Welcome to the Islands Christian Church podcast.
Subscribe to hear a new episode every week.
Thanks for joining us. OK, so if you can get your your
phone out and turn your flashlight on, who uses that
feature regularly on their phone, right, man, you're like
quickly, like, and you're like, you could get it on fast, right?
Brad's over here going, he's practicing.
He's like, I think I could do this.
I think I could have won. I didn't know there was a gift
card, but but you know, like you could pretty quick.
You can get that phone on, get that light on.
How many of you like you use it regularly?
Let me see again. OK, how many of you just learned
that your phone will do that? OK, good.
I did this in 2016 and about 1/3 of the room raised their hand.
They just learned that their phone will do that.
So we are advancing as a people. This is good to hear.
Why are we so quick at getting our flashlight on on our on our
why are we so quick at that? I'm not even quick.
I'm like, I turned my camera on. What am I, 50?
I still, I really cannot do it anyway.
My cameras are like, I'm going to put this away anyway.
So The thing is, it's like, why are we so quick at being able to
get our flashlight on? Why, why does that?
Why does that happen? Why are we able to do that?
Because we know how to do it and we need it.
We use it like if you're in a situation where you're like, and
you know, I don't even, I can't even tell you where flashlights
are in my house. Like just hey, go get a
flashlight. Be like, bro here, it's in my
phone. Like you need a flashlight.
Like I bet the flashlight sales numbers have just collapsed over
the last 10 years, you know? And so the reason that we are
all good at getting our flashlight out on our phone is
because light is better than darkness.
It's just very simple. Light is better than darkness.
Light dispels darkness. It makes it where you can see
things, you can solve problems, you can accomplish tasks, all
because of a little light on the back of your phone.
Here's the thing. This is true for our lives as
well. You and I need light for our
lives. No matter how much I encourage
you or inspire you or challenge you, no matter how many
encouraging books you read or self help books you read, no
matter how much you try to muster up the courage to face
your life. The fact of the matter is, is
you and I, to move in life and to function in life, we need
light. We need light and the word
light. Words are going to see today in
our text. It stands in for things like
hope, for peace, for a belief in the future.
You need to believe that you have light.
And Christmas is the celebration of a God who ushered in light
for us, for you, a God who ushered in light powerful enough
to dispel the darkness, the darkness in our world.
Now follow me, The darkness in our world and the darkness
inside of our hearts. This is hard because we don't
want to believe there's darkness inside of our hearts.
We want to believe that other people have darkness inside of
their hearts. But when you look at my heart,
mine is good. I was texting with a friend this
week and we were talking about particular case, something that
happened in culture. And she was somehow she wanted
to hurt this person who had done this terrible thing.
And she said, I don't know if that makes me a bad person or
not, but I I would hurt them. And I wrote them back and I
said, you are a bad person and so am I.
Like you didn't know that like I am a bad person.
My heart is dark. Jeremiah says the heart is
deceitful above all things. Who can understand it?
Jesus said, if you being evil know how to give good gifts to
your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give
you? In other words, like there's
there's evil in our world, there's darkness in our world,
but there's also darkness in my heart.
And God at Christmas time, what we're focusing on is that God,
in his infinite wisdom and his kindness and grace, he sent the
light to dispel both those darknesses.
And we're going to use a text this morning.
Maybe you know what? Isaiah Chapter 9 verses one
through 7, Isaiah 9, one through 7.
Now this is written by a guy named Isaiah.
It's a major prophet in the Old Testament.
And Isaiah is writing these words to a nation, the nation of
Judah, and primarily to the city of Jerusalem.
And this city is has compromised faith.
It's surrounded in fear. It's surrounded in darkness and
moral failure. It's uncertain about its future,
as it should be because it will be dominated by another nation
here very soon. It is in the darkness.
And to this darkness Isaiah speaks, this nation in darkness.
And Isaiah doesn't give them instructions.
He doesn't tell them what they need to do to make it better.
He doesn't do any of that. He actually gives them news of
something that's going to happen, news about a child that
will make everything different for this nation and for you and
I. Now, this is the character of
God. What we're going to read in
Isaiah Chapter 9. As we read this, I want you to
think about this is the character of God.
We choose darkness. I choose darkness, but God does
not abandon me in my choice of darkness.
In other words, he doesn't do to me what I'm prone to do to my
children. And what you, I think is good
parenting, right? You make stupid choices.
You lay in stupid beds. Anybody want that's good, right?
That's a good lesson to teach your children.
It's a good thing, you know, you want your children to feel the
weight of their dumb decisions. God, we choose darkness, we
choose rebellion. And God doesn't abandoned us in
those places. He actually comes and rescues us
with the light of his Son Jesus. That's what we're going to see.
He comes into the darkness as the light.
So Isaiah Chapter 9 verses one through 7.
This is what the text says. You ready Isaiah writing?
He says, nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those
who were in distress in the past.
He humbled the land of Zebulun, the land of Nephili, but in the
future he will honor Galilee of the nations by way of the sea
beyond the Jordan. Now isn't it interesting that
it's Galilee of the nations that will be honored?
Jesus is a Galilean. Remember that this is this is a
prophetic text. Isaiah's talking about the
coming future, the coming hope for Judah, for the city of
Jerusalem, Verse 2. Now this is a poem, right?
So he starts. It's poetry, verse 2.
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light on 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 and the rod of their oppressor.
Every warriors boot used in battle and every garment rolled
in blood will be destined for burning, will be fuel for the
fire. And this is all like what he's
done up through verse 5 so far is like, this is how things are
going to be different. This is how things are going to
change. Oppression is going to end,
burdens are going to be removed, and then verse 5, war will come
to an end. He says that basically the
garments that are rolled in blood and the boots that are
used in battle, they will no longer be useful.
They will be burned. In other words, the world is the
world is going to completely and totally be different because a
light has now dawned on people living in the darkness.
Well, how has this light dawned? Verse 64 To us a child is born,
to us a son is given, and the government will be on his
shoulders, and he will be called wonderful counselor, mighty God,
everlasting Father and Prince of peace.
Of the greatness of his government and peace, there will
be no end. And 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.
Now if you're a note taker, this is called a messianic prophecy.
This is a prophecy thousands of years before Jesus birth saying
hey, this is going to happen, Jesus will come and he will be
the light. So to this Dark World, to this
dark nation, Isaiah promises that God is not going to leave
them where they are. He's going to send a light.
He's going to rescue them. Now, our world is not completely
all that different than Judah and Jerusalem's world.
Now we are more technologically advanced.
I mean, we have cell phones with flashlights on them.
That's pretty cool. I don't think they could have
imagined even such a thing, much less electricity.
But even though we're technologically more advanced,
we are similar to the city of Jerusalem and the Kingdom of
Judah. We're very, very similar to the
people in that time. So today, here's the main idea.
I want you to know as we start this message as the thing I want
you to get as we, as we are here today.
I, I want you to write this down.
If you're a rope taker, This is the main idea.
Hope does not rise from inside us.
Hope dawns upon us. Hope does not rise from inside
of us. Hope dawns upon us.
Hope, And this text is like a stand in for hope and for
promises of a future. And here's the thing about hope
that you need to know. You cannot generate your own
hope. You cannot stand in the mirror
long enough. You cannot lay in the bed long
enough in the mornings. You cannot get up early enough
and go for a run long enough. You cannot generate your own
hope. You cannot convince yourself to
be hopeful. If you were going to be a person
with hope, that hope must come to you from outside of you.
This is what this text is teaching.
Hope comes to us from outside of us.
It dawns on us. It is not self generated.
And there are two implications from this text for you, note
takers, there's two implications.
I'm going to walk through #1 the world is darker than we like to
admit. We're going to walk through
that. The world is darker than we like
to admit #1 #2 hope comes from outside of us.
Hope comes from outside of us. We're going to walk through that
implication, what that means. So the world is darker than we
like to admit, and hope comes from outside of us.
Now let's talk about this idea of the world being darker than
we like to admit #1 the world is darker than we like to admit.
The Bible uses darkness as a metaphorical motif throughout
the Scriptures, and it uses it to describe two types of
darkness dark. One type of darkness is the
darkness of evil. There's evil actions and evil
things, evil people. And then it uses another,
another idea of darkness as ignorance.
Their minds are darkened. So you have two ways that the
Bible uses darkness, evil or evil actions, and then minds
that are darkened, ignorance, minds that do not understand.
So let's unpack this idea of #1 of what we would call the
external darkness. You know, the evil, the idea of
darkness being an external darkness.
So let's let's unpack that. So the world is darker than we
like to admit. And underneath that we have an
external darkness. And the fact that there's an
external darkness in our world is obvious to most people.
Our world is a dark place. People do evil things to each
other. Did you guys hear about the
horrific attack in Forsyth Park this week of a woman walking in
the park and having a corrosive acid poured over her body, over
the top of her head? And this is mind boggling to me
that another human being would do this to another human being.
It blows my mind. Well, why does it blow my mind?
Because I have a sense in me that such things are evil.
And it's not that crazy to think that someone else would look at
such a an act and think, well, I'm just going to do it because
I want to because it makes me happy.
Or for whatever reason, the the reality is, is that the world is
full of evil and evil actions. Darkness is all around us.
It's terrible and nothing. Another thing that's happening
in our culture is more and more, especially among younger people,
Gen. Z and younger millennials,
whenever and whenever violence happens, instead of them quickly
condemning violence, younger people more and more, not all of
them, not even the majority, but more and more younger people,
instead of condemning the violence, are asking, well, why
did the violence happen in the first place?
Now, my generation, we're never taught that.
We were never taught to ask why the violence is happening.
We were taught to condemn the violence.
The violence is to be condemned no matter what.
But there is a younger generation coming behind us that
before the condemnation of violence, they want to get the
the why behind the violence because maybe the why, if they
hear it, will justify the violence that's happening.
That's, that's, that's that storm is brewing in our culture.
It, it's not so much that these younger people are, you know,
the Chinese Red Guard running around and and killing people or
taking over cities. That's not the case at all yet.
But the storm is brewing to where, well, violence might be
justified. Let me hear the reason that this
person poured acid over this young lady.
Now that that seems crazy to us, but that's the evidence of the
fact that there is darkness in our world.
Now here's the thing about dark, the external darkness of our
world. Most people who are not even
believers in Jesus Christ, they don't believe in God even they
might even be atheistic, they will agree that the world is a
dark and evil place. Even if they're not believers in
God, they will believe that. Like maybe you're sitting here
right now, you're listening to this podcast and you're like, I
don't even believe in God. Somebody's making me do this,
making me cum today. Well, here's the thing.
You, even though you don't believe in God, you will still
use terms like that was evil or that was bad or this, this
world's a dark place. Even if you're not a believer,
you will use terms like that. This past spring, my son and I
Aller we went offshore fishing. A friend of ours paid for us to
go out in the the Gulf. We were down in the Keys and he
paid for us to go out in the Gulf and go fishing.
And Adler got brutally sick. It was, I laugh about it, but it
wasn't funny. It was a little funny.
And when we're out in the Gulf and this, this man we're with is
a very interesting man. He's retired Marine intelligence
officer, so he knows things that he cannot share with me.
Do you know what I mean? Like, and it's and it's from
like, you know, he's about 20 years older me.
So it was like from my maybe I'm 15 years older me.
So it's kind of like the Cold War era.
He was active in the Cold War era, which I just so badly
wanted to just sit down and be like, man, can I ask you all
these questions? And but as we, as we talked and
we had some conversation, you know, just sitting fishing in
the boat, I discovered that number 1, he was not a believer.
He didn't believe in God. And so that that that helps, you
know, that creates a lot of conversation for me when
somebody tells me they don't believe in God, they're atheist.
So I'm like, my wheels are turning.
We're having conversation. And at some point of the
conversation, he says to me, I asked him, like, do you do you
believe there's a don't you want there to be an ultimate judge?
Like, don't you want there to be like, like an ultimate say at
the end? That's that there's judgement.
I said, otherwise if there's not judgement, then we got to get
even. Like we have to continuously get
even. And he said he goes, I don't
know, man. There sure is a lot of evil in
the world. After what I've seen.
This is what he said. So interesting, he said.
After what I've seen governments do to their own people, and then
that stuck on me. What what what I've seen
governments do to their own people.
I said, but you don't believe he goes.
It's hard for me to believe there's a God with this kind of
evil happening in the world. Now, can you see the cognitive
dissonance that he has going on? OK, this is this is like a
little, you guys hang with me. We're going, we're going to step
down a little bit. To say you believe in evil is a
faith claim. Do I not tell you this all the
time? Isn't it exhausting to hear me
say it all the time? It's because my, this guy who
took us fishing, he can hold that cognitive dissonance in his
hand quite easily. He can believe in something like
evil governments do evil things to their people.
He can believe in that and not acknowledge that's a faith claim
while at the same time denying there's a God.
To believe that is such thing as evil exists and that governments
do evil things to their people is to believe that right exist
and righteous exist. It's in other words, to believe
that there is a moral standard that's a faith claim.
All right. And so here's a guy and so many
people like this are, oh man, I'm telling you, this is this is
prevalent. There is this movement now to
where the culture at large knows there's a moral right and that
you need to be morally right. But there's no standard
underneath their claim to what's morally right.
There's no, there's no foundation to it, there's no
basis to it. There's nothing underneath it.
It's just, it's just you have to be morally right according to
their definition. The problem with this is that
humans are not good at generating our own light.
Whenever humans have tried to morally purify their own
societies, they bring way more destruction to those societies
than anything good. And here's the reality.
If you believe that there's an evil, that means you believe
there's a good. That means that you're grasping
for this good. You want to find it.
You want to know what it is you're trying to figure it out.
And what I'm telling you is that in this Dark World, the light
cannot come from within yourself, no matter how hard you
try, no matter how determined you are.
So there is an external darkness, number one.
And then under how our dark, our world is number 2, there is an
internal darkness. So we have an external darkness
like those people are evil. That's easy to say.
Here's the hard part. This, this heart is dark.
This heart is prone to evil. Now the internal darkness can be
a lot less obvious, but no less nefarious.
You see? Have you ever wanted to change
and be more loving and be more kind?
But then that person showed up at work again.
Anybody know what I'm talking about?
Am I preaching too close to some of you?
Right? Have you ever wanted to forgive
and offer restoration, but you just could not let go of the
resentment for what they did to you?
Like you knew that the resentment and the lack of
forgiveness was a prison that you were locking yourself in.
You knew that and you want to change.
You wanted to change so badly, but you just could not let go.
Have you ever wanted to feel peace in your life but you just
continuously feel anxious? You ever want to be selfless?
This is me all the time. You ever want to be selfless,
but you end up protecting yourself in an effort to be
selfless. It takes some self-awareness to
realize this, but sometimes our our attempts to be selfless are
actually just backdoor ways to protect ourselves.
The reality is, is that the darkness of our world that is
more prevalent than we realize is not just external, it's
internal. And what this means is that you
and I, because the world is dark, but also I'm prone to
darkness, what that means is I cannot produce my own light.
I cannot make up my own hope. I can't come up with my own
solutions. So going back to the point I
just made, whenever societies have tried to say, well, let's
all get together and let's improve the condition of human
beings and let's make the nature of man different.
Whenever societies have attempted to do that, it's like
putting a lot of darkness into one room and saying, well, if
all of us try really hard, all of our darkness could generate a
light. And what has happened
historically when humans have tried to do this?
I mean, it's the Chinese revolution, it's the Russian
Revolution, it's the Cambodian Revolution, right over and over
and over again. When you see, if you don't know
what I'm talking about, Google those things over and over and
over again. When you see humans decide what
we're going to. The world's dark.
There's darkness out there. You know, whatever the evil is,
whether it's, you know, capitalism or, you know, you
know, socialism, whatever the evil is out there, we're going
to get together. We're going to solve it, and
then we're going to go fix it out there.
Those people in the circle try to come up with the solutions.
They are just as dark as the world it is.
They're trying to go out and solve.
So what happens is millions, 10s of millions of people die
because a group of people think they have the light within them
to take into The Dark World. No, it's bad.
And I, I don't want to, I'm not trying to like be this
doomsdayer, but it's bad. It's easy for us to sit and go.
Those terrible people, they do those things.
You know what's that you know we we might be 3 mils away from
doing some of those same terrible things ourselves.
You missed 3-4 meals, you can't get food.
You may realize how evil you are as well.
Like it's in me as well. That's the that's the hard thing
to be honest about. You see, if the problem, if the
problem were only ignorance, and this is what society tells us,
if the problem were only ignorance, then education would
fix it. But the problem runs deeper than
than that. It isn't just that I need more
education or I need more training.
Now. It's a hard issue.
It's a spiritual issue. Darkness is inside of us, and
that's why salvation has to come to us from outside of us.
And this is what Isaiah says. He says to the people living in
darkness, to the people walking in darkness, that's you and me.
A light has dawned. That's what he says.
See, hope does not rise from inside of us.
Hope dawns upon us. The light must come from outside
of us. Listen to verse.
Look at verse 2 again. Look at what verse 2 again says,
if I can find it here. Verse 2 says the people walking
in darkness have seen a great light on those living in the
land of deep darkness. A light has dawned.
So how does the light come to us?
So the light dawns on us, How does it come to us?
Verse 6 says for to us a child is born, to us a son is given.
Isaiah is saying that all of us need light both internally and
externally. And then he says a child is
born, a son is given. John chapter 8 verse 12 records
Jesus's words for us. When Jesus says this, I am the
light of the world. Whoever follows me will never
walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.
Now think, put, put it together. You don't have to be a Bible
scholar to put this together right now, Isaiah said to the
people walking in darkness, Light has dawned now light has
changed everything. It's from outside of us.
And then Jesus said in John eight, I am that light.
Jesus is appropriating the Isaiah text to himself.
Jesus is saying I am that child that was born.
I am that baby that came. So Jesus is the light that has
come to dispel the darkness, Not only the darkness that's
external, but the darkness that's internal.
Jesus has come to dispel all the darkness.
Now here's the deal. Well, Steven, the darkness, the
external darkness is still very much here.
You even mentioned it like these things are still happening all
since the the time of Christ. You're right, the darkness of
this world has not been ultimately dispelled.
It has not been ultimately dispelled.
It has not happened, but you and I, the Bible says, are light
bearers. We bear the light of Christ.
Jesus not only claimed to be the light of the world, then he said
about us what he said you are the light of the world.
In other words, Jesus said he's the light of the world and then
he said we're the light of the world.
Like how is that both both. How are both of those things
true? Well, in the Gospel
understanding is that when I come to know Christ, I surrender
my life to him. I'm taking on the Christ King
inside of me. Now Christ leads my life.
If Christ is the light of the world, then I'm the light of the
world. Now follow me.
OK, Well, Stephen, how, how are we dispelling darkness in the
world? Well, little ways, the people of
God, the people of of Jesus followers are dispelling the
darkness. Think about this.
When you gathered up those Christmas presents, did y'all
see the lobby? Just crazy.
Did you see our post this week on Facebook or us taking?
Yeah, you can clap. It's good.
So you, you take you take those
you we took those presents over to the Salvation Army and there
was a huge gym full of presents. And the lady said to me, she
goes, yeah, we just had a truck come from some company, I won't
say the company. And they had they brought 300
angels. And this is a massive company.
It's the second biggest employer in Savannah.
And and they, they had 300 angels.
And I was like, bro, that big company only had 300 angels.
Our little church over in Savannah has 75 like like we
just brought like we had 75. Like my goodness, like we
probably could have done, you know, another 50 because easily
people came to I didn't get an Angel.
Can I get an Angel? I was like, bro, I don't want to
tell you move quicker. Everybody here is super
generous. Like you got to you want an
Angel, get 1. And so the point is, is that
that you when you when you put together those gifts and you
delivered those gifts, you were bringing some light into some
darkness. Do you see how that works?
It was like a pin of light into some darkness.
Every child that will open one of your gifts from that Angel
tree will experience the light of Christ that now here's here's
nothing. Please hear me.
I don't have enough. I don't have enough time to
completely unpack this. But if you believe that you did
that, like you bought gifts for an Angel for the Angel tree
because you're somehow good, then you're missing the gospel.
You need to go back to what Mallory said, start preaching
the gospel more regularly to yourself.
But if you know the only reason I'm prone to be generous, the
only reason I'm prone to not look out for myself is because
Jesus Christ surrendered himself for me.
He is the light that is pushing the darkness out of my life.
If you know that, then you realize, OK, the only reason I'm
doing anything good for anyone or ever trying to do good deeds
is because life, The light of Christ is inside of me,
dispelling the darkness of my heart.
And then I'm dispelling the darkness.
Christ through me is dispelling the darkness of this world.
Christ offers us hope and light today.
And if you're someone who follows Jesus, you can stand up
and say, Stephen, I know how much Christ has changed my life.
He's dramatically changed things for me.
You could stand up and and share that.
And this is how he changes things for us.
Isaiah 4 lists out four names of this, this baby, this child, and
this is how this baby changes your life.
This is in verse 6. It says that number one, he's a
wonderful counselor. In other words, Jesus knows what
to do when you don't. Anybody ever felt like they
don't know what to do. He knows what to do when you
don't. He understands your suffering
because he himself has suffered. He's he, you come to see me.
I've counseled many people that were walking through something
I've never walked through. I'm not a wonderful counselor,
capable counselor, but I'm not wonderful.
What makes Christ wonderful is there's nothing you haven't
walked through that He himself has not experienced and
understand. He's a wonderful counselor.
He knows what to do when you don't.
He changes your life because He's a wonderful counselor #2 He
changes your life because Jesus is the mighty God.
He has power when you don't. He has the power to sustain you,
to help you through whatever you're facing.
You are not saved because you're strong enough.
This is a very anti American I know.
You're not saved because you're strong enough.
You're not right with God, because you're determined
enough. You are right and saved and
correct with God. Everything's good between you
and God because God himself and his power did it on your behalf.
Mighty God #3 Isaiah tells us he's called the everlasting
Father and this is beautiful to me.
This baby born is our everlasting Father.
You belong to Him, even we even when you feel alone.
His care for you does not ever expire.
And the number four, he calls him the Prince of peace.
This is important ready. Write this down if you write
stuff down. Jesus does not offer peace to
the world. He establishes peace in the
world. There's a difference.
In other words, Jesus is not a helpless king going, well, I
hope we can have peace in this world.
No, he's established that there is and there will be peace.
Peace has been established. Peace is not calm feelings like
everything's OK. Peace is an awareness that
wholeness has been restored. So here's the deal.
If Jesus is who Isaiah says he is, he cannot just be your
religious mascot. He must either be bowed down to
or completely rejected. He doesn't really allow any
indifference. And today that's why you need to
know that your hope is not dependent upon your effort to
self improve or your effort to be better.
Your hope depends on Jesus Christ, knowing Him, being
connected to Him. Hope does not rise inside of us.
Hope dawns on us. And think about the dawn as we
wrap up today. The literal dawn.
When the sun comes up, the dawn does not happen with a lot of
fanfare, does it? The sun does not come up and say
I'm here, I want everybody to know I'm here.
Slowly but surely, the sun rises and it takes over the land.
And slowly but surely, the darkness is pushed back and the
shadows are eradicated. And slowly the sun rises and
more and more the darkness is removed.
The same is true for you and your heart.
And the word that you need to know is the word surrender.
We sang about it today. I'm surrendered to you,
abandoned this idea of surrender.
This is how the dawn takes over your heart slowly but surely.
You say, Jesus, I'm surrender to you this day.
So you wake up tomorrow morning and you say, Jesus, I'm
surrender to you this day. Let the dawn rise in my life.
Whatever difficulty you're facing, a challenging thing
you're walking through, Jesus, I'm surrender to you this day.
Some of you feel like you're fumbling with your phone in your
life, right? You're just trying to get your
flashlight on to live your life. And what I'm telling you is a
little time with Jesus, a little time with Jesus.
I mean, just a little. There's like a massive spotlight
in your heart begins to push the darkness away and it changes
your life. And there's people you're
surrounded by right now who could testify and tell you that
that just believing in Jesus, just trusting that Jesus is real
and listening for his voice has radically changed your life.
So let me challenge you. If you've never been a person
who prays, let me just challenge you to put an alarm on your
phone. You know that thing that's a
flashlight. Put an alarm on your phone that
says pray. Pick a time that you're most
likely to do it. And then let your prayer be this
Jesus, I need your light. I surrender to you.
Is that a big fancy religious prayer?
Jesus, I need your light. I'm acknowledging I have dark
heart. I need your light.
I surrender to you. Super simple, right?
Christmas is the story that we are a people walking in
darkness. This is hard who have dark
hearts. But God did not leave us in that
place. He sent his Son Jesus as the
light of the world to dispel the darkness, to dispel it in our
hearts. 1st and ultimately, friend, a new day is coming, or
there shall be a new heaven and a new earth, and all the
darkness of this earth and all the darkness of the world will
be dispelled for good. Christmas is that promise.
Will you stand with me? So we pray together.
God, thank you that you did not tell us to try harder to get it
together to, you know, figure it out.
Thank you that you had said, call us to surrender, to
surrender to the King, to surrender to you, to daily
invite you in to be the light of our lives.
Dispel the darkness of our own hearts, the darkness of our
greed, the darkness of our fear, the darkness of our anxiety, the
darkness of our despondency, the darkness of our resentment.
And then, Lord, as you do that work inside of us, then we in
turn become a light to this world.
As we surrender to you, your light shots through us.
What a gift. We cannot generate our own
light, we cannot generate our own hope, we cannot generate our
own belief in the future You. It is a gift from you.
And thank you for the ultimate future, Father, that one day the
darkness of this world will be dispelled completely and death
will be no more. Grave shall be conquered,
illness, sickness be gone through and we shall be as we
were always intended. Thank you for the promise this
Christmas season. The light is dawn on us.
Christ name we pray, Amen. Love you friends, have a blessed
week and a wonderful day.