Joy to the World

Joy to the World. The Lord received the King. Let every heart prepare hymn room. And heaven and nature sing. And heaven and nature sing.

We know the words to that song, right? We sing it every Christmas, probably one of the most popular Christmas carols of all time. I don't know a church that doesn't sing Joy to the World at Christmas time. We certainly do. Every year we have it up and we have it going.

But what you may not know about Joy to the World is that it wasn't written as a Christmas song originally. In fact, it was written as a second coming of Christ song. A second coming of Christ song. The writer of the song, Isaac Watts, a very famous hymn writer back in the 1700s, he wrote over 750 hymns. Very prolific, very deep theological, but inspirational hymn writer.

And what's interesting about him, and some of you may laugh at this, because we think of Joy to the World as a classical piece, he was very progressive in his day with his music. In fact, he told his father one time that, I'm tired of the monotonous, boring songs of our church in this day, you know, where the Anglican church was singing. So he said, his dad's like, do something about it, okay? So he wrote some songs. And a lot of people are like, wait, this is overboard.

This is too joyous. This is too joyful. This is too happy. People are like enjoying this too much. Church can't be that way.

But he wrote this beautiful, beautiful song. And what you may not know about Isaac as well is that he suffered all of his life with health issues. He was a very short guy. He was five foot tall, a very short man. He also was born with some health issues.

And the last 30 years of his life, during the time in which he wrote this song, He was really suffering. He had to be taken care of just about every day and he lived with a family which he intended on living there for about a week and ended up living the rest of his life out which was 30 something years in that household tutoring the children of the household and being taken care of so that he could live and he could write and he could enjoy what he was doing. And my question would be, was there hope for the future with Isaac Watts? It probably seemed pretty terrible at times as he was dealing with excruciating pain from his health conditions and he even had to leave his parish early only after two years of being a pastor because his health conditions had failed so rapidly. But is there hope for the future?

And I think that as he was in that room pinning the song, Joy to the World, he was saying, yes, there is. Because our Lord is coming back. Joy to the world. The Lord is come. Let earth receive her King.

We are in a series called A Christmas Carol. And as the old Christmas Carol goes, past, present, and future, we've been dealing with all those different areas. We've had a theme going on. The first week we talked about getting past our past. We have a lot of past.

You can't even get anywhere until you get past your past. And then last week we talked about the present calamity. A very powerful message about how do we deal with bad things? How do we walk through dark places? This week, it tacks on to last week because as we're walking through present calamity, how do we have hope for the future?

What is the hope for the future? Because there's psychology behind positive thinking as far as it looks to the future. Let's just put it out there. If we have, if we believe that things are going to be well in our future, if we believe that things are going to work out one day, we tend to operate better in the present. But if we don't, if we don't see any hope, if we don't see any peace, if we don't see any joy in the future, we often suffer in the present.

The present calamity, even now, many of you are probably facing some very, very dark places in your life. My goodness, Miranda and I were talking yesterday just about how this Christmas has been really, really tough for us because we've lost people we love. We've lost people in the family. We've lost friends. We've seen children die.

We, we, and, and today we, we had someone else, Jackie, who, who, who sat here on the front row and, and, uh, you know, the, the family that sits up here in the front every, every Sunday that aren't here this Sunday, she passed away yesterday. She passed away. So we're dealing with a lot of death this year and a lot of people are going going through pain and, and, and, uh, and then there's other. What are the things going on? The world just seems different.

There's calamity, you know, going on around, economic issues. Is there ever going to be peace in the world? It seems like the world is lacking peace. Where are we? What's going on?

And it seems like things are shaping up in a certain way. And I want to deal with a doctrine that our church holds on to and the church universally holds on to. It's a very powerful doctrine. It's the second coming of Jesus Christ. So I'm going to give you a Christmas message about the second coming of Jesus Christ.

How does that sound? Because it looks like... So we're going to talk about that a little. And I hope in the future to do a whole message series on the second coming so we can dig a little deeper into that. But there are things that are shaping up to look like the end times are near.

We talk about the end times. I mean, look at the alliances that are taking place. Russia and China. And some people even say that are prophetically gifted or intellects would even compare... You know, we see in the scripture in Ezekiel with Gog and Magog as possibly Russia and China and some of those kingdoms there.

And we see that kind of pooling together. And we see things and we're like, OK, we see that there can possibly be this one world government. Some of you are freaked out because you're seeing chips in Walmart. You know, like, OK, this is getting weird, man. What's going on?

And there's probably a lot of fear going on. But here's the deal. We don't have to be afraid as believers. And people, when they start bringing these things to me, can you believe this has happened? Can you believe that's happened?

Not that we aren't to be concerned, but I am not worried because I have a God who holds the future. I can have hope for the future. When I go through times of hurt, when I go through times of darkness, I have hope for the future because I know everything will be OK one day. That even if I perish in this world, everything will be OK one day. So I can live in joy.

Joy to the world. The Lord is coming. And I hold on to that doctrine. Jesus is coming again. Jesus is coming again.

We can have joy knowing that Jesus is coming again. And it's not a horror story. Don't you just love how people make it out to be a horror story about, you know, dragons rising out of the sea and, you know, all these things. Oh, look at this happening. I don't know.

Are we going to get chips in our hands? Are we going to be robots? A.I. is taking place?

All these things. It's not a horror story. It's a love story. Jesus intended to give us hope, to show his love for us. And here's what he said, beginning with John 14, verse 1.

It says, do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not let your hearts be troubled. So that's good news today if you're a Christian. Don't let your hearts be troubled. There's good news because Jesus says this, you believe in God, believe also in me.

My Father's house has many rooms. And if it were not so, I would not tell, I would have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you. You may get that place for you. the day I saw a lot of money on the table. You know, the day I went to the table, and then I go back off the table.

Thank you. If I didn't, if I'm not going to prepare a place for you, I'm not going to tell you this, is basically what he's telling you. So don't be troubled. And if I go and prepare a place for you, here's what he says. I will come back.

I will come back. And not only will I come back, I'll take you to be with me. I want you to be with me, that you also may be where I am. You are with me. You're on the winning side, believers.

If you're a believer in Jesus, you are on the winning side. And that's something to celebrate. And he's coming back for us. It's a love story. I'm coming back for you, my precious children.

I want you to be with me. And Jesus came to this earth. He lived here for 33 years. The last three years of his life, he ministered. And then he was put on a cross.

He died for the sins of mankind. And then he was raised on the third day. He was raised on the third day, proving that he was God. That's what we talked about last week, proving that he was God. If we don't have hope of the resurrection, we have no hope of anything.

We don't have a promise that we can stand on if we don't believe in the resurrection of Christ. But right after his resurrection, he shows up. He shows up. He says, hey, I'm here. And for 40 more days, for 40 more days, he shares with people, many different people, in large groups, one-on-one, all over the place.

And here's what he said. Here's what he said. Here's some of the last words he shared on this earth. And in fact, you're all familiar with the Great Commission, number one. In Acts 8, he says, you know, go and make disciples.

Share the gospel. Tell them what's going on here, guys. Let's get out there. I'm getting ready to go away from here, but I want you all to go out. I want you all to extend the kingdom.

I want you to share the gospel. So let's get busy sharing the gospel, okay? Go out there. Tell them that I'm risen. Tell them that I'm alive.

Tell them that there's hope. Tell them there's hope for the future. You can have hope. So he's telling them these things. And then he goes into verse 9 and he says this.

After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. Now, can you imagine that? Jesus is there. He says, okay, guys, go and preach to the whole world. I'm gone.

Bye-bye. I'll be with you. The Holy Spirit will be with you. And he just flies up. So he goes up to heaven.

We call this the Great Ascension in Christian doctrine. He goes up to heaven and, you know, he just disappears in the clouds. His head, his arms are gone, his feet are gone. And they're just looking. They're like, what?

What was that? Really? Where's he gone? And it says they were looking intently up to the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them and said, Man of Galilee, he said, why are you standing here looking into the sky? Why are you just standing here, guys?

This same Jesus who has been taken from you into heaven will come back. The same way you have seen him leave and go into heaven. So that's our hope is that he is coming back. The same way he left, they saw it. He went up to heaven.

He's coming back the same way. And this world is staging itself. Everything in history is staging itself. Whether it's a thousand years or it's tomorrow, it's staging itself for the return of Jesus Christ. And there's something about this generation.

I know every generation we have people saying, Jesus is coming back this generation, Jesus is coming back this generation, Jesus is coming back this generation, Jesus is coming back this generation, and we watch it come and go, and we're still waiting. Now, we do not have the time or day, or know the time or day, and I'm not here to tell you that I figured it out, because we don't. And I'll show you in a minute in Scripture, we don't have the time or day figured out, but we do know the seasons. We can watch the seasons, and Jesus tells us about those seasons that we're going through. And what we see in this generation, we see revival taking place all around the world.

It might not feel like it right here where we sit in America that's going through some times, but we see it every way. In fact, the last 50 years have seen more people come to Jesus than the previous 1,972 years. 50 years, we've seen the gospel advance, and some of you are like, well, I don't see that happening. Here's the reason why. Because of the 193 sovereign nations in the world, 17 are not seeing an advancement of the gospel.

And guess where U.S. stands. We're not seeing an advancement of the gospel like the rest of the world. In fact, a handful of those are actually declining.

The gospel is declining. The church is declining in numbers. We're at a stagnate place right now. We're kind of sitting still, and we're a part of those 17 nations. But throughout the world, we are seeing revival take place in countries and places that...

And God is moving across this world, whether we see it or not, in our own nation. And we are a part of that. We are a part of extending the gospel to all the nations through missions and sending out missionaries and supporting missionaries. And that's why we give so that we can continue to usher in the return of Jesus. And there's 300 references to the return of Jesus in the New Testament.

Either the return of Jesus or the end times. 23 of 27 New Testament books talk about it because it's that important. Because Jesus, God wanted us to know about this. Jesus wanted us to know about this. And why?

Because we've got to be ready. It's going to be dangerous. We're going to go through some dangerous things. It's going to be tough. Let's just be honest.

It's going to be tough. Because moral decay will take place. It is taking place. It will take place. And it says even Christians will have a hard time, and most will fall away from their first love.

They talk about that. That love of most will grow cold. People will grow cold to the gospel. We're seeing that happen even today. That many who are strong in the faith are refuting their faith and walking away from the faith are growing cold or losing their first love.

But here's the deal. Jesus is... He isn't coming back for an institution. He's coming back for a relationship. He's coming back to this world for His bride.

We are His bride and we are to be encouraged. This is a message not only is it important, but it's to encourage and comfort us. This is a comforting scripture. This is a love letter, not a horror letter. It's a love letter that Jesus is coming back and we can have hope for the future.

In fact, Paul talks a lot about this in 1 Thessalonians. And I use this scripture a lot in funerals and I've shared this scripture actually a few times here recently. And I'll probably be doing it again here in the next week. And this scripture, the loved ones that had passed away, people were very sad, very sad, sad time. Some of you may be very, very sad.

Maybe this is a Christmas that you're thinking about a loved one that you lost. Maybe this is a Christmas far removed from a loved one that you lost and you've just never been able to enjoy Christmas because you lost that person. Maybe you were a child and you lost a parent or a grandparent and it just really shook your world. And you've never been able to enjoy Christmas. For many, they just can't sing the joy to the world Christmas carol because it's just hard.

Well, there were people that were dealing with this. This is nothing new. People were concerned. Their loved ones were dying. They were given their lives for the gospel.

What's going on here? And Paul begins to talk about the raising of the dead. He says we don't mourn like other people do. We don't mourn like the pagans do. We don't mourn like those who don't know our Savior.

And he says this in chapter 4, verse 15, According to the Lord's word, we tell you that we who are still alive... So if we're still alive, he's talking about the return of the Lord. He says the Lord's going to return, so have hope. And we who are left until the coming of the Lord will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. So you're concerned about those who have fallen asleep.

How are they going to be raised from the dead? I mean, if he's coming back and we're going to be, you know, caught up with him and all that, what does that mean? Like, are they just gone? Are they somewhere else? No, no.

The ones that fall asleep are going to be brought up too. For the Lord himself, and here's what it says, will come down from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead and Christ will rise first. Amen. They will rise again. So here's what we're seeing.

There's a rendering of the soul and spirit at death. Paul says to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Heaven is the presence of the Lord, being there with the Lord. So when we die in this life that the Lord should tarry his return, we will, our bodies will be left in the ground, and our souls and our spirits will be going to a temporary place in the presence of the Lord. But in the return of the Lord, and it even says in Scripture, our spirits long for our bodies.

Like when we're with the Lord, it's better to be with the Lord and we're in a great place, but we want our bodies back. Our spirits long to be in our bodies because it was God's original intention from the Garden of Eden for us to be spirit and body and be perfect and like Him. And we're waiting and our bodies grown, our spirits grown, and creation grown. And it says this, for the Lord Himself will come down from heaven with the cloud command with the car angel. And after that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.

So we'll be changed just like that. So if we're alive when the return of the Lord happens, we'll just be caught up in the air and we'll be changed just like that. Body, spirit, everything. People will rise from the ground and y'all be like, whoa, what's going on? This just seems crazy, doesn't it?

But it's powerful because it's the resurrection of Jesus in true form of the resurrection of the world. It started with the resurrection of Jesus. Now it's the resurrection of all things and we will be raised from the dead and we'll be caught up. And that's where we get the word rapture. Now, rapture is not in the Bible, that particular name.

It's a Latin word for snatching or catching up. But in the original Greek, we see this snatching up, this idea of people that are just snatched up at a whim. And together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And that's what it says. We will meet the Lord in the air.

And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore, encourage one another with these words. That's encouragement, guys. I don't feel like there's any encouragement here. Come on.

Be encouraged. We don't fear death. Do you realize we're alive in Christ in the moment? We are believers. We're raised alive.

And we don't have to be concerned about death because our Lord is returning and setting everything. We live eternally. So what do we do? We got to get the word out. Let the Bible begin.

I believe that God is stirring up a mighty revival across our world and across our land. And I want to be a part of it. And his main motivation is this. His main motivation isn't to scare us to death and, you know, flames all over the world. That's not his main motivation.

His main motivation is to come for his family. He wants his children because God's main motive is to get his children back to him. To what it was originally intended to be. Created in God's very image. We were created.

We have the spirit of the Lord in us. We were made like him. He wants us to be with him. We were made special. And he wants us to be with him.

We aren't some evolutionized monkeys from thousands of years ago, guys. We are created in the image of God. You are a child of God. You're not just an organism that came from the ground. You are a child of God.

Created with his own hands. He put in the ground and stirred up the mud and made us in his own image. And we are the only ones he breathed the very breath of life in. So God's breath is in us. And he's coming back for his children.

The ones he created. I did. What. We came from God and we will return to God and the first part of the Bible it talks about this harmony between man and God as he walked in the cool of the garden and God had this fellowship and that's what God intends to do he tends to bring us back that's the purpose of Christmas Jesus coming into the world so that we can have a relationship with him and be back to that relationship one day in fact Revelation 21 1 and 4 says it like this then I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and there was no longer any sea and I saw a holy city a new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband can you see that the beauty of that like he's coming out of heaven and it's not going to throw it's like he's not going to be done with this earth he's he's actually creating a new earth he's restoring an earth in fact I heard it like this we think of it oh he's just going to just do away with this earth but when it talks about a new heaven and new earth it's a restoration of all things just like our lives and our spirit restored all creation longs for the restoring of all things through Jesus Christ coming and it said this and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying look God's dwelling place is now among the people and he will dwell with them and here's what's been echoed throughout throughout the ages throughout the ages throughout the old testament all the way to now that they will be his people and God himself will be with them and be their God and he will what wipe away every tear from our eyes there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things has passed away the second coming is not a horror story it's a beautiful story that all the pain and all the sorrow and all the things that we've experienced in this life that's damaged us that's damaged us as we walk through this world will be restored God is still on the throne that's the message of revelation I'm still on the throne I'm still over all things this might happen but look who's still on the throne this might happen but look who's still on the throne it points right back to the throne of God that God is in control and he wants his family he wants his children he's going to come and take us home with him he's coming back for his children daddy's coming back for his children okay he doesn't leave and go away and stay away he leaves and comes back and gives them something much much much better than what they currently have so the question is are we living in the last days pastor do you believe we're living in the last days and I talked a little bit about that but here's here's my simple answer when people ask me if we're living in the last days yes we've been living in the last days since since God Jesus left this world 2,000 years is part of that but here's is part of that but here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here's here We're going to leave. We're closer than ever before.

Yes, of course, we're closer than we ever before. We are. We're closer than we've ever been before. Do I know the time, the date? No.

But I know the seasons. And when he left this world, he said, look for the seasons for when the Son of Man will return. So what do we do as we wait, whether it's a thousand years or tomorrow? He could come at this minute, guys. I could be preaching.

He could... Boom! We could be caught up. Just like that. And I'm ready.

But if he doesn't come back in my lifetime, do I have hope for the future? Do I hope that he will? Do I have hope for myself? What do I do in the meantime? Just some practical things.

The first thing I want to encourage you guys to do is to get right with God if you're not. You've got to get right with God. God. Here's what Thessalonians 5, 1 through 9 says. Now, brothers and sisters, about the times and dates, we do not need to write to you.

Why? For you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. So he's already been teaching them this stuff. They know about this. He said, I don't have to go over this again with you, okay?

Y'all know very well this thing, and I'm not going to insult your intelligence and speak about it again. And then he says this, while people are saying peace and safety, destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, they will not escape. So think about this. We don't know the day, but we know the season, like a pregnant woman. Anybody who's been pregnant here knows, you know the season because you feel the season, right?

You don't know the day. You've got an estimate of the day, but you don't know the day. But there is a season. I'm telling you there's a season. I feel it, you know, and it's going to happen.

That's what he's saying here. He says, but you brothers and sisters are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. You are not surprised. As believers, we're not surprised. That's my duty here today to tell you that it's going to happen.

You're not going to be surprised, so you can't blame it on me if he comes back and you're left here, okay? It's not my fault. I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. I'm trying to tell you, and I'm telling you here. And if you're here today and you don't believe it, I'm telling you, it doesn't matter.

He's coming back anyway, okay, whether you believe it or not. So we need to consider Jesus and look at this, you know, but you brothers and sisters are not in the darkness. Number five, but you are all children of light. You've been given information and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness.

So then let us not be like others who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober. There's a lot of people that are asleep right now. There's a lot of Christians that are asleep right now. They're involved in everything. It's going, I'm so busy.

I love these people. Oh, I'm so busy. I'm so busy with my life. Life, God, I'm so busy. You do it to everybody else, you might as well do it to God, because that's what you, you know, we do that, oh, I'm so busy, and they pride themselves on being busy, oh, I got this, and I got this, and I got this, and I got this, oh, please, give me, I just want to puke just thinking about it, you don't need, like, like, that's your excuse?

To the God of the universe, I'm just too busy for you, God, and he says, he says, but we're not, we're not, we're drunk is what we are, we're drunk with the world, some of you are literally drunk, but most of us are spiritually drunk, because we don't, our spirits aren't with God, they're with everything else, my most priority, my most important thing, my money, and my children, and this, and then maybe I'll put God over here, that's how we, this is what Paul's saying, stop being, just, like, walking around, you know, like drunk, and not seeing, and he's going to surprise you, he's going to come, we need to, we need to be sober, for those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night, some of you are in the night, but since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith, and love as our breastplate, let's be full of faith, let's be full of love, and that hope of salvation as a helmet, for God did not appoint us to suffer wrath, okay, he didn't appoint us to suffer wrath, he came to give us hope, right, suffer wrath, but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, and he died for us, so that whether we are awake, or sleep, we may live together with him, therefore, what do we do? Courage one another, and build each other up, just as, in fact, you are doing, so we should be building each other up, we should be excited about what God wants to do in our church, we should be excited about what God wants to do in our city, in our world, it may seem like everything's going south, but man, I'll tell you what, we can point north because of what God is doing, what we encourage each other, we know that God is aligning things up to make them work for his good, for our good, and his glory, and we know that, so what do we do? Revelation 19, 7, let us rejoice and be glad, and give him glory, for the wedding of the Lamb has come, and the bride has made herself ready, joy to the world, there's joy knowing that we have hope for the future, secondly, we need to rely on godly relationships, we need to get our heart right first, so if you walk away from God, come back to God, if you push God to the side, put God back in the front, now, and secondly, rely on godly relationships, if you're struggling with sin, stop blaming it on sin, blame it on yourself, okay, because you're not putting yourself in godly relationships, people who are godly, people who are righteous, help you heal, they help you get over strongholds, they pray for you, they encourage you, they keep you accountable, and we need those, here's what 1 Peter says, for above all, love... Love each other deeply because love covers a multitude of sins. That's what love does.

It covers a multitude of sins. Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling, right? We work together. We offer hospitality. We encourage each other.

We keep each other accountable. We love each other. And then Hebrews 10 says this, and this is really important. Let us consider how we may spur one another towards love and good deeds. We need to be spurring each other along, not giving up meeting together as some of you are in the habit of doing.

Boy, preachers love this one because it makes y'all think about why are you not coming to church? Why are you not doing this? Because life is busy, right? We got stuff to do and the things are there. But you can't be spurred.

You can't be encouraged. You can't be strengthened if you don't come to church, if you don't get into a group, if you don't get encouraged. If you are not coming to church, I feel for you. If you're not a part of a church family... I was talking to my cousin just the other day.

Hopefully, he's not watching this, but... Actually, he does watch this. He talks about it all the time. But he was like, I haven't found a church home. I said, you need a church home.

He said, well, I'll just watch you online because I like, you know... I was like, no, no, no, no. You need a church home. I can't do it for you. I can't be there for you.

I can't meet you there. I can't be in the house with you. You need a church home. You need... Even that day, they got in the habit of just going on.

Life is busy and all this, and they forget about relationships, right? They need to be together. The way you're going to have relationships is by being together. We have to be together. COVID told us we could be apart, and they were wrong because we're all miserable because of it.

And we're still trying to heal our heads because we were so separated for so long. And some of us still aren't here. I was talking to somebody the other day. I said, I can't... You know, most of my friends, my age and my generation aren't going to church right now because they figured they can watch it online and this and that.

But that's why mental health is way up and high on the scale now. Boy, it's 11.19. I need to get rolling. I'm sorry, guys.

But we need to encourage one another all the more until that day approaches. The day is approaching. And then finally, finally, get to work at advancing the gospel. You know the best way you can get through this life and receive joy? You've got to advance the gospel.

Every gift counts. Here's what 1 Peter says. He says, Peter's talking to the church. He says, each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms. If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God.

If you're a speaker, you should be speaking. You should speak as if the very word of God. If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength that God provides. You should be serving so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power forever.

Amen. That's a prayer to the saints. We cannot do it. We cannot drag along. We cannot stumble.

We cannot stumble. The body of Christ needs every organism, whether it's financially. I was talking about financially earlier. We are stumbling. We have a limp leg if we don't have the financial means.

If we don't have the volunteer means, if we don't have the service needs, we are stumbling. And the devil loves it. He wants to get us off track. He wants to chop off our arms. He wants to chop off our legs.

And some are in the habit of not meeting together and they're staring away from the church. And the devil's smiling and laughing because the kingdom of God is being thwarted. But guess what? God's in control. God's in charge.

And his future is coming. And we're going to advance the gospel. God's going to use me. And God's going to use you. And everybody here today, I'm just challenging you.

You make a commitment that we are going to advance the gospel every possible way. If we have to give our lives to the gospel, this is what Jesus wants. That's where true joy comes from. Matthew 24, 14. You want God to come back?

You want him to come back soon? He says the gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations and then the end will come. See, that's our joy. That's our hope. To advance the gospel.

There's joy in that. To live and love and worship with people and expand the kingdom of God in this earth. I love the story. I'm going to end with this. I love the story of the resurrection where they find the cloth and the linen in the tomb.

And there was a particular detail that I think we often miss. Jewish people understand this well. Messianic Jews understand it really well. But in John 27 it talks about his headdressing. They call it a napkin.

And I think that was purposeful in the King James Version. It says, And the napkin that was about his head not laying with the linen clothes but wrapped together in a place by itself. They purposefully talked about the linens and what was going on but particularly this napkin that was around Jesus' head. What does that represent? There's something symbolic there.

In Jewish custom if you were dining and you got up from the table and you were planning to return and you left Jesus left that grave the napkin folded because he's coming back. We can have hope. We can have joy. We can sing a Christmas carol joy to the world. We can sing that with all of our hearts this Christmas because we have a Savior that's coming back again and he's going to wipe away every tear take away every pain every sorrow erase it all and make us new and bring us new.

Father, we thank you for your message. We thank you for your word, God. As I was driving down the road today, Lord, I thought about all the people on my way to church this morning that may have partied a little too much last night. Drugs, alcohol, or maybe they didn't do anything and they woke up this morning and they're just lost, Lord. Don't know where to go.

Don't know what to do. They have no hope. No hope for the past. No hope for the present. No hope for the future.

But God, you've given us hope. I pray that you would touch hearts not only out there, Lord, right now, as people are in places and homes and trying to figure out life, Lord, that you would just begin to to stir them to the truth of who you are and that there is a purpose for their life. There is something more. And even in this place, if we have people today that do not know you or have turned away from you, walked away from you and want to recommit their life to you, Lord, we give that opportunity today. If there's anybody here today, if you would just say this under the sound of my voice, if you would pray this with me, Lord, forgive me of my sin.

I believe that you died on the cross for my sin. I believe that you rose from the dead and I believe that you are returning. Lord, I give my life to you. Come into my heart. Come into my life.

Change me from the inside out. Make me a new person. I believe in you and I give my life to you today. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen.