Small steps in faith

Saturday, December 13, 2008

"The Killer Spirit of Christmas"

These are my notes from Rob's sermon tonight.

We sang some jazzed up Christmas songs but my favorite is when we sang "It is Well With My Soul"..put goosebumps on my arms. We saw our friends Chad and Jeff and they gave us the good idea of chicken wings for supper so we went to BW's and watched the Heisman show and ate wings. We went to Town and Country in Kettering which is my old stomping grounds from high school. We used to take our kids there to Books and Co. They have good memories of going there and Cheryl and Co. for cookies :)

Notes from Sermon
Matthew 2:1-18

Herod..if you looked at him from only the view of architecture he was a phenomenon.
The Hebrews saw him as someone who rebuilt and expanded the temple. Part of it remains today..."The Wailing Wall"

Wisemen come to Jerusalem after 400 years of silence to Herod to let him know that the Christ child is coming according to their study of astrology.

Herod was troubled by the birth of Jesus because:
1. 2 Kings cannot exist in a monarchy. Relevance for today..the throne is the seat of your heart. There is only room for 1 king..Christ or you.

2. Herod used people in order to accentuate his power. If we become "king" of our own life, we tend to use people to boost ourselves. We make them jump through hoops to be our friends...certain personality,certain looks,certain financial status,etc...

3. Herod eliminated people in order to stay in power. We eliminate people, prayer,word of God, spiritual disciplines.

Herod makes us uncomfortable because we see a degree of ourselves in him

When our pursuit of greatness is toward the wrong greatness, there is a cost.
Herod's cost..separation from Christ for eternity.
"Wrong greatness" leads to consumerism,poverty,etc.

All of Jerusalem is troubled because Christ was a threat to their comfort as well..there is change with a new king. Jesus came at a low time of spiritualism.

There is another approach to greatness. It's not about what you accomplish

The Way of the Wiseman
1. Seek Him.
2. Enjoy Him
3. Worship Him
4. Give to Him
5. Obey Him

Even in the original Chrismas Story there is darkness..but Jesus comes and brings light. Darkness never has to be the final chapter in your life.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home