God With Us... Still

INTRO: When I was a kid, I loved Christmas Eve the most. It is the height of anticipation for Christmas morning. The tree was decorated, presents were wrapped and waiting to be opened, the stresses of shopping were over and on Christmas Eve, everyone was joyful.

Christmas day was nice too, but each year there was a problem. You see, all that waiting was over and though the gifts were nice, there was always a sense of sadness. The season was over… it would be a whole year before people would gather around and sing joyously from home to home or extend extra measures of grace and love.

In fact, even the Christmas tree seems to lose a bit of its glory after the presents are opened. Have you ever felt this way?

What if I told you that Christmas is something bigger and better than all that?

Over the past couple weeks, we’ve looked at Christmas in our series “God With Us”- we began with a message of Christ’s Mission to redeem us- how His presence among His creation brought HOPE, JOY, and PEACE through His LOVE demonstrated to us. Then we took time to reflect with Mary on God’s fulfilled promises to be with us, providing the gift of SALVATION and ASSURANCE.

Today, I want to draw our attention to the present reality that, even 2000+ years after the first Christmas, God is With Us… Still.

There are a number of passages that we could turn to, but as Danny Akin, president of SEBTS likes to say, “Last words are lasting words.” and so this morning I want to ask you to take you Bible and turn with me to the familiar last words of Jesus in Matt. 28:18-20. These are the final words recorded to Jesus’ Disciples in the book of Matthew.

Matthew 28:18–20 NASB95

18 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

[PRAY]

How many of you recognize these verses? I hope so- you likely know this as the Great Commission passage of Scripture, the mission of Christ which He intends to accomplish through the church and which will result in the picture of worship in heaven that we see in Rev. 7:9-10

Revelation 7:9–10 NASB95

9 After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; 10 and they cry out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.”

But it’s the last words of these last words of Jesus that will guide our study today. “lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

The message is titled “God with Us Still” - if you picked up a bulletin, I encourage you to take the enclosed sermon guide and follow along with me. In our time together this morning, I hope to illuminate 3 implications of God’s lasting presence in the life of the believer. I pray that through this teaching, the glory of Christmas will shine in you all year long.

Let us begin. The first implication of God’s lasting presence is:

Christians Have Communion with God

Jesus said, “I am with you”

He is not simply speaking about a relative location, but a relational togetherness. We celebrate this communion with Him each time we partake of the Lord’s Supper. It’s not that we enact some magical practice by which Jesus once again shares his body and blood with us as He did on the cross, but rather that we remind one another of the covenant in Christ and His promise that He is with us!

You and I must understand that Christians are partakers of the New Covenant.- that we are justified by faith in Christ who Himself fulfilled the Old Covenant Law and this covenant is sealed by the Holy Spirit who lives in us.

Thus, we have the very presence of God with us. Here is what that means- Jesus has restored to us - in Christ - the communion that Adam and Eve enjoyed in the Garden of Eden before they sinned. Let that sink in.

Remember, God walked with them daily but because of their sin, they “hid themselves from the presence of God” and were ultimately expelled from Eden and from communion with God.

This communing with God would only take place from this point forward through an intercessory priest and sacrifices.

Then Christ came - a day that was anticipated for thousands of years - He came and restored our communion with the God of Creation! Folks, the magi traveled across the known world for a taste of communion with God in flesh. Because Jesus did not remain in a manger, but instead went to the cross, today we can have communion with Him still.

You see, in Christ, Christians now are invited to the throne of grace, having been adopted as sons and daughters! We have been restored to the title of vice-regent with Christ and have been granted unfettered access to the Great I Am.

You and I get to commune with God the Father because Jesus has made us righteous through His own sacrifice. And in this communion, we can have great joy just as Adam and Eve who received the command to rule over the earth. You see, they were not sovereign, but they communed with the Sovereign.

You and I have that benefit as well. We commune with God and carry His authority and His accountability with us as we fulfill the mandates given to us.

Because God is with us still, Christians have communion with God!

The second implication of this wonderful truth is that:

Christians Are Thrivently Dependent On God

(Yes, I made up the word ‘thrivently’) Here’s what I mean: We depend upon God like we depend upon oxygen… it’s impossible for us to live without it! But, a lot of folks hear the word ‘depend’ and they their natural response is negative because dependence implies weakness.

And while that is a part of the equation, the reality is that when we have oxygen, we do not merely survive, but we thrive because we have fuel to live. Likewise, we depend on God, but because God is with us still, we thrive in our dependence.

Jesus said “I am with you always...”

That means that He will not leave us, nor forsake us. And because it is God with us, His presence changes what is possible in our own lives.

The Christian life is impossible to live in our own strength and ability; We cannot, in our strength produce the fruit of the Spirit… it’s called the fruit of the Spirit, not the fruit of Marc! We need God’s power in us, His wisdom leading us, and His grace covering us. He is the God of the impossible

And because God is with us, we can lean on Him to provide that which we cannot! And here’s a little secret: God actually wants us to depend on Him. We were designed to depend on Him. It’s like we are rewarded when we do depend on God. This is actually quite freeing if you grasp it.

You cannot earn salvation or favor with God. Instead, we rely on Christ’s finished work and we live in response to Him; grateful, joyful, free. It’s not something to take for granted, but to accept as a child accepts the grace of mom and dad.

I want to point you back to a guy by the name of Moses. Moses was called by God to deliver the Hebrews from the Egyptians. (remember?) Now look here- when God spoke to Moses from that burning bush, and Moses objected because of his own deficiencies, God didn’t say to him, “C’mon Moses, you’re the best man for the job… you speak both Hebrew and Egyptian, you know the land, you’ve got this!”

No, because then Moses would have tried to rely on his own strength and would have failed. Instead, God told Moses “Certainly, I will be with you...” (Ex. 3:12) IOW- “depend on Me and it’ll all be just fine!” It was God who delivered the Israelites- Moses had the privilege of God using Him. Moses leaned on God and God parted the Red Sea, fed millions of people with manna from the sky, and led them to the promised land: thrivently dependent.

When Jesus said, I am with you always, you and I need to know that we can depend upon Him and in doing so, we not only survive, but we thrive;

when temptations are upon us, we have with us the One who was tempted in every way but without sin to bring us to victory.

When persecution comes for us, we have the One with us who healed us by his own stripes and promises that the sufferings of this world cannot compare to the glories of eternity.

When we look to fulfill the Great Commission and we fear that we don’t have the ability to make disciples, to share the gospel, or to model godliness, we have with us the One who is Himself the Word of God - “in Him we bear much fruit”

Tomorrow, after the presents are all opened- after the decorations are taken down, God is with us still which means that we have communion with God and can thrive as we daily depend upon Him.

Finally, the last implication of God’s lasting presence I want to share with you this morning is:

Christians Reflect the Glory of God

Jesus said, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

This age will end when Christ returns to gather the church - then we will see Him as He is and we will perfectly reflect His glory. Until then, He is with us, teaching and leading us.

In the beginning, mankind was created in the image of God for God’s glory. Adam and Eve were set as beacons upon creation to display God’s glory and they did so perfectly. But sin cast a shadow on this reflection.

After they sinned, God’s presence was made visible in various ways and was always just a glimpse of His true glory.

How humbling it must have been for Adam & Eve to get to walk with God in ALL his glory in Eden. Even Moses was hid in the cleft of a rock and covered so that he might just catch the trail of God’s glory. And when He came down from this event, his face shone, reflecting the glory of being in the presence of God, even though it was veiled.

Throughout the OT, God manifested His presence in various ways: You might remember the pillar of smoke and fire by which He led Moses and the Israelites through the wilderness. After that, it was in the Ark of the Covenant which the priests would carry as a sign of God’s presence with them.

Everywhere they went, God’s presence with His people led them to glorify Him. This is why the temple was so important for the Jews- that was where the presence of God was made tangible- sacrifices could be made and they could commune with God and glorify Him through their obedience and worship.

Here’s the good news for you and me. (1 Corinthians 6:19–20“19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? 20 For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.” )

Because God is with us still, we get to be the tangible evidence of God’s presence in the world. We, as Christians reflect the glory of God in our lives, shining forth the radiance of the King of kings as we abide in Him. You cannot do this apart from God with us. That’s why we celebrate Christmas.... Christ came.

I was thinking about this and I want you to ponder this: Moses could not make his face shine on his own… no matter how much he could try, there is no way that he could muster up this glorious reflection in his own strength or ability. He was just reflecting God’s glory, evidence that Moses was with God.

This Christmas, when the glory of the moment seems to have faded, remember that God is with us still and that you and I have the great joy of reflecting the glory of the only begotten.

Let this be evident in our lives as we commune with God- through prayer, fellowship among the church, stewardship of His world.

Let it be evident as we depend upon Him for our strength and ability to walk this Christian life.

Let it be evident as we glorify God through obedience and worship. Mat 5:16

Let your light shine all year long because God is with us still.

[PRAY]

As we sing, if you are here today or watching online and you have never trusted Christ for salvation- friend, what better time than now? ADMIT your need- that you are a sinner in need of amazing, supernatural grace. BELIEVE that Jesus is the Son of God who came to pay the price for our sin, and CONFESS your surrender to Him. You can do that right where you are. You do respond to God’s call.

Discuss: How aware are you of God’s presence in you? Explain.

Discuss: What area of the Christian life are you attempting to live in your strength as opposed to God’s? How can you learn to depend on Him?

Discuss: What other implications are there in the reality of God with us?