Christmas Unwrapped

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

You guys look good this morning. Everybody good? Are the cookies baked? No. The presents wrap. No. The presence box. No. It’s still a good day. Amen. You can have a seat. I do believe this is the most wonderful time of the year, and not because a song says so. I believe this is wonderful. I think that most of us we know this season. We have all sorts of memories, we have all sorts of expectations. But Christmas is very familiar to us. And we love most of it. We enjoy most of it. We feel at home in it. We’re happy when it gets here, we look forward to it. And we’re happy when it all goes back in the box and back in the garage till next year.

But I’m here to tell you that there’s a lot more to Christmas than even all our memories hold. There’s just a lot more that we can experience and we can come to know personally for ourselves regarding Christmas. Especially when the kids were little, and some blessed aunt or uncle would give them a toy with 150 pieces in it, and at least 50 of those pieces went in the trash. I think Marshall put them there on purpose. But there was stuff that just got thrown away in the wrapping paper. And I think that sometimes so much has gotten wrapped around Christmas culturally that we can’t find it. And this morning I want us to unwrap three things, and then I want to rewrap one. So you with me?

The Pace of Christmas

The first thing that I want to unwrap, and I want to say this I am not dissing Christmas. If you if you could see our house, our house, every room in the house has a Christmas tree in it. It’s not fancy, but there are lights everywhere. The PM bill will go up. Outside, there are lights everywhere. In our neighborhood, Marshall and the neighbor across the street years ago started decorating our houses outside. And at first it was just a little bit. And then Jim added more, so Marshall added more. So Jim added more, so Marshall added more. So Jim added more, so Marshall added more. And then Michael next door is like, I’m gonna do something next year, I promise. And do you know, little by little, the whole neighborhood got on. We live in a small little cul-de-sac, there’s only nine houses, and this year every single house has lights. It’s so fun. You come home in the pitch dark at five, and the whole neighborhood is fully lit. And the man next door to us has some health issues, and he just couldn’t do it. So the neighbors went and wrapped his trees in lights. It’s sweet. It’s a good thing. I’m not dissing Christmas. I promise you. I think as Christians, we have more reason to celebrate than anybody. But let’s get to the celebration.

I think there’s so much wrapped around it that sometimes we lose the real spirit of joy and wonder and celebration. And the first thing that I think that needs to be unwrapped is speed. Although some days I think I could use some to keep up. I mean the pace. The pace of Christmas. It’s just we’ve keep we’ve added so many things. And most of it’s good. Really, most of it’s good. If you think about things that we’ve added into our lives, but our calendars are crammed. We’re we have to-do list of our to-do list of things to get done, places to be. There’s parties, there’s recitals.

I have to tell you, girls, close your ears. I don’t miss school programs. When the grandkids have them, I’ll go. But I can still remember Mary Hope and Richard Buckler and Marshall and I sitting through innumerable, eternal school programs. Don’t raise your hand, parents. There’s some things that will fall off your list and you won’t miss it. Trust me. You gotta go now, though. Put in your time. Smile, clap for everybody’s kid, and get ice cream on the way home. School programs, cooking, baking, shipping, partying, traveling, finals, all the high school kids, mid school kids, college kids. I think the college kids are done with finals for this year, but the high school kids have finals this week. So we’re praying for all of you guys. Go to class, do good, study, and then ask the Holy Spirit to help you, okay? Amen.

Spending and Sentimentality

So what I think happens is that everything speeds up, and it feels like somebody’s just winding it tighter and tighter. And then we’re the only way that we can keep up with all of this is to speed up. But the more we speed up, the more likely it is that we’re absolutely gonna miss the silent night, the holy night that we’re gonna sing about. Spending. We have culturally wrapped. Good Friday, Cider Month, Cyber Monday, and then now they’ve added Giving Tuesday. I wonder what Wednesday will be by next year. Right. And in culture, this is the official kickoff of Christmas season. Black Friday? Shopping is the kickoff.

I saw a business report this week that was telling us all of the amount of money that we should give to people in our lives that do things for us throughout the year. I was like, I’m not Santa Claus. I don’t have a workshop. I don’t have a sleigh. I don’t have an unlimited budget. I don’t even. One of them was the postman. We don’t even see the postman. He puts the mail in this big old box at the top of the hill. We never see him or her. And they come later and later and later. And they don’t even leave us. Our mail half the time they leave us the neighbor’s mail. I’m supposed to give him or her something. I don’t even know who they are. And they don’t know who I am. They can’t even get my address right. I can’t give a monetary thing to everybody in my life, even if I wanted to.

But this has become the kickoff. And then for some people, it’s the most vital part of Christmas. I think gifts are important. I think God teaches us this. I think giving is godly. I do. But I think obligation to give. I don’t think so. I think it for giving to be true giving. Marshall just talked about this. It needs to come from the heart. Right? It needs it needs to come from love. A place of genuine love and appreciation and gratitude. And so giving can get kind of crazy. I’m not opposed to it. But all the sales stuff. David talked last week, week when they were kids, that and our kids did the same thing on Thanksgiving. The newspaper came in the newspaper had about 16 different toy catalogs. Do you remember that? And the kids all went through it and circled everything.

Listen, when we were kids, it wasn’t it wasn’t that. It was the Sears catalog and the JCPenney catalog, right? Don’t raise your hand, they’ll know how old we are. These kids have never even heard of that. But Gracie, Gracie shops online. These kids, they have Amazon list. Marshall and I were shopping at the kitchen counter last Saturday, and we’re like, oh my God, this is more stressful than going to the mall. Click, it’s gone. Click, it won’t get here by Christmas, right? Buy this now, buy this now. It’s on sale, it’s on sale, it’s on sale. Hey, I’d love a good sale. I’m not opposed to it. But that’s not Christmas. That’s not all there is.

Among my family, staff, and others, and I asked this question of the adults. I asked them, and I think this is a great question you could ask around your family table at Christmas this year. I said, What is your most vivid memory or your favorite thing about Christmas, particularly from childhood? Of all the adults that I ask, not one said gifts. Not one. I asked my sister, could she remember some of the things we got for Christmas? And she said, no. Nothing. We got great gifts, and we loved them, but those gifts were temporary. We outgrew them.

After a week of thinking about it, I could remember one year we had moved to Mesquite. It was the first time ever that my sister and I had separate bedrooms, and my dad got a Christmas bonus. Didn’t know what that was, but he bought a portable black and white TV that was this big portable. And it lived one week in my sister’s room and one week in my room. We thought we were rich kids. But neither one of us care one thing about that black and white TV right now. We just remember dad. We remember a lot of things.

Now my grandkids, they remember gifts. Can I tell them what you said, Laney? Lainey remembers the year she got her hot pink Hello Kitty first guitar. I said, I think you should bring it back. She said, I think I will bring a hot pink guitar back. We remember things, and those gifts are a big piece of what happens at Christmas, and it’s part of the memories that we’re building. They’re wonderful things. But you know what? At Thanksgiving this year, the day before, the the kids and the grandkids were at our house. We were cooking. Lainey was home from college, and she was sitting on the sofa and she was playing her Nintendo Switch. And Gracie sat down beside her and begged her to let her have it. And Laney said, No, you can’t, it’s mine, you can’t have it. Well, I I want to buy one. And Laney said, Well, I saved up all my Target gift cards from Christmas and my birthday until I had enough to go to Target and get it. And Gracie said, Well, how much does it cost? And Laney said, uh about $200. So Gracie slides off the sofa. Papa. Papa. Papa. What, honey? She goes, Papa, I need $200. Papa looked over her head. He looked at me and went. He said, What? What do you need $200 for, honey? For a Nintendo? She doesn’t even know the name of it. And Papa said, what all wise grandparents say. Go ask your dad. Yeah.

Do you know what? When I was a kid, I was just like that. I had no idea of what things cost. I had no idea of the value of it. Your kids don’t either. They want everything they see. I just want to say to you, young parents, first of all, if you have a baby, this is the easiest it will ever be. Just wrap up a box and let them play with the box and the paper. It never gets easier. But when I was a kid, I had no idea, just like your kids and my kids and grandkids have no idea. And when I was a kid, my mom’s parents had I didn’t know this, I didn’t count this way at the time, but my mom’s parents were very hardworking, very religious people, and very pragmatic. And so every year at Christmas, it was a we figured this out. It was on a three-year rotation. One year you got a Bible, the next year you got fabric, so your mom could make you some clothes. And the third year was worst of all, you got underwear. And then it started, Bible, fabric, underwear.

And so we weren’t real excited about the gifts from Nano and Papa as kids, but we just knew you just say thank you. And you you mean it. You say thank you. No complaining, just say thank you. And what I didn’t get until I was working, and I got my minimum wage paycheck and bought gifts for people out of my money, was my grandparents had 10 grandchildren, and all of us always got something. They sacrificed something they wanted or needed so that all of us got something. So family, this year, if somebody that works minimum wage gives you a gift, that cost them two hours of their work week. So it might not be exciting to you, but the love and behind that gift deserves a thank you. Heartfelt. Amen. I just think that helps reorient us. And you parents and grandparents can pay me after the service.

If if you’re a grandkid in here, especially maybe a kid, really, we love everything you give us, but the most special thing that you could give us this year is if you could look up and we could see your face and your mouth move and we could hear your voice in a conversation. Because right now we just see the top of your head looking at your phone. And we don’t need all day. Five minutes would be great with your phone down. Eyes. No condemnation. I love you, parents. You pay me later, okay.

The Story of Christmas

The third thing we need to unwrap, and I think this might be the biggest one is the sentimentality. Wow, we’ve wrapped so much sentiment around Christmas. Santa fruit cake. I don’t know about you, but my family dropped having fruit cake at Christmas after Granny Pace died because nobody but Granny liked it. And if she wasn’t gonna eat it, we didn’t need it. Right? I it just felt like they just saved it from year to year. Because nobody liked it. So we we didn’t have any sentimental attachment to fruit cake. So it went. I don’t, I don’t know, I don’t think I have ever had a chestnut roasted on an open fire. All my nuts come in a plastic bag from Trader Joe’s. So if the chestnuts on an open fire are missing, I don’t miss them because I don’t have any attachment. It’s it’s cute in a song.

My family personally prefers grandma’s peanut butter balls, my mom’s peanut butter fudge, grandma’s sausage balls, and the Hershey kiss cookies that have to be rolled. If it has peanut butter or has to be rolled into a ball, apparently we like it. And you have your things. You have the things in your family that you like. You carry it forward, and there’s something wonderful to be said about that. That we carry things from those that have come before us into our now and pass on into our future. If any of you, if your thing in your family is homemade biscochetos and you have one left over, could you bring it to me? Not a fan of tamales, but the biscuchitos, y’all have the best cookies.

So sentimentality is this. It’s whatever we have attached, our particular preference or memory for Christmas to feel like Christmas. So much so that when that thing or that person or event that evokes the feeling is missing. If I’m without a person, if I’m without them, or if I’m without that thing, this is what we say. It just doesn’t feel like Christmas. Because we’ve attached things.

Marshall got a phone call. That his dad was dying. He had stage four lung cancer. They were putting him on hospice that day. And his mom said, son, if you want to be able to have a last visit with your dad, you should come soon. They’re telling me that he might, he might live till Christmas. So that was Monday, Tuesday night, Marshall did service. Wednesday morning, he flew to Dallas. Talked to his dad. His dad was already on morphine in the hospice bed in the living room. And he asked God for one last good visit with his dad. And he got it. Flew home. The next week, grandpa passed that fast. So we all flew in to Dallas for grandpa’s funeral. A few days later. It’s Thanksgiving.

Normally we don’t go to Dallas for Thanksgiving at that time in our lives, but that year it was my mom and dad’s 50th wedding anniversary. My sister and I had already planned and sent out all the invitations for a party for my mom and dad. So we all went back to Dallas for the third time in a few weeks. Had Thanksgiving, had a party, we had the bitter end the sweet all at the same time. And on our way home, Marshall and myself, Hannah and Jordan, we weren’t planning on going back for Christmas. And we all said, we think Grandma needs people. So we think we should go. And the really, really truth of that was we needed grandma. And we needed to be together. So we went back to Dallas for the fourth time in six or seven weeks.

That year we had speed, spending, sentimentality, and grief all together at their highest levels. It did not feel like Christmas. We were in a different place with not all the same people. Grandpa’s chair was empty. We didn’t eat the same foods that grandma always had. But it was. Memories of Christmas. Your childhood, Christmas, is not something that you want to remember or relive. It’s dark. You dread it. In fact, if you can, you avoid it. I know that there are some people in here that that’s your present reality. It’s not ever a holly jolly Christmas.

But I also know that there are people in this room, and I can point them to you. I won’t call their name out loud, but if you come and ask me, I know there are people that grew up in that household, but today they have the light of God in them. And they’re rebuilding a different life than that one. Whatever that was, it’s not your destiny. It’s not your story for the future. Because God, God’s the difference maker.

So I think that brings us to the last thing. And that’s the story. Not all of it. But the reality is this church that if we’re blessed with 20, 40, 60, 80 years of Christmases, they’re gonna change. What they look like, the people that are with us, the food we can’t even eat anymore, how many presents we can buy, whether we can even get up on the ladder to decorate the tree or not, all that’s gonna change. But what’s never gonna change is that Christmas is the promise of God kept to humanity. Never forget every time you look at the word Christmas, Christ is the main word in that word.

The word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one of a kind glory, like father, like son, generous inside and out, true from start to finish.

So I think no matter what kind of Christmas it feels like for you this year, if we move Jesus back to the center of Christmas, and let him lead, not follow, but lead all the other things, then I think that the wonder of Christmas can come back to us even as adults. One of the things we most love about Christmas is to see the joy and the delight in the faces of the children, is it not? But Jesus is the one that said that you must come to me like a little child.

And so maybe if the wonder has gone out of Christmas for me and for you, it’s because it’s full of speed, spending, and sentimentality. But the story is lacking. There’s so much of the story of Jesus. It starts in Genesis and it goes all the way to the end of Revelation in our Bibles. We should keep digging and digging and revisiting to refill ourselves. John said in the first chapter of John, he said about Jesus, out of his fullness have we all received grace upon grace. So if you’re not full of wonder, if you’re not full of Jesus, receive out of his fullness. Not the fullness of all the things, not the fullness of all the spending, not the fullness of all the stuff that got wrapped around Christmas, the fullness of Jesus.

If you’re in that season of life where you’re literally speeding through day after day to get it all done. Think about this. Proverbs chapter 3, verse 6 says, in all your ways, know, recognize, and acknowledge him, and he will direct and make straight and plane your paths. What if it’s in all your Christmas ways? We acknowledge him. So your to do list is a mile long. I get it. But what if instead of hoping that you can push through with Starbucks and Red Bull to make it to Christmas Eve to sing, oh come let us adore him? What if we start out every day with oh come let us adore him? Yeah. Yeah. And then in all your Christmas ways, acknowledge him, and he will direct your path to the store when that thing you gotta have is there and on sale. Hallelujah. Say thank you, Jesus. Listen, you might not believe that, I do. He’s done it for me a bazillion times. A bazillion. All your ways.

You get to that party that you weren’t really sure that sure you wanted to go to, but in all your ways you’ve acknowledged him, and you didn’t know it, but God did, and there’s a divine appointment with someone that needed to hear something from you when you got there. And because you got to help someone else, you got lifted. In all your ways, acknowledge Him. And if you’re in the car all day driving, you’re busy, you’re doing all kinds of things, you got kids going 90 different directions. Pop your earbuds in, listen to Pastor David’s message from last Sunday, listen to Pastor Marshall’s message from last Tuesday. When you’ve done that, flip over to Christmas Carols, not Christmas songs. Grandma getting run over by a reindeer is not gonna help you. But if you listen to Christmas carols, they sing the story of Christmas to you, and you’ll find yourself singing that along with them, and you’re retelling yourself the story.

And then you can call up on your phone someone to read the Bible to you, and they can read you Matthew chapter one and two, Luke chapter one and two, John chapter one through four, and Hebrews chapter one through four. Hebrews, yes, the story of Christmas is through your whole Bible. It’ll feed your spirit, and you won’t just speed through. If you settle, if we settle, if we settle for speeding, for spending, and being sentimental, we’re gonna get to December 26th, and we’re gonna be so dissatisfied and so depleted, and that would be a pity for the most wonderful time of the year. That’s not the ending God has for us.

We say this, and it’s become a cliche, but don’t let it be that. That Jesus truly is the greatest gift of all. It’s the truth. Do you get it? It’s the truth. Jesus was the gift of God to all of humanity. To save us. Matthew in the Amplified says it this way. To save us from failure. And so we would not miss the true end and scope of life. Huh. Ain’t no Nintendo can do that. Right? Don’t miss it. Don’t miss it. Don’t miss it.

The thing about the gift of God. Doesn’t wear out, we don’t outgrow it, doesn’t have to be repaired or replaced. And it isn’t bestowed or taken away based on whether we’re naughty or nice. It’s a gift. Jesus is the only way to God. No other way is needed. Don’t be thinking. There should be more ways. He’s the perfect. The perfect way to God. And listen, we get this mixed up, I’m telling you, it is the greatest disappointment to those of us that are pastors. That we preach our guts out week after week. We tell people over and over that the gift of God is eternal life, that Jesus is the only way to God, that the only way to receive it. You cannot earn it. You cannot be good enough. You cannot give enough. You cannot do enough. Because the gift of God can only be received, believed and received by speaking it and believing it from your heart. That’s the scripture.

And yet we interview people, we hear this all the time. We you’ll hear it on TV. We heard it recently from the most famous Times Time magazine’s man of the year. Are you going to heaven? Well, I hope so. I try to do good things. I dare say if we put that microphone in front of many people that walk in and out of our church, they would say the same thing. Do you believe in God? Yeah. Do you think you’ll go to heaven? I hope so. I try to good do good things. I’m just here to tell you, I gotta tell you the truth. Because I love you, you’re not gonna go to heaven if you think you’re going because you’re doing good things. You’re gonna miss it. And I don’t want you to miss it. Marshall doesn’t want you to miss it. David doesn’t want you to miss it. Jordan doesn’t, we don’t want to get to heaven and do what we have to do every Sunday morning. Did you see? Well, you know, I don’t think I didn’t see them. Where do you think they’ve been? Come to think of it. I haven’t seen them for a long time. I don’t want to be doing that in heaven. I want to know. I want to, I want to be high-fiving you. I want to be, yeah, I want to be worshiping beside you, but don’t get it mixed up. You can’t do good enough to get there. You have to come through Jesus.

You say, well, then I don’t have to do good. If you’re following Jesus, good is what you’re gonna do. Jesus went about doing good. If you’re following him, you’re gonna be doing good, and your good will get better and better, but that’s not what’s gonna get you there. Come on. Let’s not keep mixing this up. Can we not? Can we get it? Because we want you. Jesus wanted you bad enough to give up heaven and come here and then die. So you and I could receive that gift of salvation and not miss the true end and scope of life. Because that’s God.

And then Luke 179. Love this verse. Love this verse from the Amplified. This is Zachariah, John’s dad, who hasn’t spoken for nine months. And when he gets his words and his voice back, he’s prophesying over his son John. And he is prophesying what Jesus will do. Listen to these words.

Luke 1, 78 and 79 from the Amplified. Because, because of, and through the heart of tender mercy and loving kindness of our God, a light from on high will dawn upon us and visit us to shine upon and give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to direct and guide our feet in a straight line into the way of peace.

The tender, did you catch that? The heart of tender mercy and loving kindness of our God. He said, The people that are sitting in darkness will see a great light. Maybe you’re where we were in 1999 at Christmas. Maybe it’s not the same reason, but you’re sitting in the darkness of death, divorce, depression, disappointment. All those are dark places. And to you it feels like Christmas isn’t happening, but Christmas isn’t passing you by. If you’re in the dark, Christmas came to shine his great light right into your great dark. And when he shines his light into your great dark, he wants to lead you.

Listen, it’s right for you and I to grieve loss. It’s right. And honestly, we do get it that it’s not a holly jolly Christmas. But he is with us. And he wants to lead us out of the valley of the shadow. Shadows are what you feel when death has come. He wants to lead us out of the valley of the shadows of death. He does not want us to live there. Back into fresh green pasture. And he won’t make you speed through it. He’ll lead you gently through it.

In 2015, we had 15 church staff members. That’s how many were on staff. And in 2015, in nine months, five of our 15 buried our mothers. Marshall, myself, Louise, Shirley, and Gail. Gail’s mom died days before Christmas. Man. That was a lot of funerals. So the women that birthed us weren’t here. But the baby that Mary birthed was here. He was with us. You know what we did? We put our arms around each other. We cried with each other. We talked about our moms with each other. We laughed about our moms. Gail and I say our moms were the same person. We told stories. And we came in and we sat in this room and let love himself begin to restore our souls.

If you’re in a dark place, maybe you’re watching online today, because you really don’t think you can come into the room. Can I say to you, we want you here? We want you with us. And because Jesus was with us. And if he can’t sing, it’s okay. If you sit and you cry, it’s okay. But if you sit in the middle of love, your soul will begin to be restored.

Jesus, Our High Priest

One last scripture. Hebrews 4, 14 through 16 in the message, it reads this way. Now that we know what we have, well, barely, right? Now that we know what we have, Jesus, this great high priest with ready access to God. Let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a high priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all, all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.

Do you get this? This baby whose birth we are celebrating Christmas. He came to this very earth that we’re living on. It’s not just a story. It really happened. He came to this earth. In fact, he was born in the very region that we today call the Middle East. The nation of Israel. It’s still one of the most violent, hate-filled, disputing, and warring regions on earth. It was then and it still is.

That verse we read in another translation says, He is touched with the feelings of your and my infirmities. He felt what we feel. He moved into our neighborhood. He lived out everyday life as a human. He went to weddings and he went to funerals. He experienced acception, acceptance, and rejection. He was loved and he was betrayed. He feasted and he fasted. He made friends and he made enemies. He ate, he slept, he walked, he worked, he prayed, he worshiped, he celebrated and he mourned. He felt everything that we feel, the Bible says, so that he could become our faithful high priest.

He felt what we feel, he knew what to do with it, and he left us the Holy Spirit to walk with us through everyday life here, so we can know what to do with the good and the bad, the feasting and the fasting, the celebrating and the mourning, the dark time and the good day. And he’s willing to give it all to us. I just think in Hebrews chapter 2, verse 1, it says this since all of this is true. Let us not drift through life past all that God has done and is doing. Since all of this is true, let’s not drift through Christmas, not recognize, not acknowledge, not give attention to what God has done and is doing. Whether I’m in the dark or I’m in the light, he’s with me. Amen, church. Amen.

Could you stand on your feet, please? Listen, we want to pray for you. We mean it when we say to you, don’t stay away. If life is hard, you need a refuge. You need a refuge, and God provides that refuge in the middle of his people. If you need help this morning, we want to pray with you. If you’re in the dark, just come and let us speak light and life over you. Pastors will be here. We have great prayers, even positioned at the back. We we want to make it as easy as we possibly can for you to come and say, can you pray with me? Because we believe in the power of the prayer of agreement. We’re not just talking. We have access to the throne room of God to obtain his help in our time of need. Amen.

So, Father, I thank you so much for this great family. This great church. Lord, I pray for every person in here. And I thank you that you will continue to shine your light as always. That in our hearts your light gets brighter and brighter. And that we have the opportunity to shine that light upon other people and help them find their way out of this darkness. Lord, I thank you that you’re watching over these people. You’re guarding them. You’re protecting them. You’re giving them your helping them lift up their heads and see you, acknowledge you, and enjoy you every day of their lives. Thank you. Thank you, God for Jesus. Can you say amen, church? Amen. Amen.