Living Water Church

“Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14.

Christmas is the one time of year that our culture acknowledges the Lordship of Jesus Christ.  In the mall the other day, I heard the song, “Joy to the World the Lord is come…” blaring through the mall’s sound system.  The entire mall, through song, was proclaiming that Jesus Christ is the Lord God.  However, notice that the season glorifies the infancy of Jesus and not His Deity.  Jesus came to the earth two thousand years ago as a humble baby. He will return to the earth a second time as the reigning, ruling King.  He will come with the sound of the trumpet and every knee will bow, not to a crying baby but to the Lion of Judah on the throne.

This same God, the Lion of Judah, the King of all kings, to whom every knee will bow, now resides with us.  When I consider the Christmas season, the one word that seems to sum it all up for me is, “Immanuel.”  God promises to be with us. He goes with us everywhere we go, helps us, comforts us, convicts us, and ultimately loves us.  It’s not the baby in a manger that is with us, it is the Lord God Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth.  He is all-powerful, all-knowing, good and kind. And He is with us.

He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in still another village, where he worked in a carpenter shop until he was thirty. Then for three years he was an itinerant preacher.

He never wrote a book.  He never held an office.  He never had a family or owned a house.  He didn’t go to college.  He never traveled 200 miles from the place where he was born.  He did none of these things one usually associates with greatness.  He had no credentials but himself.

He was only 33 when public opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. He was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves.

When he was dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing, the only property he had on earth. When he was dead, he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Nineteen centuries have come and gone, and today he is the central figure of the human race, the leader of mankind’s progress.

All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on earth as much as that One Solitary Life.

adapted from a 1926 sermon by Dr James Allan Francis

Just this week I heard someone say how hard the Christmas season is on so many people.  Doesn’t it almost feel like a marathon from Thanksgiving to Christmas?  All the shopping, baking, buying, wrapping…  It’s easy to get too busy and spend too much money.  We easily exert our energy focused on the wrong thing.

Consider the wise men.  (They were called ‘wise’ after all.)  They traveled hundreds of miles across the desert to seek out the baby King.  Did they feel rushed in their journey?  Did they worry about arriving too late and missing the biggest event in all of history?  Were they burdened by their desire to present gifts.  I would imagine that gold, frankincense, and myrrh were fairly costly.  Were they overwhelmed by the expense?

To answer the questions, I seriously doubt they were worried about any of these issues.  Near the end of their journey, Matt 2:10 tells us they “rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.”  Why were they not burdened by their travels? by their added expenses?  Perhaps because their focus wasn’t on these things but rather on something else much more significant — coming to worship the new born King.

This Christmas season, choose to focus on the right thing.  Reject the pressure to attend every event.  Don’t go into debt to buy the perfect gift.  Don’t live to please our society.  Rather, focus on Jesus.  Worship the King.  Be a wise man.                Adapted from Billy Graham, Hope for Each Day

Continued from last week… I am on a negativity fast.  I am attempting to eliminate negativity in what I say, hear, and think.  And to be completely honest, it has not been an easy task.  I have been amazed at the amount of negativity that pervades our culture.  Because of my fast, I have become more aware of it.  Very few people seem to see anything wrong with being negative.  It’s the norm.  People laugh at it.  T.V. all but glorifies it.  Sadly, I think we all have become acclimated to our culture’s negative atmosphere, acclimated to the point that it doesn’t bother us (like it should).  In my fast, it began to trouble me.  And funny as it may seem, I became negative about all the negativity.

In Philippians, Paul tells us over and over again to rejoice.  He also instructs the church to do all things without grumbling.  All things?  ALL things.  In choosing not to grumble, in choosing to rejoice, in being careful in what I let myself listen to, I have had a very good week.  As I attempted to tune out negativity (my own and other people’s), I found myself more peaceful, more loving, and gentler with my children.  I laughed more, I was kinder to my loved ones and to strangers.  In all, I think the culture of negativity affects our lives more than we realize.  So fast negativity, do all things without grumbling or faultfinding … choose to rejoice.