Advent 2020: Love

Hi family. How are you glad to have you here? Glad that you're joining us online. I have one thing that I need to throw at you, and then we will jump into our sermon, which I am particularly motivated by. Um, here's the thing we sent out. Um, and this was probably 10 days ago, so you guys may not remember this. We sent out a link to a survey that we have put together that is actually going to be really significant. So if you're like, well, I didn't get that email. Let me tell you how to fix that. Get on our app, download our app and update your information. Cause we have like 10,000 people a weekend engaging in our service and we have like 2000 emails. And I know that for a lot of you guys, you're like, I don't want to get all kind of spam, whatever I hear you. Me, either, we'll only email you if it's important. Now the difference between you and me is that we get to decide when that is important. Like you may not think it's important, but it would be important to us. Like we're not going to just send random email things, right? Like it'll, it'll be important. So, uh, make sure you jump on and update your information if you can do that. But, here's the thing. If there is a, on our web page, there is a link to this survey and I really want you to take it. And especially for those of you that are watching online, I really want you to take it. And here's what the survey is about. We are beginning to plan and think about and focus on and develop what we need to do and be as a church, post COVID. And we would love to have your input on that. Like, what are the things that you are personally struggling with it, that’s anonymous, what are the things that you see other people struggling with that you would like to see the church focus on? Like, one of the things that's really emerging is families and kids and the dynamics. Depression has been a major issue, probably unlike we recognized. That's something that's already emerging out of the survey. And so I want you guys to jump in, fill that survey out and then that will help us to be able to know kind of, some of the things that we can do to help partner with you in continuing to put the world back together. So that's there for you to take, please, please, please, please, please, please take advantage of that. Please fill that out. It'll help us out a ton. Okay.

We're going to jump into our sermon and this is week four of advent. We will finish that up with our Christmas Eve services, which I hope that, if you're watching online, that you have received your boxes. I'm sure that you guys saw Rudolph there, which I don't even know how I feel about that. But, it's all right. I guess. If you got your box, then you know why we've been reviewing these emblems every week. First, week one, we talked about hope and our hope is in the fact that God's promises are secure and God's promised us the light of the world. And so we use this tealight candle as a way to symbolize that. And then in week two, we talked about peace and we used this dove as the symbol of peace. This ornament, and we talked about how we can have peace because God is who he says he is and because his promises are secure. And then in week three, last week, we talked about joy and I'm so bummed that this isn't big enough for you guys to actually really see it. Cause it's a smiley faced. And we talked about the wrestling match of finding joy in the world that we're in right now. And, one of the things that I have so appreciated about advent this year is that it's just so appropriate. Like the whole thought process of the advent of wrestling with where is God in the midst of this mess. Like, it's just so appropriate in the world that we're living in right now. And I talked to you guys last week about the fact that I don't feel very joyful some days-- like the starting at the beginning of last week, I was like, I don't have a lot of joy. I don't know how I'm gonna talk about joy. Right? We can have joy because God isn't holding out on us. He isn't holding out on us.

And so this week we're going to talk about love and we have this happy little heart stone, which I'm sure you guys are like, Ooh, that's really cool. Or more likely you're like, Hey, I can't even really tell what that is. It's a heart stone. So we have this heart stone. And, this is something that reminds us of the love that is expressed in the Christmas story. Okay. And so today that's what we're going to focus in on, is this part of the story where we really begin to draw out God's love and how that love is portrayed in the lives of Mary and Joseph. And we've been living in Luke 2 for the last couple of weeks. And so this week we're going to move out of Luke 2 and we're going to go into Matthew chapter one and we're going to start in verse 18. Here's what it says: “Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband, Joseph being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.”

Okay. Let's talk about so much going on there that we need to review. Number one, Mary is pregnant and Joseph and Mary have not come together yet. That's what the scriptures say. So there's all these questions from people on the outside looking into that going, Oh, sure you haven't come together yet. But here's the thing. Joseph knows that the child isn't his, he wasn't there right? The child isn't his. And so he's got to wrestle with what is he going to do with her culturally, he has three options. Option a is that he can have her stoned. She's an adulterous woman from the time that they are betrothed, engaged. In other words, from the time that their fathers make an exchange of a dowery and they have a signing of the Katoomba and the drinking of the glass of wine from that point on, they are looked at as married, even though they won't consummate the marriage until the wedding day, which varies in length. That engagement period varies in length on a number of different factors, but they're looked at as married. And so, she is, from everybody's eyes, an adulterous woman, which I, I just want to stop there and go, do you want to be used by God? And I think most of us on the surface would go, yeah, I want God to use me. I want him to put me to work in his world. And I'm like, really? Cause sometimes, you know, when you look at the stories of the people that God used, it just seems like, inevitably, people around them are constantly raising an eyebrow. Like what's going on there? I'm pregnant, but don't worry about it. It's God. Right? Now, again, we're in an honor/shame culture. So you bring honor to your family or you bring shame to your whole family by all the decisions that you make. I kind of wish a little bit that teenagers in today's world felt that kind of pressure. I think it would shape what they, what they do or don't do. But Joseph and Mary, while they're not married officially, they're considered married. And so because she's pregnant, she is adulterous. And so option a is he can have her stoned, the law allowed that -- that's option a. Option B is that he doesn't have her stoned, but he has her shunned -- put out of the village that they're a part of disconnected from her family and from his, and there's actually a ceremony that happens when that happens. They sit around their table and they all air their grievances. And then the, the patriarch of the family kind of leads the way in this, but they all stand up together and turn their back. And then the person just has to get up and leave. And that's the end of it. Shunned. I actually had a friend years ago when I was in Bible college that was  raised in a Jewish home and then found Christ and accepted Christ. And it was the most interesting thing when he described the shunning process that his family put him through because he had accepted Christ. Like there was no conversation, he was shunned and, and they did the whole thing. They stood up, turned around, turned their back and he had to get up and leave. And just in telling the story, and this had been years, right? But just in telling the story, the, the tears from the rejection and the shame and, you know, the, the separation of people that he loved the most, like this is a really powerful thing in their culture. So, he could kill her or he can have her shunned by his family and her family. And, because of that, the whole village would do the same thing. They would honor what the family chooses because she's brought shame on the whole family. The third option that he has is that he can just go, you know what, I'm just going to keep things as they are. We're just going to keep moving forward together. But in order for him to do that, he, he's kind of admitting that the child is his, that he was the co-conspirator in this pregnancy. Right? What that means is he is taking on her shame.

So Joseph has these three options. He can have her stoned -- killed. He can have her shunned, or he can take on her shame. These are his three options in the world that they're living in. What I love about Joseph from the get-go in this story is that he is a man of integrity. Here's what I mean by that. He doesn't want to submit her to any kind of disgrace, even though he doesn't know yet that this is from the Lord. What he understands is this girl that I'm committed to, and that I've fallen in love with she's pregnant. And I wasn't the dad. Like, that's gotta be devastating to him. If you've ever been someone who has been on the other side of an affair, you might understand a little bit about what's going on. She from his, because again, he doesn't know this is from the Lord. She committed adultery from his perspective. And what I love about this is that he doesn't let his anger get the best of him. “And her husband, Joseph” --it says, let's keep reading,-- “being a just man.” There's that whole justice thing again, that we kept talking about – “and unwilling to put her to shame.” That's – I gotta be honest with you. If I found myself in that situation, there'd be all kinds of shame for her. I would be very willing to put her to shame. I cannot believe you did this to us. Like, Joseph and what he's like, he's a man of character which opens up the conversation of why would God choose to use a guy like that? Why God would choose to use Joseph. Here's why, because he's a man of character. “He resolved to divorce her quietly.” So the idea for him was he created option, which was, I'm just going to absolve this whole thing. And you can go about your way. I can't take away the fact that you're pregnant. I'm not the dad. But I will not make a big deal out of it so that you can have somebody that cares for you. “He resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus for, he will save his people from their sins.’  All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: ‘Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and you shall call his name Emmanuel, which means God with us.” Which, by the way, they never call him that. So we probably need to explore, like, why is that even in there? And why is that the prophecy that's being fulfilled. “When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, but knew her not.” He did not yadah her. That's the Hebrew word. Yadah is the Hebrew word for knowledge. So it's not an improper translation, but what knowledge for them, isn't just a mental assent. It's to experience intimately something. So yadah as an intimate experiential knowledge, which is why it becomes a euphemism, a euphemism for sex. Does that make sense? Like that's why they say it that way. “He knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus”.

So, I want to take a look at what Matthew is doing in this passage. What I want to, I really want to hammer home this idea that in the midst of this messy world that they're in, and we've talked a lot about that, that the reason why Joseph stands out as a guy that God wants to put to use in his redemptive process is because he is a man of God. He is a man of character. He is a man of integrity. He is a man that when the Lord comes to him and says something, he does it. And no matter how messy the circumstances are Joseph steps in and does what he has to do to honor the Lord, even if it means that he brings shame on himself and his whole family, which is such a -- That's hard, that's hard. That's a hard line to draw. And I think when you consider like Jesus in Luke 14 says, um, “unless you hate your father and mother, you cannot my disciple”, right? Which we go, wow, they can't even like your family. Well, it's not like it's not hate the way that we see hate. Hate the way that we see hate as this like intense, loathing, this like I can’t even stand to be in the same state as you, like, Colorado's not big enough for the two of us, you know. Like that kind of intense hatred, the loathing and get out. I don't, I don't want to see you not even in my peripheral. That's not what we're talking about. When we're talking about Luke 14 is the idea of loving them less than you love the Lord, unless you love me more than you love your own family. You can't be my disciple. What we see with Joseph is he loves God more than he loves his own family and he proves it. He proves it. So I really want to hone in on Joseph as this person of integrity, because he doesn't get a lot of credit in the Christmas story. Like he doesn't get a lot of exposure and church tradition over the years has made much of Mary, but Joseph kind of gets lost in the shuffle. And I think he's actually super significant -- is actually super significant in the story.

But the other thing that I want to talk about this morning is this prophecy from Isaiah 7. And why do we say behold, the Virgin will be with child and she shall give birth and will call his name Emmanuel, which means God with us. Where does this come from? And what's going on around that? And what are the lessons that, that are trying to be through the Holy spirit, trying to be transferred into the lives of us today? Because I think they're especially important. Let me set the context for Isaiah 7. We're going to read verses one and two, and then we're going to skip a few verses and actually get into the prophecy. So here we go. It says this: “in the days of Ahaz, the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, the King of Judah,” and all those names are really important. Even in the book of Isaiah, they're really important, but Ahaz is the King right now. And when he was reigning, it says this: “Rezin the King of Syria and Pekah,” a couple of names for you to consider if you're with child. “the son of Remaliah the King of Israel came up to Jerusalem to wage war against it.” So let me set the context. The nation is a divided kingdom right now. So we have Israel in the North and we have Judah in the South. Jerusalem is in Judah. So the King of Judah reigns from Jerusalem, okay. Ahaz, is the King of Judah. And what it says is Rezin, who's the King of Syria, and also developed this powder for violin bows that really helps. That was weak. That was weak. I do get to have a dad joke, periodically. Rezin is the King of Syria and Pekah, the son of Remaliah the King of Israel. So the King of the Northern kingdom and the King of Syria partner together to come against the King of the Southern kingdom. Does that make sense? This is the context of this passage and they're going to wage war against it, “but could not yet mount an attack against it. When the house of David was told, ‘Syria is in league with Ephraim.” Now, why say that? Ephraim is, remember when the 12 tribes of Israel come into the land, each tribe gets a plot of land, right? And it's named after the son, after what each one of those tribes, Ephraim has a plot of land in the Northern part of the kingdom. Okay. So, “Syria is in league with Ephraim, the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.” So, this is the context of this prophecy of Emmanuel, God with us. Ahaz, who’s the King of Judah, is trying to rule his chunk of land, his people, and then the King of the Northern kingdom partners with the King of Syria and they're going to attack. And what it says is, Ahaz, and all of the people of Judah are so scared, they're so unsettled by this, that they shake like the trees in a windstorm. They're scared to death.

Which, let's just step out of that story for a minute. And let's step into our world. Everybody's talking about how polarized the world is and how we need to have somebody who's able to like, try to figure out how to bring the two sides together, to have a re regardless of the topic, if it's politics or it's masks or it's whatever, like whatever the, it just, everything is polarized. Everything is like, I am a thousand percent on this end, or I'm a thousand percent on this end. And I am going to put my flag in the ground and we're going to go fist to cuffs over it. Right? Like that's where the world's at right now. And how do we bring people together? Well, I would say that the step before that is the issue that we're facing is we're living in this world, riddled with fear. And the fear in our culture drives the polarization. Because now I got to anchor in more because if I'm wrong, that accentuates the fear, we're living in a world where people are shook, like the trees in a windstorm. Like, what does this all mean for our economy in 2021? What does this, is the vaccine safe? Are we going to be okay? Are they now going to use mask mandates as a common place part of our co -- and I've listened, people have these opinions and they're not like, they're not like, you know what? I don't know, let's discuss it. Let's think about it. Let's run. They're like, it's be this way! Right? Everybody's that way. And if you disagree, shame on you. I had somebody write me an email a couple of weeks ago that said, shame on you three times in a row. I was like, wow. They really mean it. Shame on you, shame on you, shame on you. It's just, it's the world that we're in, right? People don't have kind of an opinion about it. And that's all rooted in fear. It's exactly the same world that Isaiah 7 is spoken into. This world of just being really unsettled and shaken to our core and rooted in fear. I am fearful, not concerned, not even deeply concerned. I'm fearful of the world that we're in and what this means for tomorrow. Because of that, once again, I just feel like the advent story is so appropriate for the world that we live in. It's so appropriate. Let's keep reading. We'll pick up again in verse 10 of Isaiah 7. Here's what it says: So the Lord basically came and said, Hey, Ahaz you're going to be okay. I'm not going to let them win. Okay. And they had this like, Oh, Okay. Except I don't know if I can trust you. Which, don't we do that with God. Like I was like, Hey, I don't know if you know this, but I'm still God. And things are going to be okay. And we're like, yeah, right. But how do I know? Right? We do this with God. So, “again, the Lord spoke to Ahaz. Ask a sign of the Lord, your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as the heaven.” That's what he says, ask a sign and I'll give it to you. Let it be way high up. Down low. Big, little, it doesn't matter. You pick whatever sign you want. Ahaz, I will give it to you to prove that I'm, I'm going to follow through with my word. “But Ahaz said, I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test.” Which, at one level we go, Oh, that's noble of him. Nope. Because it's rooted in fear. This is one of those moments. This is one of those defining moments for him as a leader.

Let me step out of the Christmas story. Just step into a leadership conversation for a minute. Because If you're a leader, you don't get the luxury of halfway decisions. You don't get the luxury of I'm their leader, which way did they go? Especially not now. You've got to have a sense --  in these scared, uncertain times that we live in that Ahaz is in, these insecure spaces. Leaders have to step in and go, we're going this way. But I don't like that. You're not the leader. Right? That's the cost of leadership. Now it's the blessing of leadership, but it's also the cost of leadership because in these, in these kinds of spaces, where Ahaz is at, where you and I are at as business leaders or leaders in our community, it's lonely. It doesn't matter. Say this for those of you that feel like you're not so much a leader, but you're being led in this culture, pray extra hard for your leaders. Because their decisions mean more. They mean more. So, Ahaz isn’t like, I'm not going to put God to the test because I trust him. Ahaz is saying, I'm not going to put the Lord to the test because I'm afraid. Because if he, if he doesn't give me a sign, what does that mean? I know God can give me a sign. I just don't know that he will. Have any of you ever had that conversation with God? I know that he can do anything. I just don't know if he will. And so God said, “Hear then, O, house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also?” You guys should chuckle at that. You're, you're scaring the people to death. You're, you're making them weary. They're losing their will to fight. Is it, is it not enough that you're making them weary, that you, you make God weary with your faithlessness? And God's like, really? Do you, do you really not know Who I am? Do you not know who I am? Do you know what I'm capable of? I think it's one of the reasons why it's really important for us to read the Bible. Because when you read the Bible, what you see is these stories. The problem with the Bible, if I may be so bold, is that the Bible is like a God highlight reel. Do you know what I'm saying? Like, it, it leads from one God moment to the next, to the next. And, and in one sentence, it's like, and then 40 years went by -- and we're like, I want a church like the New Testament church. Well, we have one -- good news -- we have one. But the problem is, what we mean by that is, when you read like the book of Acts, for example, it's just highlight after highlight after highlight. And what we miss is the faithful grinding that goes in the middle. But we need those highlight stories because it reminds us of what God's capable of. We need to know that God parts the seas when he wants to. We need to know that God feeds thousands of people with a little boy’s sack lunch. We need to know that that's what our God is capable of. Because knowing that he can do that, gives us the courage to stand in the fight. “And he said, ‘hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God, also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” There's the prophecy. It's spoken into a context where people are fearful and unsettled, that God is going to be able to deliver them out of it. By the way, when Jesus shows up, people are fearful and unsettled that God would be able to deliver them out of that. And I would offer that today, many people are fearful and unsettled that God would be able to deliver us out of this. Let's keep reading. “He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two Kings you dread will be deserted. The Lord will bring upon you and upon your people and upon your father's house such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah -- the King of Assyria.”

God's promise is, Hey, I got this. So don't even worry about it. Like before they're ever going to attack you that their land is going to be deserted. How? Well what's going to happen is instead of them attacking you, Assyria is going to attack them and then they're going to have to refocus their attention. Which is not something that Ahaz, would have thought about. Right? That's not a plan that Ahaz would've come up with. Which, by the way, God’s in that business, right?  He's in the business of coming up with the plan that I didn't see coming. He's in the business like Habakkuk  -- how long, oh Lord, will you allow our people to make a mockery of you? And God's like, I got a, such a cool idea. I'm going to solve it. Thanks for talking to me about it. Here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to send in the Babylonians to wipe you guys out. Habakkuk is like, Oh. Oh, that wasn't what I had planned. Right? God's in that business. Go back to the parting of the sea. They have the, all the Israeli people have just escaped slavery. They got the sea on one side, the most powerful army on the other side. And they're like, God, what, what the heck? And he's like, Oh, check this out. I know you didn't see that coming. Right. Like that's, I know you didn't see it coming, but what it proves to us again and again, and again, is that God, isn't standing far off watching this all unfold. And that's our fear, isn't it? Is it in the midst of the mess and the grind that if we're not experiencing the God highlight reel portion of our life, that in this faithfulness where we're day in and day out walking the path, that God really isn't close. I mean, he's present, but he's not really here. He's not really right by my side, hearing every word, caring about every concern of my heart. God, isn't really close, is he? What would it change if we really believed, like God's in the midst of this, And I'm not saying God's causing it, and that's a whole separate conversation. Either God causes it or allows us the way that he will either way. No, like sometimes we're just really dumb and we get ourselves into a bind. We just make poor choices. And the consequence, God loves us enough to not rob us of the consequences of our poor choices. But that doesn't mean that God's absent. God's always there. Like Jesus coming and becoming man proves that God is with us. That's what it means.

And so if we skip on to Isaiah 11, there's this prophecy: “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse.” Now, by the way, this is, there's a really awesome metaphor here about the olive tree. And we've talked about this before. But, an olive tree, every 50 years or so, it gets tired. So they cut all the branches off of it. Like all of them, it looks like an Arizona cactus. That's, that's really how it looks. You're like, wow they killed it. Why, why would they do that? But here's what happens. Here's what happens. Every 50 years or so, hey trim that back. And then all this new growth comes out. And within a couple of years, it's bigger than it was before they trimmed it. This happens. And this is one of the beautiful illustrations of why the olive tree is a metaphor for God's people in the Bible. Is that every 50 years or so, we got to trim back all the fluff, because what happens is, it gets tired. All the religiosity, it gets tired and we have to rethink like, what is it that we have that stays and what needs to be pruned and all of those conversations. It's really important. It's really important. These are the problems, and this is why, when we hold onto those things too tightly, it's why people kind of buck against religion, which religion’s not bad. Religion is simply an expression of our faith. But religion that we hold on to for the sake of tradition becomes lifeless. And then it's not worth anything. But the stump of Jesse, so what are we saying? Well, if we're saying the stump, what does that mean? That means it's all been pruned back now. Who's Jesse? Jesse is the father of David. And who's the Messiah? Messiah is the son of David. So this prophecy is, this stump that becomes this thing, out of that is going to be, is going to come the Messiah. “And a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins.” This is who Jesus came to be. That God showing up with us, number one, shows us that God never left. He's always been with us. But Jesus showing up and becoming man, rights the needle of those who are taking advantage of the poor, those who are taking advantage of those who have no voice, whatever that construct may be. Those who have the power to unsettle us by not properly stewarding their authority. We don't have to freak out, because God never bailed out on us. In the midst of all of the mess, God never bailed out on us. God was with us and Jesus becoming man proves it. Here's the great thing about Jesus as our Lord and Savior. If you have Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you never have to question whether or not God loves you. You never have to question whether or not God's with you. You never have to question any of those things, regardless of the circumstances that are going on around us. And here's the deal. If I was Satan, some of you are like, go on, cause maybe I could get there. Like, you know, on the pendulum, I'm probably a lot closer to Satan than I am to being God. But, if I was Satan, here's what I would do to you. This is what I would do to you. What I would do to you is get you so distracted by all the things going on around you, that you forget that it's God, who's holding your hand, walking down the trail with you. I’d get you so consumed in focusing on all these scary things. And they are, they're scary. They're scary until we know that they bow in submission to the God holding our hand. He's God with us, not God watching us, not God standing back going, isn't that interesting? I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do about that. That's not our God. These things are scary until we remember the love that God has for us, to say that he will always, always, always be with us. And I would, I would just offer for us in this Christmas season and then we'll tie down some implications that it's so important right now today for us to: number one, walk our walk in a way that reveals God is with us, but it's more important for us to help people see that the us isn't just me. It's all of us, including whoever we come into contact -- God is with us, God's with us. And because of that, we don't have to be afraid, which is why 1 John says: “perfect love, casts out fear.” Perfect love casts out. Fear. God with us is an active love.

I have some implications and I’ll run through these. Number one: Joseph was a man of integrity. I don't want us to lose that. His integrity allowed him to love well in hard circumstances. Joseph was this man of character that was able to step into this messy place and do the right thing, right? So for you and I, to be able to step into the messy places of our world and do the right thing, we have to be people of character. Like Joseph is a model for us. And that's important.

Implication number two: God shows up. He's not watching us from afar. He is Immanuel. He is God with us.

Implication number three: God's plans are secure and nothing can get in his way. I guarantee you that everyone in the, in the Israelite kingdom that is living under the oppression of the Romans are praying and saying, God, what in the world are you going to do about this? Like you and I have been praying over the last nine months, 10 months, however long it's been, it feels like it's been 10 years. God, what are you going to do about this? God's like, Hey, I'm with you. I got this. My plans are secure. Nothing can get in my way. Just press into your relationship with him.

Implication number four:  Jesus is proof that God loves us. We don't ever have to question this. Here's the thing I've talked about this before, but it bears repeating Isaiah 55. God says: “my ways are not your ways. And my thoughts are not your thoughts. As far as the, the sky is from the seashore, my ways from your ways and my thoughts from your thoughts.” Here's what that means, to question what God does is totally normal. You have to, but you know why? Because when you step into a situation, God will do something. And you're like, I didn't even think about that. And now it's like, I know my thoughts are not your thoughts. And we step into another situation and go, man, I wouldn't have done that. And God's like, I know my ways are not your ways, right? Like my thoughts are not your thoughts. My ways are not your ways. This is normal. This is normal, but there's a big leap between questioning what God does, which is normal and questioning who he is. God with us, Immanuel, Jesus, God becoming man and walking among us takes that question off the table. You don't ever have to wrestle with whether or not God loves you. That's been settled. The good news of the gospel is, that not only does he love you, but he sees you and he is with you every step of the way.

As we move into communion time, I would just invite you to consider what is it that's making me so afraid? What is it that makes me unwilling to step into this space where I might be shamed for following God, and that's okay. Because it seems like those that God uses most in history, that's kind of the space that they go into. What is that thing that I would rather have be said or true of me rather than the fact that I am wholly devoted to God, regardless of the cost. Understand that at the core of that is a fear that if I really let go of that, whatever that is, money, power influence, I don't know some emotional brokenness. I don't know what it is for you. The Holy Spirit can tell you That is I'm holding onto that more than I am saying God, you're with me and I'm yours and whatever that means it means take me and use me as you see fit. Like David says in Psalm one 39, search me O Lord. See if there's any, any offense in me. Deal with me in any way so that I can be more devoted to you. What is that space? Because what communion does for us is it reminds us of how far Jesus is willing to go to tell you, you don't have to hold on to that anymore. So let's just take a minute as we're preparing our hearts for communion and sit with the Lord on that issue, and then we'll take communion together.

On the night, Jesus was betrayed. He took bread and he broke it. And he said, this is my body, which has given for you. So whenever you eat this bread, do it in remembrance of me. Let's remember God with us today. And then after the dinner he took the cup and he said, this cup, this is a new covenant, my blood, which is shed for you. So whenever you drink this cup, do it in remembrance of me. Let’s remember him.

Let's pray. Lord, thank you that you're with us. God, thank you that through all of the ups and downs of 2020, that through all of the insecurities and the questions and the questioning things, everything from sicknesses to ethics, to democracy, like all the things we've been asked and forced to wrestle with over 2020 God, you're with us and that rather than getting lost in the game of distraction, that we need to focus more and more on you and allow you to lead us. God, we want more and more and more of your presence in this church. We want more and more and more of your presence in our community. And God, we want to be light bearers. People who carry that light because the hope is that the light has shined. And so when we take you with us, we take light. Wherever we go, may we be lights this week, God, in your name, amen, let's stand and sing. One more song.

God is with us. You don't have to worry. If we don't have to get shooken like trees in a windstorm, we don't have to do it. And I, I gotta be honest with you. I've had my bouts of that over the last year. And I'm sure we all have these moments where we're like, gosh, this is just really unsettling. The Christmas story tells you and me that we don't got to worry about it. It calls us back to this truth that God is with us. And I would just invite you, if you came in today and you're like, I have lost perspective on that this week. We have some people up here to pray with you and they would love to pray with you about that. To invite Jesus back into the center of our perspective. If you, if you need to pray with somebody they're here, but more than that, may we walk out of here this week prepared to not just accept the light, but to reflect the light into our community because our community really needs to know that God is with us. He hasn't abandoned us. He hasn't bailed out. Be the light this week. If you're coming for Christmas Eve, we'll see you here. If you're gonna watch online, we'll see you virtually. We're looking forward to that. Thank you for coming. Have a great week.