Christmas at Traders Point |This is for Everyone

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Transcript

December 23 and 24, 2016

Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone Aaron Brockett | Luke 2:8-11

All right. Merry Christmas. So good to see you. I want to welcome you if this is your first time to be with us. And I want to welcome those tuning in online, as well as our North campus that is tuning in live streaming as well. One of the things that I’ve learned over the years is that everybody has their own Christmas traditions and preferences when it comes to this time of the year. And maybe you’ve picked up on that. You married into a family and on your first Christmas together as a married couple you went to her side of the family and you were like, “Why are we eating that?” And, “Why are we celebrating it that way?” Or maybe you went home with a college roommate because you couldn’t get back to your family for the holidays and you just saw that they did things a little bit differently. And that’s okay. There’s room for everyone in all of that. But I want to take a Christmas tradition vote. We’ve been doing this in all of the services. So I would kind of like to know who I am speaking with and this will actually tell me a lot about you, alright? So vote carefully. What I want to do is, whenever I throw up one of these things up on the screen here I want you to vote for your preference and North campus I want you to vote as well—vote for your preference with rowdy applause, the rowdier the better. So let’s start with Christmas music. How many of you would be a Michael Buble kind of a Christmas fan. Lot of ladies on that one. I don’t hear too many guys. What about Mariah Carey? How many of you are a Frank Sinatra Christmas fan? Yeah. One I’ve been listening to. How about movies? We could go with It’s a Wonderful Life. How many of you? Pretty solid choice. I hate to admit this out loud but, honestly, I’ve not seen this yet. I know— every service has shamed me. Where’s the grace? I know, alright? I know. I don’t know if this counts or not but I have seen the same scene in this movie 500 times. I don’t know if that counts. But anyway what about Elf? Any of you Elf fans? Yeah. Alright for Elf. What about Christmas Vacation? Alright. That tells me a lot about this crowd so I know how to adjust the message. What about this one? Die Hard, you’ve got to include it because it technically is a Christmas movie. What about food? How many of you are ham people? You didn’t think you’d be voting for ham. How about turkey? Any turkey people? Some of you are like, “Just forget it. We’re ordering Domino’s pizza.” Alright, I see how you are. How many of you—a little pecan pie? Or pumpkin? How about pumpkin pie?

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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

Let’s transition here to gifts. How many of you are all about the professionally wrapped gift? You want everything to be perfect. You don’t need to be ashamed of that. How many of you are like this—yeah, yeah. I don’t care. It looks like a kindergartner hyped up on sugar wrapped that gift but it’s wrapped in love and that’s all that matters. How many of you are fake tree people? Fake tree. Real tree? You’re the real people. You’ve got more Christmas spirit, I’ll give you that. How many of you are all in like this guy when it comes to Christmas lights you don’t care about your utility bill, you’re going to light up the neighborhood. How many of you are like the guy, ditto? Yeah, what that guy did over there. Yeah, I feel you. Well here’s the great thing about Christmas votes is that all of those options up on the screen—I’m good with any of it, alright? It doesn’t matter what you voted for. I’m good with it because all of those options are pretty great. I mean, it’s a good day when the big decision that you’ve got to choose between is pecan pie and pumpkin pie. It’s like, “I guess I’ll suffer for Jesus and I’ll choke down the pecan pie.” See when it comes to all of the Christmas traditions and preferences there should be room for everyone. And that’s one of the great things about this time of the year; at least it’s supposed to be. I don’t think that I have to tell you that we live in a world that is so divided that maybe you’ve lost hope that those two little words for everyone—that you could ever find them because we live in a culture that naturally divides people into categories and class. So much so that we begin to wonder if there is anything that could be for everyone. Yet the Christmas story should give us some hope. And when I say the Christmas story I’m actually not referring to anyone of these traditions that we just voted for on the screen, as great as all of those things are. I’m talking about the Christmas story as it’s found in God’s word. It took place over 2,000 years ago in a stable in Bethlehem. And here’s what I want you to know about it. The Christmas event that took place was more than just a story, it was more than just an event, it was actually an announcement that had a message that’s contained for everyone. We actually read about it in Luke, chapter 2, starting in verse 8. It says, “That night there were shepherds,” and I want you to notice this group of people because we’re going to talk about them an awful lot here in the next few moments. There were some shepherds, “staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep. Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord’s glory surrounded them. They were terrified, but the angel reassured them. ‘Don’t be afraid!’ he said. ‘I bring you good news that will bring great joy to,’” and here’s the two little words that I really want you to notice in the passage, “‘all people. The Savior—yes, the Messiah, the Lord—has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David!’” Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

Now this passage right here is an announcement of the birth of Christ, which is God’s answer to all of the hurt and the hopelessness that exists in the world both then and today. And this particular announcement would have come, first of all, to the Israelites—the Jewish people—because they had been waiting for this message for a very long time, 400 years to be precise. They had been looking for a Messiah. And that word Messiah just simply means: Deliverer, somebody who would deliver them out of their circumstances. And the particular circumstances that they found themselves in was that they were in slavery in a foreign land, in Egypt, to a really corrupt guy by the name of Pharaoh. So, to you and to me, whenever we read that passage out of Luke, we might read it and say, “Okay, I think I know what he’s talking about when he’s talking about a Messiah. It’s that Jesus is going to come so that if we put our trust in Him then we can go to heaven one day when we die. But that’s not how the Israelites received it. They would have heard this as, “This is actually news for tomorrow. This is actually news that could change our circumstances right now,” because they were in slavery and what they really needed was a deliverer, somebody who would actually deliver them out of the circumstances that they found themselves in. So for them, when they heard this announcement they thought it was for them and for them alone. I mean, who else would this announcement be for because they were the ones who were in slavery in Egypt and they had been holding on to promises like this one in Deuteronomy, chapter 14, verse 2 for a really long time. It says, “You have been set apart as holy to the Lord your God, and He has chosen you from all the nations of the earth to be His own special treasure.” Now when they heard a promise or a prophecy like this one, they saw that word chosen and they saw these two little words set apart and they thought, “Well, obviously this promise is for us. This sounds like possessive language. God is telling us that this is going to be better for our lives and really no one else.” But what they failed to realize was that what chosen and set apart really meant was that God was going to give this gift of a deliverer to them and that the message of that gift was to pass through them to all people. They failed to see that. And I don’t know that I necessarily blame them. I think that I probably would have failed to see that as well. Kind of like whenever I give the gift of an Xbox to my son at Christmas. It’s like I buy that for him not just so that the gift would stop with him, but that he would allow the gift to pass through him to his father so that I might be able to participate in a little Call of Duty after the kids go to bed. But if he doesn’t necessarily catch that hint then I’m somewhat disappointed. It’s sort of the same thing, the Israelites had heard that there was a Messiah that had come to deliver them from their circumstances, they anticipated a Savior who would come to rescue them from bondage it just had never really been very clear to them that Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

this was for other people—as Luke says for all people meaning people who prefer fake trees, Domino’s pizza, and the Die Hard movie, so to speak. Even those people—it’s for all people. So Luke says in verse 10 that this is an announcement of good news and it will bring great joy to everyone. And Luke is very clear about his words. If you know anything about the four gospel writers: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—Luke was the most educated out of the four of them. He was a doctor. He’d actually been hired by a wealthy benefactor, this guy by the name of Theophilus, to write out a historically accurate account of Jesus’ life and ministry that could be relied upon for centuries. So when Luke writes something, it’s not just by chance. Luke is being very intentional about what he writes. And he chooses his words carefully to convey this truth most clearly. This is an announcement of a message that is for everyone. And Luke says that this is for all people but he goes even beyond that and he says that the first group of people to actually hear this announcement were shepherds. Now to you and to me today, in 2016, that doesn’t sound all that unusual because in our minds we’re thinking, “Of course, the shepherds were there.” Maybe you’ve been to a couple of Christmas programs over the last couple of weeks and you’ve seen some shepherds in the nativity scene and we just sort of take it for granted, “Of course, the shepherds were there.” But this would have been a highly unusual detail to include in this narrative. In fact, Luke is the only gospel writer to include the shepherds. I don’t know if you knew that or not. Matthew, Mark, and John don’t. And we don’t necessarily know for sure why, but my guess in this is that they thought to themselves, “We can’t include the shepherds.” To include the shepherds would have run the risk of discrediting the whole story because they were such a despised group of people. We may not necessarily see or understand that today but they were. See in my mind I’ve always had this picture in my head that shepherds looked like Gandalf in Lord of the Rings. That’s just always what I kind of had in my mind. These were older men, they were wise, they were strong, they had a killer beard, and you know they had a staff yet it wasn’t necessarily the case. See shepherds—I always thought that shepherding was a career choice in the first century. You know at the Bethlehem elementary school, on career day, nobody was showing up as a nurse or an astronaut but they were all showing up as shepherds. But that’s just not the case. In reality, 2,000 years ago in Israel, shepherds wouldn’t have been able to grow a beard like that because shepherds were mostly boys, orphan boys, whose families had either given them up or sold them into slavery to pay off some debts. Most of the shepherd boys, their real fathers—if they hadn’t been executed by the Roman Empire—they would have been rotting away in a Roman jail cell. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

See the job of a shepherd was considered the lowest of the low. That occupation was on the bottom rung of the Palestinian social ladder right alongside of tax collectors and those who swept up camel dung from the streets. If I could put it this way, I would say it like this: Shepherding was what you did when there was nothing else available to do. Shepherding was not something that you aspired to but something that you settled for because of a lack of options. But it hadn’t always been that way. See back in Genesis, chapter 4 is when we first read about shepherds. And actually the Israelites were mostly shepherds and it was considered a noble occupation. But when they were captured by the Egyptians and when they were sent into slavery in Egypt, they encountered a life-style that was different to what they really knew. See the Egyptians were not shepherds. The Egyptians were farmers and they actually despised the shepherds because, if you’re a farmer trying to grow crops you don’t want sheep and goats walking around on your crops. So the Egyptians actually had a very negative view toward shepherding. So much so that in Genesis, chapter 46—you can look this up later if you’re interested in reading it— there is this guy by the name of Joseph (and this is different than Mary’s Joseph, this is a different Joseph) who had a real fancy coat, it was a coat of many colors and his brothers were jealous of him. If any of you know the story you know that they sell him into slavery in Egypt. And he lived there for many, many years. He actually worked for Pharaoh. And then late in life his brothers, the very ones who sold him into slavery, are reunited with Joseph in Egypt. And Joseph decides to be gracious with them. And he’s helping them get acclimated to their new life in Egypt and he says these words that you wouldn’t really understand the significance of if you didn’t know the back story, he’s trying to show them the ropes, and he says this in Genesis 46, “Hey guys, the Egyptians despise shepherds so when you meet Pharaoh and when he asks you what you do for a living, don’t tell him that you’re a shepherd. Tell him you’re a farmer and that will make life a little bit easier for you.” See the very first murder recorded in history erupted between a farmer’s resentment of a shepherd when Cain, the farmer, killed his brother, Abel, the shepherd, in Genesis, chapter 4. And as a result of this and over the course of 400 years, what happened was the Egyptians began to prejudice the Israelites’ attitude toward shepherding. So shepherding had not only lost its widespread appeal but it eventually forfeited its social acceptability and many became victims of a cruel stereotype. The religious leaders would take shots at shepherds in an effort to discredit them and Rabbis banned shepherding except on desert plains. The Mishneh which is Judaism’s written record of the oral law records this and reflects this prejudice referring to shepherds in belittling terms. One passage says that they were incompetent and another one says this: You should never feel obligated to stop and help a shepherd if he Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

has fallen into a pit. That’s just how they thought of them. One historian wrote this, “To buy wool, milk or a kid,” and a kid means a baby goat, “from a shepherd was forbidden on the assumption that it would be stolen property,” which is another way of saying that shepherds are thieves. So if you see a shepherd selling something don’t buy it because it’s likely to be a stolen item. This was how shepherds were viewed. This is what was said about them. This is how people thought about them and you come back to our passage in Luke and it was into this social context of class prejudice that a handful of marginalized, unpretentious shepherds were hand-picked by God to be the very first ones to know and to announce the news that Jesus had come. And you’ve just simply got to ask yourself the question: why? Why wouldn’t God choose somebody a little bit more prominent to make this announcement to? Why wouldn’t God choose a king or a queen to make this announcement? Why not be somebody who just had a little more social clout or a little more credibility. I don’t know, maybe the same reason why God would have a couple of ladies discover the empty tomb when Jesus was resurrected. You see shepherds, their testimony wouldn’t hold up in a court of law and the same thing was true of women in the first century as well. I think that God is trying to say something to us at the book ends of Jesus’ earthly life. At His birth and His resurrection God chooses a group of people who didn’t necessarily have credibility within society to be the very first ones to know and the very first ones to make the announcement. And I think it can all be traced back to that little verse, verse 10, that we read from Luke. He said, “I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people. God is trying to emphasize this point by bringing the shepherds, this despised class of people, into the know first because God is trying to say that this is for everybody. See by including the shepherds, God is making a statement that this news is for everyone and everyone is included. And to be included in something, to be wanted, to know that you are loved that is an intrinsic desire that can be found in every person listening to this right now, whether you believe in God or you don’t, whether you would call yourself a Christian or not, whether you would say that you’re a church-goer or you are not it doesn’t really matter. All of that is irrelevant. You’ve been created in the image of God therefore you have value because you are an individual. You are a human being. You have this desire to be wanted, known, and loved. We just all have that within us. Now here’s the thing. What does it feel like to be Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

unwanted? What does it feel like to be excluded? What does it feel like to be stereotyped or to be marginalized? Now chances are that you may have gotten a little bit of a taste of those things, maybe in some setting in your life—some of us more than others. Chances are that you’ve seen it in some setting and it does not feel good and it does not look pretty. It’s a broken thing. I’ll never forget when I was in the sixth grade growing up. There was this girl in our class named Crystal. And Crystal just didn’t really fit in with anybody. She didn’t really have any close friends. She and her mom lived there in town. She had just started coming to our school at the beginning of the year. And Crystal wore her hair in these tight, kind of greasy curls. Her clothing was never in style and it never really seemed to fit right. She had these really thick glasses that always seemed to be smudged. Crystal just didn’t fit in with anybody. I’m not proud of this but everyday at recess a group of boys that I kind of ran with and I would play a game in which one of us would provoke Crystal and get her to chase us. And then she would chase us around the playground. The goal of the game was don’t let Crystal catch you. Don’t let Crystal touch you because if you do you’ll catch her cooties. I’m not proud of that but it’s what we did and as sixth grade boys I think we justified it in our minds because she always played along. She always ran after us. She’d always have this big grin on her face as she did it. And I think the reason why, looking back, is probably because she enjoyed the attention. It was the only attention that she really got even though it was at her expense. But I’ll never forget the day when we were playing this game and in the middle of it Crystal stopped chasing us. And she turned around and she walked over to the corner of the playground and she sat down Indian style on the ground and she dropped her head and she began to cry. Now, sixth grade boys really are not known for their sensitivity, alright? And they aren’t really known for picking up on how other people are feeling. But there were a couple of girls in our class who walked over to Crystal—I’ll just never forget this—and they sat down on either side of her and they put their arms around her and they asked her what was wrong. And I was within earshot so I could hear everything that she said. And I’ll never forget Crystal saying, “Nobody likes me. Nobody wants to be around me. I don’t know that I have a friend.” See by God bringing the news of this announcement to the shepherds first, He is making this grand statement that there isn’t anybody who is excluded. There isn’t anybody who is unwanted. There isn’t anyone who is unlovable. And Jesus would continue to come back to this same refrain over and over and over again throughout His life and His Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

ministry. Some of my most favorite words of Jesus can be found in Mark, chapter 2, verse 17 when He would say this. He says, “I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” Jesus’ adult life would be marked over and over again with compassion for broken people, people like you and like me. He always had time for devious tax collectors and guilt-ridden prostitutes, and image conscience religious leaders. Therefore it shouldn’t be surprising that, even from birth, Jesus would choose to associate with the lowly and the broken because He’s trying to communicate something to all of us. It’s that there is nobody who is unreachable. There is nobody who is unlovable. So I’ve got a question for you and it might sound a little bit unusual. I want you to just ask yourself this question here in the next few moments. How do you picture Jesus? When you think about Jesus how do you envision Him? Everybody has a different picture in their brain. Maybe it was something you grew up with, maybe it was a sermon, or a story, or whatever. Maybe it was something that you’ve seen on the internet or on TV. How do you picture Jesus? Now the reason why I think that this question is so important is that the way that you picture Jesus I think will say a lot about the way that you relate to God. It will say a lot, actually, about the way that you even think about yourself. How do you see Jesus? There are a couple of different options. I was trying to think through some of these last week. Maybe for some of you you see Jesus as WWF Jesus. You love that passage where Jesus goes into the temple court and He starts to overturn the tables of the money changers, and He flexes. And it’s like, “I really like aggressive Jesus, that’s really right down my alley.” But others of you are like, “No, no, no. I actually like Mr. Rogers Jesus a lot better. I like the Jesus who is really good with kids and He’d make a great babysitter and He’s kind and He’s meek and mild mannered.” That’s a great image of Jesus to be sure. But others of you may think of Jesus like security blanket Jesus. Like, “When I’m really in a bind Jesus is there to comfort me, and He’s there to point the way.” Others of you though, maybe you think about Jesus like David Copperfield Jesus. You know the magician, “Man Jesus did some really cool things like walk on water and turn water into wine so that’s how I think of Him.” For others of you maybe it’s resurrected Jesus, which for sure is a great image. Others of you though, it’s Armageddon Jesus, “You scare us a little bit. You need to stay off of Facebook.” That’s kind of how you see Jesus. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

And then maybe others of you it’s Ricky Bobby, little baby Jesus. You’re the same people who like Christmas Vacation. It’s just the way you kind of see Jesus, in a manger. You know Christmas services are always so well attended and I just wonder if this is part of the reason why. It’s because this is our favorite way to picture Jesus, as a little baby in a manger. And all of those are great. And all of those have elements of truth in them. But did you know that they way that Jesus would describe Himself to us over and over and over and over again in the Scriptures had nothing to do with any of the things that we just looked at. The way that Jesus would describe Himself is like this: Shepherd Jesus. Maybe you’ve heard that before. Maybe you’ve heard Jesus described as a shepherd. But given what we’ve just learned about who shepherds were in the first century, is that a little surprising? That Jesus would choose to describe Himself, to identify Himself with such a despised, lowly group of people? In Hebrews, chapter 13, verse 20 it says that He is, “…the great Shepherd. In John, chapter 10, verse 11 Jesus says, “I am the good Shepherd.” What is a good shepherd? The good shepherd is somebody who sacrifices his life for the sheep. In 1 Peter, chapter 5, verse 4 it says that He is the Chief Shepherd. And long before any of this David would write, in the Old Testament, in a Psalm, Psalm 23—maybe it’s a Psalm that you know. He would say these words, “The Lord is my Shepherd.” Now to us we think this is great. Maybe you’ve got this on a coffee mug somewhere or you’ve got it in a picture frame and we’ve heard it so often that we don’t even think about it that much. But in the first century if you were to hear this for the first time, and in fact to the Rabbis in the first century this would have been mind blowing for them and they couldn’t get their heads around why in the world David would say that the Lord is his Shepherd because the equivalent of this is to say the Lord is my street sweeper. The Lord is my dung cleaner. That’s the equivalent. Why in the world would you say—why would you equate God with such a low-class group of people? And yet in the Book of Philippians it says it this way, “Jesus did not consider equality with God something to be obtained but He made Himself nothing.” In other words: a shepherd. Why would He do that? And you’ve got to understand that the thing that He’s trying to communicate behind the scene is that He’s trying to say, “Listen. This gift of grace and mercy and love and hope— it is for everyone, including the shepherds.” So if this is the favorite image of Jesus that He keeps coming back to over and over again, if Jesus keeps saying, “Listen. I’m the Good Shepherd. I’m the Chief Shepherd,” then He’s trying to communicate something to us. So what does it mean to allow Jesus to shepherd you? What does Shepherd Jesus look like? Well, we get one clue in John, Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

chapter 1, verse 17 where it says, “For the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.” Here’s what God is saying. He’s saying, “Listen. My love and My faithfulness are coming through Shepherd Jesus. Jesus is both faithful to you and He is loving to you. Jesus is both filled with grace and truth.” And we need both. If I could summarize it into two statements I might say this: Shepherd Jesus is not religiously dogmatic. I don’t care what you’ve heard about Him, He’s not religiously dogmatic. On the other hand, Shepherd Jesus isn’t easily accommodating. There is a tension between these two statements. And the tension is where the power is found. See it’s kind of like a rubber band. A rubber band is not really good for anything until you stretch it. And it’s the tension between the two points is actually transformational. I would say that between these two statements is the tension that will bring about transformation in your life and in mine. Honestly, for some of us all we’ve ever known of Jesus is just some sort of religiously dogmatic figure. We’re not quite sure if we can believe that He was the Son of God, or that the Bible can be reliable. And then others of us just want Jesus to be overly accommodating to us. So when life is troublesome, whenever your girlfriend breaks up with you, or your mom is sick, or you’re facing financial trouble you want Jesus to swoop in and rescue you but then when life gets back to normal you kind of want Jesus to mind His own business, “Jesus, don’t call me I’ll call You.” And others of us want Jesus to be easily accommodating. What love is, or what we think it is, is Jesus loving and affirming and accepting us just the way we are. And I want you to hear this really clearly, Jesus does love you just as you are. He also loves you way too much to leave you as you are. He wants to shepherd you and it’s going to be the tension between these two points: His grace and His truth—His mercy and His love. Jesus is the only one who is able to do this perfectly over and over again. We see this all throughout the Scriptures. Jesus would actually go and seek out people who would probably never step foot in church. He would seek them out and He would talk to them. There was this one time when He was talking to this lady at a well and she was collecting water in the middle of the day, primarily because she didn’t want to see anybody else because she had a reputation and people were known to be gossips. Jesus would sit down with her and talk with her and tell her, “I want to give you water that will never make you thirst again.” Jesus calls her out for her sin but He does it in a loving way and He says, “Listen. Just leave your life of sin. I’ve got something so much better for you.” Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

One time Jesus was having dinner with a group of dogmatic religious leaders and this woman with a reputation came in and interrupted the meal. She fell at Jesus’ feet and she wept. She could see that He was the Messiah and the religious leaders couldn’t. How ironic. She fell at His feet and she began to weep and she began to wipe His feet with her tears and she began to dry them with her hair and she anointed them with expensive perfume, which in their eyes was a waste. They were sitting there thinking that she should sell that perfume and give all of that money to the poor. How could she be doing that? And they thought that to themselves because they didn’t have the courage to say it out loud. And they said to themselves, “If Jesus only knew what kind of a woman this was, He’d kick her out.” And Jesus knew exactly what kind of a woman she was and He knew that she needed love and He knew that she needed hope and He knew that she needed grace. Jesus could tell what was going on in their hearts and He called them out for it. See what Jesus was doing in that moment was that He was shepherding her heart. Remember this: Shepherd Jesus means he is the perfect combination of both grace and truth. And grace without truth isn’t very helpful, nor is it very loving. But truth without grace, can we all just agree? is pretty brutal. And when you give your life to Jesus Christ, what I want you to know is that what the Scriptures are inviting you into is that they are inviting you to come to Shepherd Jesus. That’s the image of Jesus that the Scriptures paint over and over again. And I don’t know, maybe you’ve never heard that before. Maybe you’ve never seen that before. Maybe what you thought is that you were supposed to go to church and modify your behavior and try to be as good as you can. Maybe some of you grew up Baptist or Methodist or Presbyterian or non-denominational or Catholic or whatever—I don’t care. It’s irrelevant. Is Jesus your Shepherd? I want you to look at this image of Jesus because Jesus doesn’t look like a pansy. He’s pretty strong here and He’s pretty attentive. And He’s got a staff and He’s got sheep around Him. And I can’t help but notice the sheep that is being carried because that’s me. I can identify with that more than these others because there are times when I just need the Shepherd to carry me because I’m weak and I’m broken and I’m hurting. And Jesus wants to shepherd you. He’s going to shepherd you with tenderness but He’s also got a staff. See, sheep—I don’t know if you know this or not but sheep are dumb. There you learned something at Christmas. And what happens with sheep—like if one sheep decided to walk off the side of a cliff do you know what these other guys are going to do? They’re going to follow him. they aren’t even going to ask any questions. They’re like, “Oh, must be grass.” They’re going to follow the sheep over the side. And it will happen over and over and over again where all of these sheep will follow him Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

over, to their deaths, until it’s this big, bloody cotton ball at the bottom of the valley. And in order to stop the nightmare you have to have a shepherd, somebody who will come along and they don’t necessarily see it, they are blind to it, but somebody will actually guide them away from danger. And that’s what Jesus desires to do and to be. So I’m going to give you three statements. And really these three statements, I think, kind of give us a good picture of what it means for Jesus to shepherd you. The first one is simply this: it should be transformation over behavior modification. What Jesus is inviting you into is a life of transformation from the inside out—not modifying your behavior. And I think for many of us this is what we have thought church was. See, understand this. As people we’re going to mess up a whole lot and that’s why Jesus uses the analogy of a shepherd because we wouldn’t need a shepherd if we, as sheep, knew what we were doing. But we don’t so we need somebody to guide us and we need somebody to protect us and we need somebody to love us. And the invitation that Jesus is extending to you is an invitation to a life of transformation over a period of time. I think sometimes we have a tendency to think, “Well, I’ve got to get my act cleaned up before I can come to church. I mean if I walked into church the roof would cave in.” We look at the Bible as a rule book and we’re like, “You know what? I don’t know that I do any of these things that the Bible tells me to do. There are a whole bunch of things that the Bible tells me not to do and I actually do those things and I’m pretty good at them. I don’t know that I fit in here.” Well what Jesus is inviting you into is a life of transformation. Can I just tell you after about 30 years or so of chasing after Jesus that my life—my walk with Him—kind of looks like this: three steps forward and then I take like two-and-a-half steps back but I’m still a half-of-a-step ahead. And in His patience and in His love He is shepherding you and me toward transformation, not behavior modification. Here’s the second statement: Progress over perfection. You’ll actually hear us say this a lot around here. God isn’t expecting perfection, just progress. But God is inviting us into the opportunity to be perfected over time. And the fancy Bible word for that is the word sanctification. As we stay in a relationship with Shepherd Jesus we’ll begin to grow, year after year after year, and we’ll begin to produce, over time, these things the Bible calls fruit. It’s found in Galatians. It’s love and it’s joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self control. And none of those things happens over night in any of our lives. It takes time. There are some things on that list that, after chasing after Jesus for about three decades, I’m beginning to see a little bit of fruit in an area, finally. And then there are other areas where I’m like, “Man, I’m yet to see anything.” I’ve got to continue to stay Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

connected to the vine that is Jesus Christ. And I’m not very patient. I don’t know about you. See I’m not a very good gardener. My wife is a gardener. She loves the whole process. She loves to prepare the soil, to plant the seeds, and to water, and to weed. And I’m looking at her like, “Honey, why are you doing that? We can just go to Meyer and buy cucumbers and tomatoes.” And she just rolls her eyes at me because she’s a gardener. She knows that it’s going to take time. Have you ever just stayed connected to Jesus long enough to see some fruit produced? It’s progress over perfection. Here’s the last one. This is my favorite. It’s: Grace over guilt. This one is so important but we oftentimes don’t see this very often in life let alone experience it. I would say that we live in a grace deficient culture. It’s not our fluent language. We don’t see grace in the news media. We don’t see grace on twitter, usually. In fact, our first reaction to people—just ask yourself this question. When you are offended or when somebody cuts in on you in traffic or whatever is your first option to extend grace or is it to get even? Yeah, me too—it’s to get even because why? We are grace deficient. It’s just not a nutrient that is natural within us. We need a shepherd. I know this. I’ve preached sermons on this and yet I still fail over and over again. In fact, just last week I was doing some Christmas shopping over by the Fashion Mall and it was a nightmare. Traffic was crazy. It was bumper to bumper. I don’t know about you but I Christmas shop like I hunt. I just want to kill it, bag it, and take it home and then have somebody else wrap it. So I’m trying to get through this as quickly as I can. I’m at the stop light and the light is red and there is one lady in front of me and we’re waiting to turn left. So we get the green arrow, left, and she just continues to sit there at the light. Now, you need to understand that there’s an etiquette to these things. I don’t know if you knew that or not. But a long, extended, singular honk is a sign of aggression in the wild. I don’t know if you knew that. So you’re basically saying to the person in front of you, “Hey, you big dummy. You need to move. You need to go.” But that’s not what I did because I understand honking language. So I did the short, two honk—beep, beep—because the second beep is a sign of friendliness and what you’re basically doing with the two short beep is that you’re saying, “Excuse me, madam. The light has turned green and could you kindly push on the gas to get through the intersection.” That’s what I said. She didn’t take it that way. Apparently she didn’t speak honk. So she looked up at me in her rear view mirror. And this is what she did. I’ve got to get it right with the hand Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

motion and the head wob, she rocked her head back and forth and motioned strongly with her hand to the right. So I was like, “Alright. I don’t know what that means.” So I turn to the right and that’s when I saw the fire truck coming. So there was a fire truck coming from the right and lights were blaring, horn was going. That’s why she was sitting there. She was waiting for the fire truck to go through. I didn’t see or hear it because I was jamming to Michael Buble, alright? So I see it. Now I’ve got all of the information she’s got. So literally—I immediately felt bad. So I leaned forward as far as I could so she could see me in the dash and I waved and mouthed, “My bad.” That wasn’t enough for her. So here’s what she did next and I need to try to figure out how to tell you this appropriately. She chose to tell me that I was number one. That’s what she chose to do. And I was like, “Ah, I deserved that. Alright, I get it. I’m sorry.” I think I even mouthed I’m sorry. Here’s the thing. She kept the bird flying like for a really long time. It was like we sat through the next light of red and then green again. And so she proceeds to go and she drives with one hand and keeps the bird going all the way around the corner and for the next 500 yards straight it’s just like up there. And I’m right behind her. I have to keep looking at it. And I’m sitting there going… At this point it dawned on me. Does she go to my church? Is she… Is this more than just a honk, right? And honestly I don’t know who she is. I don’t know what she looks like. I didn’t get a clear… She could be here right now. And if that’s the case—I’m so sorry. So at some point I thought to myself, “Man, I really feel bad about this. I didn’t mean for this to turn into a big thing. I didn’t mean to give her a bad day. So my impulse was to follow her into the parking lot. That’s what I wanted to do. Should I have not done that? I wanted to pull up behind her and get out and just apologize and to offer an explanation but something told me—Holy Spirit—that that wouldn’t have been a wise move. I didn’t want to get Maced, alright? But, honestly, I couldn’t stop thinking about her for the rest of the day. I don’t even know what she looks like. I remember just thinking to myself, “What would prompt her to immediately have that kind of reaction?” And I thought, “I don’t know. Maybe the same thing that prompted me to honk, just a lack of patience and a lack of grace.” I started thinking about her. I was like, “I wonder where she was driving from and to.” Who knows? Maybe she was going through a divorce. Maybe her mother is sick and in the hospital. Maybe she just lost her job. Maybe she just needed some grace and I didn’t give it to her. See she needs a shepherd and so do I and so do you and so does that person you came with and that person sitting behind you that you don’t know. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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Christmas at Traders Point | This is for Everyone December 23 and 24, 2016

We all need a shepherd. We all need some grace. But we also need some truth and Jesus is offering both. See 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem light pierced our really, really dark world. And it may not seem like He’s here but He’s here. The Israelites had been waiting for a long time for deliverance and so are we. We’ve just come through a tough year. And I don’t know about you but I say we need a Deliverer more than ever. We need a Shepherd. We need somebody who will give us grace and truth. Would you be willing in 2017 to step into the tension and to allow Jesus to shepherd your heart because that’s why He came. I hope you will. Father, we come to You right now grateful for this announcement of great joy for all people. God I pray that if there are some who are here right now who especially needed to hear that message that right now their hearts would be open that You’re Spirit would comfort them and minister to them and guide them. Father, we need a Shepherd. We need a Shepherd more than ever, right now, who will speak truth to us but do it in love. So, Lord, I pray that we would have the courage to invite Shepherd Jesus into our lives. We thank You that Luke tells us the shepherds were there and that You are communicating to everyone of us right now that there is no such thing as an unwanted person, there is no such thing as damaged goods in the eyes of God. We’re all included. So, Father, we come before You right now and we thank You for this announcement. We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.





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