WHAT WILL YOU FIND AT CHRISTMAS-Part 6
WHAT WILL YOU FIND AT CHRISTMAS?
Christmas Messages - Part 6 of 6
Luke 2:12, 15; Matt. 2:1-2, 7:7
Rick Warren
Angels: "You'll find the baby... lying in a manger."
Shepherds: "Let's go and see!" Luke 2:12+25
"Wise men came from the east asking, `Where is the baby...? We have come to worship him.'" Matt. 2:1-2
"Seek and YOU will find" Matt. 7:7
1. YOU CAN FIND FORGIVENESS
"Today your Savior was born... He is Christ, the Lord!" Luke 2:11 (NCV)
"... All who believe in Jesus will be forgiven of their sins through his name." Acts 10:43 (NCV)
2. YOU CAN FIND PEACE OF MIND
"Those who love your teachings will find true peace..." Ps. 119:165 (NCV)
(Jesus) "Learn from me... you will find rest for your lives." Matt. 11:29 (NCV)
3. YOU CAN FIND ETERNAL LIFE
"God makes us ready for heaven... when we put our faith in Christ to save us... The one who finds life sill find it through trusting God." Rom. 1:17 (LB)
"Christ, God's Son, has come to help us understand and find the true God." 1 John 5:20 (LB)
"You will find me when you seek me with all your heart." Jer. 29:13 (NIV)
WHAT WILL YOU FIND AT CHRISTMAS?
Christmas Messages - Part 6 of 6
Luke 2:12, 15; Matt. 2:1-2, 7:7
Rick Warren
What do you want for Christmas this year? If you were to ask the typical little boy he'd give you two initials -- Power Rangers!
A little boy in our church named Brian for weeks has been bugging his parents about getting a watch for Christmas. Finally he mentioned it so many times, his dad told him, "If you mention that again, you're just not going to get it. Quit bugging us." Last night, they asked him to lead in prayer before dinner. He said, "I'd like to quote a Scripture verse before I pray. Mark 13:37 `I sayeth unto you what I've already told you before, `Watch!'" That is an appropriate use of Scripture!
We spend most of our Christmas season searching -- searching for the perfect gift, searching for bargains, searching for that just right decoration, searching for a parking spot. Many people, at the very first Christmas, missed the Christmas because they were too busy. They were looking for other things. The politicians missed the first Christmas. The business community missed the first Christmas. The innkeeper missed the first Christmas. Even the religious establishment missed the first Christmas. They were looking at other things.
The only people who enjoyed the very first Christmas, 1994 years ago, were the people who were looking for it. "The angels told the shepherds, `You'll find the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.' And the shepherds said, "`Let's go and see!'" (Luke 2). They found Jesus because they were searching. They were seeking Him.
Later on another group, the wise men, found Jesus because they were seeking Him. They said, "We've come from the east and we've come to worship Him."
What are you going to find this Christmas? You're going to find what you're looking for. The Bible says, "Seek and you will find." Whatever you look for, you're going to end up finding.
In our society today, there's a new emphasis on seeking spiritual truth. The media has caught it. A couple of magazine covers: "Life After Death", "A Clear View of Heaven", Life: "Who was He?" with a picture of Jesus on the cover, U.S. News: "Who Wrote the Bible?", "Who is God?", "The Search for the Sacred." They don't put these kinds of covers on magazines unless they sell magazines. This means there is an intense interest in spiritual things in our society right now.
Recent article, "The Search of the Sacred" in Newsweek says, "Maybe it's just a critical mass of Baby Boomers in the contemplative afternoon of life. Or maybe it's anxiety over the coming millennium. Or maybe it's general dissatisfaction of materialism of the modern world. For these reasons and more millions of Americans are embarking on a search for the sacred in their lives." The bottom line of this article is saying people are simply asking, "Is there any meaning to my life? Does my life count? Is there a God? And if there is a God, can we get to know Him?"
That's what Christmas is all about. Christmas is about you getting to know God. God says, "I know everything about you. I know your good, your bad, you ugly, your past, present, future." God knows everything about you. Now He wants you to know Him. So He sent Jesus at Christmas.
Later on in the article it says, "A lot has changed in the last half century. We've stripped away what once our ancestors saw as essential -- the importance of religion and the family -- and people feel they want something they've lost. but they just don't remember what it is they've lost. But they've left a gaping hole. That, in essence, is the seekers quest -- to fill the hole with a new source of meaning. Why are we here? What is the purpose of our existence?"
If you're honest with yourself, at least sometime in 1994 when you slowed down long enough, you probably asked yourself these same questions. They popped in your mind. Why am I here? What am I here for? Why do I exist? Why get up in the morning, go to work, come home, watch TV, and go to bed? Is there any purpose to that? Is there a God? Can God be known?
Where do you think those ideas are coming from? Forest Gump? God is putting those questions in your mind because He's creating a desire and thirst to know Him. God knows all about you. He wants you to know Him. There's no better time than Christmas to become a seeker like the wise men were. Wise people still seek Christ.
This Christmas God wants to give you three Christmas gifts:
You can find forgiveness if you seek for it.
You can find peace of mind if you seek for it.
You can find eternal life if you seek for it.
1. YOU CAN FIND FORGIVENESS
Luke 2:11 "Today your Savior was born. He is Christ, the Lord!" Circle "Savior". Jesus didn't come to scare us, but He came to save us.
Why do I need a Savior? the Bible says that Heaven is a perfect place. There are no mistakes, no inconsistencies. It is perfect. Because of that only perfect people get to go there. If God let imperfect people into heaven, it wouldn't be perfect any more. That means I don't stand a chance in a million of getting into heaven on my own effort. And neither did you. I lost my chance of perfection a long time ago.
So God had to come up with Plan B. He sent us a Savior -- somebody we could get in on somebody else's ticket. That's the Good News because a Savior has been born.
This last week a little boy wrote a letter to Santa Claus. "Dear Santa, there are three boys living at my house. Jeffrey is two. David is four and Norman is seven. Jeffrey is good some of the time. David is good some of the time. Norman is good all of the time. I am Norman." The problem with that is none of us are Normans. None of us bat 1000. None of us always are perfect. None of us are always right. If we had a giant screen behind me and were able to display for the audience everything you've thought, said or done in 1994, most of us would be extremely embarrassed. We live with a sense of regret because none of us is perfect. That's why we need a Savior.
Christmas card: "If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent an educator. If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent a scientist. If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent an economist. If our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent an entertainer. But our greatest need was forgiveness, so He sent us a Savior."
"Unto you is born a Savior" You can be forgiven. That's the most priceless gift you can get -- the gift of a clear conscious. You can't even buy that at Neimen-Marcus. It's priceless. Yet He offers it to you at Christmas time. To have your past forgiven, wiped clean, start over, brand new! That's good news.
How do I let Christ save me? Real simple. R-E-L-A-X. You relax and simply trust Him. Acts 10:43 "All who believe in Jesus' name will be forgiven of their sins through His name." You just believe. Let go. How do you get Christ to save you? Just admit you need it.
For three years I was a lifeguard. (They fired me because every time I saw somebody raise their hand, drowning, I'd go, "Yes, I see that hand. God bless you. Is there another?" -- No, I made up that part.) One of the things all lifeguards know is you can't save anybody as long as they're trying to save themselves. They'll take you under the water with them. As a lifeguard, you swim out to them, they're flailing around in the water until they finally give up and collapse. Once they give up it's real easy. You just put your arm over their shoulder and swim back to shore. Nothing to it. But you can't save them as long as they're trying to save themselves.
Our problem is we're always trying to save ourselves. We think we can work our way into heaven, "God, my good works are this high and my bad works are this low. Therefore look at the balance." The only problem is, God doesn't grade on the curve. He says only perfect people need apply for a perfect place. You say, "But I'm better than Hitler!" Of course you are. You're better than me, I have no doubt about that. But God doesn't judge you according to anybody else. You need a Savior. And He's provided. Just accept it. It's not like God is trying to give you cancer or something. Just accept. Forgiveness.
2. YOU CAN FIND PEACE OF MIND
Psalm 119:165 "Those who love your teachings will find true peace." Peace is a word that our world uses a lot but the world doesn't have the foggiest idea of the true meaning of peace. Our society hasn't got the slightest idea what genuine real peace is all about -- peace of mind.
For many, peace of mind means drinking enough until I'm so drunk that I'm numb and I no longer feel the pain anymore and I'm at peace. For other people it means hopping from one relationship to the next to the next, hoping that somebody will fill the void in my life. And they don't. They never do. For some it means being busy and staying busy all the time so at night I kind of collapse into bed so I don't have to think because any time I'm quiet, those haunting thoughts, and fears and sense of loneliness comes caving in on me and I don't like that feeling. For other people it means working and working, becoming a workaholic and overachieving so I can get all these attributes of success to prove to the world, "I'm somebody!" But inside I'm thinking, "I don't really feel like somebody." For other people it's trying some new age gimmick like crystals, sitting in a lotus position and contemplating lint in your navel and going "Ahhhmmmm". That's not peace of mind.
Real peace of mind is having a relationship with Jesus Christ, God's Son and becoming friends with Him, with God. Real peace is knowing that no matter what I do, God will never stop loving me. Real peace is knowing that no matter what happens, God will never leave me alone by myself. He'll always be with me. Real peace means no matter what happens in 1995, I know that God is going to give me the strength to handle it. Real peace is living by God's word, the Bible, so I can avoid a lot of the needless hurts and hang ups and habits that mess up my life. Real peace is teaching my children, God's word, as a foundation for life and then watching them grow up and make decisions that I look at and say, "I'm proud of that. They're making that decision on their own." That's real peace.
There are three things that will rob you of peace of mind this Christmas. Guilt, grief, grudges. Those are the three great destroyers of peace of mind.
Guilt -- You don't have to walk out of here with guilt. God says, "I sent a Savior to wipe away your sins so you can be forgiven. Clear conscious." Like an etch-a-sketch -- clean.
Grief -- If the truth were known, some of you are in major pain right now. Christmas time brings up all kinds of hurtful memories. You remember the loss of a loved one, or a parent who abandoned you or a divorce you went through or a death of a spouse or child. You have grief and that robs you of joy and peace of mind. If that's the pain you're carrying, I'm sorry you hurt. I really am. But more than that, God cares about your hurt. He sees it, He knows it, and you were never meant to carry that grief all on your own. Never! You were never meant to carry that pain by yourself. You were never meant to handle that hurt on your own. God says cast all your cares upon Him for He will care for you. Do that tonight and receive the gift of peace. Cast all your burdens on the Lord.
Grudges -- That's being resentful. We feel guilty when we hurt others. We feel resentful or grudging when others hurt us. You will be hurt in life, it's a fact of life. Intentionally or unintentionally. How you respond to that hurt will determine your level of happiness in life. For your own sake, for your own hope, for your own peace of mind, you've got to let go of that hurt. Resentment doesn't hurt them, it only hurts you. You're the one stewing and spewing while they're out there living their life. Some of you are still letting people from your past hurt you today and that's not too smart. You've got to let go of your grudges.
But you say, "I can't. They hurt me too much. I can't forgive them." You're right. That's why you need Jesus Christ. Only He can give you the power to let go. Why? Because they deserve it? No, they don't deserve it. But for your own sake so you can get on with your life and not stay stuck in the past over a grudge or a hurt or a resentment. You can find peace of mind if you're willing to do the things Christ says to do.
3. YOU CAN FIND ETERNAL LIFE
Facts of life:
1. We're all going to die someday. That's not a pleasant thought. I don't think you need to be morbid about it or always be worrying about it, but the fact is we are all going to die some day. Tomorrow, next year, ten years from now we don't know.
2. You're going to spend more of your life on that side of death than you will on this side. You get 60, 70, 80, maybe 90 years here on this earth. But on the other side of death you'll spend the rest of your eternity in eternity. Only a fool would go all through life totally unprepared for something they know is inevitable. That doesn't make sense. To know that someday you're going to die and not be prepared for it. You're not ready to live until you're ready to die. Fortunately, the good news is, that's what Christmas is all about too. That's why God sent Jesus Christ.
Romans 1:17 "God makes us ready for heaven when we put our faith in Christ to save us. The only one who finds life will find it through trusting Christ." You can find it through trusting Christ. God says I'll take care of your past regrets, your present problems and your future fears.
When you summarize those in one word it's called salvation. Anytime you hear that -- God saves me, Jesus saves me -- it means He clears up my past, He takes care of my present and He secures my future. That's a gift you'll never get anywhere else. You can't find it under the Christmas tree. You can only find it on the man on the cross.
Our problem is we often don't really know what we're looking for in life. We think we're looking for happiness so we try all different things. Or we think we're looking for love -- "I just want somebody to love me, to fill this void in my life." Or we think we're looking for success, or security, or significance. Or we think we're looking for meaning and purpose in life.
We think we're looking for all these things. But actually what we're looking for is God. That's what you're searching for. God is behind all those other things. He has placed in you a God‑ shaped vacuum that nothing else can fill and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Him.
Good News: All the time when you've been looking for God -- although you didn't know it was God you were looking for; you thought it was happiness or love or success, etc. You were really looking to be in touch with your creator. All that time you've been searching, God's been searching for you too. He's been looking for you. He's been working on the other end. That's why He sent Jesus Christ at Christmas about 1994 years ago.
"Christ, God's Son, has come to help us understand and find the true God." God sent Jesus to earth to help us understand and find the true God.
Christmas is really the celebration of an invasion. It's a close encounter of the God kind. God invaded earth 1994 years ago. He came to earth as a human being so we could know He's not some big force in the sky, so we could know what He's like. It split history into A.D. and B.C. and every time you write a check the reference point, whether you're a believer or not, you're using Jesus Christ as a reference point every single day of your life. 1994 from what? From Jesus Christ, when God came to earth. When God came to earth it split history.
If God had wanted to communicate to cows, He would have become a cow. If God had wanted to communicate to ants, He would have become an ant. If God had wanted to communicate to dogs, He would have become a dog. But He wanted to communicate to human beings so He became one of us, a human being. I can look at Jesus and say, "Oh, that's how God wants me to live. That's what God is like." I learn that He's some impersonal force in the sky. How did He come to earth? The same way all of us did. He came through a birth canal. Why? Because nobody is afraid of a baby. And God came, not to scare you, but to save you. So He came into the world the same way all of us did through a birth.
That's what Christmas is all about. He makes that difference. The Bible says that Jesus came to seek and to save. While you've been seeking, He's been seeking you.
The miracle of Christmas is not on 34th Street. It's in Bethlehem. He says, I offer to you forgiveness for your past, peace of mind in the present, and a solid future in eternity. Those are the gifts.
How do you find those gifts? They are all wrapped up in Christ. "You will find Me when you seek Me with all your heart." You matter to God. Your problems matter to God. Your pain matters to God. Your potential matters to God. He came to earth and He's seeking you while you're seeking Him. What better time than Christmas to make contact. He says, Seek for Me. Two thousand years ago wise men sought Christ. Wise men still seek Christ. I challenge you to be a wise man or a wise woman and this Christmas seek Christ, because "Seek and you will find." That's His promise. That's His gift to you.
We all came here for many different reasons. Some of you came because it's the thing you do on Christmas Eve. You go to church on Christmas Eve and Easter. Or you came out of habit. Or you came out of tradition. Or you came because you wanted to hear the music. Some of you came because you were invited by a friend or relative who cared deeply about you.
Regardless of why you think you're here, you're not here by accident. Even a thousand years ago, even before you were born, God knew that you would be in this tent (or outside) on December 24th, 1994, Christmas eve. And He brought you here so He could get your attention for about five minutes at the end of 1994 and say this to you, "You matter to Me. I know everything about you. I saw your birth. I know when you're going to die. I know everything in between. I made you for a purpose and I have a plan for your life. Life does have meaning when you get involved in my plan and develop a relationship to Me. I love you and I want you to know Me so badly that I sent My Son to earth 2000 years ago to show you what I'm like."
What I'm talking about is not religion. I'm not about a relationship. Religion is just man's attempt to get to God. Relationship is when you get to know Jesus Christ in a personal way and He becomes a friend. I'm not afraid to die. I already know what God's like. I'm not afraid. I know what is going to happen. So I don't care what your background is. You may have a Catholic background. You may be a Hindu or Buddhist. You may have a Jewish background. You may be a Protestant. Maybe you have no background of religion. That doesn't matter to me. It really doesn't matter. What matters is, have you established a personal relationship to Christ? Those gifts -- forgiveness, peace of mind, and eternal life -- are wrapped up in Him.
Can you imagine ever being given a gift at Christmas and never unwrapping it? It would be silly. If you gave me a gift for Christmas and I took it home and a year later you came over and I still hadn't unwrapped it, you'd think I was a little nutty! "Why don't you unwrap it?" I'm going to get around to it one of these days.
Yet many of you go Christmas after Christmas, you know the songs, you know the stories, you know what it's all about but you've never unwrapped the gift. What's the logic behind that? When God says, I want to offer you forgiveness and peace of mind and eternal life ... and you haven't unwrapped it? Be serious! You're never going to be offered a greater deal than that!
As we close I invite you to pray the seeker's prayer, that you, like the wise men, will say, I'm going to seek Christ -- "Seek and you'll find" -- you'll find forgiveness and peace of mind and eternal life.
Prayer:
If you'll seek for it this Christmas you will find a new and a deeper understanding of God, of your own life, and of the problems that you're facing. You will also understand bettered the answer to those problems that's been bothering you. Why don't you pray this in your heart. You don't have to pray it aloud. You could be inside or outside the tent. Just in your mind say this, "Dear God, thank You for bringing me here tonight. I've known something was missing in my life but I just didn't know what it was and I didn't know it was You. Thank You for seeking me even when I've ignored You. God, I want to know the truth about You, about myself, and about life. Jesus Christ, I want to get to know You. I want to put my trust in You. As much as I know how, I ask You to come into my life. Please forgive all that's been wrong in my life. I accept Your gift of forgiveness. And I accept Your gift of peace of mind. And I accept Your gift of eternal life. In Your name, I pray. Amen."