MK040 Sermons
The Gift of God's Presence (Audio)
At times it seems pretty far away. What about a Christmas? It's a lot of things happen in a Christmas, a lot of things that don't happen the other times of the year, church is full on Wednesday night. When does that happen? Except to Christmas. Shopping, decorations, lots of parties, bank account a little bit lower, vacation time in the middle of the week. It's clear indicator that there's something different about this time of year. But I think as it relates to God being with us, I think sometimes we want God to almost act a little bit like Santa Claus, you know, to bring us some good things, some things that we hope will happen, some things that we would like to see happen in our lives are like, "Let me kind of nice if you did that for me this year, kind of deserve it." Other times we kind of wish God was a little bit like a firefighter and he'd come and put out the fires in our lives, the things that, you know, are kind of painful and uncomfortable and kind of making a mess of things or maybe that God would just show up and would like a police officer kind of push people in their opposite corner so things would go along a little smoother than they have been. But I want to suggest, you know, that God is something somewhat different than all of those things, that he's not like Santa Claus or he's not like a fireman or like a policeman. I want to suggest to you that God's place in our lives is as a trusted guide who can lead you through anything that comes your way. Last summer I had the opportunity with a few other guys here at CCC with their father, with their sons to go on a whitewater rafting trip out in western Pennsylvania and we were getting the details ready for this trip and my wife was putting the details, some of the details and finalizing some of the reservations and she said to us, she said, "You guys want a guide?" And I was like, "Does it cost any extra money?" No, it doesn't cost any money. I was like, "What can it hurt?" Yeah, get us a guide. So that's kind of how our vacation planning usually goes, you know? So she got us a guide. So we got there and you can kind of see the guys that are in there, that's a pretty good group of guys. Some are sitting here on the front row with us this evening, you know, and of course they give us this guy in the back who doesn't have any shirt on and you know, with a nice look and helmet and all buff and you know, there's a bunch of us guys there but you know, so we all get out there in this boat and there's 12 boats, I think 12 to 14 boats and guess how many boats had a guide? Three, us and our sons and one other boat had a guide, that was it, that was it. And so we're kind of looking around at the rest of the people in the boats and like there's a bunch of Japanese students over here, you know, they're in their boat and over in this boat is a father and his wife and his daughter and they're in their boat and they don't have a guide and kind of feeling a little self-conscious here, well like, you know, we got a guy with us, he's canoeed down, half the east coast with a bunch of teenagers before we should be able to do this without a guide, you know. And so as we're out there preparing the guide is telling us now when I say this I want you to stroke this way and when I say this I want you to lean this way and when I say this I want you to do this and he's giving us these instructions and we're kind of practicing and we're really like thinking do we really need this, do we really need a guide, do we really need a guide, do you ever been at that place in your life where you think do I really need a guide, I think I'm doing alright and then all of a sudden life collapses on top of you, life collapses financially when a few decisions that you made you thought in the moment were good decisions and all of a sudden they collapse and you realize I need someone to give me some direction here, maybe relationally you pursued this relationship it didn't work out, you pursued this one it didn't work out, you pursued this one and there's problems and there's just kind of this trail of broken fractured relationship and you look behind you like maybe I need a guide here, maybe you're trying to find peace for your soul and you're trying to find it through soothing that pain with drugs or alcohol or just addictive behaviors and you're like you know that's not really working for me, maybe I need a guide here, try to do all kinds of things to make yourself feel good about yourself and at the end of the day when you buy yourself at night, it doesn't work, you think maybe I need a guide. In the Bible there's a story of a man, a man that we're pretty familiar with, his name is Joseph and life was going pretty good for Joseph, the Bible tells us his story in Matthew chapter 1 verse 18 the verses are going to come up on the screen it says this is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about, his mother Mary which pleas to be married to Joseph but before they came together she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit because Joseph her husband was a righteous man, did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. Joseph was a good guy, Joseph did what was right, Joseph did what was expected, he found it kind of followed the straight and narrow and in those days marriages were arranged in that culture and so his parents contacted Mary things exchanged and then it's planned and she's in our terms engaged and what the groom would then do is then he would build an addition to his home or sometimes a smaller home on their property that would become their home for a number of months, sometimes six to eight months before they would actually be married. During this time the Luke another writer of the birth of Jesus tells us that Mary after she, shortly after she was engaged to Joseph she went away to be with a relative named Elizabeth and when she came back after being away with Elizabeth she said Joseph I have some news to tell you, Joseph's like what news is that and he said she said I'm pregnant, what do you think Joseph's first thought or words were who's the father because I know it isn't me and then Mary comes back with this line she says um by the way God's the father and Joseph's thinking wow that's a new one, never heard that one before, Joseph's a good man, he cares about this woman but he knows the rules of the land and he follows the rules of the land and the rules of the land were in that day and in that culture that if a woman became pregnant with a child before she was married that she would actually be stoned to death but Joseph didn't want that to happen somehow he wanted to spare her and so he's caught in this dilemma of trying to figure out what do I do to spare her it's at the same time to follow the rules of the law. It goes to bed at night but that thought is mine and look in verse 20 at what happens but after he'd considered these options an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said Joseph son of David don't be afraid to take Mary home as your wife because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit she will give birth to a son and you are to give him the name Jesus because he will save his people from their sins. So in the middle of the night is he's wrestling over what am I going to do and how am I going to care for this woman that I love and yet still fulfill the law of the land that I live in and an angel shows up to give him direction and some of you are thinking how convenient for him that never happened to me but how convenient for him and then look what the angel does the angel basically says Mary's telling the truth so listen to her now many of you women are wishing that an angel would show up in your husband's dreams occasionally and tell him just the same thing but that's literally what happened to Joseph and the angel says this is what his name is and then the angel goes on to say he will save his people which that would have been amazing news for Joseph to hear because the Israel the Jewish people at that time were under Roman rule and the Romans kind of let them do whatever they wanted to do but they were anticipating one day that they would not be under Roman rule and that they would rule in that land and that God would be their king and they were waiting for someone to free them from the oppression of the Roman government even though it was somewhat of a benevolent dictatorship at that time and so to hear that my son is going to be the one that's going to save the people must have been amazing news for Joseph to hear but the angel added these three words at the end from their sin my guess is Joseph didn't really understand what that meant. Bible is pretty clear that we all at their core as we are born into this world are sinful meaning we choose our own way when given the opportunity and we don't choose the way God wants us to go don't have to watch a child that's very old to discover that they all have a sinful bent or nature in them but the Bible also says that sin is what keeps man from having a relationship with God and God so loved mankind that he wanted a relationship they had to find a way to do something about this sin so that man could have this relationship with God and that's what Jesus was going to be he goes on in verse 22 to describe it a little bit more and we don't know if these were words that were said to Joseph or words that were just stated by the writer Matthew he said all this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet a virgin will be with child will give birth to a son and they will call him Emmanuel which means God with us you see nearly 700 years earlier there was a prophet by the name of Isaiah and God spoke to this prophet which is how God communicated in those days and he said to him there's going to be a young woman and she's going to give birth to a child and his name is going to be Emmanuel which means God with us you see God's plan was not to send an army of angels to rescue his people he's done that before his plan wasn't to send fire from heaven to wipe out the bad guys he's done that before his plan wasn't to simply wipe bad guys off with water or fire but his plan was to send a baby whose name means God with us yet he didn't send a baby to make life easier he didn't send a baby to eliminate pain and suffering he sent a baby to be with us to be present to offer guidance and direction to us so you want to know what happened on the rafting trip let me tell you what happened on the rafting trip so we our raft happened to be the raft with one of the guides and so our guide said we're going to be the first raft through the rapids and so as we come down the rapids the rap the guide says row this way so we rode this way said lean this way so we lean this way and he said do this and we did that and we slid right through those rapids and it was really a cool experience to do that and then we got to turn around and watch every other raft come through the rapids and and I got to tell you that was the most amazing experience to watch these other rafts come through the rapids I mean they came through the rapids sideways they came through the rapids backwards you know they came through the rapids upside down with the raft on top of them and they're trapped underneath the raft I mean and this happened for five hours is how long this happened so at the end of the raft ride you know we're carrying our raft out we're high five want to say that was great guys we had a blast we should do this again and you should have seen the people that we pulled out of the water repeatedly over and over again they were could barely walk out of the water they were like dying they were this is the worst experience of their lives I mean that one guy there's a couple hundred pounds we pulled him out two or three times out of the water I think by the third time he's ready just to go to shore and walk home you know and why was that why we all went down the same rapids we all faced the same challenges we all went through down that river the only difference was what we had a guide that was the only thing that made the difference we had a guide and the question for each of us to ask ourselves tonight as we think about the birth of Jesus and his arrival signaling to us that it is possible for you to go through the struggles of this life with the guide and that's God's son Jesus to be with you you don't have to go through it on your own you don't have to face them by yourself you will face them we all will we can't avoid the rapids of life watch in the video as so what hope do you have as you face the rapids of your life are you just going to try to do your best navigate it on your own maybe that's what you've been trying to do and this evening as we look at the the story of Jesus and his arrival and the significance of his name of God being with us he offers to each of us a relationship a relationship with Jesus and the God of the heavens a relationship that will provide for you a guy that will be there with you not taking you away from the rapids of life but will guide you through them and help you navigate down that road many of us tomorrow or tonight will give gifts but will also receive gifts we receive a gift we take that gift and it becomes our own and the Bible says that everyone who receives the gift of Jesus they become one of God's own they become one of his children and he will walk through life with them and as it said in the verse that was read he'll never leave you and never forsake you no matter what you're going to face and so this evening it's an opportunity for you if you've never taken that step in your journey to say God I've kind of navigated life on my own I've done my own thing I know about God and I've celebrated Christmas and I'm here in church but I've never said you know Jesus I'm going to let you take over the lead in my life and maybe tonight's the night that you will do that Johnny and the team are going to lead us in a song that reminds us about God's place in our lives and the role that he wants to play as we navigate through the rapids of this life.