He Came: Christmas Series | He Came as God (December 10th, 2017) - Mike Armstrong

Alright, Amen.

Well, hey, if you would turn in your Bibles now to uh John's Gospel, uh John chapter one is where we're gonna be over the next uh the next several weeks.

And so uh as you're getting turned and situated there, uh growing up as a kid, I was uh I was pretty into comics.

I really enjoyed uh comic books and all that and all kinds of different ones.

And I remember as a you know 10 or 11-year-old or so, I was given I was given this book right here.

And uh, you know, my parents I obviously held on to it, and just recently they kind of gave me a box, you take your junk, right, and gave this back to me, and I gave it to my son who you know promptly you know spilled water all over it and everything.

But essentially, this is a hard copy version of it's a reprint of the very first four ever uh Superman comics.

The picture that you're looking up there is the very uh the very first one ever made back in June uh 19, what does it say there, 1930, uh 1938.

And in that comic and in uh the four that are here, uh it really tells uh essentially Superman's origin story.

That's what it really is.

It's the story of how he became the superhero that most of us in here, at least on uh on some level, are familiar with.

Well, John's gospel, John chapter one, and specifically the first five verses of John one, uh takes us back to the beginning.

It takes us back to that, to the origin, if you will, of the Christmas story.

And really it's the origin of all of life.

And so uh obviously this is the time of year where churches, you know, delve once again back into the Christmas story.

And we talk about, you know, the birth of Jesus and his his entrance into the, you know, his creation as the baby in a manger in all of that.

But but John chapter one, again, in the first five verses here, takes us back even further than that, to the beginning of time itself, to reveal to us Christ's true identity, which of course is that he is God, right?

He became God, he came to us as God.

So if you are turned in there, let's read this now, the first five verses of John's gospel.

This is what it says.

It says, In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

God, we come before you this morning as your church, and Lord, we have uh an awesome opportunity now to uh dive into uh this incredible uh little section of scripture, Lord.

There is so much in here.

This is so rich, it communicates so much to us, Lord.

And again, as we have already prayed and and we have already been singing, Lord, again, I pray that uh we would have our hearts turned uh to the person of Jesus Christ this morning, Lord.

I pray that we would be um growing in our understanding of who you are, Lord.

It's not a secret identity, Lord.

You're not hiding that from us, but Lord, you are you are God.

And Lord, I pray that we would be shaken by that here today, Lord.

I pray that we would be stirred up, Lord.

I be I pray that we would be filled with joy, Lord, as your Holy Spirit is illuminating your words to us, God.

Would we be different?

Would we be filled with joy?

Would we go from here excited about Christmas, uh, excited about what Christmas is really all about, that's for sure, Lord.

Would you please do this, God, as we are so easily distracted, as we wrestle with our own sin and flesh, as we wrestle with the enemy and and the values of this world, Lord, we confess that we are dragging our weary bones in here today.

And so, God, we pray, we plead, we ask, we cry out, Lord, would your Holy Spirit meet us in this place?

God, would you do this?

Would you do what we can't do, Lord, and that is to transform us.

And so, Lord, we recognize that it is you that does that work.

We are humbly submitting ourselves before you and inviting you to do that work.

Would you do it here today, Lord?

We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

All right, so over the next three Sundays, then we're gonna be working through the first 18 verses of John chapter one.

Now, for some of you, you're like, yeah, I like to know kind of what we're doing and have some kind of semblance of direction and all of that.

Well, there, there it is for you if you're all about like kind of studying ahead and reading ahead and all of that.

Uh, we're gonna be looking at those first 18 verses there.

Now, um, though we don't find the birth narrative specifically in this text the way that we find it in Matthew's gospel or in Luke's gospel, we will be looking at these 18 verses uh through the lens of um through the lens of the Christmas story.

All right, and that God came into his creation in the most humble and and unassuming way possible to ultimately save mankind, save you and I from the curse of sin in the most epic way imaginable.

All right, so here's the first thing then, if you are a note taker and you're following along in that, it's this the Christmas story begins with recognizing that Jesus is and always has been God.

Right?

Always, always has been.

Take a look at this here, verse one.

This is a big verse.

Okay, follow along with me as we go through this.

It says this in the beginning was the word.

And the word was with God, and the word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All right, so what this verse is telling us in no uncertain terms is that Jesus Christ is in fact God.

Jesus Christ is in fact God.

Now, of course, let's unpack that a little just a little bit, maybe, right?

Let's kind of get into this here.

That that uh that word beginning there, you see it, it literally means origin.

It literally means origin.

That's what we're kind of talking about, the Superman origin story and all of that, right?

This is this is really the origin of the creation of the world.

This is this is kind of reminding us of of Genesis uh 1 verse 1.

And when it says, in the beginning was, in the beginning was, it's implying that that Jesus already existed when the heavens and the earth were created, when they were, when they were spoken into reality.

Okay, when when everything was formed, as we read it in Genesis chapter 1, guess what?

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

Jesus was already there.

He was already there.

And so what we need to understand about all of this is that Jesus is not, was not a created being.

Some have suggested that, some have really warped even this very verse, this very section of scripture that we've that we're looking at here today.

And they've looked at the Greek and they've misunderstood how to how to translate all of that, and they would say that no, Jesus is a created being.

He is he is a God, but he is not in fact, he is not in fact God.

But the reality is that he is existed from all eternity.

Okay, this is what John MacArthur says.

This will be on the screen for you.

He says, since since time began with the creation of the physical universe, whatever existed before that creation is eternal.

Yeah, I know like smoke is starting to form in your mind as you kind of think that through a little bit, right?

It's a little bit early to be thinking about this, but does that make sense?

You understand that?

There's never a point, okay, where Jesus didn't exist and then later kind of came into existence as though something, someone created him.

No, he always was.

That's the word there, right?

Was he always, always was.

Now, when it says there that in the beginning was the word, okay, it's to say that in the beginning was Jesus.

In the beginning was Jesus.

Okay, that that Greek word, this is really important that we understand all of this.

Because at first glance it's maybe a wee bit confusing.

Okay, but but the Greek word there for word is the word logos, okay, logos, which literally means a thing, a thing uttered, right?

Like a thing spoken.

Now, now to really kind of understand where John is coming from when he is writing this, you have to, you kind of have to get, you have to realize that he's writing this with two kind of different audiences in mind.

Okay, so John's John's Jewish audience, they would have understood Lagos as referring to God's spoken uh expression.

God's spoken expression of uh of his power and and wisdom and and revelation and all of that from you know uh in the Old Testament to mankind in the Old Testament.

So, for example, let me give you a couple examples of of kind of where their headspace would have been at and what they would have immediately thought of as they were hearing or reading these words from John.

Okay, by God's word, okay, by God's logos, he spoke creation into existence.

Okay, this is what the Jews would have been thinking as they were reading this.

And we, of course, we've already kind of hinted back to this already.

This is Genesis chapter 1, or the rest.

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

By by his word, he gave Israel the Ten Commandments.

We know that from Exodus chapter 20.

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

By his by his word, logos, he he spoke through the prophets of old.

He spoke all through the the Old Testament and He led and He He guided His people, Israel.

This is how the Jews would have understood the word uh Logos.

Now, John's Gentile audience, all right, so this is the second part of the audience here that was hearing this, they would have been quite familiar with the word logos as well.

Only they would have understood it quite differently.

Because in in Greek philosophy, logos was was basically seen as a very, a very impersonal, kind of kind of abstract force, if you will, of, you know, a force of wisdom and and and reason and order in the universe.

And so that's how they would have understood uh the word logos here.

And so what is John doing as he's writing this, as he's writing verse one?

Well, what he's doing, he's actually introducing his audiences here to Jesus Christ.

He's explaining to them who he is.

Have you ever read John chapter 1 before?

John 1 · chapter mention

And be like, what is what is John talking about?

Why does he say in the beginning was the word?

Why would he just say that in the beginning was was Jesus?

That would make it a lot more kind of straightforward to maybe to you and I.

Okay, but you have to understand he wasn't writing immediately to you and I.

He wasn't necessarily thinking immediately about us, he was thinking about his audience and the context there and where these people were coming from.

And so that's where that's where he's coming from.

And and so he's revealing to the to the Gentiles, to the Greeks here, that Jesus is far more than how they understand Logos.

He he's way more than just this impersonal, you know, abstract sort of cosmic force or whatever, you know, not that at all, but rather he's very he's a very personal, personal being, both completely God, both completely divine and human.

He is the true Logos.

And so he's expanding their understanding of what that really, what really is.

And so for the Jews, okay, John's revealing that Jesus is is even more than kind of simply uh you know a human persona uh personification of God's revelation or or his wisdom or whatever, but rather he is God's, he is God's ultimate, you know, perfect expression and revelation of himself in the flesh.

It's like this is who Jesus is.

He's far more, listen, Jesus, he's far more than just you know, just a moral person or or or or a great teacher or rabbi or whatever.

He is Jesus is the living word of God.

He's the living logos of of God.

He is fully, fully deity.

He's fully God, and he is also fully man, who came to reveal God to us, to showcase who God is and to save us from our sin.

And so John is communicating an awful lot here, isn't he?

And he's explaining to us who Jesus is.

He's like, Jesus is, you know, Jesus initiated this new covenant now between God and between man.

He he sets the standard of righteousness and and holiness right and wrong, all of that for for all of humanity.

He judges sinners, he sovereignly directs and guides his church, he inspires scripture, he transforms our hearts, and you know, all of that and more Jesus does.

Jesus is the incarnate word of God.

We just sang about that in the last two songs.

Jesus is God in the flesh.

And this is what he's kind of getting at here as he continues.

Now keep going here.

We're still in verse one.

He says, and the word, okay, we know that to be Jesus now, the word was God and, or was with God and was God.

Now, what we get here, this is super cool, we get this like amazing, this amazing insight here, this glimpse into the nature of the Godhead and the doctrine of the Trinity, which of course is that God is one, eternally existing in three persons.

So God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

That is our one God.

Now, we are going to spend, actually, we're gonna spend an entire Sunday going through this amazing doctrine, the doctrine of the Trinity.

We're gonna get to that a little bit later on uh in February as we get back into our We Believe series and doctrine and all of that.

So just so you know, that's all coming, and we're gonna really pull that apart and try and wrap our minds around that.

But for now, here, okay, we have Jesus with God the Father.

That's what this text is saying here.

Now, the English translation, it doesn't quite capture the like the oomph of all of this, if you will.

The the the the original language here is, you know, it gets it a little bit more.

This is this is so much more than you know, Jesus and the father sort of merely existing together.

Right?

Much like how you might sort of, you know, I might kind of picture like a uh kind of a dull and joyless marriage, where you know, like the husband comes home after work and he kind of grunts his hello, and then you know he goes downstairs and does his thing, and and the wife is kind of you know taking care of the food and the kids or whatever, and they're you know, technically they're they're existing together on uh under one roof, but there's no real communication.

They're you know, the spark seems to have fizzled, the the relationship is is quite flat and and and feels quite joyless and dull and all of that.

That's that's not what this is here.

That's not what God and Jesus together is.

This is what W.

Robert Cook says.

He says that John 1 gives the picture of two personal beings facing one another and engaging in intelligent discourse.

All right?

So it's it's insight actually into the the intense and amazing fellowship that the Trinity enjoys together.

They are in a you know face-to-face uh relationship.

It's a picture of a deeply personal thing that Jesus and the Father and the Holy Spirit here uh get to enjoy.

It's personal, it's it's engaging, it's it's healthy, it's vibrant, it's it's fulfilling, it's amazing.

I mean, this is our awesome Trinitarian God.

This is who you and I we get to know.

Right?

We get to be in a relationship with this awesome God who exists and has this amazing fellowship uh with each other, right?

This God who didn't at all have to, okay, but invites us to to know him and to in some way experience what he experiences.

Okay, and as you you know, as you read these verses and and and and and recognize that Jesus is God and and was in the beginning with God the Father, and you know, as the world was created, that was happening.

I mean, it really as you're kind of reading that and thinking about that, it it should it should probably shake our world.

I don't know, like maybe just a little bit, right, as we kind of think about all of those things.

Because I mean let's let's but let's put it this way the concept of uh of you know like a baby being born to you know this young Jewish couple, Joseph and Mary, is something that at least on some level we can you know we can kind of relate to that.

Right?

So many of us here in this room, you know, we've we've had children, you know, and we can we can you know remember what it felt like as like, oh, the baby's coming, and you know, we're rushing off to you know the hospital and the mixture of emotions and all of that, and and you know, the anxiety and sometimes the fear, but also the the excitement and the passion and the love, it's all kind of converging all together.

You know, we we can kind of you know understand that if we don't have kids, we've we've probably celebrated with with other couples that have had kids, and maybe you've visited somebody in the hospital as this is all brand new for them, and you know, you've had the picture taken with this new tiny little child and all of that, you know.

We can, again, we can we can kind of relate to to that in some ways.

But listen, when we consider that that Joseph and Mary's baby was actually God, like we we don't have a we don't have a category for that.

We can't imagine you know what that would have been like.

We can't relate to that at all.

And I think as we kind of study this and we read this and we start to to think about it, I think, you know, at the end of the day, all we're really left to kind of experience and feel is this this sense of awe and and and amazement at what was taking place here.

And I believe that that really is the you know the appropriate response for us.

You know, and as the as the church and as Christians in today's world, have you noticed how much we have to fight for that sense of awe?

That that that sense of um uh amazement and and to be gripped by that and have that you know to be a constant thing and just just in awe of who Jesus is and and what's actually going on here uh at Christmas.

You know, and and I believe that you know we we do this by you know by by carefully studying God's word and understanding what of you know verses like this mean and and and allowing the Lord to teach us in these things by by intentionally reminding ourselves as you know this time of year as to what Christmas is really all about.

And as we kind of do this over time and as the spirit is moving and you know, all of those things, I believe you know, we can be you know captured by a sense of awe and all of that as we're kind of imagining the manger scene and all of that.

Because I'll tell you, listen, we gotta do those kinds of things because because listen, the world will not help us out in the awe department.

Have you noticed this before?

It's like they're not like the world's not like, well, hey, you know, I guess you know Christmas is really about the Bible.

We should probably help the church out with this, right?

Like no one in the world is thinking that.

And of course, the world is making Christmas about all kinds of other things, and and and some of that's kind of subtle and stuff, and some of it is like an overt attack against Christianity, and and maybe somewhere in between where you know they're trying to just kind of make it um maybe one big joke.

And I mean, just take the take the manger scene, for example.

I really hesitated to show you this picture, but have you noticed this?

Have you seen this before?

I found this.

This is what they call the hipster nativity scene.

You can actually buy this uh on Amazon.

Please, no one do that for me.

I'm not interested in that.

But this is like, I mean, you look at that, right?

It's it's so ridiculous.

You've got you've got like the three wise men on segues, right, rolling into the scene.

They've got like Amazon Pro.

Rhine boxes under their arms, with what I can only imagine being gold frankincense and myrrh.

You've got 100% organic beef there, the cattle.

You've got solar panels on the selfie happening and the shepherd Snapchatting the whole thing and all of it.

I mean, you look at that there, and you know, you know, some of us, you know, in some ways, you might be kind of like, yeah, that that's you know, I get it.

Like that's kind of funny, and there's maybe maybe a bit of a smirk all of there, you know, and you know, on some level, you know, it kind of seems like, you know, okay, whatever, kind of funny, I get it.

But listen, it it shouldn't there be in us as believers and as as the church this kind of increasing you know sense in us, this feeling in our emotion, emotional connection, like, no, this isn't right.

Right?

This is this isn't this isn't okay.

I don't want to make light of all of this.

You know, I we can't afford to see Jesus as anything less than he really is.

Okay, things like that picture.

I mean, that's just one kind of dumb, super dumb example.

But but what does it do?

And there's other examples too, where these kinds of things like sort of subtly, you know, chip away at, you know, really at our reverence of the whole thing.

And it sort of breeds this flippant attitude about Christmas and it kind of dulls our admiration about what's really going on here, especially in John chapter one.

And it can even shift our focus and our attention away from Christ's divinity and and all of that, and just being in awe of all of it.

You know, and perhaps again, you know, that's one example, but perhaps you've noticed you know, multiple other examples of the way that the world kind of, you know, they're it's trying to draw us away from what's actually happening here in John's gospel, in verse 1 and in verse 2 here.

It's subtle ways, sometimes it's not very subtle at all.

And you've seen that happening to you.

Listen, we've we need to intentionally fight for awe.

Okay, so to appreciate the Christmas story, it begins really with recognizing that Jesus is and always has been God.

Do you understand that?

Are you being shaken with that here this morning?

Okay, while at the same time appreciating the sheer power that he possesses.

Sheer power.

I mean, take a look at this from verse 3, it's so clear.

Okay, it says this all things, okay, all things were made through him.

And and without him was not anything made that was made.

Okay, so this is this is speaking, of course, to how Jesus himself is the creator of the entire universe.

Okay, this is this is our God.

This is Jesus.

And I mean, we've definitely, you know, we definitely hear echoes of this all throughout the scriptures.

I immediately think of Colossians chapter 1, okay, starting in verse 15.

Colossians 1 · chapter mention

This is what it says, says he that's talking about Jesus.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, for by him, here it is, all things were created.

All things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him.

He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

All right, the the the creative power there, right?

The the ingenuity that that Jesus himself possesses and and then unleash through through the formation and the creation of the universe and the world is about as overwhelming for you and I to try and like comprehend and and process as is the reality, the fact that He is He is God.

Now, as humans, as people, we are we are easily impressed with power, aren't we?

We're easily impressed with it.

And you might even say, you know, somewhat obsessed, right?

We're obsessed with power.

You know, I think about our vehicles, right?

We we love to have powerful vehicles, whether it's your your big truck that you love or it's your it's your fast car, whatever it is.

You know, we think like, you know, four cylinder, yeah, that's cute, you know, great for gas mileage and all of that, but you know, can you get up to highway speed on the you know on the on-ramp?

We want we want the fast car, we want the powerful truck, we want we want all of that.

What about things like our devices, our phones, and our and our computers?

We want like the newest and the best and the fastest and the you know, the most computing power ever.

My computer's a number of years old now, and it's like slightly slower than it was.

And and the temptation in my heart is like, get a new one, toss this.

Right, that's what I want.

I want I want something something powerful.

We we love power tools.

We we love positions of power and leadership.

We love to have influence over people.

We like those kinds of things.

We we lift weights, why?

To become physically powerful, and you know, we look in the mirror and and and we we we we are impressed, or we hope to be impressed, with with what we see after we've been working out or eating properly or whatever.

Okay, so so why is it then that when it comes to Christ's power, okay, that the power that that literally formed solar systems and created them so they don't smash into each other and we all die immediately, right?

Why, when we think about Christ's power, listen, it all came through the utterance of a word, right?

He just spoke it into existence and and it was all created.

Why is it that we so often fail to appreciate that?

Why are why are we like that?

Like if we love so you know powerful things, if we love those things so much, why in in so many ways are we so thoroughly you know ho-hum about the power that Jesus possesses?

An example of this was just you know a little while ago, you know, Ange and I were driving in the car, and like this Aston Martin drove by, and you should have seen the whiplash on my neck as I was like, Why, you know, like trip to the Cairo, because I was so like, wow, like I'm and to Ange, I'm like, that's that's the car that James Bond drove.

And she's like, great.

Right?

Like, didn't care at all.

And I'm like, I'm wishing, as I'm thinking about this, I wish that that was my reaction to this car.

And my you know, whiplash spinal contusion was was more my reaction as I as I read a verse like this, and then I consider the power and and the creative just amazingness of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Right?

I I wish that was me, and you know, and I but I read a verse like this, and I'm kind of like, oh, okay.

You know, I'm spending like the week through this, like preparing this for us today, and I'm just like kind of kind of grieved by the fact that I'm like, all right.

Do you ever feel like that?

And I'm kind of thinking, like, why?

Yeah, you ever get so kind of frustrated with yourself about these things?

I do for sure.

Like, why do we why do we not care?

Why are we so laissez-faire and blah about power that is real, power that is is truly awesome?

You know, I'm sure the answer can be found somewhere sort of in the mixture of our you know, our pride and our arrogance and our you know idolatry and you know the dullness of our hearts and our spiritual immaturity and our worldliness and all of those things kind of combined.

And you know, we could talk about what are all the reasons why we you know we don't seem to be so gripped by by the power of Jesus Christ and all of that, but instead let's just do this.

Okay, I will appreciate Christ's power when.

Okay, I will appreciate Christ's power when four things.

Okay, because I'm hoping that you're like me and you're like, I just want to appreciate this more.

How can I get there?

All right, well, here's the first one.

I humble myself.

I humble myself.

Listen, you want to appreciate the creative power of your God.

You want to appreciate the power of Jesus Christ.

You cannot skip this.

Okay, you cannot be like I'm awesome, and then somehow also see the awesomeness of Jesus Christ.

You can't do it.

You have to humble yourself.

We've talked about this before, but the scriptures never say, hey, be humble.

As though humble is something you can just kind of act like.

No, it's instead it always says, humble yourself.

It's an action that we need to take.

We need to get low.

We need to confess our pride.

We need to admit this freely before the Lord and and also with others.

We need to confess our our preoccupation with other things that that we seem to think are are super great, but but they're not.

Listen, you want to appreciate Christ's power, you have to go through this road.

You have to walk this.

I must, I must humble myself.

I will appreciate Christ's power when I humble myself, but also when I plead with the Holy Spirit to unleash it.

You know, sometimes I think we're like, well, I, you know, I wish I would see, you know, God's God's power more, and I wish I saw that.

And then, you know, maybe the question is, well, have you even asked him for it?

Are we really even asking the Lord for him to do a work?

Or are we just so pathetically satisfied with our lives and status quo?

You know, you know, sometimes we're just like, you know, we don't ask him, and or or other times we're like, yeah, I've I've asked him before, but it's more of just like in a check the box kind of way.

I know that as a Christ follower, I should, you know, it's something that I should ask for, and God, I want to see your power, but but but I use the word plead on purpose.

Are you are you pleading him with him for it?

Are you, you know, how many of us wake up in the mornings and we immediately get down on our knees?

We're like, Lord, I cannot handle this day unless you pour out your power.

How many of us have prayed for our wives or or our husbands like that?

How many of us have have knelt before the the the beds of our of our children and and put our hand on them and just play and just cried out, Lord, would you do an awesome work of your power in my son or in my daughter?

Do we do that?

Do we plead with him for that?

Often we we aren't even asking him for it.

And yet we're wondering why, you know, why am I not seeing it, or why am I not sensing it, or why is it not there?

Now, there are some things warped about those questions uh as well at times, and we'll get into all of that.

We need to plead with the Holy Spirit to unleash it.

God, would you do this?

We see him do it, we'll start to appreciate it.

Here's the third thing I will appreciate Christ's power when I persevere through difficulty.

I will persevere through difficulty.

I've been reading in my own time uh in God's Word uh through the book of Acts, and I was, you know, just yesterday morning just kind of thinking through and realizing, wow, like, you know, perseverance was a hallmark of the early church.

You know, and so many times you would see this pattern happening where where God would say something, I am going to do this, or you go and do that, and he would direct the apostles, and he would direct the church, and and they would obey.

And guess what would happen?

Opposition, difficulty, like every single time.

But what would the church do?

They would gather back together, they would they would rely on the Lord, they would they would persevere through the difficulty, and then at the time that God decided, then he would pour out his power.

And I think sometimes what we do is we're just so soft when it comes to this.

And we're like, Lord, would you show me your power?

And then difficulty happens, and we just like we just like crumble.

Like, we're we're we're so I'll just stick with the word soft.

We don't recognize that that difficulty comes, and and if difficulty didn't come, then we wouldn't see God's power for as awesome as it was.

Does that make sense?

If our lives were continually awesome all the time, we would probably maybe not recognize power uh when it came.

But listen, we need to persevere through difficulty.

That is something that that the Lord is is trying to accomplish, and he is working in you in the moment where you are praying and asking God for his power and the gap between that moment and the time that he actually pours it out on you.

He's trying to make you tough, he's trying to strengthen spiritual muscles and all of that.

And sometimes we don't see God's power because we just give up.

And God's like, I was about to show it to you, I was about to pour that out, but you just kind of threw in the towel.

Soft.

I will appreciate Christ's power when I humble myself, I plead with the Holy Spirit to unleash it, I persevere through difficulty in this one.

I learn to see it at work.

I learn to see it at work.

Now think about this.

If Jesus is all powerful and he actually created the entire universe, and the verse that we just read talks about how he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Okay, guess what?

It means that he is 100% of the time pouring out power.

That is what he's doing.

He's not like, well, here's some, but now I'm gonna hold back and I'm gonna wait a couple of millennia before I pour out any more.

That's not the way that God operates.

It's just constantly unleashing it.

It's like this massive funnel of power continually coming.

Now, some of you might be thinking, well, hang on a second, that doesn't seem like my life.

Well, guess what?

It might be because we just don't see it, we don't have eyes to see.

And we don't realize that God is actually doing awesome things.

We had a conversation with our kids over the dinner table, I think it was just this week, about some things, and it was, you know, one of our kids was praying about something that they wanted to see happen.

It was a challenging situation, some difficulty at school or something like that.

And and and we were talking about perseverance and we were talking about continuing to get keep praying and all of that stuff, and then we kind of just started talking about other ways and other prayer requests that the Lord has already answered.

It was amazing that to see the kids all of a sudden like their eyes lit up, like go, yeah, like the Lord is moving.

And that was a really powerful answer.

And so, what's the difference?

Well, the difference was at one point they didn't see it, and then another point, all of a sudden they did.

Right?

So we need the Lord to open up our eyes and give us spiritual discernment and understand and see all the different ways that the Lord is m is moving.

Right?

I think sometimes what we want is we want the you know, the outright obvious, crazy miracle to happen where you know seas are are splitting open and you know, groups of people are walking through on dry land type miracles, and and really the Lord is working, he's doing a lot of powerful things, but we're thinking, we're just kind of missing it because we're thinking about something else, or it should look a certain way.

And so, uh as believers, I believe a big part of it is just learning to see God at work, learning to understand how he moves.

Well, I don't understand how the Lord moves, and I don't get what his power might look like in my life.

And that's why we get into this book, right?

That's why we read it, we become intimately familiar with with the ways of the Lord and and how he works.

And God, give me those eyes to see how you do that in my life.

Look, this Christmas season, appreciate the sheer power of Jesus Christ.

This this verse, again, it tells us that Jesus made absolutely everything.

That is that is incomparable power.

And it's the same power that he came to earth in.

So don't make the mistake this Christmas of thinking that the humility and the unassuming nature of the manger scene means that that the Christmas story is just this you know, light and fluffy, you know, tale about a baby and some cuddly animals.

All right, that's not what it is.

It's the absolute and awesome power of God coming to bear on the world that he made.

So the Christmas story begins with recognizing that Jesus is and always has been God while appreciating the sheer power that he possesses, and then this thing, the third thing, marveling that his mission was to give me life.

That was his mission.

Verse 4, take a look.

He says this in him was life, and the life was the light of men.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

Now we're we're gonna we're gonna explore the idea of Jesus as light.

Jesus came as the true light uh a whole lot more next week, but but here we see something of God's desire to give us spiritual life.

All right, you see that right there.

Mankind was was enveloped in in spiritual darkness.

That's the word that we see here in this verse.

And of course, that was due to the sin in our hearts.

So God decided what?

He decided to do something about it.

Right?

I am going to, I'm gonna take action.

He came in the person of Jesus Christ to shine the light of Christ on a world darkened by the sin of man.

His mission was to give us life, it was to give us eternal life, which which only an eternal God could bestow upon us.

And it says here that I love this, the darkness could not overcome it.

That's that's like such an epic verse, right?

We need some like sweet soundtrack playing, I think, as we read that or something.

Right?

Nothing Satan could do, nothing his forces could do, nothing, nothing we could do, nothing, you know, no problem, no pride, no conceit, no spiritual oppression, nothing could possibly stop Christ's mission.

The darkness could not overcome the light.

Now again, when you stop and and marvel at all of that, isn't it kind of amazing that Christ would do this at all?

Right when you think about that?

I mean, I mean, who are we?

And who are we that that he would willingly give up that that extraordinary fellowship that he had with the Father and that he had with the Holy Spirit, that he would leave it all behind and come to us in a in a manger like that?

But of course, that's that's exactly what he did.

That's exactly what he did.

And and we see it, I love Philippians chapter 2, verses 6 to 8.

Philippians 2:6–8

It's talking about Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, he was God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.

That doesn't mean understood, it means held on to.

He's like, I'm gonna leave my rightful position and everything that goes along with all of that.

I'm gonna step away from that, I'm gonna enter, I'm gonna go down to meet with them and do something about the entire problem of their sin.

It says that he emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient, and then it gets into Easter here, to the point of death, even death on a cross.

This is astonishing.

It's astonishing that that Jesus, who is God, I mean, I mean the creator of of all things, gladly just kind of stepped away from all of the benefits and the perks and and the rights uh of being in that Trinitarian relationship and and came down to this mess, right?

That he would come down to us just to well, to give us life.

Listen, response is, I don't know, I think necessary.

You know, as we read through these verses, as we talk through all of this, and I think one of the best ways that we get to respond as a church every single week, and we're gonna do that right now, is by singing.

And so we're gonna marvel.

That is gonna be our response.

And so the worship team, you can make your way up here.

I'm gonna pray.

And just so you know, the worship team isn't here to entertain, right?

They're not here to be watched, they are here to lead us in worship.

And this is worship is uh, if you want to look at this, is not a spectator sport.

Okay, we participate in this, and so this is what we're gonna do as we marvel at the power of God, as we marvel at the mission of God to give us life.

Uh, let's do that.