Hope for the Future
Notes
Transcript
Worship Thoughts
Super sick last weekend
My only relief was prayer for someone else
The revelation sparked an incredible need to worship in song
All my Oil on my heart
All these afflictions on me, but I chose worship. and the Holy Spirit came upon me and moved on my heart.
Worst sounding song in the history of songs.
One of the Truest moment of worship I have ever had.
This song is about pouring all your oil out onto the alter of the Lord.
Giving Him everything
All the dreams, all the hopes, all the victories...
All the pains, all the regret, all the heartache...
That experience taught me something that I hadn’t grasped up until then:
Sometimes all we have are the broken parts of ourselves.
Sometimes all we possess, in those moments, are pain. And defeat.
Here is All my oil, Lover of my soul. I saved it all for you.
Day by day I bring, this costly offering. All of this...it has to be for you.
I am pleading with you this morning, from the deepest part of myself:
Seek Him with me. Seek the One that has all the answers, with me. Close your eyes, and go through the inventory of your life...the things you cherish.
And give them up to His will.
Intro
Intro
Marry Christmas and Happy New Year
Dylann’s 1st Birthday
Baptisms Today
Nathan Keith
Oliver Keith
Brian Bird
Comedian: I don’t say Merry Christmas anymore
Instead I say,
“May the Grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ penetrate your heart in this season of salvation from sin. May His power conquer the strongholds in your life built up by every other false religion.”
Bible in 5 years
5th and Final Week in the Book of Luke
A story that, like many of us, is often overlooked. The significance, the value, remains hidden.
Luke Chapter 2
We have a sure hope when we trust in Jesus
We have a sure hope when we trust in Jesus
21 And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.
22 Now when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were completed [40 days for a son, 80 days a daughter], they brought Him to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord
23 (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every male who opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord”),
What does it mean to be Holy, again? Set Apart. Circumcision is what set them apart.
Why do we need to know this?
Why does Luke take the time to include this information:
Mary & Joseph were faithful followers of the Law.
If Jesus is going to fulfill the Law, as He says in Matthew 5:17, then He most be the perfect follower of it.
So...He was circumcised.
This was a sign of The Old Covenant
The covenant that Yahweh God made with Abraham.
We see that in the 17th chapter of Genesis
10 This is My covenant which you shall keep, between Me and you and your descendants after you: Every male child among you shall be circumcised;
11 and you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you.
Circumcision was a sign in the flesh to the world that you were set apart for the purposes of an eternal God.
You were in a covenant, a contract with God.
You promise to do this, God promises to do that.
If either party fails to hold up their end of the burden, the contract is broken.
Y’all still with me?
But we know Jesus brings with Him a New Covenant.
In this New Covenant, God no longer requires that we circumcise our flesh, but our hearts.
Look was Paul says in his letter to the Colossians:
Notice there is a back and forth poetry going on here: This then That.
11 In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands,
by putting off the body of the flesh...
12 having been buried with him in baptism,
in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God,
who raised him from the dead.
13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
God made alive together with him,
having forgiven us all our trespasses,
14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.
Baptism is a sign of being buried with Christ and raised again into new life.
And He shows us that this sign is not just for the men, as circumcision was. But for ALL PEOPLE.
Don’t forget Genesis 17:11 where it says circumcision is a SIGN in the FLESH of the COVENANT.
Circumcision didn’t save the Israelites, it was a sign of the Covenant that did. Baptism doesn’t save Christians, it is a sign of the New Covenant that does.
We will be practicing this sign of the covenant today, we we have at least 3 people who want to be baptized in front of this church body, among friends and family.
Stick around!
So already here, Luke wants us to look at the birth story of Jesus and witness the Old and New Covenants crashing together.
Let’s keep reading:
24 and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, “A pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”
This shows us that Mary and Joseph were poor.
The custom was to sacrifice a lamb and a dove or pigeon. But if you couldn’t afford the lamb, you could sacrifice two birds instead.
6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Even in birth, God emptied Himself.
Again we see this in 2 Corinthians chapter 8:
9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.
Jesus was in Heaven, being worshiped my a Host of angels, and he chose to humble himself, emptying Himself, He became poor. So that we, through His Grace, may become rich.
Mary and Joseph may not have been able to afford A lamb to offer...but they didn’t realize they were poetically offering THE Lamb.
The Lamb that would take the sins of the world.
25 And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.
3 times in this passage, the Holy Spirit is mentioned in relationship to this man
Keep your eye out
That is the first.
Waiting: [prosdechomai] : to accept; to receive willingly, to look forward to; to welcome
There is a tone of eagerness to this word. Anticipation.
Let me give you an example that you may be able to relate to:
When I was in high school, my Dad would sometimes take me out of class to go hunting, or fishing, or camping.
Whenever he did that, he would always pick me up in his red 3/4 ton pick up truck: A Dodge Ram 2500 named Big Red.
Big Loud Diesel truck, 3in lift, huge offroad tires
You could hear it coming from half a mile down the road
Anyway...
My dad wouldn’t always tell me when he was going to do this, he liked to surprise me. So I didn’t always know when it was going to happen.
But...whenever I saw him prepping Big Red and making trips into the attic...my heart would leap for joy.
And I would sit in class at school...WAITING...for my dad to come get me.
It didn’t matter where we went, ALL of the choices were amazing, a thousand times better than school.
I was just happy to be out of there doing something I loved with my dad.
I WAITED with unconditional approval.
YES. I want to go Dad, take me with you.
That’s what this word means, that’s what Simeon is doing.
And what is he waiting for again?
Consolation: [ot] : Comfort; signal, flag, beacon, monument, omen, prodigy, evidence
Lit. Translation: Simeon was waiting, looking forward to accept and receive willingly the beacon, the monument of Israel.
And the Holy Spirit was upon him.
Some of you come in here and wonder why you feel so uncomfortable lifting your hands and singing loud, while others seem to shout loud enough for the kids to hear.
You wonder why it seems like the Holy Spirit comes upon everyone else, but never you. Not in a long time, perhaps.
Let me ask you this: Are you waiting on Jesus? Are you waiting with an eager anticipation, having already accepted what He reveals to you?
Have you written a blank check to Jesus that says, “Lord, no matter what you bring in or out of my life… I will follow you.
That’s what Simeon was doing here.
26 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.
Simeon knew with confidence, somehow through the Spirit, that he would not die before seeing the prophesied Messiah.
My mom used to sing me a bedtime prayer than some of you may remember:
Know I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.
Well Simeon knew he wasn’t going to die before he woke, he wouldn’t die until he saw the man who would be King over all the nations.
That’s a cool promise!
So he’s gonna have to change that prayer
Like Simeon we can have...
Like Simeon we can have...
1. Hope in the person of Jesus
1. Hope in the person of Jesus
We can forget that Jesus came into this world the very same way humans have since the dawn of time.
He was conceived in a womb, carried for 9 months, then was delivered by his mother.
He was circumcised at 8 days and brought to the temple for cleansing rites.
He was a real guy that lived in the 1st century Middle East.
Proof of the Personhood of Jesus:
New Testament
>5000 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament
>24,000 translated copies (non-Greek)
All manuscripts agree with each other to an infinitesimal degree.
The claim that the Bible has been translated over and over again is completely false. We have the original written language, all of our translations are based on the original text.
The next closest ancient text in evidence is Homer’s works. Iliad and the Odyssey.
~1000 copies | 60 from the time of Homer.
If ancient manuscripts were stored on shelves, then the Odyssey would take up a few shelves, while the New Testament would fill the entire library.
The New Testament is the most accredited collection of ancient documents in the history of mankind.
Jewish Historians | Josephus in 1st century - less than 75 years after Christ.
“About this time there lived Jesus, a wise man, for he was one who wrought surprising feats and was a teacher of such people as accept the truth gladly. He won over many Jews and many Greeks. When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of the highest standing amongst us, had condemned him to be crucified, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him. And the tribe of the Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared” (Josephus, Antiquities, 18:3)
Josephus was a Jew, no reason to include a record of Jesus unless it was true.
Tacitus | Roman Historian in 1st century - no friend to the Christian faith, still writes about the person of Jesus. Christus = Anointed one
“...Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.” (Tacitus, The Annals, Book 15)
This man, that was God, got his feet dusty by the same earth that we do.
That means He can relate with us. He knows what it is to hurt.
He knows what it is to mourn; to pain and loss
He has seen the snares of the enemy, and has conquered them.
So when Mary and Joseph bring 1 month old baby Jesus to the temple, Simeon sees what he has been hoping for: the person of Jesus.
27 So he came by 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,
28 he took Him up in his arms and blessed God and said:
29 “Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, According to Your word;
Simeon had hope in the person of Jesus, but Like Simeon, we can also have Hope in purpose of Jesus.
Simeon had hope in the person of Jesus, but Like Simeon, we can also have Hope in purpose of Jesus.
2. Hope in the purpose of Jesus
2. Hope in the purpose of Jesus
Simeon continues his prayer:
30 For my eyes have seen Your salvation
What is the Hebrew word for Salvation: Yeshua - Jesus’ real name!
Mary and Joseph would have called Jesus, Yeshua: Salvation or Yahweh Saves
How did we go from Yeshua to Jesus?
The New Testament was written in Greek, so the Hebrew name “Yeshua” needed to be transliterated into the Greek alphabet.
Greek adaptation:
No “sh” sound
No “y” consonant
“ua” = feminine | “us” = masculine
Yeshua became Iesus
Latin adaptation:
Latin used the letter “I” for both “I” & “J” sounds
Iesus is not spoken with the “I” & “J” sounds
English adaptation
“J” was added to english alphabet in 1500’s
Iesus became Jesus.
So if Simeon was speaking Hebrew, he would have said, “My eyes have seen your Yeshua! Your Jesus!”
That right there tells me something big:
Salvation isn’t something you do, it’s someone you know.
31 Which You have prepared before the face of all peoples,
32 A light to bring revelation to the Gentiles, And the glory of Your people Israel.”
What does it mean when the Bible talks about Gentiles and Israel at the same time?
It means Everyone. All peoples.
A continuation of the point made in verse 31.
33 And Joseph and His mother marveled at those things which were spoken of Him.
Think about this, church. 40 days into being parents of the Messiah...
You walk into a church and an old man asks to hold your newborn baby...
And he starts prophesying about the impacts your child will have on the world.
Step into their shoes for a moment and remember what they know about their baby Messiah from conversations with Angels: not very much.
This is new information for Jesus’ parents.
In Matthew 2:21 the Angel of the Lord tells Joseph that He shall save HIS people from their sins.
Now Simeon is saying, it’s not just Israel. It’s the whole world. All peoples.
Like Simeon we can have hope in the person of Jesus, in the purpose of Jesus, and have...
Like Simeon we can have hope in the person of Jesus, in the purpose of Jesus, and have...
3. Hope in the prophecy of Jesus
3. Hope in the prophecy of Jesus
34 Then Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary His mother, “Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against
1 Peter 2:8 tells us that to those who reject Jesus, He is a stone of stumbling.
But those who receive Him are raised up | Eph. 2:6
35 (yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also), that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.”
sword = personal grief Mary would endure when she watched her own son die in agony.
Here is what Simeon is saying, in clear words:
Jesus is destined for a sign that will be opposed. I.E. His death and resurrection.
It’s in the opposing of this sign, that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed.
The rejection of Jesus as Messiah would reveal how far the Jewish people had fallen from their calling.
Deeper point: You can gauge someone’s spiritual health by looking at their attitude towards Christ.
With zero direct interaction, you can immediately know the state of someone’s heart by witnessing their attitude towards Jesus.
36 Now there was one, Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of a great age, and had lived with a husband seven years from her virginity;
37 and this woman was a widow of about eighty-four years, who did not depart from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day.
Married for 7 years. Widowed for 84 years. About 105 years old, okay?
And it says that she never left the temple. She served God and prayed to Him day and night.
Remember what Simeon was doing? WAITING for the Consolation?
Anna was too.
38 And coming in that instant she gave thanks to the Lord, and spoke of Him to all those who looked for redemption in Jerusalem.
Allow me a moment to highlight Simeon and Anna’s example:
You see, we don’t follow the Holy Spirit because He needs our help to accomplish something for the Kingdom.
His plans will come about regardless of our puffed up human notion that we MUST be involved.
But Good Lord, it is a blessing to be included.
Simeon and Anna refusing to walk into the temple that day likely would have affected no change in God’s plan for Jesus as the Messiah.
But in doing so, there bore witness to the miracle of the newborn Christ, born of a virgin. And they became the first evangelists, telling others about who Jesus is.
Allow me to close with a story I heard. I story about wrestling with the hope that the Holy Spirit so desperately wants us to lean in and submit to:
I was listening to a sermon given by a Native African missionary.
I can’t remember his name or what country he was working in.
He was telling us how God was moving and working in their mission field, working miracles of all kinds in the village they were sharing Christ with.
One day, he told us, he felt this heavy conviction on his heart.
God wanted Him to share the message of Jesus with a local hospital in nearest town.
I remember how he described the local town. Gang violence and impromptu executions were common place.
Being a Christian was very dangerous in town, and things were going so well in the village.
He didn’t want to go. So he wrestled with the Spirit, and chose not to go.
That night, he dreamed about the hospital.
In the dream, he saw himself praying over the people in the beds.
The whole 2nd day, this man paced and tried to find excuses that would convince himself this was all some mistake.
The village needed him.
The new believers needed him.
The mission projects [digging wells & building schools] and volunteers from the church needed his leadership.
And he convinced himself again, not to go. So he did not.
The next night, something terrible happened. There was no dream.
The Holy Spirit convicted him so heavily, that he dressed as quickly as possible rushed to the hospital on his motorbike.
When he arrived, he saw something miraculous. The hospital was filled with people in hospital gowns, walking around, crying and hugging loved ones. The staff was freaking out.
He asked them what was going on and a nurse told him,
“You won’t believe it! This morning, every person admitted to this hospital, emergency room included, were healed of their injuries or disease!”
Every. Single. One.
I remember feeling, like you, wonder at this point in the story. Wow! God is still working miracles in our day and age!
But this man’s response was different.
His heart broke and he fell to his knees in shame and regret.
He tasted a piece of wisdom in that moment that has stuck with me ever since.
God is going to do what God is going to do. We either get on the bus or not.
God was going to heal that hospital, regardless of the missionary’s participation. But God wanted this man to be a part of it, witnessing His power and speaking the truth of His love to a people that were looking for miraculous answers to real questions.
God doesn’t call you because He needs your help. He calls you because He wants you with Him, to see and experience all the wonders He has to reveal around you and through you.
1st Service, Tithe and Offering Prayer
One calling that God has for many of you here, is marriage.
And that is a calling that so many people, believers included, can stand to improve upon.
I want to take this moment to close this message with some good news, some joy.
Jimmy & Annie Norwood
50th Anniversary - Pray Over Them
5% of marriages last until their 50th anniversary.
What does it take to stay married for 50 years?
Thankfulness for the institution of Marriage and it’s true purpose: an image of our relationship to Jesus.
