You open what looks like a personal Christmas card and it’s just a pitch for insurance. There’s always the something being snuck by us, isn’t there? Jesus faced that same suspicion — how can we know He is really who He says He is?
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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 the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan.
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. 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.
Merry Christmas Eve, church family, and Somber says Merry Christmas Eve as well. I hope this finds you well and happy. Please stand for the opening of the service.
I’m going to read Isaiah 9. I love this passage, not only for Handel’s Messiah, and I can sing it in my mind as I read it. But that, you know, we are in gloom and doom. And God says, fear not because I’m here, I’ve come, and I’m coming again. And so we can totally rejoice in the fact that God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son, that whoever believeth in him shall have everlasting life.
Read along with me.
For unto us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulders, and he will be called 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.
The word of the Lord, thanks be to God. Please remain standing as we worship and rejoice our coming Lord.
We are so glad to have you here tonight. What a joy it is to be together as God’s people assembled together, celebrating the goodness of the Savior being born.
And if you’re new here tonight, if you’re new online, maybe you don’t even know what church this is, you just clicked on the link because you saw a Christmas Eve service. We would love to get to know you. And you can do that by texting hi to 833-356-4032. 356-4032.
And also, if you have any prayer requests, maybe you’ve been here a bunch and, you know, prayer requests, you’ve been struggling with whether you even want to say it to anyone. You can use that prayer line. It will go to one of our prayer partners and you don’t have to go through Christmas without being prayed for. So please do use that. Avail yourself of that.
Well, it is Christmas, isn’t it? Yes, it is, yes. And we’ve had four candles here. We have four candles. And each week, we lit one candle, and they represented the different stages of Jesus’ birth. And what we need and what we need to look forward to. Yes, exactly.
And so, we’ve been anticipating, that’s what Advent is about is anticipation. And now here, we come to Christmas Eve. Yes. The night that we remember that the Savior was born. Correct.
And so, over the past four weeks, as we’ve anticipated that we’re preparing but tonight, we’re going to light the candle that represents the culmination of those preparations. Correct.
The Christ candle that we light tonight represents that Jesus is the light of the world, who came into the world, who cast away the darkness of sin and death.
When we see that, Apostle John writes in John chapter one.
And it says, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Consider the wonder, the wonder of this as we, as we’d gone through all four weeks of this, and wanted to celebrate celebrating the birth of our, of Jesus who created everything, as a light, as we light this candle. I just want you guys to think, as we light this candle remind we were reminded that Jesus not only created the entirety of the world, he offers to make us new members of his family.
And as the gospel writer says in John 1:9-13, the true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him, but to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
So if we think about that, you know, we are God’s creation. So I think it is a good time just to remember, maybe there’s sometimes we separated a little bit this week from making God thinking about that, and then we can reflect on that for a moment, and then we have good news of assurance after that.
So let’s just bow and just think, maybe this place, whatever it is, somewhere we found ourselves apart from the Creator. Correct.
But once we do that, fool we are. I know we all do that. I mean, we all have that sin in us and the temptation. Maybe we’ve been tempted a lot with something. We need to give that to God and ask for his power to help us overcome. So let’s just bow our heads. Give a moment of praise to God.
Father, I just want to thank you for this wonderful free gift you’ve given to us. And every year, Lord, I’m just so thankful that we can celebrate the greatest gift of all. Lord, the gift that’s above all other gifts that we can ever receive in our life, and that’s the assurance of our salvation.
And Lord, and that your son covers our sin by the shed blood on the cross. Lord, but yet I know there’s times in my life I kind of go through the day I may forget who you are, and I get into my own will. Lord, please forgive us and forgive me Lord, for the times that this might have happened.
Lord, that I can always learn that every day to focus on you through every thought, every emotion, and anything that I do. Lord, thank you for your awesome assurance of salvation, your awesome grace, in your wonderful name. Amen.
And it will be fine in this next verse. You know, there’s always this assurance and there’s never a time to where like God keeps us underneath his wing and keeps us underneath the whip.
And it says in John 1:16-17, it says, for from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
Aren’t we glad we don’t live under the law? And if you look back at that, it says grace upon grace. So in other words, he says, God never says, I’m done with you. That’s it. So his grace upon grace. And we have to learn to live that way.
So let’s prepare our hearts from God’s word in the sermon.
Jesus makes an incredible claim. Think about what we just were reflecting on as we lit the wreath. Jesus makes a truly, truly incredible claim.
He says that he is the source of life itself, that he is the creator of all. And here’s the mystery of Christmas when it really boils down to it. Here’s the mystery that our society wrestles with even today as we try to figure out what to do with Jesus.
We say he was born as human being. And yet he’s also the source of life. We say that he was someone who grew up in this world, and yet he was the one who created the ability to grow up at all.
How do we understand these things? And this is not a new problem. Certainly in today’s world, we’re skeptical at times and ways that we might say, well, you know, in the past, they weren’t so skeptical, but we don’t give enough credit to the ancient world. They were thinkers.
They were people acutely aware of challenges that might lead them astray from the faith, and they looked at Jesus and they heard his claims, and they said well, wait a second here.
We see that if we turn to verses 41 and 42 of John chapter 6.
So the Jews grumbled about him because he said, I am the bread that came down from heaven. They said, is not this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, I have come down from heaven?
It’s a legitimate question. And every year when we come to Christmas is a question that’s worth asking, how can it be that someone who says he came down from heaven, was born and looked like a human being, lived like a human being?
How do we know that he’s authentic? How do we know that he’s legit?
We ask that question a lot. I’m reminded of that question every time I look at the mail come in. You go out and you get the mail. And this time of year, there’s at least a little bit more that’s of interest.
I’ve become terrible at sending Christmas cards. I feel terrible about it because Christmas cards are a beautiful, wonderful thing. It always seems like the season just comes roaring by and one year I’m going to resume sending out Christmas cards. It’s not you. I just am really bad at it. I confess.
But I love getting them. They’re beautiful. They’re joyful. It’s neat seeing all the different artwork that people pick out and so on but especially when you’re looking for something like that, and you’re getting mail from different people.
Then you start going through that stack and you also notice all the things meant to look like there’s something personally written to you. And they’re getting ever better at making it look personal.
And yet, it’s really just an ad. Oh, here’s a Christmas card. Open it up, right? Would you like to buy life insurance? Because you should realize that you can get term life insurance for this low price, even if you have 3 different health issues that you’ll have to report to us.
All right, throw that away. Okay? That was not a legitimate Christmas card. It doesn’t even matter if it has a picture on it of Christmas. It’s not a Christmas card.
But how do I know if it’s legit or not? How can we know?
We have that problem all the time especially even more in the electronic world, where people are constantly trying to pretend that there are other people and try to fool us into giving our passwords or other information so they can scam us.
We see over and over again the attempts to look official. And if we just step back for a moment, we tear away all the beautiful decorations and the beautiful carols and the fact that we have the New Testament to look at. And we have put ourselves in first century Palestine, you’re a Jewish teacher of the law.
You’re asking about Jesus as he’s speaking. Are you sure you’re not here to sell me term life insurance? Can I really trust what you’re saying Jesus? Are you just fooling me into thinking that you’re really from the Father? Are you really from heaven? Have you really come down for us?
Jesus is willing to sustain that question to hear it and to answer. And that is what we’re going to look at tonight as we continue. We’ve been studying John 6 over the past few weeks and as we look at this, Jesus is going to say very clearly to them, yes I am and here is how you can know.
And all of us can know as well. And let’s ask our God that he would help us to know as we read his word. Let’s pray.
Father, we come before you as those who are tossed to and fro by culture and the demands of our world. We try to do what is right, but so often we fail. Sometimes we don’t try to do what is right. We fail even in our lower standards that we know our Lord.
Then we come to your word and we try to wrestle with it. We try to understand it. We try to understand how it applies to our lives and we get confused and we struggle.
Sometimes those doubts creep in and we ask, is this really something I should even pursue?
Lord, would you guide us tonight with your Holy Spirit? Would you help us to know the truth, to hold on to the truth, and then to share and do the truth? We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Jesus came with heaven’s authority. There is the important claim we need to hold onto. If Jesus came and doesn’t have heaven’s authority, if everything he said was just he was winging it on the moment, he just was a man who was very creative and very good at telling stories, then all of us should get up out of our chairs and walk out this door right now.
And if you’re online, you should hit the disconnect button right now because we’re wasting our time at worst at best. At worst, we’re actually believing horrible lies and not getting to the true meaning of life and who placed us here.
But if he did come with heaven’s authority, then he has something very important to say.
So Jesus answered them in verse 43, do not grumble among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day.
Jesus says, I know you’re grumbling. And I wanted to give you a reason to listen. The reason is if I’m telling you the truth. I’m telling you the truth, this is life and death.
This is not just life and death in our normal worldly sense of it. This is eternal life and death. Where do you want to be?
If you encounter me, you’re going to hear from God himself and you’re going to encounter the truth of the one who made you, the light has come into the world. If you do not encounter me, then you miss out on all that.
So Jesus challenges them to look at the evidence, to look at who he is, what he says, and decide whether to believe it.
And when we think about the baby in the manger, the challenge was the same, the wise men, the shepherds, Herod, the religious leaders, anyone and everyone else who at different points encountered Jesus or the news of his birth.
They were being challenged just like we are today. Do we believe?
Isaiah chapter 54, verse 13 says, All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children.
This was the promise of the Messiah that someone would come and actually bring the teaching of the Lord to them. That he would bring it right to them where they could experience it and feel it and hear it.
They knew this promise, but they couldn’t possibly contemplate the full wonder of it because Jesus wasn’t just going to bring an authentic message from God. He wasn’t just the mail carrier, the one writing the mail was coming.
If you receive a Christmas card and the person who wrote it actually hands it to you, you know who it came from.
And they might say, well, I’ve had that happen at work, and it was really the boss’s secretary. He didn’t even know my name. Okay, well, you know, that aside. In general.
We received the card, we know it came from the one who said or she said she gave it to us.
And likewise, as Jesus stands there, he says, go ahead, look at my life, look at my ministry and understand the Christmas card of my life is being handed to you by me.
And what does that mean? That means when we contemplate the miracle of Christmas. That promise from Isaiah is coming true in ways people couldn’t even begin to imagine that the God of the universe had come into the world, that we wouldn’t just learn about God, we would learn from God.
The opposition, the religious leaders who heard Jesus, and there’s a shift in tone in John’s gospel, he starts referring to the Jews here. He means the Jewish leaders. There’s a shift. Why?
They understand what’s at stake here. They get it. We often just pass through it. They get exactly what Jesus is claiming. They don’t necessarily believe it, but they understand the stakes of what Jesus is claiming.
That’s why they grumble. Wait a second here, buster. What are you saying? You can’t just say that.
Jesus sets the stakes. He places them before them and he challenges them to wrestle with it.
In the moment we’re going to sing Away in a Manger. We’ve probably sung that since we were little, a favorite carol, and as we do so it’s always interesting to hear about the origins of carols.
And for years, Away in a Manger was attributed to Martin Luther. In fact, one of the first records, if not the first record we have of its publication there was a journal published in the 19th century that referred to as Luther’s Cradle Song.
Well, if you think about the dates for a second here, I realize sometimes we’re a little fuzzy on history, but this is a dramatic issue because it is published in the 19th century. Luther was doing ministry in the 16th century.
Now, where did it go between the 16th century and the 19th century? And the years since people have concluded Luther probably didn’t write it at all. Someone wanted to give it authority.
Now it’s a beautiful carol. They could have just stood on its own, but someone wanted to get attention. So they said it was Luther’s cradle song. That way anyone who respected the great reformer Martin Luther would listen to it.
But it wasn’t really authentic, it would seem in that. Now you might say, well, Tim, why then are we going to sing it? This forged Luther hymn. Oh boy. But yeah, it’s not Baptist.
But here’s the reason why. Because our concern as Christians, isn’t whether Martin Luther wrote it. Our concern isn’t whether John Calvin wrote it or St. Augustine wrote it or Tim Keller wrote it or John Piper wrote it or whomever you like to hear from, that he wrote it.
What’s our concern? Is it affirming what Jesus said? Affirming the truth of the gospels. I do believe it does that.
See, what we need to look for is, does it match Jesus’ words? And what the people listening to Jesus needed to do was to say, does Jesus’ life match his words?
Because they’re saying, Jesus, you’re saying these things and they sound all really nice. They’re like a beautiful carol that they’ll sing someday. But here’s the problem, Jesus. We think that you’re a forged Luther.
We think, yeah, we don’t know who Luther is yet because he hasn’t been born yet but we think you’re a forged Luther. We want to know is this authentic?
Jesus gave the postmark. You know, if you look at those Christmas cards, a lot of times the way you realize they’re not authentic, well, it looks like a card from someone you know, but you look at the postmark, and you don’t know anyone that lives in the place that’s coming from, and you say, aha.
Or it has one of those commercial mailer postmarks on it, and you realize that that’s not from a friend of mine. They don’t run a shipping business out of their house. They couldn’t have possibly done that. It’s not authentic.
But Jesus, his life was a series of miracles. His life was a series of steps of faithful living, all of which authenticate exactly who he was all the way until where we arrive when we get to Easter.
First Corinthians 15:3 says, for I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.
Looking back at the whole story that starts with that baby in a manger, Paul says, here’s what I can tell you about that baby.
If you’re asking, was the baby that was born that day really God incarnate? Was the baby that was born that day, did everything that he said and now we’re reporting to you, is that true? Is that authentic, Paul says, well, guess what?
That baby was someday crucified. He was put on a cross. He was dead for days. And he was raised to life.
You don’t have to take my word for it. There are hundreds of people living at the time that I’m writing this to you.
Paul told the people to check it out. And so people surely did. They went and checked it out. They went and asked the questions and they said, wow, this is real and they passed it on and that’s why we have it here today.
But it wasn’t satisfied with just one person. It wasn’t, well, if only you could have seen what I could see, but I locked the door and I made sure you couldn’t see it there would have been something.
No, Paul says, check the witnesses. You can verify it. You can see where the stamp came from.
And then when you hear about the nativity and you hear about what Jesus taught as he grew up. When you hear about him going to the cross, you can say, wait a second, this is true because here’s something we can be confident in.
God doesn’t raise up a false teacher. God doesn’t take someone who says he is God and raise him up so he looks like he has authority that he doesn’t.
If God raised up Jesus and Jesus says exactly who he said he is, that the baby in the manger really is God incarnate. And the man who walked on this earth is God incarnate, and the man who took our sins to the cross is God incarnate.
And because of that, then we may not know who wrote Away in a Manger. But we know the one of whom we sing. So let’s go ahead and stand and sing Away in a Manger.
Jesus came to bring heaven to us.
Now, maybe you’re saying, Tim, you’ve been talking, you mentioned the manger a few times. We just sang that song, but it seems like you’ve been talking awful lot about Jesus past the manger. Why?
Because the miracle of the birth on Christmas. The miracle that we celebrate as Christians matters whether it’s true or not.
It’s not just so we can think about a baby in a manger, it’s so that we can know if that baby in the manger truly was the one who he says he was.
As we think about what we were talking about, about his resurrection years later 30 plus years later, what do we know? We know what we say about him in the manger was also true.
We look at John 6:57. Listen to what Jesus says of himself. He says, as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me.
When we think about Christmas morning. We don’t know the day of it. The Bible doesn’t say December 25th. That’s the day we’ve picked to observe it.
When we think about that morning, whatever day that was, through the day that Jesus was born into the world. And as he was, that sending that Jesus later would talk about, the Father sending him into the world was happening.
The Son went into the world.
Now, if we know that, if we know that, if we can say Jesus really was who he says he was, and friends, there’s I could go on and on and on about all the reasons we’ve just touched on it.
But if he is who he says he was. And he is who he says he is, then in some ways, actually, the Christmas story becomes even more peculiar.
Because why did God incarnate come into the world the way he did? Why did he come to be humiliated by laying in a feed trough?
We use the word manger really only today to talk about what we might put as a decoration at Christmas time, to remember that Jesus was born. And so it sounds like a good thing, but if you talk about the feed trough, it doesn’t sound really all that great.
And when we say the one who gave life, the one who made everything, yes, if we look at it, it authenticates it, it really is him.
How absurd is it that Jesus would choose to come the way he did?
Play a thought experiment with me, if you would. Imagine. If you were the king of the universe. And you’d never walked on earth, a whole human life, and you decided I am going to actually live as one of my creatures.
I’m going to come down to earth. I’m going to have prophets tell about my coming for years ahead of time, and then I’m going to come into the earth.
How would you do it?
Well, I can tell you, I wouldn’t do it by being born in a feed trough. Maybe if I want to pretend I’m more humble than I am. I just like a nice, comfortable baby bed.
But really, come on, I’m the king of the universe. How about a gold-plated baby bed? And I might as well just levitate. Why am I sitting on anything at all? Let’s just make sure everyone knows unmistakably I am who I am.
And he is, I am who I am.
By just doing something no one else does. Okay, I’ll be born, but when I’m born, and my mother gives me a bath, I’m going to walk through the water of that bath. There’s not going to be any mistake who I am.
And then when I grow up, those who oppose me. It will not be a good day for those who oppose me. They will know that they opposed me. And it will be past tense.
Because I’m king of the universe and I can do whatever I want.
That’s not how Jesus came. The nativity scene, that manger, the choice to come as a baby at all, not to come as a full grown man, or to come as some force of light that somehow was visible, but not to go through the humiliation of being one of the creatures at all, that choice declares who Jesus really is, one who comes, but he doesn’t come to humiliate like an earthly conqueror does.
Because what I’ve just been describing is what we would do, what I would do because if I were the king of the universe, I would be a very earthly conqueror. I would do what an earthly person would do.
But Jesus doesn’t seek that. He doesn’t need to have people cheering him on when he’s born and realize when they’d walk by, yeah, okay, I’ll be born in that manger, but I’m going to be floating and the lights are going to be glowing.
And anyone that walks by any place in Bethlehem. They’re putting sunglasses on because it’s so bright because now I’m here.
He doesn’t do that because he’s come as the humble servant. He came to serve. He came to redeem.
He came to be one of us, to actually know what it was like to be us.
That’s why sometimes people quibble a little bit with Away in a Manger. I think it’s perfectly fine to sing it but it says that when he awakes, he never cried. Well, babies cry.
I don’t think there’s anything inherently wrong with babies crying. Do we really want to assume that?
I don’t know that we necessarily do. I can’t prove whether he cried or not. But what we can say from his life is that he actually lived like us.
He got tired. He needed to sleep. He got hungry. He needed to eat. He got thirsty, he needed to drink.
That makes me think he probably did cry because how does a baby say, I need some nourishment now.
He’s fully human. He didn’t, he wasn’t lying in the manger and said, mother, I would like something to nourish me now. He was a true baby. He understood. He experienced the humiliation.
Imagine this, the one who created language, couldn’t speak for a period of time. Can you imagine that?
True God on earth as a true human being.
And so when we look at the story of the nativity, when we look at Jesus’ life, we see all the marks of authenticity, both the authentic mark of being a human being and the authentic mark of being God.
We say, this is a real Christmas card. Because it’s both it’s both sent by the person who, I think it’s from, and it is personal, but it’s also a Christmas card.
At times I’ve received a letter in the mail. I thought it was a Christmas card. I put it with the Christmas cards to open joyfully with the Christmas cards, and then I open up and it’s someone I knew but they sent me a bill.
That was because they were doing something for me right? Or, or they send me a letter complaining about something or, you know, something like that, you open it up and you think well, wait a second.
I thought you sent me a Christmas card. No, Jesus does both. He’s both authentically from God and he’s also authentically human.
In other words, he’s truly everything we talk about at Christmas.
And when we look at his story, all the pieces line up.
Now here’s the other quibble we can make with Away in a Manger.
Is it a bad thing to ask Jesus to look down upon us? No, nothing wrong with that.
But I think it misses a little bit of the heart of the story. Jesus didn’t come into the world so he could look down upon us. Jesus came into the world so he could abide with us.
And that’s what we see in verse 56. John 6.
Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him.
Jesus came into the world. But he didn’t stop there.
He could have come into the world but been totally inaccessible. There are lots of people in the world who are totally inaccessible to me.
I can’t go speak to the president right now. I can’t go speak to the king of England right now. I can’t go speak to the great business leaders of the world.
I can’t speak to some of the great pastors of the world. They’re too big. You can’t just walk up to them.
Lots of people we can’t just go up to, but what did Jesus do? He was born as a baby. So the very lowliest of society. So shepherds came up to him.
Pagan philosophers and the wise men that hadn’t been the chosen people of God, but somehow, in God’s mercy, received part of the promise, came up to him.
Rejected Samaritans would come up to him. And yes, too, the rich and the religious leaders that would hear his message, they too came up to him.
Jesus was accessible to everybody.
And so he did more than just look down on us. He isn’t just aware of us. We’re told that as we come before him, as we worship him, as we take communion as we pray to him.
He actually abides with us.
He didn’t stop when he was born into the world. And that’s one of the reasons why I hate for Christmas Day to come and go. I like anticipating it.
But then you get to Christmas Day and it’s gone. It’s one of the reasons I push so hard for all of us to observe the 12 days of Christmas together.
And I’ll talk more in a moment about this year’s devotional booklet, and I hope you’ll download it. And we can do this together.
Why? Because Christmas shouldn’t be a period. It should be a comma before we go on to the rest of what God does.
And we should take the wonder of Christmas Day and use it as a booster rocket into everything God wants us to do with his people in the year to come.
Jesus came into the world in a historical moment to change all of history, not just to have a historical moment.
And that’s why tonight can be the historical moment for each of us.
Maybe you’ve never trusted in Jesus. And if that’s so, then make tonight your historical moment when you can say today I’ve trusted Jesus.
Today I’ve said, Jesus, I see that you are truly God and truly man, and I don’t know what to do without you.
Because that historical moment matters too.
There’s different versions of Away in a Manger, like many old hymns and carols there’s alternate lyrics that get changed around.
And one that really struck me is that depending on the version, sometimes it says, take us to heaven, sometimes fit us for heaven.
We sang fit us for heaven. Because Jesus brought heaven to us.
Jesus declared the kingdom of heaven is here. Jesus didn’t just come to tell us someday he’d take us away. Someday we’d fly away.
Jesus came to us to bring heaven to us.
We’re called to ponder in this moment and to wonder. Christmas should fill us with wonder.
About the mystery of the incarnation, the awe of the incarnation. This is not something straightforward even though we talk about it every year.
This is something that should make us say God, why would you do this? Why would you do this for me?
I love another one of the great carols, we haven’t sung it here at Little Hills before, but we should sing it tonight.
We’re going to sing, I Wonder as I Wander. And as we do, think about those words because it challenges us on the true complexity, the true mystery of what God has done for us.
That was written by John Jacob Niles.
I didn’t really know anything about the composition of that song until just recently. But it’s interesting.
John Jacob Niles was a man who spent his life collecting folk songs and arranging them, collecting the music of America over a very long career and rearranging it and orchestrating it and sharing it.
And so they went around to the places where you would find folk music, including revivals. And at one revival, there was a family the Morgan family who had gone around and were preaching old style outdoor revivals but they were very poor, and they were hanging their laundry between revivals to dry it on the monuments of the city, and the people of the city didn’t really care for that.
And so they’d ask them to leave.
Well, they said, well, we’d agree to leave, but we don’t have any money even to leave. Allow us to have one more revival and we’ll take an offering at that revival to pay for our trip.
Well, the daughter of the pastor and his wife, would sing for 25 cents. You could pay her a quarter and she would sing.
And Niles went to this being thrown out of the city revival and heard her sing the first line of this song.
And she would only sing the first line, but she’d sing it to the tune. And so he thought, well, I’ll pay her some more and I want to hear the rest of the song.
And he paid her over and over again the 25, but she would only sing that first line. And so he said he walked away having no idea how the song was supposed to go, but a marvelous idea for a song that should be.
He took that and he reflected and he wrote the words to I Wonder as I Wander as we have them today.
As he paid her those quarters trying to get the message, trying to hear it so that he would know what to write down. He kept getting a garbled picture of what he needed.
She’d sometimes hum it. She’d sometimes say the same words over but she wouldn’t give them the whole thing. I don’t know if she knew it or not.
And he had to seek to clarify that to somehow reach the truth.
Friends as we come to Christmas, sometimes we get a very garbled message. And even as we wonder about the miracle of Christmas, we end up arriving someplace garbled.
We hear about peace and love, but we forget the one who brings that peace and love.
We experience discord at Christmas even. We get stressed out and tired at Christmas and we think, where is the one who said he was going to revive us?
We face death of loved ones at Christmas. And we think where’s the one who said he was going to bring life?
We get garbled message.
The people, as they listen to Jesus, they heard part of it, but they were so fixated on what the Messiah would look like. They were so fixated on who he could be and what he should say and what he should do.
The rest might have as well been garbled to them. They couldn’t hear. And what did Jesus say? The Father would bring some of them to him.
The Holy Spirit would enable them to hear. And maybe that needs to be your prayer tonight. You say, I am hearing a garbled message to him. I hear this every year.
I know what you’re saying. I could say the words, but it doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t know how to apply it.
Sometimes it all starts with just not giving a quarter to someone to sing, but to stop. By where God’s singing.
Because he’ll sing gladly for you. Say, Lord, I need your help. I don’t know how to make sense of this.
And here’s the beautiful thing. The fact that Jesus was here at this time teaching, that God did indeed come and teach the people for himself shows that he’ll be faithful to do that for you today too.
And when we get through all that garbled mess, we realize that the reason that we continue to ache is because we desperately need a savior, this world desperately needs a savior.
And as we declare that on Christmas and sometimes it’s painful, maybe your family isn’t receptive to it and it hurts.
They need a savior. And as we tell it to them and we don’t always think the most kind thoughts.
We need a savior.
Say, but Jesus, if you’re just looking down from the sky at us, I’m in trouble.
He’s a savior that came to stay with us. That’s the ungarbled truth. That’s the message of Christmas, that Jesus came into this world.
And by the power of his spirit, he is with anyone. Who seeks him tonight.
You can ask him tonight. What’s our response going to be?
If you believed in him, if you trusted in him, is our response going to be to say to those who maybe are obnoxious at Christmas, maybe those who are ununderstanding at Christmas, maybe those who would like to sing Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer and Santa Claus is coming to town, but stop dead silent if you actually sing a carol that mentions Jesus and you just…
What’s wrong with you? Don’t you know that Jesus is the reason for the season? What’s our response going to be?
Are we going to say there’s people that need the savior? There’s someone who needs Jesus like I need Jesus.
We’re going to pray, Lord, help me to be your hands and feet. Let me take your light to the people who need it.
One of our favorite Christmas traditions pretty much anywhere you go and not just here at Little Hills, is to light a candle on Christmas Eve. I’m going to ask Jim to come up and help me with that.
And as we light candles. I’m going to give Jim some light in a moment here.
And as I give Jim that light. Now the two of us have light.
And see, we come to the light that Jesus has provided, and then what do we do? We start to share that light.
And as we share that light, we start to see other people’s lights light up too.
We see that because of one silent night. There isn’t darkness. There need not be darkness. There need not be death.
There can be hope.
As we look at that light form, we’re reminded that God called us. The one who brought light into the world the one who is the light in the world called us, to receive his light.
And as we do, to take that light. Take that light and to sing. To sing of the silent night that was, and the reality that came from that silent night that still is.
Let us stand and sing.
Would you please lift your candles up high that we can shine that light to the world that needs it? We can shine it to each other. We bring that joy, that light to each other.
Look around at that beautiful sight. I love to take this in and think about it.
It’s one of my very favorite moments every Christmas Eve is to see the light of God represented this way.
But here’s the other thing. We’re going to lower our arms, aren’t we?
And then we’re going to extinguish these candles. And you can go ahead and do so if you’d like.
Well, I don’t really want to, but.
We extinguish these candles. You may be seated. And we look at them.
And it looks like it’s extinguished in that moment where we could feel the warmth of the fellowship together and that beauty of the light that God has given us feels like it has passed.
But God gave us another symbol. He didn’t actually call us to raise candles, although it’s biblical to think about the picture of light.
What did he call us to do? What did Jesus tell his followers to do to remember the light that came into the world? He called us to the Lord’s table.
And Jim, if you want to come back up we’re going to prepare our hearts now for that Lord’s table.
Now, Jim, as we do, the question, the question we got here is, who all takes this? Right. Who partakes?
Oh, the partaker of this is somebody, this is a reminder of what we did on the cross what Jesus Christ did, and then when we accepted Jesus Christ as our savior, so this is really for this Christian people for people who accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, entrusted him and living him.
This is a reminder of us Christians, what Christ did for us on the cross.
But maybe you’re unsure about your salvation, unsure if you really should trust in Jesus, or if you have questions about it.
Pastor Tim and I are always open to questioning that and feeling you and going through the biblical Bible in the process of what it means to fully trusting Jesus Christ.
But we ask that, since this is only for Christians, if you never accepted Christ just let the elements pass by.
If you’re at home also, you know, don’t just take it because it’s something ritual or something nice to do, but because God says that if you do this you’re causing damnation upon yourself.
And that’s not what’s important is Tim is a leader and me, also is that we don’t want that to happen.
That’s why every Sunday we come up here and we teach you the word so that way to help you walk in the light. As the candle is lit, you know, help us walk in the light, not in the darkness.
But there’s just something about that God said, don’t do this. Or if there’s something even like if you’re aggravated or like church disciplined or aggravated at God or at people, you know, you can let it pass until you get that cleanliness back in your heart again. Okay?
But here is the truth about that. That it’s not any special miracle that Jim or I need to do. We don’t have to do something for you so you can take and suddenly it means something.
All you need to do is to know the Lord Jesus. What we’ve been talking about, have him abide in you.
And so maybe you’re online tonight and you’re saying, I’d like to carry Christmas beyond tonight. We have our church family on there. They’d love to pray with you and walk you through that.
And then maybe you’re saying tonight, I’m weary, I’m broken. I am struggling to have kind thoughts. Say, Lord, Jesus, help me. And then come to this table.
Come to this table and receive that you would be reminded of his grace and that he abides in you.
And so it was on the night he was betrayed. Jesus took the bread and he broke it. And he said, this is my body, which is for you, do this in remembrance of me.
And in like manner after supper, he took the cup. And he said, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink of it in remembrance of me.
For as often as you eat this bread and you drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. Let us pray.
Lord, we come before you not as those worthy. Even as Jim was challenging us a moment ago, I can think of a thousand things I could say that would be kinder to people. I can think of a thousand places I’ve failed.
Lord, what you remind us is that what matters is that we come before you. That we say, God help me as I struggle. I can’t save myself.
I can’t get grace for myself. The message is garbled when I do it myself. Lord, I need your strength. I need your grace.
As we come before these elements, Lord, we pray that you’d bless them, and that the power of your Holy Spirit, you might communicate the very body and blood of our Savior, Jesus, to us, that we might as he promises in John 6, have him abide in us, and us in him, as we eat his body and drink his blood that we might be strengthened, and that we always would know that he is with us both on Christmas day, and every other day of the year.
We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.
This is my body which is broken for you break and eat.
This is my blood, which is shed for you for the remission of your sins, take and drink.
Wonderful news. Yes. It is that Jesus abides with us. He answers that prayer. Because of that silent night. Correct.
And because of that day that he went to the cross. And now his spirit is there with us each and every day.
We’re going to go out tonight. We’re not going to have Sunday School Express. I just should mention that. We’ll return next week because every week when we study that, we’re preparing our hearts to be that light in the world.
The mission to be the light in the world doesn’t end when we extinguish that candle. Because Jesus abides with us.
Let me also just mention to you that we have our 12 days of Christmas devotional booklet, and I hope that you will download. It will be available shortly from our website.
You can go on and download it at littlehills.church/devotional will be on by midnight tonight.
I’ll also put a Facebook event if you wanted to be able to discuss it with people over the course of the next 12 days. It’s a completely free download.
And why do we do that? To help us to think, how do we take that light genuinely into the world?
We’re not going to walk into January carrying a candle around lit everywhere we go, you go to office here. I have my candle. How are we gonna do it?
We’re gonna do it by showing the light that Jesus raises in our lives.
And so, again, if you haven’t already please do download that, well, you can’t download it yet, but you will be able to shortly and go on that journey with us.
Part of that will be started kicking it off tomorrow with the brand new series Christmas Day series. Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence 7 p.m. live stream only.
We won’t be here in person tomorrow night but we will have a Christmas service, 7 p.m. tomorrow.
We’ll begin a series thinking about the things we’re going through in that devotional, about the spiritual fruit that God brings out in our lives and how we apply that, how we share the best gifts of Christmas with those around us.
Also, this week, if you just need a little Christmas cheer daytime throughout the week. Oh, Christmas stream is back, it will also be coming on by midnight tonight, and there will be a link on our church website and also at faithtreecf.org/christmasstream.
It is a continual loop of Christmas music Christmas devotionals, fireplace scenes the sort of thing you can just put on maybe the TV in the background as you go about Christmas week, and get a little bit very minor about what we’re celebrating throughout, and hopefully be encouraged by that.
If there’s any way that we can pray for you, if you are new here, we would love to hear from you at 833-356-4032. That’s 833-356-4032.
Remember, you can also send prayer requests straight to that line. We’d love to pray for you on this Christmas Eve or any day of the year.
So we close tonight. Choir’s going to come back up because we need to have a little bit more joy. We need to celebrate just a little more.
Let’s go back to that silent night and allow the choir to guide us as we sing of the Savior’s birth.
As we close tonight, remember that our God is the God who abides with us. Our God is the God who is born, and who lives.
And our God, as the God, will live each and every day.
When you receive this benediction, please for us. May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all both now and forevermore. Amen.
Go in peace.
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