Christmas Online Service

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! Hi, my name's Amy Ly, and this is my husband Tyler, and we wanna welcome you to the Christmas service for Trinity Community Church.

Yeah.

Christmas is a special time, and for us it kind of has even more meaning, right?

Yeah.

You asked me to marry you 30 years ago on Christmas Eve

And she said, yes,.

I'm so thankful four children later.

Three.

Three grandchildren, and who knows what is to come.

Amen.

Amen.

Yeah.

All right.

Well, again, thank you for joining us and please feel free to worship with us during this first song.

There's a lot of things that you could say about the Christmas story.

Obviously we could spend hours and hours breaking it down.

Yeah.

But I thought it would be kind of neat.

You and I both have have thought about the end of the Christmas story as being something that's special.

Yes.

Right?

Yes.

So who are the characters we're talking

About?

We're gonna talk about Anna and Simeon and Jesus.

Yeah.

And shepherds

.

That's right.

So let's look at Luke chapter two.

If you, if you're reading along with your Bible, you can turn to Luke chapter two verses 22 through 38.

And when the time came for their purification, according to the love Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord as it is written in the law of the Lord.

Every male who first opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord.

And to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtle doves, or two young pigeons.

Now, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout waiting for the consolation of Israel.

And the Holy Spirit was upon him, and it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit, that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

And he came in the spirit into the temple.

And when the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him, according to the custom of the law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said, Lord, now you are letting your servant part in peace according to your word, for my eyes, have seen your salvation.

That you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people.

Israel.

And his father and his mother marveled at what was said about him, and Simeon bless them and said to marry his mother, behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel and for a sign that is opposed.

And a sword will pierce through your own soul also.

Hmm.

So that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.

And there was a prophet test, Anna, the daughter of Piel, of the tribe of Escher, she was advanced in years having lived with her husband seven years, and from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was 84, she did not depart from the temple worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.

And coming up at that very hour, she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who are waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.

That's great.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't think a lot of people consider Simeon and Anna, at least I haven't heard them talked about a lot when you hear the Christmas story.

Not much, I don't think.

Yeah.

And so I thought it would be kind of neat to look at them and maybe glean some lessons from the way that they responded to Jesus.

Yes.

So the first thing that we can point out is that Jesus' parents were obedient to dedicate him to the Lord.

It's kind of interesting.

He's dedicated to the Lord and he is the Lord, but it was right.

It was like a progressive thing.

These things were happening.

So he was presented to his father, right?

Mm-hmm.

that his father who had given him into this world.

And so there was, uh, they, everything that was done was in order to fulfill the commandments and the law.

And so it was just really neat.

I love when we do dedications here at Trinity.

Yeah.

And I think it had to be special for Mary to realize he is is never mine.

Right.

He's always the fathers.

So yeah.

Over and over again, you see where Mary's considering these things.

Yeah.

So, uh, the next thing is that Simeon seems to give us an example of how we almost look to Jesus as our savior and for salvation.

Um, Simeon was a righteous guy.

It says that in the verses here.

He was righteous and devout.

He was devoted to his heavenly Father, right?

Mm-hmm.

.

And it's always good to have good people around you that are like that, loyal to the Lord and faithful to each other as well.

Well, I think that some of the saints in the body, these young or these men that have faithfully served mm-hmm.

and dedicated their lives and been married 50 and 60 years, and the example that we look to in them.

Yeah.

And I think how much Simeon if we take heed to what the word say Sure.

How the devotion that they had serving the father Yeah, yeah.

In expectation for the savior.

Right.

And as Simeon is kind of pointing us to how we can interact with the life of Jesus, how we can really be redeemed and saved.

It's interesting that, first of all, we, we must recognize that only God can make a person righteous.

Even though Simeon was a good man, God called him righteous because he was, uh, because he had chosen him Yes.

To be one of his children.

And so that's just something to remember as you're contemplating what it means to be a Christian.

We can't do it on our own.

You can't do enough good things.

You can't give enough gifts.

You can't, uh, you know, be, be religious enough.

There's nothing that we can do to be righteous outside of God calling us righteous.

Yep.

Anything we do that is so supposedly good is like filthy rags.

Yes.

So we need the righteousness

Of Christ.

We need the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

Yeah.

And then the next thing that I see with Simeon in this passage is that he was waiting for the Messiah based on the Old Testament prophecies that, that he knew from, from a young age, because these verses would've been quoted over and over again whenever he was in the temple.

Yeah.

And, and it's a challenge to us to memorize the word of God.

Yeah.

That we have it hidden so that we know the truth from falsehood.

Yeah.

Simeon knew what to look for Yeah.

Because of what was in the, in the word of God, what he had read already or what he had heard already his whole life.

So some examples of those prophetic things, uh, found in, in the Old Testament one is Isaiah seven 14.

You wanna read that?

Sure.

Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign.

Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Emmanuel.

Amen.

And then Micah five, two.

But you o Bethlehem Efta, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah from you shall come forth for me.

One who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from old, from ancient days.

Yeah.

Just amazing to me that hundreds of years before Jesus was born in this earth, there were these prophecies, these promises found in God's word that were so precise, where he was gonna be born, how he was gonna be born, all of those things.

Yeah.

And the promises that stood the test of time, and the test of rulers and nations coming and going.

Yeah.

And God's words stood time

Still, always true.

And then the final one is Isaiah nine, six.

This is probably my favorite.

I love

It.

Yeah.

For two, i, a child is born to us, a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, prince of peace.

Yeah.

So if we want to be followers of Jesus, first of all, it's only He that can make us righteous.

We learned that.

Yes.

The second thing that I think Simeon gives us an example of is that we must hear the word of God.

In order for faith to grow, we need to be hearers of the word.

And we, we can't, again, we have no ability to change ourselves.

The Holy Spirit has to make that happen.

But the word of God is what God uses to draw people to himself.

And, and when we believe it and, and live it out, you know, he changes our lives.

Yeah.

And hearing and implying that word daily.

Yes.

And multiple times a day, just like we need to eat or drink water to sustain ourselves.

Exactly.

We need that word of God to sustain our faith and our belief.

That's right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Another thing that we see from Simeon, he had been given a personal guarantee by God that he would see the Messiah with his own eyes.

Can you imagine that it's not only that he had read the prophecies, or that he had this thing that he felt in his heart.

He actually had been told by God that you're gonna live long enough to see the actual Messiah born into this world.

I'm sure every day he was in anticipation like, it's today the day, it's

Predicted.

It's today, the day.

Today be the day.

It's like you didn't want to miss a day at the temple, just in case it was that

Day.

Yeah.

And just

Watching, watching, looking, wondering.

Uh, and it's not like Marion Joseph wore a sign that said, you know, Messiah's parents.

I mean, he had to have discernment.

The Holy Spirit had to show him.

Yeah.

Right.

That relationship with the father, he he knew Yeah.

He saw

Him.

Yeah.

And, and so that's that vital step again, the next step in understanding salvation is that the Holy Spirit has to open our eyes so that we can see Jesus as he really is.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm, I'm so glad that God's done that for us, for our children.

Yes.

For a lot of the people who are, are part of our church.

And we're just believing even for more eyes to be opened today by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And it's something we have to do for ourselves.

We can't rely on our parents doing it for us or our children doing it.

It's a commitment we make personally with the Father.

Exactly.

And I, I think the final thing there with Simeon is he responded by blessing God and blessing Jesus' family.

So what was his first act after he realized that this was Messiah?

He turned his face heaven word.

And he began to praise and worship God and thank him that he had the ability to, to be a part of this very important moment in time.

And then he looked to Mary and Joseph and began to prophesy to them about what their future looked like and what Jesus' future was gonna be.

And so, in order for us to be believers in Jesus Christ, we must believe in our heart and confess with our mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord.

It wasn't enough for Simeon to know about Jesus or to even be hopeful concerning him in order for him to access who Jesus is for himself.

He needed to speak it out of his mouth.

And, and we have that same, you know, the call from Romans 10, nine and 10 is that we are supposed to confess, believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths.

And, um, one of the greatest ways to do that, in my opinion, is in through baptism.

You know?

Yeah.

I, I still remember getting baptized on an Easter morning, and it was one of the most spectacular days of my life.

Yeah.

It's just this public declaration of what God's already done on the inside.

Right.

Right.

Shouting it to the

World, shouting it to the world.

Um, and he is interesting cuz he didn't, he prophesied a couple of things that were pretty unique.

The first thing was that he said that God's intent with Jesus was to bring salvation to the Gentiles as well as the Jews.

And this would've been a radical thought because most of the Jewish people believed that the Messiah was coming exclusively for them.

Right.

This was tearing down prejudice.

Yes, yes.

Big time hitting it right on the head.

And then the other thing is that he not only talked to most, uh, Mary and Joseph about the good things that were coming, but he also said, there's gonna be a, a great season of difficulty that you're going to face and that Jesus is going to face.

And we know, as you read the scriptures and understand the rest of the story, that Jesus suffered greatly in order to be able to be the sacrifice that we needed him to be.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And he was a willing sacrifice.

Yeah, exactly.

Thank God.

And so you're gonna talk about Anna for a few minutes.

Yes.

Yes.

Um, I love how Anna was an example, uh, how to live a life of hope surrendered.

Yeah.

Um, she lived in the temple and she devoted probably like three-fourths of her life.

That's a long time.

Or devoted

Because she was like 85 years old.

Right.

Something like that.

84 and four.

And she was married for seven years and then a widow.

Wow.

And it says she worshiped and fasted and prayed in the temple day and night.

Yeah.

And so this woman was expectant Yeah.

For the hope to come.

Right.

And she, it says she was a prophet mm-hmm.

.

And so I believe she just had such great expectancy of knowing the scripture and being so in tune with the Holy Spirit that she know knew great things were coming.

Yeah.

And so she passes by Simeon Sure.

As Simeon with Marian Joseph, and she sees the Christ child, and then she begin, begins declaring it Yeah.

To everybody she sees in the temple.

And so first of all, she's her filled with hope.

Yep.

And she sees that portrayed in flesh before her, and she immediately starts telling other people.

Yeah.

And what a great example about our faith to begin to Yeah.

To be bolder about sharing our faith for one thing.

For sure.

It's almost like Simian is giving us the pathway to salvation.

And then Anna is coming in and showing us what to do once we've been saved.

Yeah.

So the first thing that Anna kind of teaches us through that you mentioned is that believers should be committed to worshiping God even through with prayer and fasting.

Yes.

Right.

And we'll have Kelly preach a message on that next year, 2023 sometime, but no, we should, we should really be believers that are sincere in the way that we worship God.

Right?

Yes.

And then the next thing she, she kind of brought up there, um, is that believers should stand on God's promises, trusting that, that he knows the right timing, like you said, she recognized, she discerned, she saw, um, what was happening with Sumin and she immediately moved in that direction.

Yeah.

You

Know, and we have that hope and that promise that Jesus is returning Yes.

One day for his church and his bride.

Yeah.

And so we should be filled with that expectancy and be praying for that and, um, belonging in hope for those things to come.

Yeah.

Yeah.

If we believe it, if we actually believe it, and we've, we've read it in the scriptures and we feel it on the inside, it should so impact us that we are like Sime and Anna in the way that we respond.

Yeah.

You know, that we live our lives, uh, fully expectant that in our lifetime, in the, in the, any moment in time that this could actually happen.

Yeah.

Uh, that's so, that's so good.

And the final thing with Anna is that, like you said, she shared her faith with everybody that was around her.

And we as believers should, in my opinion, um, more than we do, more than I do, I should say, we should share the good news of Jesus with those that we encounter around us.

Yeah.

I think we, we can choose to show and share all the things that he's done for us.

Yeah.

In the past, he's done so many things and salvation is enough, but daily, as we are in tune with him, and with him living out life, we can see God moving in our lives every day.

Yeah.

And so there is always something new to share about

Jesus.

Yeah, exactly.

I ask the Lord all the time for new stories because as a pastor of a church that, you know, we've been here now for, I guess it's 10 years, something like that.

And so it is like you preach often enough, you tell enough of your stories,, I

Mean, new stories,

, he needs some new stories.

Right.

And so I'm thankful that, um, I go looking for God to move.

I have an expectancy that he's going to do something not just through me, but around me, where I'm gonna be able to observe it and be able to, like you said, to, to share it with other people.

I mean, what a great gift we've been given.

And it's just unfortunate that sometimes we feel pressured from the outside to be silent, concerning the thing that's really the most important thing that's ever happened to us.

You know, it's the most important thing that's ever happened to the world.

To the world, to the world, period.

Yeah.

So I, I've just, I think Sian and Anna, like, like we said from the beginning, really had a lot to share with us today.

So thank God for those that that don't even get noticed or mentioned a lot.

They're still important in the Kingdom of God and that those verses are in the scripture for a very important reason.

Yeah.

So, yeah.

And it's a good encouragement to con as we get older to continue for suing and

Longness.

Well, I'm getting older.

I don't think you're getting older.

You still look, you're great about the same as when I married you almost years ago.

So speaking of love, why don't we love on the Lord?

And we'll go to this next song, this worship together.

I think one thing that's special about Christmas is how families can incorporate traditions.

Yeah.

And I think one of the things that's been unique, you know, I grew up in a family where we didn't really celebrate holidays a lot.

In fact, Christmas was kind of like the joke at our house was green as evil because my dad was, went to a Bible school and was taught some things about Christmas that were just, it's not that they were necessarily horribly wrong, but they just, it made a very strict environment for our family.

So what we would do is we would actually set up a, a, a beautiful nativity scene and we were allowed to put some lights around it.

And, and that was the focus, the focal point.

And honestly, looking back on it, you know, it's not like missed out by doing that.

It was really kind of a neat way to, to focus.

And then we'd put our gifts under, under that area and open our gifts.

But we as a family with our kids mm-hmm.

and now hopefully our grandkids, right.

Um, wants to continue to be creative in coming up with things that could become traditions.

And one of the ways we've done that is by doing, uh, the Christmas story in v in a variety of ways, right?

Mm-hmm.

.

So one year, you remember what Jordan did one year?

Yeah.

Jordan like narrated in the whole Bible story.

He acted out the whole

Christmas story.

Like every person he would just spin and then he would be Joseph, he'd spin around, then he'd be Mary's part.

And it was quite entertaining.

It was very entertaining.

Everybody laughed a lot.

I don't know if there were any tears.

He might've cried when he kicked the table or something, I don't remember.

But

Yeah, it was quite a sight,

But it was hilarious.

And, but it was also special.

It was meaningful because we were talking about the greatest story, right?

Yeah.

The Christmas story.

And so I think that, um, as we continue, as, as we've continued to move along through the years, we've tried a lot of variety of different ways.

Cause I think one of the things again that can happen is that we can become so like, tied into and, and caught up in the, the world's way of celebrating, which is not, none of it's, it's, it's not like everything is evil.

But you know, if, if your entire focus of Christmas is on the movies or you know, the, or presents or, you know, you could list a whole bunch of things.

Well, and if it's all on that, I think you leave the season feeling voided Yeah.

Of an empty because you haven't focused on the right things.

Correct.

But if you're focusing on the gift of Christ and the things that he's done for you, you can leave that season feeling refreshed and filled up Yeah.

Instead of drained from shopping like crazy or whatever.

Right.

And I think we've done Christmas, like we've always tried to do the Christmas story, but we've, like, you've challenged them to do it different ways.

So maybe each kid had to share a different way or they acted out or different things.

And so it was different because you have to change it as the kid's age or to, you know, it's part of, or just to make it fun or, um,

Yeah.

I I think, you know, God is a creative God, and so I think that, that he gives his children the same creativity.

And so we thought, we've talked about this enough, probably we thought that we would, um, give you an example of something that you might be able to do with your family or friends group or, um, spiritual family.

And, uh, this is just one example, right.

So what we did was Manna White, my wife has brought this beautiful velvet bag, and if anybody can guess and put in the comment section what, where you think that came from, there'll be a bonus, something for you in the new year.

I don't know what it will be yet, but that'd be fun.

So what we're gonna do is we're gonna draw, there's some sheets of paper in here that have the different people or, or entities Right.

That were a part of the Christmas story.

Okay.

So each one of us are gonna take, turn drawing out of the bag, and then, uh, whenever you draw out of the bag, you, you get to share from your perspective what it must have been like for those characters in the Nativity story.

Okay.

Okay.

All right.

So are you gonna start or am I gonna start?

I guess I'll go first.

All right.

All right.

Here we go.

Okay.

I got Shepherds.

Shepherds.

Yes.

Amazing.

So what do you, what do you wanna say about the shepherds?

Well, when I think about it, I think you have faithful young men, or men that would be out there, um, in different types of weather, in the rain, and, um, maybe feeling lonely a lot of times,

I would think.

Yeah.

And maybe feeling a little bit less than mm-hmm.

because they're missing the hustle and bustle of the city.

Or maybe, um, they're leaving their families for extended time.

So I would think they feel maybe less than and lonely.

Yeah.

Even if you think of, like, for example, David in the Old Testament, remember he was a shepherd Yeah.

And he was out taking care of his flock.

And then Samuel, the prophet came and he was going to pick out who the next king was going to be out of all of, uh, out of David's family.

Jesse was the father.

Right.

And David was out shepherding, and they even forgot to mention him.

Yeah.

He was, he was not on the radar.

He

Wasn't on the radar because he was just doing the work that the, the lowest person kind of, uh, in the, on the scale would, would do Yeah.

As a shepherd.

But

That's so like God to pick the lowest I know and confound the wise.

Yeah.

He's always so good at that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And if you wanna read on, uh, about this in the scripture, I'll, I'll actually read it to, uh, for us here.

Luke chapter two verses 15 through 18 says, when the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.

And they went with haste and found Marion Joseph and the baby lying in a manger.

And when they saw it, they made no one the saying that had been told them concerning this child.

And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them.

Yeah.

And I think of shepherds, you know, seeing an angel Yeah.

And then going, I mean, to see a baby born is one of the most beautiful things in the world.

Yes.

It, it is.

I I'll have to say.

Yes.

And so for them, these, it's

Easier for some than others

To have the angels come.

Yeah.

And then to go and to see be in this stable Yeah.

And to see this new baby, um, and to experience the presence of God.

Yeah.

I mean, how beautiful and how life changing that moment was true

For them.

That's true.

Yeah.

That's great.

Yeah.

All right.

So that's the first one.

So it's my turn now.

There you go.

Let me see, I'm gonna pull from the bag.

Random.

It's going to be Joseph.

All right.

Well, Joseph is a, a family name in my family.

My dad's middle name is Joseph.

My uncle's name Joseph.

So I don't know why that's important, but I just thought I should share that.

Sure.

But Joseph means actually means favored one.

Okay.

So that's a, I think that in the story, Joseph was a favored one, even though he wasn't, um, connected to the story in the same way that Mary was.

Um, he still was such a vital, important part of it.

And I think about what it must have been for him as a, a young Jewish man who was betrothed or basically engaged to marry, to be married to her.

And then he finds out that she's pregnant.

And honestly, he kind of was willing to do the, the honorable thing in a way, because if she had been found to be pregnant, um, obviously through, through sin Right.

Then they, you know, she, she could have been killed or stoned for her, um, unfaithfulness to the Lord.

Yeah.

But because of the fact that Joseph had a visitor named called Gabriel.

Gabriel.

Right.

And Angel that came and told him that this was God's plan, this was God's will.

Yeah.

And that he wasn't to be afraid.

And, and it's interesting that Angel even gave Joseph the baby's name.

It said, she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.

Yeah.

And I think that made it really, um, tangible, more tangible and real for him, and he was able to accept it.

And that's found in Matthew, that story is found in Matthew chapter one.

Yeah.

So, and it's beautiful how he chose to do the honorable thing Yeah.

And, and, and marry her.

Yeah.

And raise Jesus

God's son.

Yes.

.

Um, and yeah, I think it's just so beautiful.

Yeah.

How he was willing to do that and Yeah.

Yeah.

And we know the story of even, you know, God warned them again through an angel and a dream to go to Egypt to protect their son.

You know, Joseph was the one spearheading all of that.

So,

So it's showing us that, I mean, he feared God.

Yeah.

Because he listened and obeyed.

He didn't run from, this is a high calling that he was called to, and we don't hear much about him, I think True to just,

Yeah.

To think of what he pay attention

He went through.

Sure.

Yeah.

All right.

Beautiful.

Your turn.

We've only got a few more.

Okay.

Here we go.

Angels, angels.

Why did, we didn't put one in there about you,.

You're my, you're my Christmas angel.

.

All right.

She's saying to stop.

So

Luke two, eight through 14 says, and in the same region there were shepherds out in the field keeping watch over their flock by night.

And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shown around about them, and they were filled with great fear.

And the angels said to them, fear not for behold.

I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people.

Yeah.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a savior who is Christ the Lord.

And this will be a sign for you.

You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a major.

Yeah.

And suddenly there was, with the angel a multitude wow.

Of the heavenly host praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace among those with whom he is.

Pleased, man.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

Love that.

Again, one of my favorite, um, parts of the Christmas story that just the, the way that it's written in scripture is just that you can almost like envision it.

You can almost see it yourself.

So

I just can't imagine how great it sounded.

Yeah.

, I know, right?

Angels

Singing that.

Oh, wow.

It must have been like really close to when Jack was leading Trinity in one of the hymns and everybody was crying out.

It must have been something similar to that.

But anyway, my turn.

I think we've got two more maybe.

Okay, here's my turn.

Let's see.

We've got, what's this one?

All right, wise guys?

Oh, no, that says Wiseman.

I'm sorry.

Need my glasses?

.

So Wiseman, and now a lot of people, and about probably 50% of the people right now watching this mm-hmm.

are yelling at their phones, the, their iPads, the computer, whatever it is, the tv, whatever it is, they're watching this on.

And they're saying the wise men weren't there,.

And it is actually true.

They were not there when Jesus was born.

They came about two years afterward.

Right, right.

Yeah.

But to me, the thing that's so powerful about their story is that there were signs in the heavens and on the earth, and these wise men who may not have even really known much about who God is or who, you know, they, they set off from their homeland and they followed it, and they came to, uh, Israel and they actually went and talked to, tried to talk to Herod the king.

Yeah.

And Herod began to get, you know, frustrated.

Who is this?

I don't know about this baby that's born in Bethlehem, but, uh, and so they, they left and they, the Wiseman actually came to visit the family, Joseph and Mary and Jesus.

And he's probably, like I said, about two years old.

Mm-hmm.

.

And they brought gifts of gold, Franken senses and mer and there's all kinds of conjecture about what those mean, the symbolism of each one of them.

But we do know that the Lord used those gifts, the gold to make provision for them because they were going to have to go to Egypt Right.

And live for a while before they came back to their hometown.

And then the Franken Sensens could have been relating to the anointing that was on Jesus's life and the fact that he was going to, in the future, be used mightily of God, obviously, not only to bring salvation, but also miracles and healings and all of those things.

And then the final one, my myr is usually used to, uh, in the, in these days and times was used in the, the burial process.

Yeah.

And so it was almost like foreshadowing that, uh, these guys who knew nothing really probably of the story, but God used them to, to bring provision and also to worship from different places, probably non-Jewish people.

Another example of the Gentiles, thank God being given the opportunity to become followers of Jesus.

Yeah.

And they were bringing expensive, costly gifts.

Yeah, exactly.

Like you would bring a king

, like you would bring a king.

Exactly.

Right.

Yeah.

So if anybody wants to bring any gold or Frank, no Mer, please spend anything besides that.

Oh, man.

All right.

So your turn, I think.

Right.

Okay.

The last one, I wonder, who could it be?

Mary.

Mary.

Yeah.

Mary, did you know?

Yeah.

Do you wanna go ahead and read that first?

Yeah.

Uh, in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth to a virgin Bero, to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David.

Remember it talked about David before mm-hmm.

.

All right.

And the Virgin's name was Mary.

And he came to her and said, greetings.

Oh, favored one.

Joseph's name's favored.

Same, same greeting here.

Yeah.

The Lord is with you.

But she was greatly troubled at the saying and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be.

And the angels said to her, do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name

Jesus

.

He will be great and will be called the son of the most high God.

And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father, David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and of his kingdom.

There will be no end.

Amen.

And Mary said to the angel,

How will this be

since I'm a virgin?

And the angel answered her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the most high will overshadow you.

Therefore, the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.

And behold, your relative, Elizabeth, in her old age has also conceived a son.

And this is the sixth month with her who was called Barron.

For nothing will be impossible with God.

And Mary said,

Behold, I am the servant of the Lord.

Let it be to me according to your word.

And the angel of the Lord departed

From her.

Yeah.

And if you read on in that passage, Jesus, in Luke one, if you read on you, you can read Mary's song.

Uh, and it's just a, such a great expression of, um, how good the Lord is and how faithful he was to her.

Yeah.

In even choosing her.

She was so, she wanted to know how this is going to happen, but she was so willing to be obedient to the call.

Yeah.

So,

Yeah.

I just think she got comforted by saying, you have found favor.

Yes.

Because was greatly troubled at first Yeah.

With to do reason.

That's right.

And then she found favor and to just be rest assured, and then she even questioned.

But it wasn't a question of doubting, it was just a wonder No.

How.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so I just think of, um, her beautiful surrender Yeah.

And willingness Yeah.

To Father, because she was giving up, she was getting so much of course, correct.

But she was giving up, um, her reputation and, um, poss she didn't know if she would lose Joseph as her spouse.

That's right.

And things like that.

She, um,

Yeah.

However her family respond, she was chosen.

So many things.

Yeah.

She was

Chosen.

She was chosen by God.

Yep.

And she said Yes.

Yes.

, um, I think there's one more in here, isn't there?

Let me look.

I thought for sure there was one in here that said donkey

.

No, there's not.

No.

Oh, okay.

Maybe next Christmas we can talk about the donkey.

I mean, I'm sure you had some thoughts, right?

No, no.

Okay.

, I guess we're not going there.

So I've enjoyed doing this with you.

Me too.

And I'm thankful for the people inviting us into their homes.

That's Sure.

And letting us celebrate a little bit of Christmas with them this year.

Yeah.

So I think we've got one more song and then we'll come back and close in prayer.

Man.

I love our worship team.

They're amazing.

Did a great job.

Yes.

Yeah.

Well, we're gonna go ahead and pray now, and we're just gonna ask the Lord to bless you.

And we hope that whenever you're seeing this, um, service, that it will mean something to you.

And even if you'd like to share it with other people, feel free to do that.

The truth of the gospel is so important for us to hear over and over and over again.

Yes.

Thank you for the gift of sharing your time with us today.

That's true.

Yeah.

Well, father, we thank you so much for your precious son, and that we celebrate Yes.

Not only his birth, but his death and resurrection.

The gift of eternal life, your goodness, your faithfulness, and your provision.

And Father, we just pray that we would continue to serve you and glorify you.

Would those listening to my voice feel your presence even now?

Lord, yes.

If they're weary or sad, would you refresh them with your Holy Spirit?

Yes.

And Father, I just thank you for who you are and what you've given us.

We glorify your name in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

And we wanna invite you back in the new year.

Yeah.

In 2023.

Next

Sunday.

Next Sunday, we'll be meeting here at the church live.

Yes.

And we look forward to getting a recap of what God's done in 2022, but also looking forward to what he's gonna do in 2023.

I think it's gonna be a great year.

Yes.

Good things are yet to come.

Amen.