Christmas Around the World:
Jesus is the Answer

John 3:16

By Tom Cheely

Prayer:

Father, we thank You for the privilege we have to be together and worship as we have. We thank You for those who have come to share with us their customs and ways of celebrating the birth of Jesus. Help us now to focus our attention on Your Word. Lord, we pray that You would encourage us and continue to lead and guide us as we celebrate this Christmas season. It's in Your Name we pray, Amen.

As I have listened to things that have been shared tonight there are couple of passages from the Bible that have come to my attention. I don't apologize for sharing with you from the Bible because it is the Word of God. The Bible does not contain the Word of God and it does not become the Word of God. It is the Word of God and therefore we should listen carefully to the things that God has recorded as He allows us to understand His heart and mind.

I was first reminded that in the Scripture we read that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. It's a threatening thing in that one little word as the verse begins, " have sinned…" Has anybody ever not sinned? If so, I'll talk to your wife later and we'll talk to your mom. God says we've all sinned. That means we're all in trouble so we all need something to deliver us from the power of sin and from that sin that lives within us but God hasn't left us as sinners. Although the wages of sin is death the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. That's what we celebrate. God so loved us that He sent His Son into the world to deal with that sin in our hearts and lives, to save us from that power of sin, to give us a new heart, to lead us as to be His people. I don't believe there is much that God desires more than the people of the world to know how much He loved them.

I want to tell you a story which fits so well here at Christmas. God entrusted three children to Kathy and me – two daughters and a son. One of my daughters lives here around town so if you see be sure to tell her you heard daddy say he loved her. The other daughter will be coming to town in about six weeks so you be sure and tell her I love her too but the girls don't fit my story. My son fits the story and he and I are very close. I love him intently. We're very good friends. He doesn't live here in the city. He lives outside the country and I don't get to see him much. I don't mind where he is and what he is doing I'd just like to get my hands on him a little more often than I can.

If I were to come home tonight and find there was a message on my computer or my phone that someone had picked up my son and they intended to put him to death, but they would let him live if I die, I'd die for him in an instant. I wouldn't have to think about if I would die. It would just be the circumstance whether they would trust Pastor Reeder to put me to death or whether I would have to go somewhere else and some other means to die but I'd die for that boy because I love him.

Now suddenly into this room if there would come a group of people with shot guns and machine guns and they were to announce that they were going to put all of youto death, but they would let you live if I die, and I got to choose who was going to live or die. I want you to know I love you but I don't know whether I love you that much or not. I probably would die so you could live because I've about had it up to here with the junk down here and I know where I'm going when I die. I'm not planning to leave tonight but I know where I'm going and I'd probably let you live so I could die and I would die for you but I do know if the choice was for you to live or die or for my son to live or die, I would never choose for my son to die for you or anyone else to live because I love my son.

Now listen carefully and follow. God the Father has a Son and God the Father determined that God the Son would die so that you and I, the people of planet earth, might live. I don't understand love like that, of how a father could stand by and watch his own son die for someone else to live but in the Bible I read that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but have everlasting life. You know if there had been any other way for us to have been made right with God the Father, apart from the death of God the Son, the Father would have never put Himself through the agony of having to watch His own Son die if there had been any other way – whether you call it Hinduism or Buddhism or Taoism or Shintoism or Islam. There is no other way but Jesus Christ, God's Son, who came that we might have life and that we might have it abundantly.

That is cause to celebrate and that's why every year we have this time in the life of the church to remember God's great love for us that enables us to be made right with Him. The most tragic thing that could happen this Christmas would be for you to receive all the gifts on the list that you have, to be able to give all the gifts that you have been asked for and to miss receiving the gift from God which is eternal life through Jesus Christ the Lord. It could be there is someone reading this right now who came to celebrate Christmas but have not received Christ yourself, to forgive your sin, to receive that new heart as a gift from Him. It would be our desire and our prayer that this Christmas would be the Christmas of life for you. Would you pray with me?

Prayer:

Father, greater love has no one than this that a man lay down his life for another. We rejoice that You have loved us so deeply that even in our sin You demonstrated that love by sending Your Son to live the life we should have lived, to die the death that we were due, to be raised to life that we might live forever. Father, if there is anyone reading this who has not received the Savior Jesus, O God, would You press hard by Your Holy Spirit upon their life. Enable them not only to hear the message of Your love but open their heart that they might respond and receive it. Come into their life Lord Jesus, save them from sin and do that which You came into the world to do. Do it today for those who are reading this and help us all as we look around the world to celebrate with brothers and sisters in Christ, knowing that one day that Savior will come again and receive us to Himself that we might be with Him forever. Hallelujah, what a Savior! In the name of Jesus Chris the Lord, the Son of God, I pray, Amen.