Embracing God's Invitations This Christmas Season

"It would be so interesting to know how you came to be here today, this place, this time, this season, this year. And each of us would tell a different story. And what I mean by that is, how did you realize that you were ready for Christmas? I don't mean like, did you come north or south on 15? But I mean, how did you come to be here? And some of us would probably tell stories kind of like this. We'd say, you know, I was just kind of going through life, Randy. I was just working or doing whatever. I was not thinking about anything, just trying to be as happy as I knew how to be. And then suddenly someone started talking to me about God and, and I was not even interested to be truthful, but they kind of provoked my interest and then the next thing you know, they, they invited me somewhere. They invited me to a Bible study or to study the Bible with them, or they invited me to church. And I just, I just went for it. I just, you know, followed through the invitation." [00:41:14] (57 seconds)


"Never expecting, never expecting it was going to start a life transforming journey for me. And my life, Randy, it's never been the same. I was not looking for God at all. I was not searching. But suddenly I found him or he found me. I'm not sure how that works. But here I am. It's never been the same since." [00:42:11] (21 seconds)


"Today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you. He is the Messiah, which means the Christ, the Lord. Now, pause for a minute, because, you know, this Savior is going to be born, so obviously it's a baby, and it's the Messiah, the Christ, the one that the Jews have been waiting for for 1 ,500 years, that so many of the prophecies had pointed towards, so the one that they had waited for." [00:46:03] (24 seconds)


"But he's also the Lord. He's divine. So we have the humanity of Jesus and the divinity of Jesus right from the very start. And then, of course, he's a Savior. This will be a sign to you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. Suddenly, a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel praising God." [00:46:31] (21 seconds)


"When the angels had left and had gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing. Now, this is important. We'll come back and visit this later. But look how quickly they responded. And maybe you can think back, some of you, that your journey was easy and short. It was kind of a surprise to you. You weren't thinking about God or looking for God. But somebody invited you. And you never would have dreamt of the difference it was going to make. But you responded. You were open. You responded quickly." [00:46:47] (32 seconds)


"Listen to what it says in Isaiah, chapter 55, verse 6. It says, Seek the Lord while, while he may be found. Call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them. And to our God, for he will freely pardon." [00:58:28] (22 seconds)


"I just want you to consider that, and again, not trying to elevate fear, not trying to persuade you to make any kind of decision. You may, I may, we may never have a better opportunity than what we have this very moment to make spiritual decisions, to move toward God, to respond to God. We may never be in a better condition. Our focus may not ever be better. Our hearts may never be softer. Our enlightenment may never be greater. Our faith may never be greater than this moment, and like those shepherds, we would be wise to respond to God." [00:58:40] (32 seconds)


"And suddenly the king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, one night has a wild dream. How many of you ever had some wild dreams? Yeah, sometimes you just wonder about it. But anyway, he has a wild dream. And so he decides to test out his group of counselors, which were called the wise men, the magi. And there was lots of them. He says, okay, I had this dream last night. I'm really alarmed about it. I want you guys to tell me what I dreamt. And they're like, oh, king, you don't understand how this works. You tell us your dream, and we interpret it for you. And he says, oh, no, no, no, no, you don't know how it works. I know that game. Anybody can come up with an interpretation. You can make something up. If you're really in touch with, supernatural powers, you tell me what I dreamt. And if not, I'm going to kill all of you. So this is in Daniel chapter 2. You can read it sometime on your own. Well, they're in utter panic, these wise men, these magi, these magic magicians. These guys were in touch with all the occult religions of their day. They were very wise when it came to astronomy and astrology. And astrology is not a real science. It's not to be followed. But anyway, this is who these guys were. But they were also politically wise. They were really powerful in their own way. And they were really powerful in individuals. But now they're in a dilemma. So Daniel is given the answer to the vision from God. He saves the lives. I'm going somewhere with this. Hold on. You're going to see why this means something to the magi. He saves these guys' lives, all of them. And then he's living there with them for about 70 years. So Daniel is openly sharing, you know, his God with them again and again and again. You fast forward to Daniel chapter 9 and verses 24 through 27 and Daniel 9, 24 through 27. It gives an exact timetable when the Messiah will arrive on earth." [01:07:11] (107 seconds)


"It's a 483 year period. That is why these wise men knew that it was time for the Messiah to be born. Plus, God gave them a supernatural sign, this star. It wasn't a regular star by any means. It was probably one of the chariots of fire of the Lord. We read about it in Psalm 62. You know, it says the Lord's got millions of them, whatever. It was a supernatural sign. But these guys had learned scripture from Daniel being there amongst them. So these wise men were very, very powerful, very influential, very intelligent individuals." [01:09:16] (36 seconds)


"And now they're spiritually seeking. And they come from Babylon or Persia, which would be modern day Iran. So it's about a 900 mile journey to get from there to Bethlehem. Probably would have taken about three months in those days. Dangerous journey. You can get, you know, hit by robbers along the way. Lots of things could have happened. This has not been an easy search for them. And these guys are sincere searchers. Their heart is made up that indeed, if God is bringing the Savior of the world into existence in the form of a baby, we are going to submit our lives to this baby. We are going to worship him. We want to come and give the best gifts we can give. Now let's talk about the gifts. So there's gold. Well, that's what you give to royalty." [01:09:56] (45 seconds)