Pastors here at the church and it's good to be with you, good
to be together, good together and to worship.
So welcome we have been now for this is our 4th week talking
about Advent and it's Advent only Week 3.
We started a week early and one of the things that we did on
that first Sunday for us on Advent 0.5 was encourage one
another to slow down and to try to embrace some of the practices
that the church has been following and using for
thousands of years now to to really prepare ourselves for
Jesus birth into the world again.
And so Advent, for those of you who who are newer to church,
Advent is this beautiful season of preparation and anticipation
where we wait for Jesus and we prepare ourselves again to hear
this story. And for some of us, it might be
hearing the story for the first time.
And for some of us, it might be hearing the story in a new way
for the first time. Some of us, it might feel like
the 99th time we've heard the story.
And there's still something there for you.
There's still an invitation to wait and to anticipate and to
prepare and to slow down. One of the things that we gave
out on Week 1 was this sheet of different practices that you
could incorporate or attempt to incorporate into your life.
And one of the things that I said was please don't try to
incorporate all of them because that would defeat the purpose of
slowing down. Like it's not A to do list.
So my family, I just wanted to share a little bit of an update
because it's it's great. My family, we did the last one.
We picked that last one. The last practice that we wrote
on that paper was to build, to create, to make an Advent
wreath. And then as we're doing here,
once a week, gather together and light the candle, pray, read
scripture and talk about the story of Jesus's birth.
And so my kids helped and we bought this great little wax kit
and rolled our own candles made of beeswax.
You can do that. That's a thing if you're
curious. But then so we made these
candles and I bundled them like, you know what look really great?
It looks so nice. I'll bundle them all up together
and I'll tie them in nice, nice little bow and we'll put them in
the centre of our table. And so we're like 2 weeks in
from lighting this thing and the whole thing is like melted.
So we're like forget the four candles plus the 5th Christ
candle inside. We're like this mess of candles
ish that all just puddled. And so it's not perfect and it's
not intended to be. It is a good practice to do
together and so it's not too late to encourage you to try to
slow yourselves down between now and Christmas, as hard as that
might sound. There's just a beauty to
embracing that and the messiness of it and the failures of it.
Like me trying to think, pretend or convince myself I can make
candles that will last. But that's that's the
invitation. What I wanna do is pray.
And then we're gonna be shortly into Matthew chapter 2 today and
we're continuing the story of Jesus birth.
And today in chapter 2, we see the Magi visit Jesus.
And so that's where we're going to begin.
We're going to read probably about 12 verses starting there.
But let me pray and then we'll jump in together.
You got thanks for your love and thank you for your grace.
Thank you that you are with us and that you invite us into
these spaces and places that you've prepared.
And here, it's here we get to sing and lift, hide the name of
Jesus. We're able to slow ourselves
down and pray. We're able to take some deep
breaths in and experience your presence and know the power of
your spirit in this place. So yeah, I pray that in these
next few minutes as we read from the Scripture, as we challenge
ourselves again with Jesus, your birth, what it means for us,
what it means for this world that you love and have redeemed
and our redeeming winning back to you.
Yet I pray that you would do what you need to and you would
speak to each one of us the words that we need to hear.
Yeah, whether it is for the 99th time or whether it is for the
first time in a brand new way. Yeah, I pray you get ahold of
each one of us. Speak to us now.
We pray in Jesus name, Amen. So in our series, in our Advent
series, not the .5. But beyond that in our series
week one we looked at how at just the right moment God chose
to speak into a very specific story.
So week one we looked at how God spoke to Joseph and called
Joseph said do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife.
What is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
Baby will be born year to name of Jesus and which challenged
ourselves looked at the idea that God wants to speak into our
stories and the God wants to speak into your story like no
matter where you find yourself, no matter what season of life
you find yourself in, God has something to give into that
story and to call you toward in that story.
God wants to speak to you. And Week 2, we looked at how God
then interrupted Joseph's life in the middle of what was for
him a messy story. And we talked about God's desire
to continue to interrupt our own lives.
Your life that God has something for you, desires to speak to
you, call you into something, and then that thing is probably
going to interrupt the ideas that you have for your own life,
the plans that you have for your own life.
We talked about many different kinds of interruptions, ones
that God gives, brings into our lives, ones that He does not.
But where is the invitation to obey and to seek after God in
the midst of those interruptions?
And so you can look at it this way.
Week 1, what we said was listen. Listen.
Our heart for you is to listen the guard as he speaks.
We too, we said obey. Our heart is for you to learn
and to trust and to begin to obey God as he interrupts your
life or into the interruptions of your life.
What is it that God has for you? And one of the things that I
really hope each of us walked away with from both of those
weeks. Is this a sense or beginning to
wonder at what might change in your life if you finally said
yes to God? What would God do if you finally
gave up on some of the things that He is calling you to
surrender, some of the things that you've been holding on to?
How might your story need to change so that you can continue
to say yes to God and continue to choose to obey and to move in
His direction? How might it actually change if
and as you do? What is God interrupting?
What needs to be interrupted in your life?
And what is God calling you to do with the interruption or in
the midst of the interruption? Today what I want to look at is
what happens when God enters your story and you do begin to
listen and obey God into the things that He's challenging you
with right in the middle of your story.
What would it begin to look like if you chose to obey, if you
chose to say yes, if you chose to step in and lean into the
things that God is offering and calling you to do?
I don't know about you, but here's the thing about about my
own life, about my own brain. I don't love the middle of any
story, right? I I don't love like, it's like,
let's get to the end. Let's figure out how it's going
to be like, don't make me wait and sit in this unresolved kind
of wondering and waiting and tension of life.
And is this, how is this gonna play out?
Like, let's get to the end of the story.
And I don't know if you've ever done this and I've talked about
this before, but you're reading a book and you're like, this is
too intense. I'm just going to flip to the
end and make sure, OK, everything turns out great.
OK, I can go back and I can exist in the tension, right?
Or if you're watching a TV show, if you're going through like
series and you keep jumping to the next one because you're just
like, OK, I can't sit here. They've left me.
Now I have to hit that like play next button, right?
Like, are you still anyways? You just have to continue
watching because you also maybe you can identify with struggling
to sit in the middle of it. I want to know what the outcome
is. Like, I want to know what the
goal is, What's the outcome? Let's get to that finish line.
Let's at least know that it's there.
Can we skip skip a few steps and get there even faster?
Hey, fantastic. But that's not the pace of life
with Jesus, is it? That's not the pace that Jesus
lived his life, and it's not the pace that He invites any of us
into as we live out our lives. See, I think God is calling you.
Each of you is calling me to take a step of obedience, and
that's gonna look different for each of you, but it's a step of
obedience in the middle of whatever it is that you're going
through. It's not like I would like it to
be a big jump to the end. It's like God, I will obey if
you can just tell me what the final step is.
What God is calling you to do is take a step, a little step of
obedience in the middle of wherever He has you right now,
before you know the outcome. Because I'm convinced that when
you begin to listen and when you begin to obey, God isn't as
concerned. I don't think about changing
your immediate situation or circumstance, but what is going
to begin to happen is that throughout all of your little
steps of obedience and trust, God is going to begin to change
you. You will change and we got
changes. You.
The direction of your entire life can and does change along
with it, and so I want to read. This is the story of the Magi
after Jesus, it says, was born in Bethlehem in Judea during the
time of King Herod. Magi from the East came to
Jerusalem and asked where is the one who has been born King of
the Jews? We saw his star when it rose,
and we have come to worship him. When King Herod heard this, he
was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him.
When he had called together all the peoples, chief priests and
teachers of the Law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be
born in Bethlehem, in Judea. They replied, For this is what
it was written. But you, Bethlehem, in the land
of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah, For
out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.
Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them
the exact time the star had appeared.
He sent them to Bethlehem and said, go and search carefully
for the Child. As soon as you find him, report
to me, so that I too may go and worship Him.
After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the
star they had seen when it rose, went ahead of them until it
stopped over the place where the child was.
When this when they saw the star, they were overjoyed.
On coming to the house they saw the child with his mother Mary,
and they bowed down and worshipped him.
Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of
gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a
dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country
by another route. So there are many things that
begin to happen as you choose to trust and to listen and to obey
God in the middle of your story. And all I wanna do today is
suggest three things. I I think we see in this story
at least three things that begin to happen when God enters your
story and when we begin to obey. And I'm not going to make you
wait till the end to work out which three there are.
I'm going to give it to, I'm going to get you right from the
very beginning. All right, So these are the
three things that I believe this story shows us as the Magi
arrive and as they encounter and meet Jesus.
Number one, you will experience change.
Something in your life is going to need to change.
You will experience there will be opposition.
So #1 you're gonna experience change #2 there will be
opposition. This is why I wanted to give you
all three at the very beginning. Because third, I do believe you
will find joy. I didn't want to leave you
hanging with, hey, there's gonna be change and there's gonna be
opposition and make you think and wonder.
Like, is the third one gonna be bad too?
All right, there's there is going to be your will experience
change. There will be opposition along
the way, but you will. Here's the promise.
I believe you will find joy. So after Jesus.
We worked through this story. After Jesus was born in
Bethlehem, Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from
the East came to Jerusalem and asked where is the one who has
been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and
have come to worship him. We don't know a lot about these
magi. They've kind of taken on a life
of their own over the years. They tend to be portrayed as
kings or wise men. If you see pictures of them
painting works of art, different things.
Wise men who came, kings who came for starters, throughout
Christian history, right? They've they've morphed.
They're, they've got magi and then we have wise men and then
we have kings. Also, probably if I were to ask
some of you, and I'm not going to do that, but we each each
probably pretty quickly say there were three of them, right?
Because there was a hymn written in the 1800s, We 3 Kings, 1857.
We 3 Kings. It was written by a man named
John Henry Hopkins Junior. We sing the Carol, right?
We 3 kings. And so we say they're three.
Probably more than three. The magi they're they're
interesting characters. So their title, Magi We is the
word we use to get magician magic.
They weren't magicians in the sense of like, deception.
They were priests, but they weren't Jewish priests.
They were likely Persian and they weren't, like I said, they
weren't magicians like we think of magicians.
They were astrologers who studied the stars in the skies
and made determinations based on what they saw.
So these magi who came maybe 3 probably more likely came from
one of two places. Persia.
Some say Persia, modern day Iran, and some say from Babylon,
close to what would be Baghdad now in Iraq.
And So what we see over and over in the Scriptures is that they
come from the east, and that term usually means Babylon.
So here's these magi, maybe 3, probably more priests from
another nation who travel about 12 to 1600 kilometres to see
Jesus. This is like A2 probably 3 to 4
month trip by caravan along the known trade routes at that time
that these Magi would have had to go through in order to arrive
and to meet Jesus. So again, like we said, we've
got some number of Magi, Persian astrologers who traveled 1200 to
1600 kilometres to find a baby who was born who wasn't even
there. King, but aching.
And they do it because they follow a * says we saw his star.
We saw his star when it rose. And we have come.
Not only have they come to see him, says they have come to
worship him. Was it curiosity?
Spiritual hunger. Did they expect to find Jesus or
were they expecting to find someone else?
Were they there to honour the new King or just get into his
good graces? Like, we don't know a whole lot
about who these people were. What we do know is that Matthew
is shocking his Jewish and then Christian readers with the fact
that they were outsiders, outsiders who had come and who
recognized Jesus as the true king.
And in order to do that, in order to recognize Jesus as the
true king, they had to get up from where they were, and they
had to travel three to four months along trade routes, 12 to
1600 kilometres to be in Jerusalem and then Bethlehem to
meet Jesus. And when they do, they recognize
Him as the true King. They get up and they go.
They respond to what God is doing in the world.
They respond to what they were seeing.
They respond to the thing that God had come to do, and in doing
so, in getting up and in going, in embracing the journey to see
Jesus, what they end up finding is the true King of the world.
Not just the King of the Jews, not just the baby who was born,
but one who is the King of kings.
So for these maji, there's sacrifice and there's surrender
involved in this journey. And for us and for you, there is
sacrifice and there is surrender involved in the journey of
listening to what God is doing in your life and in the world
around you. One of the first things that you
do that you are called into and called to embrace, one of the
first things that happens when you respond to God is change.
Your life won't be the same. There will be something for you
to do and it may be costly, but there is something that God is
calling you to embrace, a journey that you are being
called to go on, a place for you to go.
You cannot follow Jesus and stay where you are.
This is why I love the words of the hymn that we sang.
Come to Bethlehem and see him whose birth the angels saying,
come to Bethlehem. This is the journey of
Christmas. This is the journey of Advent
that you are invited on to come and see.
Come and see him whose birth the angels sing, but not only come
and see. Come adore on bended knee,
Christ the Lord, the newborn King.
It's not just about coming and witnessing the thing.
It's not just about knowing it. It's not just about even seeing
it happen in front of you. We're reminded to come adore
him. The magi arrive and they worship
Jesus and and that's the him. Listen, on bended knee, what do
you bend the knee toward? Where do you?
To whom do you do you bend the knee?
Christ, the Lord, the newborn King.
And so I wonder this Advent, I wonder into this Christmas
season as we move through it, and I wonder into the new year,
what is it that God is calling you to walk toward?
What is it that God is calling you to move toward, right?
Is it to move toward forgiveness, to forgive, or to
ask to be forgiven? Is it to pick up the phone and
reach out and choose to trust? Is it to walk toward healing?
Is it to move toward healing, to finally deal with the thing that
you've been putting off? To finally address it, To
finally own it, To finally admit to it, to finally wrestle it out
and deal with the thing. Is it a move toward community,
like joining a group or volunteering or asking for help
rather than hiding? Is it a move toward generosity?
Trusting God to give even when things feel tight.
To bless somebody who can't repay you?
What is God calling you to move toward?
What might that 12 to 1600 kilometre journey look like for
you this Christmas season? And with it, what comfort might
God be calling you to leave? Because as we go, we leave
comfort behind, even just in the sense that we leave what we know
behind. I'm not gonna surmise, I don't
know what where these magi were living and what their life was
like when they left, but it wouldn't have been comfortable
along the way. We know that for a long trip
would have embraced discomfort in order to be with Jesus.
And So what is it that you are too or that God is causing you
or calling you to leave behind as a control, trusting God with
something that you have tried to manage on your own?
Is it self protection? The masks that we put on or the
guard, the Shields, the defences that we put up because we just.
I've trusted once too many times and been hurt once too many
times. Trusting that opening up to God
and even to others is for your health and wholeness and
healing. Is that to leave behind the
comfort that is convenient or even self-image, what you think
of yourself and what you want others to think of you?
Is it leaving behind even the comfort of being stuck, or
staying stuck because so often we don't want to move toward
healing? Because dysfunction is familiar,
and at least it's predictable and it doesn't ask anything of
me. I know it.
What is God calling you to leave behind as you go?
Here's what we see in the Magi Believing in something doesn't
mean thinking differently about the thing.
It means moving toward it, and it means allowing it to change
you and actually changed the way you live.
And our obedience to Jesus isn't just believing something to be
true, it means moving toward Him.
And whenever you move toward Jesus, he's gonna lead you out
of something that is comfortable for the sake of something that
is better with the magic I find is so much more than they could
have imagined or expected because they don't just find
king of the Jews, they find king of the world and they find the
true King of kings and Lord of Lords.
Frederick Beecher, he says this. He's got a great line about
faith. He said faith is stepping out
into the unknown, with nothing to guide us but a hand just
beyond our grasp. God is calling you toward
something. There needs to be change in your
life. There will be change number one.
Number two, there will be opposition.
When King Herod heard this, he was disturbed.
Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them
the exact time the star had appeared.
He sent them to Bethlehem and said go and search carefully for
the child. As soon as you find him, report
to me so that I too may go and worship him.
Spoiler alert, that's not what he wants to do.
When the magi arrive in Jerusalem, they don't
immediately find Jesus. Jesus is in Bethlehem, but they
arrive in in Jerusalem and instead they find a ruthless and
insecure leader. They find King Herod, who's
paranoid that someone would be challenging his kingship.
In fact, Herod was so insecure in who he was and so paranoid
that somebody would overthrow him and take over his position
as king. He had two of his sons executed
because he thought they were plotting against him.
Again, spoiler alert, They weren't.
At least as far as we know. But that's how he lived his
life. Fearful, paranoid that somebody
would find out, would overthrow. He would lose who he is here.
It is disturbed because the coming of another king, even the
coming of a Messiah, would mean the end of his kingship, the end
of his time as king. And I think in so many ways,
Herod represents the worst of human inclination toward change,
and more broadly, toward what God is doing in the world.
Because Herod represents all of fear and control and
manipulation and threat that you and I can also experience.
When we feel like somebody's after us or when we're a little
bit concerned with somebody's after us, they might not be
right. When we feel threatened, what
are the things that we default to become afraid?
We can try to control, we can try to manipulate.
We can try to figure everything out so that it works out just
the way we want. I think, you know, recognize
some of these patterns in yourself.
Harold sees this baby's birth as a threat and he's terrified of
what it might mean for him. And so he does what so many of
us try to do when we are also fearful and insecure.
He tries to control and manipulate the magi.
And so he says go and search for him.
Like, go and find him for me, Go search so they're sent.
Go and search carefully for the child and then report back to me
so that I can also worship him. When God gets ahold of your life
and when you begin to do the things that God is calling you
to do. When your life actually does
begin to change, you will also face opposition and criticism
for doing the things that God is calling you to do.
Why? Because it exposes people's
insecurity. Because it threatens comfort.
Because they can't control your obedience or maybe don't
understand it, people can become fearful of what it might mean
for their life. If these things are true, how
might it now be demanding of me that I change?
And, and so maybe at times we try, people try to see the
change through their own lens or understand it through their own
worldview or make sense of it. But more commonly, what happens
people try to dismiss it or contain it or limit it or
explain it away or control it and use it like OK great, how
can I benefit from this scenario and situation here?
Tries to manipulate and use the magi for his own selfish
reasons. Why?
Because Jesus's Kingdom will always challenge and clash with
the kingdoms of the world. Jesus's Kingdom will always
challenge the kingdoms that are ruled by kings and would be
wannabe kings. And Jesus's Kingdom also
challenges the kingdoms that we've created in our own hearts
and in our own minds and in our own lives.
Because again, you may Here's the thing.
You may experience opposition out there, and you may
experience opposition to what God is doing in here.
Your own heart and your own mind might push against what God
wants to do in your life. You might experience opposition
that is entirely internal. Sometimes the herd we face isn't
out there, but the herd we face is in here because God's Kingdom
pushes against the kingdoms of darkness and even the little
kingdoms of darkness that exist in you and in me.
And those kingdoms don't go quietly into the night.
They don't wanna be defeated. They don't wanna be overthrown.
Hard shows us that the greatest threat to obedience isn't always
outside of us. Sometimes it's part of us that
refuses to let Jesus be King, and so internally we face
opposition of not wanting to let go of control and be like, I
finally thought I understood. Now you're telling me to let go.
Because we also fear what is unknown, and because we want
comfort given by old things, we struggle with insecurity.
Who will we become if we do the thing, God, that you're calling
me to do? How will others see me?
We sit in the shame of past wounds that we can't get out of
looping feedbacks in our brain and in our mind and heart.
And to you right says this about the Kingdom of God.
He says when God kingdoms or when God's Kingdom comes into
the world, the kingdoms that have set themselves against him
do not submit quietly. Following Jesus will mean
opposition as his Kingdom pushes against the kingdoms of
darkness. And as his Kingdom wins, there
will be opposition. John 14 says in Jesus there was
life, in Him was life, and that life was the light of all
mankind. He says the light shines in the
darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it, and cannot and
will not and does not. But God's Kingdom does push
against even inside of you these little kingdoms that don't want
to submit quietly. There will be opposition.
So number one, there will be change #2 there will be
opposition #3 there will be joy. The magi still do the thing that
they came to do. They find Jesus and they worship
him. So when they saw the star, they
were overjoyed. All right, the Magi were
overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw
the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and
worshipped him. Then they opened their treasures
and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and Mer.
On the other side of change and on the other side of opposition,
internally or externally, is joy, because there is joy to be
found in Jesus and in Jesus presence.
There is joy to be found in finding Jesus, in walking toward
him along the way that he leads on the other side of change, on
the other side of opposition. Joy.
And the magi experience joy. They experience joy of presence,
the joy in Jesus presence. They're overjoyed, says when
they saw the star, they're overjoyed because they found who
they were looking for. This is the implication.
They found Jesus Henry now, and though he says this for each of
us who wants to experience joy in our life, joy does not simply
happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep
choosing it every day. This is what the Magi choose
when they choose to go, and when they choose to be the ones who
find Jesus. They experience the joy of
Jesus's presence, the joy of knowing Him.
What I want to give you is two ways to choose joy that we see
in the magis life. Two things.
Joy is and will always be the outcome of worship.
This is #1 Joy is in so many ways the natural result of
worship. Because worship centres your
life around Jesus, worship orients and points your life.
It directs your attention and your affection around the only
one who can satisfy you truly. And so as you lean into worship
and as you honour and lift high the name of Jesus and the person
of Jesus, you will experience joy.
Joy will be an outcome of worship because worship centres
you around the presence of Jesus.
And joy numbers us #1 joy is the outcome of worship.
Joy is more than an emotion. This is number 2.
It says they give gifts. They opened their treasures and
presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and murr.
Now, these gifts, they're not just any gifts.
These gifts aren't just OK, well, what do we have in our
pockets? Like, what could we pick up
along the way? It's not like OHS we forgot
something and we gotta hit up like a store on our way through
Jerusalem and into Bethlehem and find something to buy this
little baby. These gifts were gifts that were
reserved for a king. And with it, with these gifts
that they choose to bring and offer Jesus, the Magi are
declaring Jesus to be king. It's not just like, hey, we
think that you would like these things.
Like what kid is like gold, frankincense and murr.
Yeah. OK, game on.
I don't know a kid who would love any of those things.
Seriously. Like if I trust me the gold is
gonna it's a long play, it'll be OK.
They gold, frankincense and myrrh.
This is these are the magis declarations over Jesus that he
is the king of kings. One of the primary jobs that a
magi had in their religion and system was to declare the King
of Persia as King of Kings. In fact, one of the other names
for the King of Persia was King of Kings, Lord of Lords.
And So what these magi are doing is stepping away.
They're walking away from that declaration and that form of
obedience to that other king and declaring Jesus to be the true
King of kings and Lord of Lords over and above their king would
be King of Kings, Lord of Lords. And so I think what they find is
that joy, their state overjoyed, is because of the presence of
Jesus. It is because they worship
Jesus, and it is because they choose to offer and give and
submit and arrive at Jesus with their gifts to declare him King
of Kings and Lord of Lords. And there is joy for you to be
experienced in the presence of Jesus as you worship him and
declare him to be King of kings and Lord of Lords.
John 15 Jesus says this. He says as the Father has loved
me, so I have loved you. Now remain in my love.
So if you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as
I have kept my Father's commands and remain in his love.
I've told you this so that my joy may be in you.
Jesus does long to give you his joy and for you to experience
it. And he says, and that your joy
might be complete, it might be full, it might lead to
flourishing of life, the fullness of it.
You listen. Learn to listen to God as He
speaks to you and obey as you move toward Jesus.
You are going to experience change, and change will always
be hard, and there will always be opposition, and sometimes the
greatest opposition will be inside your own heart and your
own mind. But on the other side of those
things, and as Jesus leads you through them, what you will find
is just more of Jesus's presence.
And with it, along with it, you will find the joy that only
Jesus can give. And it is a joy that you have to
choose over and over again. It is a joy that's found on the
road as you follow, as you live your life out.
It is joyless we found in worshipping Jesus.
It's joy to be found in bringing gifts that we have and place
them at His feet. And it's a joy that God honors,
and it's a joy that God provides for you so that it may be
complete. I love the way that this story
ends. That's not it, That's a quote.
Having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they,
the Magi, returned to their country by another route.
There are so many things that I don't have time to get into
about this passage. This one verse.
I love that they go home alright.
It's like Jesus doesn't say, OK, you're here, game on, time to
stay and stick around and have a big old party.
And just like you stay here and keep bringing me these gifts of
like gold, frankincense and Mer, the magi are sent home and
they're sent home to another country.
And T right. And his commentary says he said,
listen, don't miss the fact that what Matthew is doing here is
declaring from the very beginning, Jesus's birth is not
just for the people of Israel. Jesus's birth was for all
people. And we begin to see it declared
even here at the very beginning of Matthew's Gospel.
But having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod,
they returned to their country by another route.
That's what I want us to land on for today.
You cannot experience the presence of Jesus and go back
the same way you came. You can't experience it, the
presence of Jesus, and then just keep living life as though
nothing has changed. And yes, there's provision here.
The magi don't go back to Herod and they don't tell Herod where
they found Jesus. And there's a whole lot
happening here. But they go back by another
route because they had met Jesus and because their lives have
been changed by Jesus. And so I wonder, this is all it
is. I wonder what different route
might God be inviting you onto this season and into the next
new year and for the remainder of your life?
Let me pray. God thinks that you love us and
you do have something for each of us.
And yet again, whether this is a story that we've heard hundreds
or thousands of times, whether this is a story that we're
hearing in a new way, whether this is a story we're hearing
for the first time, there is an invitation to each one of us.
And so God, for some it is an invitation for the very first
time to surrender and to confess sins.
And our need for you, Jesus, Redeemer, One who wins back once
he breaks down darkness, One who wins over sin and death and
brings and breathes new life into into us.
Yeah, whether it's for those of us who need to hear a a new step
of obedience, like maybe we've been living in a pattern for far
too long and we know God, you're calling us out of it.
Whether it's to hear the story and to be the support for
someone along the road. Whether it's to choose finally
to go back by another route, to lay some stuff down Jesus at
your feet, and to pick up life inside your Kingdom at I pray.
Would you speak to each one of us today and as we continue to
lift high Jesus your name as we continue to sing and pray and
then as we go from this place. May we also go as people who are
changed because we met you and because we encountered Jesus
your presence. Thanks.
Let us not contained in this building.
It doesn't it's not just like oh, you gotta get to the special
place to meet you thinks that your presence goes with us
explodes into the world. Yeah.
We're so grateful that you love us.
Help us to love you in Jesus name, Amen.
You stand. With us as we sing.
God, I look to you. I won't be overwhelmed.
Give me the vision to see things like you do.
God, I look to you, you're wearing my hell comes from.
Give me wisdom. You know just what to do.
I will. My strength I will.
Lord this shit. No, my wrong forever, all my
days I will love you. God, I look to you.
I won't be overwhelmed. Give me vision to see things
like you. Do what I look to you, You wear
my hell comes from. Give me wisdom.
You know just what to do. I will love you, Strange.
I will love you Lord, and now will my forever all my days I
will love you God. Yeah, how they are.
God, how dare you? God reigns forever.
All my days. How dare you?
Yeah, and I will love you. Goodbye Stray, I will love you.
Ah, she I will love you goodbye forever.
All my days I will love you God. Yeah.
They. How are you?
Every day. How they?
How? Forever.
All night days. And then please be seated and
join me for the prayers of the people.
Gracious God, we thank you for this time of Advent.
Thank you for this time we are able to slow down, to wander, to
share in the joy of the season together as a church community.
We praise you, God, for your name, Emmanuel, that you are God
who is with us as we think on this mystery and wonder.
We praise you that you so loved your wayward people.
You were not content to simply dwell in our mist in the temple,
but you actually took on skin and blood and became one of us
to be with us, to know our grief, our temptation, and our
need. Lord, in the season with the
holidays, we pray for those in our church who experience
renewed reminders of grief, of loss, of a loved 1, of hardship.
And we pray that they would know you.
Who is with them? Would you draw them close?
Would they know your tender care?
Would You equip us as Your body to bear each other's burdens and
to love each other in Word, and indeed giving to each other as
you have given to us? And Lord, when we are tempted to
look outside at the headlines raging, and we are left just
waiting in a mystery with weary questions, would you help us not
to miss You, Your Holy Spirit drawing us near, would you help
us to?