It’s All About Joy!

Today we're talking about joy coming into the world. Open with us to Luke chapter two. Somebody's singing, and you sound good! You sound like that guy who won the karaoke award that day; that was incredible. Merry Christmas to all of you! Welcome to Cross Connection Church. Thank you for being here this morning. I'm Pastor Miles. If you're visiting us for the first time, welcome! We're glad you're here.

If you wouldn't mind taking out your Bible, if you don't have one, you can raise your hand, and one of our ushers will bring you one. We are going to read one verse in the New Testament, in the Gospel of Luke. So, right about two-thirds of the way through your Bible, you'll find the Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. We're going to be in Luke chapter two, and if you wouldn't mind standing with me as we read this verse.

In Luke chapter two, there are shepherds near Bethlehem where Jesus was born, and an angel appears to them. In verse 10, we read this: "Then the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.'"

Father, as we stand here this morning with our Bibles open, I pray that our hearts would also be open. Speak to us, and as we finish up this series that we've been going through in preparation for Christmas—Christmas being tomorrow—here we are on Christmas Eve. I pray, God, that you would help us to fully understand in our minds and hearts why this whole thing called Christmas is important. So speak to us today and continue to enlighten us with your truth from the Scriptures. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

You may be seated. We started just a few weeks ago with this series called "Why Christmas Is." We're getting ready to celebrate, and of course, it's amazing how...

Quickly, this season just kind of flies by. Can you believe that tomorrow is Christmas Day? It's pretty awesome! All the kids are probably super excited.

As we've been preparing for Christmas, I find, and as these videos that we've been showing make very clear, that there are a lot of people who celebrate Christmas. In fact, a survey done in 2015 and again this year found that 92% of Americans celebrate Christmas. The overwhelming majority of the people in our nation celebrate this holiday every year in December.

However, when you ask them why they celebrate, as I did down on Black Friday, you often get what Pastor Mark called the "human dial tone." It's kind of like people just stand there, going, "I don't know why I celebrate." They might start to go through it and mention some good reasons related to family, tradition, and happiness, but when you get right down to it, people don't often know or have a good reason for why we celebrate this holiday.

They may be able to tell you some of the details of what took place in the Nativity story that we talked about last night. If you were here for our Christmas Eve Eve service, we went through this story as given to us in Luke and Matthew, two of the Gospels. People might be able to talk about Mary, Joseph, Bethlehem, wise men, shepherds, and angels. They might know some of the details, some of the "whats" of Christmas.

But when you get right down to it, if you ask them why we celebrate the birth of this child that took place 2,000 years ago in a place far, far away from here, you have to wonder why this is so important. Why do 92% of the people in our nation celebrate this holiday? Why do billions of people around the world who name the name of Jesus celebrate the birth of Jesus of Nazareth? Why was His coming so important?

We have been looking at this and trying to answer this question biblically. The first thing that we saw a few weeks ago is that we celebrate Christmas because we live in a broken world. Man's disobedience, as described all the way back in the first book of the Bible, the book of Genesis, reveals that through one man, sin entered the world, and death through sin. Death spread to all humanity because all sinned. Therefore, we all experience the brokenness of this world. I would say that there is no more painful brokenness than that of death. There is no more devastating brokenness than that of death. It is our greatest enemy.

Pain is our greatest fear, and the Scriptures reveal that it is our strongest enemy. Some of you this year have been confronted in a very personal and intimate way with the reality of the brokenness of death. For some of you sitting here today, this is the first Christmas you are celebrating without a special someone in your life who died this year. It has been a tough year for many of you, and we have prayed with a number of you through that difficulty. We all realize the brokenness of this world.

I spent a lot of time this last week with people who are affected by the brokenness of life in this world. Of course, we had a firefighter who was born and raised here in Escondido and graduated from Orange Glen High School back in 2004. Cory Iverson, with CAL FIRE, died in the Thomas Fire on December 14th. As a chaplain with the fire department, I have the opportunity to spend a lot of time with those in emergency medical service and the fire service. This last week, I spent a lot of time at various fire stations here in Escondido, sitting down at the tables with the firefighters.

These individuals see a lot of horrific things; they experience the brokenness of this world like not many people do. They witness the reality of tragic accidents and the unfortunate realities of infant drownings. They are there when people have lost a loved one, and they see people hurt in such a horrible way many times. It affects them deeply, but nothing impacts them more than the death of a firefighter, especially an on-duty death. While they see truly horrific things, this particular event hits home more than anything else.

I found myself sitting at many tables this week with firefighters, many of whom do not really go to church or have not been interested in the things of God. I have had the opportunity to share the things of God with them many times, which is great. However, in that circumstance, when death confronts them in a way that it does not often confront them—thankfully, on-duty deaths are rare, praise the Lord for that—they are truly faced with the brokenness. I had the opportunity to talk about that.

When we get into the whole discussion of Christmas, we find that the Scriptures reveal, point number one on your sermon guide, that Christmas is God's response to our brokenness. Genesis chapter 3 reveals where the brokenness came from. We are all intimately affected by that brokenness. There is not a person in this world who does not experience it, whether they are a churchgoer or not.

The Bible helps us understand the reality of brokenness in the world. When brokenness and sin brought death into this world, God's response was to deal with it. Christmas is all about God addressing the brokenness that exists. The reason God sets out to deal with that brokenness, as we've discovered over the last several weeks, is that our God is the gift-giving God. When He saw the world affected by sin and death, He set out to address that problem because He is the gift-giving God.

An amazing verse that I find really inspiring is found in Revelation chapter 13, verse 8. As I was finishing up some of my reading in the Scriptures this year, I came across this verse. It says that Jesus is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. This means that God knew, before He ever said, "Let there be light," and before He created anything, exactly what He was going to do in response to our brokenness and sin. He had a redemptive plan, a sacrificial plan to deal with it, because Jesus is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world.

In alignment with His nature and character, God created the world we live in as it is. He is not going to force us to follow Him; He is not going to force us to love or be devoted to Him. Therefore, He gave humanity the opportunity to fall. He allowed for the choice not to follow and to be devoted to God through the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, as described in Genesis chapters two and three. This gave the opportunity for sin to enter the world. God knew that because of our frailty and smallness, we would disobey and turn toward the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, resulting in sin and death entering the world.

However, even before that happened, because God is the gift-giving God, He had a plan to deal with this brokenness. Every single person we know—neighbors, friends, family members, and co-workers—tries to deal with this brokenness in various ways because we are all affected by it. We attempt to deaden it, soften it, or take it away. In observing the people I know and watching the culture we live in, I have found that some of the...

The things we do during the holidays are often just distractions meant to shield us from the pain and brokenness of this world. The various happy traditions associated with holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas serve to keep that pain at a distance. For a brief moment during the Christmas season, we might be able to dull the brokenness through gifts, gatherings, food, lights, ornaments, and all the festive activities we engage in. However, once the gift wrap is thrown in the trash and the Christmas decorations are stored away in the rafters or the garage, we are immediately confronted with the brokenness of this world again. In fact, the reality of that brokenness hits hard as soon as the credit card bill arrives, reminding us of the struggles we face.

We try to cope with this brokenness, but everything we do to address it is merely like putting band-aids on arterial bleeds; it will never fully resolve the issues we encounter. Yet, because God is the gift-giving God, He set out to tackle the root problem, not just the symptoms. He aims to address the core of our brokenness.

Point number two on your outline is that Jesus is our Father's Christmas gift to deal with our brokenness. But why does He do this? Last week, we discovered that the reason God acts in this way is not only because He is the gift-giving God, but also because, to God, life is precious. We innately understand the brokenness of this world, and we also recognize that life is valuable.

This understanding is why a very public death, such as that of firefighter Corey Iverson, affects us deeply. Many people stood to honor Corey Iverson as his remains were transported from Ventura to San Diego last Sunday. I happened to be near the overpass at Via Rancho Parkway when the procession passed through. My daughter, Evangeline, and I stood there with a group of firefighters and many others, watching and honoring him as he went by. Yesterday, I had the privilege of standing with thousands of firefighters in remembrance of him.

Rock Church in San Diego held the funeral for Cory Iverson, and at the beginning, they had the procession come in. His family and thousands of people gathered together to honor him. The death of Cory Iverson is challenging for us, but it reminds us of the preciousness of life. The reality of the preciousness of life is rooted in the fact that God created us in His image. He created us to have that very thing.

Sadly, it wasn't only the death of Cory Iverson that affected the firefighter community this week. We also had a former firefighter here in Escondido who took his life at the beginning of December. This was challenging for the guys here in Escondido as they reflected on these events. It brings us back to the preciousness of life. We love life; we find it precious because God created us to do so. However, it was our disobedience and weakness that brought sin, death, and brokenness into this world.

Because God loves life and considers it precious, He sets out to deal with that brokenness. The greatest verse of the Bible, perhaps the most translated verse, is John 3:16. You have probably seen it in the end zone of a football game or two. It reads, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but have everlasting life." Because of God's love, He sends His Son for us.

In the Gospel of John, specifically John chapter 6, there is a message from Jesus given to the people who were listening to Him in His day. A multitude of people heard Him say this challenging message. Jesus spoke in poetic metaphor in John chapter 6, but the people who heard His words took them very literally. The things He was saying, if taken literally, were striking and somewhat odd.

In John chapter 6, verse 33, Jesus says, "For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." Here, Jesus connects His coming to this world with the story of Exodus in the beginning of the Bible. If you've read the book of Exodus, you know the story of Moses. God sent Moses down to Egypt to bring the children of Israel out of bondage. He went to Pharaoh and said, "Let my people go." Ultimately, through the power of God and ten plagues, the people of Israel were released from Egypt. They crossed over the Red Sea and came into the promised land.

The wilderness was where the Israelites would stay for forty years. When they first entered the wilderness, they realized there was a major lack of food. This huge encampment of people, maybe a million strong, did not have enough food, so they cried out to God. Moses went to God in prayer, and God provided them with miraculous food from heaven.

They woke up in the morning, went outside their tents, and found a substance all over the ground. They asked, "What is it?" They called it manna, which literally means "What is it?" Moses instructed them to pick it up and eat it, and so they did. For forty years, every single morning, God provided bread from heaven—this manna that they would eat. He took care of them, and in that story, it points to Jesus. All the Old Testament stories point to Jesus in some way, and this one does so in a very beautiful way.

In John chapter 6, Jesus references the story of manna in Exodus. He says, "Listen, just like your fathers ate bread from heaven that fed them while they were in the wilderness so that they would not die." In John 6, verse 33, He states, "The bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." He continues in verse 50, saying, "This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever, and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of this world."

The people hearing this, the multitudes, took it very literally. They reacted, "Hold on a second, you're telling us we have to eat your flesh, your body? Are you calling us to cannibalism?" They were completely freaked out. He also mentioned that they had to drink His blood, and they thought, "Okay, vampirism and cannibalism all in one message? I'm out." As a result, many of His followers left Him. John 6:66 states that many of His followers no longer followed Him after that message because they couldn't understand the metaphor He was using. He wasn't speaking literally; He was saying that to have life, you must take in His life.

God loves life. Jesus says, "I give My life for your life so that you would know the path of life." In John chapter 14, verse 6, Jesus declared, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by Me."

Point number three on your outline is that Jesus came to die for our life.

To die for our life is a simple statement, and it encapsulates the essence of the gospel—the good news. Though it's simple, it is profound. For some of you, if this is your church or if you've been around church for a long time, you know this truth. You've heard it many times, so it's not new to you. However, I think sometimes we need to be reminded of these very simple truths. Even though we think we know them, we often add so many other things to the good news of Jesus.

The salvation that Jesus came to give was simply this: He died so that we could have life. Through our sin and disobedience, death came into this world. But the one who originally gave us life came down to deal with the problem of sin and death. He took death for us, challenged it, and raised from the dead so that we could have life.

We often add all kinds of things, such as church attendance at a specific church, a specific way of baptism, service, or giving. We say you have to do all these things to have salvation. Yet, Jesus simply says, "I came to die in your place." All He calls us to do is to put our trust in Him and to receive Him. John chapter 1 tells us that as many as received Him and believed on His name, to them He gave the right to be called the children of God.

So, though we add many things to the gospel, we need to constantly return to the simplicity of the gospel: that Jesus came to die for our life. But it's not only for life forever; Jesus did not merely die so that we could have eternal life. He died so that we could have abundant life. In John chapter 10, Jesus said in verse 10, "The thief has come to steal, to kill, and to destroy. But I have come that you may have life, and that you may have it more abundantly." Another translation says that you may have life to its fullest.

I pointed out in our study last time that when you read Genesis chapters 1 and 2, it says that God created a garden filled with all kinds of trees that were beautiful to behold and also had wonderful fruit that you could eat. Among all of the fruit-bearing trees in the garden, there were two unique trees. One was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which God said, "If you eat of that, you will surely die." But there was also the Tree of Life. Genesis chapter 2, verse 9 tells us that the Tree of Life was in the midst of the garden.

Now, if God is the gift-giving God, and if...

God looks upon the brokenness of this world because of our sin, the death that has come about because of our sin. If He loves life and He is the giver of life, then why would He not immediately have given Adam and Eve the Tree of Life after they had eaten from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which brought death? Why didn't He immediately say, "Here, come over here! I want you to eat of the Tree of Life, and you'll live"?

In fact, not only did He not give them the Tree of Life, but Genesis chapter 3 says that He expelled them from the garden and put an angel there to guard the way back to the garden so that they would not eat of the Tree of Life. The only thing that we can deduce is that when God looked at the brokenness of this world because of sin, He wanted to deal with the brokenness and deal with death. He did not want those people, Adam and Eve or us, to eat of the Tree of Life and have life forever in a broken world. It is not God's desire or design that we would live forever in our broken state.

Honestly, I don't think I would want to live forever in a broken state. Yesterday, I was walking down the stairs at our house, talking to my wife as I was walking out. I was wearing socks on our stairs, which have really thick carpet. As I was looking up and talking to her, I slipped and fell, landing right on my shoulder. My shoulder is killing me this morning. If I had to live forever in a broken world, that would be horrible. I don't want to live forever in pain and brokenness.

My hope, my future that I'm looking forward to, is life in the Kingdom of God, where there is no sorrow, no tears, no sickness, and no pain. That sounds good! That's the kind of abundant life that we are desiring and looking forward to. What exactly is it? Well, it's a life like that which is described in Psalm 16. If you wouldn't mind turning there, about the middle of your Bible, you'll find the big book of Psalms. There are one hundred and fifty of them, so turn and find Psalm 16. It was written about three thousand years ago by King David, the great psalmist of Israel.

As you're turning there, I want to tell you a beautiful story about Psalm 16 that I heard yesterday. I was at the funeral for Corey Iverson, and his widowed wife, Ashley Iverson, got up and shared. It was absolutely amazing. She shared that on the morning of December 14th, when Ashley was getting up, she is a strong believer who believes in Jesus. She was reading the scriptures and happened to be at Psalm 16, which deals with...

Addresses the pain of death and the problem of death. On the morning of December 14th, as she was reading a passage, she thought that maybe the Lord was giving her that verse for a family member who has cancer and has been facing the possibility of death. About two hours after she read that, the chief for San Diego County CalFire showed up at her door to let her know that her husband had died in the Thomas fire. She realized that the verse was not for her uncle; it was for her at that moment. God, in His infinite wisdom and grace, gave her this beautiful passage of Scripture.

Look at what it says in Psalm 16, beginning at verse 9, the words of King David three thousand years ago: "Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; my flesh also will rest in hope." Why do we have hope? "For You, God, will not leave my soul in the grave, Sheol, nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy, and at Your right hand are

Jesus came to deal with that problem, and so we have this beautiful opportunity every single December. As we gather together with friends, we can return to the reality we read in Luke chapter 2.

"And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This census first took place while Quirinius was governing Syria. So all went to be registered, everyone to his own city. Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David. He went to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. So it was that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. She brought forth her firstborn son, wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn."

Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch

Good-looking people, nobody ever comes to Jesus enough. They never come good enough, beautiful enough, happy enough, intelligent enough, wealthy enough, or healthy enough. None of it matters, and we don't have to be enough to come to Christ. Jesus came down to us in our brokenness, and this is what Christmas is all about.

We've been going over this, and we've talked about it before at Cross-Connection Church. We'll talk about it again in the future because it's so important that we who know God understand this truth. Christmas exists because the world is broken, and our God is the gift-giving God who loves life. Because He loves life so much and loved us so much, He came and gave Himself so that you and I could have life. That is the good news of this holiday season.

When you gather together, I don't know what your tradition is. Maybe you get together with family members tonight or tomorrow. Whatever it is, there is an awesome opportunity for us to simply say, "Hey, listen, we're all celebrating Christmas today, but do you know why we celebrate this holiday?" You might find that some of the people you have known for a long time don't know why because they don't know Jesus.

As we're exchanging gifts with one another, may it be that we set out to exchange this gift. What an amazing gift we get to exchange: our sin, our shame, our guilt, our fear for His forgiveness, for His grace, for His joy, for His peace, for His rest. What an amazing thing! The Scripture says this: the Prophet Isaiah says that God takes away our ashes and gives us beauty. He takes away our mourning and gives us praise. It's a beautiful thing that our God does. He exchanges these things; He takes away all the brokenness of our lives and exchanges it for all the grace and goodness of His life. That's what this holiday is all about. Amen.

So, we're going to stand and pray in just a moment. After we're done praying, the worship team is going to lead us in "Joy to the World." In the first service, I had to come back up and tell them, "Listen, that was pitiful. You sang horribly. You need to sing ten times as loud; you’ve got to do it better." Then the worship team had to lead us a second time through "Joy to the World."

So, first service was horrible; second service, you're going to kill it, right? Ten times louder than you normally sing! You may say, "Well, I don't have a good voice." That's perfectly fine. The Bible doesn't say to sing with a good voice; it says to make a joyful noise unto the Lord. So, if all you can do is make a joyful noise, then do it!

Make a happy, joyful noise, because this is about joy coming to the world. Father, we thank You for Your great grace. I thank You for a holiday such as Christmas, for us to be able to gather together as friends and family members and to rejoice in the good things that You have done. This truly is all about joy coming to this world.

Jesus, You are the joy of this world, our Savior. Your wondrous love for us is something we are deeply grateful for. Lord, we thank You so much that You have demonstrated it to us; that while we were yet sinners, You died for us.

I pray that You would overcome our fears, our embarrassment, and our timidity. God, may we, with boldness, share the good news of who You are and what You have done for us by coming to this world. We praise You and thank You for this opportunity to rejoice in Your goodness.

Lord, give us strength to sing loud, we pray in Jesus' name.