Senior Pastor Damein Schitter finished our Advent series with a homily reflecting on the importance of this season.
Hello everyone, this is Pastor Damian. You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, orlando. At New City, we believe all of us need all of Jesus for all of life. For more resources, visit our website at NewCityOrlandocom. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 1:Well, I just want to share for a few moments here and I want to reflect on this reality that today we're singing a lot, and that makes sense, because, since the creation of humanity, the way we mark momentous occasions is so often with a song. You think about in the garden, the first time Adam sees Eve, what does he do? But he erupts and prays in song. He says bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh you think about. Later, in redemptive history, when God provides a way for Israel to escape Egypt across the Red Sea. They get to the other side and what do they do? Moses and Miriam write a song and they sing, and so it's not surprising, then, that the beginning of the gospel of Luke, which is so well known around the Christmas season for how it starts off with the details surrounding the birth of our Lord Jesus, that the first part of Luke is chock full of people writing songs and singing and praising. Now, most of us have never written a song, but I bet every single one of us has experienced the power of a song to tap into our longings, or a song to bring us to a memory or to describe something deep in us that would be hard to bring words to, apart from a song, both in praise and lament. We heard the children, for example, earlier recite Mary's song from Luke, chapter one, and Mary praises God for the sending of his son, this baby, her son. And from there Mary goes on to describe what her birth, the birth of her son, what it means to all of Israel, and this longing that God's people have had since Abraham, she says, is going to be fulfilled in the coming of this promised one. And so she sings of how God's steadfast love and mercy are fully and finally displayed in this one Jesus.
Speaker 1:And in the midst of this season we all experience longing as well. We experience longing, and in that longing we desire fulfillment. And in fact we have both of those in this season. Today we sang oh come, oh come, emmanuel. And yet we also sing joy to the world. The Lord has come, let earth receive her king.
Speaker 1:And so all of us this morning at times wonder if our longings and desires will ever be met, we think. Will I ever get married? Will my relationship with my spouse and family ever be what I long for it to be? Will I ever stop struggling with this specific sin? Will I ever truly feel known by people, or will I always, looking happy on the outside, remain lonely?
Speaker 1:This season of celebration speaks to our longings and shapes them as well, because it's not just our longings that are brought to light in this season, but our longings also ought to be shaped by the priorities of the scriptures, and so we think about this at the end of Luke, chapter one, the final song, zechariah's song, john the Baptist's dad. He says this toward the end of his song. He says because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace. Now, there are many images for the Messiah and the Bible. Some we're more familiar with than others, and I wonder if we're less familiar with this image, that is, the beautiful image of a sunrise. The coming of the Messiah is like the rising of the sun. Now, this is connected to Isaiah's famous Christmas prophecy when he says the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shown. And so we have here in Christmas a picture of dawn. And of course, dawn marks the rise of the sun and it marks the end of the night and all the concerns that come with the fear of night.
Speaker 1:The Messiah brings a new dawn, and in this first coming, god has not visited his people with the trumpet blast of war, but, as one commentator put it, he's visited us with a smiling morning which, in gentle glory, floods the world with joy. You see, there's nothing like gentle and warm sunrises when you're freezing cold and everything is dark and with me, if you've ever been camping and it's freezing cold at night and you're not sleeping that well anyway, and so you're waking up constantly in the middle of the night, reminding you of how cold and miserable you are. And finally you give up on sleep and you just wait with your eyes wide open, praying that the sun would come, that sunrise would dawn. Yes, thank you. And we know what it's like the first light beam that crosses into the tent and while the warmth isn't yet trailing. We even start to feel warmer because we know it's coming. As the light dawns, then the warmth comes. As night is banished, the warmth begins.
Speaker 1:And so Charles Spurgeon, commenting on this idea, says the coming of Jesus to us, when he does really come in our hearts, it takes away the darkness of ignorance, sorrow, carelessness, fear and despair. He says our night is ended once for all when we behold God visiting us in Christ Jesus. Our day may cloud over, but night. Night will not return. O you that are in the blackest midnight, he says if you can but get a view of Christ, morning will come to you. There is no light for you elsewhere. Think about this. There is no light for you elsewhere. Believe us in this. But if Jesus be seen by faith, you shall need no candles of human confidence, nor sparks of feelings and impressions. The beholding of Christ shall be the ending of all night for you.
Speaker 1:I'll repeat this one part again but if Jesus be seen by faith, you shall need no candles of human confidence. The beholding of Christ shall be the ending of all night for you. Have you ever considered that longings that you have are longings that are real and good but cannot be fulfilled by anything around you. They cannot be fulfilled by anything of your own doing. There are longings in your heart and mind that cannot be met with more competency, more recognition, more control, more comfort or more human praise. And the Bible says this is true because our ultimate longings, the ultimate longings of our hearts, must be met by God and God alone.
Speaker 1:And so this growing light in Jesus in this Christmas season gives us great warmth and vision. Now, by his light, he guides our feet into the way of peace. But this season also brings with it the promise that the sun will continue to rise and it will, in time, be the blazing noon day. This is the promise, of course, of greater glory yet to come. And I wanna end with this. Jesus knows the shadows of your life already. Turn your face to his light and walk in his way of peace. Jesus sees your pain and confusion, yet he has visited you in this Christmas. Turn your eyes to face him. We do not make the sun rise, we simply turn our face to its glory. And this Christmas there's nothing we can do to make the sun rise, to meet our own longings. But the sun has risen, it's dawned in Jesus, and so we need only turn our face to its warmth and light. So I invite you, jesus seeks you this morning. Turn your face to him and see him in his word. Jesus seeks you this morning, and we've seen in the lighting of these candles, metaphorically, the light that Jesus brings the world. Jesus said I am the light of the world, and we end with lighting the Christ candle, the white, larger candle in the center. We've been waiting in expectation these four weeks, and now we celebrate that Jesus has come, that the light has dawned and it will continue to rise. Now, in a moment, I'm going to move to the Lord's table and we're going to celebrate communion together. After that, I'll then invite. I won't be able to invite the officers up, but when you see me, officers, when you see me, light this candle, please come, and we'll end our time together by taking up the candles that you got on the way in and we'll pass the light of Christ to one another. And so now I'll move over here to the table.
Speaker 1:One of the songs that we sang was that Jesus came and was born as a baby. And yet, of course, even as he was born as a baby, it was with his death and resurrection in mind. And so Jesus came with a particular mission he came to seek and to save the lost. Jesus came to lay down his life for us. And so today, as we reflect on this reality that Jesus has laid down his life for us, our response is one and one only, and that is to receive his promise, to receive the gift of his life, his death and his resurrection.
Speaker 1:And in a moment, by coming up empty-handed and taking what is offered to you, you are in fact taking by faith this death and resurrection on your behalf. And so if this morning you're here, and you were invited, and you're visiting, and you've never experienced that, you've never experienced, as the Christmas hymn goes, making room for him in your heart, that you've never trusted him, that you don't follow him. We're so grateful that you're here, that you could celebrate this story with us, this story that is now our story. But we'd ask that if this isn't your story, if you in fact haven't embraced Jesus by your heart, you haven't been baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and you're not walking with him, we ask that this morning you would remain seated and that you would not come up and take this meal, but would you, before you leave or as you go with the person invited you, would you ask them more about this? What would it look like for you to come to this table?
Speaker 1:Father, we come to you grateful for sending your Son and your Spirit. Lord Jesus, we are grateful that you came from your throne. You took on human flesh. Paul says you suffered even to the point of death death on a cross and you were raised. You were raised to newness of life before us as fruits that we also would experience that resurrection with you, holy Spirit. We now ask that you would take these elements and separate them from their ordinary common usage, that you would see fit, as you promised, to set them apart, that we would experience our union with Christ even more richly in these elements. In the name of Jesus, we pray amen.