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.

Pre-Decide: Part 7

Pre-Decide: Part 7 - I AM A FINISHER

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

So we've been in this series talking about pre-decide and we're going to wrap that up this week but but first I want to kind of maybe talk to those in the room who have ever felt like giving up. You've felt like you want to give up. You got you got into a place in life maybe maybe you at one point... Oh wonderful thank you sir. Maybe at one point you had a dream or you had a goal you had a vision maybe you started with great anticipation you're all excited about you kicked it off. It was going great, but then you hit a wall. You hit resistance and then all of a sudden you found yourself in a place with little to no progress. Frustration started to set in. You felt like discouraged. You wanted to give up. Anybody ever been in a situation like that? Maybe this week. Maybe yesterday. Maybe this morning. I don't know. But maybe you found yourself in a situation where you had a relationship where you really wanted to restore it. You wanted amend it and you tried everything you could you poured energy and time and effort into it and then you found yourself with an even more broken relationship on the other side maybe you're fighting to save your marriage you're doing everything you can you're pouring everything into it but you're just running out of fight you're maybe you're believing for a miracle you have something that you have been praying about every single day for God to do in your life maybe your kids live maybe in a friendship maybe a healing a financial situation like God I need you to do something here I need a miracle you need God to help you overcome maybe an addiction and you tried and you've prayed and you believe but you have seen little to no results and you're losing hope I want to talk with those today who have ever felt in that place or maybe you're in that place today and I want to if you're gonna write something down this morning I want you to write this down when you want to give up we're gonna talk about that today. If you would pray with me. Jesus we thank you for this morning God thank you for those who are here to be able to gather with us God we pray for those who aren't able to be here but are still watching us and joining us through the awesome thing called the internet Jesus we thank you for your blessings in our lives every day and Jesus I pray that the word that you have for us today that you would make it absolutely 100% clear that we would know exactly what you want us to do you know exactly how we're supposed to take that first step today we thank you Jesus, Amen

Well we are concluding a series today and called pre decide and we've been in for five, six weeks or so. And we've been talking about this idea of our decisions. And we first started off, the first week we talked about the quality of our decisions, of your decisions, my decisions, determines the quality of our life. Problem is, we're not good decision makers, right? We try really hard and there's times where we just nail it. We knock it out of the park, we kill the decision. we're like, yeah, look at what I did right here, yes. But then other times you're like, I'm just so, just, I can't. And we just make the wrong decision. Well, our series we're focusing on the statement we've been talking about and this idea of when we're faced with a certain situation, we have pre decided to take a specific action. So when you find yourself in this place, but beforehand without emotion, with the leading of God's will on our lives and His word and prayer and focus and encouragement from our community, we have pre-decided to make this specific action when faced with this certain situation. We've had this statement, we had this circle, we handed out stickers. And if you want one of these cool circle stickers, we got some in the back on the table, we'd love for you to take one home. But we have these six things that we're focusing on. And we've been talking about how I am ready. Say it with me, I am ready. Oh, you're ready, I love it. Talking about I am consistent, I am devoted, I am generous, I am faithful, and by the will of God and His faithfulness in our lives, we will be a finisher. And that's what we're talking about today. I know one thing about the desire to finish. I'm a project guy, I love projects, I love to do things, I love to get my hands dirty, but the desire to finish, it is so easy to start, right? So easy to start, but it is so not easy to finish, right? My wife, God bless her heart, has been living in a kitchen now for over a year. She's got really awesome countertops, painted cabinets, new appliances, but no backsplash. It's just cement board. Just basically plywood on the walls. Everything else looks awesome. New sink, garbage disposal, it's beautiful. No backsplash. I am famous for starting things, but never getting to the point of finishing them.

See, this idea for us is a lot more important than I think people understand, right? Because I want to ask you a certain question, and I think you'll be able to understand, is what do you think separates average people from amazing people? What's the difference from those who are really fulfilled in life and those who are often empty, maybe those who struggle or those who succeed? I will tell you, it is not their intelligence, it's not their appearance, it's not their It's not their education. It's not who or what they know It the difference is their perseverance their perseverance Their willingness to stick to it their grit to finish their drive to preserve Persevere the refusal to quit there was this big study that was done recently that that interviewed successful people And we're talking talking a fortune 500 business leaders. We're talking successful military leaders We're talking teachers, we're talking even like spelling bee champions, like the whole spectrum of people. They did this research and all this was down to one quality that separated unsuccessful people and successful people. And it's one quality and it is this. It is grit. Grit. The definition of grit, if you don't know what word I'm talking about, is the strength of character that refuses to quit. If you follow the NFL, there's a team out of Detroit right now that is all about grit. They got into the playoffs, but not very far in the playoffs, okay? I'm just kidding. It's going against my whole sermon. But the lady who did this whole research, her name is Angela Duckworth, and she has this quote with this giant study that she did. She said, "Enthusiasm is common." You can find it everywhere. Everybody's excited about something, right? So excited for this. I can't wait for this, can't wait for this. This is happening, I'm really pumped. But endurance is rare. Endurance is extremely, extremely rare. Grit is this difference that it is not what you know or who you know, but it's your willingness to stay in the fight. Easy to start, it's hard to finish. And this is why we wrap up our whole series with this one statement we just said, it said, I am a finisher. We are pre-deciding to be finishers. And by nature, we wanna take the easy way out, right? We wanna take the simple road, the easy path. The one of least resistance, that's like boom here to there. Like I am constantly when I drive on ways with my app. Why? Because I wanna know if there's traffic, or something in the road, I want the easy way, I wanna get home as quick as I possibly can. We live in that world today.

But our big decision today that we are making when we pre-decide to be a finisher is this. It says, "When I commit, I don't quit. "I am a finisher." Say this with me, he says, "When I commit, I don't quit, I am a finisher." a finisher. And why is that? Well because us as disciples of Jesus, how do we persevere? How do we strengthen? Because the devil wants to pull us back, right? The devil wants us to quit. The devil wants us to throw off our game. So how do we strengthen ourselves so when we get to the point where we want to quit that we don't? There's this moment, I want to look at the words of Apostle Paul. And he's in prison, and he's writing this letter to basically his spiritual son Timothy. And he's in jail under the Emperor Nero, and he's basically waiting to be beheaded. And he's in a dungeon, well really more of like a sewer. So he's like underground in a sewer, and he's just waiting to be killed. And this was a really common place for these people to wait to be executed. And a lot of them honestly wouldn't even survive just being in the sewer. They would just die even before their execution. But Paul is writing this letter to his spiritual son, Timothy, with all of his emotion and everything that he has. Essentially, these are his last words. And he writes it to Timothy. We see this in 2 Timothy 4:5. He says to him, Paul, “Do not be afraid of suffering for the Lord. Work at telling others the good news and fully carry out the ministry that God has given to you.” You think I'd be here to encourage you this morning? I am, but we gotta get through some stuff first. But here's the reality. If we're gonna finish like we say we are, we're gonna likely suffer. We're likely gonna go through some hard times. And honestly, being a Christian doesn't mean that you don't have hard times. It actually means honestly the opposite, that being a Christian, a follower of Jesus, a disciple of God Almighty means that we're probably most likely absolutely going to suffer. And in other words, Paul here is trying to tell Timothy that don't be afraid. Don't be afraid, but carry out the ministry that God has given you, even if you're going to suffer. He continues on, "As for me, my life has already been poured out as an offering to God. The time of my death is near. I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have remained faithful." Paul here is saying, I've been in the battle. I've not given up. I fought the good fight. I have remained faithful and I have pressed forward even in the face of suffering. Here is what is really powerful about this. And I think Paul here has finished his race. There's nothing that's gonna save him. There's nothing that's gonna rescue him. History shows us that after this point, he is beheaded, he is killed, he no longer lives here on earth, but in heaven.

And what is powerful is that it's obvious that Paul has finished his race, but you and I have not finished ours. You and I have not finished our race yet. And if you find yourself in a place of discouragement or feel like giving up, maybe God might be saying to you even today, if you're not dead, you're not done. If you're not dead, you're not done. There is more for you to do. God has more for you. I see some of you checking yourself. Am I alive in this moment right here? Yes, you are. God's got more for you to do. He still has more plans, more assignments. He's got more stuff for you to do. He's got more ministry for you to do. He's got more business for you to do. He's got more content for you to take. He's got more hope for you to share, more friendship for you to make, for more addictions to break. Turn to the person next to you and say, "God's got more for you." Come on, come on. God's got more for you. If you're not dead, you're not done. There's more for you to do. And Paul here is encouraging Timothy, I might be done, but you aren't done yet. fully finish, fully finish the work that God has started in you. But you don't get it, Pastor Chris. I'm tired. I'm tired, and not just tired, but I'm turd. I am tired, I'm tired. I know, I talked to some of you guys. Hey, how was your week? I'm tired. How you guys doing? I'm busy and I'm tired and I'm tired and I'm busy. I'm tired, I'm busy. I'm tired, I'm busy. I'm tired. A lot of us feel like there is so much to get done, right? So much still to get done. Author and speaker, David Allen has this quote I think might help encourage us today. “It's as much of the stress that people feel doesn't come from having too much to do, it comes from not finishing what they've started.” Maybe some of you have this just constant stress in your life that what you have to do isn't getting done. and that you don't know how you're gonna move forward.

If you guys would with me, just kind of have, just mentally right now, just kind of shift into this posture of prayer. I wanna read some scripture of you and ask you a question, but kind of just have this moment of posture or prayer is that I want you to set yourself up for maybe what God wants to share with you this morning in this moment today that you would be listening to him and maybe something that God is prompting you of something that you haven't finished. And I'm not talking about like, oh yeah, pastor, I haven't finished season four of that on Netflix. But like, I'm talking about something really spiritual, okay, something spiritual. Jesus says this to the church in Sardis in Revelation. He says, "I know your deeds. You have a reputation of being alive, but you're dead." Maybe you feel like that this morning. Someone would say, "Oh, you're such a good Christian, but deep down inside, you're like, I'm just not feeling it." Jesus says, "Wake up, strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have found your deeds unfinished in the sight of God." Here's the question I want to ask you. What is your unfinished business? Maybe it's a unfinished assignment. What is it more specifically though as a follower of Jesus? Maybe you once were prompted to do something, you know you were supposed to do it, you thought you were going to do it, you really wanted to go and do it, You hoped to do it, you thought about doing it, and you knew you were supposed to maybe say something, you were prompted to give something, maybe you were looking to reach out to someone. What is it that you were prompted to do? Maybe you were supposed to reach out and mend a relationship. Maybe you were supposed to step out in faith and take a step that you didn't know all that was gonna happen after that, but God said, I need you just to take this step. Maybe you were something as simple as you were supposed to go finish your degree, but you just, you haven't yet. Maybe you were supposed to start some kind of hobby or you're supposed to start join a community group. We're kicking off on Wednesday. Maybe you're supposed to start serving in the church in a way with the gifts and talents that God has given you. Maybe you were supposed to follow through with something, but you just never got there? Maybe a physical goal, a spiritual goal, maybe even to just apologize to someone, but you just never got there.

What's the unfinished business that you have in your life that God has asked you to do? What just, let that kind of sink in for a moment. What would God be saying to you? Paul has some really incredible advice And this in 2nd Corinthians, he says, “Here’s my advice It would be good for you To finish what you started a year ago church.” and Corinth got off to this great start They were doing all these amazing things and it kind of just Like all of us it just fizzles out, right? “Last year you were the first who wanted to give and you were the first to begin doing it Now you should finish what you started.” What's your Maybe you're thinking about it right now. Maybe you're like, "I don't even know what you would want me to do right now." But I think we have to answer the question of, "What if we don't do it?" What if we don't follow through? I mean, honestly, there's some things in life that we should quit. So I'm not talking about those things and we can't do everything, but each of us has something that we are called to do. Some of us have divine assignments on our lives, but we have yet to finish them. So what does it matter if we quit? Today, you are going to face an opportunity to determine who you are. You're gonna show that, let's put it this way. You are going to cast a vote for your future self in this moment, that you are going to either decide to do what you're supposed to do and cast a vote to be a finisher, or you're gonna decide not to do that, and you will then in turn cast a vote for being a non finisher.

So the question for us is, who are we? This is why it's important. You're gonna come, you're gonna face a moment in life, whether maybe some of you have faced this before, you're probably gonna face something in the near future where you're gonna have to make a tough decision. And you're gonna have to decide the kind of person you are. you are going to cast a vote into which camp of the person that you want to be. And you're gonna face something and some moment where it's gonna seem like impossible odds. It's gonna seem like everything is stacked against you. It's gonna seem like you're gonna have people and friends in your life that are gonna turn to you and say, there's no chance that this is ever gonna come through. But God is standing there saying, I want you to take this step of faith. And you're gonna have to decide, will I face this adversity? Will I overcome the greatest pillars of faith in the halls of history have faced this and chosen correctly? Was it easy? Absolutely not. Was it all fun and celebration did a confetti cannon go off when they made the right decision? No, most likely not, maybe. But they at some point had to make the tough decision. It didn't mean they didn't struggle through it, but you didn't see them quit. Just because I'm up here with the carpet, the table, and the podium doesn't mean that I have it figured out. Can I be honest with you? I wanted to quit yesterday. I did. I 1,000% wanted to quit, but then I knew that I was going to have to be here at 10 a.m. to give a sermon to myself and you guys. This sermon is so much, just as much for me as it is for you guys here today. Saturdays for some reason in our house have just been chaos. And I think it's because the devil knows that Sunday's coming, right? The devil knows Sunday's coming and he's like, I gotta knock that pastor off of his path. 'Cause if I can, then I can start messing with Spring Valley. So if you guys are thinking of Pastor Andre and myself on Saturdays, people will be praying for us. We covet your prayers, you guys are amazing. I know there's so many of you that pray for us every single day and we feel it, we feel it. But I wanted to quit yesterday. But I knew I couldn't. And I struggled through it. So you may see me struggle, but I'll tell you 100% here today, right now and forevermore, I will never quit. I will never quit.

And the apostle Paul is this incredible like superhero of the faith. He's just this stellar pillar of the early church. And he even himself struggled, but he never quit. He fought through day after day after day. And he shares what I would consider his life motto in Acts chapter 20 at the end of his life. He says, "However, I consider my life worth nothing to me. "My only aim is to finish the race "and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me, "the task of testifying to the good news of God's grace." "My only goal in life," Paul says, "is to finish the race." But there's this little phrase in there of this power-packed verse that I think some of us just kinda gloss over real quick. And it answers the question of, how could Paul finish the race? He says this right at the beginning, because he wasn't running for himself. He says, I consider my life worth nothing to me. Paul says, it's not about me. It's not about my dreams. It's not about my desires. It's not about his popularity. Paul says, "I consider my life worth nothing." And I had this thought yesterday in the midst of wanting to quit. Me wanting to quit what God has called me to do was maybe because I cared something about more than running God's race. And I think for some of us, we might find ourselves in that place. That there might be something that we care about more, whether we want to admit it or not, than God's race that he's called each and every one of us to run. And we have to really wrestle with this. And this concept of, I consider my blank worth nothing to me. What would that be? Maybe your comfort. Maybe your net worth, your opinions of others, social media follows, your personal hopes and dreams that you can only finish the race that God has called us to run when we commit to him and we don't quit. So how do we run our race? How will you and I finish? We can't run it for ourselves. We can only run it for God. And when you run it for God, the only way that you can is to take it one step at a time. So I want to encourage you this morning, take the next step. Take the next step. And here's what's even greater. You don't have to finish your race today. This is a life long journey day in, day out, week in, week out, month in, month out, year in, year out, decade in, decade out. centurion in, I don't think we'll get there but just take the next step. This is how Paul lived his life moment by moment. If you've read his story it is crazy.

When we look at the greatest example of Jesus, he lived this life. He took it one step at a time. And Jesus is on the cross right before he looks up to his heaven and basically cries out, "Into your hands, God, I commit my spirit," and he breathes his wrath. Just before that, he says, "Telestai, it is finished." finished He's saying I did everything you sent me here to do dad I'm coming home. I finished my race Jesus wasn't running for himself He was running for his father Day by day week by week month by month year by year painful moment after painful moment, he just took the next step. When they hated him, he just took the next step and loved them back. When they struck him on the cheek, he just took the next step and turned the other cheek. When he was carrying the cross up the hill, he fell down. He stood back up and took the next step. When he was hanging there on the cross and they cursed him and they mocked him and they shamed him He took another step and says father forgive them. They just don't know what they're doing From that very moment Jesus decided that he is going to always be ready He's always gonna be consistent He's always gonna be devoted. He's always gonna be generous He's always gonna be faithful, and he's always gonna be a finisher. So what are you and I gonna do? The trajectory of our life is always towards what is easy, what's convenient. And the devil's gonna want you to quit, I'll just be honest here. He's gonna want you to give up on what God has called you to start and to do. So you and I are going to have to pre-decide that no, we're not gonna do that, but that when we commit, we will not quit. When you run for God, you run one step at a time.

There's the story of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. And there's this runner sprinter by the name of Derek Redmond. And he was basically the shoe in for the 400 meter. He was gonna win it hands down. There was no other competition. There was nobody that was gonna even come close to him. It was all his, it was basically you might as well and put the gold medal on him before the gun went off. And the gun goes off and they start the race and about halfway through, he collapses to the track and he ruptures his hamstring. All the training, all the early mornings, all the late nights, all the perfect meals, all the perfect schedule, all the travel, all the meeting with coaches and doctors and trainers, everything that he had put into this moment in an instant is completely shattered. Everything is gone. The Olympic hope and dream doesn't exist anymore. And as he lays there on the track in pain and agony, his dad is there to watch him. And his dad gets up out of his seat, gets down on the track, walks up to his son, picks him up, and the two of them hobble to finish the race. Here's what I want you to get. You and I running this race don't run alone. We don't run alone. The Father is there with us every single step of the way. So when we slip up, when we fall down, when we mess up, when we don't make the right choice, God is there with us, carrying us along. It says in Philippians, "Be confident of this, "that he, being God, who began a good work in you, "will carry it to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”

You never run alone. So, you may see me struggle. You may see me want to quit, but I won't quit. Because when I commit, I don't quit. I'm a finisher. And you, because you're a disciple of Jesus, and he is the ultimate finisher, he is the author and perfecter of our faith, that when he says he started it, he will finish it. 'Cause Jesus says, "When I commit, I don't quit. "I am the finisher." Pray with me. Jesus, we thank you for today. God, we are so incredibly grateful for your grace, your mercy, your hope. And so Jesus, today I pray that you would speak truth into our lives. God, that you would reveal where maybe we have unfinished business. That God, you would reveal this to us right here, right now, today, in this moment, or maybe this week, God, that you would reveal of where we need to finish. And God, I pray that you would give us the strength for us to be faithful. That every day that we would find ourselves running for you, not for ourselves, not for our own glory or our own recognition, but running for you, God. Taking that next step, even when we don't understand, even when it might not make sense, even when we don't fully understand how the race is going to finish, God, but that we would just take the next step in you and that we may at the end of our life here on earth when we see you in heaven that we ourselves may be faithful as Paul and as Jesus and as so many others before us have been so faithful to finish that race God made we to finish the race that we may be faithful to you that we may be be a finisher. Jesus, thank you for being the ultimate example of a finisher.

Pre-Decide: Part 6

Pre-Decide: Part 6 - I AM FAITHFUL

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

I wanna ask you a question real quick. as we jump in, if you had one word, it would be a goal or something to achieve in life, what would that one word, what would you choose to be that one word for you? Just one word, one word that you would do everything you can that you would want and desire for it to represent your character, maybe your nature, everything that would summarize for what you stand for in life. What would that one word be? There was a recent survey, a study done of people both in and outside of the church. And they were asked this very same question and the top three common answers that came out from this survey, the first of which, and these are all really good things. The first of which are the word that people says they wanna be successful. And I like this, I like this. I think God wants us to be successful. God makes successful people. God creates successful people and gives them opportunities. And I hope and pray that you find success in life. The second word would be influential. And this is a good word. This is another good word. And for us as Christians, this is a good word because as Jesus calls us, we're to be salt and light in the world, to push back darkness, to change things, that we are called as ambassadors to make a difference in this life for the kingdom of God. The third word was happy. I think each and every one of us deep down inside, we can really resonate with this word, right? Another term might be used here would be a blessed or a fulfilled life. But even as good as these three words are, there is what I believe one word that in God's eyes should stand above all of the rest. So that when we get to heaven, and if we live a life that pleases God, he won't say to us when we meet him face to face, "Well done, my good and successful servant." He won't say that. He won't say, "Well done, my good and influential servant." He's not gonna say, "Well done, my good and happy servant." What he will say to us, Jesus will say, "Well done, my good and faithful servant." And that there was one word that would stand above every other word I believe that we should strive to be faithful, that we should be the faithful of Christ. Turn the person next to you and say, you're looking faithful today. Looking faith, yeah, there we go. That's right, I like it, I like it. If you were to write something down this morning, I want you to write down this morning of one word that will change your life. And that's what we're gonna be talking about this morning.

Pray with me. Jesus, thank you so much for this morning. God, we pray for those who aren't able to be with us, those who are joining us online. Jesus, I pray that you would touch their hearts right now, wherever they are. God, whatever they're walking through in life right now, Jesus, you are right there beside them. They are not alone in what they are going through. And Jesus, I pray for us who are here, present, in person, Jesus, that your word would speak over our lives today, that we would, you have something specific for us, Jesus. And so I pray that you would reveal that to us and that we would not leave here the same as when we walked in those doors this morning, Jesus. Transform our hearts, transform our lives, make us into who you want us to be today, Jesus. We thank you for your love. Amen.

Today, we're gonna be talking about this idea of being faithful. And if you've been with us, we've been in this series, Predeciding, And we've been talking about our decisions and how the quality of our decisions determines our quality of life. But the reality is we're not all really good decision makers. Sometimes we get it right and that's awesome. And we're like, thank you, Jesus, I made it. And sometimes we royally mess up and we say, thank you, Jesus, you're here with us. Thank you for your grace, right? And we've had kind of this saying that we've been talking about that when faced with a particular situation, that we are by the health of God with the direction of Scripture, pre-deciding what we are going to do in that situation. We're not gonna let emotions drive us, we're not gonna get caught off guard, we're not gonna play catch up, we're not gonna be trying to figure things out on the fly, but we are pre-deciding that we are gonna take a particular action when faced in a certain situation. There's six specific things we've been talking about. And a couple of weeks ago, we handed out these stickers for you guys to take, to place different. We got a bunch of them in the back still. If you want a second one, please, second, third, please take those. You are welcome to those. Put them everywhere. Put it on a water bottle, put it in your mirror, put it in your car. I don't know, put it on your computer or wherever you see this to remember. We've been talking about these six topics. and the first of which was ready. Say, "I am ready." There we go. We talked about this, that the enemy is out there scheming, trying to get us off our game, but we have to pre-decide to be ready. We had to pre-decide to be consistent. Say, "I am." Let's go. Now you're waking up. All right, now you're getting the flow. Say it with me. "I am devoted. I am generous. I am faithful." And next week, Pastor Lauren's gonna wrap us up with I am a finisher.

Now, today, we're specifically talking about being faithful and that the reason that we are pre-deciding to be faithful is that you never accidentally, by happenstance, just fall into being a person who is consistently faithful. I'm talking about a day in, a day out, a week in, a week out, a month in, a month out, a year in, a year out, a decade in, a decade out type of faithfulness. That we will constantly be faithful, but that doesn't come without intentionality. See, the reason I think that we find this really difficult, let's call it what it is. Can we be honest this morning? Is that the trajectory of our life, we like to follow the easy path, right? We'd like to follow that path of least resistance, whatever's convenient and being faithful, like especially faithful to God is rarely easy. It's often hard, it comes with a cost, but I wanna tell you today that it is always, always, always worth it. I love these words from the Old Testament prophet Habakkuk. In Habakkuk 4:2, he says, "Look at the proud. They trust in themselves." Anybody know someone proud in your life? Don't point at them, don't make eye contact, don't elbow them, keep focus for them. We're gonna leave friends today, okay? But everybody knows somebody who's proud, right? They trust in their own wisdom. They have all the knowledge, right? They got it all figured out. They have the righteousness. They have the goodness. They got the bank account. They have the abilities. They have themselves. But what does scripture tell us? They trust in themselves and their lives are crooked. But the righteous, righteous will live in their own wisdom. by their faithfulness to God. Say that together, the faithfulness to God. Unfortunately, I'm usually in the earlier crowd and I find myself proud at times. I often think that I can do it on my own. I think that I have it figured out. I think that I'm sufficient enough, that I'm good enough, that I can do it all by myself. But if the scripture is true, we believe it to be true that being proud is not good, but that we have to be intentional to press into the righteousness of God and to live in His faithfulness.

Now this raises a question for us. What does it mean to be faithful? What does it truly mean to be faithful? How do we practically live that out? If you would have asked me probably before this week or the week before working on the sermon, I probably would have said that I would not cheat on my spouse, wouldn't cheat on my taxes, that I would be honest, I try to be a good person. And I think all of that is true. Yes, that is faithfulness. But when we look at who Jesus is, he's really intentional on how he shows faithfulness. And if you were to do a study on the life of Jesus, the moments of where he shows faithfulness, there's really three big categories that come out of looking at his life. The first of which we would see how Jesus treats people. You would see how Jesus talks about stewarding resources, and you would look to see how that you respond to God. And we look at Jesus's faithfulness, it boils down to three categories, relationships, taking care of what has been given, and how we respond to God. See, when you look at these ways that Jesus says, This is how you are faithful. We as Christ followers, following in the footsteps of Jesus in his example, we have to pre-decide three things. That we are going to pre-decide in faithfulness that every interaction is an opportunity to add value. We're gonna pre-decide that we're gonna be faithful in relationships. We're gonna talk about every resource is an opportunity to multiply. That because Jesus designed faithfulness is how we steward what He trusts to us. And that every prompting is an opportunity to obey God. Because every time Jesus talks about faithfulness, He talked about how you treat people, how you steward resources and how you respond to God. Let's dive into this first one. Every interaction is an opportunity to add value. If we are going to be faithful, we're going to have to pre-decide that every interaction with every person that we have is an opportunity to add value. So what does this mean? How do we see this played out? I think for you, whoever you come in contact with, every person you meet, Everyone that you see is an opportunity to bless, to encourage, to be generous with, to add value to their life. And we are going to pre-decide that every person is an opportunity for us to show love of God in a way that brings value and blessing to their life. And see, the reason is it isn't because we're focused on ourselves, because we are, right? We all are focused on ourselves, you and I both. And I can prove it, right? If there's a picture of eight people, you're in a group photo, you see that group photo, who are you looking at first? Yourself, right? You're looking at that photo, you're looking at yourself and you're going, okay, how do I look? Is it good? Is it bad? Is it not good? Because the reality is that you are looking at yourself. If you're blinking in it, you're thinking, oh my gosh, how embarrassing. That is completely un-postable. And anybody who does post that does not love you. Like that really, right? Like you're thinking there's no way that this can be shared. We have to immediately delete. I don't want anybody to see this. You look at you first, we all do it. And so how does that translate into adding value to people? When you interact with them, when you talk with them, what are you usually thinking? Do they like me? Is what I'm saying interesting? Did what I say just make sense? Oh no, what did I just say? I can't believe I just said that. How do I end this conversation and walk away immediately? I am so embarrassed, right? That's what's going through our mind. Each and every one of us, we're thinking, how can this be happening? And you walk away and you think about the conversation and go, okay, I shouldn't have said that. Shouldn't have said that differently. Oh man, I wish I could go back and take that back. And oh, just all this stuff.

But what if instead of saying, will they like me? Am I saying the right things? What if, because the reality is that Jesus lives in you and you have pre-decided ahead of time that every moment you have interacted with others is not focused on yourself, but that you are in this moment going to add value to others' life, that I am going to bless others with everything that I do, and I am going to focus on them. This is faithfulness. Ephesians 4:29 says, "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your nouns, but only for what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." I love this. This is so good. To be faithful to God means that you are going to add value to others. that when you walk into a room, you are a climate change. Because when you walk into the room, if we believe what scripture says, that the Holy Spirit is on us, that we are ambassadors of Christ, we are different than the world, right? That when we walk into a room, we bring Jesus with us. And because we bring Jesus with us, the room is different. Right? So that wherever you go, whether you're in the grocery store, you're at school, you're at work, you're picking your kids up, you're at a soccer game, you're out running errands, wherever you're at the gym, I don't know where, wherever you are at, you are bringing Jesus with you. This isn't a, you come into church, you sit down, hey Jesus, what's up? How's it going? I'll see you in six days. Peace out. But that we take Jesus with us, that you are an encourager, you are a blessing. You tell the truth, even though it may hurt, but with love, cover in love, okay? But you are that, when you walk away, because of you living intentional, they are different. That they are not the same, why? Because they just had a spiritual encounter with the living God. They may have no clue what's happening. But you and I do, right? That they are not the same because in being faithful, You bring and you add value to people's lives.

When you look at Jesus and how he treated people, the words in which Jesus said were incredible. When the disciples got worried, what did Jesus say? Oh, you guys are the worst. I can't believe it. How are you worrying? You know, this world, oh, have you seen society today? It's going to hell in a hand basket. You see who's in politics, left side, right side of the aisle. I don't care. It's just all going into the, down the drain. It's just all into the pooper. It just, oh, that's it. Might as well give up. No. What does Jesus say? Jesus says, don't worry. God's got you. He loves you. Don't worry about what you're gonna eat or what you're gonna drink or what you're gonna wear or what tomorrow brings. God loves the birdies and they're taken care of. How much more does He love you? Seek first His kingdom, His righteousness. And when you do that, everything else is gonna be taken care of, right? What did Jesus say to the woman who was caught in adultery? This pretty intense moment in scripture, these righteous people are ready to just stone her 'cause she has sinned very publicly. And Jesus walks in and He puts something in, He draws something or writes something saying, "We don't fully know what it is." But then he says, "Who's without any sin? Go for it." Crowd disperses. Jesus turns to the woman and says, "Where are your accusers?" She goes, "They're gone." So Jesus says to her, "Go, send no more. Live in God's grace and His mercy. Live the life that you know you should be living." He forgives. When Peter decided to deny Jesus, not once, not twice, but three times, what did Jesus say? "Peter, you're canceled. Get out of here. Can't trust you anymore. No, what do you say? Says, "Peter, do you still love me, dude?" He goes, "Yeah." Jesus says, "Okay, go take care of my people. Love them, serve them." Jesus himself specifically tells us, he said, "I came to show the love of my father and I will never leave you and I will never forsake you. And that when Jesus left, He sent the Holy Spirit, He sent somebody even greater. And even a covering, a leader, a perfect comforter to be with us as we take these steps every single day in life, what a blessing. What a blessing. Every interaction with anybody is an opportunity to show the love of God, to build them up, to show them grace, to pour blessing upon them. You have no idea how God might use a single word of encouragement to change someone's life. This is faithfulness to God.

I want to tell you a story that's really important to my life, kind of the reason I'm even in this place here today. Out of college, Laura and I, my wife and I, got married in college and graduated, and I had an opportunity to take a job, one of the few jobs in about the '08 downturn that churches were even hiring. Most of my friends who graduated from school with a pastoral degree just went off into the world to try to start paying for student debt. They didn't get an opportunity. I was fortunate enough to get hired on staff at a church, And we moved there and got settled in. And a couple of weeks into me being a part of the team on staff there, I was leading worship and I was assistant pastor. We started having some conflict. Started having some issues where I wasn't necessarily performing at the level that the pastor wanted. There was a lot of confusion and missed communication with each other. And after eight weeks of being in my first pastoral job, after spending four years studying and writing papers and reading books and doing everything I had, God had called me this place in this moment, the pastor meets me and says, "Hey, it's just not gonna work out, we're gonna move on." And here I am with my wife, thousands of miles away from family, I have a year long lease on a house, and I have to go home and tell my wife I'm no longer employed by this church. And through a crazy, crazy series of events from a pastor who knew a pastor who knew a pastor who knew a pastor, I get a random phone call one day. This is like just a couple days after this had happened. And for whatever reason I answer it. And I had said, "Hello?" And I hear a voice on the other end. He goes, "Hey, this is Pastor John. You don't know who I am, "But I heard about your story. Can I buy you a cup of coffee?" I'm like, "I'm freshly unemployed. Nothing else to do. I'd like a free cup of coffee because I can't afford one right now." So I go and I sit down with this guy and he begins to tell me the story of his dad, who had been in a church for a really, really, really long time, and the church one day decided they didn't want him as their pastor anymore. And they kicked him out of the church. He goes, "I know your story isn't the same." He goes, "But I saw what happened to my dad, and I saw another local pastor come alongside my dad and said, 'Hey, just come sit in church.'" And I remember the coffee shop, I remember the conversation, I remember the pastor sitting there or across the table from me. And he told me, he goes, "You are called to be a pastor. God has placed that on you. And you are too important to be put on the bench right now. You need to stay faithful to God's calling." I was ready to walk away. I was so angry with God. I was like, "How could you take me to this place?" I had all the conversations with God. And he says, "I'm starting a church. I'm not asking you to do anything." He goes, "You and Lauren just come and sit." So we went and we sat. Couple weeks later, he needed some help with stacking chairs. I was like, "I can stack chairs. I got a four-year ministry degree. You betcha I can stack chairs." (audience laughing) I had A+ in that class. So it started with stacking chairs. And it started going to a small group. It started helping with a small group. And then it started helping with some of the teams. Started doing this thing and that thing. And pretty soon I found myself basically on staff working with this pastor pro bono, just being back, falling in love again with the church. you will never know what a opportunity to add value to someone's life may turn into. And one of the great ways to be faithful to God is to be a blessing to others. And that pastor that day and that season of life, even to this day, is an incredible blessing to me and my wife. You may even have a divine appointment on your calendar right now that you don't even know about, but God does. And the question for us will be, will we pre decide that every opportunity and every interaction is an opportunity, a moment to share love to other people and to be a blessing.

The second thing we see from Jesus is that every resource is an opportunity to multiply. Jesus in Matthew 25 tells this parable of a man, a rich man, who went on a journey and he trusted his wealth to his servants. He handed out bags of gold to the first guy, he got five bags of gold. To the second guy, he got two bags of gold. And then to the third guy, he was given one bag of gold. And the first two the five and the three bag bros went out and they risked their gold. They risked their investment and they multiplied it. They multiplied it. They were able to add more to it. And it says in Matthew 25, 21, he says, "His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful with the few things. I will put you in charge of many things.'" They're saying, "You multiplied what I gave you, and in the kingdom of God, that is faithfulness." The Greek word here for faithfulness is actually pistos, and the definition here I want us to see is a person who shows themselves faithful in the transaction of business, the execution of commands or the discharge of official duties. One of the ways that you can be faithful to God is caring for what God gives to you. God gives you an ugly yard, you make that grass green, right? You make that yard better, that is faithfulness. God blesses you with a clunker of a car, you betcha you have the cleanest clunker on the road today. If God gives you a body, you take care of that body and you steward it.

If you are in business, and I have this conversation all the time, I feel like sometimes in business, maybe you own your business or you're high up in a business or you just work for a business, sometimes those people, because they're in the world of making money, making profit, sometimes they get viewed or they think of themselves as second-class Christians. That well, you know, I'm not a pastor, I'm not really like working for a nonprofit, like I'm not in the in the world to just like give things away that I am less than. Let me tell you this, you being faithful in your business, your job, your work, whatever you put your hands to, you being faithful in that is an incredible, incredible witness to God. Because the world's what? Trying to cut corners. World's trying to get ahead. World's clamoring, climbing over people, pushing them down just to elevate themselves. But for you to say, "I'm gonna have 100% ethical behavior in my job, that is a witness to Jesus. That you're gonna treat your co-workers with kindness. That you're gonna maybe treat those that you're a supervisor over, you're gonna care for them and how you lead them. That is an example that the life that you live, the way that you conduct your business is a massive, massive opportunity to show Christ to those around you. And that just because you're not one of the pastors, it doesn't mean you're less than. We're all called to be witnesses, we're all called to be ambassadors. Your workplace may just look a little different. And that's okay because God has called you there for a purpose and for a reason and a lot of that is to be faithful. And then there was the guy with the one bag. He had the five, the three, the one. He was afraid. I've been that guy. I feel him. I've been anxious. I've been worried. I've tried to be careful not to make a mistake, but what does the master say to to him. He says, "So I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. So here is what belongs to you." I was scared. I was nervous. I didn't want to lose any of it. I didn't want somebody to steal it. I wanted to make sure it was still good. You trusted a lot with me, boss. So here you go. His master replied, "You wicked, lazy servant." Here's what I want you to see and to feel in this. The one who multiplied, the master said, "You are faithful." But the one who buried it, he wasn't just lazy. He wasn't just, hey, boss it was a busy week, had all this other paperwork I had to do, like stuff happened with the family. Like, he says he's wicked. If we're going to choose to be faithful, every interaction is an opportunity to add value. Every resource is an opportunity to multiply. And every prompting is an opportunity to obey God.

I love this part in Acts where Paul is really happy with where he's at in Ephesus. He's like locked in with the church, he's doing great. He's like, this is all set, we're golden. But he has this emotional farewell. He says, "Now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there." This word compelled means that it's kind of like wrapped up or like bound by a rope and kind of pulled in this direction that you can't resist that the spirit says, "I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there." It's one of those opportunities where you can't explain it, you don't understand it, you don't know the details, but you know is God, you are being drawn in that place. And when you follow Jesus, He will prompt you, He will compel you, and faithfulness is responding when you don't know what will happen. Sometimes we know, sometimes we don't. That job with that church or that pastor, I had to, God actually eight months later asked me to just completely resign from the job without having the next job lined up. And I didn't understand, Lauren, I didn't get it, but we felt like we had to just kind of let go before God would add the next thing. And after we did through a series of crazy events, I get an opportunity for another job and another church, and God takes care of that next step. So good. Other times where God's asked me to step out and to do something, even this last week, I stepped out and did something. I felt like God was saying, and then it just kind of went. Nothing happened. I was like, okay, really thought I was, okay. But the reality is that obedience is our responsibility, but the outcome is God's. Our job is to be responsible. And when he leaves, we say yes and take a step forward, even if it doesn't make sense.

Habakkuk 4:2, we started with this. "But the righteous will live by their faithfulness to God." I haven't always gotten it right. 'Cause I'm up here doesn't mean I've always gotten it right. (chuckles) But I've tried everything I can to be faithful in the small things. 'Cause when you're faithful in the small things, there's this incredible spiritual compounding interest, return on investment that God builds up. And I've seen it in faithful people in the church for generations. I said, "How did you get there?" He was just like, "Every moment of faithfulness." It's just like grains of sand. It's just being thrown onto the beach. And all of a sudden you look down and it's just a shoreline of just sand upon sand upon sand. And I think we will vastly overestimate what we can get done in a season. Well, thank God I'm gonna fix this. I'm gonna fix my marriage. I'm gonna fix my finances. God, 2024, like this is the year it's gonna be done. But I think we will also underestimate the faithfulness of God in a lifetime. That we will underestimate what God can do when we are faithful in little things time after time after time again. Every interaction is an opportunity to add value with relationships and people. Every resource is an opportunity to multiply. How do we steward with what God has blessed us with? and every prompting is an opportunity to obey God. Just do it. Obedience is our responsibility, the outcome is God's. We just have to be faithful. That's your life, to be faithful to God.

Pray with me. we thank you for this morning. God, we are so grateful for your faithfulness. Where you, since the beginning of time and the broken relationship in the Garden, God, you started the world on a path towards redemption and that even in the midst of that, when all hope seems lost, you, God, were still working a plan to make the world right once again. And when you sent Jesus, You fixed the biggest problem that we had in our life and you took care of us and you reached down and you said, "I love you." It's going to be okay. Jesus, we're so grateful that you are so faithful to us. God, may we in return be faithful in the little things so that we may then have opportunities to be faithful in the big things when the time comes, when you prompt us to step out. God, as we look forward to this next week for the divine appointments you have on our calendar already, God, may we be obedient even if we don't know the outcome. We thank you, Jesus. We praise you. We love you. We worship you today. Everybody said, "Amen."