My name is David Harper, pastor of HBC Rome, and we're excited to celebrate with you the message of Jesus Christ. We expect that for the next hour or so, you'll be filled with hope, encouraged, and refreshed as we learn together what it means to follow Jesus.
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I hope you enjoy today's worship and message. If you haven't already, go ahead and...
In our corporate prayer time this morning, I want to do something just a little bit different. I, like you, sense that there are a lot of needs. Bill talked about it a little bit. Every staff member right now in this church is having major issues going on in their lives, and I got a sense that a lot of you probably are the same way.
So here's what I want to do. I want to ask you, would you just bow your heads with me, please? Every head bowed. And then I'm going to ask if you would like, if you say, "Lord, boy, I need God to work in my life this morning. I need some prayer. I need God to answer prayer. I need God to move in my life." If there are some specific needs, nobody looking around, I'm just going to ask you, would you just stand? Would you just stand to your feet? If you say, "Boy, I really need prayer this morning. Would you pray for me?" Would you just be willing to stand where you are right now?
There's one, two, three, four. Boy, there's a bunch of them.
So I'm going to ask some of you that are prayer warriors to come gather around these people. Those of you that are our prayer folks and you're willing to pray for people, I want you to stand up, look around, and go find some of these folks. You're going to have to scatter out in a lot of different positions here, and I want you to pray with them.
There are people standing all over this room, and I need your help. Deacons, elders, prayer warriors, would you just come? You're going to have to gather around different people. You can't all go to the same one. Gather around some folks right here. Come and pray with them. Minister to the needs they face.
Right now, right here, in this moment, would you lift them up and pray? Just go right ahead where you are. Pray for them. Pray over them. Ask God to minister to them.
Lord, I need you. Thank you for being part of this time together as we lift up each other and these needs. We're just grateful to God. Aren't you grateful?
You've got a Father that immediately hears your prayers. The Bible teaches us that Jesus is our great high priest who sits at the Father's right hand to make intercession for us because He knows what it's like to be human. He knows what it's like to go through the troubles of life that you and I go through, and He makes intercession with the Father for us.
I'm grateful that in this Christmas season, when it seems... you know, a lot of the songs we sing talk about joy and happiness and the lights and the wonder, but Christmas can also be the most depressing time of year for many people because there are some family members that are gone. There are certain circumstances that aren't exactly what you want them to be.
We're going to kind of talk about that this morning. Five days from now, we have the shortest day of the year, where we have the least amount of sunlight. It's the darkest time of the year. There are places, there's a place in Alaska in November where the sun went down and won't come back up until the end of January—total darkness for over two months. I don't think I could live there. I need to be at the place that has the most sunlight, not the least sunlight.
So it's a different time of year, and I pray that God would use our time together here this morning to minister to your hearts. That's what I wanted this to be because I know we have these incredible expectations. If you watch a lot of the Christmas movies, it's all about the highlights of life. Then you have "Christmas Vacation," which kind of hits all the low points of life. That would be my family that burns the tree down or lets the squirrel in. I have a couple of crazy Uncle Eddie's and Cousin Eddie's in my family.
But we all seem to have these high expectations of what we think Christmas is going to be like, and then you can't get together, or somebody can't make it, or something happens, and somebody says the wrong thing.
So I want to talk about this morning the wonder of the wise men as we talk about a timeless Christmas. This story never gets old. Every year, for I guess this is my 39th year trying to tell the Christmas story a little differently, a little different twist. But it's such a great story because God saw the darkness of the human race. God saw the hopelessness.
See, it's not just that it's dark; we are hopeless without Jesus. That's what we, as believers, as followers of Jesus, as Christians, believe—that the human race was trapped in this hopeless situation that we could not get out of. We were sinners, and the future was bleak and dark. We deserved death and hell—all the horrible things that came with sin. There in the Garden of Eden, they fell on us, and there was no way out from under that burden.
Jesus came to not make a way, listen, but to be the way. That's why that verse in John 14 is so important to me: "I am the way, the truth, and the life." He said, "I'm not making some way. It's not the Baptist way or some church way or denomination way or religion way. Religion kills; it's a relationship with the way—Jesus."
So I want to take a twist on that this morning in Matthew chapter 2. If you'll go with me, it's the story of the magi, or if you live in the South, we can just call them the wise men. Everybody calls them the magi; we don't know what that is in Georgia and Alabama. That's the wise men.
Let me just kind of debunk a couple of things with you real quick. Jesus wasn't in the manger when the wise men showed up. My belief, as I understand Scripture, is that Jesus was not the baby in the manger. The wise men didn't show up with the shepherds. I know your little nativity set has the three wise men there. We don't know if there were two or one or... well, it's multiple. It says "they," so there's more than one. There's at least two; it could be six; it could be ten; we don't know. But they brought three gifts, and because they brought three gifts, we think there's three wise men.
So I know some of your brains are on fire right now because you realize you've been lied to your whole life. We don't know how many wise men there were. They did not come to Bethlehem, my understanding of Scripture. They didn't come to Bethlehem; they probably came to Nazareth.
That's the reason when Herod looks to destroy Jesus, he goes two years and under because he asked the wise men, "When did you first see this star?" And they're saying, "Two years ago. We've been traveling, trying to get here, trying to find Him."
We're going to talk about that story right here in Matthew 2. A lot of hurt and misunderstanding can go along with Christmas, as you well know.
Matthew 2, chapter 1, read with me:
"Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem. They start there, saying, 'Where is He who is born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the east and have come to worship Him.'
When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled. What do you mean? Why was he troubled? Because he thought there was a replacement coming for him.
As a matter of fact, just a sidebar, I think I told you this a few weeks ago: Herod is going to kill his two own sons because he's afraid they'll try to take his power and replace him.
He says he was troubled, and all of Jerusalem was with him. You know what that means? Herod got troubled, and he made everybody else troubled about it. He got everybody else shook up in Jerusalem about it.
When he gathered all the chief priests and the scribes of the people together, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. So they said to him, 'In Bethlehem of Judea, for it is written by the prophet: But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are not the least among the rulers of Judah, for out of you shall come a ruler who will shepherd My people Israel.'
Then Herod, when he secretly called the wise men, determined from them what time the star appeared. So he goes back, "When did you first see this?" He sent them to Bethlehem and said, 'Go and search carefully for the young child.'
Notice again, he says "young child," not "baby," not "baby in a manger." Again, just helping understand what the Scripture is really saying. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, 'Go and search carefully for the young child. And when you have found Him, bring back word to me that I may come and worship Him also.'
So how many of you think he really was going to go worship Him?
Yeah.
And when they heard the king, they departed. And behold, the star which they had seen in the east went before them till it came and stood over where the young child was.
When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. And when they had come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary, His mother, fell down and worshiped Him.
When they had opened their treasures, they presented gifts to Him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Then, being divinely warned in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed for their own country another way.
When they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, 'Arise and take the young child and His mother, flee to Egypt and stay there till I bring you word, for Herod will seek the young child to destroy Him.'
When he arose, he took the young child and His mother by night and departed for Egypt and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, 'Out of Egypt I called My Son.'
Let's pray together.
Father, thank you for the beautiful story of Christmas, that in the darkness of that day, in the horror of a person like Herod the king, you would send forth hope in the form of a baby boy named Jesus, who would save not only His people, the Jews, but He would save the world from our sin. Thank you for that precious gift.
As we study the story today of these wise men and how they wandered around trying to figure out the next step, remind us that sometimes in our lives we wind up wandering around trying to figure out what are you doing? What's the next step we need to take? Where do we need to go?
I pray you'd speak direction into our hearts here this morning. You would speak power by your Holy Spirit into our lives to give us the strength to do that. Give us courage to take that next step and to follow you and to look for you and to seek you with all of our hearts, just like these wise men were looking for Jesus. Help us to seek out Jesus for our life and for our direction.
I pray for your glory and honor to be seen and known and work here in this place today. We ask all of this in the name and for the glory of Jesus, we pray. Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Again, thank you for being here this morning.
Kind of jumped right into prayer time, but thank you for being here, for your attendance, for our guests. We're so glad you guys are here with us today and others, our church family.
We've got several out sick and a lot of folks. Boy, somebody ought to thank Lauren again for her one-man show today. That's incredible. There are a lot of struggles and a lot of sickness and stuff going around and a lot going on with our staff, and pray for them.
A lot of songs we sing at Christmastime are reminders that we're supposed to be happy.
It's the most wonderful time of the year. Is it?
Have you been to town lately? Have you been Christmassed?
Have a holly jolly Christmas.
Chestnuts roasting on an open fire. I don't even know where you get chestnuts. I don't even know where you get chestnuts anymore.
Jingle bells. Oh, by the way, do you know "Jingle Bells" wasn't written for Christmas? It was written for Thanksgiving. I found that out this week. Always learning something new, even as an old man. I like that.
Walking in a winter wonderland. Well, if you walk in our winter wonderland this week, it's kind of mushy and muddy and wet and funky, right?
Happy Peterson did call me this week, and he was kind of... he always, when something comes up crazy wet, he knows they're crazy weather up there. I can't remember if he told me it was four below or 14 below.
And I was like, "Dude, you can have that. You can keep that."
Blizzard snow coming off the Great Lakes. No, no, no, no. I don't want any part of that. Snow's fine for a day. If you have to shovel snow, you will find out why people have heart attacks.
It's beautiful and wonderful, but when you have to shovel it, it's heavy and awful, right?
I can't imagine having to go out. I told Gary and Regina the other day about it because their son-in-law and Aaron's there and their granddaughters. I can't imagine going out every day and having to scrape my windows so I could drive my car. That's a horror story.
I told her, I said, "I'll take 98 in July any day over minus four and snow and wind. You can keep that. God bless you."
We don't have the winter.
Now, by the way, let me just stop and say this. I watched some weather stuff the last couple of days trying to, like everybody else, we're trying to make plans for the next couple of weeks, what we're doing and when we're getting together and what's going to happen and stuff to be done before the year ends.
There's a chance of snow, they're saying, for the Southeast next Sunday, next weekend. So, if you're not signed up for the text messages, it's like Bill said, you may slip and slide your way down Lombardi Hill. I'm telling you, there'll be every idiot in Rome who's got a four-wheel drive. If it snows, they're coming here to try because the goal is, "I've got to climb Lombardi Hill in the snow."
They used to block it off. When I lived in the pastoral years ago, all the teenagers and young adults would come to the pastoral when it snowed, and we would get pieces of sheet metal and cardboard and everything else and try to see who could slide the furthest down Lombardi Hill. You can't do that anymore because the four-wheel drives will run over you.
So, just know that if you're not getting the text messages, you may need a message next Sunday. We'll see.
You know, winter wonderland. We all want to have this joyful, trouble-free Christmas.
And it doesn't seem to ever really work. It doesn't work out like that, does it?
What are you experiencing this season? As we think about Christmas, what are you experiencing? What are you going through?
You know, you didn't plan to have somebody in the hospital, like Shelly's dad's in the hospital right here at Christmas season and suffering.
You may feel like it's just been one crisis after another for some of us this year. And now here we are at Christmas, and you want that joy and happiness, and yet you get an avalanche of problems that seems to come your way.
Some of us are so busy working, we're trying to pay for Christmas and groceries and everything else. Again, if you've been to the grocery store lately, if that's your job, you understand. It's kind of depressing to go to the grocery store and leave.
There's a lot happening. There's a lot of struggles in our country. We hear reports every day, and I don't know how true they are, but every day I see another story about we're one step closer to World War III.
A lot of people are predicting with what's happening in the Middle East, in Syria and Iran around Israel, and what's happening up in Ukraine, that we just seem to be being sucked into this war that may be headed our way. You look at that and go, "Well, that's not what I wanted to see at Christmas."
You want this emotional lift; you want this encouragement; you want this happiness; you want this joy. And it can be a delusional time of the year where we have all these issues that are going around, and we have more struggles than we have answers, and we become disappointed.
Ever opened a gift and been disappointed?
I'm just going to tell you, if you give me underwear and socks, I'm going to try to smile. But most of you that really know me or know me well over these years, when you look at my face, Steve, what you see is what you get. I try to hide it; I try to cover it up, but I'm not real good at faking my emotions in the moment.
But have you ever been given... you thought you were going to get this incredible gift, and you got socks instead?
So what can we do at Christmas to try to avoid that struggle, that disillusionment?
Let me give you three things quickly this morning out of the story in Matthew 2 about the wise men from the star. Apparently, a couple of years back, they began to indicate to them where Jesus was going to be born.
There are so many prophecies about Jesus' first coming. There's a ton of prophecies about a virgin shall conceive, to be born in Bethlehem. He's going to come out of Egypt.
Do you understand? That blew the priests and the scribes and the historians that studied the Old Testament in the Jewish nation. They could not understand how the Messiah could come out of Egypt. That blew their minds to read that passage and look at it and go, "How is the Messiah going to come from Egypt? How does He get from Egypt to here? Shouldn't He be born in Israel?"
And yet they don't understand. Now, when we read Matthew 2, we understand Jesus is born in Bethlehem. He goes back to Nazareth.
By the way, when the wise men leave and they don't have to go back through Jerusalem, because Jerusalem, kind of like Atlanta in Georgia, is the hub of Georgia.
Anybody going anywhere in Georgia, you've got to go through Atlanta, right? I mean, just about it. Anywhere you want to go, they've made you go through Atlanta.
Well, Jerusalem was like that. If you wanted to come from Babylon, go anywhere, you basically had to go through Jerusalem. But Nazareth is way in the north. It's about a seven-day journey on a donkey from Nazareth to Bethlehem.
Bethlehem is right outside of Jerusalem, not far, just a mile or so outside of Jerusalem is where Bethlehem is located. If these wise men had gone to Bethlehem, they would have had to go back through Jerusalem to get back to where they came from.
But if they're leaving from Nazareth, there's a highway going out of Nazareth that goes north and takes them back to their home, and they don't have to come through Jerusalem.
You put the pieces together, and you begin to understand this picture of what's going on. These wise men, they've been traveling. They've been traveling for a while. At first, they're trying to figure it out. They remember the prophecies that Daniel and others gave them there in Babylon when the Jews were there.
The Jews were trapped in Babylon as slaves for all that time, and now they see the word of God, and they see this star, and they put the pieces together. The King of the Jews is being born. The Messiah is being born. He's prophesied all over the Old Testament, and we want to go see Him and worship Him and be part of Him.
Now, when they come to find Jesus, I want you to listen. They didn't just come to give gifts like we do at Christmas. We go to Grandma's house, and we swap gifts. We might sing; you might sing a song. If you go to the Turrentine family, they sing songs and have poems and readings.
And do y'all act it out now? You have to be baby Jesus anymore? They, you know, and maybe your family's like that. You just have the whole deal, man. It's incredible.
But do you understand when the wise men came, listen to what they were doing that first Christmas, that first time they met Jesus? You know what they came to do? The same thing the shepherds did there in Bethlehem. They came to worship Jesus.
Listen, Christmas is about worship. Christmas is about understanding who Jesus is, the Son of God who has come out of heaven, taken on the form of human flesh, that one day He might go to the cross and pay the debt for our sin.
Christmas is about worshiping Jesus for who He is and what He's done for us. That's what Christmas is all about. It's not about what present can I get or what present can I give. All that's important, and it has its place. But don't lose sight of the fact that Christmas is really about worship.
Every part of the story of Christmas that's in the New Testament is pointed towards worshiping Jesus. When the shepherds show up, they worship Jesus. When the wise men show up, they worship Jesus. When the angels come and give glory to God, they're worshiping Jesus.
So the picture of Christmas is about worshiping Jesus. I think there are some things we can learn from this as they come and find that newborn King, all the events that are going to happen around there, and the struggle, the problems. Because it's not without its own set of problems there.
There are some things I think we can learn from this.
So the first question, there are three questions, and here's what I'll give them to you: three things, and they're all questions.
What do you seek?
What do you seek at Christmastime? We talked about it earlier. A lot of folks are looking for the perfect Christmas. They're looking for the perfect family get-together. They're looking for the perfect menu.
I heard about a family that had a great Christmas meal, and they were enjoying all the stuff that goes with it, whether you had turkey and dressing and ham and mac and cheese or whatever it is. All of a sudden, I'm getting hungry.
And they got through with the meal, and the mother stood up and went, "Oh, the cranberries! We forgot the cranberries!" For her, the whole meal was ruined because they forgot the cranberries.
Can I just say to you, moms, cranberries aren't the main thing.
Now, I just got to say, I'm David Harper speaking. I can eat ham; I can eat turkey. When I have a meal at Thanksgiving or Christmas, I want dressing.
It ain't Christmas, and it ain't Thanksgiving, and it ain't the holidays without... you can get all that other stuff any other time. Why can't we have dressing at Easter? Why can't we have dressing Fourth of July? For dinner, hey, any time.
I had to go to a restaurant. I had to go to a restaurant meeting the other Sunday. We'd had a Christmas meal on, I think, on Sunday, and then I had to go to a pastor's meeting planning an event later this fall of '25, and I was there Monday, and we went to Red Lobster.
I can't go to Red Lobster without eating some shrimp or fish or something, but I said, "Sitting there, I thought, man, I'd like to have a big old block of dressing to go with this." It didn't go with shrimp, huh?
Can I get an amen from anybody? Come on now, just trying to let y'all know if you're the one... if you're the cook, we want dressing.
But there's more to Christmas than food. There's more to Christmas than just families getting together. There's more.
What are you seeking? Are you looking for a feeling of holiday spirit? Is your family like my family? When we get together, there's not always a lot of holiday spirit together.
There's somebody trying to prank something, somebody trying to pull something, somebody's upset at somebody. You're looking for the present you've been hoping for, and then you don't get it.
See, the problem with all those things, whether it's the food or the presents or the fellowship or the hospitality, they can all disappoint you, can't they?
Have you ever been disappointed by those things? I'm sure we have. Probably all of us have at some point.
But we've all been expecting something that we didn't get. The wise men show us that. They weren't expecting Herod to react the way he did. They weren't expecting the response that they're going to Jerusalem.
They're going to Jerusalem and talking to Herod would lead to the death of a whole bunch of baby boys. They had no concept that that was going to come out of what they were seeking. That surely was not what they were seeking at that moment.
So that's why we need to be looking and expecting something for Christmas that... man, look for Jesus in Christmas.
I love the other day. I just got to tell you, I love last Sunday, being able to baptize Melissa and see the response of her family and friends around her, and her testimony was so powerful to hear that.
To me, that's Christmas—that new birth, that true gift of Jesus into somebody's life. I loved what she said. Even the words she said, "I am a follower of Jesus. I'm not a church member. I'm not a Christian. I'm not an attender. I'm not this. I want to be a follower of Jesus."
And can I say to you, that's what we all ought to be looking for at Christmas. I want to be a follower of Jesus. I don't want to be a follower of the church or a follower of some rules or a follower of all the different things you can come up with. I want to follow Jesus.
Because here's what I know: If I follow Jesus, I'll wind up at the right place. And I'll be doing the right things if I'm following Him.
What do you seek? I think we ought to be looking for an experience of worship.
Every Sunday morning, I get up early. I used to watch an hour of Charles Stanley. They've thinned his program down now to 30 minutes since he passed.
Then I watch David Jeremiah, and usually, I flip over to YouTube at that point. This morning, I was... watched another pastor for a little while. But usually, I'll flip over to YouTube and put on some gospel music.
Personally, I like... I honestly like black gospel music probably better than I do anything else. And I'll sometimes listen to Brooklyn Tab or people in songs or whatever.
Because you know why? I want to get my heart in a worshipful setting. I want to get my mindset and my heart worshipful even before I walk into this room.
I think, honestly, we probably ought to do that every day. Get our hearts in a worshipful mindset so that I can... so that when God's at work, I'm in tune with God when He's working in this room.
When He's working in your life or I'm with you, I want to be in tune with God as He works and worship Him and see Him move in our lives.
Because worship ought to be an everyday experience, guys. Worship isn't just a Sunday morning thing. Am I just going to worship God one day a week? Is that what this life is about?
No. I'm supposed to worship Him every day. Every day I'll walk with God and worship Him.
And by the way, I'm going to encourage you. I'll talk more about it maybe at the end. Over the next few Sundays, you're going to hear a lot about it as we walk into 2025.
I mean, you realize we're just like three weeks away from a new year, 2025. January the 5th will be the first Sunday. We're two weeks away, three weeks away, two and a half weeks away from the first.
I'm going to ask you to join, that all of us join together in reading the word of God together through 2025.
What kind of difference do you think it would make in your life and in this church's life if we're all reading the word of God? I mean, the same passages, the same chapters on the same days throughout 2025.
Do you think that would make a difference?
So I'm going to ask you to join me in that. I'm going to talk more about that at the end. In the days to come, I'm going to put some resources and information in your hand. I'm asking you to be part of that.
You know why? I want God to change the mindset of our church. I want Him to work in us. And the way you do that is through the word and through prayer and worship.
Because prayer and the word are a form of worship. It's not just singing songs. It's preparing your heart through the word and preparing your heart through prayer that our hearts are drawn to God in worship.
If I'm worshiping Him every day, I'm going to be different. You're going to be different. And if we're different, the church is going to be different. Amen?
I'm focused on Him. So I'm going to ask you to do that.
So what are you seeking?
Second question: Where do you look?
I've got to move quickly. Where do you look?
Here's these wise men. You know, your level of joy at Christmas is directly related to where you look for that joy.
If you expect somebody else to give you that joy, let me just go ahead and tell you right now, you're in trouble.
Because you're going to have these great expectations. One of the horrible things about the life, about the human experience, is unfulfilled expectations.
I'll bet you every wife in this room could tell you a story about unfulfilled expectations toward their husband. Don't start elbowing them. Come on.
And I don't... so bet that every man in this room that's a husband could tell you about unfulfilled expectations toward his wife. Amen?
You see, and then you could point the finger at your kids. Don't look over there, Adam. Don't look at them right now. They know they've disappointed you. Don't look at them.
And you know what? Kids can look at parents and go, "You've disappointed me. I thought we'd get to do more. I thought we'd have more. I thought you'd be able to do better by us."
There's all these unfulfilled expectations that float around, and they really come out, it seems like, at the holidays, don't they?
Where are you looking?
We learn from the wise men there are wrong places and right places to look for that joy, to look for what they needed at Christmastime.
They started by looking at the wrong place. They went to Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the wrong place to go looking for Jesus. They thought it was the right place, but it turned into the wrong place.
You know why? Why did they go to Jerusalem? Their human reasoning said, "If there's a new king, then he's probably in Jerusalem. And if there's a new king, the old king ought to know where the new king is coming from."
They reasoned that in their minds and thought their human reasoning would figure out where they needed to go look. Boy, was that a wrong step because all it did was make Herod aware the Messiah had been born, and he's going to destroy a bunch of people's lives.
A lot of families' lives are going to be destroyed because they went to the wrong place.
A lot of times, we're tempted to look for Christmas in the wrong places too. We think if we give the right gift, if we get the right gift, if we do the right thing, if we're with the right people, and a lot of times we're disappointed by what happens to us at Christmastime.
There'll be some family members in all likelihood that are missing from your family celebration. It gets harder.
You know what? As you get older, I mean, how many of you that are my age and older or even younger can say it gets harder and harder to get your family together?
Because everybody's families get pulled in a different direction. I understand that. Our sons now have their wives, and then they have their children, and they want to be with them on Christmas morning.
It's harder to get together, and you have to do things differently. It's harder to get my family together. We went last Sunday night down to my brother's house and got most of our family together and got to hang out together as best we could.
It gets more difficult every year to get people together. So if that's what you're looking for, if that's the place you're looking for that excitement of Christmas, that fulfillment of Christmas, a lot of times it can be in the wrong place.
I just say to you this morning quickly, man, look to God. Just like those wise men, they looked to Jesus. They went to find where they... they didn't give up. They could have given up in Jerusalem and said, "Oh, He's going to be born in Bethlehem." They go to Bethlehem, and He's not there either.
It would have been real easy to give up and go, "Okay, hey, we've done... we've come." Here's the way I feel: they probably felt, and I feel this way too, if I'm going to go that far...
You know, sometimes I'll... this is a minor example of this kind of thing, but I'll find myself, I have to go to Kroger to get something. When I do, I'm like, "I want to get everything I've got to get while I'm here, right? I don't want to have to come back and fight for a parking space and fight for a buggy and get in and get... let's do it."
I mean, while we're here, we've come this far, let's go, let's get it.
I think that's what the wise men did. We've come all the way for weeks; they've been traveling, maybe even for months. They've been traveling to get there to that place. Why give up now?
Then they notice the star reappears, and they are able to go and find the baby, I believe in Nazareth at that moment. They find when they look in the right place, they look in the right place, they find where Jesus is.
I just encourage you this morning: look in the right place. Where are you looking?
Look in the right place. I'm thankful to God for all my family. I'm thankful to God for all of you. I'm thankful for what He's done in my life through the years.
When it comes to Christmas, I don't want... Christmas is about Jesus, right? Or it's supposed to be.
In the church especially, Christmas is supposed to be about Jesus—a reminder of Jesus to all of us. Then why am I looking everywhere else to give me that joy and excitement when I need to look to Jesus?
And secondarily, you can look down the list; you can look at other things, but look for Jesus in this Christmas season. Look for what He's doing in your life and in the lives of people around you.
Let me give you the last thing quickly: What do you give?
What do you give? These wise men, they brought gifts. They didn't give their gifts to Herod. They didn't give their gifts to the priest and to the scribes. They didn't give their gifts out to just anybody else.
As a matter of fact, you don't even know they have gifts until they find Jesus. As they worship Jesus, they give gifts. The wise men came to Jesus' house bearing gifts.
Those gifts they gave were entirely appropriate. Let's talk about the gifts for a moment. They gave gold. Do you know what gold is? It's a gift for a king. They understood. They clearly understood that this little baby boy, this little two-year-old boy... I wonder if Jesus had terrible twos, don't you? Just a thought, just an idea.
Can you imagine being James, Jesus' little brother, and going, "Jesus didn't act like that."
All your life, you heard, "Jesus didn't get mad like that. Jesus made up his bed. Jesus cleaned his plate."
I'm just telling you, that's kind of how my stupid brain works. All their life, they heard, "Jesus was a perfect child. You're not. He's the Son of God. We're not. He's the king."
Those wise men knew that. They recognized that. He's the king. And they brought an appropriate gift for a king. They brought gold to Him.
They brought frankincense. Frankincense is literally an incense that's used in the temple. Frankincense was burning constantly in the temple to give this aroma.
By the way, part of that aroma was to cover the smell of death right outside the Holy Spirit. There was an altar out there where they were constantly butchering and killing everything from a dove to a cow, sheep, goats, cows.
It was a bloody, bloody, stinky mess at the altar of sacrifice. By the way, which is a picture of Calvary, when Jesus died for us, it was a bloody, bloody horror show that smelled horribly.
So in the temple, they would burn frankincense all the time that gave off this incredible aroma from the temple area. And it was a gift. Frankincense was a gift for a priest.
Today, Jesus is our high priest. We don't have to go to a pope or a priest or a potentate or a pastor or the grand pooh-pah. You don't have to go to anybody and bow down before them and say, "Get me to God."
You yourself can go directly to the Heavenly Father at His throne in Heaven through Jesus Christ. And I think if you understood that, we wouldn't have to beg people to pray.
We wouldn't have to beg people to talk to Jesus every day. You wouldn't want to talk to Him because of the struggles and problems and heartaches, because of the worship that you have for what He's done for you.
You wouldn't want to be speaking to Him because He's speaking to the Father. He's making our petitions known, the Bible says.
He stands between us and God. He makes the needs of your heart, the needs of your life, He whispers to the ear of the Father what's needed in your life and what you're asking God to do.
If you really believed that was happening, look at me. If you really believed that was happening, nobody would ever, ever, ever have to beg you to pray again.
And you know what I know happens? When your child gets sick, when your grandchild is sick, when your husband's in an accident, when you have a problem, when you go to the doctor's office and they give you that look, prayer's instant for you.
Because it's an instant need. Why does it take something like that to get us to pray?
Why aren't we constantly, daily... see, I believe the Bible not only teaches that prayer ought to happen like in the morning as you begin the day, but it really ought to be a conversation that's ongoing through the day.
I have... Beverly will tell you, I probably drive her crazy some days. I have multiple conversations. I'll just call and say, "Hey, I don't... you know, I don't call her and go, 'Hey, this is David. I need to tell you something.'"
No, she knows who I am. And besides that, her phone tells my number, and my picture comes up when I call her. I'll text her.
I'm constantly communicating to the person on this earth that I love the most. Why aren't we talking to the Father like that all day long?
Here's these needs. I see this issue. I see something in somebody else's life, calling out to the Father, communicating with Him.
They gave the gift of frankincense. They gave the gift for a priest. They gave the gift of gold for a king.
And the third gift—and this is why we think there's three wise men—they gave the gift of myrrh.
Listen to this. Myrrh is a gift of death. It's what you would take. It's what, at the end of the Gospels, when Jesus' body is in the tomb, or they think His body's still in the tomb, the ladies are going to the tomb to prepare Jesus' body the next day.
Three days later, they go to the tomb to prepare His body. They would take these... it's like you think of a mummy. It's like you think of bandages they would wrap, and then they would rub the myrrh and the different ointments into those bandages so that as His body decayed, it wouldn't put off such a horrible smell.
And they go and find He's not there. He's risen.
The wise men, looking ahead, bring this fragrant ointment that would be there to anoint a body at death. And by giving that, they acknowledge—even at His birth—Jesus came to this earth to die for us.
I've said this over and over again through my time here at this church. See, my greatest... people tell me, "I can't believe, I can't understand why Jesus would go to the cross for us."
And I fully understand that. I can't either. I can't understand how He could love us enough that we turned our back on Him. We use His name as a curse word constantly in our culture.
Constantly. Constantly we curse the name of God, or we curse the name... we curse the name of Jesus. And yet He loves us in spite of that.
The Bible says He came to His own, and His own received Him not. But He went to the cross anyhow.
Here's my deal: I can't understand Him going to the cross. I can't understand Him even coming into this world—this horrible, dark, sinful world that's going to use His birth.
Herod's going to use His birth as an opportunity to kill a bunch of two-year-old boys. That's horrible. Yet Jesus comes into this earth.
There's so many horrible... the sickness, the death, the pain, the disappointment that He's going to experience these next 33 and a half years and then go to the cross.
I can't understand. He lived in heaven, the most beautiful, glorious, powerful, sinless place that ever existed. He was there, and He steps out of that to come to this place.
To come for us, knowing that even at His birth, His birth is pointed towards His death on the cross for us.
Thank God for Jesus, for those gifts.
And can I ask you, what are you giving Jesus at Christmas?
I'm not talking about buying Him. I'm not talking about some kind of present. I'm not talking about putting money in the offering plate.
Although I think if you're going to give everybody else a present, you ought to give something towards the work of Jesus Christ.
But you know what God really wants? It's like the little boy. You've heard me tell this story. There's a little boy, a little poor boy from the neighborhood came to a church.
Back in the days when they passed offering plates, they put the offering plate, they passed it around. He saw people dropping money in it. He had no money. He had nothing.
As the plate came by him, he took the plate and set it on the ground. He stepped into the plate and he said, "I don't have anything else to give Jesus, so all I know to do is to give Him me."
Look at me. Can I tell you? That's exactly what Jesus wants. He wants us. He doesn't want your pocketbook; He wants you.
He doesn't want your things; He wants you—all your life, all your heart, all your soul, all your love, all that you have. Give it to Jesus. That's what Christmas is really all about.
Let's pray together.
Father, thank you for the example of these men. Where they're from and who they are and how many of them we don't really know. But boy, I pray.
As we think about Christmas this year, I pray we would think about giving ourselves to you—our heart, our mind, our soul, our spirit, our worship, our time, our experience, our family.
I want my family to experience you, Lord. I want this church to experience you and your power and your glory and the work of the Holy Spirit to guide us just like you were guiding those wise men.
Guide our lives and use us for your honor and glory, that we will seek the right thing, we will look to the right place, and we will give the gift that you so desire from us.
I pray you move in our hearts and lives here this morning as only you can.
With heads bowed and eyes closed, I don't know who you are. I don't know what's going on in your life. If you've never trusted Jesus as your Savior, I would encourage you today's the day you ought to trust Him.
Or maybe you're like that prodigal son or daughter. You've wandered off like the prodigal did and gone to a far country, far away from God. This morning, He invites you to come home.
Give yourself. Come back and give yourself to Him—your heart, your life to Him.
Or maybe there's a need going on in your life that you don't know what to do with. As we prayed already, maybe there's something that you need to give to God this morning.
As He calls out to your heart, to your life, seeks you, desires for you to be your best, to follow Him, be a follower of Jesus.
So in just a second, we'll stand to our feet. Lauren will sing. I'm asking you to take whatever step the Holy Spirit's telling you you need to take. Seek Him, follow Him.
Find Him in this moment. Amen.
Father, have your way in this place. Move in our lives and draw us to Jesus, I pray, for your glory and honor. I ask you to do these things.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Would you stand to your feet if you're able, heads bowed, eyes closed? There are folks here; if you want somebody to pray with you, they'll pray with you. If you want to be alone and pray, whatever it may be, this is your moment to mind God as He calls you.
I pray you'll step out and obey Him in this moment. Will you seek Him? Seek Him right now. Come on. You come pray with these that are praying, please. God's calling you. Come on. This is your moment.
Thank you again. Thank you again for being here. Thank you for your attention this morning.
I do want to give you one last closing statement out of the sermon just to say, when you look for the right thing, and look in the right place, and give the right gift, you'll find the joy of Christmas. That's what it's about.
Thank you again. We're going to mention a couple of things and then get you headed out. I know some of you have places to be.
I hope you noticed as you came in, we hope some of the final stages of getting the building finished up out front is taking place. We begin to put the cladding on this week and got a good bit done there.
We're grateful for that as we continue to move forward with that. We're not sure exactly yet what we're going to be able to do as far as the cross is concerned. They're putting the beam in the corner of the wall.
We're going to go ahead and do that, and then we'll see what we're able to do. We haven't even... we don't even have an estimate yet on a cross, what it would cost us.
But we're moving forward. On your announcement sheet, you'll see a couple of things. Our Christmas Eve communion service is coming on December the 24th. Please make a note of that at 5 p.m. Plan to be here. That's a great service.
Invite some people. A lot of people are looking for somewhere to go, something to do at Christmas, Christmas Eve, a worship service. Invite your friends and family. Most of them would come if you invite them to be with you.
You'll be out by six o'clock and able to go to Grandma's house or wherever you're headed here around the area. Unless you're going out of town, you'll be able to be part of that.
The kids' check-in location has shifted from this east end of the B building, the preschool building, to the west end. There'll be signs up next week to kind of guide you in those directions so that you can go through the A building down the long hallway and come out under the awning and go right into the preschool building from that side.
They'll guide you, help you with that. If you took one of the tags we had up here two Sundays ago, and you guys grabbed every one of them, I think there were 25 or 28 little Christmas ornaments that were tags for what we needed to do to help some families at Christmastime.
You took them all. We've gotten about, I think, a little over half of those back. We need those back today. Or you can bring them by the office tomorrow.
But we quickly need to get those in those families' hands. Thank you for helping with this and working with that. Please help us complete this.
Another thing just to say quickly is we do receive an offering this morning. You can give online. You can give by text to give. Or you can do like I do, write a check or put cash in the plate.
The box is in the back; the basket's here in the front. You can give to those. But if you plan to give before the end of the year and you want credit for it towards your taxes in 2024, it must be received. It's got to be postmarked or received before the 31st for that to happen.
So just in case you want to know that. Next Sunday, there will be no small groups meeting. There will just be the worship service in here and preschool care and for kids and all up in the B building at 10:30.
So we have kind of a different schedule. This is our, I think, our last Wednesday night we're meeting until into the new year. So that happens this Wednesday night, and then we'll take a couple of weeks off.
You can see all the dates. I hope you'll take a look at those and see what's going on.
Then I mentioned to you last week the list of shut-ins. There are some, I think, on the table. On the table out front right there. If you grab one of those, drop these folks a card and just let them know.
These are folks that have been faithful. Can I just say some of our shut-ins are more faithful in giving than some of the people who show up here every week.
We have shut-ins that send us a check every month to still help support this church. Most of them served for decades in this body and gave not only their time and energy to the church, but even as a shut-in, they still continue to financially support this church.
Grab a copy of that, drop them a Christmas card or a note, and just say, "Hey, we're thinking about you, we're praying for you, and want to encourage you through this season."
Some prayer requests, as we mentioned, Shelly's dad, Kenneth, has said it looks like at the point of death any time now. Not sure when that exactly is going to happen, but that's kind of what they're expecting to happen.
Continue to pray for Dow. He was here earlier, health issues he's facing. Tommy and Linda Renfro, David Bailey will have, hopefully, another round of chemo this Wednesday.
So continue to pray for these needs and lift them up. If you're watching online, God bless you. Thank you for being part of us and watching this week.
We can encourage somebody while you can.
Whether you are with us online or in person, thank you for joining us today. We hope you experienced God's presence in today's service and see God moving in your life.
We would love to pray with you and come alongside you on your journey with Christ. So be sure to connect with us this week and let us know how we can help.
You'll find us on social media, or you can visit us at hbcrome.org and connect with us there. We would love to hear from you.
Have a great week.
on Dec 15, 2024
