it'll be on the screens as well, we are going to read verses 8 through 20. It's 12 verses. We're just going to read all the way through today. Starting in verse 8. And it says, “And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you. He is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.’ Suddenly, a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth. Peace to those on whom his favor rests.’ When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherd said to one another, ‘Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.' So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph and the baby who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child. And all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherd said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.”

So as far as we know, this was a run of the mill night for these guys. They were just out doing their job, taking care of their sheep, and then an angel appeared out of nowhere. I think glowing probably. It was, you know, it said there was light. So there was just this angel. And I think an appropriate response is fear. I would be a little nervous if all of a sudden an angel appeared and was talking to me. And so they were. They were terrified. But the angel told the shepherds, "Do not fear." It was the same message he gave Mary and Joseph when the angel appeared to them as well. "Do not fear." Now, having this creature sitting in front of you suddenly would bring about fear, but he was from God. This angel was a messenger from God. So there really was nothing for them to fear. So while it was unexpected, they did not need to fear because this message that the angel was bringing was from a loving God. And what do we know about love and fear? Well, 1 John 4:18 says, "There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment." The angel wasn't there to bring punishment. The angel wasn't there to bring a terrifying message or bring bad news. He was there to bring a good message of love. That was his whole goal. And so we can take this truth with us too, that love drives out fear. We don't need to walk in fear when we're serving a loving God. We don't need to be afraid when God speaks to us through His word or through other people or through our time in worship. We don't need to be afraid. Now, maybe we're a little nervous about what He's calling us to do. That can be a little scary sometimes, but we don't have to be afraid of the call He has put on in His life or the messages He gives us. We don't need to be afraid when we get bad news or when we're facing a really tough situation.

Again, those things that are humanist may seem scary, but we don't have to be afraid because we serve a loving God, and love drives out the fear. I imagine the angel just kind of standing there going, "I know, I know. This is kind of unexpected, but don't be afraid. All right? It's good. It's good news." And that's what He said. He immediately told them why they didn't have to be afraid. "I bring you good news. So don't be afraid. It's all good." So what was this good news? Well, there was a new baby in town. That always feels like good news, right? New baby, the long-awaited Messiah. This was the good news the angel wanted to share. It says in John 3:16 through 17, I'm sure many of you are familiar, "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him." This right here sums up the good news. This is the gospel, that God sent His Son out of His love for us. Now, the Jewish people had been waiting a really, really, really long time for a Messiah. God had been hinting at it since the fall of man. He'd been sending prophets and priests to help them know that He had a plan. But then there was also 400 years of silence. That's a long time to not hear from God. It was really dark times. There was a lot of waiting, a lot of hoping, waiting to see if God was going to come through on His promises. There was actually, in their case, a lot to be afraid of. But the angels told the shepherds not to be afraid because they knew that love can drive out fear.

Sometimes fear is our natural first response, fight or flight, right? That's just kind of the natural way our bodies react to certain situations. But what would it look like if we chose to rest in God's love rather than leaning into the fear? How would we live differently? I think we would actually live a lot differently. I think we would be more bold in our faith if we weren't afraid of what other people would say or think. I think we would be more confident in our identity in Christ. We would operate in a surer identity that we are Christ's, that we are His. Ultimately, I think we would just be more effective for the kingdom. We would share the gospel more. We would make different choices. We would respond differently if we weren't afraid. But we can. We can choose to do that because love drives out the fear. Now, although God had been silent for hundreds of years, the Israelites still had the prophecies from the Old Testament to hold onto. And that really is what they held onto as they were waiting for the Messiah. And one of these prophets was Isaiah. And in Isaiah 9, we see just one of the prophecies. Verse 2 and 6 says, "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned. For to us, a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

With Jesus' coming, He was fulfilling these prophecies. And the shepherds got to be the first to hear about it. In a literal dark of night on a hillside outside of Bethlehem, light came into the world. The light came to the world. This tiny baby brought light after 400 years of silence. Waiting is really, really hard. Ask my five-year-old. He'll tell you. "Mom, waiting is so hard." I know, bud. But waiting is even harder when you're waiting in the darkness. When you feel like your situation is never-ending. When you feel like you have no idea what the next right step is. When you're just like, "God, I've been praying for this one specific thing for a very long time." And your answer is still no or not yet. That is really hard. But I promise you that even a no or a not yet from God is not Him withholding His love. In fact, in His sovereignty, Him answering in the affirmative might actually be unloving. It might not be what is best for you. And that doesn't feel good, right? But because we serve a loving God and He can't do anything outside of His character, He will only do what is loving. And sometimes loving is no or not yet. So when He feels like He's silent, it's not a lack of love. It's an invitation for us to wait. To wait on Him. To surrender to Him. To be still. Maybe not literally still all the time, but a heart posture. Because when we do that, when we are waiting on Him, when we are still before Him, it's so that we don't miss when the breakthrough does come. When the light does peek through. When the darkness gets pushed back either just a little bit or blown out. We don't want to miss it. So it's an invitation to draw closer to Him. To draw near to Him, even in the darkness. Because He's there. He will never leave us. I don't know what these particular shepherds were going through in this time in their lives. Again, we don't know much about them. But I wonder, you know, did they have a fight with their wife before they went and watched the sheep? Were they having financial troubles? Maybe some health issues that they were dealing with? I don't know. We don't know, but they were human. So we can assume they had something going on. Just like us, we all have some sort of thing we're facing. But despite their struggles, this unexpected moment turned into a holy moment because the light came into the darkness.

Again, back to Isaiah. It says, "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light." Now, this particular idea is meant regarding people who are walking in the darkness of sin without the light of salvation. But it also can apply to those of us who are walking in seasons of darkness. Thankfully, the light came. They didn't have to stay in darkness. The light came and His love dispelled darkness, and it does the same for us, too. Darkness can be different for all of us, and even in different seasons. We might face different seasons of darkness or types. Maybe it looks like relationship problems or financial concerns. Maybe you've received a tough diagnosis or a close one has. Maybe you've lost someone this year like so many in our church have, and you're going through grief. It could be mental health struggles or feelings of loneliness. It could be sin issues. Maybe there's a sin that just has a hold on you that you're struggling to surrender. Or maybe you aren't walking with Jesus yet, and that's your darkness. But whatever it is that you're facing, whatever darkness you're experiencing right now, His light is bright enough for any of it. He can break through any darkness that we face. John 1-9 says, "The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world." That is some good news. So where do you need Jesus's light in your life right now? What darkness do you need Him to come and dispel? Because He's so good to do that. He is the light of the world, and He dispels the darkness. Well, here's the kicker for us. The angel said that they bring good news, which we've already talked about what the good news is, but it wasn't just good news for the shepherds that day. It was good news for all people. Good news of great joy for all the people.

Now, I wanted to dive a little bit deeper into this, so I went and looked up the Greek. I wanted to know what the original language meant. So the Greek word here for all is "pas." P-A-S. So "pas." And here's what it means. All. All of it. All against you. Individually, each, every, any, all, the whole, everyone, all things, everything, collectively, some of all types. It literally means everybody. How many people is that? All the people. It is for everyone. If that's not good news, I can't help you. That is some good news. No matter what we're facing, no matter what fears we have, no matter what roadblocks we're up against or feeling like it's never going to get better, he came for all of us. So my next question was, well, if this message is for all people, why did he come to a bunch of shepherds? We don't even know these guys' names, so why would he go to them? Why didn't he go to some king or some political figure that could send out some proclamation and spread the word quicker? Why didn't he go to maybe raise up some new prophets? They already had a history of hearing from prophets, so why didn't he raise up a new prophet to spread the message? Why didn't he do it in a more populated city? Bethlehem was already small, and then they were in the outskirts of Bethlehem in a hillside. Why didn't he go in a more populated city? Or why didn't he go in the daytime when more people were out and they could see this amazing display? Why did he choose to tell some shepherds in a countryside outside of a tiny town in the middle of the night? We don't know specifically, but we can look at the rest of Scripture and make some educated guesses. First of all, shepherds weren't necessarily like the lowest of the low by any means, but their job was real dirty. Like, if you've ever been on a farm and smelled the smells, it was not a glamorous job, right? They were taking care of sheep, they were sleeping outside, they did not have hot showers at the end of the day. It was not a job that people were necessarily envious of, but it was important. And there are some things that we can pick out that I think really speak to this. Shepherds were there to take care of the sheep who also had lambs. And in this time period, lambs were used for sacrifices. They were still doing sacrifices in the temple at the time, and so they needed shepherds so that their supply of lambs would continue. The Jewish is just a really important part of their Jewish culture. So while it was not a glamorous job, it was an important job. And this little hint for us, this little Easter egg that we see in the story is that the shepherds cared for the lambs that would be used as sacrifices so that it would point to Jesus, who was the lamb, who would be our sacrifice. He was the ultimate sacrifice. I think the second reason that God sent angels to shepherds was because Jesus also called himself the shepherd. It's like a hyperlink to another scripture.

In John 10:11, the same word for shepherd there is also what is used in our Luke 2 passage. And it says, this is Jesus talking, He says, "I am the good shepherd." The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. So highlighting the shepherds points us to the grown man Jesus, who was going to lead his sheep, his followers, us, and he was going to sacrifice himself and lay down his life for his sheep. There's these little things that we can find that say, oh, maybe that's why God went and told some shepherds. And lastly, I believe that it was because they were ordinary. I think that was important. He could have gone to the elite. He could have gone to a king. But he went to ordinary men very intentionally to show us that God's love is for all people. It wasn't just for the rich and famous. It wasn't just for the ones who had it all together. It wasn't just for the elite or the upper class. It was for everyone. By verse 17, we can see that they were already spreading the word. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about the child and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. They were already believing them. They were already getting the message. Because Jesus' love is for all people, the message of love went to the ordinary people so that the other ordinary people would hear it and know that it was for them too. The beautiful thing is that it's also for us. It wasn't just for them at that time. We can know that this message of love, of this Messiah that came to save us, to shine his light in the darkness, it's for us too. Because it's for all people. It's for those of us who have major fears or who are facing darkness. It's good news for all people across space and time. For those who are facing struggles, who think they're too far gone. Or maybe you think someone else is too far gone. It's for them too. It's for the ones that feel like their sin issue is too much. What they've done is too far out of God's realm of forgiveness. It couldn't possibly be them. It is. It's for them too. It is for the ones that don't feel important enough or polished enough or smart enough. It is for all people. The good news that these angels brought to the shepherds was that the light had come. Fear had no place with love. And that the good news was for all the people.

Let's pray. Jesus, we thank you for who you are. We thank you that you came and that you told some ordinary shepherds in a countryside that you were here. In your sovereignty, in your goodness, and in your love, you came to us. And you did it in such a way that tells us that it's for all of us. God, I pray that in this season, whatever we are facing, that you would remind us of your light and of your love. That we have no need to fear. And that your light and your love is big enough to push back the darkness. Be with us as we face those dark seasons. Comfort us as we mourn. Be present as we're unsure of the next step. And remind us that the good news is for us just as much as it is for anybody. We praise you and we thank you for who you are. And then we get to celebrate you this Christmas season in Jesus' name. Amen.

Unexpected Moments - Part 2

Unexpected Moments

Faith - Obedience in Faith

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

The idea in this whole series is focusing in on moments that were completely unexpected with the Christmas story. But when we see them from a heavenly perspective, not necessarily our earthly perspective, we see the purpose in those. And what most people would consider earthly chaos, God actually has ordained and to put into motion for his heavenly purpose. And last week, Pastor Andre talked about Mary who came on scene and we know the whole story of her happening. But today I wanna talk about someone who may not necessarily get the limelight or the spotlight or the sermons or the paintings or the stained glass that Mary does. But first I want us to think about, it's been said that life is not measured in time, but life is measured in moments. Life is not measured in time, life is measured in moments. And this is true in so many ways when you think about it, when you look back maybe this past year or this past month, maybe this past week or even yesterday, we don't remember everything that happens in that time. But what we do remember are the moments, moments in our past, moments in our past year, in the past week, the past day, yesterday. And we really, when you think about it, moments are what we hold onto.

I remember as a kid moments of vacations with my parents. I remember moments of holidays and Christmases, moments with my grandparents who have gone ahead before me to heaven, the special moments with them. I remember the moment when I answered the call to become a full-time vocational pastor. I was at a youth conference in North Carolina. I remember that moment almost like yesterday. I remember moments when I proposed to my wife on the beach in Catalina Island in Southern California. And it was that moment, that special moment. I didn't eat any dinner hours before, I was so nervous. But I remember that moment playing her a song I had written her and getting down on one knee and asking her to be my bride. And then a year later, I remember the moment she walked down the aisle at our wedding just here in Loomis at the flower farm. I remember that moment. I remember the moment when I found out I was gonna be a dad for the very first time. And Lauren telling me and surprising me and we had been trying for a while and we were so excited for that moment I became a dad. I remember the unexpected moment. When I had to put our family dog Ace down, he had brain cancer and it wasn't doing well. I remember that moment holding him as he breathed his last breath. And I remember the other moments of holding my children for the very first time. They were just minutes old and get to hold them in my arms after praying for them for nine months in that moment. Time is measured by moments.

And in our series of unexpected moments, we're looking at specific moments in the story of the birth of our savior, Jesus Christ. And to look at a very powerful moment this morning, a very unexpected moment. And when you hear about this moment, I think you might find yourself learning from this time. Because you and I have no idea what God can do through one unexpected moment of obedience. We have no idea what God can do. And some of you know that. You've been prompted at times unexpectedly to do something. To do something, to say something, to give something. And you did something, you said something, and you gave something. And you look back and you think, oh wow. Look at what God did through that unexpected moment in my life. I can't believe what he did through what seemed to be a small act of obedience. Other times you felt prompted to do or say or give something. And we didn't know all of the details. And because it was unexpected, we didn't do it. And maybe sometime in the future, we look back and wonder, what did we miss out on? What was God doing in that unexpected moment that he wanted to do through us? And because we chose not to obey, God didn't do it through us. If you wanted to write down the title for this morning for notes, it would be, When It's Hard to Obey, Obedience and Faith. And when we think about the obedience and faith that was needed, even before Jesus was born, it's pretty incredible. Surrounded by unexpected moment after unexpected moment after unexpected moment. And yet, even though it was hard to obey, they had obedience and faith. Pray with me. Jesus, thank you for this morning. God, I pray that our hearts would be open to you, that you would do a work in us through your word. Give us the faith to obey today, God, knowing that you are always good and that your word is always true and that you are always with us every single moment of every single day. We thank you, Jesus, for who you are. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Everybody said, amen, amen.

Well, we're gonna dive into this morning a very special part of the Christmas story. And we're gonna be in Matthew's Gospel, chapter one, starting in verse 18. And I will read a portion of this to you right now. And it says, "This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother Mary was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit." Chances are pretty good here that many of you were very familiar with this part of Scripture. You may have heard the story before and you probably know Mary, right? Mary gets all the sermons, Mary gets all the limelight. Everybody focuses in on Mary. But what I wanna focus in on and talk to you about today is about Joseph. And who is probably one of the most important, least talked about characters in all of the Bible. One of the reasons he's not talked about a lot is we just don't know a whole lot about him. He didn't, what we understand is that he didn't live the normal length of a life in that day. We think that he probably passed away earlier in life than what was normal. But what I want us to focus in on here for a second is what we do know about Joseph, okay? So what we do know about Joseph is he was a carpenter. He says that in Matthew 13:55. It also says that he was a righteous and faithful man. We know that he was a descendant of David through the chronological order of Scripture in there at the beginning of Matthew, as well as in Luke 2:4. We know that Joseph was Mary's husband in Matthew 1:16. And we know that Joseph was Jesus's earthly father. But outside of that, we don't know a whole lot about him.

What we do know about him is that he had one unexpected moment of obedience that helped bring about a change that impacts each and every one of us even today. When we look at Joseph and we see him in Scripture, we see him very early on in the life of Jesus from this part of Scripture in Matthew through his younger years. And the last time that we actually hear about Joseph is when Jesus is about 12 years old, and then he seems to kind of disappear. And what scholars tend to believe is that he most likely died sometime after when Jesus was a teenager. And we believe this and understand this is because Joseph and Mary would have divorced, it would have been something very important to the story that would have been included in Scripture and it's not there. But what is mentioned is the fact that Jesus lived at home until about 30 years old. Now, they didn't have video games back then, so Jesus just wasn't living in Joseph and Mary's basement, like a bum, okay? But it was actually culturally seen as a way that if your mom was widowed, you lived at home to help her until you're about 30 years old. And so when we see this, we hear about Jesus, then at the end of his life on the cross, we see that Jesus asked the beloved disciple, John, to actually take care of Mary. And this would have been culturally accepted to pass off that caretaker of Mary to someone else because she was a widow. So in the context of our story, back to Matthew chapter one, the Scripture here says that he, Joseph, was engaged to Mary. Now, in our modern thought, we may think that being engaged happens, what, 22, 23, 25, 26 years old? But actually in this way, Mary was probably 14, 15, maybe even 13 years old. You may think, wow, that's pretty young, but that's kinda how they did it back then. And Mary was a virgin, and she comes to Joseph and says, "I'm pregnant." Joseph hears this news knowing that he had not been with her intimately yet, that Joseph would have been devastated beyond all measure. And the more that we think about this, probably because in the understanding, the context of the first century, engagement culture is when you got engaged. But it wasn't just the proposal, right? It wasn't just the proposal with the whole moment and the outdoors with the photographers, like that capture that moment for the gram, right? That moment for Instagram, you have that picture and that moment of hashtag ring before spring, hashtag I'm married, you're not, like hashtag check out the ring. Like that wasn't how the proposal thing was in the first century. It was a little bit different. A proposal meant a legal agreement when they got engaged, and they were technically, as we understand today, in our context, they were married, but they weren't allowed to consummate the marriage. And when they were engaged, until they had the official ceremony. And so Joseph and Mary would have not participated in any gift of lovemaking at that point. They would have been waiting until after the ceremony.

So when Mary comes to Joseph and says, I'm pregnant, she has gone off and slept with some guy. And for Joseph, I can only imagine the emotions and what he was feeling, and that the reality was that this was going to be a life ruining scandal for both of them. Because in that context, Mary, who he loved with all of his heart, who was gonna be the future mother of their children, who his best friend, everything that Mary was in that moment was broken. She had disobeyed God. She had dishonored her family. She had put Joseph in a place that he was going to be disgraced publicly. He'd been laughed at. He would have been mocked. He would have been shunned from his own friends and family and community. And it was considered such a horrible sin in that culture that in Deuteronomy 22, Joseph could have legally had her stoned. Now that wasn't common practice. What was more common practice was that to avoid all of the shame and all the scandal for Joseph's side, he would go before the city council and he would have basically his name cleared, showing that he had no part in participation with this, that he would have his name good. But for Mary, she would have probably ended up living by herself, raising her only child, giving herself away to make income, which most likely ended in prostitution that day. So for Joseph, he's in this horrible place. The woman of his dreams has apparently betrayed him. And how his next actions and how he chose to walk forward could potentially ruin her life even more. But what do we know about him? You remember we had just talked about him? We know that he was a righteous man, and he didn't want to disgrace her or to shame her. And so that's why when reading the scripture, he was thinking about basically separating from her or divorcing her quietly. But what Joseph didn't realize is that at this lowest unexpected moment, it was about to become one of his holiest moments. In his life. Moving from what was earthly chaos into heavenly purpose.

Scripture tells us continuing on in verse 20, “As he considered all of this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. ‘Joseph, son of David,' the angel said, 'Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife.’” Before we look at what Joseph did, I want you to notice what Joseph did not do, okay? The angel of the Lord said, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. But what didn't he do? He didn't explain away the dream. He didn't wake up and go, man, I should not have had that pizza that late. That was weird. Right? He didn't argue with God. He didn't say, hey, hold on, wait a minute. You're asking me to put my name on a line and trust some random dream? I'm not gonna do that. Joseph didn't negotiate with God. Go, okay, God, if this is really you, next time I take a nap, I need a dream with 12 angels. And I need each of them wearing a T-shirt that says this is your sign. Okay? No, he didn't negotiate. He didn't fight back. He didn't ask for details. Ooh. Okay, God, if I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna need to know how all of this is gonna play out before I make one decision going forward. He didn't do any of that. As the angel said before, did you guys catch that? Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. Verse 24, when Joseph woke up from the dream, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife. I think if there was one statement for us, when we were to come to the end of our life, we would want to be known as we did what God commanded us to do, that we were obedient. Without understanding all the details. And Joseph proves this thought to us, is you don't have to understand completely to obey immediately. We don't. We don't have to understand completely to obey immediately. We don't have to know every single detail. We don't have to have every single thing ironed out. We don't need to have all of the information before us, before we make that decision. All we need to know is that if God is in it in the beginning, God will be in it through the end. 'Cause when you think about it, what Joseph didn't know he didn't have hardly any information at all, right? Think about the details that Joseph didn't know. Joseph didn't know that when Mary was gonna be nine months pregnant, there was gonna be a decree issued and they were gonna have to travel a hundred miles by donkey or horseback or walking to Bethlehem. They didn't know that. Joseph didn't know that on that journey, his wife was gonna be very, very, very, very, very, very pregnant. Probably wasn't the most joyful trip in life. They were gonna be traveling a long distance at winter time with low freezing temperatures at night. They were gonna go through areas of wild animals, of people known for robbing others along the journey. It was gonna be a dangerous trip. Joseph didn't know that when they arrived in Bethlehem, that there weren't gonna be any hotel rooms. Everything was gonna be sold out 'cause everybody was there for the census. Joseph didn't know that. Joseph didn't know that his wife was going to give birth in basically a farmstead in a barn next to animals. Joseph didn't know that. Joseph didn't know then that at some point, all this information was gonna get out that Herod, the king, was gonna issue decree that all boys under the age of two were to be killed and they were gonna have to go on the run. Joseph didn't know that. Joseph didn't know that he was gonna have to deal with the weight as they escaped with baby Jesus, knowing that their friends, their families, people that they loved that had children, boys under two, those kids were gonna be killed. They didn't know the weight that they were gonna have to hold and the guilt, knowing that their baby was safe and others were being killed. Joseph did not have any idea of the weight it would have been to raise the son of God. And yet, without knowing any details, he obeyed immediately.

So how does this apply to you? Well, at some point, God is gonna ask you and prompt you through his word, through his Holy Spirit to do something. And he's gonna ask you to do this without knowing any of the details. And you're going to find yourself maybe in a relationship, maybe dating, looking at the younger people in the room, and you're gonna think, I can't be with the right person if I'm currently dating the wrong person. And you're gonna have to have that conversation of thinking, I need to end this. But you're gonna think, well, God, I put so much time into this relationship. I've been with this person for so long. Like, I just can't cut it off. I'm gonna be all alone. But God's gonna prompt you to do something, and it's gonna be our moment then to see, do we obey or do we not? God's gonna stir in your hearts to use your gifts in the church. Because we know that we don't go to church, but that we are the church. And we all have gifts, and we all are important, and we're all valuable, and we all have our part to play in the body of Christ. We don't just watch what happens in the kingdom of God. We are partners in the kingdom of God. And you're gonna say, but God, I'm just so busy. I've got so much going on. And yet God's gonna prompt you to go, maybe some of that going on isn't what I want you to be going on doing. You need to change your priorities. God may prompt you to give something, to bless somebody. But God, money is just so tight. Have you seen the cost of a banana lately? Gas is expensive, life is expensive, inflation is through the roof. Interest is crazy. Stock markets are up and down, left and right, upside downwards, upside overs. But God, he's gonna prompt you to give something to be a blessing. Or maybe somebody betrays you, and God's word is gonna pierce your heart. And he's gonna say, you have to forgive others in the same way that I have forgiven you. And we have a choice to make. And it may be hard, and it may not know all the details. It may cost us something. God is prompting you, but you don't know how it's all gonna play out.

I want to encourage you in these moments, these unexpected moments, to remember that obedience is our responsibility, but the outcome is God's. Obedience is our responsibility, and the outcome is God. And he's gonna lead us to these moments of prompting, and all we can do is make the right choice and to trust him with the details. That's all we can do. That's all that he's asking us to do. And I think when I, the more I have conversations with people in the church, and I meet more Christians in my life, some of these things keep coming up. And what I would consider, or what I would call maybe more cultural Christians, the problem is that there are so many Christians that I would say are way educated beyond their level of obedience. In other words, we have all this head knowledge of who God is, and the Bible, and how church works, and how salvation works, and all this stuff, but our lives do not reflect a life of application of what we already know. People will say, "Feed me, pastor. "Feed me, pastor. "Feed me, pastor. "Teach me, pastor. "Give me more information. "Grow me, pastor. "Grow me. "Give me more. "Give me more. "Give me more. "Feed me, feed me, feed me." And I think what we need is to be obedient to what God has already told us. We need to be obedient to what his scripture has already said to our hearts, but we just want more information. We live in an information hungry world, right? We have to know what the details are. We have to know how things work. We caught ourselves this week Googling different things in our household of questions about Christmas that we didn't know because we couldn't just sit with the unknown, right? We have to know more, but this is not the life that God has called us to. We have to be obedient. We know his word and we should apply it. And we should also walk in obedience without knowing all the details and to trust him with the results. This is called faith. Joseph didn't have all the details. And yet he did what the angel of the Lord told him to do.

And the angel said this, verse 20, "For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and she will have a son and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." This is why Jesus came. This is why God sent Jesus to us. The child within Mary was a miraculous, holy birth conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. Why does this matter? Chris, why are you telling us this? Well, I'm telling you this because what is happening here is that if Jesus was conceived by human seed, then what would have followed would have been sin nature because sin nature is tied with the human seed. But instead, the spiritual nature of God, he was born into Jesus without sin so he could live without sin in order to be the perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world. I don't know about you, but I know that I need grace. I, every single day, I need God's forgiveness. So let me ask you, what is your sin? Where are you heavy? Where are you feeling the weight of that on your heart today because I wanna tell you, you battling greed? God's got grace for your greed. Are you battling jealousy? There's forgiveness for your jealousy. Are you, have you been angry? His grace covers your sins. There is no sin too great that cannot be covered by the grace of God. Jesus was born of a virgin without sin so that he could die and we could have the forgiveness of our sins.

And the angel says, "Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife." And Joseph obeys. Knowing that there will be significant cost, knowing that he's gonna face serious opposition, he's gonna face ridicule. But time and time again in my life, see, I'm in this interesting place. Realize this this week. That I'm too old to be considered young but then I'm too young to be considered old. I'm in this no man's land, right? Right, I'm too old, right? Yeah, I'm too young, right? Right, yeah, I'm too, yeah. I'm too old and I'm too young at the exact same time. But I will tell you the life that I've lived, the short life that I have lived, of these almost 40 something years on earth, that every time that I have said yes to God and stepped out in obedience to where he has called me, there has been opposition. And there will be opposition. Your obedience will cost you something at some point. You'll have to say no to friends or others about being around them 'cause they're pulling you away from God. Maybe it's social drinking, maybe it's participating in activities you're not supposed to be doing. You know God's word and you know you're not supposed to do that. And yet you're gonna have to say no and step away in obedience, but you'll face opposition. Your friends will judge you. Those who call your closest in your decision to choose God will ridicule you. You'll have to step away from sexual proximity. You'll have to say no to those things. Why? Because you know that should be done only within the context of marriage. For those who are younger, the scripture tells us there's a better way to live and that's to wait for sex until you're married. And then you make up for lost time. Okay? It's not no forever. But we know that because God has a better life for us to live. There's gonna be times where God's gonna call you to be generous. And the world is gonna say, you're giving away your money. You're gonna give 10%, 11%, 12%, 15%. And if you're real crazy, I know people who will give away 50% of their profits to God for His glory, for His church and His kingdom. But the world's gonna look at you and go, you're nuts. Know what you could do with that money? You could have a vacation house. You could have a brand new car. You could have the vacations of dreams. The world's gonna ridicule you. You're gonna have to step out and trust God. And obedience is going to be difficult. But you have no idea what God can do through unexpected moments of obedience, just as He did with Joseph. And the angel said to him, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. And Joseph did as the angel commanded, a moment. Life isn't measured by time. It's measured by moments.

So where does this leave us? Here's a question for us to ponder. Where do I need to be obedient to the prompting of God? It may be as big as Joseph in this moment to stay with Mary. It may be as simple as I need to delete an app off my phone. But where do I, ask yourself this question, where do I need to be obedient to the prompting of God? God's gonna prompt you by His word, I promise you. I hope you're reading His word. You should be reading His word. I'll tell you that today. He's gonna prompt you by the leading of His Holy Spirit in your life. He might ask you to confess a sin. He might ask you to confess an addiction that you need help. You might need to apologize to someone for something you did wrong. He might lead you to forgive someone in the same way that Christ has forgiven you. He might prompt you to pray for somebody, not just pray for them, but to let them know that you're praying for them. He might prompt you to be a witness to someone. Probably not on the street corner with a bullhorn shaking a sign, but probably in the small moments of life in the way that you love others, the way that God has loved us. He might prompt you to invite somebody with the Christmas card this season. But maybe even beyond that, to have a relationship with someone who doesn't know Jesus yet and live a life in a way that is attractive to them, that is different from the world and to the place that they want to come to church with you because they want to know more about this Jesus and this God and this love and this peace that you have in your life that the world cannot understand. You have no idea what God might do in you through one simple, unexpected moment of obedience.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, stir within us today. God, I pray that you would give us the faith and the courage to obey. And as we're reflecting today, God, I wonder how many of us would say that I want to hear from you, God. And not only, God, do I want to hear from you, I want to be even more obedient. God, I see the courage and the incredible obedience that Joseph had in that situation with Mary. God, I want that for my life. If that is you right now, I would do something different. I want you to just raise your hand and say, I want to be obedient to God. I want to be obedient to Jesus. I want to say yes to God. Raise your hand right now if that's you. You want to say, I want to be obedient. And God, I pray that you would give us the faith, Jesus, you would give us the faith to be obedient as Joseph was obedient. God, speak to us, God, convict us, God. Wherever we are sinful, God, I pray that you would lead us in the right direction. God, search our heart. Lead us in your way that's everlasting. God, speak to us. I pray that there would be people, God, that couldn't even walk out of the church building today without reaching out to someone with a word of encouragement. A word of blessing, a moment of prayer, God, that you would help us to be available to you in every moment, in any moment, God, and especially in unexpected moments. That God, when you speak, you would give us the faith to obey just as the angel said and just like Joseph did. That when you speak, God, we will obey.

And as you keep praying this morning, there might be some here today that would say that you're hurting spiritually. And today, Jesus wants to bring you spiritual healing. I told you earlier that I need grace every single day. I need grace for my sins. I need grace for my mistakes. And I'd be curious if we were to sit down and have an honest conversation about spiritual things. And I said, where do you stand with God? Like chances that some of us would say that yeah, we messed up. I've done things wrong. And I want to know this love. See, we've all sinned. Bible tells us that, that every single one of us, and we actually inherit this sin nature. We were born into sin. Sin is passed down from generation to generation. And that is why Jesus was different because he didn't inherit the sin nature of man, but the spiritual nature of the heavenly father. See, this is the good news is that Jesus was without sin. He was the perfect sacrifice for the forgiveness of our sins. So if you're under condemnation, you have the weight, you have the burden of sin in your heart, I want you today to know that you can confess that and you can receive forgiveness. That we turn away from our sins. We call on the name of Jesus, our hearts and our prayers. He forgives us of our sins that you're not here in this moment right now by happenstance. It's not an accident that today you are here and Jesus wants to give you that forgiveness today. So today you would say to Jesus, I surrender my life to you. Those who would say that I'm ready. Today I leave my old life, I give my life to Jesus. Take a moment, show me, look at me today, raise your hand, say yes today, I want to receive that love of Jesus. I wanna receive that forgiveness. For those of you who said yes, this is my prayer for you. Jesus, I need your grace, I need your mercy, I need your salvation. Know that when you are in the presence of a good God who loves you so much, I want us all to pray this together. I think this is a great reminder. Even if it's your first time praying this prayer, maybe you've prayed this prayer before, you received Jesus before. I don't want anybody to pray alone this morning, I want all of us to pray together. I want all of us to pray and to have a reminder about this moment in our life when we say yes to Jesus. So repeat this after me out loud. Heavenly Father, forgive my sins. Jesus, I trust you to save me, to make me new, to fill me with your Spirit so that I could know you and serve you and obey you and show your love in all that I do. My life is not my own. I give it all to you. Thank you for your new life. Now you have mine. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Amen. Can we just give God praise?

Unexpected Moments - Part 1

Unexpected Moments

Peace - Trusting that God is in Control

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

Like Pastor Chris just said, I'm so thankful to have a season focusing on gratitude and now we're gonna turn our attention to Christmas. It's the first Sunday of Advent. You may hear the word "Advent" a lot in church and maybe you know, but in case you don't, I just want to remind us that Advent is the four-week season in the church calendar dedicated to anticipating the arrival or the advent of Jesus, the long-awaited Messiah and King. Simply, it's a time of waiting for Jesus. One pastor says the good news of Advent is not that we are faithful in our waiting, we often aren't faithful in our waiting, but that God is faithful in His arrival. And it's that arrival that we celebrate every year. And I just want to take a moment for all of us to think and back up a bit to recognize and appreciate that Christians all over the world from many different backgrounds celebrate this time with reflections of peace and hope and love and joy and we are joining with them in anticipating the arrival of Christ. This Advent, we're gonna take some time to reflect on some of those moments of hope, peace, love, and joy, but through a unique lens. In our Advent series, we're gonna take a look at four specific moments in the birth story of Jesus, what we are calling unexpected moments. Moments from the human perspective that look like they may be full of chaos and crisis, but actually turn into divine moments, holy moments filled with heavenly purpose. We'll look at various angles of the birth of Jesus starting today from Mary finding peace in the midst of life-altering news, to the obedience that Joseph needed when being asked by God to partner with him in the birth of his son, to the news of Jesus' birth being brought to the shepherds of all people. Our theme throughout this series is what we see as unexpected may actually be God-ordained and might be a holy moment for us too. And as we look back on these unexpected holy moments in Scripture, we'll also look to our own lives and await how God might move in unexpected ways, producing something holy in and through us for his glory. So I'm really looking forward to seeing each one of these stories in an unexpected moment being used for God's divine purpose.

Today we're going to be in Luke chapter 1. If you want to turn there, it'll be on the screen. Luke chapter 1:26-38, which again holds this unexpected moment where Mary learns that her life will never be the same. Changed forever with the news from the angel that she would become the mother of the long-awaited Savior. I just want to quickly provide some context for where we're at in the story of the Bible. We're at the beginning of the New Testament where the Israelites have been waiting for the Messiah for a very long time. I'm gonna do--this is gonna be super brief--overview of the entire Bible, okay? Well, kind of. We're starting in the Exodus. But after the Israelites, God's people, escaped Egypt. They went to the Promised Land, but they were not satisfied with that fulfillment of God's promise. They wanted more, and they wanted a king. And so God sent judges and then kings, and then the kings led to Israel's downfall. And it was a sad downfall for the nation of Israel, and they were in captivity for a long time. And we just had a series earlier this year in Nehemiah talking about the end of captivity and Israel coming back to their land, but never reaching their former status of glory like they were in the days of King David and King Solomon. It was still a struggle, but God continued to reach out to them, hoping that they would follow him, specifically through prophets who brought truth and tried to, again, bring them back to what they were supposed to do, a life of obedience to God's Word. And these prophets always pointed them forward to a coming Savior, the Messiah, who would save them. And ever since captivity, ever since those glory days of Israel, other foreign powers had been the superpower of the world. And at this time, Rome is the world's superpower. And so Israel is hearing these prophecies and is thinking, "Man, we have a Savior coming at some point. We hope that our Savior, our King, is going to overthrow this superpower, Rome, and that we will be back on top in the world." But it's been 200 years since the last prophet. It's a time of silence, and the people are just waiting for God to move. It's a long, long season of Advent. And it's in that time of waiting that we come to our series and our sermon today.

So I want to go ahead and read our passage together, starting in verse 26. You guys can follow along. It says, "In the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, 'Greetings, you who are highly favored. The Lord is with you.' Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, 'Do not be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. You will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever. His kingdom will never end.' 'How will this be?' Mary asked the angel, 'Since I am a virgin.' The angel answered, 'The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth, your relative, is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month, for no word from God will ever fail.' 'I am the Lord's servant,' Mary answered. 'May your word to me be fulfilled.' And then the angel left her.”

Let's pray one more time. God, thank you again for your word, for your truth, and for the arrival of your Son Jesus, the Incarnation, that bring about the redemption plan that you have had since sin, since before, since the creation of the world. And we are just so thankful to take time in our lives and in our calendar to celebrate. God, I pray that you would be with us this morning as we read about how you take unexpected moments that aren't unexpected to you at all, and reveal to us the plan that you are working, making things holy in our lives. Speak to us this morning, God, we pray this in your name, amen.

So I just want to point out a few things in our lens of unexpected moments. Really we're gonna see two sides of this unexpected moment. One that is earthly chaos, and the other side which is heavenly purpose, represented in these two parties. Mary being the one who embodies potential chaos and crisis, and the angel as one who carries this future heavenly purpose, this message of a divine purpose. So let's take a look at this situation through the lens of Mary. In verse 27 we find out that she's a virgin pledged to be married. This news is a source of possible chaos initially, disrupting her plans, what she thought her life was going and what her life was going to look like. Just like we do today, I'm sure Mary had dreams and expectations and a life forming in her mind of, "I'm pledged to be married, these are the relationships and the family, this is what life is gonna look like, this is what our home is gonna look like." Wondering how they're gonna fit in to the community and their family. I'm sure you guys have done something similar, maybe moving to a new area, getting a new job, and you just start thinking about, "Oh, am I gonna become friends with co-workers or my neighbors or what's it gonna look like in this dynamic and what is life gonna be?" And you start wondering but also hoping and expecting, "This is what it is gonna be, I'm gonna make effort for it to be like this." And then what if at some point in that, you just get news that it's gonna be totally different. That is a moment for me at least, for someone who likes control and wants to know what's happening, that is major stress, major anxiety, it's a lot. And so that's where Mary is in this moment. And then in verses 28 through 29, the angel spoke and Mary was terrified. This is another chaotic moment. Angels who were, you know, they're not the precious moment angels that we think of. They're not very cute and cherubs and baby halos and wings, they're terrifying. Every encounter in the Bible with an angel, the person is terrified and the angel has to say, "Hold on, it's okay. I'm from God, I'm good and God's got something good for you." And so this is, even not just mentally for Mary, in the moment, this is chaos, this is crisis. And then in verses 30 through 35, there's this future possible chaos, having a child out of wedlock, the unknowns of her relationship with Joseph. How would he take the news? The message that the angel brings is good news and we'll get to that in a second, but at first glance, when hearing these words, the situation is just boiling over with anxiety, confusion, doubt, and stress. What would people think? How is this gonna happen? What would become of, again, the relationship? Would she have to raise this child alone? What would this child be like? It was certainly unexpected and it could have meant a lot of chaos and led to a crisis. But instead, we know that the message is of good news and there's this presence of peace that the angel brings. So this other perspective of divine purpose, heavenly purpose, verses 30 through 33, the angel delivers the good news of the coming Messiah. And now we're getting to that divine meaning and that heavenly purpose. This is the Messiah that Israel has been waiting for, the one who would bring about God's kingdom. And as the prophet said, this would be the Prince of Peace, the King of Kings, Emmanuel, God with us. And this is the holy news. Mary is being called by God to partner with him in his ultimate plan of redemption for humanity, a most holy calling.

And then in verses 35 through 37, the angel brings reassurance and heavenly support. Again, the angel is countering this chaotic mind that Mary is having with good news, the truth of Jesus and his incarnation, the arrival of the Messiah. And the angel encourages Mary with the truth, and I love this verse, "For no word from God will ever fail." I don't know where Mary's emotions were while the angel was talking, but I bet that this verse, when he said this, it gave her peace. Because that response in verse 38, "I am the Lord's servant. May your word to me be fulfilled." I read that and I think that the chaos and anxiety running through Mary's mind dissipated so she could rest in the assurance of God and his word and his character, and it gives peace to her soul. So are we seeing this passage now through the lens of unexpected moments, potential chaos, future divine purpose? Let me just run through it one more time, summarizing everything. So in this conversation, verses 28, the angel greets and it's unexpected, very unexpected, but in verse 29 we have Mary trying to figure out some things.

And then in 30 through 33, the angel announcement brings the heavenly purpose to the forefront. But then in 34, we're back to unexpected and chaos, because she says, "How will this be? I don't understand. This doesn't make any sense." And then in 35 through 38, we see heavenly purpose again, heavenly support, this divine plan that Mary has been invited into. And the passage ends with Mary having peace in her heart. While we may not be able to personally relate to Mary's exact birth story, I know we can't, what I think we all can relate to is having an unexpected moment in our lives. That has the potential to lead us to chaos and crisis, or to heavenly purpose. It could be the news of a new job, means you have to move, maybe a diagnosis of health that could go either way, you're not sure. Maybe it's a relationship that you have that's on the rocks, and it could work out, but it takes work and it's gonna take a lot of intentional focus on healing and restoration. What I know is this, unexpected news, often at the onset, looks like chaos. It seems impossible, and it can easily turn into a crisis. And if we don't or can't see the heavenly purpose in the unexpected, it will turn to chaos, and it will become a crisis. But seeing and understanding that God has a plan, that He is present with us in that moment, changes it all. It doesn't mean that the outcome is now perfect and amazing, it just means that God is with us, and we can have peace as we go through that unexpected situation. I think it'd be nice, I mean think of Mary, if we could all have a Mary situation, not be terrified by angels, I think in the modern age maybe it was like a text or an alert from God, just being like, "By the way, unexpected moment coming up, I'll be with you," but just like a little ding from the phone and be like, "Hey, the next 24 hours, expect something unexpected." I would love that. It doesn't work like that, but what we do have, fortunately and even better, is the Holy Spirit in us, direct access to God in our hearts, dwelling in us. The Holy Spirit brings and assures us of God's plan, reminds us of the truth of God's character, and brings us the peace of God. Let me say that again, the Holy Spirit assures us of God's plan, reminds us of the truth of God's character, and brings us the peace of God within us. And here's what I hope speaks to you today, when we experience the unexpected moments that push us towards chaos, but we understand that there is a heavenly purpose, that God is at work, God gives us peace in that moment.

And if we look back on our passage again, Mary moved forward after this moment, her last words are, "May your word to me be fulfilled. I am the Lord's servant." I don't think she says that without the peace of God within her. She had peace to endure pregnancy unlike any other. She has peace to endure all the ramifications of what that means socially, facing friends and family and the neighborhood of judging her possibly for a situation that they don't understand. She has peace that surpasses all understanding of how this will work out, how is this going to happen. Even after the angel tells her, I don't think she's like, "Oh, that makes perfect sense. Thank you, angel. I get it now." But she has peace that allows her to keep going, peace that brought her into God's will, and peace that would give her the confidence to partner with God in his plan. And so from the emotional response we see in verse 29, Mary is greatly troubled to seeing her measured response in verse 38. It's because she understood that there was clearly a heavenly purpose for what she would endure, for what she was called to, and God gave her peace. That peace from God kept her from getting too hyper fixated on what was ahead and also kept her from being taken over by fear and a desire for control that would have kept her from being present. With the peace of God, she was able to face any confusion and uncertainty and be present in her new reality. I think that's true for us. The sooner that we turn to Jesus and accept our limitations, our limits in understanding, the fact that we are dependent on him, the sooner that we can be content and calm. And with the peace that God gives us, we can be more present with God, with others, and with ourselves. This unexpected moment for Mary changed her life. It had the potential to be a source of chaos and crisis, but as she surrenders to God, she accepts the heavenly purpose, and this unexpected moment is transformed into a holy moment for her, one that I'm sure she comes back to over and over again. In her pregnancy, raising Jesus as a child, I'm sure she remembers the moment she was visited by an angel, was told the plan of God, saying, "I'm calling you to something, and I will be with you as you endure." I want to spend the rest of our time thinking of our lives and our unexpected moments, hoping and praying that they might turn into something holy.

So let me ask a few questions as we reflect on our current situations. First is this, have you ever had an unexpected holy moment? Just think back in your life. Could be recent, could be a long time ago. Have you ever had an unexpected moment turn into a holy moment? In the moment, it was very chaotic, it was a potential crisis, but as you look back now, you see, you know what, God was working, God was moving, and there's something holy was produced from that. I'll share with you one of my biggest unexpected moments turned holy. It's got a happy ending, don't worry. But years ago, well, like four years--time is weird--four years ago maybe, I was working at a church for a long time, church I grew up in, had a similar history to here at Spring Valley Church, and at this moment in time, the pastor resigned. It was a good thing, but it was hard. And then soon after COVID hit, and we had an interim pastor, and that was actually great, and at that moment I think I started to see a divine purpose, but losing the pastor that was a mentor to me, like an older brother, that was hard. That was the first moment of potential crisis, and then COVID hit, and that was a crisis for the entire world, and then the church wasn't sure if it was going to continue. And so I just was kept being--the future was just unknown, and I just kept going to God, like, "What is happening right now? Lost my boss, my friend, my brother, and now the church that I'm working at that I thought I could work here forever is facing closure, and the world, the world is just chaos right now. What is happening?" In the midst of all this, too, my wife had a job change, and so because of the situation, we decided to live with my parents, just for temporary. And so that first year living with them, we were always looking at houses. We were putting bids, we were just going, visiting, having conversations, sending letters, just trying to advertise yourself, like, "Hey, pick us! Look at us! We're a wonderful family! Don't you want us to grow up in your home? And aren't we awesome? And we'll take care of it. We won't change a thing. It's amazing." You know, those conversations that, if you know, you know. And it was hard. That's taxing after a while. And then, through COVID, the housing market, just, we couldn't afford anything. And again, just coming to this moment of, "God, what is happening? We're here. We trust you. It's hard to trust you because I don't, I want to know the future. I want to know the plan. I want to know where we're gonna be." Many difficult conversations, hard nights, facing rejection from these people with housings and with the houses, and unexpected moment after unexpected moment. And for me, it was leaning more and more towards chaos and crisis. I was not yet seeing the divine plan, the divine purpose. And then, we found out that my dad had MCI, which is mild cognitive impairment, with a high likelihood for dementia. And that changed everything. And again, that was another moment where we, I think, God was cluing us into, "I have a plan. I'm doing something. You need to trust me." And I was actually interviewing at, not this church, a different church. And at that same weekend, that Sunday, went out and interviewed. And the Friday before that Sunday, I just found out about my dad's health. And on the way back, my wife and I were talking in the car, and we just felt like, "I don't think we're supposed to go anywhere. I don't think we're supposed to leave my dad." So I look back now, and I see the divine purpose. And what God was calling my wife, Becky, and I to do. And it was twofold. And it happened simultaneously, because at the same time, I had a great coffee with Pastor Chris, and this church was here and hiring. And so the plan, thankfully, and now I see clearly, was to come here and be a pastor on staff, and to stay home and take care of my dad, help take care of him.

But we had to trust God. And as soon as that became clear, that chaotic noise and the doubts and the fears within me were stilled. Being clued into what God was doing, saying, "I wanted you to be at this house. I don't know if on my own plan I would have chose to live with..." I can tell you, I would not have chosen to live with my parents. They're wonderful, and it works out. They're here, by the way, which was not expecting. Unexpected moment, live. I don't remember what I was saying. But yes, the chaos and the fears were stilled, because once you know that you are a part where you are exactly where God wants you, when you are partnered with Him and His plan, He does give you peace. And it's a peace that doesn't matter what anyone else is saying, the judgment the world is giving you, the confusion that other people, they don't get what you're doing. They're like, "Why? Just hire some help. Just do that." And it's like, God has a different plan for us. And I was able to be more free to be present with God, to be present with myself, and present with others. And it's not to say that now that it's all done and it's been going great that I never struggle with that. It's still things that come up after a little bit. But I come back to this moment, where God wants you. When you are partnered with Him and His plan, He does give you peace. And it's a peace that doesn't matter what anyone else is saying, the judgment the world is giving you, the confusion that other people, they don't get what you're doing. They're like, "Why? Just hire some help. Just do that." And it's like, God has a different plan for us. And I was able to be more free to be present with God, to be present with myself, and present with others. And it's not to say that now that it's all done and it's been going great that I never struggle with that. It's still things that come up after a little bit. But I come back to this moment, where God revealed His plan and said, "This is why." And I always come back to that and say, "That's exactly why." And it gives me peace all over again. So, have you had an unexpected moment turn into a holy moment? Again, maybe it's right now. Maybe you're in the midst of it. Or maybe you look back and it was four or five years ago and you can see now clearly what God is doing. Maybe you're in the crisis mode where it's like, "I don't understand yet. This is just a lot of chaos. It's a lot of stress and anxiety." And I'm praying that God does have a plan. I want to reassure you, He does. And you can continue to talk with Him and pray, "God, please let me know. Give me a little sense of the plan so I can just hold on to something and I can understand that this is of you and that you are doing something through this." Be reminded that chaos can easily turn into crisis without sensing the divine plan.

Second question is, "What is your typical go-to response when feelings of anxiety and confusion surface in your life?" We sent out this email yesterday and I don't expect any of you to have read it. You're on holiday mode. It's totally okay. But it is an Advent meditation. It's an invitation to meditate each week. There's four meditations on the peace that Jesus brings. And one of them brings up this question, "What is your typical go-to response when feelings of anxiety and confusion surface?" Because oftentimes we want to handle everything. We want to control something. We want to come up with a solution. And God becomes further and further from the solution and the answer to our problems in that moment. I want to read Psalm 131 because I think it speaks directly to this idea of, or this moment when anxiety and confusion surface. It says, "My heart is not proud, Lord. My eyes are not haughty. I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me. But I have calmed and quieted myself. I am like a weaned child with its mother. Like a weaned child, I am content. Israel, put your hope in the Lord both now and forevermore." The psalmist is encouraging us to have a go-to response of humility and hope. Humility, understanding that God is in control. We can't do, we're limited in what we can do. And then hope, to put our hope in Christ as the answer, as the source of joy, of hope, peace. It's helpful to be mindful of our natural response when feelings of anxiety and confusion surface, to be intentional, to draw closer to Jesus in that moment. Instead of backing further away from him, sometimes we do that unintentionally, but to be intentional to say, "Jesus, I need you right now. I'm feeling stressed. I'm feeling anxious. God, let me meditate on your truth, on your character. Let me draw near to you. Let me just come with all my questions and let me just ask them all to you." And just release it and say, "God, you do the work that you're gonna do. I don't have to know everything, but we have a moment with Jesus." So take some time this week and think about what do you do in moments of anxiety and confusion, and is it drawing closer to Jesus? And if it isn't, what can you do to make that happen? And lastly, what chaos or crisis are you facing and have you seen the heavenly purpose in it yet?

This is similar to the first question, but again, just having a moment to assess your life. Maybe it's, again, three or four years ago. Maybe it's happened earlier this year. Maybe it's a recent development that's happened in the past couple weeks. But whatever that potential chaos and crisis, have you seen the heavenly purpose yet? And if you haven't, then ask these questions. What might God be trying to tell me? How is God trying to lead me right now? What is God trying to invite me into? What blessing and growth and opportunity might lie ahead if I follow Jesus? Will you trust God and rest in the peace that He alone brings? This Christmas season, during Advent, our prayer is that we experience the peace of God. That we can take joy in who He is and what He's doing in our lives, and that we can see clearly the love that He has for us, and that we are filled with hope for our future. Would you guys pray with me?

God, thank you again for this story, and I pray you know everyone's story here, and you know exactly where they're at, and you know the past moments that are unexpected that they've gone through, moments of chaos and crisis. Maybe presently you know people in this room who are going through a very difficult season or an unknown season. And God, you also know for those of us who are enjoying life right now that we will have future unexpected moments. And I pray for all of us that when those moments arise, that we would be able to see your divine purpose. God, that we would ask the right questions to you, to better understand that you are at work, and to rest in the fact that you are in control. Nothing is a surprise to you. And that you have a plan through it all. And God we ask that you would give us peace. Peace in this season. Fill us with hope, joy and love. We pray this knowing that you are a good God, that you are good for us. We pray all this, Amen.