Sunday Morning Service 10:30AM- The Gifts of Christmas- Pastor Ryan

Good morning. I think it's safe to say Merry Christmas now. I think we're in that season. I want to welcome you all to Calvary Chapel. Welcome to everybody watching online. I invite you to stand with me, with us, and we'll pray and we'll get started.

Father, we thank you for the day. Lord, we thank you for another opportunity to be here, Lord, to serve you, to worship you, Lord, to praise you. Lord, help us to lift a joyful noise to you, Lord, and let it be a sweet song in your ear. We ask your blessing upon this time, and on the word as it goes out, Lord, let it permeate our lives. We love you, Father. We praise you, and we thank you in Jesus' name. Amen.

Better in your presence, Lord, than to lift you up, Lord, to praise your name.

Oh, Lord God, we just thank you, and we praise you, God, for who you are and how good, how true you are. How truly awesome and good you are, and good you are to us, Lord. Lord, in spite of all of our sin and our rebellion, Lord, you still choose to show your grace and your mercy to us, Lord, in spite of it all. And we thank you, Lord, and we praise you. Lord, this morning, I pray that you would soften our hearts, Lord. Make our hearts tender.

Make my heart tender to your word this morning. Let your Holy Spirit minister to us, Lord, as Pastor Ryan comes. Lord, do something. Lord, do something awesome in this place. Lord, we love you, and we praise you, and we thank you. And in Jesus' name, all of God's people said, amen. Let's have some fellowship.

Good morning. If you could begin the process of finding your seat. Grab a bulletin, and we'll get ready to go over some announcements.

Welcome to Calvary Chapel. I'm glad that you have joined us this morning. A handful of things to take note of. As always, on the left-hand side, now that we're past Thanksgiving, hopefully everyone had a wonderful time with their families. Everything is back in action this week with Bible studies throughout the week, small groups throughout the week, so look for a spot to get plugged into.

In the middle section of your bulletin, a reminder that since this is the first Sunday of the month, tonight will be our intercessory prayer time down at the other end of the hallway, praying for the things going on, not only within our church, within the community, but also throughout our world. And then also, we still need some help with the live nativity that's going to be taking place December 13th and 14th. We need people to play all parts still, pretty much. Everybody, wise men and shepherds, are there shepherds involved? No, there's Mary and Joseph involved. And if you have a toddler,

we'll put them in a manger, and probably be a baby doll in there, unless you have a really, really awesome toddler. So anyway, if you are interested in helping with that, I know it was a blessing to everybody that not only helped out, but attended last year. Go talk to Joe Palmer. If you'll put your hand up, go talk to him afterwards, and there's a sign-up sheet out there.

So go get involved with that. And then the one thing that's not in your bulletin is, ladies, there's just a reminder that there's a one-day women's conference next Saturday, the 7th, up at Calvary of Wellington. There's a poster hanging out in the hallway right by where you picked up your bulletin that has all the details for that. So those are the things that are going on.

If you would make sure that your mobile devices are silenced, and then for our responsive reading this morning, we are going to be in Psalm 121, Psalm 121. For this part, we're going to look at the New American Standard, just so that we can all say the same thing, hopefully at the same time. If you need a copy, there should be one in a row around you. And as you are turning to Psalm 121, if you are able, please stand in the honor of the reading of God's Word. I will read the odd verses, if you will follow along with Jared, and the even verses.

Psalm 121, a song of ascents.

From where shall my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to slip. He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper. The Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun will not smite you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will protect you from all evil. He will keep your soul.

The Lord will guard you from all evil. He will keep your soul. He will guard your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forever. And Father, we do praise you that you are our helper. Lord, we praise you that we can look to you and that you are our protector, our guide, and ultimately are everything that we need in this life. And so, Father, I pray that as we spend some time in your Word this morning,

that your Holy Spirit would begin to minister to our hearts. Father, you know what each person in here needs, and you know how to minister to each person individually. And so, I pray that we would begin to minister to each person individually. And so, I pray that we would each have hearts that are open to whatever it is that your Holy Spirit wants to do this morning.

In Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. And if you would, open up in your Bibles to Luke chapter 1. Luke chapter 1.

The Christmas season is upon us. I started celebrating Christmas the day after Thanksgiving as God intended for it to be. Some people started celebrating Christmas on Halloween day. That's not what God intended. He intended for us. I had to wait until after Thanksgiving. My wife did not follow that rule this year. She decorated the inside of the house, but I refused to decorate the outside until this weekend.

So, I've held strong to that. But that being said, as we come into this Christmas season, I always like to take a little bit of time to divert from whatever we're usually doing to just spend some time focusing our hearts on what this season is supposed to be about. And so, because we were going into a chapter in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 that was going to take up multiple weeks to cover, I decided, hey, let's just do it. Let's jump into this a little bit early.

And I've been praying for quite some time. I always start around the end of October, starting to kind of pray and think about what God would want me to share, what I should go over with the Christmas season. And I haven't been able to really come up with anything. It's like I had lots of different ideas, but nothing really came together for me. And so, earlier this week, I think it was earlier this week, I don't know, when there's

a holiday in the middle of the week, I never know what day it is. So I think it was Monday. I was talking to my wife, and I said, I just don't know where to go this year. I have several different ideas. What do you think? And she said, Ryan, what are we always looking for Jesus to do in our lives? We're looking for Jesus to bring us some joy, some peace. We're looking for him to bring us some hope.

And I think that that's the whole point of why Jesus came into the world, is to bring those things into the world. And so, why don't you do a study on each of the things that God brings to us, each of the things that we're looking for, for Jesus to do in our lives, and all of the things that he did when he came into the world. And I was like, that's a fantastic idea. I should be running this by you more often.

Right? That's kind of how I felt at that point in time. And so, I was like, well, that's really good. And so, the only thing I could come up with was a super cheesy name. Not her name. It was my name. So, The Gifts of Christmas. I felt like that was a Hallmark movie waiting to happen. But it's what I came up with. So, The Gifts of Christmas. And today, we're going to talk about joy.

And so, there's three things that I want to cover today. We're going to kind of define what joy is. We're going to look at sorrow. And then we're going to look at Jesus and how he brings joy into our lives. And so, it's interesting to do a little bit of a word search on joy. So, I went into the Bible study program that I use. I use this thing called Olive Tree Bible.

And I just typed in the word joy and hit search. And it kind of gave me the search all the way through Scripture and all the different times that joy is used in Scripture. It also gave me a couple of dictionary definitions of it. And I found it to be interesting because, the Old and New Testament words, they're written in different languages. The Old Testament was written almost mainly in Hebrew

and the New Testament almost mainly in Greek. So, there's some things that there's some mild translational differences. And so, in the Old Testament, the word joy is defined as gladness and exaltation. In the New Testament, the word joy is defined as gladness, cheerfulness, calm, or delight. I thought those were pretty interesting definitions. But when I searched on,

just online, like what's the definition of joy? I came up with this thing called the Bible Project. Perhaps some of you have heard of it. It gave a great definition. It said, Biblical joy is more than having a happy feeling. Biblical joy is a lasting emotion that comes from the choice to trust that God will fulfill His promises. I thought that was a pretty fantastic definition of joy.

And so, I was kind of searching like, okay, so what does it mean in our lives? What does Jesus do to bring joy into our lives? And as I was doing all of this research, I thought, you know, if we really want to understand joy, I think we should first really understand sorrow. Because that's the opposite of joy. It's the antonym of joy, right? It's sorrow in our lives.

And so, I started thinking about, you can't bring joy into someone's life if they don't also understand sorrow. And so, I looked that up as well. So, the second thing I want to talk about this morning, now that we've kind of defined it, I want to talk about sorrow because I think that creates for us the understanding of why Jesus came into the world. So, again, Merriam-Webster's dictionary defines sorrow as this.

It is a deep distress, sadness, or regret. Deep distress, sadness, or regret. And I thought, man, that word regret is what really got me in that definition. But I thought, where did sorrow begin? When did we start to have sorrow in the world? Well, of course, if we want to understand sorrow in the world, we always have to go back to the beginning. We have to go back to what took place in the garden

when Adam and Eve sinned. God had given them that one rule to not sin. He had given them that one rule to not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And of course, it looked good. They thought it would taste good. And after all, it could make them wise, perhaps even make them like God. And so, they partook of the fruit. And the moment that they partook of the fruit,

sin came into the world. And the thing that truly ushers sorrow into the world is sin. We're always trying to pinpoint what's wrong in people's lives, and we want to diagnose everybody, and we want to try to get to the bottom of what's going on. I can tell you right now how to get to the bottom of what's going on in everyone's life in the world right now. And that's the problem of the sorrow that came from sin.

Because sin came into the world, and sorrow came with it. That sadness came with it. That distress, that regret went along with it. I want you to think about this in the perspective of Adam and Eve, right? The first thing that they had is they had a deep distress when they sinned. Do you remember what they noticed the first thing? The first thing that they noticed is that they were naked.

That something was different. They were no longer clothed in this righteousness of God. They were aware of their shame. They were aware of their nakedness. And great distress filled their hearts. As a matter of fact, great regret filled their hearts. You can only imagine how many times after they ate of that fruit that they thought, if we just hadn't done it.

If we had just decided not to do it. Perhaps you understand that regret in your own life. And then of course great sadness filled their hearts because they were no longer able to live in this garden that God had prepared for them. And now they had to deal with the consequences of their sin. But do you know what else that sorrow of sin brought into the world?

That sorrow of sin brought into the world brought death into the world. It brought first spiritual death because Adam and Eve were now separated from God because of their sin. They found themselves hiding from God because of their sin. That's called spiritual death. But the second thing that it ushered in is it ushered in physical death. Their bodies would now wear out.

Their bodies would no longer be eternal. And they would have to face the consequences of eventual death. And then that death eventually brought destruction. After all, it was the very first death that occurred in the Bible that was actually destruction when Cain killed Abel. Not only did sin come into the world but death came into the world. Destruction came into the world.

And then loss came into the world. People lost their loved ones. Relationships were both destroyed and lost in the process. Innocence was lost. Oftentimes identity was lost. Purpose was lost. And there was great loss that filled the world. But the last thing that that sorrow brought is sadness. We use a different word today for that. We use the word depression.

And that began to fill the world because of sin. Because sin caused us to focus in on ourselves and so there was this sadness that filled the world. But it wasn't just the world of Adam and Eve that found sorrow that came about because of sin and death and destruction and loss and sadness. The world that Jesus came into had the exact same things and quite frankly the world that we live in now has the exact same thing.

We perhaps, each one in here could tell our own story about some of these things. Perhaps you can tell the story of the sorrow of sin in your life. Maybe it was something that you did. Maybe it was a sin that you committed that brought about that great sorrow that brought that great distress that great sadness, that great regret into your life. Maybe you were at a Thanksgiving meal

this week with a family member that brought a certain amount of sin into things and it brought about a great deal of regret within the family. Perhaps you are the one that brought that into your family. But each of us in here knows a little bit about how sin brought sorrow into the world. And we all have seen the effect of sin in that death has been brought to us.

Because each of us in our own way has had to face the reality of death whether it be in our own lives and facing difficulties or whether it be in the lives of our loved ones that we've now lost. We've all seen destruction. We've seen what sin can do to destroy the world around us and to destroy relationships in our families, to destroy relationships of loved ones and quite frankly to destroy the lives of people. And we currently see it destroying our culture.

And then of course we all know what loss is like. But what I really see with the sorrow in the world that we live in now is the deep sadness that I see all around me all the time. A song came on the radio the other day and I was always a little bit of a Beatles fan. I'm not from that era so if you're a kid I didn't grow up in that era so don't be like, oh yeah it's your era.

Nope, not my era. Just like the music. But the song Eleanor Rigby came on. Right? And that part where he says I look at all of the lonely people. Right? Like that's just such a hard line to listen to because it's such a real line to listen to. It's such a depressing line to listen to because it's really the world that we live in. And sometimes when you walk around in the world

is I just look at all of the lonely people and they're all filled with so much sadness and they're filled with so much depression. Why? Because sorrow came into the world because of sin. And so as we seek to understand joy let's first understand sorrow because we can't know the joy of the Lord until we first face the sorrow of sin. And it was into a world like that

that Jesus came. And so what I want to do is I want to spend a little bit of time looking at the promise of Jesus and the gift of Jesus when it comes to joy. Because when God looked at the world the first thing he said was it's okay I have a plan. Do you remember the first promise that God made? We've gone over it bunches of times. But he said I'm going to make you

a promise. The seed of the woman will always be at enmity with the serpent. He will the serpent will bruise his heel but the seed of the woman will crush his head. And that's such an important thing for us to pay attention to because it was the very first promise of the fact that though sorrow had come into the world joy would be restored. And it would be restored

through a Messiah. And then of course God went on to make coverings for Adam and Eve out of the skins of animals which involved a sacrifice. Coverings so that they would no longer deal with the shame because it would be covered by God. And it's into that world that Jesus came. So as I did this research into the word joy I want to look at two main things. The

promise of joy and then the gift of joy. Now hold your spot here in Luke chapter one. If you want to turn. We're going to go to a lot of different places in scripture this morning okay. We just right stretch them out get them ready or if you can't navigate your Bible very well that is totally fine. I don't want you to feel bad at all. Jot these things down and you can go look them up later

because I would rather you take in all of the things we're talking about then get frustrated trying to find it in your Bible. So the first place I want to look at is with the promise of the coming is in Isaiah chapter nine. Isaiah chapter nine there was this promise that God had made when he first declared that there would be a Messiah that would come and take away the sin of the world but the promise really started getting real in the book of Isaiah. That's where we really start seeing a lot of these messianic prophecies and so I think I had them put up there. Oh they corrected

me already. Look at you guys. You guys are great. Thumbs up in the back. Starting in verse one it says this. But there will be no more gloom for her who was in anguish. In earlier times he treated the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali with content but later on he shall make it glorious by the way of the sea on the other side of the Jordan Galilee of the

Gentiles. Kind of sound familiar? The people who walk in darkness will see a great light. Those who live in a dark land the light will shine upon them. You shall multiply the nation. You shall increase their gladness. They will be glad in your presence as with the gladness of harvest. As men rejoice when they divide the spoil. For you shall break the yoke of their burden and the staff

on their shoulders. The rod of the oppressor as at the battle of Midian. For every boot of the booted warrior in the battle of Tumult and cloak rolled in blood will be for burning fuel for the fire. For a child will be born to us. A son will be given and the government will rest on his shoulders and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father,

Prince of Peace. And what will he do? He will increase gladness and men will rejoice as when they divide the spoil. You see there was a promise made in the Old Testament that there was a messiah that was coming that would restore joy. That though sorrow had been ushered in through sin, joy was on its way and it would come through a person and that person would be the

messiah who would ultimately be the one who would bring joy. Next place, go over to Isaiah chapter 51. Isaiah chapter 51. If you hit Jeremiah you went too far. Isaiah chapter 51 and I want you to look at verse 3. I'll give you a second to get there. Isaiah 51 3 says this. Indeed the Lord will comfort Zion. He will comfort all her waste places and her wilderness he will make like

Eden and the desert like the garden of God. Pay attention here. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and a sound of a melody. Jump down to verse 11. So the ransomed of the Lord will return and come with joyful shouting to Zion and everlasting joy will be on their heads and they will obtain gladness and joy and sorrow and sighing will flee away.

What's going to flee away? Sorrow and sighing. Why? Because the giver of joy will have come. And who is the giver of joy? It's this Messiah that we're celebrating right now, okay? One more place in the Old Testament having to do with the promise. Go to the book of Zephaniah. That's right. Uncrunch some of the gilded pages that you've not made it to yet. Zephaniah

and I want you to look at chapter 3 verse 17. Zephaniah 3 17. If you hit Zechariah or Malachi you went too far. It's right before Habakkuk. Zephaniah 3 17 says this. The Lord is in your midst a victorious warrior. He will exult over you with joy. He will be quiet in his love and he will rejoice over you with shouts of joy. So in the Old Testament we see this promise

that there's a Messiah coming who will bring joy. Sorrow has come into the world because of sin. All of those sorrowful things have come into the world because of the sin and destruction that has entered. But it's okay. There's a plan to make things right. And that plan will be a Messiah who will ultimately usher joy into the world with his presence and with what he does. And that brings us

to the New Testament. Look over again at Luke chapter 1. Now as you go through the New Testament there are an amazing amount of sections on joy. We're not going to go through all of them today. Okay? We don't have time for that. Nor do I have the mental bandwidth for that. But there's a lot of them. But I focused in particular on what Jesus did, what he continues to do, and what

he will do for us in the future when it comes to joy. Now the first mention of the word joy is in the book of Matthew. But chronologically it's in the book of Luke. So let's follow the chronological path shall we? Start in Luke chapter 1. And I want you to look at verse 39. Set the stage for you. Elizabeth has had it just announced to her that she is going to have a son even though she's

way too old to have kids. And she's been barren her entire life. She's going to have a son and they're going to name him John. And he's going to be the forerunner of the Messiah. He's going to do a very important job for this Messiah who will bring joy into the world. Right? And then after that Mary, a young teenage girl at this point in time, was also told you're going to have a son

and he is going to be the long awaited Messiah. The one who will restore the nation. The one who will be the savior of his people and restore joy to the world. And so Mary goes to visit Elizabeth and this is what it says in verse 39. Now at this time Mary arose and went in a hurry to the hill country. To a city of Judah and she entered the house of Zacharias

and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting the baby leaped in her womb and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she cried out with a loud voice, blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb. How has it happened to me that the mother of my Lord would come to me? For behold when the sound of your greeting reached my ears the baby leaped in my womb for, go ahead and shout it out, he leaped for joy.

All things aside this is one of the most amazing proofs of life before birth that there is in all of the Bible. Because who was the very first person to declare with joy the coming of the one who would restore joy? It was an unborn baby. Because the very one who would herald the truth of the coming Messiah, the very one who would prepare the way for the Messiah, inside of the womb of Elizabeth just knew that Mary who was already carrying the Son of God came into the room.

He leaped with joy. Why? Because he knew because of the Holy Spirit at work already there was this work of joy that was in him and we see that this Messiah would bring joy into the world, a world that was so filled with sorrow and sadness, a world that was so filled with depression was going to be filled with joy and John leaped in the womb. He had a little party, right?

He got really excited about it and he declared the truth. Now the second time that joy is mentioned to us is in Luke chapter 2. Perhaps you know it. Starting in verse 8, so go over to the next page. Starting in verse 8 it says, And in the same region there were, this is right after the birth of Jesus, and in the same region there were shepherds staying out in the fields keeping watch

over their flock by night. The angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened. The angel said to them, Do not be afraid, for I bring you good news of great joy, which will be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord. Right? That's what Jesus

brought and these angels show up and the next time that we see this word it's no longer a baby leaping inside the womb, now it's angels talking to shepherds saying we have really good news for you. Because I have good news of great joy and it's going to be joy for all people because Jesus has been born. The one who will restore the sadness, the one who will lift the veil, the one who will lift the depression, who will bring about joy to the world. He is born.

And so the next time that we see joy is in the book of Matthew. So hold your finger here if you're up for it. Go over to Matthew chapter 2. Over to your left. If you hit Zephaniah you went too far. Matthew chapter 2. I want you to look at verse 10. So just a quick set up for Matthew chapter 2. Jesus has been born and it's some time later and the wise men have seen the star in the east.

Right? And they've been following star. We three kings of orient are. Anyway. So they're following the star right? And they show up to Jerusalem because they're like that's the star of the king of the Jews. So they show up to Jerusalem which is where they thought a king would be born and they said where's the one who's been born king of the Jews? And Herod's kind of like come again?

And they're like yeah we saw a star in the east. And he goes hey guys figure out where the king of the Jews is. He's supposed to be born in Bethlehem. And he was like you need to go to Bethlehem. You should follow them. And the next thing that happens is in verse 10. It says and when they saw the star they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy. Why? Because they knew

that the king had been born. Because they knew that the one that was to restore joy to the world had been born. And they'd been following this star this whole way. Can you imagine being the wise men? Hey guys what are we going to do today? Well I just keep seeing this star. I don't know why I feel like we should follow it. That's a terrible idea. We'll throw in. And everybody what are you guys

doing today? We're leaving to follow the star. You guys are morons. That's okay. And they follow the star all the way to Israel. And they don't know where they're going. They say go to Bethlehem. They go to Bethlehem and as they look to see where the child was living boom a star. There it is. And they rejoiced with great joy. Now the next time that we see joy mentioned

in scripture is actually in Luke chapter 15. So go over to Luke chapter 15. So after all of the excitement of the birth of Jesus, Jesus starts teaching. And he starts teaching them what the kingdom of heaven looks like and he starts teaching them what it looks like to live in the kingdom of heaven knowing full well what he was about to do. Knowing full well that he was on his

way to being crucified for the sins of the world. To turn the people back to the Lord. To ultimately restore the people. To ultimately restore joy. And you know there is great excitement. There is great joy when sinners are turned from their sorrow to a place of joy. Right? And so Jesus starts telling these parables. And one of the parables that he tells is called the parable

of the lost sheep. Let me just recap it for you real quick. He says if a shepherd has a hundred sheep and ninety nine of them are in the fold. And he's missing one. Does he not leave the ninety nine in the fold and go after the one? And when he returns he has great joy because he has found the sheep that he has lost. And that takes us to verse seven of chapter fifteen.

He says I tell you that in the same way there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety nine persons who don't need repentance. This tells us that our greatest source of joy is turning to Jesus in repentance because of what he's done for us. Now I don't know if you've ever thought about this verse. I don't know if you've ever thought about what happens in heaven when one sinner turns from their sorrow to repentance to ultimately find their greatest joy in Jesus Christ. But heaven

goes crazy. Can you imagine a Billy Graham crusade? I don't know if you've ever watched those Billy Graham crusades at one point in time. But thousands of people are coming forward and they're receiving Jesus. Right? Like they're just setting fireworks off. They're going crazy. I don't know how you picture that in heaven. I don't know if you picture the angels just going

yay. Right? That's usually what we think of when we think of them rejoicing. Great joy over people in heaven. I don't think that's what happened at all. Picture your favorite team winning the Super Bowl for the first time and the fact that they're a franchise. Right? And they win and everybody gets really excited. Everybody's going outside and they're setting off fireworks and everybody's

jubilant. They take off work the next day because they're so happy about the fact that their team won the Super Bowl and everybody's geeked up or maybe your team won the World Series or you name the thing and there's just so much excitement. That's what heaven does when a sinner turns to Jesus. Why? Because they have turned from sorrow to joy. Because their life was full of

sin and death and destruction and sadness and regret and distress and all of that was lifted off of them and they were filled with so much joy. Do you remember the day that you came to Jesus as your Lord and Savior? Do you remember the day that you came to Him and you confessed all your sins to Him? And you learned that day that you had been forgiven and how much joy filled your heart?

You didn't totally get all of it. You didn't totally understand how it all worked. You just knew that for the first time in your life you had joy. For the first time in your life you weren't sad all the time because you knew that you belonged to Jesus. Well our greatest source of joy is when He turns us from our sorrow to Jesus. When one sinner repents. Well the next time that we see it show up is at the

end of the book of Luke chapter 24. So go over to Luke chapter 24. Jesus has risen from the dead. He was crucified for our sins. All of our sins laid upon Him. On His body on the tree. Took all of the sin of humanity to ultimately bring about this restoration. Of course the last thing He declares from the cross is it is finished. And then He died. For three days

everybody wondered what was going to happen. And then on that third day He rose again. And there's only a handful of people that had seen Him by this point in time. Matter of fact only three. Mary Magdalene, and then the disciples on the road to Emmaus. Jesus was walking on the road to Emmaus with these disciples and He says, hey what's everybody talking about right now?

And they said, have you been living under a rock? We're talking about this Jesus. We kind of thought He was the Messiah and now He's been crucified. And we don't know what to do. Seems like all of our hope is lost. All the joy has been sucked out of us. My words not theirs. But all their hope had been lost. And He says really? Well let me tell you a little bit about this Messiah.

And starting from the Old Testament Scriptures. He went all the way through and showed them all the places and all the things that the Messiah was supposed to suffer. And so they arrive at their house in Emmaus and they say, why don't you stay for dinner? It's getting kind of late. He says, that sounds like a fantastic idea. So He goes in and they say, would you bless the meal for us? So He

blesses the meal and He breaks the bread and undoubtedly they could see the scars in His hands. It says their eyes were opened and they realized it was the resurrected Jesus. And in that moment He was gone. So they run back to Jerusalem. And as they run back to Jerusalem, they're in the upper room telling the disciples everything that's going on. And Jesus shows up.

Verse 36. It says, while they were telling these things He Himself stood in their midst and He said to them, peace be to you. But they were startled and frightened. And thought that they were seeing a spirit. And He said to them, why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your heart? See my hands and my feet that it is I myself. Touch me and see. For a spirit does not

have flesh and bones as you see that I have. And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet. And while they still could not believe it because of their joy and amazement. He said, don't you have anything to eat? They gave Him some food. See their next place of joy was in the fact that Jesus is alive. Jesus came. He showed them how to live the right

life. He died the death that they couldn't do for themselves. And now He was alive and they felt great joy. Over the fact that Jesus was alive. But you see those are the things that Jesus did while He was here on earth to bring joy into our lives. So what do we do with it now? We'll go over to John chapter 15. John chapter 15. I want you to notice again this is the next place.

One of the next major places that it shows up. And I want you to look at verse 11. John chapter 15 verse 11. It says, These things I have spoken to you so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be made full. Now I hope you just asked yourself a question right now. I hope you just said what things did He speak to them? Well I'm really glad you asked.

Let me tell you. So Jesus had been giving one of His last teachings before the cross. We call it the chapter on abiding. He said I am the vine and you are the branches. Every branch that abides in me bears much fruit. Whoever does not abide in me does not bear fruit but is cut off and cast away. You abide in me. Now that aspect of abiding means an active and living

relationship. That's the idea of the abiding relationship. And if we have an abiding and living relationship with Jesus Christ then we have continual joy. Because notice what He says. These things I have spoken to you about an active abiding relationship with the Jesus who came for us. These things I have spoken to you so that my joy may be in you and so that your joy may be full.

In other words, over abundant joy. Where does it come from? It comes from an active and living relationship with the Jesus who came to restore joy to our lives. It is He who came to deal with the sin, the sorrow, the death, destruction, the loss, the sadness that we have. And He dealt with all of that on the cross and therefore what we do is we have an active

and living relationship with Him on a consistent basis and it continues to bring joy into our lives. Perhaps you are asking yourself a question right now. If this joy is in Jesus and I am a believer why don't I have any joy in my life? I would tell you it is because you don't have a very active relationship with Jesus Christ right now. And if you were being honest with yourself

you would have to say that is true. Because an active and living relationship will always produce joy in our lives. Because an active and living relationship will always cause us to be full of joy. Therefore it is time for you to dig back into that relationship with Jesus Christ. It is time to get back into your prayer closet and start talking to Jesus about the things that are going on in your life.

It is time to start listening to Him through what His Word has to say. It is time to start communing with Him all day long. Focusing on Him through things like worship and a whole lot less of the things of the world and get back into that relationship with Jesus Christ because you see the world tells us that happiness comes and goes. Jesus says joy can always be full.

Why? Because your relationship with Jesus Christ can always remain the same. You say, but what about when difficult things come into my life? How can I maintain joy in the midst of the difficulties of life? Gosh, I'm glad you asked me that. You guys have great questions this morning. Go over to James chapter 1. I hit Jude. That's too far. James chapter 1. And I want

you to look at verses 2 and 3. Everybody's favorite verses in all of the Bible. Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. You see, an active and living relationship with Jesus Christ that produces joy in our lives produces joy even in the midst of trials. And we can consider it pure joy. Remember

what we said our definition of joy was? Gladness, cheerfulness, calm, delight. All of that can be produced. It's the lasting emotion that comes from the choice to trust that God will fulfill His promises. All of that can be produced in our lives. And how is it produced in our lives? It's produced by an active and living relationship with Jesus Christ. Because it's easy to have a

joyful feeling when everything's going right. Amen? When everything is going perfect, it's like, oh, everything is great. I have so much joy. The joy of the Lord is my strength. And then everything goes wrong, and you're like, why does God hate me? He doesn't. He's producing endurance in your life, but He wants you to still have joy, and that joy will come through an active and living relationship

with Jesus Christ. Right? Let me tell you a little bit of a story of something that happened yesterday. Not in my life, but in the lives of some people that I've kind of been following from a distance. So I've been following these Ohio State football players for quite some time now, since the beginning of this semester. And I've been watching what God's been doing.

Sometimes it's gone great, sometimes it's gone bad, but their witness has been pretty amazing through all of it. Now, if you did not watch college football yesterday, congratulations. If you did, perhaps you saw that there was an incident in the Michigan-Ohio State game yesterday. Michigan-Ohio State is probably one of the most storied rivalries in all of college football. From the beginning

of college football, right? And it's one of the deepest rivalries. Well, yesterday was the rivalry game. And Ohio State was ranked number two in the nation. I say was, for a purpose. They were ranked number two in the nation. And Michigan comes in and ends up beating them by three points. Kick a field goal with like 30 seconds left or something, and they end up

beating them. And Michigan does what oftentimes teams do. They go out to plant their flag in the middle of Ohio State's field. Sidebar, that's the dumbest idea in the world, right? I don't understand planting your flag on another team's field. I don't like storming courts. I don't like storming fields. I don't like tearing down goalposts. It's like if you ask yourself, hey, what's the easiest

way to start the largest fight in our school's history? That's how you do it, right? I mean, it's just at some point in time, someone's got to use their brain. They didn't. They went out to plant the flag in the middle of the field, and a brawl broke out between the two. I mean, a major brawl broke out between the two teams. Oh, they had to use pepper spray on the players

to get them to stop. This is not funny, but it was funny, okay? The clip that I saw on ESPN yesterday was of these football players going because they had all this pepper spray on their face, and I was like, oh, that's kind of a funny thing. I know that's not good, but it was just funny to see the looks on their faces. It's okay if we could delete that part from

the video, just like for first service. That would be great. But it was an ugly ugly thing, and I thought, isn't that sad that all of these, so many of these Ohio State football players have seen God do great things in their lives. They've seen God do amazing things in their lives, and their season ends like this, not only with a loss, but with this major brawl.

And so I followed two or three of them on Instagram, and so I went on yesterday, and I was watching stories on Instagram, and I came across one of the guys, and I found it fascinating what he posted. You know what he posted? At the end of everything, the end of the day yesterday, he posted this thing that said, when everything goes my way, I will praise you. And when everything goes not my way, I will still praise you, because you are good, no matter what. And I thought,

isn't that a beautiful thing? You see, that's a guy that walks with Jesus. That's a guy that has an abiding relationship with Jesus Christ, that because Jesus came into the world to restore joy, he can still praise God with joy in his heart, with a certain amount of contentment in his heart, because even though he watched guys that he'd been pouring into make really bad decisions, even though he saw his team lose and potentially lose out on a chance to play in a national championship game, he saw all those things happen, and yet he says, I can still praise God. Why? Because he has an

abiding relationship, because Jesus came to bring joy, not based on our circumstances, but based on the reality of who he is, and what he's done in our lives. And that's what God is able to do with us, because that's what real joy looks like. That's what real joy looks like in our lives, because when Jesus comes into our lives, that's what he restores, is he takes away the sorrow, and he restores that joy. Go with me one more place in scripture.

Go to 1 Peter. I want you to look at chapter 1. I want you to look at verse 8. These guys have been so good, I'm going to screw with them on this one too. Start in verse 6. 1 Peter chapter 1, verse 6. It says, In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you've been distressed by various trials. So that the proof of your faith, being more precious

than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor, at the revelation of Jesus Christ. And though you have not seen him, meaning Jesus, you love him. And though you do not see him now, but you believe in him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory. You see, he says, you may be tested by various trials right now, but it's okay, one day you're going to see Jesus.

And even though you haven't seen him, you love him. And even though you haven't seen him, you have your joy in him. And you rejoice in him. Because the fullness of our joy comes from the presence of Jesus. Sorrow has filled the world. Sorrow continues to fill the world. And there is one source that we have for any kind of real joy in our lives, and that's Jesus.

Now, I know that there is still sorrow in this world. You're like, Jesus has come into the world. Why is there still so much sorrow in the world? Why is there still so much pain? Why is there still so much problem? Because while we see the joy of the first coming of Jesus Christ, we won't know the true joy of knowing Jesus until that day that we see him face to face.

And just like we talked about last week, that's what we're looking for, is that day when we see him face to face. Until then, we rejoice with joy inexpressible because we know him and because we believe in him this morning. I want to read something to you. So, as I was doing some research on this, I thought, I wonder how many Christmas carols have the word joy in it, right?

How many of those old songs have joy? So, I googled that and it said, it gave me traditional Christmas carols. So, I don't know if Mama's kissing Santa Claus with joy or anything like that. But, uh, I don't know if Mariah Carey sings about joy. All she wants for Christmas is you, right? But in the traditional Christmas carols, there are over 24 of them that either have as their main

theme or mention the word joy. And I want to read just a short portion of this to you because I was listening to it last night and the words to it are so amazing. It's the song, O Holy Night. It says this, O Holy Night, the stars are brightly shining. It is the night of our dear Savior's birth. Long lay the world in sin and error pining, till He appeared and the soul felt

its worth. The thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, and yonder breaks a new and glorious morn. Do you remember the scene at the very end of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe? You guys remember? You may watch that movie. There's this great scene at the end of it. Aslan, the lion, ultimately faces in battle the witch that has caused eternal winter to fall over

everything. And at the very end, Aslan dies and everybody goes, oh no, there's no hope. But then all of a sudden, Aslan comes back to life. And when Aslan comes back to life, the lion roars. And when the lion roars, everybody realizes the king is back. Because the king is alive. And all of a sudden, everything starts to melt down. All of the snow melts, the

clouds lift, the sun comes out, and it's like a brand new morning dawns on the entire world of Narnia. I don't know about you, sometimes when I think about what Jesus has done in my life, when I think about what Jesus has done to restore my own life because of his work, I think about that scene. And I think about just how much when Jesus became alive in me, it melted down the eternal winter of my soul, and it restored a new and glorious morn. Because the Son of God is alive. And brothers and sisters,

in this season, may we ultimately and truly know the joy of Jesus. Amen? Well, this morning is Communion Sunday. I don't see any children lined up. So, alright, the kids are getting ready to head this direction. So parents, if you could keep your eye out as they come through this door, and we'll wait until the kids get in here, and then we'll partake of communion together.

Right down front here, buddy. Come on in. Other side, Mila. Straight across. Is this the last of them coming in the door right now? Yeah? Wait, there's one more tiny child. There's more tiny childs. Okay. Well, as we gather here this morning, it's Communion Sunday. So, as I always like to say, inside each of these trays, there's a whole bunch of cups, and there's two of them stacked together.

And they have two elements in them. The bottom cup has the cracker, and the top cup has the juice. And in and of themselves, pretty mundane things. But what they represent for us as believers in Jesus Christ has a great deal of power to it. Because that bread represents the body of Jesus Christ, which has been broken for us. The bread that they would have partaken of the Passover meal in

looks a little bit different than what you usually see on a picture of the communion supper in the Western culture. The bread that they would have used would have been an unleavened matzah bread. So it would have almost been like a giant cracker. And it was very thin, it was unleavened, and it was pierced, and it was striped. And there's real symbolism in that. Leaven in Scripture

always represents sin. So it was, if you will, sinless. It was pure. And it was pierced and striped. And so when Jesus took that bread, Jesus who was the sinless sacrifice, who would be pierced, and who would be striped with those beatings for us, when he held up that bread and he broke it, imagine the symbolism that goes into that. He said, this is my body.

Pure, striped, and pierced for you. Take and eat. Do this in remembrance of me. And that's what Jesus did for us, is he took in his own body, on the tree, all of our sin. We're told that by his stripes we are healed, that he endured the beatings, the piercings, the crown of thorns, pierced through his side, all for us. So as we partake of that bread, we are reminded of the

body of Jesus Christ that was broken for us. And then he took that cup, he took the cup and he said, this is the cup of the new covenant in my blood which is shed for you. So as we partake of the cup, we are reminded of the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed for us. You see in the Old Testament, the way the Old Covenant was set up is that in order to continue to cover their sins every year, they had to always continually make sacrifices.

But when Jesus came, he made that last sacrifice to not just atone for sin, but to do away with sin. Which is why the last thing he shouted from the cross was, it is finished, paid and full. Because it was totally dealt with. So when we partake of that cup, we are reminded of the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed for us to completely do away with our sins. And so scripture tells us

that every time we partake in this meal, we declare the death of Jesus. So we're supposed to do it in a worthy manner. And the first thing that that means is really understanding what we're doing here. That this is a sacred meal that we're partaking in. But the second thing that it reminds us of is that it's a meal for believers. So if you're here this morning,

and you don't understand anything that I've talked about, you don't understand that joy that I'm talking about, you only understand the sorrow that I'm talking about. You only know what it's like to have the sorrow of sin and destruction in your life, and loss and sadness. You only know that. And today's the day for you to come to Jesus. Today's the day for you

to come to Jesus, confess your sins, accept that His sacrifice was enough to save you, and completely surrender to Him. And then you can be made brand new. And I'm going to make you a promise. You'll understand that joy that I'm talking about. You'll understand that veil being lifted. Eternal winter being done away with. The brand new morning dawning in your life.

But it also means for us as believers, that we need to make sure that our hearts are right before the Lord. Sometimes we need a little bit of a detox, amen? We go through life and we find ourselves kind of slipping back into old habits, perhaps getting caught up in the roller coaster of life, and forgetting that abiding relationship. We just need to get our hearts clean before the Lord. You still belong to Him, but

you just need a little bit of a detox. So, the worship team is going to sing this last song. And as they do, I ask that you would invite the Lord to search your heart. To see if there's things that need dealt with between you and Him. So that as you partake of this, it can be a true celebration of the forgiveness of sins. And so the ushers are going to come down and they're going to hand out the elements.

And as they do so, when you receive your elements, if you would please stand, and then at the end, we will all partake together.

Father, we come to You now. And Father, I thank You for the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Father, I thank You for Your body that was broken for us. Lord, that You were willing to endure not only the physical beatings, Lord, but Jesus was willing to endure separation from You. And He took upon Himself all the sin of the world. I thank You for the body of Jesus Christ

that was broken for us. Father, I thank You for the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed for us. Lord, Your blood that covers our sin. Lord, Your blood that makes us brand new. That gives new life. That restores joy. Father, I thank You for the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed for us. And Lord, may we always keep in mind the reason why we gather as a body.

Because You died for us to redeem to Yourself Your own special people. So Lord, thank You for the sacrifice of Jesus. I pray these things, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen. Let's partake. If You'd bow with me one last time. Father, thank You for the time that we've had together to spend time in Your Word, to fellowship together, to worship together. And Father, as we go into this next

week, Lord, may the joy of the Lord be our strength. We just thank You, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen. Be blessed.