Good morning, Watermark. Merry Christmas week to you. How crazy is that? Nothing says Christmas like 80 degrees yesterday, but we're here. Hey, my name is Tyler Moffett, and I serve on The Porch team, young adults, here at Watermark. I see some of you around here. You know, Christmastime is exciting. Christmas season is exciting. For my wife Jen and me, it's especially exciting because it was Christmastime when we started dating years ago.
In fact, our first picture we have together, as a couple, was at the Shane & Shane/Phil Wickham concert here at Watermark in 2017. I think we have a picture of that. Yeah, there it is. That's me and her and my little brother in the middle, who's a rocket scientist now. So, you know, there's that. And I'm up here. But it's fine. We went there. The thing is this was our third date as a couple, and it was Jen's birthday. I remember coming in and going, "Man, I really don't want to blow it."
So, I show up. We're there. For those of you who remember the concerts back in the day, they used to do something where about three fourths of the way in they'd go, "Hey, is it anybody's birthday here?" and they would sing "Happy Birthday" to that person. Well, I didn't know this was coming. So, we're up at the top. It's a great concert. Then all of a sudden they're like, "Hey, is it anybody's birthday here?" We're like, "Yeah! It's her birthday!" You know, we're losing our minds.
He goes, "What's her name?" It's like the brain chemistry in my mind just went away. I'm grasping, like, "I have no idea." It's Shane Barnard looking right in my soul, going, "What's her name?" He eventually moves on. He's like, "Well, is it anybody's birthday this week?" Some girl named Stephanie is like, "It's my birthday in two days." He's like, "Great." And they sing Stephanie "Happy Birthday." It's not even her birthday.
Then they go, "Come meet us after. We have signed merch just for you." Jen is looking at me like, "Really?" Just nailed it. Luckily, we got married, so praise God. You single guys have hope. I didn't do it again until two weeks later when I called her her twin sister's name. This thing started well.
Now, why do I tell you that? I tell you that because the Christmas season… We're all feeling it, right? There's excitement. There's a lot of distraction. The reality is in all of the things we're doing… You know, we're trying to buy the right gift, we're trying to host the right event, and we're trying to impress the right future in-laws maybe. In the midst of all that, it's so easy to forget the name. I mean, we know it. It's the Christmas season, yet we get caught up, and we just go, "Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's also about Jesus."
If you've been tracking with us in Year of the Word, we're 10 days away from doing the whole thing. We're walking through the whole Bible as a church this year. This past week, we read Hebrews, James, and 1 and 2 Peter. We're in Hebrews, chapter 2, this morning. Hebrews is a book written to Christians where the writer of Hebrews is reminding Christians of who Jesus is. In fact, I can summarize the first two chapters of Hebrews like this.
Chapter 1 is "Jesus is greater than you can comprehend." He says in Hebrews 1:3, "He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power." That's in Hebrews 1. It goes on in Hebrews to say that Jesus is far superior to the angels. If an angel showed up in this place today, we'd all be on our faces just hoping not to die. The writer of Hebrews says, "Jesus is better. He's greater." Hebrews 1 is "Jesus is greater than we can comprehend."
Hebrews 2 is "Even though he's greater, he went lower than you can imagine." It'll quote Psalm 8, where it says Jesus was made lower than the angels. Jesus is greater than we can comprehend, yet he went lower than we can imagine. This is the wonder of Christmas. In chapter 2, verse 9 (what we're going to look at in a little bit), the writer says, "But we see him…namely Jesus…" The goal for today, the goal for this season, is that we would see Jesus as he actually is and that the mind-blowing reality of the incarnation would infuse every area of our lives as we stare at him.
So, let's pray all together, and then we're going to dive into this. Would you take a minute and just pray for yourself and ask God that he would open your eyes to the beauty of Jesus? Then, would you pray for those around you that their eyes would be open to who Jesus is? Then, would you pray for me, that I would preach God's Word with boldness, conviction, and clarity?
Father, we long to see Jesus as he actually is. There's so much noise, so much distraction. It's so easy to miss the name. So, God, I pray, by the power of your Spirit, would you help us not miss it today? God, would each one of us leave more in love with you than we did even walking in here? We do love you. In Jesus' name, amen.
All right. We're going to look at three ways to see Jesus this Christmas from the book of Hebrews. So, in your Bible, look at Hebrews, chapter 2. We're going to start in verse 9.
"But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying…"
Then he quotes Psalm 22. "'I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.' And again…" And he quotes Isaiah 8. "'I will put my trust in him.' And again, 'Behold, I and the children God has given me.'"
1. Jesus got involved at great cost. Through the incarnation (which is Jesus coming as a human, God in human form as a baby) and his suffering, he stepped into our world, and he became our brother. He was always God, but when he became a human, he became our brother in flesh and blood, and he got involved in the mess that is our lives.
In 1964, a 28-year-old bartender named Kitty Genovese was walking home to her apartment and got attacked and stabbed to death right outside her apartment. It was shocking, and the nation was gripped on this horrific story. What was even more stunning was the fact that it happened right outside her apartment, and she was screaming out, and no one came down. No one even called in. No one.
When they were interviewing people later, one of the neighbors was honest, and he famously said, "I didn't say anything because I didn't want to get involved." The truth is involvement means vulnerability. If you're up in your house or your apartment, you're safe, but the second you come down, the second you call the police, you're vulnerable now.
There could be retaliation against you. You could be called in for trial. It's easier, many times, to go, "I'm just not going to get involved." Involvement always means you're giving up some of your freedom. That's why we live in a day and age when we are calloused to commitment. We're very slow to get involved because we know what that costs.
I see this in young adult ministry more than anything else. Guys who are wanting to woo their special someone, but they refuse to ask a girl on a date. Why? Because when you ask on a date, you're saying, "Of all of the girls, I'm right now, in this moment, picking you." That's too risky. It's too vulnerable. I lose too much freedom. "I just want to keep swiping left and swiping right. I want to keep my freedom."
You know, you want to live together continually outside of marriage, just kind of testing, playing house, making sure, "Is this thing going to work?" putting off standing up and promising in front of God and everyone, "You're all mine, and I'm all yours. That's it." It's just too vulnerable, too risky. I mean, even in a church our size, there are many people who will kind of test the waters of churches all the time…never really get involved, never become a member, but just, "I like this teaching, I like this worship, so I just kind of play the field when it comes to churches in DFW."
Maybe it's community where you go, "I don't really want to get involved in a Community Group because those people are messy, and they require a lot of work." Not you, but they do. Right? "So I'm not going to get involved." Yet, what is Christmas? Christmas is the reality that Jesus got involved. Jesus heard the screams. Jesus heard the cry, and he didn't just call in; he came down. Look at Hebrews 2:11. It says, "That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers…"
He looked down at you and me, and he didn't just see a person; he saw his brother, his sister, and said, "That's family, and I'm going to them." Christmas is the declaration that God got involved. Look at what Tim Keller says. He essentially says, "Christmas means God came down. He became vulnerable. Jesus Christ came down, not just at the risk of his life; he came down at the cost of his life, and it made him vulnerable, and it made him killable." This is Jesus.
If you think about it, his involvement really did come at a great cost. I was just writing down the reminder of the gospel story, that Jesus was born as a vulnerable baby. God as a baby! He was born into a poor family, lived as a refugee in Egypt, was tempted by Satan, was despised and rejected. The Pharisees tried to kill him multiple times. He was betrayed by someone he invested in for three years. All of his friends left him in his moment of need. He was mocked and spit on.
Think about that. The one who's holding everything together, the molecules of the saliva in their mouths… They're spitting on God. Then they tie him to a post, and 39 times they whip him with the cat o' nine tails whip, pulling out his flesh. He's crucified on a Roman cross, and then he bears all the weight of the wrath of God on himself.
This is what separates Christianity from every other religion in the world…every other religion. God does not just look down from heaven at our suffering and give us advice. He doesn't just look down and call in someone to support. He takes on flesh and says, "I'm getting in the mess with them." As you watch Jesus' life, what is he doing? He's going to the lepers and touching them. He's going out to the demon-possessed man no one wanted anything to do with and interacting with him, and he's casting that out.
He's going to the house of the tax collector and the prostitute and eating with them. He's going to the forgotten, the lost, and the scorned, and Jesus says, "That's where I belong." That's where God, taking on human flesh… "I'm setting my face to walk there. Not as a dignitary. Not as all of you guys bow down because I'm coming through. I'm going to the broken. I'm going to the lost."
Luke 19:10 says, "The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost." For some of you, maybe you walked in here, and you feel a little too far gone. Like, you're here with family. You're visiting them. It has been a while since you've been in church. You go, "Man, I'm a little too far out there." I would just say, based on the authority of the Bible, you can't go too far. If you feel like you're too far, look around. Jesus is there. He's there. That's what Christmas is about.
So, the first thing we see is that Jesus got involved at great cost. Let's keep reading. Let's look down in verse 14. "Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery."
2. Jesus waged war on the Devil and fear. It says he partook in flesh and blood. He got involved that (purpose clause…for the purpose) through his death he might destroy the Devil. Now, if you understand the story of the Bible, this is a huge, climactic moment in the story of God's redemption.
This past week, our residents and fellows over at the Watermark Institute gave what's called a stand and deliver, where they stood up and, pretty straightforward, delivered a 25-minute message in front of a group of people over the story of the Old Testament. As I was sitting in these, I was just reminded of what the Bible is really about.
See, when I was growing up, I kind of assumed the Bible was like the owner's manual for your life. Like, you just open it and do this and don't do this. If you want to have a good life, then here's what you do. Or the Bible is like God's love letter to you, like, all of the things he says is true about you, and you just read it and get a little comforting advice and move on. Or it's Aesop's Fables with some virtuous children's tales.
Or it's the B-I-B-L-E, "Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth." Clever and sort of true, but not the fullness of what the Bible is. The Bible is a story that starts with "In the beginning" and ends with "Forever and ever, amen." Then it has a crazy, wild plot that's more like The Lord of the Rings than a Hallmark movie. It's very complicated and weird. You open it up, and there are all kinds of things.
What's God doing? What is God doing through the Bible? He's making right what went wrong with Adam and Eve. Remember, when they eat the fruit, and they're separated from God and hiding from him, God comes. In Genesis 3:15, he's cursing the snake, and he says something interesting. He says, "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel."
That's on the third page of the Bible. Then you have hundreds and hundreds of pages of the Old Testament waiting. Where is this snake crusher going to come? Where is the Serpent crusher? Finally, the book of Hebrews says, "He came." Through his death, through getting bitten on the heel, he crushed the head of the snake. It's what the whole Bible has been pointing to. Christmas is a declaration of war on the snake.
I'm curious. How often do you think about the war? How often do you think about the snake? Many of us live as though Satan is not even real. We're agnostic to this reality of who Satan is, yet he's working evil throughout the world. I'm rereading a book right now called The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. Many of you have read it. If you don't know about The Screwtape Letters, it's a satirical conversation from an older demon, Screwtape, to a younger demon, Wormwood, describing how to tempt human beings. It's fascinating.
At the very beginning, Lewis writes this intro about demons and the Devil. He says, "There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight."
The reality is Satan is real. He hates you, he hates your family, he hates God, and he's working evil throughout the world. Yet, because of Christmas, because of what Jesus did, he's on a leash and his time is short. Revelation 12:12 says he's wreaking havoc on the earth because he knows his time is short. That's true because of Christmas.
Yet that's not the end of the story. Let's keep reading and look at Hebrews 2, the second half of verse 14. We read it. Let's look at it again. It says, "…that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery." I've been camping on that last phrase: "…subject to lifelong slavery." I'm curious if some of you in here would say "subject to lifelong slavery" feels a lot like your life the past few years.
I mean, I think back to my story. When I was a little guy, I was subject to fear, walking around in anxiety and shyness. I was held back in my grade growing up because my parents tried to get me to go to kindergarten, and I was so terrified. They were like, "This guy needs some more growth." I mean, the fact that I'm on a stage here is wild. God looked at me and said, "I have a different story for you, man. Different."
Now…it's interesting…I have a 4-year-old son named Ty, my junior, who battles fear and anxiety. Sometimes at night he'll have these nightmares, and we'll just hear him screaming in the other room. We run in, and he's just terrified, and we hold him. He's inconsolable. Finally, when he kind of dies down, we just look at him, like, "Buddy, because of Jesus, when you are afraid, God is with you. When you're afraid, God is with you."
A few months ago, we had one of those storms we have in Dallas, and lightning and thunder shook the house. I hear my 6-year-old daughter scream, come running into our room, and get in our bed. I'm like, "Oh boy. Let's go check on Ty." I walk in there, and I see him. He has the covers up to here. His eyes… I can see him like this. I go, "Hey, buddy. How are you doing?" He's just wide-eyed. He's like, "I am not scared because God is with me." I'm like, "Come on! That's right, man." Whether he believed it, he was saying it.
The truth is here's the reality. That's 4-year-olds and storms, but some of you have laid at night this past week with your eyes wide open, afraid of something going on in your life. You know what's coming this week. Everybody is excited about Christmas, but what that means with your family that you have to go back to… You're scared. You're not supposed to be single still. "It's another Christmas, and I have nobody." "We're about to cross another calendar year, and I'm still addicted to that thing." That fear creeps in again.
You'd better have something in that moment to be able to fight the attack of the Enemy with. Otherwise you're toast. Do you have some truth you can say back to Satan, like Romans 8:38-39? "No, Satan. For I am sure, I am confident, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor power, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus my Lord. I know it. I know it's true." Would you be able to say that?
There's a confidence we can have in the midst of fear and in the midst of Satan's attack that God will hold those who are his because of Christmas. This reminds me of a story that happened a few years ago with my sister. I'm the oldest of five kids. I have me and two brothers (the tall guy) and then twin sisters at the end. My sister Summer lives in Nashville. She and a friend were going to their car in a well-lit parking lot at night, making their way there. All of a sudden, two masked men with guns came and started robbing them.
Some of you have been in that situation, but many of us haven't. You can imagine the fear. They said, "Drop your phones and your wallets on the ground." So they start to do it. They're afraid. All of a sudden, my sister, almost out of instinct… She's terrified, but out of instinct she just says the name of Jesus. "Jesus. O Jesus, Jesus, please help us. O God, we're focused on you. We trust you, Jesus." She's just saying it louder and louder.
One of the guys takes the gun right at her head and says, "Stop saying the name of Jesus!" She just gets louder, like, "Jesus, Jesus, we just ask you. We need your help, Jesus." She said the other guy… She's watching the eyes of the other guy just look right at her, and then he drops her phone and drops her wallet, and he says, "Come on," and they run away. She said in that moment, she was so scared, but she said, "Tyler, I felt a power in that moment from that name."
Some of you are going through whatever darkness it is. Maybe you've been in a situation like that, or it feels like it. You need to know, because of Christmas, there's a name. There's a power. There's power over fear and over death. I mean, this is "In Christ Alone," the hymn we sing. The last verse is:
No guilt in life, no fear in death;
This is the power of Christ in me.
From life's first cry to final breath,
Jesus commands my destiny.
No power of hell, no scheme of man
Can ever pluck me from his hand;
till he returns or calls me home,
Here in the power of Christ I stand.
We can say that because of what Jesus did 2,000 years ago. All right. What do we need to see this Christmas? First, Jesus got involved at great cost. He waged war on the Devil and fear. Lastly, look at verse 16.
"For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted."
3. Jesus became our help in struggle. I want you to think. What is Jesus doing right now? My kids asked me that the other day. I honestly had to think. "What is he doing right now?" Romans chapter 8 says Christ died and after that was raised and is now seated at the right hand of God and is interceding for us. That's what he's doing in heaven 24/7 right now. Hebrews, chapter 2, tells us the roles he's playing before the Father right now in heaven. There are actually three roles Jesus is playing.
The first is that he's our high priest. What does a priest do? A priest gets you into the presence of God and the presence of God in you. That's what a priest did in the Old Testament. Think about this. Jesus is at the right hand of the Father, and he's looking at us, going, "Come on. Come on. Come up to this throne. Come up to this presence." The only problem is we're covered with sin, and you cannot get into the presence of God with sin or you die.
So, the second role he plays is that of propitiation. He's our priest and our propitiation, which is a word we don't use much anymore, but it means a payment that satisfies. Jesus is saying, "Come up to this throne. Come be in the presence of God," and then he's our propitiation. He's the payment for our sin on our behalf such that we're covered by the blood of Jesus, and we can walk into that throne with confidence because of his blood.
I think the craziest is the third role, which is present help. He's our priest, our propitiation, and our present help. He understands temptation. He's not just waiting up there going, "Come on. You fix yourself up and then get up here and party." He's like, "I'm going down. I experienced everything you experience, and I'm with you in it." Look at verse 18 again. "For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help…" Not helped…help. Present help. "…those who are being tempted."
Just think. How intimate is that? Temptation is often the place where we feel most far from God, yet Jesus says, "No, that's the place where I go, where I meet you most intimately." We like to think of God, at times, kind of like a principal in a corner, watching us, that we're the middle school kid screwing around, and he's like, "Don't. Don't do that. I will expel you if you do that." Yet what we see here is not the image of a stern principal; we see the image of an empathetic brother who's in the midst of the trial with you.
That means he's in it with you in traffic on 635 when that person cuts you off and there are all kinds of things you want to do in that moment. Jesus is not in heaven going, "Don't. Not that finger. No!" What is he doing? He's in it with you, going, "I know the feeling of having my chariot…" No, not that. "I know the feeling of being mistreated. Don't do it."
He understands what's coming when you're going to your in-laws' house and politics get brought up. He's not going "Don't." He's in it, going, "I understand." He is sitting with you in that hotel room when you're all alone and you think no one is watching. He's not stern as a principal; he's with you as a brother, going, "It's worth it. I know what it's like to be tempted. It's worth it."
He's with you at the bar. He's with you on your phone or in the argument or at home when your kids are on your last nerve and you're about to blow up on them. He knows when your marriage is on the rocks and it's done. When you're about to look at that image on the screen or when you're in that conversation and there's that juicy bit of information you know you shouldn't say, but it's going to make you look so good and them so bad, he's sitting with you.
God is not merely a judge out to get you. He is a judge who cannot overlook sin. God is a judge, yet there's Jesus sitting with you, going, "I paid the penalty for that sin, and I'm with you in the midst of the fight. Don't do it. Don't give up. Keep fighting. Keep pressing on." I wonder if some of you in life right now are… I don't know. In a room this size, some of you are in the midst of temptation right now.
Some of you are having an affair on your spouse right now. You have that text message waiting. I'm telling you, on the authority of God's Word, what is Christmas about? It's not just a cheesy little nativity scene. That's beautiful, but it's messy. It gets in the midst of your tempting situation and goes, "I'm with you. You can fight this. You can do it. You can do the right thing. I paid the penalty for you. Now I'm with you in the midst of the fight."
The addiction you're going through… This can be it. In 2025, this thing ends. It ends. Your marriage… You came in here just to check a religious box, but "This thing is done." No, it's not. It's not done. The power of the incarnation is that Jesus didn't just pay a penalty and shoot back up to heaven. He's now with us in the midst of our struggle, our temptation, and our trial.
I just want to land the plane with this story. I've told this to our young adults. As I speak places, I tell this story. I haven't told it to you. As I think about this, I can't help but tell this story. I can't help it. A few years ago, I was living down in Houston, and I got invited to go to a maximum-security prison…to visit, not to be in it. I pushed back a little bit. This guy was just hounding me, like, "Come on. Come on. You've got to go. You've got to go."
It was an hour away, and it was a full day away from my family, but I was like, "I'm a pastor. I probably should go love on the prisoners." So, sure enough, I go one Saturday. I pull up, and I leave all the stuff in the car. They do a pretty thorough search of me. I walk in, and it's everything I thought it was going to be…dark, nasty, just evil.
I walked through the prison, turned to the left into their chapel, opened the door, and it was different. Like, I literally opened the door, and there were Christmas lights (almost like this), Christmas trees, and men in white jumpsuits with Santa hats. They were like, "Hey! Welcome." I was like, "Wow! This is not what I was expecting."
I walk in, and I just start to hear their stories. They're the most honest people I've ever met. They're like, "My name is Jim, and here's what I did, an evil, heinous thing, yet Jesus saved me, bro, and I'm different." I'm like, "Wow!" I hear all of these stories. After every story, they say the same thing. They go, "Yeah, man. My story is crazy, but you've got to hear John's story." Then another guy, crazy story, and he goes, "Yeah, but before you leave, you've got to hear John's story."
Eventually, I'm like, "Where's John?" He's behind the sound booth, running slides for chapel. So I go up to him. I'm like, "Hey, you're John? I heard I'm supposed to hear your story." He's like, "All right. Come sit down." We go sit down. He goes, "Yeah, man. When I was 21 years old, I did something I regretted, and I landed a life sentence in this place."
He said, "A few years in, someone shared the gospel with me, and I gave my life to Jesus. Bro, I'm changed. I'm changed." I'm like, "Right on." He's like, "From that moment on, I lived for two things. I lived to glorify Jesus in this prison, and I lived for my little son who I got to see about once a month in visitation. I just loved that boy. He was my outlet to the world out there. I'd just share Jesus with him and talk with him."
Fast-forward 18 years later, and his son gets murdered by someone else. Obviously, he's heartbroken. He just can't believe it. Yet he's a Christian, so he's facing all of these battles. Fast-forward a few years. In the midst of COVID, the man who killed John's son ends up in his prison, and not only in his prison but in his cellblock. That guy has no idea who he is, but he knows exactly who this guy is.
All of the other prisoners in the cellblock know who this guy is, and they're like, "Bro, we'll get you guys alone. You can kill him." He's a Christian, so he's battling, like, "O God, everything in me wants to kill this guy." Eventually, they move him in, and John goes up to this guy and starts interrogating him, asking him questions. Finally, this guy looks to John. He goes, "Bro, who are you?" John says, "My name is John, and the guy you murdered is my son."
This scrawny, tatted-up guy just runs to the corner. He's like, "Bro, I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'll try to get transferred out." John goes, "Me and you…we're going to talk tomorrow," and then he leaves. He said he goes to his room, his cell, and he gets on his face before God and just starts crying out to God. "God, everything in me wants to kill him. I need your help. I don't know what to do."
He said in the midst of that moment… He was like, "It's hard to explain, but it's like God met me in a maximum-security prison right there in the midst of the struggle. It's like he put his arm around me. 'John, remember where you were 18 years ago. Remember the hell I rescued you from. This man is not someone to be killed; he's someone like you who needs to be loved.'"
All of a sudden, he picked himself up and started walking over to that cellblock. He got together with this man and said, "Hey, I'm not going to kill you, but I'm going to tell you about someone who changed my life." He told him about Jesus. He came back the next day and told him about Jesus. A few months in, this guy, a hardened criminal, gives his life to Jesus. Not only that. John spends the next two years discipling this man, teaching him the Bible.
After that, that man got transferred to another prison. John said he wept like he was losing his own son when that man left. How do you get that way? I remember John telling me this. He's crying at this point. I'm crying. There are guys in the back. They're crying. They've heard this story before, but there's just something holy about being in the moment of struggle, the moment where you want to give up, the moment that seems overwhelming, and the reality of the incarnation infusing that moment to give you the power in the moment you need it.
Some of you give up way too quickly. The beauty of Christmas is God stepped in 2,000 years ago and right now. Whatever you're dealing with, he's there. Christmas is not tame, and it's not trite. Christmas is less of a Hallmark movie and more Saving Private Ryan. Think about it. A rescue mission to save something that doesn't feel very worth it at great cost to himself.
I love what C.S. Lewis says. He says, "Christianity is the story of how the rightful king has landed, you might say landed in disguise, and is calling us to take part in a great campaign of sabotage." That's Christmas. So, wherever you're at this morning, whatever you came in here with, the beauty of Christmas is God already knows. He's not surprised, and he wants to meet you right in the midst of that. Let's pray together.
Father, I just feel that there are some here today who have played the religious game. They've done the church thing. They're here with family members or whoever, yet maybe, just maybe, they have never met the Jesus we just looked at today. God, you know exactly who they are, and I believe, for some, today is the day of salvation. No more playing games. No more messing around. It's time to connect with the one my soul was created for to bring glory and honor, to find peace and hope and health and rest and love in you instead of trying to find it from everything else, broken cisterns that keep running dry.
Lord, I just pray for whoever that is in this space, God, that right now, moment of salvation, they would say, "Jesus, I am broken, and I need you. Lord, I can't earn my way to you, yet you came down to me. I invite the fullness of your lordship, your presence, into my life. Come and make me new."
Lord, I know in a room this size there are people who are battling addiction, darkness, panic attacks, anxiety, struggle, marriage, or a wayward child. Lord, I just pray for each one. O God, please, that the power of your presence would invade that darkness and that this Christmas would not just be another calendar year to get through but it would be a moment of invitation. We invite you into the darkness. O God, do again what you've done in the past. Take the very thing the Enemy meant for evil, and would you mean it for good. You are trustworthy, and you are good. We love you. It's in Jesus' name, amen.
