1 John 1:1-4 - ”Real Joy” - Advent Series

forever and ever. Amen.

Down a bit.

>> Thank you.

>> Our Old Testament reading comes from

Psalm 47.

Clap your hands all peoples. Shout to

God with loud songs of joy. For the

Lord, the Most High is to be feared. A

great king over all the earth. He

subdued people under us and nations

under our feet. He chose our heritage

for us, the pride of Jacob whom he

loves.

God has gone up with a shout. The Lord

with the sound of a trumpet. Sing

praises to God. Sing praises. Sing

praises to our king. [snorts] Sing

praises.

For God is the king of all the earth.

Sing praises with a psalm. God reigns

over the nations. God sits on his holy

throne. The princes of the peoples

gather as the people of the God of

Abraham.

For the shields of the earth belong to

God. He is highly exalted.

Our New Testament reading comes from

first John 1:es 1 to4.

That which was from the beginning, which

we have heard, which we have seen with

our eyes, which we looked upon and have

touched with our hands, concerning the

word of life, the life that was made

manifest, and we have seen it, and

testify to it, and proclaim to you, the

eternal life, which was with the Father,

and was made manifest to us. That which

we have seen and heard, we proclaim also

to you, so that you too may have

fellowship with us. And indeed in our

fellowship is with the Father and with

his son Jesus Christ. And we are writing

these things so that our joy may be

complete. This is the word of the Lord.

>> Thanks be to God.

Okay, so I was just going to give you

guys a little game you can play if you

want. I've been preaching Paul for the

last

at least six months. So I guarantee I'm

preaching on John's gospel that I'm

going to say Paul this

I mean John.

So when I do that and it will happen

because that's how my brain works. You

should start a pool and see who can get

closest to how many times Emry does

this.

Now, one of the questions I ask on a

regular basis

of people

in conversation from all backgrounds is

why Christmas?

I asked them this question because like

why is Christmas so important to you?

Why do we take it so important? And you

get everything. You get every response

under the sun. Some tell me it's because

we can have dinner with our family we

never see. Some it's the lights and the

sprinkly stuff. Some is it's nostalgia.

Some it's the gifts

and those are all fine reasons.

And when I ask Christians why Christmas,

I get other interesting answers.

Some are, well, Christmas was something

that God did for us. That's true. Some

people a little more detailed say, well,

it's because God came into our world in

Jesus. Absolutely true.

Some will even say, "Well, it's because

this leads to the forgiveness of sins so

I can go to heaven and so I celebrate

that." All of those are interesting

answers, but I don't get the answer that

the apostles give.

See, the apostles give an answer that

might surprise you. And it was in our

reading today if you were looking

closely.

Why Christmas to them is why the gospel

and why the gospel is something that

it's not that other things components

that are answered to me aren't true. But

the purpose of this whole thing, what

are we waiting for? What is his purpose?

What's God's purpose in this is often

missed.

And some of it's cultural and some of it

because the way we're raised. So today,

what I want to do is tell you what the

apostles thought the purpose of

Christmas would be.

And maybe out of that, it can change us

just a little as we celebrate around our

Christmas trees this year. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your

amazing grace. We thank you that you're

so loving.

We thank you for your incarnation, for

your death and resurrection

and your life. And we thank you that

we're waiting because we know for fact

you're coming back and everything will

be set to rights.

Amen.

This letter which I'm starting is only

four verses. So good. You don't have to

wait and sitting for 45 minutes as I

exedute a text because there's not much

to exede to be honest. But I would argue

this little first four

um

texts in Paul John's

letter

should have like a paddle that people

raise up when I say it wrong

in John's text here is profound as all

the beginnings of all epistles are

because they lay out the important point

of what he's going to do for the rest of

his text. And a little background of

John's text. John is writing actually as

much to encourage the faithful

Christians as to rebuke the hered the

heretics. And the heretics clearly have

two things going wrong. Number one, they

don't believe Jesus was divine. Okay?

And number two, if he was divine, he

wasn't physical. That and they hate

those ideas because they're Greeks.

And so whatever else is going on, he's

going to emphasize the physicality of

Jesus. and that Jesus was God. And of

course, he lays that out at the

beginning. And then by doing so, he lays

out the purpose of the gospel.

And it is exactly against some of the

way our Christian culture has taught us.

Let me explain.

He starts off with that which is from

the beginning. Now, everybody, every

theologian under the sun debates this.

It depends who you think wrote this. And

believe it or not, not everyone who

thinks thinks it's the same John as the

gospel of John. I think it is. How does

John's gospel start in the

right and he says from which was from

the beginning?

Now, some of them are going to argue

that what he means by this is the

beginning of Jesus' life. Some are going

to argue that this is the beginning

after the resurrection. I think what

this is saying is that this is an

eternal plan from a preeminent

preexistent Jesus

that which was from the beginning which

is a before all things which we have

heard. Now here we get the sensual part

that goes against the anti-physical.

When you hear something somebody has to

speak and you need vocal cords, don't

you?

So we have heard. How could they have

heard if God hadn't spoke? How does God

speak without a mouth which we have seen

with our eyes?

There has to be something to see, right?

Which we looked upon and have what with

our hands?

Try and touch a vapor. I guess you

could, but that's not his point. What

he's saying is this is terrairma. This

thing, this thing from the beginning.

And what he's laying out here, if you

can't tell, is incarnation, right? That

this God is truly human. That that's the

foundation of what he's laying on here

concerning the word of life. The logos

zoe.

Logos is the word of God. Now remember,

the beginning was the in the beginning

was the

>> and the word was

>> with God and the word.

>> Right? So is he talking? He's talking

about God again, right? But he doesn't

just emphasize that. He adds in

something here that you don't get in

John's gospel. The word, the logos, God,

abundant life.

So what he does is in the beginning, we

have seen all of these things with our

hands concerning the God of abundant

life. And I want to say we could preach

so much in our churches that God is not

just an angry mean guy that's like, "Did

you do it right?"

He's a God of abundant life for those

who follow him.

We need to get out of our head angry

Calvinist God.

And yet, and I say Calvinist, not

Calvin,

because his disciples made him way

worse.

And remind ourselves that this God is an

abundant life God. He gives abundant

life.

concerning the logos Zoe the life. Now

he flips it off to this because he wants

to describe God now in terms of life of

this abundant life. This is a word is

not just a living like our breath but

abundant life true life fulfilled life.

The abundant life which is now described

as God was made manifest. Now here's the

key point.

They were not seeking God.

The disciples were not seeking God. They

thought they were seeking God. They were

following Torah. They were reading their

texts. But they were not seeking God

truly because God can't be found by

human ingenuity or religiosity or

spirituality.

So that's why he says it had to be made

manifest.

That's one thing about Christianity that

no other religion has is you will never

find God unless he shows you himself.

Full stop. Scripture is so clear on

that. We don't have control of God to

say now I know you independent of you.

Okay? That which was made manifest. He

let us know and we have seen it. And

then he uses a word here that's going to

be very important and it's the reason we

chose the New Testament scriptures.

And

the word is the form of martyr actually

testify.

I can't remember the exact verb but it's

like marterius or something like that.

And it means it comes from martyr. It

means you experienced it yourself.

That's gives you authority. In the

ancient world you only gave authority to

somebody if they had seen with their

eyes. Now, in our world, it's different,

isn't it? Firhand

accounts, firsthand witnesses are looked

down upon. In their world, you had to

have seen it. You can't read someone

else's thing because it has to be you

who experienced it or your story is

somebody else's story and it gets lost.

So, why they picked the scriptures we

have in the New Testament or one of

their foundational components was that

you had to have met Jesus and walked

with him.

And that's where you got apostolic

expectations for texts. And that's how

we chose

the word of life, the life made

manifest. And we have seen it. And he's

talking about them because none of us

could we can't testify like he's talking

because none of us lived with him. So he

says, "And we testify to it and proclaim

to you the eternal life." So he's got

Jesus as the logo. He's got him at the

beginning. And now he's got him as

eternal life. He's laying down a lot,

isn't he? He's laying down a lot in a

little bit. And that's what makes slow

Bible reading a good thing. I have two

friends right now are reading the Bible

in a year. Great.

Read it well. Read it slow.

Listen to it. Cuz I know one thing,

you're really going to have fun in

Leviticus. So have a lot of good times

there.

It's a great discipline, but we must

read this stuff slowly or we'll miss

what it's saying. The life was made

manifest and we have seen it and we bear

witness to it. We testify and we

proclaim to you the eternal life which

was with the father

back to the pre-existence

and was made manifest to us. We got

testified twice and manifest twice in

here. Do you think he's trying to say

something? Remember the point I always

make. When a sentence is said twice in

Hebrew, they did not have exclamation

marks. They did not have that in their

writing. They didn't have punctuation

like we do. So when you said something

in a sentence, remember when Jesus would

say, "Amen. Amen. I say unto you." Or as

your poor translation say, "Truly,

truly."

He's making a point. You better listen.

This is the exclamation mark.

And he says it twice. And we proclaim to

you eternal life with the father was

made manifest.

That which we have seen and heard. Did

he not just talk about this before? So

is he trying to bore us or is he trying

to make a point

two times? This is the point. We have

seen this. This has authority. We have

heard and we proclaim again to you. Do

you see how he did manifest proclaim

manifest proclaim?

The main point here he's saying is God

had to show us and when he showed us now

we could go proclaim.

So that's an essential part.

And then he lays out the why. And I'm

going to ask you to think this now

through the Christmas lens because it's

the gospel lens. He says so that when

you get to so that that's okay. Now I've

laid you out the theological foundation

but why?

so that you too may have fellowship with

us. The number one reason he starts with

is that we get to hang out together.

How often do you hear that in an

evangelical statement? I didn't see in

the four spiritual laws by Billy Graham

that in there.

For them, the ultimate purpose

of Christmas and thus Easter and

everything else is that it's there so

that you will stay and get involved with

people that believe.

And they're proclaiming

for the purpose that those communities

that believe can grow with more people

who can fellowship together because the

foundational point he's going to go on

saying, I I'll keep going. Hold on.

And indeed our fellowship is with the

father and his son Jesus Christ. The

ultimate purpose of Christmas is not

just that God came to earth. He could

have come to earth like a holiday and

gone back.

It's certainly forgiveness of sins, but

that wasn't his ultimate purpose.

That was the vehicle to his ultimate

purpose.

Okay? Do you hear me? certainly wasn't

just so we can go to heaven when we die.

The purpose of this was so that we would

have fellowship with one another

that's based on the fact that we now

have a fellowship with God. That's why

Christmas

>> I still want to go to heaven.

>> You Well, we'll talk about that. Now, I

got a good news. Heaven's coming here.

And we are writing these things so that

our joy may be complete. He's now laid

out the purpose is fellowship. And then

he says this thing, joy. And we talk

about joy. And we're writing this stuff

because in the sense that we begin to be

a community of fellowship with God and

with each other, our joy now gets

complete.

So for him, evangelism is not simply

going out and telling someone about the

gospel as good as that can be because

they may never run into fellowship.

So evangelism without fellowship is not

the gospel.

Had a gentleman who came in here. I

said, "Hey," he goes, he goes around all

around. He shares the gospel with

everybody. He tells people I said, "What

do you do with them?" And I goes, "I

don't go to church." He says, "I come

here once in a while." I said, "So where

do you bring them?"

Nowhere. That's not evangelism

because the purpose is read it again.

Read it and listen to it. Or either the

Bible's lying.

So that you might have fellowship with

us as we have fellowship with God the

Father and his son Jesus Christ.

And why would that be the purpose of

these people? Because guess what?

Forgiveness of sins had to happen. But

something predated sin. Do you remember

what that was? Creation.

The world didn't start sin. The world

started and it was what? Seven times

>> good. Thank you. Ordered. What happens

in chapter three? Disobedience.

The rest of it comes out of there. But

the good is in that. And the good

happened because we were in right

relationship with a God who walked in

the cool of the day. That's the language

of relationship.

And when he comes on Christmas,

yes, he has to deal with the sin. He has

to deal with chapter 3. But his ultimate

purpose was the first purpose was

chapter one and two

was to have relationship with us. And

when he went on that cross and when he

said it is finished and he came out of

the grave, what's the first things he

does?

Has dinner. He sits down and has dinner.

Watch it. Remember

uh Emmas wrote, he ends that with a

bread. sees his disciples in in John and

what what's he doing on the side of the

beach there.

He's cooking dinner.

What's the first thing he does? He gets

face to face. Cuz the purpose wasn't

just so you get to heaven when you die.

And I promise you, we will finish this.

And I will I'm not trying to stir the

pot here.

The purpose is

you and I have fellowship. And when they

preached this and they saw new people

come in for fellowship, their joy came

because they saw the fruit of what God

wants.

So why Christmas?

Christmas quite simply,

I'm going to let you know later.

Was that a good tease?

Why Christmas? Number one, of course,

the incarnation.

Christmas is about the incarnation, but

that's a vehicle to his ultimate goal.

He had to become human because we could

no longer be image bearsers of God. So

we could no longer look at him face to

face because we had broken that because

we wanted to be gods ourselves. And

through all of that, sin came. And by

him becoming human, this living God who

created the heavens and the earth had to

come back. And if he's going to set it

right so that we can walk in the cool of

the day or as Paul says as the ultimate

end, see him face to face. You've read

that text. It's like we're looking in a

mirror right now. Have you remember

that? But what's his ultimate goal? It's

a total relational language. So we can

see face to face.

He had to come. And we celebrate that

because the beginning of the process of

relationship with us was happening. a

relationship that we could never on our

end fix.

We're too selfish.

We're too self-indulgent.

I guarantee you, I've read history.

Humanity is not hunting God. What

happens is once in a while, God makes

himself manifest and by grace the church

continues.

BB Warfield, who is not the most

exciting writer, but he has a good

quote.

The glory of the incarnation is that it

presents to our adoring gaze not a

humanized God or a deified man, but a

true God man. One who is all that God is

and all and at the same time all that

man is.

One on whom almighty arm we can rest and

to whose humanity sympathy we can

appeal.

This God came so that he could represent

God and begin the process by becoming

human so that with the purpose of having

a fellowship with his children.

Now is a forgiveness of sins important?

It's absolutely important. Without the

forgiveness of sins you can't have that.

But that is the means.

Okay. The goal is fellowship.

And that's what the incarnation's about.

The second thing, and I think this

really speaks in our culture, is why

Christmas? Well, he explained it here.

Because of the truth.

Anybody following politics lately?

[laughter]

What What is the biggest complaint about

social media?

misinformation, right? Fake news. And if

the truth be known, nothing's really

changed. Jesus is sitting in front of

Pilate and he says, "I am a king." And

he goes, "Yeah, yeah. Why? What is the

truth? And what does Pilate say? What's

truth?"

The idea that truth can be harnessed by

a certain group of people or they'll

want to without manipulating it for

their own good is a joke. That's why

whenever I see one party or another

party or whatever the political spectrum

saying though they're lying. I'm like,

"Yep, and so are you."

And you say, "You're a cynic." No, I'm a

cynic to the world. I'm actually not a

cynic because we have the truth.

See, the greatest gift of Christmas is

that truth came in a person.

Now, here's where I'm going to tell you

why you trust the Bible. And this is not

this is why the fundamentalists get it

mixed up. With all due respect and the

liberals get it mixed up because they're

actually fighting the fundamentalists,

not us.

The early church did not walk around

going every jot and tit's right and we

better get this right and memorize it

because it gets us right. They didn't do

that at all. They did not put the

authority in the text.

People, what are you talking about? Then

what they put the authority in? They put

the authority in the one who gave the

text.

Amen.

They gave the authority of the Bible.

And you know, I preach the Bible every

week. I love the Bible.

But it is not there. And I don't trust

it because it was a magic book that came

from on high.

>> What's that?

>> Come on.

>> You're going to get the Pentecost coming

out here. Yeah.

Amen.

>> Oh boy.

You don't realize you just you

interrupted a Presbyterian and we don't

know where to start again. Um

but the truth of the gospel is we're

trusting in these people who wrote it

because they learned from the one who

made everything.

>> So the problem we have is we put trust

in the Bible independently of this God.

We've actually created an idol. We have

the fourth member of the quadilateral.

Well, remember remember Jesus says this,

the Pharisees around him, it's John's

gospel and they're getting hot and then

he looks at them and how does he

critique him? He goes, "You look to the

scriptures because you think that in

them they have eternal life, but you do

not look to me, the giver of life."

Scripture in itself is trustworthy

because these people like John saw with

their eyes heard and could express. It's

trustworthy because they were

eyewitnesses to this. And it's not like

any other religion who has nice ideas

and nice philosophies and nice rules.

John Sto says it so well. For the

Christian message is neither a

philosophical speculation, nor a

tentative suggestion, nor a modest

contribution to religious thought, but a

confident affirmation by those who

experience and commission have qualified

them to make it. And that's what he's

saying. I am making this manifest. I

have proclaimed this to you because I've

seen it. And so we trust scripture

because the author was with Jesus,

right? That's why we trust scripture.

The church always chose based on that.

And then our authority in scripture that

we trust is that the person who they

were talking to was significant enough

to be believed.

And I want to remind you why Christmas

is important to setting truth free. The

one who is truth. What does Jesus say

about himself? I am the way, the truth,

>> and the life. Right?

The reason they believe they have truth

that is not opinion is because the

creator God has come and given it and

they can share it with boldness because

the one who gave it. So your trust

ultimately is in truth but not getting

the Bible right but the God who wrote

the scriptures

that is your trust.

Carl Bart taking on the fundamentals of

his age noted this that the reason the

disciples had the authority and power

they did is who they were talking to at

this point the the the fundamentals were

arguing whether Easter could have

happened

and Bart said it did happen and why it's

significant is we had truth come because

we were talking to God

according to the text the Easter event

is quite plainly one of an encounter an

encounter with God, an act of God to the

disciples in which as before and as for

the first time truly revealed to them

and recognized by them as such. God

himself confronted them and spoke with

them as such. God himself confronted

them and spoke with them in the person

of Christ. That's why you can trust

scripture

because the truth told them the truth.

And when John's writing long after the

death and resurrection and ascension, he

can say, "You can trust me because I was

there and God told me."

Do you understand? So this is where our

trust of scripture must come and end.

Don't get into a debate about whether

your book's better than the Quran or

something else. We don't look at Bibles

like they do. We look at it because we

believe the living God put this in and

he incarnated himself to make sure we

got it right.

Amen.

Or maybe even maybe

so he's laid down why Christmas.

But why Christmas then comes down to the

real purpose

fellowship.

Since I've been a Christian in the

evangelical world, this is never

emphasized.

I've met a ton of people who say, "Go

and share your faith so people can get

saved and their sins forgiven.

That's true. Share your faith. Maybe

they believe in their sins forgiven. But

here's the point. That's not the goal.

That's the means.

The goal for Paul,

tell us two for John.

The goal for John

is fellowship as with all of them. Good

luck reading Hebrews, Paul's letters.

Good luck reading John's gospel chapter

17 all about the unity of the church.

What he wants as his purpose was for us

to be in right relationship with him and

ultimately in right relationship with

each other.

We need as the church to stop

entertaining.

That doesn't mean do it badly.

We need to stop emphasizing Sunday

mornings as everything as wonderful as I

love it and I love worshiping together.

We need as a church to stop emphasizing

come down and get saved. What was it?

Was that altar call thing?

What we need to start emphasizing is

fellowship.

Fellowship with God in Jesus Christ that

he has done once our sins are forgiven.

Once we come out of that baptismal tank,

we should be saying, "Now, who you going

to hang out with?

What group are you going to hang out

with?

Because that's his purpose. I don't know

if you know this, but you people who

call yourself Christians, guess what?

You're going to be hanging out with each

other for a really long time. [snorts]

You might as well try and make it work

today.

Again, John Sto. By the way, if you ever

read somebody, read John Sto.

This statement of the apostolic

objection in the proclamation of the

gospel, namely a human fellowship.

Sorry. This statement of apostolic

objective in the proclamation of the

gospel, namely a human fellowship

arising spontaneously

from a divine fellowship is a rebuke to

much of our modern evangelicalism

and church life.

We cannot be content with an evangelis

evangelism

which does not lead to the drawing

of church drawing of converts into the

church.

Nor with a church life whose principle

of cohesion is a superficial social

commodery camaraderie

instead of spiritual fellowship with the

father and with his son Jesus Christ.

We can't be content with trying to get

saved people so they're right with Jesus

so they and Jesus can go off to heaven

one day because that's not the purpose.

And we need to take a church that takes

serious that the goal and purpose is

that you have relationship with God

right now.

We need a transformation of what we

think the church is and Christmas should

be that moment.

You know what the church says about the

the gospel writers say about the church

is so different what the church thinks

about itself.

The church sees itself as an

institution. I'm talking broadly stroked

who's out there to get the gospel out so

few people can get to heaven in the day.

The church doesn't recognize that they

are the very living breathing Christ on

earth his body.

The church is not just us sitting around

slapping each other on the back and

saying how spiritual we are. The church

is a bunch of broken sinners who come

together and fellowship with one another

because we've been forgiven. We forgive

each other.

The church itself, whatever it is,

is new creation on the earth, bearing

witness to the world. That's the

purpose. And it's a church that

proclaims so that not only can we

fellowship together, but other people

get to be part of that fellowship with

us.

Thank you, Chris, for this quote.

The church is not a lifeboat escaping to

heaven. What that means, by the way, is

he's speaking against us. I just want to

die and go to heaven. That's why Jesus

saved me. Jesus saved you and you're

saved now to be the people of God now in

new creation now.

And in the end, guess what? New

creation's going to come and heaven and

earth are going to come together. What

do we pray in the Lord's prayer? Your

kingdom come. your will be done where

>> on earth as in

>> heaven.

This God doesn't give up on his

creation. He redeems it.

He never talks about destruction. He

talks about redemption and

reconciliation.

a new multithnic, multicultural

community that stands against the powers

and principalities of our age through

truth, unity, and love together with a

recognition that only by this grace can

this dream come true.

You know what God wants is he wants all

blend more to hang out and love one

another and be in relationship with him.

That's his purpose because one day he

wants everyone to be there and he wants

it to start now.

That's his goal.

I didn't write it.

And I'll tell you what though, I've

experienced it. A taste.

I've been in ministry now for

in some form of leadership. I've been

preaching in the church for 30 plus

years.

I've been involved in the church in many

ways. And I want to tell you something.

I know the church can have bad things

about it. I know that. You know what?

I've had some real pills and you can

imagine being a minister. Don't do this

job unless you absolutely have to.

Like, don't do it.

I'm sure that's why God made me become a

corrections officer and a social worker

before this, just so that I wouldn't

learn any new words in here.

But it also is the best thing ever.

Fellowship with my brothers.

I have lifelong friends because of the

church.

I have lifelong friends because I've

been hanging out with people I shouldn't

hang out with because Jesus Christ has

set me right with him and he has set

himself right with them. And we have a

bond now by the spirit to hang out to

pray. And that is a wonderful thing.

I have far greater

things to say about the church than

negative.

And when you're sitting there and you

put the effort in and you actually go

and spend out and hang out with each

other, you get to see that fruit.

So on Monday last, our home group got

together and I got a taste of the

kingdom again.

No, we did not fast. We did not speak in

tongues. We didn't do a funky dance at

the front.

We had dinner and we talked about God

and we laughed

and the church was full. The house was

full. 20some people hanging out. I know

most of these people and none of them

should hang out with each other if it

wasn't for Jesus Christ. They just

wouldn't.

But fellowship made it. So I sat there

and these people I sat there as I was

standing realizing that eight years ago

when I came here I didn't know anyone in

that group

and now I was sitting in a group of

people who loved one another who pray

for one another who walk you through

your tragedy

and I realized this is the purpose

that we will start to taste Christ

amongst each other in fellowship.

We had to even go downstairs. I wish I

had better angles, but with all those

people, it was wonderful. Church was

full and you could feel the love of God

there. I could.

And also, there was incredible fashion.

If you look at Peter here, he's really

rocking a a Christmas sweater.

He couldn't be outdone, though, because

Adam really decided to go for it.

All joking aside, these are people I

dearly love. This fellowship and this

purpose is wonderful. So when people say

to me I'm a Jesus and I don't go to

church, I don't get angry. I don't shoot

them down. I feel sad.

And I am when people tell me, "Well, I

go in church on Sunday and I go out and

have a coffee and run away." I feel sad

because they're missing the purpose of

Christmas.

He says fellowship is the purpose. And

why does he want the fellowship? Because

it gives us joy.

That's the way he describes it.

It's their joy to see us fellowship with

God and each other. That's what gives

them joy in John's epistle.

Now, joy is a funny word because we

celebrate it because joy is a

misunderstood word like love in our

culture.

When people say, "I'm joyous," they

usually mean, "I'm happy because good

things have happened." Right?

But that's not what this word means.

Happiness is based on circumstance.

CS Lewis famously said this, "I didn't

go to religion to make me happy. I

always knew a bottle of port would do

that."

If you want a religion to make yourself

really comfortable, I certainly don't

recommend Christianity.

When I was looking up hope, every time

it talked about Jesus or joy, he only

time it said he had joy is he faced the

cross with joy.

The worst thing that ever happened to a

human being, how does he face it with

joy? Because of what was coming ahead of

him, fellowship with humanity and each

other.

That's why he faced it.

In fact,

when we seek happiness, the church has

been saying forever, if you seek

happiness as an end and of itself,

you'll end up in addiction.

Thomas Aquinus, I mean, I don't even

know how old this guy is, but he has a

glowing head, so he's pretty cool.

Man cannot live without joy. Therefore,

when he is deprived of true spiritual

joy, it is necessary that he becomes

addicted to carnal pleasures.

When I was in a church before I got into

the Presbyterian church, and don't

worry, Presbyterians are not known for

seeking joy, happiness. Um,

it's a joke.

It was a church that every time you go

to church, you'd have to have a warm

feeling or you stayed until it did. And

if anybody's been in those churches,

you've sat through 110 songs so that

everyone could have a warm feeling. By

the end, if you had one or not, you said

you did.

And I watched in those things and I

watched people and God moved and all

those things. But I look back 20 years

later when I was a minister till now,

how many people don't follow Christ

anymore?

And do you know why? They didn't have

the joy. They were seeking the

happiness.

They weren't seeking the truth. They

were seeking experience.

I'm not against emotions, but when they

become your God and happiness is not our

God, joy is. And why do we have joy this

Christmas? I've had a hell of a year. I

shouldn't have any joy.

I really shouldn't. Why do I have joy?

Because there is an empty tomb. Come on.

>> There is an empty tomb for a God who

came face to face with us who says to me

through them who actually did talk to

him that he wants to talk to you again

Emmery

and he's going to talk to you again face

to face and same with your son and same

with all us around. I can have joy in

that.

Joy is the reality that the purpose of

our God

is not that I'm good enough or I feel

good enough or I've got it right or I'm

excited enough. The purpose of our God

is that he has come so that he might

have fellowship with me

and that I might have fellowship with

you.

Now, I can have joy whether you have a

good day or a bad.

And I'll tell you what, I do not envy

people who go through hell who don't

have this fellowship.

Because I'll tell you what, you guys

have been Christ to me at moments.

The joy that I'm speaking of here today,

the same joy of the guy who's now going

to go sent on to Patmas Island and be

basically

relegated to nowhere, which is the

writer of John. And all his buddies, how

do they have all this joy and talk about

joy? They're all going to be dead.

Paul's going to lose his head. Peter

apparently gets crucified upside down.

How can they be a people of joy if it's

about happiness?

Because their joy was in the truth that

we hold whether we feel it or not. That

our God, your God,

has loved you enough.

That he died on a cross.

He's forgiven your sins.

He's risen from the dead

so you can have fellowship with him

forever.

and you can have goods fellowship with

one another.

That's what Christmas is about.

And if you make that what Christmas is

about, whether you have the best

Christmas or an terrible drunk uncle

comes,

you can have joy

because he's already won

and he's going to make this happen.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for your

amazing grace.

We thank you for your love and your joy.

We thank you for the fact that you've

brought us together to fellowship with

one another.

We pray that as we proclaim this truth,

people will be drawn in and that we

become a church not that is there as

kind of a social get together, but a

group that is based around our

relationship with you that you've

opened.

May we no longer be ashamed of your

body, your church, but may we praise you

for it.

And may we work hard together so that we

can bear witness

in this world of pain

with a joy that transcends it

so that one day we can stand before you

Lord and hear the words well done my

good and faithful servant

in Jesus name. Amen.