Born Again
The Rest of The Christmas Story
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good evening I got that right every year I almost say good morning because that's what I do all the other weeks all right we're good I think maybe I should just stop now while I'm ahead right merry Christmas we can say that right Merry Christmas all right so a couple of items before I begin today or tonight this evening we do not have kids church or child care so it's kind of a nice thing that so many young families are migrating down here to Naples Southwest Florida but the thing is some of their families aren't so they come down here and during Christmas they go back up north kind of a bad time to do that with the weather and visit their families so all of our kids volunteers are out of town so what we've done if you have a little one who might be a little noisy if you go straight across the lobby we've just left the kids area open for you and I've made sure that they stream the service the messages being streamed in there so just go straight across if you need help Ed up here he'll show you just bother him or anybody carolees back there I think she'll yeah she'll help you also all the way down that hallway they can show you where the theater Black Box room is there's a big screen like this one in there and you can watch it in there if you think the kids are going to be noisy or you can take your chances and here's the thing going to warn you about this because I heard a story about a young boy whose parents insisted that he stay in the service he was doing pretty good it was Christmas Eve and the pastor began to tell the story we're going to tell kind of the rest of the Christmas story what happens before Jesus is born you see there's John the Baptist first and you have Elizabeth and Zechariah they're very old well he's a priest and he's in the temple and he's burning incense and then Angel Gabriel shows up and he says you're going to have a son John now Zechariah doesn't believe him and for the lack of belief he makes him mute the father can't speak until after John is born so now this boy is paying attention and you see remember well if you're you're not new here you know I've been talking about bickering during the holiday season a lot of families fighting bicker and so this boy all the way to church had been exposed to bickering his parents were going back and forth and at it and he didn't have the Sony Walkman like I said I had when I was a kid to save him from it so he had to listen to all the bickering so his kids listening to how the fathers made mute and out loud to the whole church he says I want Gabriel to come to our house this year so you've been warned you've been warned at your own risk so we are going to continue actually in our series we're in the middle of a series if you're new and you're visiting call the rest of the story and as a church what we decided to do a while back is look at all the accounts of the Bible do the whole Bible every gritty detail and we're seeing that even people have been in church their whole lives they're like are you kidding me that's in there I'm like yeah there's some pretty crazy stuff and I'm going to talk about it today a little bit but we are landing right in the New Testament today in the series coincidence I think not so we're in the New Testament we just finished the Old Testament it seems like we've been in the Old Testament for like three years but it's probably a year and a half it's been a long time we're working our way through it and one of the things we're we're doing and we've been talking about as a church is that for our Christmas services and things like that and I got called out for using the prefix menu analogy right so I'm not going to do that again but we're going to show you who we are the problem with a lot of Christmas services is that people come to them and the regular members are like uh here we go like the prefix menu if you really like your favorite restaurant but the people who come they may decide to come the next Sunday no service tomorrow at 10 A.M New Year's oh yeah yes New Year's Day right the first we'll see who shows up so the first it's a 10 a.m service you should be able to make it by then but they show up and here's what they do they're like 20 minute Mark of the sermon why is the pastor still talking we don't know these songs it's so different so this is who we are we're going to stay right in our series I'm going to tell you the rest of the Christmas story today it's gonna be fun the only two things that are a little bit different is this shirt this is my Christmas shirt and now with the weather here I wish I got the flannel one that's just saying this is like a very thin Fabric and it's cold but I'll warm up because I move around a lot so so the child care the shirt and we usually feed everyone after the service that's what we're about we're about the word while we're here this is about the word we are dedicated to this but we love Gathering Together We love eating together we're a family church we want to get to know you so it's a lot of fun and if I go a little long we feed you you'll live it's going to be great but we're not going to go that long today so today we find ourselves in the New Testament so let's hop right in now I've explained to you guys before that the Bible is not in chronological order you kind of got to hop around a lot so right at the beginning of the New Testament you have four gospel accounts so these are four accounts of really kind of the same thing the life and Ministry of Jesus Christ but they're told by four different people from kind of four different aspects so they're not contradictions what we end up with they're just different perspectives they give us different details and that's a good thing so you see here doing it chronologically if you know anything about the Bible John is not the first book of the New Testament it's the force but why is it at the beginning well I'm going to show you so let's hop right in oh look at John 1 in the beginning so look what it says here John 1 1. in the beginning the word already existed the word was with God and the Word was God he existed in the beginning with God God created everything through him and nothing was created except through him the word gave life to everything that was created and his life brought light to everyone the light shines in the darkness and the Darkness can never extinguish it and then there's a whole bunch of Lord Lord of the Rings writing right there it's really weird right that's ancient Greek now there's a reason I put that up there not that I expect anybody except maybe a pastor or two or my Greek friends watching online to read that but here's the thing if you know the bible really well or maybe you have a more traditional version you might have recognize John 1 1 and go well it's a little different so we are in a one-room schoolhouse and I like it so that everyone can understand it no matter how old you are or what your reading level so usually on a Sunday I'll preach from an easy to read version so you get the point and then a Bible study that follows no bible study this Wednesday but there's usually Bible study Wednesday then we get a little more technical and here's the thing sometimes I'll get guys that come in especially when they don't like what I say and they'll go what version of the Bible was that it's like the made up one that you disagree with I don't know but if they come in and they're like well this is the best translation of the Bible and I did that when I was in Pastor school and I was really arrogant and conceited so it's wearing off but anyway you know and I say this is the best translation in the Bible so now what I hit him with is that I know some Greek I go no that is can you read that no shh quiet sit down so what you want to do you want to go to those more technical translations or you really do if you're preaching you want to know the Greek you want to be familiar with it because if you're making a theological point it's important because some of the easy to read versions they'll go off a tiny bit they don't get the story wrong they're just there to help you to understand what's going on you want to get technical you got to go technical but I'll translate that for you essentially it is like this in the beginning was the word now you understand the word is Jesus the word can be the word of God or the word can be Jesus and this is what John is saying here in the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and the Word was God this one was in the beginning with God all things came into being through him and apart from him not one thing became came into being that has come into being in him was life and the life was the light of humanity and through upon so it's like think anthropology not the store the people and the light shines in the darkness you've got the Shoppers here and the Darkness did not overcome or comprehend it right you're just getting that that's cool all right yes I get dragged to them all once in a while so the word is Jesus Jesus existed in the beginning he's God Christians we worship a Triune God like the song Father Son Holy Spirit in the beginning in fact he is in the very beginning of the Bible you get a trinity you get a plurality there Genesis 2 so the holy spirit is right there hovering over the waters in creation right and say God says let us make man in our image in our likeness plurality in the garden you might know the story right about that's not an apple necessarily but so Eve they want to rob from God from the Tree of knowledge of Good and Evil to be like God so they take from that tree right then they get in trouble so they hear God coming and it says this we'll put it on the screen Genesis 3 8 when the cool evening breezes were blowing the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in their Garden so they hid from the Lord God Among the trees some Scholars call this a theophany it's when God takes on some kind of physical human appearance to man you could think of it as a christophany a pre-figure of the Incarnate fancy Jesus right so Jesus is going to come in the flesh but it's a pre-figure of that maybe foreshadowing would be a word but it's a picture of Jesus in the Old Testament when you get to the New Testament after Jesus rises from the dead on the Emmaus Road he runs into some people he has a conversation and here's what it says then Jesus took them through the writings of Moses and all the prophets explaining from all the scriptures the things concerning himself Moses Genesis that's all the way in the beginning he's going this is me this is me this is me this is me this is me from the garden through the prophets Jesus existed and so it's appropriate thinking and if you're new and people are like this is the god of the Old Testament this is the god of the new wrong Jesus Christ is the same yesterday today and forever he's never separated from himself that's bad thinking so in the prophets they're speaking on behalf of the Lord the Lord is Jesus so you is the same beginning and the end and if you read Revelation he doesn't really change that much you probably should so what we celebrate today is the arrival of Emmanuel God With Us the Incarnation so this is Jesus's birth In the Flesh so he's coming and as the song said becoming like us now when we keep going chronologically put the chart up we're going to run into some genealogies and this is what Matthew starts with so these are the parts that nobody reads but I'll show you later they're kind of important so think of it like Jesus's family tree and so Matthew's going one direction to get to Jesus from Abraham to Jesus and Luke is going the other way from Jesus all the way to Adam showing that he's from the line of David as they say even back to Abraham even back to Adam but today I'm going to show you the rest of the Christmas story what we're going to do is we're going to overview what is typically taught this time of year and I want to show you some features like in that genealogy of things that people don't normally point out so in this series we've talked about John the Baptist a little bit and I mentioned him earlier in the joke so he is the one he's the messiah's herald he's going to be pointing the way to the Lord preparing the hearts for the Lord preparing a path for the Lord so Luke gives us a brief introduction and after that we have John the Baptist and Jesus's birth foretold so you get that whole thing with Zechariah and Gabriel he's at the end sense Altar and so he sees him he's scared but he tells them you're going to have a son no way man we're too old shut up and so he he's muted just like that that's exactly how it happened and so he's muted he can't speak right but he's told that John his son is going to come with the power of Elijah so you might remember that from the series The Spirit and power of Elijah he's going to prepare hearts for the Lord pretty big deal he comes out of the temple he can't talk right just like that and they're like what what something crazy must have happened yeah so what's worth noting here and this is kind of interesting because another thing people say about the Holy Spirit right he he somehow arrives and is born on Pentecost right wrong that's the wrong answer there's no less than four mentions of the Holy Spirit like indwelling people or empowering people in the first chapter of Luke it's amazing and then again when we get to the second chapter so you pay attention to that so John it says will be filled with the Holy Spirit really interesting so if we continue along we see Elizabeth and Mary come into the picture so Zechariah Elizabeth Elizabeth indeed gets pregnant so she like kind of goes away for five months hidden for five months then Gabriel decides to visit Mary in the sixth month of her relative we don't know about the cousin thing relative so Elizabeth so it's a six month of pregnancy Gabriel comes to marry and then lets her know you're going to conceive you're going to have a child she's like how I'm a virgin right because I didn't do anything to cause that no you're conceive by the power of the Holy Spirit amazing so that's where you get that let it be unto me no Paul McCartney wrote the song about his mom it's not about Mary but Mary does say something like that anyway moving on when Mary sees Elizabeth John hears it in Elizabeth's womb and he leaps for join it says that Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit she remains there for three months she basically has this song of Praise that is called if you're in traditional Church The Magnificat it's like this big song of Praise kind of like Hannah's Prayer in Samuel if we keep moving along we get the birth of John it's now the Eighth Day and according to the law of Moses he's supposed to be circumcised they ask Elizabeth what are you going to name him John no way no one in your family isn't name him Zechariah so they asked Zechariah but right so they get him a Writing Tablet his name is John and so they name him John and Presto he can speak this is what he says Luke 1 67 then John's father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and gave this prophecy praise the Lord the god of Israel because he has visited and redeemed his people he has sent us a mighty savior from the Royal line of his servant David just as he promised through his holy prophets long ago now we will be saved from our enemies and from all who hate us he has been merciful to our ancestors by remembering his sacred Covenant the Covenant he swore with an oath to our ancestor Abraham we have been read rescued from her enemies so we can serve god without fear and Holiness and righteousness for as long as we live this is about Jesus then directs the attention to John and you my little son will be called the prophet of the most high because you will prepare the way for the Lord you will tell his people how to find Salvation through forgiveness of their sins because of God's tender Mercy the Morning Light from Heaven is about to break upon us to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death and to guide us to the path of peace prophecy if we go back to the Old Testament we'll see a prophecy about this I want to connect some things for you so context is difficult I'll just give it to you quickly it's about King ahaz and he's worried about the king of Israel Pekka and the king of Syria reason to come they're coming to attack him he's worried about it and the prophet Isaiah is saying don't worry about it your line is going to continue that is the context look ask for a sign he's like I don't want to test God we've talked about that but Isaiah says no just anything so here's this prophecy Isaiah 7 14. all right then the Lord himself will give you the sign look the Virgin will conceive a child she will give birth to his son and we'll call him Emmanuel which means God is with us so ahaz who this is being said to is in the genealogy the family tree of Jesus it's an assurance that his line will continue and indeed it does miraculously until the Messiah comes so this happens and if we continue reading in Matthew we find out how Matthew 1 18. this is how Jesus the Messiah was born his mother Mary was engaged to be married to Joseph but before the marriage took place while she was still a virgin she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit Joseph to whom she was engaged was a righteous man and did not want to disgrace her publicly so he decided to break the engagement quietly so you know just think about this for one second as we just pause on that verse so he's a nice guy it's saying why well maybe they haven't consummated the marriage or anything and she's like yeah I'm pregnant right by the power of the holy spirit it's totally cool right so as he considered this an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream Joseph son of David the angel said do not be afraid to take Mary is your wife for the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit and she will have a son and you will name him Jesus for he will save his people from their sins all of this occurred to fulfill the Lord's message through his Prophet look the Virgin will conceive a child she will give birth to his son and they will call him Emmanuel which means God is with us and so just a little note for you nerds out there this is the Greek Old Testament not the Hebrew that is being quoted here when Joseph woke up he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife but he did not have sexual relations with her until her son was born and Joseph named him Jesus now you get a little bit of parallel but a different perspective if we go back to Luke Luke 2 1. at that time the Roman Emperor Augustus decreed that his census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire this was the first census taken when quirinius was governor of Syria all returned to their own ancestral towns to register for the census and because Joseph was a descendant of King David he had to go to Bethlehem and Judea David's ancient home he traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Galilee he took with him Mary to whom he was engaged who is now expecting a child and why they were there the time came for her baby to be born she gave birth to her firstborn son she wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a Manger because there was no lodging of available for them so now if we go back to John we get the theological Viewpoint John 1 10. Jesus came into the very world he created but the world didn't recognize him he came to his own people and even they rejected him but to all who believed him and accepted him he gave the right to become children of God they're reborn not where the physical birth resulting from Human passion or plan but a birth that comes from God so the word became human and made his home among us he was full of unfailing love and faithfulness and we have seen his glory the glory of the father's one and only son now we continue we get the Shepherds and the angels a lot of you know this Luke 2 8 that night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby guarding their flocks of sheep suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared among them and the radiance of the Lord's Glory surrounded them they were terrified but the angel reassured them don't be afraid he said I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people the Savior yes the Messiah the Lord has been born today in Bethlehem the city of David and you will recognize him by this sign you will find a baby rat Snuggly in strips of cloth lying in a Manger suddenly the angel was joined by a vast host of others armies of Heaven the armies of Heaven praising God and saying glory to God in the highest heaven and peace on Earth to those with whom God is pleased when the Angels had returned to heaven the shepherd said to each other let's go to Bethlehem let's see this thing that has happened which the Lord has told us about they hurried to the village and found Mary and Joseph and there was the baby lying in the manger after seeing him the Shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child all who heard the shepherd's story were astonished but Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them often the Shepherds went back to their flocks glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen it was just as the angel had told them let me discussed this a little bit in a humorous way but in all seriousness the whole thing about the Magi it's not We Three Kings they're Magi that happens sometime later some say as far as two years later along who am I yeah that's right put those Magi those kings uh shelf for a little bit put them in timeout so up to two years some say it's debatable but they're not a part of what happens this day or this night so just saying don't get me started about it again we'll move on this time of year we celebrate Jesus's birthday as we see it in these accounts but for as much as an emphasis as we place on it in the in the mainstream Church in the modern church we don't see Christmas being celebrated anywhere in the Bible nor do we see it celebrated anywhere in the early church we have to wait 300 ish years see any historical record of anyone celebrating or the church celebrating the birth of Jesus and it wasn't on December 25th that happens way later so aside from these accounts that we're looking at today Jesus's birth account I want you to think about this is remarkably absent from the rest of the New Testament and so what you're looking at is 27 books all right so first four talk about it that it doesn't the bulk of the New Testament doesn't really even mention it very much and it's interesting Mary after the Gospels she's only mentioned by name in the first chapter of Acts then for the rest of the New Testament she's absent they're not talking about her like some denominations talk about her today at all Galatians 4 4 the brief mention of being born of a woman right but that's not the point it's not about Mary some say Revelation 12. it's debatable but it doesn't mention her by name and again no Christmas celebrations they're not talking they talk a lot about the resurrection and they celebrate that every week but not a Christmas story it's strange and you know it gets even weirder when you start thinking about it you ever read the book of James that's Jesus's brother you think he'd know Mary doesn't mention her at all Peter the lead apostle no mention first second Peter John first through third John revelation Jesus At The Cross says to John and his mother like basically take care of her this is your mother this is your son and then it says that she lives with him from that time on not going to mention her amazing no mentions of a holiday of Christmas now there's probably a reason why they knew this Colossians 1 15 Christ is the visible image of the invisible God he existed before anything was created and is first born over all creation he is first born over all creation his creation itself that's the right theology so while we celebrate Jesus's birthday this weekend it must be made very clear that we're celebrating his birth in the flesh that's what this is God and we mustn't forget that he always existed if we go back to John there's a part where Jesus is saying whoever believes in me will never perish but have eternal life and he says that he's greater than Abraham from the genealogy in Matthew where it begins Abraham's a great patriarchal figure the Jews say who Do You Think You Are Jesus has a good answer John 8 56 your father Abraham rejoiced as he looked forward to my coming he saw it and was glad the people said you aren't even 50 years old how can you say that you've seen Abraham Jesus answered I tell you the truth before Abraham was even born I am weird sentence well if you know the word well you know that when Moses encountered God as the burning bush this is what God told Moses that he would be called I am tell them I am has sent you so Jesus is saying I am I'm God they go to Stone him for that if we go back in John let's look at this again John 1 10. he came into the very world he created but the world didn't recognize him he came to his own people and even they rejected him but you all who believed him and accepted him he gave the right to become children of God they are reborn not with a physical birth resulting from Human passion or plan but from a birth that comes from God he came into the very world he created and all who believe can be born again through the one who was from the beginning we can have a new beginning we can be born again now if we continue in John from the first chapter and this is a little tricky this is 30 years later now so we're moving ahead from like the birth account there was a man named Nicodemus a Jewish religious leader who was a Pharisee after dark one evening he came to speak with Jesus Rabbi he said we all know that God has sent you to teach us your us your miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you Jesus replied I tell you the truth unless you are born again you cannot see the kingdom of God what do you mean exclaimed Nicodemus how can an old man go back into his mother's womb and be born again very literal individual Jesus replied I assure you no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water in the spirit humans can reproduce only human life but the holy spirit gives birth to spiritual life don't be surprised when I say you must be born again through Jesus we can have a new spiritual birth a new beginning we're going to draw your attention to another often overlooked feature in these accounts of Jesus's birth or the beginning of the Gospels if we look back at Jesus's family tree his genealogy again there are the parts that a lot of people skip but they tell a story so if you know the Old Testament well certain things will stand out to you and I'll kind of Point them out in case you don't that's okay I'll point out what's going on here so this time of year the focus has shifted to Mary and right at least so she's the vessel that carries our Lord in the flesh that's kind of important I'm not downplaying that but there are some other women Elizabeth later we'll see Anna we're going to look at that account but there's some other women that very few people talk about when we're talking about these accounts leading up to Jesus and his birth the genealogies the family tree by what line there are four other women who are usually left out but they're in the genealogy of Jesus now this this is very interesting because today right you know we talk about women they're in roles of authority and all kinds of things like that but back then it wasn't like that and it's remarkable because when you have the women we'll talk about this at Easter right so there they see the empty tune and they're they're like the first Tomb they're the first Witnesses right to the resurrection that's crazy because women couldn't even be Witnesses in a court of law back then so to put them in the Lord's genealogy is crazy enough but let me describe to you who these women are it's remarkable you have Tamar so someone knows the Bible back there like oh no is he going to tell that story Tamar is kind of interesting so yeah he's from the line of Judah here's the backstory so we're going back to Genesis so Judah has a son ER and so married to Tamar just says he's wicked he dies so like the brother in this Society the brothers got to marry Onan Onan doesn't want to have a kid with her I won't say what he did kids around so I don't want a kid so he dies then there's Sheila he's got one more left doesn't want him to die so Tamar is upset about it and she decides to discuss her father-in-law right her father-in-law decides to disguise herself as a prostitute so that he his father-in-law right I'm saying that right yes so that I got it right yes good I get all like the names like brother-in-law father-in-law so we just want to make sure I'm right because when I get home I'll get corrected if I didn't get it so so father disguise herself as a prostitute and sleeps with him yeah and so we get Pires and he's mentioned you know they're twins but Sarah and Pierce you're going to mention that here yup that's crazy if we keep reading we get an actual prostitute you know the story of Jericho well the spies spied out there's a prostitute Rahab she hides him but she's a prostitute she's in here I mentioned her in the genealogy Ruth now you might say oh the Book of Ruth she's a moabite there's the rest of her story she's from an incestuous Union line they're considered like kind of a dirty disgusting people the ammonites and the moabites why you might know the story of Sodom and Gomorrah you might know a lot remember the wife pillar assault right so lot goes away to Zohar first to hide then he goes in the mountains the girls think ah there's no one left to procreate with let's get our father drunk and sleep with him right and so you get the moabites and the ammonites that's roof line then you get Bathsheba oh you know King David right the story of the adultery that's an interesting one so he sleeps with one of like his soldiers women then he has him killed so he's an adulterer and a murderer that's David but this is an adulteress then comes Solomon the product of that Union well not the first one dies the first son dies that's a crazy story it doesn't mention her name the other ones are named just to be fair in Greek it says uriah's so it knows that like Matthew's thinking you're going to know who I'm talking about here about Sheba so easy to read version will say about Bathsheba that's okay because that's who's being talked about this is interesting to have for women in a genealogy of that time is kind of crazy but to have four undesirable or sinful women in the genealogy of Our Lord this speaks of the Redemptive nature of the Gospel right from the beginning no matter what you've done no matter where you come from no matter what your line is what this is saying to you is you can be a part of the family of Jesus just like these folks were doesn't stop them from getting in and then it's followed by God coming in the flesh becoming like us that should blow our minds we serve a god of compassion one who is willing to make himself like us to be born into vulnerability a baby one who understands our weaknesses he understands our pain he understands our fears we serve a god who gets it no matter what you've done no matter what you've been through no matter what you've come from no matter what you've been born into we are invited to be born again into the family of faith that's the message he's a god of Grace and he's inviting you to come into his light he's inviting you to move forward stop living life in the rear view mirror he's inviting you to put away regret move forward from it he's inviting you to come out of that shame and into the family of faith he's inviting you to live a life of joy in Jesus and so we have New Year's resolutions coming up new beginnings and so what better time to make a commitment to Christ this year to come back on a Sunday and be a part of the family of faith to experience something I talked about bickering and that's no joke people who are in the church regularly the leadership here the people who are helping me here they know you know because they're like how you doing you know because they know it gets rough this time of year people are forced to see family members they really don't want to see if they're being honest they're not getting along they're avoiding certain people Nothing are just then there's politics right so we don't talk about that here yes right now you're forces are always one right and then they're getting drunk we recommend you don't get drunk before you come to church so usually people aren't drunk here you know it's it's happened you know they were like all right you're gonna hear some interesting stories this year real Church real people I have not always been a pastor and you're like I know oh that explains everything we understand maybe you have a perfect family great bring him in but maybe not Maybe not maybe it's chaotic but here it's not here we don't do drama we don't do politics we love you no matter where you come from we don't see race we don't see political affiliation here we leave that outside that's there and again I'm not trying to be a grinch about Christmas traditions They're Not absent here because we're like legalistic or anything we have a cafe we feed you and after church on Sundays and if you go up there you'll see Christmas decorations and there's Christmas Carol and Christmas music going on and everything like that this is about Jesus this is about the word of God that's what we're doing here we're not mixing any of the other garbage in that's when you get really bad theology it's not about the world this is about the word that's what we do right here all right and then we do life with each other if you look outside the door we put these up or that's what we're moving into four things they did in the Church of Acts the word they were devoted to the apostles teaching of the word right they were devoted to this they were devoted to each other they were devoted to sharing meals with each other and they were devoted to prayer that's who we are that's who we are and I want to invite you to join us in that you can be a part of a family you might have a I have a past it's crazy but no one's shaming me about it my mess has become my message they test my testimony and that's the only time anyone's going to bring it up no one's using it against me reminding me about it oh you can't change no that doesn't happen here it's not allowed I preach those people out of the church they're gone we don't we don't do the finger pointing the Judgment that's my job to correct the people but here no they're all here to love you and treat you like family that's what it's about and so what better time what better way to start off the new year and here's the thing we are kind of in a vacation place so as we close you might be going back home and again I apologize about the weather it's really it's not supposed to be this cold here I just you know I forgot to pray about that I had other people to pray for I messed up my fault you can blame me so it's too cold sorry about that not great uh but you may be going back to Colder Weather I'm sorry and if that's you look I just encourage you if you're not already there find a Bible believing Church in a bible-believing church find a church where the pastor will get to know your name right so now I get worried because I'm like oh no I forgot their name when they'll get to know you if he doesn't know you he's not your pastor find a church where they're not trying to be famous or they're not trying to get rich or it's not about the money or it's about the people it's about the community it's about the word of God I had a bible-believing church where it's about family get plugged in go once a week don't do life alone don't do life alone so an encouragement again Merry Christmas thank you so much for joining us this evening we appreciate it we're going to have some announcements I think and then we're going to sing another worship song but in the meantime let me pray for you Lord I Thank you for this church everyone who took the time during this busy holiday season and all the worldly distractions to come here and set aside the time for you to celebrate your coming and becoming like us Lord we love you and we thank you so much for doing all that you've done for us Lord I pray for everyone here that you fill them with your Holy Spirit and you make them vehicles of your grace your mercy and your peace especially during the season where so many are forgetting the real reason for the season I ask these things in Jesus name amen