Good News of Great Joy
First B Jackson
2017-12-17

Automatically transcribed. Where this and the recording disagree, the recording is the record.

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Sing we now but Christmas, oh, I'll sing weir.

And can y'all hear me? Alright, y'all can have a seat. I've got a few announcements to make this morning. Welcome. Glad you're here.

We get here early and we sound check and we go through it and it sounds pretty and I mean it. Really perfect and then we get up and something like that happens. We just don't know. Welcome. Glad that you're here.

Angel Tree is first in line. I don't know why but this is still out there. There are few tags left. If you'd like to take a tag today, most of y'all understand what's going on with the Angel Tree. We have Tanya administrates this and she puts up tags specifically for an age and usually with a specific gift on em and if you look back in my office, a lot of those have already come back in and if you would like to take a tag and bring one back, you still have time.

If you can get em here by Wednesday, we're going to have people we're going to be delivering those on Thursday, Friday this week. So, if you want to do that, you're welcome to and there are few tags left. You're welcome to it if you want to. Next week, Christmas Eve morning, there will be one service here at 10AM. It's just one service, combined service for everybody.

So, plan on being here at ten, not nine, and that'll be fun. We will also have services at 04:30 and six. We already have enough childcare volunteers for the 04:30 service but if you would like to volunteer for the 06:00 service, you're welcome to. You can contact Bailey and she will she will put you in touch with who how's that going to work? Bailey's Bailey's got Devin Rose but she's still.

Get in touch with Nick. How about that? Like, I don't want you calling Bailey right now. I'm not quite ready this morning, am I? Here we go.

There's a snowmobile retreat. It's happening January 26 through the twenty eighth. If you want to see Kyle Knutson for that. Kyle, are you here? Would you stand up just a second?

Wave your hand. If you want to go on that, see Kyle Knutson. There you go. Yes, sir. Perfect.

Sounds good and this is earlier than it usually is, right? January twenty sixth to twenty eight. Alright. Very good. Thank you, Kyle.

Monday nights at First B are happening. Tomorrow night, what you doing, Carl? Real music message. Amen. There it is.

And for all the other announcements, you can check your bulletin. Before I have you stand and greet one another though, I want to invite up a family to do the Advent reading for this Sunday. Here come the Lampas. It's it's up here. The red mic is up here.

On this third Sunday in Advent, the candle of joy is lit. Jesus came to give us fullness of joy and abundant life. Joy's is ours because of Jesus. His presence brings the promise of joy.

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shown around them. And they were terrified, but the angel said to them, do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. Today in the town of David, a savior has been born to you.

He is Christ the Lord. Thank

you, lampers. And now, if y'all would, you can stand and greet one another and we will bring you back together with a song. There's a swelling ties there.

A to We're be a child was born. Unto us, a son has given. Very unprepared throne. Let every let on day this and his name shall be from this day on wonderful wonderful counselor everlasting father. Let's sing that.

Everlasting father. Let's sing again. Wonderful counselor. Wonderful counselor. Everlasting father everlasting father.

Alright. My soul, my soul, soul, my things for me my soul magnifies the Lord my soul magnifies the Lord he's done

Let me share a verse here from Luke. It says after seeing Jesus, the shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child, and they went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. It was just as the angel had told them. They saw, they shared.

Amen. That cool?

I've got a verse here from second Corinthians eight nine I wanna share you with you about Jesus leaving the glories of heaven to to meet us here on earth. And it says, you know the generous grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, though he was rich yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty he could make you rich. That would that's what Jesus did by by coming to earth.

Light of the world.

And you all can be seated and I'll invite up the frontline team, but also Kyler Areola and Judy. He's gonna sing a a song here and this is where we're participating here in the worship through giving and I just like to to pray and give thanks if I could. God, we do sing to you because you are all together good and lovely and wonderful. And we do thank you, God, for stepping down from the glories of heaven to meet us here on earth in our in our brokenness. And I thank you, God, just for restoring the brokenhearted.

I thank you for for giving peace and love and joy and everything that we celebrate here at Christmas. They are eternal things that you bring. God and thank you. We have a we have a an opportunity to to share our our our treasures with you. Thank you God that as we do we're not just storing treasure here we're storing it.

You tell us that when we give we store up treasure in heaven and so Lord I pray that you'd use these gifts to advance the gospel and I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Wow. Wow. It's time for children's church downstairs. I'm sure there are some Christmas festivities going on. We get to this point every year, Good news, a great joy and we've sung about that already and and we've sung about the shepherds and we've sung about Mary and the message is going be about the shepherds and Mary and you from Luke's gospel today but I want to talk about the struggle.

Each year, I went back and listened to my Christmas messages from the last five years and it's a struggle for me to do a Christmas message. I like to go in in order. I really, really like that And Luke likes going in order. Luke has an orderly account. He says it in Luke one.

I have set forth to give an orderly account of all the things. And I I pick up from Luke with the struggle with Christmas is, y'all know this story. Right? Do you know the story? Am I going to introduce to you a new character today?

Is there anything that you haven't heard about this story? I know when we have a new Christmas movie come out or something, there'll be a burrow and it'll be about the burrow because we've all heard this story, right? This story is awesome. Christ is amazing and Christmas is amazing. The story that we have, if we're looking at it from our human point of view, as I'm looking at it from the messenger's point of view today, I'm trying to transmit the message, you know?

And so I was talking earlier in the meet with somebody about the struggle. He's in Darien, Georgia. He sits right back there when he's here, and it's Sam South So, Sam South and his deep Georgia accent I said and he texted it back but I read it in his accent. So, I texted him. Yeah, I'm I struggling with the message this week and he sends this back.

It's simple. So simple Jesus came to Earth so we can go to heaven Let's go eat. You know, that's that's the way that that goes. Well, thanks, Sam He texted me again and wanted to amend his statement this morning. He goes Jesus came to Earth and be like to be like us so that we could be like him and go to heaven.

I thought that's a better amendment right there. I like that but that is pretty simple. It helped ground me and helped me reboot it, I think. I'm going to read the story for you that we've already had snippets from this morning. First of all, about the message to Mary to begin with, then the message to the shepherds, then the response of the shepherds, then the response of Mary, and then the message to you and the response from you, I hope.

Okay. Now, in the sixth month now, usually I have 80 slides. Some weeks, I have 40 slides. This I have a 100 slides. Listen fast, okay?

Now, in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph of the descendants of David and the virgin's name was Mary and coming in, he said to her, greetings favored one, the Lord is with you but she was very perplexed at the statement and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. This greetings favored one has been taken a lot of different ways over the intervening two thousand years, but the word for greetings right there is grace. Okay? And then when it says favored one, it is ingraced one. So it's grace, graced one, and it's about the unmerited favor of God rather than the merited favor of God.

So greetings is grace, cheris, favored or ingraced one. The Lord has graced you. He has given you and shown you unmerited favor. And this is why she was perplexed at this statement. What does that even mean?

And kept pondering what kind of a salutation this was. Grace, grace, God's grace. The angel said to her, don't be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. You have been graced by God and behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the son of the most high and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father, David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and his kingdom will have no end and Mary said to the angel, angel means messenger, by the way.

How can this be since I am a virgin? And the angel answered and said to her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and will the power of the most high will overshadow you and for that reason, the holy child shall be called the son of God and behold, even your relative Elizabeth has also conceived a son in her old age and she who was called barren is now in her sixth month for nothing will be impossible with God. And Mary said, we'll stop right there. Wait for the response on that. This is a painting of Bethlehem by Vasily Polin Polinov, 1882.

It's a hillside town. It's actually about 100 feet higher than Jerusalem, not much higher, 30 something meters higher than Jerusalem. It's not far away, 4.4 miles, they say. It's not a big place It did have some prophecies that pointed towards it such that when the wise men went looking, they asked, where is the king of the Jews to be born and all of them just said, immediately, Bethlehem, they knew that. That's what it looked like in 1800, late eighteen hundreds.

That's what it looked like on Christmas Day eighteen ninety eight. I just pulled these images from various sources. I don't know the photographer on that one. It's a bigger town now than it was. That's washed out.

Morocco. And actually Morocco and Western Sahara are actually right there in the northern part of Africa, And it's on the opposite side of the Mediterranean, which you can't really see that well right there. Blake's probably trying to fix that. Sorry, that's all on me, Blake. If I can just go to the next slide, I'm just passing these so it's not not going to stay there for long.

Spain and Morocco. In 2010, while I was out here serving as an intern, some of you all sent me away to go on a mission trip to Spain and Morocco. And we were in the southern part of Spain. We crossed over. We saw the marketplace in Old Tangier, yeah, and went from there on the Marrakesh Express down to Marrakesh, and then outside of Marrakesh there's a little town in the foot of the Atlas Mountains.

We got a chance to walk up those mountains. We started outside of this little town called Amishmij, And as we were walking along, we saw a lot of little villages on the hillside. And for me, I didn't think of it at the time, but we were walking everywhere we went. We walked a lot of miles that week. And we were walking in places like this.

There are dry riverbeds and wadis, spice market. We actually met our guide at the souk that day. Spice market was right there. There's the parking lot. Where we were going, we couldn't go in a car.

So we walked and we rode. Actually, one of us rode. All of us walked. We had a guy carrying water for us and stuff on the mule. We just saw him right there.

We're walking up and that right there is about the size and about the situation of Bethlehem around this time. That little town right there. Looking down on olive trees and out in the distance, we walked up wadis like this and most of us walked. There's one little person right there that's riding. That was Pascal, twenty ten We came upon a well right there with a sycamore fig tree and so the topography of the land is a lot like it and the whole feel of it I brought these pictures out of time, one time in the past at least.

Stop. Give the horses some water. I mean the mules, not horses. Those are ancient boundary posts right there. That tells the limits of your land.

We saw black cows and white sheep in little towns like a little town of Bethlehem and as we wandered by without cellphones and without all this normal stuff, you kind of get back into starting to see things. I wanted to show a few pictures just so you feel. That's inside of the house. We're walking by on the outside, so that animal's on the inside of that house. That is a there's a little fireplace right there to warm up the room inside.

There's soot all over that building. That's why it's blacked out. That is indoors and it is a place where the animals stay, so that's the stable. It's very much the same kind of construction that would have been around in Bethlehem at that time. That over in the corner is something for the animals to eat out of.

Had chickens, they had cows, they had lots of pigeons, doves. Pascal enjoyed that. That cow is eating out of that manger over there. The roofs were made the same way. The buildings were made.

There there was some concrete but most of it was made the same way that they used to be. Rabbit. That was how we had our meals for several days. It was a very, very simple thing. It was very hot, like hair dryer blowing on you kind of hot.

We slept on the roof, looking down on other roofs like that, and it really brings you back into that place. I wanted to do that before we got to this. Luke two eight through 20. Now, there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields. When we were walking along, we passed these two guys and they were laying down, laying down on the job.

They were keeping watch though over their flock and the shepherds in the biblical store were keeping watch over their flock by night which is a treacherous time. The predators out, Keeping watch. Fulat Sun Test. Fulat Sun Test is the word there and this is what it means. Basically, I highlighted them.

It is to guard, to keep watch, to watch, to guard a person or thing that they may may remain safe, to protect, to protect, to keep, to preserve safe, to guard, to guard, to guard, to observe, to keep it carefully. And that's what they were doing. Those guys right here don't look like that's what they're doing, but that's what they're doing. They're keeping watch over the sheep. They had them in a safe place.

The form right there, now the word's used a lot of times because it's an agrarian society. There's a lot about shepherds in the Bible. So, the form though, just this form is used twice in the New Testament. So, that's a jumping off point for me. I'm going to go to that towards the end of the message with the other place.

Keeping, guarding, protecting, observing carefully for the sake of well-being. That's what their job was. There is a shepherd we passed right there. That's the guy, and he's standing on a ridge and he's keeping his sheep from standing too close to that ridge. There he is.

That is a hedge of protection. Those are not gravestones, they're not it's not a boundary marker. That is a set of stones, flat stones, that have been stood up to protect the sheep from going into something that would be very dangerous for them, a dry stream bed there. Can you see that? Our projectors are getting more and more dim as we go, but that is a dry, wadi, that's kind of dangerous, a place that they could fall into.

So the shepherds take it upon themselves to protect their sheep by putting up these standing stones. They are keeping watch, guarding Fulat Santes. And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them and the glory of the Lord shown around them and they were greatly afraid Lighting up the night air. Then, the angel said to them, do not be afraid for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy Good news of great joy. We just sang it.

Great good news of great joy. We come back to that refrain. It's good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. Now, it will be. Right then, who is getting the message?

They are. In the middle of nowhere, out in the fields, minding their own business literally. They get this message. Don't be afraid. Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy.

You're getting the message directly, but it will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David, a savior who is Christ the Lord and this will be the sign to you. You will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. So, what was their sign? Babies don't usually, I mean, y'all don't, we don't have mangers so much but Bailey's not keeping Devin Rose in a thing that we feed animals out of right now.

It's not a normal thing. So it would be abnormal to find that and that's the sign to them that they're going to find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes but lying in a manger. Lying over there in the corner. Of a building like that. And suddenly there was a name that there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, goodwill toward men.

One of the messages that I did a while back had to do with that translation. I use the New King James just as my normal Bible. This one is from the New King James. Glory to God in the highest on earth. Peace, goodwill toward men and we know that from the songs.

There's a lot of song. There are a lot of songs that are based off of that. That's a good translation but there's another translation to it. I'll get to the end but what was the shepherd's response? I waited on Mary's response till the end but I'm going tell you theirs right now and so it was that when the angels had gone away from them into heaven, so the messengers did what they were sent to do, they delivered the message, and then they took off.

So, it was when the angels had gone away from them into heaven and the shepherds said to one another, let us now go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass which the Lord has made known to us. Do you get that? It's a message that was delivered specifically to them and they took that message and they did something with it. They acted upon it. Let's go.

City Of David, that's Bethlehem. Let's go right now. See this thing that's come to pass which the Lord has made known to us and they came with haste immediately. They went and they found Mary and Joseph and they found the babe lying in a manger just like God had had sent the message to tell them and now, when they had seen him, they made widely known the saying which was told them concerning this child. Literally, it says, and having seen, they made it known.

You get it? Their response, pretty cool. It's immediate and it is very simple. We've been given a message and we immediately start spreading that message. And all of those who heard it marveled at those things which were told them by the shepherds.

They were first hand witnesses telling it to these second hand witnesses but Mary kept all these things in her heart and pondered them. Luke talked to Mary about this. Think about this. We think about Mary's age at Christmas and we say she's a young teenager, 13, 14, somewhere in there probably had not known a man. Fast forward thirty years to the crucifixion.

Mary is younger than me at Jesus' crucifixion. That might not surprise you, the gray hair and all, but Mary is younger than me at the crucifixion. She's pondered these things in her heart. She's still a reliable witness. She's been thinking about this and Luke gets his story from the reliable witnesses.

These shepherds, Mary Then the shepherds returned and they returned how? Glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen as it was told them. It was a message and they carried it and when they carried the message, they transmitted it faithfully and they glorified God for having had the opportunity to see it and hear it. They glorified and praised him. So, what was told to them, glory to God in the highest on earth, peace, goodwill toward men and they glorified and praised God.

So, the angels had the message of glorify glory to God in the highest and then the shepherds transmitted that message. The reason you're sitting in these seats right here is because they did. You get that? Then the shepherds returned glorified and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen and it was told them. So, this is the response Angel answered said to her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow you and for that reason, the holy child shall be called the son of God and behold, even your relative Elizabeth also has conceived a son in her old age.

This is kind of an authentication for Mary. I mean, her response was great anyway but it's nice of God to give her this this authentication of the message too and the forerunner of Jesus. Behold, even your relative Elizabeth has also conceived a son in her old age and she who has was called barren is now in her sixth month for nothing will be impossible with God and Mary said, what did she say? I am the Lord's servant. May it be to me just as you have said.

She was willing. She was willing to do and to be whatever it was that God wanted her to do or to be. It goes forward into the magnificat. I skipped the part where she's with Elizabeth because I had to leave something out. Mary said, my soul magnifies the Lord.

My soul, my soul magnifies the Lord, my soul. That's what we were singing in the refrain a minute ago and my spirit has rejoice in God, my savior For he has regarded the lowly state, that's humility. The lowly state of his maid servant, for behold, henceforth, all generations will call me blessed. Now, when you walked in here this morning, you did not expect probably since it's a baptist church. You didn't expect Ave Maria Am I right?

About halfway through Ave Maria, you're thinking, Kyler's voice is amazing but I can't believe Ray is letting him sing that at this baptist church Where are you thinking that? Because of our little vignettes all over, that's Mary, that's Mary, holding Jesus. She was right when she said, and all generations will call me blessed Now, I think that we've gone off the rails at times about Mary and I think it embarrass her. I actually think it embarrassed Paul too. The way we lift Paul up and we, the great apostle Paul, when he says, I'm the chief of sinners Well, he's, this is a side, this is a rabbit trail but it's not long.

Paul Paul and Nero Nero great, mighty emperor of Rome Burns the city down because he wants to. Blames the Christians Persecuted him, lit him on fire in his garden to light the night Awful guy. Chief of sinners, Paul, but faithful messenger to tell what God told him. And nowadays, people name their firstborn Paul and they name their dog Nero. This is why Mary is blessed right here.

He who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is his name. She lifts up God on every occasion. She lifts. My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God, my savior, for he is regarded the lowliest state of his maidservant. That is humility.

That is the way to receive a message. For behold, henceforth, all generations will call me blessed. Why? Because he has done great things, and holy is his name. And it happened as he spoke these things that a certain woman from the crowd.

This is later on in the gospel of Luke. Luke 11, this is Jesus has already turned his face toward Jerusalem and he is starting on the road to the cross. He knows it. He's already told his disciples about it and he is going along and people are blessed in his pathway and then it says, and it happened as he spoke these things that a certain woman from the crowd raised out her voice and said, blessed is the womb that bore you and the breast which nursed you. But He said, more than that more than that, Jesus said, blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it and that's the other place where we see that form of fullassantes.

Keeping, guarding, protecting, observing carefully for the sake of well-being, the word of God. To guard what you've heard, the message that you've heard, to guard it, to hold on to it. When all around you is telling you it's not true, when all around you is telling you that it's foolish, that it can't be believed, that sure you can do whatever you want to, really? Come on. You put money in the plate.

They don't care what you do. To watch, to keep watch, to guard, to guard something so that it may remain safe to protect, protect, to keep, to preserve, safe, to guard, to observe. Are we keeping watch of the word of God that we've heard? I mean, we've had a steady stream of scripture, a diet of it. Those most of us in this building, there are a few extras here today probably for Christmas but for the most part, this ain't Christmas yet.

It's December 17, right? It most of us are home folks. Most of us have heard this message. Are we keeping it and watching it? Have we set up a hedge of protection to keep ourselves holy?

Do we have people around us that love us, that we know love us? That we're accountable to. Are we keeping the word of God that we have? Are we keeping ourselves from danger? Because of the word of God that's within us.

This guy's charge was that field. I just liked him. He kind of had a weird cold stare but he was taking care of what he was taking care of, you know? That was his charge. I'll go back to this for a minute.

Behold, an angel of the Lord stood before him and the glory of the Lord shown around them and they were greatly afraid and I think we can be greatly afraid carrying the message of God sometimes is scary. Receiving it sometimes is scary. The angel said, don't be afraid for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be to all people. Now, Jesus said, I'm going to build my church. The end of Matthew's gospel, he says, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth and so, I send you.

Go out to every tribe, tongue, and nation carrying this good news of great joy. In this world, you will have trouble, yes, but take heart. I've overcome the world and I will build my church. I'll be with you always even to the end of the age of the age. For there is born to you, he says, this day in the city of David, a savior who is Christ the Lord.

And this will be a sign to you. Now, what is a sign to you? It's not a manger. Here we go into the glory to God in the highest. I've shared this with you before but I think it's important.

I'm going share it with you again. Glory to God in the highest and on earth. Peace, goodwill toward men and that is true because it is toward men because God has sent this message. He sent it by the angels. He sent it by the shepherds.

He sent it through Mary. He sent it through Jesus. He sent it through Paul. He sent it through all these. It is toward men.

That's true. That's a good translation. There's one little textual variant and it's this much. It's a sigma and it changes the meaning from glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, goodwill toward men to this. Sorry, those are all taken off of that text.

All of the rest of the modern translations go off of that one. Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace to those on whom his favor rests. Now, this is a persistent question because one of them has to do with the sovereignty of God and the other has to do with the responsibility of man. Everybody who's sitting here today has heard peace, goodwill toward men. You've heard God's message from his word.

Will his favor rest on you? That depends on how you take the message. If you take the message and you take it and you act on it, it shows that you receive the message. Do you get that? You can reject the message.

That is a possibility. It makes people mad to hear it, but I think Mary could have rejected the message. I think if she couldn't have rejected the message, it wouldn't have been a choice on her part. It would have been meaningless. I think Jesus could have at any point in his human life have succumbed to temptation, but he wouldn't have been Jesus.

He wouldn't have been son of God had he done it. But he always had the very real possibility of slipping up. Do you get what I'm saying? There is responsibility. There's sovereignty God but there is responsibility too.

Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth, peace to those on whom his favor rest. Here it is in the ESB. Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased. Glory to God in highest heaven on peace and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased. Glory to God in the highest heaven and earth peace among men with whom he is pleased.

Why is he pleased? Because they received the message They got it. They accepted it They took it Can you reject it? Absolutely, you can. Is that pleasing to God?

No, it's not and it's to your peril Keep on going Glory to God in the highest heaven and peace on earth to people he favors He favors the humble who accept the message with humility. Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace among those whom he favors. Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among men in whom he is well pleased. I like that one too. Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace among men on whom his favor rest.

Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace among men in whom he is well pleased. Esteem to Elohim, this is great. This is the institute for scripture research. Esteem to Elohim in the highest and on earth, peace among men with whom he is pleased. Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth to peace on earth to people who enjoy his favor.

Now, there are a couple of possibilities that are not good possibilities. We've got some translations and this is an old one from 1867. Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, good pleasure in men. There's one more. The Douay Rheims Bible from 1582.

This is typically, this was the Catholic Bible of the time. Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace to men of goodwill. Are there any men of goodwill without God? No. Without Jesus, without receiving this message, that cannot happen.

That one doesn't work either. There are great people, don't get me wrong. On a relative scale, there are great people. But when you're looking at it as being standing before God Almighty, none of us deserves salvation. None of us deserves the Lord's favor.

Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace and goodwill toward men. That's what I've transmitted. But I pray that you will allow his favor to rest upon you and your response to the message is, do I do that? Do I do that? Jesus said, more blessed is the one who hears the word of God which you've heard today and keeps it protects it, guards it, holds on to it for the benefit and well-being of themselves and others What will your response be?

I pray that it's something like this. My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God, my savior for he is regarded the lowliest state of his servant for he who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is his name. That's it. Amen. Can I get the band back up here?

And I'll give you a chance to respond that way because you can either respond this way or you can respond this way. No, thanks. He's done great things. He's transmitted the message. Will you accept it?

I pray you will.

How about this? Let's stand up again. We'll a chance to sing it again. We introduced it earlier. But could I just the bridge, we kinda raced through it.

So can I just say it before we sing it? It says, his government, there will be no end. And he'll establish it with his righteousness. And he'll reign on David's throne and his name shall be from this day on wonderful counselor, everlasting father.

And worship. And worship. Do not be afraid. I'd sing out my soul my soul my soul magnifies the Lord my soul magnifies the Lord on one for one counselor. Everlasting father.

Everlasting father. Sing it again. Wonderful counselor. Wonderful counselor.

Amen. So, the struggle I mentioned at the very beginning Sometimes, it's a struggle in that study. Getting something to come through, to get getting something to come out and I thought this morning on the way in here, thought, I I had two parallel messages that were developing. Nick put the one that I had planned on preaching in the bulletin on Thursday. I had two of em coming along and one baby just wasn't ready to be born.

Okay? But next week, coinciding with our celebration of the birth of Christ, I'm going be birthing that one that I feel like is a lot of the New Testament things that that just hit the impact of why Christ came and we heard about the message of good news of great joy. I pray next week, it will be a very, very joyful, great news of good news of great joy type message and I want to leave you with this. John six twenty nine, Jesus answered, the work of God is this, to believe in the one he sent. Amen.