Sermons tagged with Worship

I see the evidence of your goodness all over my life, all over my life. I see promises in fulfillment. All over my life. All over my life. Help me remember when I'm weak. Fear may come, but fear will lead. You lead my heart to victory. You are my strength, and you always will be. I see the evidence of your goodness all over my life. All over my life. I see your promises and fulfillment all over my life, all over my life. See the cross, the empty grave, the evidence of your goodness. Jesus. I see your promises in fulfillment all over my life, all over my life, yeah. I see your promises and fulfillment all over my life. Yeah, you're all around us. So why should I fear? The evidence is here. Why should I fear? Oh, the evidence is here. I searched the world, but it couldn't fill me. Melted deep rays, treasures of fame were never enough. Then you came along and put me back together. And every desire is now satisfied here in your love. Oh, there's nothing better than you. There's nothing better than you. Oh, there's nothing, nothing is better than you. Come on, tell them. To show you my weakness My failures and flaws Lord, you've seen them all And you still call me friend Cause the God of the mountains Is the God of the valleys There's not a place Your mercy and grace won't find me again. Oh Come on. Tell them now. Come on, choir. Oh, there's nothing better than you. Nothing. You turn bones into armies. You turn seas into highways. You're the only one who can. Somebody give a praise in this house. I don't think we're finished yet. Come on. Come on, one more can. You're the only one who can. You're the only one who can. Jesus, you're the only one. Come on, give Him one more shout of praise. When all I see is the battle, you see my victory. When all I see is the mountain, you see a mountain moon. And as I walk through the shadow, your love surrounds me. There's nothing to fear now, for I am safe with you. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees, with my head lifted high. Oh God, the battle belongs for you. Thank you, God. God, you see the end to tell. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees. With my head lifted high. Oh God, the battle belongs to you. And every fear I lay at your feet. I'll sing through the night. Oh God, the power of our God. You shine in the shadow. You win every battle. Nothing can stand against the power of our God. In all mighty fortunes, you go before us. Nothing can stand against the power of our God We wanted to let you know that our mission here at Grace is to connect people to Jesus and to connect people to people. One of the best ways to communicate with us here at Grace is through our connection cards. If you would like to speak to a pastor at Grace, if you have any prayer requests for our prayer team and our elders, or if you're not receiving our Grace Vine weekly emails, this would be a great way to fill it out and let us know. If you're watching with us online, you can click the link below and submit the connection card there. Or if you're here with us at Grace, the connection card is in the seat back pocket in front of you. Just be sure to drop it on your way out in the box next to the doors. Thanks so much for joining us this morning and we hope that this service is a blessing to you. Well, good morning, everyone. It's great to have you here at Grace Raleigh. I'd like to ask you to stand. My name is Steve Goldberg. I'm the worship pastor here at Grace, and it's great having people here in the room. It's great having people at home joining in with us. I thought that this morning we could start off with the scripture of John 3.16, that God so loved the world that he sent his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life, come to the well that never runs dry. Drink of the water, come and thirst no more. Come all you sinners Come find his mercy Come to the table He will satisfy Taste of his goodness Find what you're looking for. For God so loved the world that He gave us. His one and only Son to save us. Whoever believes in Him will live forever. bring all your failures bring your addictions come lay them down at the foot of the cross Jesus is waiting there with hope in our hearts For God so loved the world praise god praise god from whom all blessings Praise Him, praise Him For the wonders of His love For God so loved the world that He gave us His one and only Son to save The power of hell forever defeated Now it is well, I'm walking in freedom Oh God so loved, God so loved the world Bring all your failures, bring your addictions. Come lay them down at the foot of the cross. Jesus is waiting. God so loved the world. Amen. God sent his son. They called him Jesus. He came to love, heal, and forgive. He lived and died. To buy my pardon. An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives. Because He lives, I can face tomorrow. he lives all fear is gone because i know he holds the future And life is worth the living Just because He lives And then one day I'll cross that river I'll fight my spine No war with me And then as death Gives way to victory I'll see the lights of glory and I'll know He lives. Because He lives, I can face tomorrow Because He lives All fear is gone Because I know He holds the future And life is worth the living Just because He lives. And life is worth the living just because He lives. Amen. Amen. All right, y'all can have a seat for a moment. Good morning, Grace Raleigh. It is fabulous to see your smiling faces in here. And welcome to those of you that have joined us online. It is a beautiful and sunny Sunday morning, Welcome to the world for this beautiful sunny weather because in two weeks, the mission committee will be here to gather all of the goodies that you choose to bring. So if you go to Grace Raleigh's events page, you will find a list of things that the mission committee is looking for for the Interfaith Food Shuttle. You will buy those. And then on either that Friday or either that, I'm sorry, that Saturday or that Sunday, you can drive through. The hours are listed on the screen. You can drive through. They will come out to your car. They will pick it up. They will bring it inside, and they will take care of it. So all you have to do is go to the grocery. And I guess these days you could even have it delivered to your house. So that is fabulous. And speaking of driving by and dropping off, if you are the parent of a 6th grader through 12th grader, today is the day you get to drive by and push them out of the car. Woo-hoo! We are so excited to announce that Grace Students is back up and running live and in person. Kyle will be here tonight in all of his fun. And we have the cool thing happening too that he's live streaming the service. So if for some reason your 6th through 12th grader can't be in the building tonight, no problem. Email Kyle, kyle at graceralee.org. And he has all the information and the links that you need to be able to be attached to the live stream and join in that way. They're now going to start into a routine of being in person one week, meeting online together the next week in person, and you get the idea. But email Kyle for any information that you guys might need. So thank you again for coming, for being a part of Grace Raleigh thisbbling together another meal just to check that off the list. Have you ever wondered if you have the balance right? Have we worked hard enough? Have we played enough? What will our children remember about us? Have you ever wondered if you've done it right? Is it possible to even really know that? Did we give our passions and energies to the right causes? Have we given ourselves to the things that matter the most? Or in the end, is it all just favor? Well, good morning. It's good to see everybody here. This is as full as the church has been since last February. That's crazy. Man, you guys, apparently, we've been going through Ecclesiastes. Y'all love depression and hopelessness. So thanks for showing up to that. You're like, I got to get out of the house now. Maybe that's what I needed to do the whole time, which is make you really, really sad. So you had to come see people. This is great. If you're still joining us at home, we're so grateful for that. This is the third part in our series called Vapor, where we're moving through the book of Ecclesiastes. We've said the whole time that we've saved the dreariest book of the Bible for the dreariest month of the year. And what's really fun is that this is the joyful sermon. This is the one, this is the good news. This is the one where we celebrate. We only did two songs up front because we want to end praising God together, and he gave us sunshine to do this. So it seems that the weather is matching the rhythm of the series, and I think that that's fantastic. In the first week, we started out and we talked about this idea of a hevel or vapor or smoke, and we concluded that Solomon would argue that a vast majority of Americans are wasting their life, right? Which means a vast majority of us are probably investing our life pursuing things that ultimately we can't grab onto or vapor or smoke. They're here one day and they're gone the next. And so that really left us with this question at the end of that week, is there a worthwhile investment of our lives? And if you have notes, you see that at the top of your notes. I think that's been a question that's been lingering in the series. Is there really a worthwhile investment of my life or is it all just a waste of time? Is everyone here just, we're all just chasing vapor? And I think that there's a good answer to that question, but last week we answered it a little bit, but we stumbled into another harsh reality. The harsh reality that even if we pursue wisdom with our life, even if we're obedient, the godliest of the godly, that does not insulate us from pain. Our godliness doesn't protect us from grief, right? And so what we learned by looking at that beautiful passage in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, there's a time for mourning and there's a time for joy. There's a time for grieving and there's a time for healing and there's a time to be hurt. There's a time to live and there's a time to die. Like we saw that passage. And what we learned is that pain is not punitive. God's not tightening the screws on us to punish us. Pain is the result of a fallen world, right? And that the harsh reality that Solomon gives us in Ecclesiastes is that no matter what we do, we're going to hurt. No matter how godly we are, there will be seasons of mourning in our life. And so that leaves us, I think, with another really difficult question. Can I ever hope for true happiness? Can I ever, on this side of eternity, grasp onto something that isn't Hevel or vapor or smoke? Can I grasp onto a joy that is immutable and unchangeable, that is resistant to circumstances in life, that even as the storms come, I can still find myself in seasons of joyfulness and contentment? Is it even possible to do those things? And I think those are the two big questions that we bring into this week. Is it possible to pursue anything that really matters? And is it possible to grab onto anything that looks like actual true contentment and joy? And the answer to those questions, I think, is yes. And Solomon answers those questions multiple times in Ecclesiastes. I think in four separate passages, he addresses those with the exact same answer. Four different times, he gives this answer, and I love this answer. I think there's so much bound up in his choice to answer the questions in this way. But like I said, he says it in four separate times. I'm going to read you two of them so that you can get a sense. They're in your notes. If you have them, they'll be on the screen if you're following along at home. But here's what he writes in Ecclesiastes, Solomon repeats this idea. That at the end of the day, what's left for us to do is enjoy our toil, enjoy our food and drink, and honor our God. The end of the book, he ends. The end of the matter is this, all has been heard, fear God and keep his commandments. This is the whole duty of man. We talked about that last week. And it's important that as we look through what I think is kind of this formula for contentment, that we understand that when he's talking about eating and drinking, when we see eating and drinking in the Bible, that is almost always a reference to a communal activity. Eating and drinking is inherently communal. The Bible rarely talks about eating for sustenance, right? It rarely talks about food as this way to be healthy. It always talks about food and bread and gathering around a table as a form of community. And so when he says that there's nothing for man to do except to find joy in what he does and to eat and to drink. What he means is when we look around the table, when we have our meals, if we love the people who are around us, that's good. That's a gift from God. We go out to eat, we're eating with our friends, and we look around and we have genuine affection, we enjoy these people. That's a gift from God. When you look around your table and you have family there and you love that family. Now listen, we're all parts of families. We know that love isn't just sing song and fairy tales all the time. Sometimes it's hard, but at the end of the day, if you know that I love you and you love me, then that's a gift from God. And so when he's talking about food and drink, he's really referencing community. And then when he talks about toil, enjoying your toil, I have a men's group that meets on Tuesday mornings at 6.30. Anybody can join us if you want to. Just email me. Well, the more the merrier there. And we were talking about this word toil. And to a room full of men, it means career, right? It means work. It means what's your job? But Solomon uses that word a lot more broadly than that in Ecclesiastes. And the word toil really doesn't refer to your job or your career as much as it refers to the activities that you have set aside for that day, the productivity of that day, whatever it is you're going to do. Because we have some men in the group who are retired. If it's only about work, career, then they have no shot at happiness, right? They better get back to it. But really, it's broader than that. It really means, Toyo, what do you have set for yourself today? What productivity are you going to engage in today? And then in this verse, he says that we should do good. And he defines doing good as honoring God with our life, fearing God and keeping his commandments. And it's with these understandings that I kind of arrive at this conclusion of kind of Solomon's equation for contented joy and apex happiness. And I really do think it's this. People you love plus tasks you enjoy plus honoring God equals apex happiness. Listen to me. If when you eat, if as you move through your day, you look around and the people in your life bring you joy, and when you wake up, you're looking forward to the things that you're going to do in that day. Maybe not everything, but the point of the day brings you joy. And you're honoring God with your life. If those things are true of you, then I want you to know this morning, you are apex happy. It doesn't get better than that. Sometimes our problem is just that we can't see it. But I'm telling you, man, if you wake up every day and you get to have breakfast with your family or you go out to lunch with some people at work that you enjoy or you look forward to seeing some friends at small group or something like that, if you look around at your community and you're surrounded by people you love and you look at your days and God has given you something to put your hand to that you enjoy, that gives you a sense of purpose, that helps you become who he's created you to be and use your gifts and abilities to point people to Jesus as you move throughout your days, if that's what you get to do and you're honoring God as you do those things, then listen to me, you are experiencing apex happiness in your life. And I think that we get it so messed up sometimes. We do all the things that Solomon talked about in the first two chapters, and we chase all the things. We run out there and we chase all the success and all the relationships and all the money and all the fulfillment and all the pleasure and all the stuff that's out there. When really what's true is God has already given us everything we need for joy. God has already provided in our lives everything we need for joy. And listen, if you don't have those things, if you look around, you're like, I don't like any of the people in my life right now. If you don't have a fulfillment in your job, if you're not honoring God with your life, then guess what? Those things are attainable. Those things aren't out there and forever away. Those things are attainable. They're right around you. God gives us everything we need for joy within our reach. That's why I brought this chair today. This chair here is my chair from my house. This is my chair in my living room. This chair sits in the corner of our living room, and opposite me is we have a little sectional couch. There's other people who sit in this chair sometimes, but for the most part, it's me. When I sit in this chair, I get to watch dance recitals. I get to watch Lily come in with her friends, and they sing Elsa to me. And I pretend to care about Elsa. I get to watch dumb little magic tricks. We went to some restaurant and they gave her some pot with a magnet on the bottom and there's a plant that comes out of the wand and she comes in and she does the abracadabra, the whatever, and then she pulls it out and for the 37th time, I'm amazed by this magic trick, right? I sit in this chair and Jen sits on the couch and we talk about our days. We talk about what's hard and we talk about what's fun. From this chair, when someone rings the doorbell, if I angle my head just right, I can see down the hallway to the front door and I can see the little face that's there to come play with Lily. If they're all over, I can look this way out the window and I can look at them all, all the neighborhood kids jumping on the trampoline that we got to get for her. In the mornings when I'm doing life right and I'm downstairs reading like I'm supposed to, at about 6.45, 7 o'clock, I can look up the stairs and see Lily up there and motion her down to come sit in my lap and tell me what she's going to do that day. When we have friends over, which I love to do, eventually we end up in our living room and we sit around and we talk and we giggle and we laugh. In the pandemic, I worked from this chair. I set up a little table right here and I do my Zoom calls and I argue with the elders and that's pure joy except for Chris Lata. I love working from that table. I can see all the things that bring me the most joy from this chair. And if I go out there chasing joy, if I go out there trying to track everything down, what am I going to do? Buy a new house for this chair These are from old David. If this church grows to 2,000 people and I get to feel what that feels like, do my conversations with my family and friends get any better from sitting in this chair? No, man. This is it. And sometimes it's not the chair, right? Sometimes it's the kitchen. Sometimes it's when I get to cook dinner and Jen sits on the stool and we talk about our days. Sometimes it's the mornings when Ruby and Lily are on the bed and I'm in the chair in the corner of that room and we're all talking, just enjoying our times. But here's what I know. I can go out there chasing whatever I want to chase. But my times of most profound joy come when I'm right there. They come when I'm around the people that I love the most. They come when I'm soaking in the blessings that God has given me. And this is what we need to pay attention to. Solomon tells us these are God's gifts to us. If people in your life that you love, who love you, they're God's gift to you. Drink them in. Hug them more. Tell them more that you care about them. Tell them more that you're grateful for them. Tell them more that they are a gift from God in your life. You have a thing to do every day that you like to put your hand to, whether it's raising kids or volunteering somewhere or spending time in your neighborhood or going to work or looking forward to seeing your friends or whatever it is. You have things that God has given you that make you productive, that let you feel like you are living out His intended will for you? That's His gift for you. That work, that toil, that's His gift. It's designed for you. And then if we honor God, His invitation to honor Him is His gift to us because He knows that when we live a life honoring Him, we live a life of fewer regrets. We live a life of deeper gratitude. We live a life with a deeper desire for Jesus if we'll just revel in his gifts. This helps me make sense of the Honduran children I saw at one time. For years of my life, I would go down to Honduras with some regularity to take teams down to visit a pastor named Israel Gonzalez. Israel is one of my heroes. The things that he's done for the kingdom are unbelievable. And he is based in a city in central Honduras called, called, uh, Swatopeke. He and his wife have set up a free clinic there. He has a church there. And then from that church, what they do is they organize these goodwill parties and they bring teams down and you get together hot dogs and little tchotchke gifts and you go up into the hillsides. There's mountains surrounding Ciguatapeque and you go up into the mountainside and you go to these villages and he throws these goodwill parties and he hopes that by doing this, these villages that are deeply Catholic, but Catholic in such a way that shuts them off to faith rather than turns them on to faith. And so they're lost communities. And he goes and he throws these parties, and by throwing these goodwill parties, they invite him into the community to plant a church. He's planted 14 churches that way, last I checked. And I would go on these parties. And you go up into these mountains surrounding Suwatopec into a village. And that's not derogatory. It's literally a village. Homes are built of mud and wood, makeshift roofs, one or two rooms, literally dirt poor. I've had the opportunity in my life to be in a fair amount of other countries and to see poverty on multiple continents. Honduras is just about the worst. But yet when we would go there, we would get out and there would always be these children there. And these children would have the biggest, goofiest grins on their face ever. They were so joyful, and they would laugh, and they would play, and they were happy to see you, and it never got wiped off of their face. And I always wondered, kid, how can you be so happy? Don't you know you don't have a Barbie house? Don't you know you don't have a PlayStation? Don't you know your soccer ball stinks? Those kids had it figured out, man. They had people around them who loved them. They had things to do each day that they looked forward to. And they hadn't lived enough life to carry the weight of what it is to not honor God with our choices. They were walking in apex happiness. And I carry all my American wealth down there and privilege, and I look at them and I'm jealous. Because they figured out something that we haven't. And I just think that there is this profound truth that everything that we need is right there within our grasp. We don't have to run around out there chasing vapor and Hevel. God has given us these gifts already. And in that truth, in that truth that everything we need for joy is within our grasp? We answer those two questions we started with. Is there a pursuit that's actually worth investing my life in? Yes. The people you love, the tasks that give you purpose, and honoring God. You want to live a life that matters? You want to get to the end of it and wonder if it's all vapor? Or not have to wonder that? Then invest your life in the people that you love and the tasks that God has ordained for you. Ephesians 2 says that we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus, that we should do good works, that we should walk in them. Walk in those good works that God intended you for and honor God with the choices that you make. Those are worthwhile pursuits. You will get to the end of your life if you pursue those things and know that it was a life well lived. And he actually doubles down on this idea of pursuing relationships with other people. I don't have a lot of time to spend here on it, but again, this is a passage that I can't just skip over as we go through the book of Ecclesiastes. He doubles down on this idea of having more folks in our life when he writes this has not another to lift him up. Again, if two lie together, they keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken. Solomon doesn't take a lot of time to tell you to invest in a lot of things in Ecclesiastes. If you've been reading along with us, he doesn't tell you to do a lot of stuff there. He just kind of tells you, hey, this stuff's a waste of time. You should honor God. And then he tells you how we got to that conclusion. But here he stops and makes sure you understand the value of having people in your life who love you, who you love in return. And he sets up life as this struggle, this fight, because it is a struggle and a fight to choose to honor God with our lives. It is a struggle and a fight to keep our marriages healthy. It is a struggle and a fight to direct our kids in the right way, to love our families well, to share our faith, to be evangelists in our community, and to make disciples of the people who are around us. That's hard. And Solomon says, if you try to do this alone, woe to you when you fall and you have no one to pick you up. Woe to you when addiction creeps in and there's no one you can tell. Woe to you when doubts creep into your faith and there's no one you can talk to. How hard it must be for you when your marriage gets rocky and there's no one to fight for it. If there's two, he says, you've got a fighting chance. If there's three, that's not quickly broken. We need people in our lives to fight for us. We need to fight for the people in our lives. It seems to be a big value to us. That will help us ensure that we always have people to eat and drink with that we love and enjoy. So I thought it was worth pointing out Solomon's emphasis on this. The other question that remained from the previous weeks is, can I ever hope for true happiness? Yes. Yes, because here's the thing. If the bad things in Ecclesiastes 3 are true, then so are the good ones. Last week, I read the passage and I said, listen, pain is coming for all of us. It's going to hurt. We're going to mourn. We're going to grieve. No one gets to dodge that based on our godliness. It's going to happen to all of us. We will walk through hard times, but here's the reality. If that's true, then the flip side is true. If the bad things are true, then God says we will walk through seasons where we experience the good things. Look at the good things. There is a time to be born, to plant, to heal, to build up, to laugh, to dance, to gather things together, to embrace, to keep, to sow, to speak. A time for love and a time for peace. If we're going to have to walk through hard times, there's going to be good ones too. And I just think that the blessing from Ecclesiastes is this. It hits us with some hard realities. It's stark. It's unflinching. Hey, most of us are wasting our lives. And no matter what you do to invest it well, you're going to hurt. Those are hard truths. But I've said the whole time that if we can accept them on the other side is this joy that is waiting for us. And this is the joy. The joy is, yes, there's big things going on that we can't control. But in the midst of all that stuff that we can't control, God gives us these gifts, these moments of joy, these pockets to lean into where we celebrate him, where we're grateful for him, and we acknowledge those things as gifts. And I just think that if we accept the difficult realities from this book, then we can start to look for these little pockets of joy in our life, and they will bring us such more fulfillment than if we just move through them waiting to get to the next thing. At our house, we do a thing called Breakfast Sammy Saturday, all right? I like a good breakfast sandwich. I know it's hard to tell by looking at me, but I like a good, I put butter down, I toast the bread, I do the eggs, I do some bacon, do some cheese on there, and then I put it all together on the blackstone, cut it in half, and the good egg bleeds out onto it. It's all the goodness, and then you dip your sandwich in there. It's the best. I love breakfast Sammy Saturdays. You guys are not enthusiastic enough about this. You need breakfast Sammy Saturdays in your life. Well, I'll just let you guys sign up. Come over to the house. I'll make them for you. We love it. But it's just kind of a thing that I do. I like it. I make one for Jen and Lily, and they kind of eat half of theirs. I'm more excited about it than anybody else. But then one day, Lily brought this home from preschool, and it made me cry right on the spot. That's breakfast Sammy Saturday. She drew my griddle. She put food on it. Apparently, I make pizza there. And she brought it home to me. Now, the thing about this is, it was an assignment at preschool. She was told, just make whatever you want. It's an art project. And she made breakfast Sammy Saturday. And she brought it home to me. And she said, look, Daddy. And she told me what it was. I started crying right there on the spot. I got these big old alligator tears in my eyes looking at Jen. What a cool thing. And sure, life's going to be hard. She's going to be a teenager. She's five now, so she's kind of maxed out on cuteness, and now it's just hyper sometimes. But even though I know that there's hard times ahead, even though I know she won't always appreciate things like Breakfast Sammy Saturday, I know she does now. And I know that that's a gift from my God. And I know that what Ecclesiastes says is the best thing I can possibly do is to drink deeply of that. The best thing we can possibly do is find joy in these moments that God allows. We don't know how long we'll have them. I was talking with a friend last night who's got a new infant. And he said every time he gets up with the infant in the middle of the night and holds her, that it's a privilege. Because he doesn't know when that last time's going to be. And that's the truth of it. I think that we have so many pockets of joy in our life every day. If we have people that we love, if we have something to do that we appreciate, if we're choosing to honor God with our life. And I think that because we're so busy chasing vapor, sometimes we miss these sweet little moments that can all be had right here if we're just paying enough attention. That's why I think on the other side of these realities awaits for us this profound joy. And I think that when we realize that, that when we realize that God has designed these things to bring us happiness in our life, that what's really important is if we don't believe in a God, if we're atheistic in our worldview, then that's it. The joy terminates in those moments. That's all we have. But if we are a spiritual people who believe that God designed these things and these blessings in our life to make himself evident in our life, then our joy doesn't terminate in the moment. It turns into exuberant praise. It reminds us that we have a God that designed this for us. And the other part is, and this is incredible, that the joy that we're experiencing in that moment is only a glimpse of the eternity that he's designed for us and won for us with Jesus, which is what we're going to come back and talk about next week, is how these things are glimpses to the eternity that Jesus has already won for us. So in a few minutes, the band is going to come, and we've saved two fun, exuberant songs to praise God together. And while we do that, I want to encourage you to keep those two thoughts in your head. What are the things that I can see from my chair? What are the joys that God has given me that are within my reach from places that I already have in my life? What are the things that maybe I'm missing because I'm chasing stuff that I don't need? And then let's reflect on the reality that there is coming an eternity where that's all we experience. It's no more just pockets. It's reality. And that is something for us all to celebrate. Let me pray for us. Father, you are so very good to us. You've given us so much. Lord, I pray that we would be grateful for those blessings. I pray that you would steep us in profound gratitude for the things that we have, that you would show us what we need and what we don't. God, if there is somebody here or who can hear my voice, who doesn't have people in their life that they love, God, would you bring that to them? Would you provide that community for them even here at Grace? Would you give them the courage to slip up their hand in some way, to fill out some sheet, or to send some email, or make some phone call, or some text, and help them engage with relationships that matter to them. God, if there are people who don't have something they enjoy in their days, would you give them the courage to find that? Show them how you designed them and what you created them for. God, if we are not honoring you with our lives, I pray that you would give us the courage to do that. Let us praise you exuberantly, God, for the joys that you have given us in our lives. It's in your son's name we pray. Amen. Amen, amen. Thank you, Nate. Let's all stand up. guitar solo Our God, firm foundation Our rock, the only solid ground Let's lift his name. you are the only king forever you are victorious Unmatched in all your wisdom In love and justice you will reign and every knee will bow we bring our expectations our hope is anchored in your name the name of jesus Jesus you are the only king forever forevermore you are victorious We lift our banner high. We lift the name of Jesus. From age to age you reign. Your kingdom has no end. We lift our banner high. We lift the name of Jesus. From age to age you reign. Your kingdom has no end. You are the only king forever. Mighty God, we lift you higher. You are the only king forever. Forevermore, you are the only king forever Forevermore, you are victorious. He is doing great things See what our Savior has done See how His love overcomes he has done great things. We dance in your freedom, awake and alive. Oh Jesus, our Savior, your name lifted high be faithful forever more you have done great things and I know you will do it again for your promise is yes and amen you will do great things God you do great things Oh Oh you have done great things you've done great things every captive and break every chain oh god You have done great things. You have done great things. Oh God, you guys here today. God bless. Have a great week. Thank you. Come all you weary, come all you thirsty, come to the well that never runs dry. Drink of the water, come and thirst no more. Well, come all you sinners, come find His mercy. Come to the table, He will satisfy. Taste of His goodness, find what you're looking for. For God so loved the world that He gave us, His one and only Son to save us. If you never believed in Him, you'll live forever. Here we go. We'll live forever. God so loved the world. Praise God. Praise God. From whom all blessings flow. Praise Him. Praise Him. For the wonders of His love. Praise God. Praise God. Praise God. Praise Him. Praise Him. For the wonders of His love. His amazing love. For God so loved the world that He gave us. His one and only Son to save. For God so loved the world that He gave us. His one and only Son to save us Whoever believes in Him Will live forever Oh, the power of hell Forever defeated Now it is well I'm walking in freedom For God so loved the world. Amen. You are here, moving in our midst. I worship you. I worship you. You are here, working in this place. I worship you. I worship you. You are here. Working in this place. I worship you. I worship you. You are way maker. Miracle worker. Promise keeper. Light in the darkness. darkness my god that is who you are Jesus. Jesus I worship you. I worship you. You're mending every heart. You are here and you are mending every heart. I worship you. I worship you. You are here and you are way maker, miracle worker, promise keeper, light're the way maker. Yeah, sing it again. Oh, that is who you are. That is who you are. That is who you are. My Jesus. That is who you are. That is who you are. That is who you are. That is who you are. My Jesus. Yes, even when. Come on. You never stop. You're the way maker. Oh, that is who you are. Oh, it's who you are, my Jesus. Miracle worker. That is who you are. is above depression. His name is above loneliness. Oh, His name is above disease. His name is above cancer. His name is above every other name. That is who you are. Jesus. oh i know that is who you are When darkness tries to roll over my bones When sorrow comes to pain is all I know, oh, I won't be shaken. No, I won't be shaken. I am not captive to the light. I'm not afraid to leave my past behind. Oh, I won't be shaken. No, I won't be shaken. My fear doesn't stand a chance when I stand in your love. My fear doesn't stand a chance when I stand in your love. My fear doesn't stand a chance when I stand in your love. Oh, I'm standing. There's power in your name. Power in your name. There's power that can break off every chain. There's power that can empty out a grave. There's resurrection power that can save. is Thank you. I'm standing in your love. I count on one thing. The same God that never fails will not fail me now. You won't fail me now in the waiting. The same God who's never late is working you're working Yes, I will bless your name. Oh, yes, I will sing for joy. My heart is heavy God that never fails. Will not fail me now. You won't fail me now in the waiting. This ain't God who's never late. He's working all things out. You're working all things out. Oh, yes, I will lift you high in the lowest valley. Yes, I will. For all my days. Oh, yes, I will. And I choose to praise, to glorify, glorify the name of all names that nothing can stand against. And I choose to praise, to glorify, glorify the name of all Thank you. The name of all names. That nothing can stand against. And I choose to praise. To glorify, glorify the name of our names. That nothing can stand against. Oh yes, I will lift you high in the lowest valley. Yes, I will bless your name. Oh, yes, I will sing for joy when my heart is heavy. All my days. Oh, yes, I will. Thank you. Come let us bow at his feet. He has done great things..

Well, good morning, Grace. It's good to be with you in this way. I am excited for the fifth part in our series called Things You Should Know, where we're looking through things in Scripture or that come up in church or in Christendom that we are familiar with, we've heard of before, but maybe we don't know how to explain or maybe it hasn't been discussed or maybe we're just too far down the rabbit hole of faith to raise our hand and ask about these things to get some clarity. And so what we wanted to do, so that you didn't have to ask those embarrassing questions in small groups, is take five weeks here at the beginning of the year and talk through some of these topics that we may have questions about, because we don't really discuss them all the time. This morning, I wanted us to look at grace and mercy. Grace and mercy are two things that we see come up in Scripture a lot. We're going to look at Scripture in a little bit to see how replete it is with references to God's grace and God's mercy. And we sing songs about them. We certainly know about them. We've heard about them. The name of the church is Grace, for crying out loud. But I wonder how many of us would be confident in whatever your working definition of grace is. I wonder how many of us would be confident understanding mercy or explaining it to our kids if they heard those words and said, hey, what does that mean? How many of you would feel comfortable going, I got this, I'm going to knock this out of the park? If I asked those of us listening and watching, hey, could you explain grace and mercy to the church? Could I get you to come in one Sunday morning, I'm just going to bring you up on stage, and you tell the good people of grace what the name of the church really means. Now, I have no doubt in our church, we would do a good job. There would be, I think, a myriad answers across a wide range of definitions using a lot of unnecessary words that would be mostly right. But I think it's worth it as a church to take some time and define these words in a simple way and understand what grace and mercy really are. Because when we understand God's grace and God's mercy towards us, I think that we can't help but want to respond in exuberant praise. I think when we really understand what's going on with grace and mercy, when we really properly understand those two characteristics of God, that it inspires within us a response of gratitude, and that gratitude manifests joy, and it ought to make us want to leap out of our skin and praise our good God. Which is why we've positioned the sermon at the beginning of the service this week, and we're going to transition right into worship as I wrap up the sermon. Because I wanted to give you guys a chance to respond to the reality of God's grace and mercy. So with that in mind, and I would also say, for those of you who are listening to this or me, not on Sunday morning, if you're catching up later in the day, if you're listening on a podcast in the car or on a walk or something like that, as you listen to my voice right now, I would encourage you, plan to listen to some praise and worship music on your own at the end of this sermon. Just go ahead and budget some time in your head to listen to two or three songs or just have it playing in the car and allow yourself to respond to what's shared here this morning. But with that preamble, I wanted to jump right in to defining these words for us so we have a working definition here at Grace. So mercy, the way I understand it, is simply when we do not get what we deserve. Mercy is when we do not get something that we deserve. When our actions or our attitude or our behavior warrants punishment, something punitive, or just some natural consequences, and we don't receive those consequences, we don't receive the punishment that we deserve, when we've earned some trouble and we don't get into that trouble, that's mercy. So mercy is simply when we don't get something that we do deserve. Think of it this way. Pretend you've got a 16-year-old son. He's just got a new car. He's got the keys. And part of the deal with having the freedom to drive is that there's a curfew. And his very first time out, he goes out with his buddies and he breaks a curfew. And he understands that you guys have set up these rules that if you go and you break curfew, when you come back, we're going to take your car keys for a week. That's the deal. All right? So he gets back, he's broken curfew, and what he deserves is for you to take his car keys. And instead you say, you know what? I hope that you remember this. I want to forgive you. I'm not going to hold this against you. Go into bed. I'm not going to take your car keys. Right? That's mercy. He does not get a punishment that he does deserve. He doesn't get the consequences that his behaviors warrant. You just showed your son mercy. That's what that is. So mercy is when we do not get something that we do deserve. Grace, conversely, is when we do get something that we don't deserve. Grace is when we get a special favor or a blessing that we did not earn, that our behavior does not warrant. So we go back to the 16-year-old kid. You've forgiven him and you've sent him to his room, go to bed. I'm not going to take your keys. You can continue to have that freedom. You deserve that punishment, but I'm not going to give it to you. But grace is this. Maybe part of the agreement with your son is if he's going to have the freedom of driving, then he has to be responsible and earn his own gas money, which is a pretty fair driving arrangement across, I think, all families. That's a pretty typical arrangement. You're going to have a car, you've got to pay for your gas money. And because you love him, and because you want him to be blessed, and because it seems like he felt particularly bad about breaking curfew, not only do you send him to bed without taking his keys, but then after he's gone, you take his car and you sneak over to the gas station and you fill that thing all the way up for him. And you leave it there as a surprise the next morning. That's grace. Grace is the full gas tank that he doesn't deserve. He just broke the rules, man. He doesn't deserve that at all. He doesn't deserve any special favors. But because you love him, because you're a good parent, you fill up his gas tank. That's grace, right? And it's important that we understand these concepts because they are all over Scripture. Scripture shows us over and over again that God shows us mercy and that God shows us grace. I went through this week and just kind of looked at some of the passages, and I wanted you to see a few of them. So I'm going to read them kind of machine gun style real quick here. There's going to be three in a row for mercy, and then we're going to talk about these. But just look what Scripture has to say about mercy. I love this one in James. This is just a snippet of the verse, but it's a simple phrase. James writes that mercy triumphs over judgment. And then on in Lamentations, back in the Old Testament, the scriptures say, And then finally, Paul writes in Ephesians, What we see in those verses very clearly is that God's mercy is the forgiveness of our sins. God's mercy to us is forgiving our sins, is not giving us the just punishment that we deserve for our sins. I don't know if you've ever thought about it this way, but when we sin, it is offensive to Creator God. When we sin, we take up arms in a violent insurrection against God's domain in the universe. Last week, we talked about Satan, and we talked about his fundamental sin that is all of our fundamental sins, which is to look at God and to say, you're supposed to be up there. You're supposed to be the authority figure, but I don't want that to be true in my life, so I'm going to be my own authority figure. When we sin, when we choose something that is outside of God's will, what we're saying to God is, I don't accept your authority in my life. You're not the boss of me. I'm the boss of me. You don't make my decisions. I make my decisions. You see, when we sin, it is an active rebellion against the way that God created us. God is the creator. We are the created. I'm firmly convinced, and I've said it before, that that's why Genesis starts the way it does. The very first words in the Bible are, in the beginning, God created. It establishes that relationship, creator, creation. In charge, subservient. And when we sin, we go, I don't like that you're in charge. I want to be in charge. And we rebel against God. And God sent his son in light of that rebellion to make a path back to him so that we could spend eternity with him. And God says, when we sin, listen, you can't spend eternity with me anymore. You can't do it. You're imperfect. You've offended me. You violated the terms of the agreement. I am taking your keys. And then God sends his son to make a way for us to go to heaven anyways, for us to spend eternity with him anyways. And what do we do? We trample on that. We sin again. We demand forgiveness again. And I'm not sure that we stop and realize the miracle of God's mercy, the miracle of his forgiveness. When we do, that phrase in James, mercy triumphs over judgment, becomes really amazing. We deserve judgment. We broke the rules. He should take our keys. But he doesn't because our God chooses mercy and mercy triumphs over judgment. Jesus tells Peter, when Peter says, how many times should you forgive someone when they wrong you? Jesus says, 70 times seven. As many times as they wrong you, show them mercy. It's in his very nature to do this. Even though we are involved in a rebellious insurrection against Creator God, He looks at us in all of our offense. And for many of us, we're not talking about ignorant sin here. We're not talking about this thing that we did and now we realize, oh my gosh, I shouldn't be doing that. Now that I'm acquainted with Scripture, I know better. I'm talking about the willful sin that you and I commit every week, every day. Who am I kidding? That's offensive to Creator God. And yet he shows us mercy because lamentation says his mercies are new every morning. Every day requires more of God's forgiveness. Every day we break curfew and every day he gives us mercy for that. He withholds the punishment from us that we do deserve. He withholds the separation from us that we do deserve, the damnation from us that we do deserve. That's God's mercy. But it gets better because I think God's grace adds another layer on top of that that's even more remarkable. Look at what Scripture says about God's grace, just two verses really quickly. In Ephesians, Paul writes, for by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God. And then on in Romans he writes, and we are justified by His grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. So mercy forgives us. God's mercy forgives us, but God's grace restores us. You see? God's mercy says, you're forgiven. I know you messed up. I know you broke curfew. You're forgiven. But then God's grace says, and I've made a way for you to be in my family. He fills up the tank. God's mercy says, I no longer hold your sins against you. God's grace says, because of that, I sent my son to die for you, and now you have a seat at my table etern, Do you understand? God's mercy says we messed up, we've offended Creator God, we've willfully sinned, and we've offended Him, and we deserve punishment, and He says, I'm not going to punish you. And He could stop there. He could say, I'm not going to punish you, I'm not going to punish you this one time for breaking curfew, but don't mess up anymore. And then if we mess up again, then we're done. We're toast. That's it. But in his grace and in his goodness, he doesn't stop at forgiveness. He stops at restoration. Not only are you forgiven, but now here, have a seat at my table. Not only are you forgiven, but now you are an adopted son or daughter of the king. You are an heir to the universal throne. Not only am I not going to hold it against you, not only am I going to clothe you in the righteousness ofal son. For those of you who are not familiar with it, I'm about to give you the quickest, worst rendition of it ever. All right. I've preached about this before. I can do a better job than this, but for the sake of time, we're going to look at some essential details. The parable of the prodigal son goes like this. There's a father who's wealthy and he has two sons. And one of those sons, the younger one, looks at the dad and he says, you know what? I really just want your stuff. I don't want you. Can you just go ahead and give me my inheritance? I'd rather you be dead anyway. Just give me my money so that I can live how I want. And that father, in his goodness, for reasons I don't understand, says, okay, fine, and gives him the money. And the son goes off into the city and he spends it on living in ways that just feed his appetites and his lusts. And he runs out of money. He spends it in totally dishonorable ways. He comes to the end of it. Everybody leaves him. He can't find a job. He ends up eating slop on a pig farm. And one day the Bible says he comes to his senses in this really poignant moment and he decides, I'm going to go back to my dad's house. But he works out this speech in his head where he's going to go back and he's going to say, I'm going to go back and I'm going to tell him, can you just please forgive me and let me be your servant? I don't deserve to be your son anymore. What I've done is too offensive. Will you please just let me be your servant? Because they live better than I do right now. And so he heads home with this speech in mind, which, by the way, it's a pretty fair speech, right? Dude took his dad's money, went off and spent it however he wanted to, wasted it on debaucherous things, and then comes back with his hat in his hand. Yeah, you're darn right he doesn't deserve to be a son anymore. He should live as a servant, at least for a few years, right? But he goes back, and the father sees him from a long way off and runs out to greet him. And the son starts in with his speech, dad, I'm so sorry, I don't deserve, yada, yada, yada. And the dad shuts him up right away, flings his arms around him and hugs him. And in that moment, the son knows that he's forgiven, that his father's not going to hold those things against him. That's mercy. But he doesn't stop there. He takes the ring, the signet of the family, and he puts it on his son's finger. And he takes the robe and he takes the slippers and he puts those on the son. And then he goes and he kills the fattened calf, the really good stuff. And he throws a big, huge party. And he says, my son is back, and he welcomes him right back into the family, which he didn't have to do, and his behavior didn't warrant. It's the perfect picture of the mercy and the grace that God offers us. We're the prodigals. We run away and make willful decisions to offend our God, to throw off his authority in our life and be our own authority. And then at some point or another, we come back, hat in hand, apologetic, I'm so sorry. And he forgives us. But he doesn't just forgive us. He restores us. He doesn't just say, hey, I'm not mad at you. Come here. You would expect that he would say, you're forgiven. Get away from me. I need a minute. That's not what he does. He says, you're forgiven. And then he hugs us. And then he sends his son, his only son, whom he loves, who was perfect, who never offended him, to die for you and for me. He gave us that gift. Do you understand? We don't deserve the grace of Jesus. We don't deserve that. We didn't earn it. Our behavior doesn't warrant it. Nowhere in the scripture is there a contract that says when we break the law and offend Almighty God that he owes us the death of his son? That's not the deal. But he does it anyways. That's grace. And in light of that, the mercy of forgiveness and the grace of restoration, we should want to exuberantly praise our God. But I'm also aware of the fact that many of us, as we listen to this, if you look at the ends of the spectrum of, Nick, you better shut up so I can start praising God right now. I'm about to jump out of my skin. And then, oh, okay, that's cool. I think I understand grace and mercy a little bit better now. A lot of us are closer to this end. A lot of us have responded in our heads and in our hearts to what I just said in that way. Oh, okay, yeah, I get it. I understand that better. That's good. Thank you. And it makes me wonder, me included, why we're on that end of the spectrum. And as I thought about that this week, I could only include that it's probably because we're all entitled brats. We're probably on that end of the spectrum because there's a very good chance that the two to three hundred adults I'm talking to right now are really just entitled brats. Here's what I mean. I just want to give you a picture of my daughter's life. I have a daughter named Lily. She just recently turned five. This is her last six weeks. Before you get offended at me calling you an entitled brat, which I did just do, just hear me out. Lily's last six weeks have been unbelievable. She is, through no fault of her own, incredibly entitled now. I ran this by Jen. She's not happy I'm saying this, but we've accepted that it's true. Here's what's happened with her. In December, we as a family spent basically the month down in Athens, Georgia with Jen's family as her dad transitioned into eternity. And in doing that, with Christmas coming up, there are people here in Raleigh who love us and who love Lily and wanted to make sure that Lily got a gift. So a couple times I would come back to Raleigh to take care of some church stuff, and there would be packages waiting on me at the house. I had, I literally, the first time I came back, this is embarrassing, we had some neighbors collecting our mail for us. I had to get a wheelbarrow and go down to their house and fill it up with all the stuff that was waiting on us. And then they pulled a wagon and we unloaded it at my house. That was Christmas arriving at the Rector's. That's us. And other people had like dropped things off at the door. So now I go home, I'm getting these gifts. I take them back to Lily, who is now opening these gifts like, hey, all these people got you these things. Okay, great, thank you. So she's opening them. We're trying to do the video with excitement. She's trying to fan excitement, but she's four at the time. She's not really good at this yet. She doesn't know that's part of the deal when you get gifts. So she's already getting gifts in early December. I made another trip back. There's more stuff waiting. I bring that back. I go ahead and give that to her because we know that there's Christmas coming. We don't want to mute those things. Then at Jen's house, because of things going on, we did early Christmas with her dad. So all the grandkids go in and she's now opening three or four other gifts from her grandparents. Thank you for these and these and these. Then Christmas Eve, we have real Christmas with Jen's family and she gets more gifts. Then the next day we go to my family's house and she gets more gifts, right, on Christmas. And so now the situation in a state that we don't even live in is at my parents' house, there's a pile of gifts that's too big to carry back to Jen's parents' house. So we just have to leave it there for a second. At Jen's parents' house, she has gifts strewn across three stories of a home, including inside a princess room that her grandfather made for her while he still could that she gets to sleep in, complete with lit teepee, okay? This is her life. There's a mess of toys there. There's some on the main floor. There's a basement that she's adopted as a playroom. And then there's toys in the playroom that my parents have for her. And then she comes back. We don't get back until early January, right? When we get back, there's more gifts waiting on her because people at the church love her and are so good to us. And then her birthday's on January 15th. So on January 15th, prior to that, more gifts are showing up at the house. She's opening them up. She lives in a, in a, like a dang gift parade. It's a totally normal thing for her to come home and open up to like, hey, these two things came for you today. And she just opens it up like they're nothing. Then on her birthday, the neighborhood kids come over and give her stuff she doesn't need in exchange for cake that they don't need. And then the next day we have church drive by where the families come through and they hand her more stuff that she doesn't need. And we wave at them in the freezing cold, and we just have so much junk all over our house. And to this child, it's totally normal. She has no idea that she lives inside of a gift parade. They just show up every day. And what Jen and I have realized is she's entitled. Now, I will say this. She is not a brat. She's not that. That word was for dramatic effect only. She's sweet and kind and loving, but she has no capacity to show the proper gratitude for all the gifts that she's been getting because to her it's a totally normal thing. It's embarrassing to me how much people love us and love her. And I don't know what I'm going to do as a dad. I've literally tried to talk Jen into when somebody gives us a gift, let's put it in a room somewhere. And then as she is good, if she has a good week, then we'll give her one of the gifts from the gift room, right? To try to help her earn it. I don't know exactly how to solve this. I would imagine that we're not on an island with this issue. But the reality of my daughter's life is she's entitled. And she doesn't know it. We're going to try to correct it. But what I understand is that that entitlement blinds her to what generosity really is. That entitlement works to mute her joy because she sees everything through the lens of this is normal. I deserve this. If I ask for a thing, I get the thing. This is how life goes. And she has no reason to believe that that's not how life goes. She's only barely five, and she's loved. See, here's the thing. I think it's great. I'm happy for her. I'm floored by the love that our family experiences. I'm grateful that she gets to live a life like that. But she has no perspective on how grateful she should really be. Because again, her entitlement blinds her to the generosity around her and serves to mute her joy that she should have when she receives a gift. I bring that up because I believe that you and I live in a stinking gift parade and we just don't know it. We live in parades of God's goodness and we don't see it. All of our life, if we grew up in church, as soon as you're involved in church, at some point or another, you're going to hear, you've sinned and you've offended Almighty God. And then as soon as that is said to help us feel better, as a capstone to it, you've sinned and offended Almighty God, but God offers us mercy, so you're good. Jesus died on the cross for your sins, so you're fine. You've sinned, you don't get to spend eternity with heaven, but God offers us mercy and sends his son to die for us, so you're forgiven. So we never have to sit in the reality of what our sin really warrants. We never have to sit under the weight of, I have sinned, I have chosen my authority over God's authority, and that has earned me eternal separation from him. We don't have to sit in that for more than 30 seconds before the pastor comes back and says, but God died for you, so we have mercy. We never stop to think that we don't deserve mercy. We never stop to consider that these gifts don't have to keep showing up at my house. We've never done the math to understand that God doesn't owe you forgiveness. Do you understand? He doesn't owe it to you. He created you. He set you on the planet. He said, these are the rules. This is how you can please me. And we've all at different points in our life said, you know, I'm not really that interested in pleasing you. He doesn't owe us forgiveness for that. We walk around like we're entitled to it. We walk around like we deserve it. We walk around like, listen, the deal should be, God, I'm going to mess up a couple times. If you could let some people kill your son, that seems pretty fair. Grace, we are not owed mercy. That's nowhere in the contract. You say, yeah, but God is love. God forgives. He is love. He does forgive. He's also just. And what we deserve is separation from the God that we've offended. But because mercy triumphs over judgment, and because His mercies are new every morning, he withholds that judgment from us and he offers us forgiveness. He offers us a mercy that we are not owed and that we do not deserve. Yet we are so familiar with it and we sing songs about it so often and we count on it and take it for granted so regularly that sometimes we treat mercy like another doll that someone handed us out the window that, yeah, of course I get this. It's my birthday. This is what we do. And our entitlement blinds us to the grandeur and the majesty of God's mercy. Not to mention the graces that we don't see. Grace is a goodness that we get that we have not earned. Grace is God's favor on our life that doesn't warrant it. We just walked through the really, and we're in the middle of the really difficult season of losing Jen's dad. His name was John. Towards the end of John's life, we found out we were pregnant with a boy that we're going to name John. What grace from God. What grace from God that he says, listen, everybody has to go. As appointed to man wants to die. Everyone's going to have to walk this path. And now it's John's turn to walk this path. But because I love you and because you're good and because you're my child, you're good because I made you good. Here's another John for you to love. That's grace. We don't deserve that. We didn't warrant that. Do you understand that the goodness in your life is grace? It's God's goodness in your life that when you get the new car and you drive it down the road and it smells nice and it looks nice and you're real proud of yourself and it makes us feel like we arrived, that happiness, that moment, that's God's grace. When we sit in our living room and our kids are back from college and we watch our grandkids scurry around or we see their joy and a gift that we were able to buy them, like that's God's grace. When we sit around with our friends and we laugh and we have a good night and we go home and we feel warm, that's God's grace. Your gifts and talents that got you where you are, those are gifts from God that are his grace. His grace is all over our lives. And if we would just stop and look around and acknowledge that we're in a dang gift parade, I think we would be blown away by God's goodness. It reminds me of one of my favorite verses in John, where he simply writes, from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. From God's fullness, out of the goodness of his heart, we have all received grace upon grace. He just lavishes them upon us because he's a good father and he likes to see you happy. He likes it when you cry tears of joy. He likes the moments that you share with your husband or your wife or your friend or your parents or your kids. He likes those sweet moments. He designs those for you. He doesn't just forgive you. He doesn't just say, hey, I'm not going to hold your sins against you, but he fills up your tank with gas every day over and over from his fullness. We have all received grace upon grace. He doesn't just forgive you. He sends his son to die for you and he restores you and he welcomes you into his house to sit at his table. And these little snippets of grace are just glimpses into eternity where it's nothing but grace and nothing but goodness and nothing but joy that's waiting for us, that he won for us, that he gifts to us that we didn't earn. And so I just wonder what God's grace and mercy will look like when we no longer see them through the lens of entitlement. I wonder what God's grace and mercy will look like when we no longer see those things through the lens of entitlement. When we can just stop for a second and acknowledge, yeah, I don't deserve mercy. That's not part of the deal. God chooses to show me mercy because he loves me. What will it look like if we take for a second? In a few minutes we're going to sing that song that has the line, I see the evidence of your goodness all around me. What would happen if we would look around at all the goodness in our life that's a gift from God and acknowledge that, man, we live inside of a gift parade. God has given us countless goodness and countless grace. He lavishes it upon us. His mercies are new every morning because we require them every morning. Let's this morning be grateful for God's grace and for God's mercy. Let's see them fresh and new, not through the lens of entitlement that blinds us to the grandeur of his generosity, but through the lens of humility that helps us see his grace and mercy for what they are. And let's be humbly blown away by those things. So sing along as we sing or sit and listen as we sing. But in light of God's grace and mercy, let's praise him together this morning.

Good morning, Grace. Welcome to the new year. I am so thrilled to be here this morning. Before we jump into what we're actually going to be talking about and going to be walking through this morning, I wanted to take just a quick second to give you an update. I know as many of you guys have been walking alongside and have been praying for Nate and for Jen, as Jen has been in the process of her father has been going through pancreatic cancer. And a lot of you know, as we've talked about kind of during the Christmas season, that it looked like that during this Christmas holiday was going to be the time where he finally was able to pass on into eternity. And that did happen. John is now in heaven, in the arms of the Father that he committed his life to. He's able to be up there absolutely rejoicing in Jesus, this Jesus that he's loved his whole life. He now is able to see and to know and to touch and to worship with no distractions. But as that has happened, I say that not only to say continue to keep the Vincent and the Rector families in your prayers, but I also say that to say that I could see and I could tell through your virtual faces as I look at you through your screens that you were like, ugh, this guy again. And I get it. I know and I understand. But I say that to say that John's funeral was yesterday. It was yesterday at two o'clock and then they did a graveside afterwards. And so it's my pleasure and my joy this morning to just have the opportunity to take away that one small extra burden from Nate that while he was dealing with being there for his wife and for his family and while he was there helping plan a funeral and preparing words to say for a funeral that he didn't have to worry about. Also writing a sermon and worry about jumping in the car from the funeral and driving from Atlanta all the way to Raleigh just so he could be here preaching this morning. And so I'm thrilled and I'm excited to be here this morning, not only because I love being up here getting to preach and getting to talk with you guys about things that I'm passionate with, but in particular this morning, just as a way to alleviate just a little bit of stress from Nate that he didn't have to worry about doing all of that, about driving back just so he can preach a sermon and he could just spend this week with his family as they mourn, but also as they celebrate John's life, what it was and what now it is in perfection in eternity. And with that, I say welcome to the new year. And this morning, as we're kicking off the new year at Grace, we kick it off with a new series called Things You Should Know. And I know that that title leaves a bit to be desired. I know it's probably, you know, you're like, okay, that could go a few different directions. And if it's going to go in the direction of you're going to come up and be Professor Kyle and teach me all of these boring things I don't know, then I'm turning it off. And don't, don't turn it off. That's not what I'm up here doing. I admit that probably when it comes to things of wisdom and discernment and just pure knowledge and understanding of things, I could probably turn to you much quicker than you would turn to me to learn those things. But instead, as we're focusing on things you should know, what we're talking about is maybe some of those words or some of those concepts that we hear and that we talk about in church that we definitely know what they are, right? And we definitely, like, we could probably define them and we could use them in conversations pretty well, but that maybe when we take like a deep look, and you've all been there, right, where you use a word, and someone goes, do you really know what that word means? Okay, like give me a definition, and as you struggle with it, you go, gosh, maybe I don't actually fully know that definition. Or when you talk about that you know a lot about, you know, you say like, I know about this, I understand this. And as soon as someone asks you two or three questions, you go, goodness gracious, I don't know how to answer that. And so these instead, for the next five weeks, we're going to talk about some of these words, some of these concepts, and some of these beliefs that we have in our church and through scripture that definitely we know, that we probably know pretty well. Some of you are going to know very well, but some of those things that I think at times we talk a lot about, but maybe don't sit down to just only talk about that, to just get a full and holistic view and understanding of what they are. And so this morning, I have the distinct pleasure of talking about baptism. What a wonderful and what a beautiful time to talk about baptism, to talk about us giving our hearts to Jesus, of the symbol of us being dead as Jesus was killed and being resurrected as Jesus was being resurrected. As yesterday, we celebrated a man, Jen's father and Nate's father-in-law going to heaven as this beautiful celebration of life and a celebration of a faith that he committed to and a baptism that he committed to long ago that he's now able to see the full fruit and the full fruition of what that means. But this morning, we're talking about baptism. And I know that if you've been around grace for a while, then you're probably, as soon as I said we're talking about baptism, you probably were a bit confused. You're like, wait, didn't we have like an entire Sunday, like an entire sermon where Nate preached about baptism, about what it is, and about what it means? And the answer is yes. It was, I would say, a little bit less than two and a half years ago. And the reason why I remember that is because my first Sunday was right after Nate had given that message. And the reason I know that is because my first Sunday was when Grace celebrated this huge day of baptisms where we had a group of people come, different people throughout age groups and men and women and youth and student age folks come and celebrate and be baptized this first Sunday that I was at Grace. And it was incredible and it was remarkable. And in that sermon that Nate gave that got all of these people thinking about and got all these people excited about being baptism, he talked about what we believe baptism is at grace. That we believe that baptism is for those who are able to articulate a faith and have experienced salvation. That when someone is able to give their heart to Jesus, when someone is able to repent of their sin and fully realize and understand the magnitude of their sin and how their sin equals eternal death, but because God is a good God, that God, because he sent his son to earth, that his son who lived a perfect life, when he was killed, he was killed to put to death your sin, to put to death our sin. And as he was raised to life, he was raised in a symbol that in the same way, if we would give our hearts to faith, if we would put our faith in that Jesus, that because of that, we could go from eternal death and destruction to eternal life and to have an eternal relationship with God, our creator and our father, both on earth and in heaven and eternity. And so in the same way, when that happens, we believe that we baptize when someone comes to faith through immersion. That's just a big word for basically saying we dunk people. As Nate puts it, we get them full wet or completely wet or whatever it is, the weird phrase that he says. But basically when someone comes to faith, they come in front of the church and they're baptized and they're brought down into the water, completely underwater, and then being brought back up. And that is meant to be a symbol of the faith that we are giving our hearts to. I think the symbol is most beautifully put and most beautifully said by Paul in Romans, in Romans 6, 3 through 4, where he says, What a beautiful depiction, and what a beautiful description, and what a beautiful symbol that as we are being dunked into the water, that we are being gone. And that is signifying the death of our old life. That is signifying the death of our old selves. And most importantly, that is signifying the death of our sin that no longer binds us and no longer holds us back from knowing God and having a relationship with him. And as we come out of the water, just as Jesus was resurrected, so are we being resurrected in newness of life. That water has washed the sins away from us. And as we burst forth out of that water, we are bursting forth into eternity, into this eternal relationship with God. And we know and we understand, just as John Piper put so eloquently, that faith, faith is what unites us to Christ. Baptism symbolizes the union. Baptism is a symbol of the union of Christ. We understand and we know and we have knowledge that it is our faith in Jesus. It's our hearts being given to Jesus is what saves us. If that is not something we've experienced, then baptism is meaningless. Then believer's baptism becomes meaningless because the water isn't what saves us. Our faith is what saves us. And on a Sunday where we're talking about baptism and on a Sunday where we get to talk about baptism, I don't think that there's any way, nor should there ever be any way around getting to talk about why baptism is so significant, why it is so important that baptism is the symbol of coming to faith. Because coming to faith is what this is all about. We are called, as we're called to make disciples, we're called, part of that is being called to baptism, that we come to a saving knowledge of faith. We come and we give our hearts to Jesus and we know that our eternal resting place is with God in eternity in relationship with him. And so when we experience that faith, we bring that faith, we go and we make disciples, we tell people who that is, we tell people of this experience that we have had with Jesus so that they can experience it as well. And as they do, we're able to baptize them into the kingdom, into our eternal family. And so there's no way to not talk about that, nor should there be. But I also understand, and what I also realize is you're like, Kyle, this is all stuff that we've talked about. This is stuff we do know. You should change the title to Kyle Tells Us Things That We Already Know, right? Because you've heard this before, and I know that it's not an incredibly difficult concept to understand, right? That when you've heard, when you read scripture, it's like, okay, like, I understand that symbol. You know, I understand that the water is washing away our sins and that we're going from death into life. And I understand that it's not what saves us, but instead it's our faith that what saves us. But I do understand why it's important. But the reason this morning why I'm excited to talk about baptism is because one of my favorite aspects of baptism is also falls in line with the question that I most often get from the people who I talk with about getting baptized. Granted, these are normally students. They're normally like middle schoolers, high schoolers who have given their hearts to Jesus. They've come to know who Jesus is and they want to live their life for him. And so they come in and they talk to me and they're like, Kyle, like, I get it. I understand baptism. I think it's really cool. I get why it's important, but they're smart. And they're like, but if it's a symbol of our faith, don't you talk about all the time that our faith is personal and it's ours and it's our own hearts, that our faith is not about our parents' faith, that we don't have our parents' faith, we don't have our friends' faith, we don't have our kids' faiths in the words of an adult or of a parent? Don't you say that? And so if it is a personal thing, then wouldn't the symbol of baptism, wouldn't it be that I could just like invite you over or I could just call up Nate and say, hey, Nate, can you come over to the house? We'll go out back and you can baptize me and you can go out back. You can baptize me in my pool and we can be done with it. But instead, the question, so the question they have is, I understand all of that, but why do I have to do it in front of everybody? And I love that question. I think it's a great, and I think it's a great point that yes, certainly baptism is the symbol of your personal faith. And certainly the symbol of baptism is not lost when you do it by yourself or when you do it alone. But I love the question and I understand the question, especially if you can imagine sixth and seventh graders being like, Kyle, I don't like when anyone looks at me ever. Much less do I want to be the reason why an entire room of people are looking straight at me. I don't want to go, because it's like, it's not like I'm standing, I don't even want to stand in the back of like a choir or like stand in the like, as Rob always talks about when he's playing the bass, he's like, gosh, we got to get some more light on me so people can see me rocking the bass. It's like, students don't want to be in the dark playing instruments up front, much less have a spotlight on them being like, hey, everybody in this entire place, we're talking about this kid now. And I would imagine that this is something that you've probably thought about and considered as well, because don't grow out of people of not wanting like everyone to look at you. You don't grow out of like being like, oh, this feels weird. This feels awkward. I don't like having all of these people looking at me. And so I think it's a great question of why in the world do I have to be in front of everyone to get baptized? And with that question, I want to take a quick pivot and I want to tell you about one of the best and one of the most joy-filled days of my entire life. And I know with all of that, everything coming down the pipe, you're like, all right, now he's going to tell me about his baptism or he's going to tell me about someone he loves baptism. And while that certainly probably would have been a far better idea, I'm actually going to not talk about that, and I'm going to talk about something else. Instead, I want to tell you about the day that my brother, Jay, my younger brother, and his wife, Conley, got married. To give you a little background, to know me is to probably also know Jay and to know Conley. I talk about them quite often. Jay has been my best friend since, I guess, his birth because he's younger than me. So I think mathematically that works. And for our whole lives, since he's only a couple years younger than me, we've kind of just done all of the same things. We like the same things. We do the same things. We've always gotten along really well. We don't fight a ton. We just have always kind of gotten along. And so especially as the years progressed and as he got towards middle school and interests kind of began aligning even more, we just were kind of best friends and have been best friends ever since. He's the person I love most in this world. On the other side, Jay had this great friend named Conley when he was in elementary school. And as early as like sixth or seventh grade, they started dating or going out or being boyfriend and girlfriend. I don't know. Like they were in sixth grade. No one knew what to call it, whatever. But as funny as it is, and as goofy sometimes as middle school relationship goes, their relationship lasted through middle school and through high school and through college all the way to marriage. And so I say that to say that as long as I have known Jay and as long as I have been so close to Jay, almost as much as that time, I have known Conley in the same way. And so in the same way, his wife Conley, I have seen for a long, long time, for years and years, as basically my little sister and as basically just another one of my very best and closest friends. And for the same reason, Jay didn't have too many friends that weren't also great friends with Conley and vice versa. Conley's friends were great friends with Jay and loved Jay. Because for so much of their lives and so much of their growing up, they were growing up together. And so as people are walking in friendship with these two apart, they are walking in friendship with these two together, walking towards and anticipating the day, one day when they will finally be able to have a wedding and be married. And so you can imagine how wonderful and how joyful a celebration we had when they finally got married a couple years ago. It was unbelievable. I can't describe to you a time where I have been more joy-filled and more proud in my whole life than to stand next to Jay and watch him be married. Standing in there with a church full of people, church full of loved ones who absolutely love these two and would do anything for them. And the celebration as we sang hymns, the celebration as we joined in excitement and cheering as they vowed to each other and as Jay kissed the bride, as Jay kissed Conley, and as we went off into the reception and we danced the night away and did all of those things because there was not a time more joyful than that because what an incredible experience. And we all know it. Like, you don't know Jay and Conley, but you've probably been to a wedding and you've probably had a wedding before. And so you get it. Weddings are joyful. People love weddings. I have even heard tale, this is true, I have even heard tale that Nate Rector, our pastor, has actually been known to dance at weddings. Like they are joyful experiences. They are joyful celebrations of these two people making these vows and making these commitments to each other. And I think just as significantly, even if not more so, one of the great and incredible reasons to have a wedding where you invite loved ones in to celebrate with you is not simply to celebrate with you on that day or on that night where you are saying yes to your partner forever, but also outside of that day, after that celebration ends, that the people that are watching and the people that are witnessing Jay and Conley and whoever these two people are that are getting married, as they are vowing their hearts and their lives to the other person, then the loved ones around them are being invited into saying, hey, I am making this vow. I am making this commitment. I need you to walk alongside me in that. And I think that's maybe even a more significant reason to have a wedding and to share your vows in public with these people that love you because what those people know because they've been married or just, I mean, for me, I haven't been married, but what I know through experience and what I know through loving people is it gets harder, right? That it's not always the honeymoon. They call it the honeymoon stage because at some point it ends and it gets more difficult. And so as that happens, Jay and Conley have all of these people who just as joyfully as they're celebrating are also saying yes to a commitment of saying, I care about these people and so I am committed to partnering them, to walking alongside them, to providing them wisdom and to providing them guidance in their new lives together, bound together for life. I say yes to giving them accountability. I say yes to allowing them to ask questions and for me to check in. Jay, how's it going? Conley, how has everything been? Is there anything that's difficult or is there anything that's great? And all of those things. And you know that, right? I know that maybe we don't in the moment think about that, yeah, we're watching them make that vows. And so we're committing to helping them as loved ones uphold those vows. But we all know how excited we are to talk to a newly married couple, to ask them how things are going, to ask them about all the great things, but then you always have the, you know, a little bit more like, okay, so what are some of the hard things now? Yeah, I dealt with that too. This is kind of how I dealt with it. This is how you walk in that. This is how you walk through it. And so for those two reasons, to be able to joyfully celebrate these two people who are coming together, while also committing to say, I will partner with you as you walk in your entire life, as you walk in your life committed to this person, I have chosen and I will partner with you. I believe that those same reasons are the main reasons why we have big weddings where we invite our loved ones in to join. Because what we know so well, and as sad and heartbreaking as it is, we have people in our church this year who know all the well and all the more because of COVID that it's not what legally binds us, right? It's not legally required that you have a big group of friends and family and loved ones around you as you get married. It only requires you, the person you're marrying, and someone to witness it, right? So why do we do it? I think more than any other reasons, those two reasons, the ability to celebrate and the ability to have people there to partner with you are those two main reasons. And in the same way, I also believe that the reason that we do baptisms in front of the entire congregation are the same. That in public baptism, that public baptism invites the congregation to celebrate and to partner with the person that is being baptized. When someone has gone from death to life, it is something that deserves to be celebrated. And I would say, I would go beyond that. The Bible says not only that it deserves to be celebrated, but that it is literally being celebrated. In Luke 1.15, it says, In the same way I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. If you have given your hearts to Jesus, if you have repented of that sin, if you have said yes to Jesus, if you have given your heart over to God, then the angels in heaven have rejoiced and have celebrated over you because of that. When you came to faith, angels in heaven celebrated. And so baptism is an earthly representation of the rejoicing that is taking place in heaven as someone has given their heart and given their life over to God. It's your family. It's your friends. It's your loved ones. It's your church family. Here in particular, it's your grace family coming together to celebrate that you know Jesus, that you have gone from eternal death to eternal life, and you now get to experience this eternal relationship with God, your creator. And we get to celebrate alongside you, and you get to be celebrated for this incredible moment and for this incredible thing that has happened in your heart, the greatest thing that can ever and will ever happen inside of your heart. Similar to weddings, once again, I think that there's another reason that is at least equally as important, if not more so, that when you're getting in front of these people, you're vowing and you're making a commitment, a lifelong, eternal commitment to God, to Christ. I know a lot of you probably were able to see, and if you haven't, you can go to our social media and you can watch the video of when Jordan was baptized a few weeks ago. And as she was baptized, as exciting and as joyful as that was, before she was actually put into the water, before Nate actually baptized her, he said, Jordan, I've got two questions for you. Have you accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior? He said, yes. He said, are you committed to living the rest of your life for him. Yes. So Jordan, I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Before Jordan was baptized, she made this commitment. She made this vow, vowing and committing her heart for eternity to God, not only so that she can go to heaven, but so that in her life and in this life, she is committing to living the rest of her days, the rest of her life, glorifying and seeking after Jesus. And as she does that, what is being asked of you, and you have a part to play in this, us as her grace family have a part to play in this, in saying, okay, Jordan, I heard you say that. And so I know that just like there's a honeymoon stage in marriage, there's also a honeymoon stage in faith, that we're riding high and we have this spiritual high where we great, and Satan can't touch us, and we're trying our hardest to kill all of our sin, and we're just loving reading scripture and going closer to God. But in the days and weeks, months, and years to come, it gets more difficult. Life gets hard sometimes, and it's hard to maintain that. Or in the opposite, sometimes life gets really good. Sometimes what life is offering seems way better and seems way more valuable or important at that time than your faith or than your heart and maintaining it with Christ. And so with that knowledge, as you are saying yes to these two questions in baptism, I have given my heart to Jesus, I accept him as my Lord and Savior, and I commit to living the rest of my days for him. Then what the congregation, therefore, is being asked to do is saying, you are now my sister, you are now my brother in Christ. And so for that, I commit to partnering with you. To walking with you. To checking in on you. To making sure that you are continuing to press on towards Jesus. Asking you questions. Giving you advice. Giving you guidance. Giving you accountability when you need accountability. And for those reasons, though we are signifying and though we're symbolizing and though what is being celebrated is certainly a very personal and very internal thing of you giving your heart over to Jesus, it is made public and it is public because it is something that a congregation, that your family of believers around you should celebrate. And it is something that you should stand up because I promise you and you will hear us forever in eternity here at Grace talk about the value of people walking alongside of you. That faith can't be done alone. It is incredibly difficult to walk in your faith, to grow in your love and in your understanding and in your walk and in your life with Jesus if you don't have people walking alongside of you. And so when you make that commitment, you do it up in front of your congregation, up in front of your grace, in front of your church family, saying, hey, I commit to this and I'm asking you to walk with me. And grace family, those of you who have already made this commitment, those of you who have given your hearts to Jesus, those of you who have been baptized, when you compare the two, when you compare marriage and when you compare baptism, how much more joyfully should we celebrate someone who is not only committing their heart to another, but is committing their heart forever to Jesus. How much more should we celebrate literally someone going from death to life? And how much more committed should we be to that person? Committed should we be to their life and making sure that they are continuing to press after God, press after their Lord and Savior that they committed to on that day for us to see, for us to witness, and for us to celebrate. And so my question is, will you come? If this is a commitment you haven't made, today, tomorrow, this week, this year, would you press after Jesus? Jesus, I'm tired. I'm tired. We're tired of trying so hard and falling short. Jesus, I realize that that's the point. The point is that I will always and forever fall short without you. Will you say, Jesus, I'm done falling under sin. I'm done walking without you. Jesus, I need you. Will you say yes to the grace that is freely offered to you from God through Jesus' death and resurrection? Because God is just sitting there waiting for you. And for those of you who are listening this morning that maybe haven't been baptized and you're like, well, I've, you know, maybe I've given my heart to Jesus already or maybe I was a little bit worried and I had a little stage fright. I didn't want to do it in front of people. Maybe you listen this morning and you're like, gosh, I get it. I get it. I understand the value. I understand the importance, and I understand why it is important to do it in front of these people that I love, and these people that love me, and I'm walking next to in life. Would you come and talk to one of us? We would love to talk more about baptism. We'd love to set you up to baptize you. It'd be the greatest joy and honor in our whole lives. And Grace family, those of you who've given your hearts to Jesus, will you continue to celebrate those of us who are doing it now? And will you say yes to partnering with the rest of your Grace family and saying, I know I haven't cared quite so much about this person's spiritual life as I should have. And will you commit today to saying, yes, I am committed to partnering with these people as they're currently giving their hearts to Jesus or as this is my best friend and they gave their heart to Jesus 20 years ago and I need to be more partnered with them than I am. So will you come? I pray that you will. Pray with me. God, thank you for your son, for sending him. God, that as sin, as our sin, tears us away from you where we deserve nothing but death. God, that you sent your perfect son to die to take over that sin. And God, I thank you for that. And I thank you that all that you ask of us in return is a simple faith and is simply coming to you and saying, yes, I believe. And yes, I want to give my heart over to you. Lord, I pray that when we think of baptism, we think of that. We think of new life. We think of going from death to life. And God, I pray that even as some of us have moved beyond the stages where we are coming to a saving knowledge in you, God, as we have already maybe been baptized, that God, we realize that we still have a hand in these other people's salvation around us. That in our grace family, we have a hand in these people's salvation, and we have a hand in walking with these people as they are giving their hearts over to Jesus now. Allow us to commit to these people. Allow us to commit to our family. And God, first and foremost, allow us to stay committed and loving you. We love you so much. Amen.

Merry Christmas everybody! My name is Fort and I'm a junior partner at Grace. Now come and join me. This is going to be the best Christmas Eve service ever! I can't wait! I know because I've been here at Grace for my whole life. Thanks for watching. Merry Christmas, everybody. Bye. Well, Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope that you'll stand up and join us as we sing. guitar solo joyful and try Oh, come ye to Bethlehem Come and behold Him Born the King of angels Oh, come let us adore Him Oh, come let us adore Him Oh Sing, choirs of angels, sing in exultation. Sing, all ye citizens of heaven above. Glory to God all, oh Oh, come let us adore Him. Oh, come let us adore Him. Christ the Lord. Every nation will bow down before You. Every tongue will confess You are God. We worship and adore you. We worship and adore. this happy morning Oh oh Let's birth. Oh, tell it on the mountain, over the hills and everywhere. Go tell it on the mountain that Jesus Christ is born. In a lonely manger, the humble Christ was born. And God sent a salvation, the blessed Christmas is born. Go tell it on the mountain, over the hills and everywhere. Go tell it on new content That Jesus Christ is born. Go tell it on the mountain over the hills and everywhere. Go tell it on the mountain that Jesus Christ is born. That Jesus Christ is born. is Hark the herald angels sing. Glory to the newborn King. Peace on earth and mercy mild. God and sinners reconciled. Joyful all ye nations rise Join the triumph of the skies With angelic hosts proclaim Christ is born in Bethlehem Hark the herald angels sing is Lord in time behold him come offspring of a virgin's womb veiled in flesh the Godhead see hail incarnate deity pleased as man with men to dwell Jesus our Emmanuel Jesus But him, born Prince of Peace, hail the song of righteousness. Light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings. While he lays his glory by, born that man no more may die. Born to raise the sons of earth, Bye. to the newborn king. Hark the herald angels sing. Glory to the newborn king. The first Noel the angel did say Was to certain poor shepherds in fields as they lay. In fields where they lay keeping their sheep. On a cold winter's night that was so deep. Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel, born is the King of Israel. They looked up and saw a star Shining in the east beyond them far Into the earth it gave great light and so it continued both day and night. Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel, born is the king of israel is to our heavenly Lord that hath made heaven and earth of naught and with his blood mankind has brought Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel Born is the King of Israel Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel Born is the King of Israel In those days, Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. This was the first census that took place. While Quirinius was governor of Syria. And everyone went to their hometown to register. So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea. To Bethlehem, the town of David. Because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary. He was pledged to be married to him. And was expecting a child. While they were there, the time out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born. He is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths. Suddenly a great companion of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God, saying, Glory to God. Glory to God. Glory to God. Glory to God. Glory to God in the highest heavens and on His mother Mary laid down his sweet head. The wise men were led. Come see the baby and worship him. His name is Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace, Everlasting Father, Emmanuel, Holy One, Son of God, Savior of the world Come and adore Him On bended knee He came to ransom Someone like me What could I offer? What could I bring? Come and adore him. King of kings, his name is wonderful. Counselor, mighty God. Prince of peace, Everlasting Father, Emmanuel. Holy One, Son of God, Savior of the world. And the greatness of His reign will never end. Let there be peace on earth and all good will to men. Come, us worship him. Wonderful counselor. Mighty God. Prince of peace. Everlasting father. Emmanuel. Holy one. Son of God, Savior of the world. His name is Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace, Everlasting Father, Emmanuel. You're the Holy One, Son of God, isn't a store-bought gift under the tree that we are waiting to open. We've been waiting. Waiting for something much more important. For hope to rise up. For love to embrace. For peace to invade. For joy to bubble up. In the midst of our waiting and longing, the prophet Isaiah from the Old Testament tells us, For unto us a child is born, a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the greatness of his government and peace, there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. When we see it like this, we should remember that in our turbulent world, the government is on his shoulders. For he is our love, our highest governing power. And so right now, we light the central Christ candle because we have found our hope. We have discovered our love. We have realized our joy. We have encountered our peace. Today we celebrate joy to the world. The Lord is come. Choose today to step out of the darkness and into his marvelous light. And as we light this final candle, we ask you, light of the world, to light a fire within us, to burn this a part of your Christmas Eve. You know, earlier, the kids did a great job of reading the traditional Christmas story, and that's a great story. That's the big story. That's the one that we all care about on Christmas. That's what Christmas is all about, is the gift of God's Son, Jesus, the greatest gift that was ever given. But one of the things I like about that story, as we retell it over the years, is that we are actually in the habit of placing people in that story who were never a part of that story to begin with. We see this in our nativity scenes all over the place. If you go through your house or your mom's house or the front lawns of churches, we see these nativity scenes. And in those scenes, we see, of course, baby Jesus. We see Mary and Martha or Mary and Joseph, his parents. And then we see angels and we see shepherds. There's usually a donkey involved, and inevitably there's three wise men, right? And those nativities in symbol tell the story of Christmas. And it's always been interesting to me that we place the wise men at the manger of Jesus as part of the Christmas story, when in all actuality, they had nothing to do with Christmas. Not only are they not a part of the Christmas story, but they never even saw Jesus on a Christmas, let alone the first Christmas. And this is something that's always been interesting to me. It's kind of one of those little Bible facts that I've always thought was kind of neat, but I wasn't sure that it was very significant. But this year, as I was thinking about the Christmas message and rereading the Christmas story, I was reminded of this fact that we always place the wise men at Christmas, even though they weren't even a part of Christmas. And I began to reflect on that, and it became evident to me that there is something in the Christmas experience of the wise men that speaks absolutely to us and is representative of us. And so I thought we would take this Christmas Eve service, this Christmas Eve message, and focus on what Christmas meant to those wise men. I would almost say those three wise men, but we don't even know that that's true. We just traditionally say that there was three wise men because there was three gifts, but there could have been any number of wise men who came from the East. So let's look at the story of these men who came to fall on their face and worship Jesus. The only place we see the wise men is in Matthew chapter 2. So let's look at the beginning of this chapter when we miss all the time. Something that just tradition just glosses over. It's right there in the passage. It says, now after Jesus was born, this was years after Jesus was born, they come to Herod and they're looking for him, which means they were journeying to see him for a while. And it also tells us that unlike our nativity scenes reflect, they weren't at Christmas. And it's interesting to me that they weren't a part of Christmas, but that they came in later to find Jesus because for them, Christmas invited them to Jesus. They weren't a part of the first Christmas, so they didn't get to participate in seeing the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and laying in a manger. No, they weren't participants in the first Christmas. Rather, Christmas for them was an invitation to Jesus. From the east, from very far off, from Iraq, Iran, India, China, somewhere in that region, Christmas, when Jesus was born and the guiding star over Bethlehem appeared, Christmas was an invitation to the wise men to come and find Jesus. They weren't there, but they were invited by Christmas, and in that way they represent all of us. And that way they represent all of who we are. I see the wise men now as representative of the rest of the world coming to Christ after he was born. We couldn't be there for the birth. We couldn't be there to celebrate the first Christmas. But the same invitation that the wise men received is the one that we are offered, an invitation to come and find Jesus. And I think in this story, they represent all of us. All of us who couldn't be there at that very first Christmas. All of us for whom Christmas is an invitation to our Savior to come and to find Him. And so if that's true, if the wise men in the Bible represent us, and Christmas is an invitation to us that they received as well, then what can we learn from their pursuit of Christ? Well, one of the first things we see based on clues in Scripture is that they searched for Jesus for nearly two years. We see that once they got there that King Herod was an evil king and he was afraid that Jesus would be the king of the Jews and take his throne away from him. So he had all the firstborns, all the sons ages three and younger killed in Israel. Which means that their journey was at least two years long before they found Jesus. Do you understand that that means the wise men searched for Jesus for two full years at minimum before they really experienced him? Before they really were able to worship him? Before they really were able to find him? I wonder how arduous that journey was. I wonder how many times they wanted to quit. I wonder how many nights the storms that came blocked out the light that was guiding them. I wonder how many conversations they had about turning around and going home. I wonder how many people called them ridiculous for their pursuit. I wonder how long it took them to work up the courage to leave and to go. Two years is a long time to search for one thing. But I love that they had to do that. I love that they searched for Jesus for two years before they experienced him. Because that search and the arduous nature of it and the necessary persistence of it is so true to life. Some of us experience Jesus like the shepherds did that night in the meadows. In the Christmas story that the children read, we're reminded that the shepherds were keeping watch over their flocks by night. And then the angels appeared in the sky and sang to them and ushered them over to the manger so they could see this baby Savior. And for some of us, our experience with Jesus is like that. We're minding our business, tending our flocks in the fields, and angels appear to us and they sing from on high and we're whisked into the presence of Jesus and we experience it right there in that moment. And some of us have stories like that where our experience of Jesus and our understanding of him and being swept away by him was just instantaneous. But for many of us, our stories with Jesus are a lot more like the wise men. We had to search, and we had to persist, and we had to overcome discouragement. And there were times when the storms of life might block out the light that is guiding us. There may have been times where we have wanted to quit. There may be times when we wanted to walk away. We may have had discussions with those around us about just going home and saying, this is too difficult. The truth of it is, we are told in Scripture to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. We see in Scripture that there is this process where we grow closer to Jesus and that sometimes finding him is difficult. It's not that he's not there. It's not that he hides himself from us, but it's just more true to life that the search for Jesus is arduous, that it requires persistence. And it also makes me wonder about these men. How did they know to follow that light? How did they know that that star in the sky right there, that's the one, and we're going to follow that for two years. The only answer I can come up with is that to recognize the star, they had to listen to the voice of God that was in their lives. It's interesting to me that Herod and the men and women in his court could see the same star that the wise men saw. But when the wise men know that that was the star and the people in Herod's court didn't? I think the only difference is that the wise men were listening to the voice of God. I believe that Scripture teaches us that God has written himself on our souls. That our Creator God breathed in us spirit. He breathed into us the breath of life. And he gave us souls that yearn for him. He gave us souls that pine for him. He gave us souls that year. They listened to that yearning. And so they had the faith to follow the guiding light. And I'm comforted by the fact that that same yearning is written on our souls. Our souls were designed and intended to be united with Christ. Our souls yearn to be united with our Savior. And because of that, God always provides guiding lights. God always provides a flicker of hope. He always maintains a course of direction. He always beckons to us. He always invites. He never shuts the door. He never gets stamped out. His invitation never goes bad. He always shows us guiding light, sometimes in stars, sometimes in a flicker, sometimes in a pillar of fire, sometimes in a voice in our ear. But make no mistake about it, God? What did the wise men do when their journey was done and they're experiencing Jesus? Well, look at what offered Him themselves and they offered him their treasures. They immediately, haphazardly, without hesitation, offered themselves and their treasures to this baby Christ. And it wasn't, it's important to note, it wasn't out of the sense of ought. It wasn't out of obligation. It wasn't, well, I guess this is what we need to do now. It wasn't even out of a desire to placate this deity or to get God on their side or to endear Jesus to them. It wasn't for any of those things. It was this spontaneous and natural response to fall on their face and worship the creator of their soul and to rejoice that they had been united with their Savior and to offer everything that they were and everything that they had. That's the natural response when we encounter our Savior. I believe that so ardently that I would even say this. If we feel like we've experienced Jesus and our first inclination in that moment isn't to fall on our face and worship his majesty, isn't to be overwhelmed by his goodness and to celebrate his kindness, if our first response isn't to fall on our face and worship him and offer all that we have and all that we are, then we haven't yet fully experienced him. Maybe we have a notion of who he is. Maybe we have an idea or we've heard a teaching or we've seen a glimpse and our soul has lurched and responded. But if it's not this full, submissive worship, then we haven't yet experienced who Jesus is, and our search continues, and we have to keep looking for him. But I think it's interesting that we exist in this culture that ebbs and flows and is progressive and is conservative and cares about Christian values over here and over here, not so much, and sometimes it's hard to tell what those Christian values are, and we all experience this culture in different ways. But amidst all the changes in our culture over the years, Christmas stands as this guiding light every year. Every December, our culture stops and we focus on Christmas. It starts as soon as Halloween is done. Things get swept aside and we throw up the Christmas decorations and we start to decorate our house and we start to do all the things and we look forward to celebrating the holiday and Christmas music started in my house very early this year because I think 2020 needs a little extra Christmas. But if we'll sweep all the extra things away, what we see is that we live in this culture that has exalted Christmas, that God has strategically placed in the middle of our joint attention as this guiding light, as this beacon calling our souls home to Jesus. And what we have in Christmas is the same invitation that was offered to the wise men. We can't participate in the first Christmas. It's already happened, but in that light, in that star, in that very first Christmas was an invitation to come to their Savior. And the same invitation that was offered to the wise men is offered to you. It's offered to you right now, the opportunity to come and sit at the feet for whom your soul was created to desire. Now some of you have been looking forward to this all year. Some of you make it a habit to regularly sit and worship at the foot of your Savior. Some of you have been looking forward to Christmas because it allows you to celebrate the one that created you. It allows you to celebrate the one that saves you and who conquers death for you. It allows you to celebrate the one who loves you. You are already like the wise men. You have made your journey and you are experiencing Jesus and you are sitting at his feet and worshiping. And for you, I hope that this service is only a help in doing that. For others, we've tasted and we've seen. We've experienced Christ. Maybe even got glimpses of who He is. Maybe felt His warmth from time to time, but for one reason or another we've wandered off. And maybe we're a little bit further away from Him at the end of this year than we have been in previous years. Maybe we haven't paid attention to that light in a while, even as it beckons us back. My hope and prayer is that this Christmas you'll hear that invitation anew. And you'll turn and you'll take a step back towards your Savior. And you'll begin that search again. Or maybe we've never begun our search. Maybe we're like Herod in his court. And the light is there. The invitation has been extended. But we haven't been listening. So we don't hear it and we don't heed it. My prayer is that this Christmas would be the first time that you open your eyes to the beckoning of God. That you would listen to Him calling to your soul. That you would acknowledge that He is the one who created it. And that you would begin your journey towards Christ and experiencing Him. The great news is, if we seek him, we are promised that we will find him. We are told that if we ask, we will receive. That if we seek, we will find. That if we knock, the door will be opened to us. That's Jesus himself speaking to you. So my prayer this year for all of us listening is that we would heed the invitation of Christmas to come to our Savior. That this year we would take a step further in our journey. That we would take a step closer to Christ. And that all of you, whether it's right now in the service, whether it's this month, whether it's in months to come or years to come, but that all of you within the sound of my voice would have a moment where you fall at the feet of Jesus and you offer all that you are and all that you have and you worship him because you are experiencing your Savior. I hope that you know that Christmas is an invitation to do that. In just a few minutes, our great children's pastor, Erin Winston, is going to come with her family, and they're going to light the Christ candle to close out Advent. And when that flame lights on the wick, I hope that you will look at that and you will see that as God's guiding light. That you will see that as his invitation that he offered and extended to the wise men that he is extending to you in this moment to come and to be a part of Christmas and to come and to find your Savior and to know him and to fall down and worship him. I hope that you'll accept the invitation of Christmas this year. Let me pray for you. Father, thank you for always beckoning to us. Thank you for always inviting us, for always calling for us, for never giving up on us, even when we give up on you. May we, God, all who are listening, accept the invitation that you extend through the birth of your son in Christmas. May we be guided by your light. May we have the privilege of experiencing Christ. And may we be so overwhelmed by him when we find him that we fall on our feet and we worship. Father, I pray that through song and through reflection and through communion to come in this service that the rest of our time together would be a time where we sit at your feet and we worship with grateful hearts and spirits at the miracle of the invitation of Christmas. Thank you for loving us. Thank you for the greatest gift that's ever been given. It's in that gift's name we pray. Amen. are brightly shining, it is the breaks a new and glorious dawn. Fall on your knees, O hear the angel voices. O night divine, O night when Christ was born. O night, O night Oh truly he taught us to love one another. His law is love and his gospel is peace. Chains shall he break for the slave is our brother, and in his name all oppression shall cease. Sweet hymns of praise in grateful chorus raise we Let all within us praise his holy name Christ is the Lord O praise his name forever Oh is proclaim fall on your knees oh hear the angel voices When Christ was born O Holy Night O Night Divine If you have been around Grace Raleigh on Christmas Eve in the past, you know that communion is a very special part of our evening. And we wanted this year to be no different. So we're going to give you the opportunity to participate in communion at home, giving us the opportunity as a body of believers to come together in fellowship and in communion. And so if you joined us and picked up a participation bag over the last week, you received in your participation package this cute little cup. This is what we will be using during communion. If, however, you were unable to pick up a participation package or you're joining us from somewhere, a different state maybe, and don't have access, then we ask that you take a journey into your kitchen and find some juice or some wine or some bread and then come back and join us. And while you're doing that, we will walk through a little tutorial on how to best utilize these cute little cups. So first of all on our cute cups there is a pointed side and if you bend it upward you will notice that there is a piece of aluminum foil and a piece of cellophane. The first thing that we want to do is take the piece of cellophane off. Underneath there, you will find your wafer or your bread, which we will use later. The next step is to then take your edge and to pull it back ever so slowly. And I caution you to do it slowly because if you just rip it off, you're liable to baptize the person sitting next to you or end up with a beautiful grape juice stain on your pretty carpet. So ever so slowly, pull back on the aluminum foil and you will reveal the juice that we will use in communion. And so now, I hope that those who have gone to the kitchen have returned. You have had the opportunity to open your elements. And now I'd like to prepare our hearts for this moment of communion by reading a piece of scripture from 1 Corinthians chapter 11, verse 23 through 26. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is the body of Christ broken for you. Take and eat. The blood of Christ shed for you. Take and drink. And now I'd like to take the opportunity to pray for us. Heavenly Father, thank you. Thank you for moments like this when we have the opportunity to remember who you are and the sacrifices that you gave for us. Thank you also, Lord, that you give us the opportunity to come together as a body of believers. Even though we are separated and in our homes, we still feel that communion with you and with each other. And thank you, Lord, most of all, for loving us so much that you sent us your son on this very, very special night. And Lord, we love you. And it's in your son's most holy name that we pray. Amen. And now I would like to invite my family to join me on stage as we light the Advent candle. John 1, 1 through 5. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made. Without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Tonight we light the final candle of Advent, the Christ candle. This candle represents the light of life. It is the same light that we began talking about on that first Sunday of Advent when we spoke of this light crashing into the darkness of the world with the arrival of Jesus. It is his arrival, it is this precious child and the promised king that invites us to seek him, to follow him, and to become people who walk in and share his light. So therefore, go into the world with great joy, love, hope, and peace, knowing that he is with you on and go ahead and light them. Now, normally the worship team would sing Silent Night, but this year, being so strange, I thought it was fitting to show what it was like singing Silent Night last year. So here's some footage of Grace singing Silent Night in 2019, and we hope that in 2021, we can all be together again. Merry Christmas. All is calm, all is bright Round yon virgin, mother and child Holy infant so tender and mild, Sleep in heavenly peace. Sleep in heavenly peace. Silent night, holy night, shepherds quake at the sight. Glories stream from heaven afar. Heavenly hosts sing alleluia. All sing hallelujah. Christ the Savior is born. Christ the Savior is born. Silent night, holy night. Son of God, love's pure light radiant peace from thy holy face with the dawn of redeeming grace Jesus Lord at thy birth Jesus Lord at thy birth Jesus Lord Merry Christmas, everyone. Heavenly Father, this has been a difficult year, a year fraught with challenges, hardships, isolation, tension, anger, and uncertainty. We know, Father, that you have seen your church and your people through more trying times, but for us, this year was hard. It was unlike any we've known. Yet in your word, you tell us to behold, for you are doing a new thing. You tell us that you make paths through the wilderness and streams in the desert. So even though at first glance it seems this year is one defined by pain and uncertainty, even though it may feel like we've been left alone to wander, God, we know that you are doing new things. You've done new things in the families of grace, allowing us to welcome new blessings into our homes. You've enabled couples to experience the life-giving fullness of holding their child for the first time. You've made it possible for children to feel the sense of privilege and responsibility that comes with being an older brother or sister. We see new things as this dark year has been brightened by announcements of children yet to come and blessings yet to experience. Even in a season of profound isolation, you've orchestrated the lives of those you love for our pleasure and your glory as parents saw the personification of years of prayers in the marriages you formed this year. We saw baptisms to celebrate and new families to welcome and small groups that tenaciously persisted. We do not deny that this year was trying and even for some of us, marked by loss. But we also acknowledge in that loss the years of profound gratitude for the time shared with those we love so much. More than that, we know that Christmas carries with it a promise that we will see them again. As this unique year comes to a close, we are more certain than ever of your presence and your goodness, bringing us together in socially distant circles and parking lots and driveways and backyards and drive-by birthday parties. Father, you've brushed away the fog of pain and uncertainty with moments of laughter and joy. We remember you on our soccer fields and baseball fields and Zoom calls and family outings and see you in the blessing of soul-warming friendships. After all that, we say thank you to our good Father. Thank you for the blessings in the midst of our struggles. Thank you for always making new paths for your children. Thank you for 2020 and all the new things it held and the future hope it has preserved. Amen. you

Good morning. My name's Doug Bergeson. I'm a partner here at Grace, and I'm going to start off this morning by giving you all a very, very special treat. I'm going to sing a song from my childhood that some of you will be familiar with. Although I can't remember what I did yesterday, for some reason, this song that I learned in Sunday school when I was only four or five years old remains etched in my memory crystal clear. So here goes. You might want to say a quick prayer for me, but here goes. Oh, the wise man built his house upon the rock. The wise man built his house upon the rock. The wise man built his house upon the rock. And the rains came a-tumbling down. Oh, the rains came down and the floods came up. The rains came down and the floods came up. Sing along if you know this next chorus. Oh, the foolish man built his house upon the sand. The foolish man built his house upon the sand. The foolish man built his house upon the sand. And the rains came a-tumbling down. Oh, the rains came down and the floods came up. The rains came down and the floods came up. Splat! Now, if you can overlook the singing, you might be thinking, aw, that's a cute little Sunday school ditty. But of course, it's much more than that, as its lyrics are lifted directly from Scripture. And even more than that, they come straight from the mouth of Jesus. It's a reading from Matthew chapter 7. The streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and theining the way you relate to God, and we're reading this book together, to answer that most central of questions. What does it mean to build one's house on the rock? And while the book doesn't use that exact language, that's precisely what the author in this sermon series are doing as we explore the many ways in which we relate to God. How we try to build our house, our lives, on the rock. If you've heard either of the last two weeks' sermons or are reading along in the book, you know that the author sets the table for where he's trying to take us as readers by describing the primary postures that many of us adopt in our relationship with God. The four postures are life under God, life over God, life from God, and life for God. In his introduction, the author Sky Jathani describes a scene at a 1,500-year-old Roman tomb in Italy where tourists are ushered in to the dark, unable to see the reason they came in the first place. A vaulted ceiling covered in an exquisite mosaic that depicts Jesus as the good shepherd, surrounded by sheep in a starry paradise. However, if one is patient, a light will eventually come on, illuminating the mosaic for just a few seconds before returning to darkness. Each time that light comes on, the visitors are given another glimpse of the world behind the shadows. And just like when the lights come on in the tomb, each of these four postures give us one perspective, one angle of what life with God is like, but it's not the full picture. Standing alone, each of these postures will give a distorted view. This matters a lot because the postures we adopt, that lens through which we view our relationship with God, is critical. And it is that view, that lens, which drives what we expect out of our relationship. And this is where the book is dead on. As what we expect has an enormous and defining impact on how each of us experiences life as a Christian. And it's especially tricky because not only do all four postures contain elements of truth, some more than others, but all four also find some basis and support in Scripture. So unless you don't mind being surprised, disappointed, and disillusioned with the Christian experience, we need to make sure that our expectations match up with what the full testimony of Scripture teaches us to expect, allowing it to properly inform, set boundaries and limits, and provide context for when each of these postures is appropriate in some measure and when they're not. When Jesus came to earth, his message was incredibly radical and countercultural, a message which challenged everyone and flipped the status quo completely on its head. But as the author of our book points out, in the ensuing 2,000 years, we've learned to cope with that message quite well by slowly but surely co-opting Jesus and his message, making him more like us, reflecting our priorities and desires, and less like him. I'm reminded of the chorus from the old Linkin Park song, Numb. All I want to do is be more like me and be less like you. That's not a very good impression of Linkin Park, but whatever. For many, it's morphed into a spiritual Rorschach test. In determining what our relationship with God should be like, we see whatever we want to see. And inevitably, we tend to assume that what we want for our lives is what God must want for our lives. And this assumption that what we want for our lives is what God must want for our lives is especially true of the third posture that we're looking at this morning, life from God. Now let me first say that for those of us who believe in Jesus as Lord and Savior, life, of course, does come from God. But what does that mean exactly? Our author defines the essence of the life from God posture as a relationship in which we are more interested in what God can do for us and how he might bless us than we're interested in actually knowing him. A relationship whose primary value is to help us solve our problems and navigate through life's challenges to achieve what we want. This posture is most often and most easily criticized when it's taken to an extreme, commonly referred to as the health and wealth or prosperity gospel. Growing up in Chicago in the 1960s and early 70s, I would sometimes listen on Sunday night to Reverend Ike's radio broadcast. His unrelenting and super upbeat message was that God wanted to bless each and every one of us right now in this life. His sayings included, God doesn't want you to have your pie in the sky by and by when you die. He wants you to have it now with the cherry on top. Or, he added this, you don't have to wait for the pearly gate. Reverend Ike also claimed good health is my divine right. And I remember him saying that God wanted me to have a Cadillac and that he had nine or so, enthusiastically adding, my garages runneth over. Although easy to do, it's not my intent to mock and refute such extremes because I don't think most of us fall into that camp. Furthermore, my complaint with the life from God posture isn't that it's wrong to want God's blessings. It's not. The Bible constantly encourages us to desire God's blessings. Rather, this morning, I'm going to take a different tact than our author in critiquing this posture. As I stated earlier, life is from God, but that's often misunderstood in the life from God posture in two primary ways. The first thing to realize is that God has already blessed us. An implicit premise of the life from God posture is that we have to do certain things and behave certain ways to somehow curry God's favor and procure his blessings in our lives. Whereas in fact, the Bible is abundantly clear that God's plan was to always bless us. Before the foundation of the universe was laid, God's intent was to bless us through his son, Jesus Christ. Before any of us lifted a finger or did anything good or bad, God was blessing us. As the Apostle Paul stated in Romans, but God demonstrates his own love for us in this. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. It's like a gift from Amazon that's already been delivered. We don't have to convince someone to send it. We don't have to help order it. The gift has already been given. It's already been sent. It's already been delivered. In fact, it's already sitting on our front porch. All we have to do is open our front door and bring it inside. The life from God posture assumes blessing is transactional. But it was all God. No transaction. As the disciple John wrote, we love him because he first loved us. So the first major misunderstanding of the life from God posture is the notion that we need to get God on our side, working on our behalf. Truth is, he's always been on our side. Before time began, he was on our side. Our job isn't to get God to bless us, but to trust that he already has and will continue to do so. The second big misunderstanding of the life from God posture and what I'll spend the remainder of our time on this morning is the very concept of what constitutes a blessing from God. What does being blessed by God actually look like in our lives? And it's here that the life from God posture in a community of faith like ours operates much more subtly than extremes like Reverend Ike. Yet, it can still wreak havoc by creating expectations which aren't validated in Scripture. Life from God is seductive and appealing because it posits that Christianity is worthwhile because of the way it blesses me. Life just goes better as a believer. But again, what does that even mean? That's the $64,000 question. What does being blessed by God look like in the here and now? Particularly in more affluent societies, the tendency is to think that God wants the exact same things for us that we want for us. And my guess is that's how life from God posture subtly impacts us here at Grace. Although I doubt many of us genuinely believe that being blessed by God involves a bunch of Cadillacs or perfect health or a problem-free life, I would bet that for many of us, God's help and blessing correspond pretty closely to what we think is important. A good family, good health, happiness, comfort, professional success. I could go on and on. So in the next few minutes, I'm going to challenge our conventional understanding of blessing. And if what I have to say rubs you the wrong way, then I'm probably on to something. Although we can learn about God by observing the world he created, God's most intentional and fullest revelation is to be found in Jesus Christ. Jesus was God's best self-revelation, representing in his person and ministry the true nature of God. And as the original book about Jesus Christ, the Bible, both the Old and New Testaments together, is referred to as God's special revelation. So God chose to reveal himself through the written word. And more specifically than that, he chose to do it through a story. A great, sweeping, complex, long, and remarkable story unfolding down through the ages. And as a story, the Bible is really the opposite of a textbook or a theological dictionary. You can't go to chapter 7 and read all that is said about faith. There is no concise, complete treatment of all that is meant by salvation. We might prefer Wikipedia, where we can learn all we need to know in a few short paragraphs, and that can be helpful at times, but that's not the Bible. A story has plot and characters and a variety of storylines that emerge and develop over time. A story can capture the full range of the human experience, providing a richness and depth that simply can't be matched by a more systematic description of principles and concepts. Nuance, mystery, contradiction, paradox, tension, all are part of great storytelling and all are indelible elements of real life. Although I'd been a Christian most of my life, it was only about 20 years ago that I began viewing the Bible first and foremost as one magnificent and seamless story of God and his love for his creation. And I haven't looked back. I'd go even further and say that I believe it is imperative for all of us to approach and understand the Bible in this light. But not because that's my preference or because I say so, but because that's how God chose to do it. And in the Bible, God reveals his purposes and plans slowly and deliberately over time. A progression takes place. Concepts are first introduced in ways that the original audiences and later day readers, such as ourselves, might be better able to get their arms around and understand. But over the course of the story, a certain development, an expansion of the concept takes place until it reaches its fulfillment and climax in the New Testament. As an example, I've often thought that if you were new to Christianity and were just airdropped in on a Sunday morning and heard the story of Jesus in isolation, how weird and bizarre must it seem that Jesus had to die for us. But as you start reading at the beginning in Genesis, one is introduced early on to the idea that God saves by substitution. Something else dies for us instead of us on our behalf. It begins modestly with the story of Abraham and Isaac and is developed and expanded further in God's dealings with his chosen people, the Israelites. But it reaches its fulfillment and stunning climax in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God. Vaughn Roberts, in his book, God's Big Picture, illustrates the value of progressive revelation in this way. A century ago, a father promises his son that he will give him a horse on his 21st birthday. Cars are subsequently invented, and so when the birthday finally comes, the boy is given a car instead of a horse. The promise has still been fulfilled, but not literally. The father could not have promised his son a car because neither could have understood the concept. In a similar way, God made his promises to Israel in ways they could understand. He used categories they were familiar with, such as the nation, the temple, and material prosperity in the land. But the fulfillment breaks the boundaries of those categories. To expect a literal fulfillment is to miss the point. Here are just three quick examples. God uses evil for good, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat to ultimately accomplish his purposes. In Genesis, Joseph's brothers can't stand him and sell him into slavery. But years later, Joseph has risen to a position of such power in Egypt that he is able to save his entire family from famine and keep alive the promises God had made to his ancestors. A fortuitous turn of events to be sure, but that's just a horse. When God's only son, Jesus, comes to earth in human form and is crucified by evil men, but through his unjust and wrongful death redeems the world for all eternity, that's an automobile. God's people wanted a king, and God gave them kings. But even the best, like David, failed and disappointed. That's a horse. But a king who will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace, and who will reign with perfect justice and righteousness forever and ever, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Now that's an automobile. When God redeems his people out of slavery in Egypt and then promises to dwell with them, first in the tabernacle in the desert and then behind the curtain in the Holy of Holies in the temple in Jerusalem. That's something spectacular, but it's still just a horse. But when God redeems us from slavery to sin and death, offering us life through his son Jesus Christ, and God's Holy Spirit takes up residence in the individual human heart, and we, like living stones, are built into a spiritual house where God now dwells, that's an automobile. I explain all this because it's so relevant for our purpose this morning in looking at the life from God posture. For another big concept that undergoes radical development and evolution over the course of the Bible is the idea of how God blesses us. In fact, it evolves so much that by the time Jesus comes and the fullness of God and his redemptive plan is revealed, it's hard to even recognize what God now considers to be a blessing as it's been turned completely upside down. No longer is blessing what might make us happy or healthy or comfortable or successful or respected or understood or liked or safe. Rather, a blessing is anything that moves our hearts and minds to a place more receptive to God's grace. Anything can be a blessing if it helps to convince us of our desperate need for a Savior. Virtually anything can be a blessing if it helps better prepare and position us for eternity. Now, there is no verse that explicitly says that in so many words. But as you move along the biblical narrative, as God's magnificent story of love and redemption continues to unfold, it becomes abundantly clear that this is the case. Certainly, there were times earlier in the story when God did bless his people and reward their obedience and trust in ways that they and we would clearly understand and to which we can all relate. The Israelite sandals didn't wear out in the desert. God gave them food and clothing and so many descendants that they would rival the stars in the sky. A promised land flowing with milk and honey. Military victory, prosperity, long life, and peace. And this makes perfect sense, as God had to convince a primitive people some 3,500 years ago, who had little else to go on, that this particular God was the one you wanted to hitch your wagon to. Blessing them in immediate, temporal, and tangible ways was essential in order to build trust. But as the story goes on, and as God always knew, the power of sin would prove to be too strong. God's material blessings did not draw Israel closer to him, did not make them more inclined to trust, and in fact often had the opposite effect. More needed to be done. And before too long, the entire biblical narrative starts changing from a temporal vantage point, if I obey and if I trust, I will enjoy peace and prosperity, victory and long life, to an eternal perspective and a future hope. As you read on, it's as if your eyes are forced to look up into the distance, start to realize that what happens in this life is not the goal. It's not the be all and end all. What happens is as important, but only as it impacts eternity. God's endgame lies in the future. Children, land, prosperity, and peace in the present, that's a horse. Eternity with God, that's a big old fancy automobile. And by the time we get to the New Testament, the entire tone and tenor of Scripture is remarkably unimpressed with the kind of things we typically consider blessings and focuses entirely on how this life is getting us ready and how we might help others get ready for eternity. Although we should be thankful for great relationships, loving family, friends, health, material comfort, peace and safety, it's in the absence of one or more of these things that we are most acutely aware of our brokenness, of our lack of control, of our need to build our house on the firm foundation of the one and only one who actually is in control. And because of that, God simply is far less concerned about our momentary comfort, happiness, and success than are we. We do our faith no favors when we think of blessing predominantly in terms of what our culture and our world say it is. If you think this is how God blesses you, you are setting yourself up for disappointment. Yes, we should be pleased and thankful to God when things go well. But to be honest, good things seem to happen as much to people who don't follow Christ as those who do. Success, comfort, wealth, health, happy marriages, well-adjusted kids, best as I can tell, don't fall disproportionately on believers. Anything that helps prepare us for eternity, anything that helps us move to a posture receptive to God's love and grace, any circumstance that conveys to us our desperate need for a Savior, in God's eyes, can serve as a blessing. On the flip side, anything we normally would consider a blessing turns out not really to be a blessing, not if it works against God's purposes. And of course, the rub is that a great many of the things we associate with being blessed do not prepare our hearts and minds for eternity. Even such universally desirable things as good health, a good job, a good marriage, a good family cease to be blessings if they undermine our sense of need for God, if they lead to arrogance and pride, to a sense of independence and self-sufficiency. If our success and good fortune draw us away from God and not towards Him, then these otherwise good things have become, to use a good Old Testament word, snares. I'm going to read just a few verses from Deuteronomy 8. these decrees that I'm giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You may say to yourself, my power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me. And that's exactly what did happen. Sound familiar? It does to me. In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul conveyed the same message, reading from 1 Corinthians 4. that we feel a greater sense of our need for God when things are difficult than when they're easy. Struggles and sorrow, tragedy and injustice are uniquely effective at disabusing us of any thought that we are in control, uniquely effective at reminding us of our insufficiency, brokenness, and desperate need. Yet so many times we question and agonize and wring our hands as to why a so-called loving God would allow a fallen world with so much sadness and evil injustice and injustice. Is it any wonder? Is it really that big of a mystery? Why are we surprised? It's my conviction that a fallen world was always part of God's plan, in part, precisely so that we would struggle. Again, it's that pattern of God using evil for good, how he uses our fallen world to accomplish his purposes, drawing a lost humanity back to himself. The pivotal question for each of us this morning is, when crummy things happen in our lives that do not look or feel anything like blessings, how do we respond? Do they move us to a place of trust or a place of despair? We have a decisive role to play if there's to be any redemptive value in our crummy circumstances. If we do not take advantage of them as opportunities to trust, we run the risk of rendering them meaningless, leaving them just crummy. So when we talk about the posture, life from God, and when we expect to enjoy God's promised blessings, we better understand in what form these blessings might come and over what time horizon they might pay dividends and how best we might respond in faith and trust so that God can actually use those things for good in our lives and the lives of others. I'm going to close this morning with the tiny book of Habakkuk in the Old Testament. Just for curiosity's sake, during these last six months of the pandemic, how many of you have read the book? Let me see a show of hands. I'm just kidding. I already know the answer. Zero. Approximately zero of you have read Habakkuk. Yet Habakkuk is a perfect example. I'm just kidding. I wouldn't have read it if I hadn't been asked to preach, so I'm not casting any dispersions. Yet Habakkuk is a perfect exclamation point for my message this morning of how God blesses and how he operates and what building one's house on the rock really looks like. It's a far cry from the life from God posture as commonly understood by most of us. The book of Habakkuk consists entirely of a short dialogue between Habakkuk the prophet and God. It begins with the prophet complaining to God of how it seems that all the violence and justice and strife that's running rampant in his country of Judah goes unpunished. Why is God tolerating it? God responds by saying, No worries, Habakkuk. I'm raising up the Babylonians, those fiercest and most dreaded of peoples, guilty men whose strength is their own God to swoop in and devour Judah. Upon hearing that, the prophet is flabbergasted and even more of a tizzy, complaining even further to God. What? You've got to be kidding me. How can you allow such a wicked and godless nation to swallow up those more righteous than themselves? You're blowing my mind. Then the Lord answered the prophet a second time. Let me worry about the Babylonians. They will get theirs in due time. However, you, Habakkuk, need to be patient and wait for my appointed time. Though it may linger, it will certainly come. But as for you right now, the righteous will live by faith. It made no sense to him. Nothing he heard was assuring. Nothing seemed fair. But in that moment, Habakkuk leaned in and chose to trust. Listen to his closing words. I heard and my heart pounded. My lips quivered at the sound. Decay crept into my bones and my legs trembled. Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us. Though the fig tree does not bud, Verse 1. and no cattle in the stalls. Yet I rejoice in the Lord. I will be joyful in God my Savior. The sovereign Lord is my strength. He makes my feet like the feet of a deer. He enables me to go on the heights. Although he was not happy with what he had heard and thought it violent, unjust, and unloving, Habakkuk moved towards God rather than away, convinced that his God was both able and willing to do the right thing regardless of whether he himself could understand, an abiding trust that God was not only in control, but was also the ultimate victor. And in that moment, Habakkuk was being blessed, all circumstances to the contrary, prepared for an eternity with the God who loves him. That is where the rubber truly meets the road. Even when you can't necessarily see God's goodness or understand his purposes in the middle of the mess, when everything is shrouded in mystery and confusion, do you choose to trust? Do you believe that no matter what seems to be happening at any given moment in this life, that God has already won the victory and always has our best interests at heart? Building one's house on the rock is resting in that knowledge. I began this morning by singing a song about the wise man who built his house upon the rock. It's important to note that it doesn't go, oh, the wise man built his house upon the rock. The wise man built his house upon the rock. The wise man built his house upon the rock. And before I pray, I'd like to invite Steve and Lisa back up here as we continue to worship. But please bow your heads. Dear Lord, thank you for this morning. I pray that you'll convict each one of us and help each one of us understand just how desperately you love us and the extravagant lengths you went to to make it possible for us to be yours. Help us to know that despite the fact that we live in a world where sorrow and unhappiness and disappointment are part and parcel to our daily experience. I pray that we'll be grounded in the fact that you love us and always have our best interest at heart. And we thank you for making it possible for us to have an eternity with you. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.