Christmas: Something Different and Same

Our Christmas Eve Service this year is called “Lessons and Carols”.  It is a simple worship service that focuses on the whole story of redemption from various readings from the Bible.  As each passage or lesson of Scripture is read by an elder, the congregation will respond with singing a carol.   The focus of the worship will be upon the Lord of glory who came into this world to redeem us, explained through the Word of God.  This year, the simplicity of worship, where we hear God’s word and reflect on its meaning and respond with singing is a change from the candle-light service.    From time to time, our traditions, even with the best of intentions, obscure the truth rather than display it.    We can go through the motions and still miss the meaning.   Our great desire here at First Presbyterian is to exalt the glory of Christ’s gospel.  From the architecture, to the prayers and the music, our worship is designed around the hearing of God’s Word.   This is the one thing that never changes with time and seasons: the Word of God which is also ever breaking forth in newness.    Over the years, my celebrations of Christmas have changed, from snow covered trees and rooftops on Christmas morning, and visiting grandparents in their Kansas’ farm homes.   Every year, in fact, something will change because life is never constant.   Sometimes we forget that the changes are all part of God’s design and purpose in our lives.   We are to remember that in the midst of our unpredictable lives, there is truth that remains the same.  This is the truth that God has loved us and sent His Son into our world to take upon himself our sin so that we might have all the riches of His grace and true joy in a great salvation.   

Gospel Struggles (sermon excerpt Dec. 16, 2012

Romans 7:15 (ESV) 

    I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 

My life does not measure up with my belief.   There is a gap between what I believe about my position as a new creation in Christ and the constant urgings of the old nature of sin.  

But, there is now an awareness of the new desires to please God and to obey.   This was not a part of the old nature.   Before Christ, one is content to follow the desires of the flesh.   There was no conflict of heart – no psychological tension – no cognitive dissonance.     But now, as Paul describes it, there is this struggle between desire and performance -  “I don’t understand my actions – my behavior. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” 

The life of living out the truth of the Gospel is one filled with tensions.   It is a struggle, not with the truth of the Gospel message or its reliability and trustworthiness, but with the inbetween stage of now and not yet.   We live in the world, but not of it.  The stench of death is still all around us, even though we have been restored to new life (If we are in Christ).  Just as Lazarus was walking out of the tomb by the power of Christ’s call, he had the smell of death in the grave clothes that bound him.    Christian living in the power of the Gospel does not translate us into angels.   We are as Luther described it, “Sinners at the same time Justified.”  Again, chapter 7 is not the description of an unbeliever – someone in an unregenerate state.   It is also not a description of a “carnal” or pre-Pentecost believer.

It is true that the Holy Spirit is only mentioned once in this chapter(vs. 6) -  law is mentioned over 30 times.  In ch. 8, the Spirit is mentioned 21 times. What he explains later in is not two types of believers, but the one believer who moment by moment, day by day must rely upon the Spirit, or he will return to the old ways of relying on the law.  Therefore, there are not two types of believers – a carnal believer and then one who is has the Spirit.    For one, this is no doubt someone who is regenerate.  All believers have the Holy Spirit.   “If you do not have the Spirit, you do not belong to him.” 

The struggle is the believer who is using the law to please God, even as a Christian.   It is the description of the in-between struggle of our heart that has been liberated and the flesh that remains bound in the old nature.   We have a new heart and new desires – but not the liberty or power to live holy in ourselves.  This is why chapter 8 becomes so crucial.  (first point of sermon)