Christmas 2020 2: The Gift of Love

Bookmarks & Needs:

B: 1 John 4:9-11

N: None

Opening

Good morning! It’s so exciting to be back together again after taking a couple of weeks online for the New Mexico COVID “reset.” Thank you, praise band, for leading us in worship and praise this morning. We weren’t really able to have a bunch of people here to decorate the sanctuary as we normally would, so the staff got together yesterday and put up our Christmas decorations, and because of a scheduling conflict, the Lusk family stepped in to pinch-hit at the last minute. Our staff is such a tremendous group of people, and I’m honored to get to serve with them. They love this church family so much, and are willing to go above and beyond to bless our congregation. So I just want to say thank you to all of them and the Lusks for their time yesterday.

This week was our week of prayer for international missions. On Monday, we heard about and prayed for our IMB missionaries Kenya and Thailand, as well as the Maroneys in Croatia, who were featured in the video we showed at the beginning of service. Then on Wednesday, we spent the day in prayer for our international missionaries during our day of prayer. And on Friday, we got together again to hear about God’s work through our missionaries to Italy, Japan, and other parts of the world. We will continue to watch these videos throughout the rest of our focus on the Lottie Moon Christmas offering.

We’re in our second week of our Christmas series that we’re calling The Gifts of Christmas. This week, the passage that I want to focus on is found in 1 John chapter 4. Let’s stand in honor of God’s Word as we read this together this morning:

1 John 4:9–11 CSB

9 God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his one and only Son into the world so that we might live through him. 10 Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.

PRAY

I don’t know about you, but I really enjoy singing. And I’ve been playing Christmas music on my car radio while driving since we put up our Christmas tree before Thanksgiving. Don’t judge. I know some who would listen to Christmas music just about all year round if they thought they could get away with it. Right, Trev?

I mean, Christmas songs and carols are a big part of the unique “flavor” of this season. What would Christmas feel like without the songs and carols?

Maybe a little saner, you say? I think some of you may already have had enough of the repetitive radio station playlists… don’t even get me started on the song “Last Christmas.”

But bear with me, then, because today we are going to play a little game. It’s called “Name That Christmas Song.” I’ll read a phrase from a well-known holiday song, and you try to think of the song title. Feel free to join me once you know what I’m singing. Ready? Here we go:

We’re snuggled up together like two birds of a feather would be. (“Sleigh Ride”)

When we finally kiss goodnight, how I’ll hate going out in the storm. But if you really hold me tight, all the way home I’ll be warm. (“Let It Snow”)

Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree won't be the same, dear, if you’re not here with me. (“Blue Christmas”)

Please have snow and mistletoe and presents by the tree. (“I’ll Be Home for Christmas”)

Mistletoe hung where you can see every couple tries to stop. (“Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”)

In the meadow we can build a snowman and pretend that he is Parson Brown. He’ll say are you married, we’ll say no man. But you can do the job when you’re in town. (“Winter Wonderland”)

Okay, if you couldn’t get any of those, here is one for the rest of us. Hint: The song title is the same as the lyrics!

All I want for Christmas is you. (“All I Want for Christmas Is You”)

Do you notice a theme here? Valentine’s Day may get all the glory for being the holiday of love, but it’s pretty clear from these songs that Christmas holds a corner on the market as the season of love and romance. In fact, in the “2014 American Wedding Study” conducted by Brides magazine, researchers found that 19 percent of all engagements occur in December, making it the most popular month to get engaged. And can you guess what day is the most popular to pop the question? Statistics show that Christmas Eve is the most popular day for engagements. Sorry, Cupid, more people get engaged on Christmas Eve than on Valentine’s Day. Data released by Facebook last year showed that Christmas Eve is the most popular day to get engaged, followed by Christmas Day, New Year’s Day, and then Valentine’s Day.

And there is certainly nothing wrong with celebrating love during this season. If you get engaged this Christmas Eve, I will wholeheartedly celebrate with you. But depending on where you find yourself in regard to romantic relationships at the moment, all this love in the air can bring happiness and expectation or it can bring or even amplify loneliness and isolation. Either way, too much focus on cuddling in the cold and meeting under the mistletoe can blind us to the real love story of Christmas.

So I challenge us all not to miss the true story of love this season. This is the love story that has been written for all of us. The story of true, faithful, unending, sacrificial love. God’s love in sending Jesus is the one love that changes everything.

Love has been God’s story from the beginning. From the moment of creation, God’s love was part of the fabric of our world. God’s love was with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden both before and after sin entered the world. God showed His love by saving Noah and his family from the flood and giving them a new start. In the Old Testament God gave the commandments and law in love as a way for His people to acknowledge and atone for their sin and stay connected to Him. And His love turned the world inside out when He sent His Son to live among us—the God of the universe to be born in a stable, to die on the cross, and to rise again from the grave. It took love to disrupt and overturn the power of death and evil.

This love story is not about a feeling, though. It’s God’s story of love in action—how the God who created everything loves you and me so much that in Christ, He left behind His throne in order to be with us, as one of us, to sacrifice His life that we could be with Him. This love is the second gift of Christmas that we’ll unwrap this Advent season.

If you were with us last week, you know that we began a journey through the season of Advent by unwrapping the gift of hope. The word Advent means “coming” or “arrival,” and this season is marked by expectation, waiting, anticipation, and longing. Advent is not just an extension of Christmas, it is a season that links the past, the present, and the future. Advent offers us the opportunity to share in the ancient longing for the coming of the Messiah, to celebrate His birth, and to be alert for His second coming.

During Advent many people light candles, which represent aspects of Jesus’s coming to a world lost in darkness. As we celebrate with our own Advent candles this season, we will light an additional candle each week. Each flame brings us closer to the arrival of the true Light of the world, born in Bethlehem.

Last week we lit the candle of hope. We talked about hope past, hope present, and hope future as we looked at a few prophecies about Jesus’s coming, were challenged to place our hope in Him amid the trials of life, and were reminded of the hope still to be fulfilled when He comes again.

Today we light the candle of love. Advent is a season for remembering and rediscovering the coming of our Savior—and for gaining even greater understanding of how wide and long and high and deep His love is for us. This is the gift we unwrap today.

Have you been with kids as they unwrap gifts on Christmas? The excitement of ripping off the paper is quickly replaced by the excitement of opening up the box and actually playing with whatever toy or game is inside. I remember as a kid that one of the most frustrating things in the world was opening a gift without batteries or a gift that required adult setup. Kids want to unwrap and dive in. That’s what we are going to do today with the gift of love—dive right in. So what do we do with this gift of love?

1. Accept His Love

I’m going to guess that if I just say the reference John 3:16, many of us in the room hear the familiar verse run through our heads automatically. Just in case, it goes like this:

John 3:16 CSB

16 For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

The problem is, sometimes we are so familiar with this verse that we can recite it and look right past it, but God’s love in sending Jesus is the one love that changes everything. We know the verse so well that we can overlook it if we’re not careful. The old saying, “familiarity breeds contempt,” is an adage because it’s true: it is possible that we can become so used to something that we lose our respect for it. But we must not lose our awe of the fact that Jesus coming and living and dying was and is the ultimate gift and act of sacrificial, holy, complete, and infinite love.

The message of this verse is the core of what we believe. So it makes sense that as we unwrap the gift of love today, we should start here at the center: God loved the world. He gave His Son. But why did He give His Son? It’s because we have a problem: sin. We’ve acted in ways that declare loudly and clearly that it’s not just that we don’t love God. But according to Scripture, we are actually His enemies:

Romans 5:6–10 CSB

6 For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. 8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 How much more then, since we have now been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath. 10 For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, then how much more, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life.

Jesus died to rescue not His friends, not super good and nice people, but His enemies from death, from being separated from our loving God for all time because of our sin! He went to the cross in our place so that we could be reconciled to God because Jesus took the punishment we deserve as God’s enemies. And Jesus defeated death by rising again, so that if we are reconciled to God through His death, we also receive eternal life because He has beaten death and lives forever!

This gift is offered to us freely. And when we trust in what Jesus has done to save us—not trying to save ourselves or justifying ourselves anymore—when we give up, and accept that gift and trust in Him alone, we are given His life—salvation and eternal life, and God Himself comes to live in us and through us through His Holy Spirit in us.

So the first thing we do with the gift of God’s love is so basic that it’s easy to overlook. We accept the gift. Notice I said “basic,” not “easy.” For some of you here today, this step of accepting the gift of God’s love and believing in Jesus may be very difficult. It may be something you’ve struggled with for a long time, it may be a brand-new idea for you, or it may be a gift you’ve neglected for a while. Maybe you feel unlovable. Maybe you’ve been burned by human love too many times to trust that there’s something greater. Maybe you think, Bill, you don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t know the dark secrets and doubts and fears and pain inside. Maybe I don’t, but God does—and the love He offers sees and knows and understands. The love that God offers is Jesus Christ—and He offers His love to you in full knowledge of who you are and what you’ve done—more knowledge of that reality than you even know yourself.

No matter what challenges or hurts you hold, God’s love can handle them and heal them. Wherever you are on your journey is okay. God knows. He understands. And His response is His open arms of perfect love.

Wherever you are, I encourage you to surrender and accept the gift of God’s love. Let this season of Advent be one of accepting the love and salvation God offers in His Son.

When we belong to Christ by faith, having surrendered our lives to Christ, accepted His love for us, then Christmas takes on a whole new meaning:

2. Experience His Love

During this season of Advent, may we all also experience the love of God deeply. It’s easy to be distracted by the chaos all around us because of COVID, or to be wrapped up in all the things that need to get done in the next few weeks. It’s easy to read the headlines and wonder if love really can overcome the darkness and hatred, the tension and conflict, in our world. It’s easy to allow worry over tomorrow—or next week or next month or next year—to overwhelm us and keep us from feeling loved.

All those things matter—God does not ask you to ignore those things in order to experience His love. You don’t have to purge or rid yourself of hurry or worry, your fret or your fear. He invites you to bring them to Him, to surrender the deepest hurts and concerns of your life to Him and allow Him to fill you and renew you with His love. The apostle Peter wrote of this in 1 Peter 5:6-7:

1 Peter 5:6–7 CSB

6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the proper time, 7 casting all your cares on him, because he cares about you.

God’s love is with us through the difficult times, through the stressful and the fearful and the worrisome times. He’s with us in the pandemic. He’s with us in the unrest in the world. He’s with us in the uncertainty and discord. He wants us to come to Him with all of those things, with the faith that nothing can separate us from that love in Christ! The apostle Paul described that love we can experience:

Romans 8:38–39 CSB

38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

This is a powerful love—the most powerful love. It is love that can’t be contained or constrained by any power in the universe: not evil, not death, no person nor power.

But it’s love to be experienced. If we want to go back to our example of a kid on Christmas day, this is not a gift to accept and unwrap and then put on a shelf. It’s more like a new favorite stuffed animal to embrace and carry and hold and love till its ears wear off—or a complete set of clothes to put on and live in. And, no, these examples don’t even begin to do God’s love justice, but I hope you get the idea. God’s love, poured out on us in Jesus, isn’t supposed to be some convenient add-on to our lives, an app that we download and occasionally use, or some “set-it-and-forget-it” gadget that makes things convenient or simpler or more pleasant. No, God’s love is our lifeblood and the oxygen coursing through us to continually fill us with life. This is because if we belong to Jesus, we have died to ourselves, and now He IS our life:

Colossians 3:3–4 CSB

3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Let this season be one of embracing God’s love fully and experiencing His love in new and deep ways as we continually open our hearts and hands and minds and lives to Him. And as we experience His love, then there is a logical next step:

3. Share His Love

Have you ever been in love? If so, there’s a good chance you’ve done something loud or crazy to proclaim your love to the world. I have an advantage here in this. I can say, right now, in front of everyone here and online that I love Melanie. She’s such a blessing to me and I’m so grateful to God that He saw fit to give her to me as my wife. But not everyone has that kind of platform. So maybe you made your own “platform” to declare your love—literally shouted it out loud in public. Certainly nowadays we proclaim our love for others on Facebook or our social media platform of choice. I’m just wondering: Did anyone here propose to your wife on a Jumbotron screen? Talk about a public display, right? It’s what we humans do. It’s why we have centuries’ worth of poetry and novels and plays and songs about love. When we are in love, it shows. We almost can’t help it. Love tends to overflow.

The gift of God’s love is the same way—it’s for sharing. And, in fact, sharing this gift doesn’t leave us with less; it leaves us with more. Once we accept and experience the love of God, the next natural step is to share it, to let it overflow out and around us.

John addressed this process in our focal verse, 1 John 4:9–11:

1 John 4:9–11 CSB

9 God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his one and only Son into the world so that we might live through him. 10 Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.

God’s love comes to us and flows through us. The more we embrace and experience it, the more we share it with others. We are to love one another as a reflection, as a testimony of God’s love for us. This when we do this, when we love our brothers and sisters in Christ well, people will see that we belong to Jesus.

John 13:34–35 CSB

34 “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

And then, as people see that we belong to Jesus, then we have the opportunity to tell them and show them how the love of God has changed us, given us hope, and how that love in Christ can do the same thing in them.

What does that look like for you this season? It could mean spending quality time with family. It could mean reconnecting with a friend who has drifted away. It might mean serving neighbors or strangers or seeking out someone you suspect is lonely or hurting. It might mean forgiving someone who has hurt you or apologizing to someone you have hurt. Telling someone about the real love story of Christmas: that God love the world—loved them—so much that He gave His Son so that they might believe in Him and have eternal life. There are endless ways to allow God’s love to flow through you as you love others as He has loved you. Think of one way right now that you can share God’s love this week. Then keep your heart and eyes open to the world around you as Christmas approaches.

Closing

Let’s keep our focus on making this a season of love that reaches far deeper than the sappy carols or even the romantic statistics. Let’s revel in God’s love and be known to others by His love flowing out of us. May this be a season of accepting, experiencing, and sharing God’s gift of love in a new or deeper way.

And the place where that starts is in accepting the fact that God loves you and gave His Son for you, and surrendering your life to His Lordship. If you have never surrendered your life in faith, trusting God to save you just because He loves you, not because we earn it or deserve it, then this morning, I ask: “What’s stopping you?” Give up and trust in what Jesus has done for your salvation, receiving the love of God poured out for you in His blood on the cross, asking that He forgive you and save you this morning. And if that is where you are today, or if you have questions about salvation, please reach out to me by email, or if you’re here in the building, after we dismiss just stay in your seat and we will come and find you so that we can help you on this new journey of faith.

If you’re already a follower of Jesus, and you believe that God would have you come and be a part of this church family through formal membership, I’d ask you to reach out to me as well, either by email or by waiting in your seats if you’re here in the room as we dismiss, so I can come and find you and set up a time to sit down and get to know you and answer any questions you might have about Eastern Hills.

And as we have this time time of reflection as Donna comes, you can use this time to give online as God leads you, or if you’re in the room, you can give in person by placing your offerings in the plates on the way out of the sanctuary as we dismiss. And use this time to reflect on the love that God has shown us in Christ, and what an incredible gift that is for all of us—it’s the greatest of all love stories.

PRAY

Closing Remarks

As Joe mentioned at the beginning of service, we are taking up the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions in December and January. Our church goal is $26,000, and we are almost halfway there, having received $12,044 so far. Remember that this offering accounts for about HALF of the financial support for our IMB missionaries on the field, allowing them to continue doing the the work of sharing the Gospel that God has called them to, and we get to be a part of that through giving to this offering. Please prayerfully consider how God might have you give to this offering this year, and thanks for doing so!

If you’re following along with our church-wide reading plan, we are currently in the book of Genesis, and today’s reading is Genesis chapter 10. If you’d like a printable calendar to use for following along, you can get that from the top of the What’s Happening page on our website.

Instructions on leaving.

Benediction: “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:17–19)