Christmas Eve | Don't Miss Christmas - Christmas

Hey, I'm Pastor Steve Hole.

I want to empower you today to walk in your true identity as a worshiper and warrior.

Today, embrace the power of God's Word and the Holy Spirit.

Welcome to the Born for War podcast.

It's Christmas Eve, gang.

It's the official day for men to go shopping.

So Liz and I were at Hobby Lobby, and I avoid Hobby Lobby as much as possible.

But she wanted me to come along, and she said, look how happy everybody is.

This was yesterday.

So we're this is yesterday.

So this is getting really close to Christmas, right?

And we had said we're gonna have all this stuff done well before Christmas, and then here we are, you know?

So we're in there, and Liz looks around, she goes, These are type B people.

See how happy they are?

All the type A's, man, they got all their shopping done three weeks ago.

And we did a lot of it online.

But you're here.

You gave up time on Christmas Eve to be here.

And I applaud that because you're putting Christ in the center of your family, in the center of your life.

But there was this guy a few years back who forgot what Christmas was about and uh decided to shoot off a little bit of steam.

He went in, it started off really bad for him because he went into the garage to get the lights for the Christmas tree, and they're all balled up.

His wife had done that.

So now he's really mad at his wife because she balled up all the light.

Took him an hour to unravel that thing.

And then he got it all stretched out across the garage and he plugged it in and they all came on.

It's like a miracle.

And then his daughter drove in the driveway and right into the garage and smashed all the lights.

That kind of ticked him off.

He was already in anger management classes.

So he knew he had to do something with his frustration.

So while the family decorated the tree, he went up and unlocked out of his safe a 45-caliber revolver and he went out into the backyard and he shot it into the ground.

Because he was venting his anger in a constructive way, he felt.

Well, then someone neighbored one of the neighbors called with somebody disturbing the peace, and so the cops came and they locked him up and he spent Christmas in jail.

He missed Christmas.

I guess it brings new meaning to chestnuts roasting on an open fire to chestnuts roasting as you open fire.

Christmas has gotten pretty weird, right?

Gifts for dogs?

Nervous laughter out there.

Gifts for cats?

Dogs, I mean, I can understand, but cats?

I mean, come on, man.

I knew somebody who had gifts for their hamster.

One lady I read about took her dog with her to Petco to let the dog pick out his present.

Folks, that's getting really weird.

So Christmas is not about Santa, and it's not about trees, and it's not about shopping.

It's not even about gift giving.

It's about the Savior of the world who came to die so that we could be set free, so that we could find forgiveness of our sins, a reason for living, and power to deal with the issues that are before us and the problems that come that Satan manufactures most of the time.

Demons are behind it.

Christ gives us the power to overcome.

And you become more of an overcomer when you follow Him.

Don't miss Christmas.

That's the purpose of Christmas.

Well, even in Bethlehem in the first Christmas, some people missed Christmas.

So if you have your Bible, look at Luke chapter 2.

Luke 2 · chapter mention

Luke chapter 2.

Luke 2 · chapter mention

It's the classic Christmas story.

We're going to actually look at Luke 2.

If you want to go ahead and get your finger in Matthew 2, Luke 2 and Matthew 2.

For you that are guests with us today, we're kind of one of those Bible churches.

So we like open the Bible a lot.

But anyway, Luke is in the New Testament, and Luke is a physician.

So he was a doctor, and he's actually the most precise of all of the gospel writers.

So you have Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

And we classically call Matthew, Mark, and Luke the synoptic gospels, each with a slightly different perspective on the life of Christ.

Luke, the most precise, and so his story is the one we pick up in verse 1.

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 Corinius was governing Syria.

I mean, I find it quite interesting that this is the beauty of the Bible, you guys, is how precise it is.

And he's giving us who's in actual political positions during this time that a census was taken.

Do you realize that over half of our history in antiquity, from about 2,000 years before Christ up to Christ, and then into the first 500 years after Christ?

Most of that history is found through the specifics we have historically from actually the Bible and church history.

This census first took place while Quirinius was governing Syria.

So all went to be registered, everyone to his own city.

Let me just stop there again.

I'm looking at this.

This is what's amazing.

With the birth of Christ, all these other characters that we're gonna look at here today are just footnotes.

But at that time, they were the headliners.

Do you understand?

These are like the social media people.

This is the headliner.

They're just a footnote to what's gonna happen in our story today.

Joseph, verse 4, 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, 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.

So she brought forth her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, laid him in a manger, and this is the operable part of the sentence here, because there was no room for them in the inn.

So the innkeeper missed the first Christmas.

And it was right before him.

Clothed in a peasant girl and a carpenter who didn't have a whole lot of money.

And if they had had money, they probably could have bribed the innkeeper.

But they didn't have any money.

So the first innkeeper that we know about in history in the Bible missed Christmas.

And Jesus was born in whatever perspective in history you want to take, either it was a barn or a stable.

A barn, a stable, or a cave.

So I've been to Israel, and when you do a tour of Israel, there's two things they're trying to do.

One is they're trying to educate you on what has happened in the past, and the other is to make a lot of money.

And so when you're in Bethlehem, there's not a whole lot of barns around.

So you go to this cave out in the middle of a pasture in a field, and they say, this is probably where it happened.

And I, I mean, I'm from Georgia, I'm not real smart, but I figured it out.

That's the best thing they've got going for you to look at.

So we don't know.

But here's what we do know.

We know that in the whole tousehold we have a chicken coop.

And I told Liz, if we're gonna have chickens, her and the kids need to take care of them.

But many times that doesn't work out.

And I end up having to go out there.

And when you walk out there in a chicken coop, you get things on the bottom of your feet.

It's some people call it droppings, and some people call it poop.

But they're all over the place, even with hay on the ground, and I can guarantee you there were chickens in that barn or that cave or that stable.

And it stunk in there.

Horses and cows stink.

Grew up on a ranch.

And there's no halos.

How many of you have manger scenes somewhere in your house?

Raise your hand if you've got a lot of you, okay.

Some of them have little halos on them.

That's not a halo-laden situation.

That place stunk, and that's the way God came into this world.

The innkeeper missed Christmas because of a buck, because of his business.

Business came first.

Now he was ignorant.

Let's give him the benefit of the doubt, of course.

But for some of us, we miss Christmas because of a buck.

Running all over the place, buying stuff, and there's nothing wrong with some of that.

But man, it can just take over your life.

I've always liked Thanksgiving more than Christmas because you don't give gifts.

So it means you don't have to buy them.

But at Christmas, Christ was born, and we get all caught up in it, and so did the innkeeper.

And it's easy for you and me to miss the point of Christmas.

Because of business, because of our finances, because of shopping, whatever it might be.

Well, there's somebody who should have known better, and that's in Matthew chapter 2.

Matthew 2 · chapter mention

So look at Matthew chapter 2.

Matthew 2 · chapter mention

Matthew, the theme of the book of Matthew is the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God.

That would be the theme of Matthew.

And so he deals a lot with kings and leaders all through the book of Matthew.

And so we pick it up in chapter 2, verse 1, with a king.

Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he who has been born king of the Jews?

For we have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him.

When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.

Now that's that's kind of a mild way for Matthew to write it.

Probably Herod was super angry.

Now King Herod's different than the innkeeper.

The innkeeper is just ignorant, and for him, his life revolves around making money and his business.

But for Herod, everything revolves around him.

Herod is considered one of the most paranoid, fearful, probably borderline schizophrenic leaders in Israel of all time.

One historian called him a paranoid, selfish tyrant.

Pretty interesting words for someone.

Everything revolved around Herod.

And when he hears this phrase, it really upsets him.

The phrase is he who has been born king of the Jews.

You see, Herod was using that for his own classification.

He considered himself the king of the Jews.

And in verse 3, it says that he was troubled and all of Jerusalem with him, because when Herod was angry, everybody was potentially in trouble.

Herod, fearful of a king, fearful of someone taking his selfish, paranoid place.

Herod was the one who had his wife and his three sons killed, thinking they were stealing from him.

This is the guy who built Masada, Nabenda the Masada.

Masada's way up on this hill in the desert outside Jerusalem, and you can't get to the top without a lot of effort because he was so paranoid he didn't want to be able to get up there.

On the day of his death, Herod had all the leading men killed so that people would mourn.

This guy was selfish, he was paranoid, he was paralyzed by fear.

And he's going to put out an edict to find Jesus.

Herod missed Christmas.

And you know what?

We have a lot to be fearful of these days.

I don't know about you, but I've slowed down on watching as much news as I used to watch.

It just gets me so down.

It gets me so depressed.

So I've gone to hooking up the kind of messages I want to hear on my computer when I do my workout.

We're living in a post-COVID life, and we remember the fear that went with that.

And what will be the next one that they crank out for us?

Reading different scientific viewpoints as it related to the plan uh pandemic.

Um you caught that.

Don't let fear and intimidation get in the way of your Christmas.

Some of you, and I know some of you, have been through a rough, rough year in 2022.

It's been really hard.

Loss of loved ones, near-death experiences, cancer, not sure about the future financially, your company, issues with losing, maybe even your employment because of some convictions and choices that you've made that went against what they said you had to make.

A lot of fear.

Don't miss Christmas because of fear.

Don't miss Christmas because of the paranoia that you struggle with because of what's happening around the world.

Because Satan is certainly alive and well.

That they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.

Men and women, you're not in control of your life.

You're not in control of your life.

If you don't know Christ, if you don't have a relationship with him, Satan's got you.

And you say, well, come on.

Are you talking about like being demon-possessed or something?

Nope.

I'm not talking about that.

The enemy's way more subtle and way more strategic than that.

So when I was 18, and many of you have heard this story before, I got tired of me.

I got tired of being in control of my life.

I got tired of running my life.

And I gave myself to Christ.

I surrendered everything to Him.

And that's when life became unique.

That's when I became me because the creator created me began to show me who me was.

And I began to discover his way and a relationship with him.

Don't miss Christmas.

So the innkeeper missed it because of the eternal buck.

Herod missed it because of fear.

But here's what's really sad.

Look at verse 4.

The religious leaders missed Christmas.

The most religious, the most moral of that time period totally missed Christmas.

And when he had gathered all the chief priests, so Herod, he knows there's something.

There's something about this prophecy.

He's thinking about Isaiah.

He's thinking about the scriptures.

He's a Pharisee himself.

He knows the scriptures.

So he calls the chief priest and the scribes of the people together.

He inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.

So they said to him, Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet, but you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are not the least among the rulers of Judah, for out of you shall come a ruler.

Bad word for Herod to hear.

For out of you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.

When Herod, then Herod, when he had secretly called the wise men, determine from them what time the star appeared, and he sent them to Bethlehem and said, Go and search carefully for the young child, and when you found him, bring back word to me that I may come and worship him also.

The religious leaders missed Christmas.

It was right there.

They had the Bible, they had the scriptures.

All they had to do is go investigate.

From Jerusalem to Bethlehem is six miles.

They never went, they never searched.

They never took the necessary steps to discover that the Messiah had been born.

Religion blinds you.

Religion gets in the way of our relationship with God.

Religion caves in to rituals and traditions.

And listen, power.

There's always power in religion.

And that power tends to blind us to the relationship we can have with God.

I mean, if we look at 9-11, it was religion that took down the Twin Towers.

It was religion that drove that plane into the Pentagon.

It's religion right now that's slaughtering Christians in the Sudan, parts of China, the Middle East, Saudi Arabia.

They're slaughtering and they're imprisoning Christians in the name of religion.

It's religion that brought the Inquisition in Europe.

I hate religion.

These religious leaders, you know what their problem was?

They were indifferent.

They were indifferent to truth because they were married to tradition instead of seeking the truth.

And they were looking for a different kind of Messiah.

They were looking for a Messiah who would break the shackles of Rome.

They weren't looking for a Messiah that would die on a cross for their sins.

Are you searching for truth?

Do you want truth?

Are you searching for what's the difference between right and wrong?

Are you searching for abundance?

Are you searching for that joyful happiness that can only come from within?

That's Christmas.

And that's what this Christmas is all about.

And there actually are a little group here.

We don't know if there were three or not.

There were three gifts.

We don't know if there were three wise men.

But the wise men got it right.

The wise men got it right.

Here's what's interesting about our story is that the wise men were not at the stable.

The wise men would come later.

Epiphany, one in the church yeah, is about, we know from history, about a year or two later before they made it.

But they had started to search for this star and where it was taking them back at the time when the Messiah was born.

But it took them a year or two to actually get there.

But they're they're on it.

So you've got a major scene.

What my mom used to do is she did two things.

It was pretty cool.

I like this about our tradition, the whole family.

She would have the major scene set it up first part of December in the Advent season.

We had an Advent wreath like we have here, have an Advent wreath on the table, and she'd light it, and the first Sunday of Advent, first Sunday of the four Sundays before Christ's birth, the manger scene came out, but there was no baby Jesus.

So you had Joseph and Mary, and you had some shepherds and some cows and stuff.

And guarantee you there were no pigs, but there were cows and stuff like that in there.

But no manger and no wise men.

And then the hunt was on because she hid Jesus somewhere in the house.

And then she hid the wise men somewhere in the house.

And we'd find the wise men quickest because there's three, you know, pretty good sized guys and everything.

And then they would move.

They kept moving toward the manger.

So every day she'd move them a little bit closer.

Sometimes they're under the bed, sometimes they're up in the closet, but we couldn't find the manger.

And if you did, I think you got like a butterfinger or something like that.

The wise men got it.

So the innkeeper missed it because of ignorance and because of his business.

King Herod missed it because he was always so fearful and paranoid.

The religious leaders missed it because they were indifferent and they were married to religion, not truth.

But the wise men got it right.

Look at verse 1 again.

Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem.

Now listen to what they say, saying, Where is he who has been born king of the Jews?

For we have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him.

The wise men are seeking Christ.

They're seeking the Messiah.

They're seeking the King of the Jews.

May I challenge you here on Christmas Eve?

Would you make it your goal this Christmas Eve and tomorrow to seek the King of the Jews?

To seek the Messiah, Jesus?

To wake up in the morning as a family and maybe open up the Bible to Luke chapter 2 or Matthew 2 and just read it before you dive into all the presence and stuff, or maybe tonight if that's when you do your thing.

Luke 2 · chapter mention

The wise men got it right.

And here's what's interesting about our story.

So let me just break it down.

The innkeeper is probably 90% chance he's a Jew, he missed it.

He had the scriptures, he knew about a Messiah, he went to the temple or the synagogue, and he missed it.

Herod, who comes out of a religious family, knew the scriptures.

He understood Judaism.

He probably even had large portions of the Old Testament memorized.

He missed it.

The religious leaders who bring the quote here from the Old Testament of the prophecy of the coming Messiah missed it.

The wise men are astronomers, astrologers, and sorcerers.

They're into the occult.

We might call them New Agers, Scientologists of the time, and they got it.

Isn't that ironic?

Everybody go like that.

I mean, I think that's ironic to me.

That when you look, everybody should have gotten it.

Except the wise men.

They're called magi, they're called magicians, but they understood two things.

They understood prophecy and they understood science.

Church.

Science is proving the existence of God.

Science is proving the veracity of the Bible.

Science is showing us the power of God, showing us what truth looks like through a microscope or a telescope.

It's amazing.

And that's what our conference is about.

God, sex, and science.

We're actually looking at sex from the perspective of science and God in this conference.

It's all lining up.

Now look at verse 11.

Verse 11.

And when they had come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him.

So first, they're truth seekers, and second, they're worshipers.

Will you worship the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords this Christmas?

Will you take time to worship him?

You're here.

Great start.

But how about throughout the whole year?

Let us be worshiped.

Can we fill our homes with worship?

Can we be truth seekers?

The wise men were.

Jeremiah says, You will seek me and find me if you search for me with all of your heart.

So many women, I don't know where some of you that are guests with us today are coming from.

But here's what I do know scripturally and from experience.

If you become a true seeker, seeking for truth in every area of your life, and you choose to say, Lord, I will worship you if you'll prove yourself to me, He will.

He will do that.

If you search for Him with all of your heart.

So, Father God, I just thank you for our time today.

I thank you for your love for us.

And I pray, Lord, a blessing over your people.

God, I pray that we would be seeking after truth in our lives.

I pray, Lord, that we would be a we'd be men and women that are truly ready to know you.

That we would cut out the religion and press into a personal, vital, dynamic, growing, passionate relationship with you.

In your name we pray.

Amen.

Thank you for listening to the Born for War podcast.

We hope today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.

To connect with Pastor Steve's sermons, books, and blog, visit Steve Holtonline.org.

God bless you.