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We’ve gone through a mini series together as a church, we’ve been studying the coming of Christ, the advent, the advent meaning the coming of Jesus. What Christmas is all about is Emmanuel, God with us. What we’ve learned about the purpose of Jesus is coming. Why God came with us and lived among us and dwelt among us. Is that so? We as people could experience the change that God desired within our lives. See, what God wants for us is a growing, healthy relationship with him. God created us for the purpose of relationship. When he created man, he breathed into him the breath of life, thus giving man the spirit. And in that spirit allowed God different than any other creature. God allowed man different than any other creature that was made to have a relationship with him. And as you read in Genesis, you find very early on that Adam and Eve were involved in sin that put a rift in their relationship and greatly divided any any sort of relationship that God had with man. It was making an eternity of difference in that relationship, and God being the loving God that he was, sought reconciliation for us and pursued us by coming to this earth and dying for our sins. Christmas is about Immanuel, God dwelling with us, but the purpose of Immanuel, God coming to this world, is so that we could experience a real change in our lives, that being a relationship with God.
This morning, what I want to talk about is just that Christmas change that God brought forth. And I want to talk about the difference between what it means just to simply wonder at God, or to have faith in who God is and what he’s done for us. See, I believe there there is a significant difference between what it means to just wonder at God and to have faith in God. Now, today in American societies, we tend to treat God with wonder and yet with little faith. We seek the enjoyment that comes through knowing God and maybe even being a part of a church community, but never even really sometimes trusting in him. But when God came into your lives, if you’re a believer here this morning and you’ve trusted in the Lord, God didn’t choose you and God didn’t select you, and God didn’t come into this world pursuing after you to save you for the purpose of you just being a consumer of the Christian faith. And church isn’t to be treated as if it were a shopping mall, where we go around in society and we look for a different church that meets my particular needs. And it’s got great music that we listen to for us to worship the Lord. It’s got great messages, which we have all that right. You’re about to hear an amazing message this morning after an incredible time of worship together. But it’s it’s not just about that.
And the minute that that good message stops or it’s not meeting my need or the good music isn’t making me feel good about myself. Then I stopped coming to the church and I attend somewhere else. I forgot this one. Let me take that off real quick. And? And I began shopping for another church. But what God desires in saving us is to use your talents, your giftedness, your resources to to serve him and to love him and to live for him. Because God created you for a relationship. And that’s what relationships are all about. It’s about giving towards one another. God wants to be Lord of everything in your life. When the Bible talks about Jesus’s coming, he he set the precedent that he is Lord. And when you select him and choose him, and you follow after him, and you give your life to him, he becomes Lord of your personal life. In fact, when Jesus taught upon this worth, he or on this earth, he really taught about two kingdoms, one belonging to Satan. He even referred to Satan as the God of this world, the prince of the power of the air. And if you’re not following Jesus with your life, if Jesus isn’t Lord of your life and you’re not giving him the direction to pursue in your life. Then who you’re following after is Satan. Because Jesus only gave to this world two kingdoms. He only ever spoke about two areas of our lives that we can serve.
That which is contrary to God or that which lives for God. Jesus came to this world to rescue us from the choices that we make to live for this world that’s contrary to him, so that we might, as people, begin to live for him. Jesus didn’t just give us a church to feel good about ourselves. Jesus wants to be Lord of our lives. He wants to be Lord of your lives. He wants to be Lord of your friendships. He wants to be Lord of of parent. Your parenting wants to be Lord of your marriage. He wants to be Lord of of your church family. He wants to be Lord of the place in which you work. He wants to be Lord of all in your life. Can I tell you as people this morning, until you’ve not laid your life solely down for God, you’re not really living for the reason that God desires for you. See, because we’ve seen as a church family, as we’ve looked at the coming of the Messiah and what it means for us as people, we saw last week that one of the things that God brings to our life as we surrender to him and live for that purpose, as we experience unexplainable joy, as we lay it all down for him. We look at the life of a Christian who’s struggling in their relationship with God. This isn’t always the case, but very often.
More often than not, we can honestly look at that individual and say, if you’re not experiencing your joy and your relationship with Jesus, perhaps you haven’t really met the real Jesus. But maybe, maybe in your own life you haven’t really given it all to him. Because what the Bible promises to people who lay in every area of their life down to Jesus and say, Jesus, have your own way, is Unexplainable joy through him. And as we’ve studied this Christmas series together, the Christmas Story is written for us in two primary books of the Bible. It’s in the Gospels. It comes in Matthew chapter one and chapter two, and in Luke chapter one and chapter two. Something that that struck me and rubbed me the wrong way as we began to read this Christmas story together was in Luke chapter two and verse 16. You know what we found as we looked at this passage of Scripture, that it is possible in our walks with God, to think that we’re walking with God, to be inches away from the manger, yet miles away from real faith in Jesus. As we saw in Luke chapter two and verse 16, it says, so they came in a hurry. This is talking about the shepherds. The shepherds have just seen the angels, and the angels pronounce these shepherds. Listen, the Messiah is born. You need to go see him. You need to go worship him.
You need to go declare this to the people. And it says in verse 16, so they came in a hurry. As soon as they heard these angels speak, and they found their way to Mary and Joseph, and the baby as he lay in the manger. And when they had seen this, they made known the statement which had been told to them about this Christ. And this is where it strikes me. And all who heard it wondered. They wondered at the things which were told them by the shepherds. Notice the contrasting statement here between verse 18 and verse 19, because it’s saying something different about the way Mary received the coming of Jesus, than the way these people received the coming of Jesus, as the shepherds pronounces, but with the word. But see the contrast there? These people stared with wonder. But here’s what Mary did. Mary treasured all these things, and she pondered them in her heart. The shepherds went back, glorifying and praising God for all that they had heard and seen, just had been told to them. In this passage of Scripture, as I read this, I love the way that the shepherds reacted. They’re just they’ve come to see Jesus and they worship him even even as a baby. When they’re leaving, they’re glorifying God, praising God. They have the joy of the Lord in their lives, and Mary is even pondering this within her own heart. But verse 18, what strikes me in this passage of Scripture is that after these people hear that the coming of the Messiah is here, the long awaited Messiah, the promise of the Jewish people that’s to set them free, has been promised to them.
And yet it never says that these people gathered around the manger to worship Jesus. There must be a difference between wondering at Christ and faith in Christ. When I see this passage of Scripture as an individual today, I know it’s no longer relevant or a warning to the people that was spoken about because they’re no longer alive. But what it says to me as a person, as I read this passage of Scripture, is that I don’t want to simply be a person that wonders at Jesus. I want to be a person that when he places faith in Christ, is so greatly impacts my life that I go and I leave. And I’m glorifying praising God because of the joy that he’s brought into my life. How do I do that? How do I have that kind of faith? How is it that these people simply wondered at God and didn’t have faith? How do I avoid that? What’s the difference even between wondering at God and faith in God? How can I ask God? Or how can I look towards God in such a way that he begins to craft faith, a stronger faith within me, a growing faith in my relationship with him that continues to make me a useful, useful vessel for his kingdom.
As we consider that for just a moment, I’m going to turn to another passage of Scripture. I’m going to examine that question that we’re asking about these people through a similar situation that took place in Mark chapter six. As we’re going to find out, as we see this morning together with one another, that there is a profound difference between what it means to wonder at God and have faith in God. Let me give you just a crude example or a simplistic example for just a moment. I love amusement parks, and when the doors open up to the amusement park and I’m able to walk in the most dangerous, considered ride that’s there. That’s the first one I always run to. You know, I love that adrenaline rush. I love to feel out of control. I love the watching my friends throw up beside me. I love all that about amusement parks, you know, whatever hot dog they just ate. As long as it doesn’t land on me laughing at them. It’s fun, right? But there’s one ride that I could never work up the gumption to get on. And you guys have probably seen it before. It’s that ride that has the it’s built. They built a giant archway, and they run these ropes down to the bottom and have a huge swing at the bottom where they put people in and they, they slowly raise this person.
And I don’t know what kind of mindset you have to have to even volunteer for this. I know if if it were possible to leak through that, I would probably use the restroom and when everyone. As I swung over their heads back and forth out of fear. I don’t know if that’s possible or not, but but you know, I’ve always sat and I watched those individuals that, that, that go on that ride. And I’m standing there with amazement and wonder at just watching these people and how somehow they get off alive. I don’t know how that works, but I’ve never quite had the faith to trust in it, to ride it, and I know I never will. I’m not that crazy. But there is a difference between wonder and faith. You know, as a person this morning, can I just tell you that God’s desire for us is for us to be more than people of wonder at him, to come become people of faith? As we look in Mark chapter six, we see the disciples taking experiencing a story here in this passage of Scripture. God’s desire in this passage of Scripture is to take them to become more than men of just wonder, but really men of faith. They were going to the school of hard knocks. Discipleship in Jesus. And Jesus recognized something significant about their life that he wanted to be people of more than just information of who he was, but that he wanted them to be people of transformation in their personal lives.
God was seeking to change them from the inside out. He. He wanted them to understand the difference between what it means to be informed of who Jesus is, which we saw in in Luke chapter two and verse 18. The people heard about Jesus simply informed about him, but he wanted them to be transformed with what it means to walk and live with Jesus in their own personal lives. This information is simply just about knowledge. Transformation is about an experience. When we talk about a relationship with God and we come here on Sunday mornings and we receive all this information about who the Lord is and how it affects my life, what God desires to do with that information, once we receive it, is to begin to work in our hearts and transform who we are as human beings. I’m going to give you an equation this morning. We’re going to see this worked out throughout this passage of Scripture as we study this morning. And we’re going to refer back to Luke and see how it applies to our own personal lives. But when we talk about a relationship with Jesus, when we talk about growing in faith with God, divine power and divine compassion equals everything that we need. Divine power and divine compassion equals everything that we need. And in your lives, if you’re experiencing any sort of trial, we’re going to see in a moment.
This will play huge in understanding in our in our walks with God. Because as we go through these valleys, we need to understand that God is with us. Divine power is important for us to understand that because God is more than capable of meeting our needs, he has all authority and all power given to him. But yet with that power, how does he respond? As long as we have the power of God and the compassion of God working behind us as people and through us and in us as people. We will have everything that we need. Mark chapter six. As the disciples go through this transformation of hard knock discipleship with Jesus, it tells us in verse 45, Immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and go ahead of him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he himself was sending the crowd away. In verse 47, when it was evening, the boat was in the middle of the sea, and he was alone on the land. Seeing them straining at the oars, for the wind was against them at the fourth watch of the night. As we look at this first passage of Scripture, I just remind us that faith for us as people oftentimes grows as we go through the storms of life. We see in the very last verse that what the disciples are encountering is they’ve gone across the sea to the other side as they are in the middle of a storm.
It tells us that the storm at the fourth watch of the night that Jesus recognizes, and the fourth watch of the night. They’re still battling this storm, and according to commentaries, it tells us that these men have been struggling, literally fighting against this battle for over eight hours. They’ve been engaged in trying to get across the sea, fighting through the storm. It was a dangerous situation well beyond any of their abilities. The sea in which they’re traveling at is well below sea level, over 60ft below sea level. And oftentimes it’s not uncommon for storms to to blow into the sea and cause such a large amount of waves that it scares the passengers who are trying to tarry across to the other side. These guys are in a fight, and no doubt if they’re not very good swimmers, they’re probably in a panic. What’s important to see as we look at the storm that these people are enduring together on this ship, as they’re going across the sea, is that how they got into this predicament. They’re not battling against the storm because they were disobedient to God. They’re battling against the storm because they were obedient to God. It tells us in verse 45 and verse 46 it says, Jesus made his disciples get into the boat. They were in this moment because they were obeying Jesus.
Think about that for just a moment. Jesus has trials in front of us in our lives that he permits or allows to take place. I ask you a question. Are you a person in your prayer life who is oftentimes consumed with just praying for safety? In this passage of Scripture, would that have fit for the purpose that Jesus had for these disciples? Is it okay for Jesus’s followers to pray for safety? You know, when I look at the epistles and I read about the Apostle Paul, I’m not going to answer that question. By the way, I look at the life of the Apostle Paul when he begins his epistles many times. You know what he prays for on behalf of the church, not for safety. He prays for grace and peace, that the grace of God will live in the hearts of people. Because when we come to know Jesus, what we experience in our lives is his abundant grace. If you choose not to know Jesus, what we’ve seen demonstrated through his life on the cross, whether you accept him or not, is abundant grace. And then Paul also prays for the peace, grace and peace to you, my brothers. You notice at the end of every service when we conclude before we dismiss, I always say grace and peace to you this week. The peace of whatever storm we encounter in life, whatever situation we have, if we have the peace of God, we’ve got the joy of the Lord on our side.
God knew everything that these disciples were about to encounter before they encountered it. And sometimes I look at this situation and this circumstance, or even my own lives, and I say, Doesn’t God love me? I mean, if God loves me, doesn’t he want me to be saved? But, you know, I think in our relationship with God, what he knows about our lives is that we too often times choose to trust in ourselves rather than trust in him and what he’s trying to get these disciples to understand through this circumstance that it’s more important to trust in everything that Jesus wants to do in our lives, than just simply trust in ourselves, because what God has to offer is far better than anything I can wish for myself, leading me to know this. God will take us where we have not intended to go, to produce in us what we could not achieve on our own. God will take you where you have not intended to go, to produce in you what you could not achieve on your own. Think about opposition we face in our lives. How much it’s taught us that we really need God on our side, and the grace of God working in us and through us. You know, when I first started to know the Lord and growing with the God, I really wanted to serve him as best I could, looking for as many opportunities as I could to serve the Lord.
And one of the things I decided to do this I wouldn’t recommend this is to go on a mission trip. Go on a mission trip? That’s good. But what I did wasn’t good. So I got on the internet and this was when internet first came out. I just was finishing up high school and we didn’t know all the warnings about internet yet and all the scary things. So I got online. I found this guy who was offering free missions trips to anyone who wanted to come overseas and work with him. It was on the coast of Venezuela, on an island called Trinidad. And not knowing everything about internet. You know, you just believe everything that you see on the internet, right? Wikipedia is always right. And so I called this individual and I said, you know, I want to come help the church in Trinidad. He says, okay. And when I get to Trinidad, this is what I discover. He was a con artist and he was writing to Americans, getting them to donate money to build a church. And he was writing to European nations to get them to donate medical supplies to help people in need. And he was taking all the money and pocketing it on his own. But the problem was, is I wasn’t the only one that found out. Trinidad. The island of Trinidad found out. And the last place that he was was he was in a village scamming some people within a village of his own city.
And it was considered by the Trinidadians as a tribal group and they operate for some reason. This section of Trinidad operates different than the whole nation of Trinidad, and that they handled law according to their own rules, and it’s very common once you break the law for them to kill you. Um, and one day I was sitting at home by myself in this man’s home. He found out that these people found out, and he and his family fled. Didn’t bother informing me. And I looked down the street and I see pitchforks and clubs coming up the hill to kill me. It was a storm. God will put us in places we have not intended to go, to produce in us results that we wouldn’t seek on our own. What do you do in that situation? For me, it was just like riding the swing. I did it, no. Just kidding. Can you say pee in church? It was a very scary time for me. And I began to pray to God to. To preserve me in that situation. I don’t, you know, and God does miraculous things sometimes in the middle of all that, somehow, in the middle of my prayer, I fell asleep with people knocking on this door trying to beat it down. I woke up the next morning and police were surrounding this house that I’m in, and somehow I don’t.
I don’t even know what happened. But God preserved me in that situation. So I decided to flee from that town. That house in that town that I was in, I found a college that was closed for the summer and got a job working for this college. No one else was there while I was at this college. I just so happened to get bit by a mosquito which carried yellow fever, and then I got yellow fever, and then for two weeks I lost £45 and had a temperature of over 105 degrees. Living in this house by myself, I was extremely delirious, um, and began to pray to God again for deliverance. And God, by his gracious hand preserved me through that situation. A lady from New Orleans happened just to find me. She happened to be a nurse who was walking in the small town that I was in, and she found me in this home, laying there by myself and nursed me back to health. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be here today. Probably. But God’s got storms for all of our lives, and he knows the path that’s ahead of us better than we do. And these disciples, as he stood upon the shore of of these disciples, and he was praying along the shore, and he saw them fighting against the storm that’s battling and raging and and causing fear to strike their very hearts.
God knew everything that they were to encounter before they encountered it. God loves them. God wanted them to get used to a theology of uncomfortable grace that in the midst of the circumstances of our life where we feel in ourselves that we’re not trustworthy, he is. And in his compassion and love for the disciples, he chooses to allow them to go through this moment. Now, God could have very simply stood on the shore as he got ready to deliver to the disciples, to this this sea. He could have prayed and said, okay, God, don’t let it storm. Keep them safe. Get them to the other side. But instead, God wanted to teach them something about himself, something about the faith that they had in him by allowing them to endure this storm. He’s willing for them to go beyond the bounds of what they understood about his righteous character, to teach about the faith that they needed to have in Him and God, and his love was a willing to allow the situation to work out. As he continued to work in them to grow their faith in him. Verse 48, the story continues, says, seeing them straining at the oars for the wind was against them. At the fourth watch of the night he came to them walking on the sea, and he intended to pass by them. But when they saw him walking on the sea, they supposed that it was a ghost, and cried out, for they saw him, and were terrified.
But immediately he spoke with them and said to them, take courage, it is I. Do not be afraid. God grows our faith and trust in him through the midst of storm. God grows our faith and trust in him. As we see Almighty God working through that storm, God comes to their aid. It tells us in verse 48, he comes walking on the sea, demonstrating his deity, his godlike ability, as he’s journeying across the sea to meet with the disciples and to get to the other side. You know what is important for us to see in this text of Scripture as we read these first few verses? Is that what God is after in this situation? Obviously isn’t the storm, is it? What God is after in our lives as we experience trial isn’t our situation as we endure hardships and triumphs, whatever our experience is in life. God isn’t after that circumstance. What God is after is you. In the midst of this storm. God isn’t after the calming of the sea. What he’s after is the teaching of his disciples to grow in their faith with him. I say in this passage of Scripture, God, in recognizing what you’re doing in the disciples, in my lives, in my life, this is a moment where I must repent. Because you know what? Oftentimes, becoming a person as a person in situations like this is a complainer.
God is not the way I want it. God, it’s not easy. God, you didn’t keep me safe. But what God is after, I’ve got to recognize in my life, even as I go through trials. He’s not after my situation. He’s after me. God wants to teach you what it means to be transformed and living for him and. And calling him Lord and growing by faith in him. God is after you. And whatever circumstance that I go through in life, it’s an opportunity for God to deepen my faith and trust in him as I see him work through that circumstance and situation. In verse 49 tells us, just as I’ve pointed out, I’ve failed in recognizing God’s work, so did his disciples. Even the people that walked with Jesus, even the people that saw Jesus perform miracles, turn water into wine. You know what miracle he’s just finished. He has just finished. If you read verse 44, Jesus has just finished feeding 5000 people with just a few loaves of bread. And it tells us in verse 49 that rather than recognizing God, that they begin to cry out because they thought that they saw a ghost. Aren’t we much better at recognizing in difficult situations ghosts in our lives and seeing God’s hand working for us? It tells us in verse 49 that the disciples in this difficult situation were well aware that it was a ghost rather than the Messiah. Why is it in our lives we don’t see God work until it’s difficult? Why is it in our lives we don’t? Excuse me.
Take the time to pray to the Lord for help until it gets hard. Why is it in our lives we’re really not growing with Jesus until we have no other? Where to turn? Nowhere else to turn and trust in other than God? Why do we do that as people? You look at the prayer of the Apostle Paul throughout Scripture, and most of his prayers were proactive prayers rather than reactive prayers. What I mean is this rather than wait till the storm comes and begin to pray for God’s help, the Apostle Paul is interested in praying for the growth of the faith of not only himself, but the believers he’s writing to as they experience their relationship with God together. So God puts us and allows us to go through these trials sometimes because we as people are oftentimes foolish to recognize the hand of God working in our lives and no other situation other than through a trial. And Jesus is allowing these disciples to to endure this trial for the growth of their faith, as they learn to trust in him and rely on him, that God may begin to transform within them the work that he desires to do in their lives. Think about the trials you’re going through now. Think about any hardship that you’ve faced in your life. Did you learn the lesson that Jesus desired to teach to you before that trial comes? Maybe we need to encourage.
Are we learning about walking with the Lord in our lives so we don’t have to face those trials to learn the lessons that God wants to teach us in our lives? He’s not after your situation. He’s after you. But often we’re better at living in fear and crying out through that pain and taking the time to trust in the Lord. I love what Jesus does in this situation. Not only is he walking on the sea to prove the deity that he holds all things in his hands. But he says in verse 50, for they saw him and were terrified. But immediately he spoke with them and said to them, take courage, it is I. Do not be afraid. If you have a Bible with any commentary on the bottom, it will note in verse 50 that when Jesus is referring to himself as the I, he’s, he’s alluding to the great I am. He’s going back to Exodus chapter three and verse 14. He’s saying to the disciples, you remember when when God set Israel free from the land of Egypt, and when he identified himself to that nation, he identified himself as the I am the sustainer, the one who holds all things in his hands, who brought the plagues upon Egypt, that you guys may be set free. That I am, who had that situation under control.
Here I am now that I’ve got you in the midst of the storm. And you’re you’re you’re so used to paying attention to other all other things, and you’re so used to paying attention to the ghosts that are around you and simply crying out, I just want you to know that I’m here to deliver you. God grows our faith through storms. God grows our faith as we see Almighty God working. God grows our faith as we open our hearts to experience that relationship with him. He tells us in verse 51. Then he got into the boat with them and the wind stopped. And they were utterly astonished. You look up the word astonished in the Greek text, and you match that with chapter two of verse 15 with look at wonder. It’s the same Greek word, just as in Luke, where people responded with wonder. The disciples just simply respond with astonishment at who Jesus is. But it never says that they place their faith in what he’s trying to do. In this passage of Scripture, what we see is this astonishment may come across to us as some sort of a praise to God, that this God was able to stop the wind, and the people stood in wonder at everything that God did. What a praise before God. These people stood in wonder. But we find out that the statement is actually a critique towards the disciples, because it tells us in verse 52 why Jesus allowed them to endure the storm.
It says, for they had not gained any insight from the incident of the loaves, but their heart was hardened. He’s saying this about his disciples as he’s worked the miracle. The disciples weren’t getting the point of the miracle. I am the bread of life. Jesus gives forth the bread to all those people feeding 5000. To prove to the people that he is the bread of life, the sustainer of all things in our lives. And the disciples didn’t recognize that in their lives. And so Jesus says, okay, you can’t recognize it in a miracle. Hold on. We’ve got a bigger storm coming your way. God will work through our storms. God will reveal his almighty nature. But as we open our hearts to receive what God is doing, we begin to experience that growth and faith with him. No amazement different than faith. Amazement simply done with our brain. Something that we acknowledge with the fact that took place with our brain. But amazement is something that happens beyond any category of description that we can fathom within our minds. And so rather than be able to define the event that just took place, we stand in shock and amazement at the knowledge and understanding that, yes, we saw this event happen, but we have no idea how such a thing could take place. Amazement is based on knowledge, but faith. Faith is something that we do with our hearts.
It’s something that we experience with our hearts that begins to change the way that we live. Why did the disciples not change? I love what Mark did in verse 52, because rather than give us some sort of speculation as to suggest why in the world these disciples even endured this, this storm, he he clarifies to us what the problem was. He actually gives commentary of explanations so that we can understand the purpose of the storm. We don’t oftentimes get that through the gospel of Mark, but in this passage, he wanted us to get this as people crystal clear in our minds. Why does God sometimes allow us to endure trials? It may not be every trial. Sometimes we’re in trial out of our own stupidity, right? But why did Jesus tell these disciples to go into the storm? He says in verse 52, is because they had not gained any insight from the incident of the loaves, because their hearts were hardened. You know what prevents my faith in the Lord from growing? It’s a very simple answer. It’s a stony heart. When he talks about a hardened heart within this passage of Scripture, if we just thought about for a minute a rock, if I were to take the time to to grab this rock within my hand. I know you guys think I’m super strong, but I have never been able to squeeze a rock so tightly within my hands that I alter the shape of that rock in any way.
At least that you’re aware of. Right. You don’t know what I do in the free time. That’s what Jesus is referring to as the heart of these disciples. Keep in mind these are the disciples that walked with Jesus each and every day. These are the disciples that saw Jesus perform miracles. These are the disciples out of anyone within Scripture. If I could say someone had faith in Jesus, it would be these guys. And Jesus is referring to these people as men with stony hearts, meaning that the heart of these guys can’t be molded, shaped, or changed into the image that God desires for it to be transformed, to begin to reflect him into this world. God doesn’t work through stony hearts. As I think about Luke chapter two and the people who had the opportunity to gather at the manger. Those shepherds were from Bethlehem. Those shepherds were from Bethlehem, and is when they left the manger, the town in which they were from. When they left that manger, they spoke to people from their own hometown. They were just inches away from the manger, but miles away from knowing Jesus and allowing him to work in their lives. Where is it in my life? My stony heart is preventing God from that transformational power that he wants to produce within me? What prevents me from growing in faith is a stony heart.
Why would we be resistant to change? There’s all kinds of scenarios we could play out right past you in your life. Where is it in your life that you just haven’t given Jesus control? Where isn’t he, Lord of your life? All kinds of answers we could get in our personal lives. And can I just say this morning, it’s not judgmental because there’s no one in this world that has enough faith in God. Everyone can always improve in the way that they trust in Jesus in their own personal lives. Maybe we could say we’re resistant to change just simply because we’re okay with our relationship with God. We’re okay with jealousy. We’re okay with greed. We’re okay with the anger that we sometimes harbor. We’re okay because we haven’t really killed anybody, right? We’re okay with lust in our hearts because, you know, we haven’t really conducted adultery per se. What Jesus revealed to us in Scripture, he was lusted in his own heart has committed adultery. He who has been angry has committed murder within his heart. And what God is after is to change that stony heart and to begin to transform it in the image that he desires. Can I tell you something weird? I’m going to, um. No one is more influential in your life than you because no one talks to yourself more than you do. It sounds weird, doesn’t it? But if we’re honest about it, no one is more influential in our own personal lives because no one talks to ourselves more than we do.
What Jesus is interested in the lives of these disciples is they get to the point where they begin to confess before the Lord the things that are just holding them back and letting that stony heart go. He could begin to transform them. What kept the people in Luke chapter two, verse 18 different than Mary and the shepherds, is because they never took the time to allow that stony heart to die at the altar before the Lord. Instead, they became observers of Christ, wanderers at Jesus, but never participating in experiencing all the miracles that God wanted to work in their lives. God will have refining trials within your lives. God’s got trials for your life. The purpose of those trials isn’t for us to begin to pray for safety for God. It isn’t for us to think that God doesn’t love us. But God allows trials in our lives for us to not complain about it, but just sit in that circumstance and just simply say to God, God, what is it you desire for me to learn in this situation? God, how can I recognize you through the beautiful moment that this is to allow you in this hardship, to make me become a useful tool, growing in faith to live for you in this world. Luke two works for us as people, as a reminder, a reminder as it is in Luke or Mark chapter six, that each and every day we have a choice with our walk with God.
The choice is Will you be a person that stands with amazement or with faith? Are we people that look at the Christmas miracle of Jesus coming to this earth? God literally dwelling among us as people who just sit back and admire it. Or do we fall down and worship him? God’s pursuit for the disciples in this passage was for them to settle for nothing less than than him in the situation. You know, when we trust in Jesus, in our hardships, we trust in Jesus. When we experience trials in our lives, what we find is that needy people become blessed people. Worried people become calm people. Angry people experience love, hurt people become healed, and tired people become alive. If I were to replay our lives this morning, all our past decisions that we’ve made both in trials and not ask ourselves, Has Jesus been one that’s been embraced in our lives by amazement? Or has he been one that’s been embraced by faith? It’s possible to be inches away from this manger. It’s possible to be inches away from the Christmas miracle of God’s coming to set us free. But be miles away from a relationship with him. This morning we saw it in Luke chapter two. As people did it. We see it in Mark chapter six as his disciples even lived with him for us.
God with us as a miracle that we don’t face just on the day of Christmas. It’s a miracle that’s intended to be lived in our lives each and every day. God with us is a promise to God’s people that Jesus is with you no matter where you are, no matter what you’re going through. If by faith we trust in him. Let’s close in a word of prayer. God, I just. We stop and we say thank you for loving us. Thank you, God that your desire for us is to continue to do a beautiful work within us. Lord, until we begin to reflect your image in this world. Lord. And we know that work isn’t complete until we see you face to face. What we need to be as people is God. We need to become people of faith, to look at the storms of our life and say, God, we’re trusting in you. Help us not to complain God, but in every circumstance we face. Lord, just come to you first and give you control and allow you to have your way to understand God. Whatever path is in front of us, Lord, you are behind it. And God that you can provide the strength that we need and the faith that we need to get through any adversity that we face. God bless us this morning, this week as we seek to live for you. It’s in Jesus name we pray. Amen.