When ‘Open Hearts’ Close the Door to Grace: A Theological Review

[00:05:23] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_09]
[00:05:23] Do you want me to do it? Sure. Slowly.

[00:05:52] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_10]
[00:05:52] Uh-huh, that was good.

[00:09:34] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[00:09:34] You know what? Okay.
[00:09:39] It's this. That first note.
[00:09:42] I figured out the last time we had to go with the beat going up.
[00:09:46] Go up as high.
[00:09:47] Show me. On four.
[00:09:49] You and I are doing the same thing. Right here?
[00:09:52] I'm going into that half.
[00:09:53] Yeah.
[00:09:54] Okay.
[00:09:58] You and I both are doing that.

[00:10:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_08]
[00:10:03] We thank you for the ringers, the ones who have been ringing for a long time, and for our new ringers, this congregation, and for all those who are working hard to proclaim your word to this community.
[00:13:48] God, let us sing well and read well, but more importantly, let our hearts connect with you.
[00:13:55] As we talk about in the Grinch today, let our heart grow three sizes bigger to love you more and to proclaim your word in jesus name honey i needed that prayer for my

[00:14:05] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_13]
[00:14:05] heart's about three sizes smaller I woke up ill, but we decided to go to bed.
[00:14:15] Yes.
[00:14:15] You went to bed.
[00:14:17] I did.
[00:14:18] No, well, no.
[00:14:19] We didn't.
[00:14:20] We didn't go.
[00:14:20] The shower's still there.
[00:14:22] We like it.
[00:14:23] I have a big one.
[00:14:23] The guy took part in it.
[00:14:28] I found out.
[00:14:29] He took the bath.
[00:14:30] I put it in that area in the shower.
[00:14:32] She said.

[00:14:33] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_14]
[00:14:33] And we didn't want to do that.
[00:14:34] We've done our share of the time.

[00:15:07] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_12]
[00:15:07] I don't know.
[00:15:37] Thank you.

[00:17:07] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_11]
[00:17:07] Yeah, and I'm finding I feel better about less.
[00:17:14] Yes.
[00:17:16] I don't.
[00:17:17] You know, my place.
[00:17:18] I don't.
[00:17:19] You know, my place.
[00:17:23] Cheers.
[00:17:34] I don't want to test the space because there's so many costs involved.

[00:17:39] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_12]
[00:17:39] Even with higher prices, it's like an industry.
[00:17:42] To justify the higher prices, basically, we don't need to do a lot of positive things.
[00:17:47] And the price doesn't necessarily have to be positive.

[00:17:51] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_11]
[00:17:51] In fact, I love, like, obviously, I like to do a lot of positive things, and I'm on it a lot of times.
[00:18:00] I try to make sure that I'm not too partisan.
[00:18:03] very important Julie's the MVP

[00:18:10] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_14]
[00:18:10] I will do my very best

[00:18:21] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_13]
[00:18:21] I don't know.

[00:19:25] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[00:19:25] Whoville liked Christmas a lot, but the Grinch, who lived just north of Whoville, did not.
[00:19:54] He hated Christmas, the whole Christmas season.
[00:20:01] Now, please don't ask why. No one quite knows the reason.

[00:20:06] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]
[00:20:06] It could be perhaps that his shoes were too tight, or that his head wasn't screwed on just right.
[00:20:14] But I think that the most likely reason of all may have been that his heart was two sizes too small.

[00:20:23] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]
[00:20:23] Today, my name is Pastor Tony Ruth. My husband Wes and I are the senior co-pastors here at Williamson's Chapel.
[00:23:22] We're so glad that all of you are here today.
[00:23:24] If you're a guest with us, we're especially glad that you're here.
[00:23:27] Welcome.
[00:23:28] We've been waiting for you, so we're so glad that you have joined us for worship this morning.
[00:23:33] If you're worshiping with us online, we're so glad that you're here.
[00:23:36] A good, strong welcome from us, and we hope that you will continue your connection with us.
[00:23:41] You can go online and let us know that you were here today.
[00:23:44] There's a I'm New page, and you can send us a message.
[00:23:49] We'd love to greet you.
[00:23:50] So thank you all for being here for worship today.
[00:23:53] My co-part is not here.
[00:23:55] Wes went home.
[00:23:56] He's been coughing his head off, and he did not want to subject you all to that.
[00:24:01] And as someone who lives in a house with him, you're welcome.
[00:24:07] So he's going to be fine.
[00:24:10] We just need him to get better for Christmas.
[00:24:12] Can I get an amen?
[00:24:13] All right.
[00:24:14] So we are continuing our—it's the last Sunday of Advent, And we are continuing our journey of doing Advent at the Movies.
[00:24:21] And so, as you can guess from the clip that you saw and from our tree up here, today we're talking about the Grinch.
[00:24:28] And not that Jim Carrey version, but the real one.
[00:24:32] The real one that's animated and is 30 minutes long.
[00:24:35] That's the Grinch.
[00:24:37] So, if I could have found somebody that could have sung You're a Mean One, that's what I really wanted.
[00:24:43] Anyway, so we're so glad that you're here today.
[00:24:46] and we are going to be thinking today about love and about the Grinch whose heart grew and what does it mean for our hearts to grow.
[00:24:53] So we are glad that you are here for us with worship today.
[00:24:56] And I'm going to invite you to just take a deep breath in and breathe it out.
[00:25:02] And let's worship the Lord together.

[00:25:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_08]
[00:25:03] I recognize that is our newest handout.
[00:27:35] Why are they started last year as beginners?
[00:27:38] Thank you for blessing us and for the time you've put in to learn something new.
[00:27:42] We are grateful.
[00:27:43] Amen.
[00:27:45] Will you stand for the lighting of the Advent candle?

[00:28:05] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_09]
[00:28:05] The one we see, we wait for the one who purifies us.
[00:28:58] The Lord's cleansing soap washes us in his love.

[00:29:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_07]
[00:29:03] He has demonstrated his great love for us so that we can be refined by his righteousness.

[00:29:22] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_09]
[00:29:22] When we see the love candle shining, we remember that our waiting is not empty, but must be filled with love for others.
[00:29:33] For as Christ loves us, so we must love each other.
[00:29:38] God of love, may your spirit spur us to actions of love during this period of waiting.

[00:29:46] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_08]
[00:29:46] As the Son demonstrated what love requires, submission, sacrifice, and sanctification,

[00:29:56] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_09]
[00:29:56] may we emulate his ways so that the world may know of your great love.
[00:30:04] In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

[00:30:07] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_08]
[00:30:07] Our opening hymn is O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.
[00:30:10] This ancient Advent hymn originated as part of the great Oantiphons.
[00:30:16] which is part of a medieval Roman Catholic Advent liturgy.
[00:30:21] And on each day of the week leading up to Christmas, one responsive verse would be chanted, each including an Old Testament name for the coming Messiah.
[00:30:31] So when we sing each verse of this hymn, we acknowledge Christ as the fulfillment of these Old Testament prophecies.
[00:30:38] We sing this hymn in an already, but not yet, kingdom of God.
[00:30:43] Christ's first coming gives us a reason to rejoice again and again, yet we know that all is not well with the world. So along with our rejoicing we plead using the words of this hymn that Christ would come again to perfectly fulfill the
[00:31:01] promise that all darkness will be turned to light. The original text created a reverse acrostic, Eros cross, which means, I shall be with you tomorrow. That is the promise that we hold on to as we sing this beautiful hymn. Let's sing together.

[00:31:18] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[00:31:18] We know that hatred and hate will continue to exist. We know that death and separation

[00:36:07] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_08]
[00:36:07] will continue to be a part of our lives. But because we are an anointed people, we know that none of these things will win in the end. The Holy One is coming to make holy once
[00:36:23] again. All that was, is, and ever will be. And in our waiting and our hoping, we work and worship, pray and play, in all things hoping that peace, love, and joy will reign in our lives and in our world, now and forever.

[00:36:51] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]
[00:36:51] Friends, we are grateful for the time that we have together and grateful for the gift of Christmas.
[00:37:03] And yet, sometimes we get a little grinchy.
[00:37:10] So I'm going to invite you to turn to your neighbor, and I want you to introduce yourself and just say one thing that makes you a little grinchy at Christmastime.
[00:37:19] And no judgment. No judgment.
[00:37:22] Turn and greet your neighbor.
[00:37:24] One thing that makes you grinchy.
[00:37:25] I really just love this dress on you. It's so pretty.

[00:37:40] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]
[00:37:40] Waiting, the watching, the hoping, the longing, the sorrow, the sighing, the rejoicing.
[00:42:02] Speak to us by your word in these Advent days and walk with us until the day of your coming.
[00:42:11] And now the scripture from today comes from Matthew chapter 1, verses 18 through 25.
[00:42:24] Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way.
[00:42:29] When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant from the Holy Spirit.
[00:42:40] Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to divorce her quietly.
[00:42:51] But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife,
[00:43:05] for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
[00:43:10] She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.
[00:43:18] All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet.
[00:43:25] Look, the virgin shall come pregnant and give birth to a son, and they shall name him Immanuel, which means God is with us.
[00:43:36] When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and he took her as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had given birth to a son,
[00:43:51] and he named him Jesus.

[00:44:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]
[00:44:03] Thank you, Julie.
[00:44:08] Friends, it's been a really good time to do all these sermons.
[00:44:14] One of the things that you may not know that pastors do when we are writing sermons, we always, because we would tell you all to do this, you've got to go back and read the context of what you're preaching.
[00:44:28] And my guess is that most of us, when we read the Gospel of Matthew, completely skip the first 17 verses.
[00:44:36] Because the first 17 verses go down like this.
[00:44:40] there was a guy named Abraham, and Abraham begat Isaac, and Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob begat Joseph, and Joseph begat, right, begat, begat, begat, begat. Begat's not a word I use a lot in my daily life. I don't know, when was the last time you used the word begat
[00:44:55] in your life? So what you need to know about this passage, you know, I was reading it this week, Matthew's the first book in the New Testament. The Old Testament ends with Malachi, the prophet
[00:45:08] Malachi and and then after the prophet Malachi there were ages hundreds of years of silence not a word from God or anybody else and then we get the New Testament and the birth of Jesus
[00:45:27] into the world and it starts Matthew doesn't start with the baby in the manger he doesn't start as as John does with this ethereal in the beginning was the word and the word was with God
[00:45:39] he starts with genealogy and unless you're really into ancestry.com you probably just skip it i want us to think about it as i was reading it this week i was reading all those names some of which i know and some of which i didn't and and i found myself going guys this is like
[00:45:57] a lot that's a lot that's a lot of that's a lot of years that's a lot of people 42 generations 42 generations from Abraham all the way down to Jesus generations of waiting and keeping hope alive and I found myself thinking how in the world did they do that
[00:46:24] how in the world did they do that because I'll be real honest with you sometimes it's hard to keep hope alive this year let alone for 42 generations worth of years 14 generations the scriptures tell us those first 14 heard the story of God coming to their ancestor Abraham
[00:46:43] and we read that list and we know probably a lot of those names that are on that list scoundrels and heroes people of loss and flourishing people that live through famine and slavery and when God heard the cries of his people and came to save them in the exodus from
[00:47:00] Egypt and how God brought the people through the Red Sea through the wilderness to the promised land and welcomed people like in this list Tamar Rahab and Ruth these are the women that are listed
[00:47:12] in the genealogy of Jesus Tamar Rahab and Ruth it isn't Sarah and Rebecca and Rachel who are the wives of the patriarchs it's Tamar who was raped and Rahab and Ruth who were outsiders that should
[00:47:27] tell you something about what God's trying to do in the world and then we get the next 14 generations 14 generations from King Solomon through the time of the exile this is the people that lived in the
[00:47:43] time that we know as the kings and the kingdoms of Judah and Israel and if you've read the Old Testament a lot of those names in that list might sound a little familiar to you we read about them
[00:47:52] some of them are righteous and faithful and they keep covenant with God and some of these kings are afraid and they trust in other gods and in other nations to be their protectors and they pay the price for it. Kings that heard from prophets like Isaiah. Isaiah starts out in
[00:48:11] the year that King Uzziah died. Uzziah is right there in the middle. And Isaiah is going to talk about a coming Messiah, a new king who will come and he will be humble and he'll be faithful. He'll
[00:48:23] be a wise counselor, an everlasting father, a prince of peace. Fourteen generations who saw that promise that they had come all the way down to King David, they watched that promise slip into darkness in the exile. And then we have 14 more generations with names and stories that are
[00:48:47] way less familiar. I know almost none of those names. Zerubbabel, because I can say it and it's fun. 14 generation of names. Generations that waited with very few prophets that were offering them any kind of hope. Who tended promises and waited on God in dormant silence. I don't know
[00:49:11] about y'all, but I don't like to tolerate God's silence for five minutes. Let alone 14 generations.
[00:49:19] how in the world at the end of this story right you read all the way down and the last person on the list right before Jesus is Joseph these 14 actually 41 generations raised up a man named
[00:49:40] Joseph who still had some hope left in him who was righteous and kind how in the world did that happen what story was being shared for 42 generations of ups and downs and miracles and
[00:49:54] stunning defeats how did they keep hope and faith in god's present nurtured through all the years how did they remain open to it friends you and i we're just one generation each i'm one generation
[00:50:08] so are you in our lifetimes we're going to be real lucky if we get to meet two generations ahead of us and two behind us if we know our grandparents and our grandchildren we consider ourselves to
[00:50:18] be lucky do we not but what is five generations that's just five that you're going to potentially know in your lifetime. What is five compared to 42? That's a long time. Passages like the opening
[00:50:35] of Matthew help us to see how very small our lives are in the bigger scope of history and the unfolding of salvation. Because friends, how many generations has it been since Jesus? I don't know
[00:50:56] by you but man i am weary you know that that the hymn that starts a thrill of hope that's that's right there in george is that which song is that a thrill of hope a holy night a thrill of hope
[00:51:10] the weary world rejoices amen to that i'm tired y'all tired i'm weary with bad news it's been a hard week to live in north carolina i'm a graduate of the north carolina science school of science
[00:51:25] of math. Jim Hunt died. That makes me so sad. What a champion of education. So thankful for him.
[00:51:32] The loss of the Biffle family. The Ryder Biffle went to our preschool last year. All our teachers know that kid. And this is the NASCAR driver that passed away this week in a plane crash, right?
[00:51:48] Rob Reiner. My whole childhood is Rob Reiner movies. And then war and rumors of war and everybody being mad at everybody else. I'm tired. Y'all tired? I've had enough. I've had enough all that. Hate, violence, hardship. We get so bogged down in the trouble that we face that we don't
[00:52:06] we forget every generation has it. It's not like all the generations that came before were living in the lap of luxury and everything was ginger peachy keen and fine. They all got weary too.
[00:52:20] Every one of them got weary too. And we forget that all of us generations, we have to have a heart to keep and keep waiting and keep passing down hope even in the middle of struggle even in
[00:52:35] the middle of the waiting even in the middle of God's silence how easy it is friends to just become hardened and you know people that do it do you not to shrink our hearts down not because we're
[00:52:50] mean and we don't want to love people because we don't want to be disappointed and hurt and frankly, disappointment and hurt sometimes come to people with open hearts. How easy it is to become Grinches, right? 1956, the man that you all, you and I know is Dr. Seuss. He was going through a
[00:53:11] season of his life when his wife was sick and he was very put off by the commercialization of Christmas. I can't imagine. Can you imagine being put off by the commercialization? He was put off
[00:53:22] by the commercialization of Christmas. And so he wrote this book, How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
[00:53:28] And of that book, this is what he said.
[00:53:30] He said, something had gone wrong with Christmas, I realized, or more likely, with me.
[00:53:39] So I wrote this story about my sour friend, the Grinch, to see if I could rediscover something about Christmas that I had obviously lost.
[00:53:51] He, the rest of his life, I think he figured out what it was that he'd lost, but the rest of his life, his license plate was Grinch.
[00:53:59] and that will come in handy for you sometime when you're playing trivia so there you go from me to you i think dr seuss was on to something that joseph in the 41st generation since the promise came to abraham also discovered in a dream joseph was a righteous man a faithful
[00:54:23] man in a long line of faithful people who were waiting and we would not be surprised to find out that his heart had shrunk down tight like the Grinch's after years and years and years of faith
[00:54:36] met with disappointment. Joseph's approach, and we all have a different approach to our faith being met with disappointment. Some people have faith that's met with disappointment. They give up packing their bags and I'm done. And other people double down and Joseph doubled down. His approach
[00:54:56] to living and keeping covenant in his generation was to follow all of the law, to be faithful to every one of God's commands to do the right thing no matter what earnestly seeking God and Joseph was betrothed to Mary and that's also not a word that we use a lot we just say engaged
[00:55:14] but betrothal in ancient times was every bit as bonding as marriage wasn't like you could get out of it you were you were legally bound to the other person during that period of betrothal and you were
[00:55:26] bound not only to the person but to be faithful to that person and Mary was found to be pregnant with a child that righteous Joseph absolutely knew was not his so what's he going to do
[00:55:40] faithfulness to the law would have been very clear Mary should be stoned to death for her infidelity this pregnancy was a very clear violation of God's law and nobody nobody nobody would have blamed Joseph for doing the right thing the right thing
[00:56:01] and yet Joseph was not a mean guy he wasn't without love for Mary so he chose a lighter punishment for her but friends understand it was still a punishment for her he would break off the engagement quietly he would not publicly expose her
[00:56:22] and Mary would go home to her family and Joseph Joseph's morality would be intact and he could find another woman to marry and go on with his life.
[00:56:31] But Mary, Mary would have a child out of wedlock and their lives would be defined by being without a husband and without a father in a world where having a husband and a father meant protection, identity, and belonging.
[00:56:52] Mary and her child would have had a very rough life indeed.
[00:56:59] God, it seems, had some work to do in Joseph's heart.
[00:57:02] It wasn't all shrunken down and small, but it wasn't transformed yet either, friends.
[00:57:08] God had work to do to change his understanding about the meaning and the purpose of this law that God had given.
[00:57:17] The purpose of the law was not to create good little obedient robots.
[00:57:21] The purpose of the law was to create a people who were after God's own heart, who wanted to be in relationship with God.
[00:57:28] But we, when you give us some rules, we can make rules binding in a skinny minute and remove every bit of principle out of a rule just in a nanosecond.
[00:57:39] We forget what the purpose of the law was in the keeping of it.
[00:57:46] Jesus, in Matthew's gospel, has a whole lot to say about that particular point.
[00:57:51] In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, You have heard it said, do not kill.
[00:57:55] But I say to you, if you hate your brother, you're liable to judgment.
[00:57:59] If you don't read the Sermon on the Mount and get real uncomfortable and squirmy in your seat, I don't know that you're reading it right.
[00:58:06] Because we like to think we're really righteous and really faithful.
[00:58:10] And then Jesus says stuff like, if you've hated anybody, have you driven on 150 this week?
[00:58:27] Jesus goes on to say in Matthew, if your righteousness does not exceed that of the Pharisees, the strict keepers of the law, then you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
[00:58:40] See, according to Jesus, the law isn't a matter of obedience.
[00:58:44] It's a matter of the heart.
[00:58:47] It is a matter of the heart.
[00:58:49] Tom Long says this.
[00:58:50] true righteousness does not mean looking up a rule in a book and then doing the right thing.
[00:58:56] It means wrestling with the complexities of a problem because, friends, most problems are not there's a very clear right and wrong. Now sometimes that's what happens, right? Sometimes it's a real clear do this, don't do that. But oftentimes aren't the problems that you face ones that don't have a
[00:59:14] clear answer that leave you questioning and guessing and trying to figure it out? Righteousness does not mean looking up a rule in a book he says and then doing the right thing it means wrestling
[00:59:27] with the complexities of the problem listening for the voice of God which means prayer and then doing God's thing not doing the thing that you were going to do anyway but doing God's thing to be a faithful disciple means prayerfully seeking to discover where God what God is doing
[00:59:54] in the difficult situations that we face how is god at work here show to show mercy and saving power being righteous is never simply being pure and good in the abstract genuine righteousness is always joining with god in what god is doing in the world so righteous joseph has a dream that
[01:00:20] changes him forever the angel of the lord came and said do not be afraid to take mary as your wife why was joseph afraid we aren't told but my guess is it had to do with his reputation
[01:00:31] and what people thought about him and he was afraid that he was going to do the wrong thing he was afraid that he was going to violate the law of god and that he was going to get in trouble for
[01:00:39] it because we all know that god's just waiting up in heaven to give us a a great big holy butt whipping isn't that what the bible says no god wants to love us god wants to transform us but
[01:00:56] But Joseph was afraid, and the angel said, don't be afraid to take Mary as your wife.
[01:01:00] Turns out this pregnancy is not a violation of the will of God, but an expression of it.
[01:01:07] A gift of the Holy Spirit.
[01:01:09] And Joseph is transformed in a night.
[01:01:11] He believed the promise to generations yet unseen, and he accepted Mary's son as his own.
[01:01:18] It is very important in the Gospel of Matthew that the person that gives Jesus his name is Joseph.
[01:01:23] it's very important that Joseph is the one to name Jesus because in doing so he grafts him into the lineage all the way back to Abraham and he makes him part of that great line of story
[01:01:41] he makes him part of that the 42nd generation that will be the one that sees the hopes and the fears of all the years met in a baby named Jesus. As God takes on flesh and in boundless
[01:01:57] love for the world, saves every generation. Instead of digging in his heels, Joseph made room in his heart for what God was doing in the world in his very generation. It's miraculous. It is miraculous
[01:02:14] that Joseph like that one dream one night abandoned his expectations and his fears for his reputation and his understanding about what it meant to be righteous and he let God shift his path 42 generations of waiting and hope and longing and striving that could and did entrench
[01:02:35] many people in old ways were broken in one man's willingness to make room for God at work in him And that, friends, brings us back to the Grinch.
[01:02:50] So let's take a look.

[01:04:09] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]
[01:04:09] and the small was singing without any presence at all he hadn't stopped Christmas from coming it came somehow or other came just the same and the Grinch with his Grinch feet ice cold in the snow stood puzzling and puzzling how
[01:04:37] How could it be so?
[01:04:40] It came without ribbons.
[01:04:43] It came without tags.
[01:04:48] It came without packages, boxes or bags.
[01:04:52] He puzzled and puzzled till his puzzler was sore.
[01:04:58] Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before.
[01:05:01] Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store.
[01:05:07] Maybe Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.
[01:05:13] What happened then?
[01:06:00] Well, in Whoville they say that the Grinch's small heart grew three sizes that day.
[01:06:10] And then the true meaning of Christmas came through and the Grinch found the strength of ten Grinches plus two.

[01:06:20] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]
[01:06:20] I love that movie.
[01:06:25] The Grinch's heart grew three sizes.
[01:06:28] busting the frame expanding his capacity to see and experience the joy and love that were already in the world around him all that love down in whoville that had been happening the whole time he just couldn't see it it's beautiful and it's hopeful and one of the lessons that we learn is
[01:06:49] that to embrace christmas we have to open our heart and we have to let god transform us not Not just one time, but over and over and over again.
[01:06:58] You see, conversion and salvation, those aren't one and done.
[01:07:01] That's the ongoing work of God in all of our lives.
[01:07:05] It might have started in a moment, but it's still happening.
[01:07:08] God is still converting you.
[01:07:10] God is still transforming you.
[01:07:12] God is still saving you.
[01:07:14] The Greek language is better at this than we are.
[01:07:16] They have verbs that's aorist tense is the name of it.
[01:07:20] Anyway, it's something that starts in the past and continues on into the future.
[01:07:25] God is still saving you. God is still transforming you. God is still working in all of us to grow the capacity of our hearts. The Spirit of God is teaching us how to embrace and participate in
[01:07:42] the redemption of the world as Christ is born anew in every single generation. My mama was an only child, and when she was pregnant with me, her second child, she worried. She was actually worried
[01:07:56] about this she was worried if she could possibly love another child as much as she loved my older sister she just loved my sister so much she couldn't imagine how could she possibly contain any more love how could she make any more love how could she did she split it how did that happen
[01:08:12] she shouldn't have worried because I'm a delight I mean have y'all met my sister just say I'm just kidding she's also a delight she expressed that worry to my grandmother my dad's mom who had given
[01:08:31] birth to six children and they were cooking dinner they were in the kitchen mom was living with them at the time and my mom and dad and my sister were all living with my grandmother
[01:08:40] and um and my grandmother in the most off-handed but honest sort of grandmotherly way because she this is just who she was she's a matter of fact person she said oh you don't need to worry about
[01:08:50] that babies bring the love with them man i love that and you know it's true right because if you've ever been in the room when a baby was born it's like shebang love I'd die for you right now
[01:09:07] I'm good the love just arrives with them babies bring the love with them Jesus did the expansion of Joseph's heart of the grinches of mine and yours friends that stuff can't be manufactured it cannot be earned it cannot be bought with your righteousness it cannot be wrapped up in a package
[01:09:29] under the tree at Christmas.
[01:09:31] It is rather love that is born in us as Christ lives in us.
[01:09:40] In our generation, God is still alive and moving, still shining light and redeeming even the darkest, the hardest of times.
[01:09:51] Jesus is still being born anew in human hearts, still expanding them, busting their bounds and bringing all the love with him to sustain our hope and our peace and our joy into every single generation.
[01:10:05] The question is, are we going to be open to it?
[01:10:09] Or are we going to be grinchy, locked up in our fear and our self-protective isolation?
[01:10:17] Will we close our heart and stay locked tight into the right thing that was the way we always understood it as the only way?
[01:10:25] Or are we willing to listen to the voice of God and jump into God's new thing, The prophet Isaiah says, now I am doing a new thing.
[01:10:33] Now it springs forth.
[01:10:35] Do you not perceive it?
[01:10:38] Can we, like Joseph, let God's love be born within us and transform the path of our life?
[01:10:45] Can our hearts expand as Christ is born in us with God's very own love for this and every broken generation?
[01:10:58] Man, I hope so.
[01:10:59] i hope that god breaks our hearts this christmas so that he can expand their capacity for him in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit amen i want us to pray friends and
[01:11:19] it's a responsive prayer so i will end a petition with come lord jesus and your response is birth your love in our generation so let's pray together lord jesus born of mary and joseph born in a manger, bringing all the love of God into the world in its fullness, we pray.
[01:11:49] Lord, into our troubles and our weakness, into the barren places of our souls, come, Lord Jesus, birth your love in our generation, into the war-torn and the refugee, and to those who live in conflict, live in spaces of war, and in homes beset by violence.
[01:12:20] Come, Lord Jesus, birth your love in our generation.
[01:12:26] Into the homeless and the hungry and the unemployed.
[01:12:31] Into those who feel abandoned, alone, lost.
[01:12:38] come Lord Jesus birth your love in our generation into the sick the grieving the suffering the disabled into those beset with mental illness and disease come Lord Jesus birth your love in our generation, into the poor and the starving, into those who are oppressed or abused. Come,
[01:13:21] Lord Jesus, birth your love in our generation, into the lives of loved ones, into the lives of our enemies, into those from whom we are estranged. Come, Lord Jesus, birth your love in our generation,
[01:13:44] into our joys and our celebrations into our work and our achievements into our hopes and into our dreams come Lord Jesus birth your love in our generation O Christ we long for your birth hasten that day when those who seek you in
[01:14:07] every generation will yield themselves to your will and way even and especially when we must be transformed to receive it hasten the day when your kingdom will come in all its glory and suffering and pain and sickness and depression and
[01:14:24] death will be overcome forever hasten the day when we will be resurrected as your great family from all generations and live in peace and harmony joy and love together in your kingdom birth Lord your love in our generation and in
[01:14:43] every generation to come to the glory of your name amen friends there is nothing more amazing than what God has done for us then the incredible holy gift that God brought us that first Christmas it is a powerful thing to remember that
[01:15:12] Jesus in Jesus God has given us the greatest of all gifts we more than we could already ever ask for the generosity of God is a profound thing to come to know it is a profound thing to come to know how faithful and generous God is to us that God
[01:15:33] would give us himself become like us in Jesus humbling himself for our sake friends God is doing amazing things in and through the church around the world in and through this church and we can't wait to see what God continues to do in our generation
[01:15:50] and in the generations that will follow after us.
[01:15:54] One way that we can be part of what God is doing in the world is through our offering.
[01:15:58] Our hope and prayer is that when we give to Williamson Chapel or to any other organization, we are giving as a joyful and grateful response to God's gift for us and for the world, the holy gift of heaven born in us.
[01:16:14] you can scan if you'd like to give your offering online you can also mail in a check or place it in the offering if you'd like to give to the generosity tree you're able to do that as well just that's gifts above and beyond just you
[01:16:25] want to say a big thank you to God for something amazing that God did for you this year I mean you could tell us your why if you write a check just write it on the back of the check on the back of the check on the memo line or on the
[01:16:36] back of the envelope and we'll make sure that that gets on the tree as well however you're giving we hope that you are giving as an expression of your

[01:16:43] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[01:16:43] worship of the one who has given you everything. Tonight, we have our blue Christmas worship

[01:24:19] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]
[01:24:19] service. Tonight is the longest night of the year. It's the winter solstice, and so it's the longest night of the year. And there are lots of people for whom Christmas time is hard for any
[01:24:30] number of reasons. Maybe they're just going through a hard season. Maybe they've lost someone this year. Maybe they're having strife with a family member, or they're just feeling a little bit blue.
[01:24:41] That's what this service is for tonight.
[01:24:43] So if that describes you or if it describes somebody you know, I hope you will come tonight.
[01:24:49] And if you do know somebody that you think could benefit from being there, don't just call them and say, hey, I think you could benefit from being there.
[01:24:55] Call them and say, hey, I'll pick you up at 630 and I'll sit next to you tonight.
[01:25:00] It's in the chapel.
[01:25:01] It's going to be a beautiful service.
[01:25:03] So I hope that you will, if that is speaking to your spirit, I hope that you'll listen to the prompting of the spirit and come.
[01:25:09] on christmas eve which is wednesday we're going to have three worship services at 3 30 we will worship around the manger in the fellowship hall that is a service designed for the littlest of little little people uh it is chaos uh it is um it is little people learning about the story of
[01:25:25] jesus and being able to participate in that story and lift their candles and um and have communion together a lot of families with little children it's really hard to be in a worship service because we all want to plan a really long worship service and that does not work when you're little
[01:25:39] so um if you have family coming that that would would be interested in that i hope you'll come that's in the fellowship hall and then we'll worship here at five and at 11 o'clock in here
[01:25:50] in the in the sanctuary so i hope you'll make a priority of that and because for reasons i can't begin to describe something happens after december 25th i don't know it's my mind the world stops on
[01:26:02] the 25th because you know i can rest for a minute but we're still going to have sunday after Christmas. So next Sunday, we will be having one worship service at the end of the year. One
[01:26:12] worship service, 10 a.m. So what time are you going to be here next week? Okay. Thank you, friends.

[01:26:18] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_08]
[01:26:18] Hark the Herald Angels sing on page 240 in your hymnal, or words are on the screen.

[01:29:20] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]
[01:29:20] That God's love might be born anew in you, and that you might know that expansion of what God does in the world, that you might be a blessing to your generation.
[01:29:30] and now may the Lord bless you and keep you the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace
[01:29:38] in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit Amen