Shadows in the water

Luke's description of Paul’s shipwreck in Acts 27 represents the most detailed, comprehensive account of sailing in all of ancient literature. The passage is studied, not just by Bible students, but by history buffs simply interested in the culture of the ancient world.

“Now, you know when God the Holy Spirit inspired Luke to write this, he didn’t write it so he'd have the most detailed ancient description of sailing," reasons Jordan. “If Paul had three previous shipwrecks that weren’t even recorded in the Book of Acts, and this one was, then this one has some doctrinal significance.

“With all the miracles and things that happened in Acts, something else could have been reported. So why did Luke choose to record what he did and not something else? Because what’s there is designed to illustrate the doctrine being taught.

“Acts 13 is an example of what I’m saying. When Paul leaves Antioch and first sets out with his ministry, he performs a miracle with Elymas, the Jewish sorcerer, and the Gentile man Sergius Paulus.

“Sergius Paulus wanted to hear God’s Word from Paul but Elymas withstood him. So, here’s a Gentile who wants to hear and an unbelieving Jew who tries to stop God’s Word from going to the Gentile. And Paul pronounced a curse on the sorcerer.

"As Luke details in Acts 13: 9-12, 'Then Saul, (who also is called Paul,) filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on him,
[10] And said, O full of all subtilty and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?
[11] And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee, and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season. And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness; and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand.
[12] Then the deputy, when he saw what was done, believed, being astonished at the doctrine of the Lord.'

“Sergius Paulus saw the event and therefore believed what Paul said, and in that doctrine he believed was illustrated exactly what happened to Elymas. It’s through the blinding of that unbelieving Jew that salvation went to that Gentile, which is what Paul’s ministry is all about—‘through their fall, salvation has come unto the Gentiles.’

The miracle of Paul blinding the Jew represents not only the first miracle in his ministry, but the whole thrust of his ministry. What’s fascinating is that this same scenario is true of both the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ and the ministry of Peter!

For Christ, His first miracle was turning water into wine at the wedding of Canaan of Galilee. Peter’s first miracle was healing the lame man at the gate.

*****

"When Jesus Christ says to His disciples and the little flock, ‘I want you to go out and teach all nations,’ they’re not going to go teach Israel; they’re going to go teach the Gentiles.

“You say, ‘Well, why wouldn’t they need to teach Israel? Wouldn’t they need to get saved too? What’s going on here?!’ Well, when you realize what Israel’s program is, it isn’t that hard to figure.

“Look at Hebrews 8: 7-11: ‘For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.
[8] For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:
[9] Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.
[10] For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:
[11] And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.’

“In other words, when He puts the new covenant into effect (after Christ’s Second Coming in the future kingdom program), the whole nation Israel is going to be converted. And when all Israel is saved, what’s redeemed Israel supposed to do? Well, now they’ve got a commission and that’s Matthew 28!

“It’s then that redeemed Israel will take their blessings and message out to the rest of the world. Once the message has gone over Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, the time is ready for them to go out, and Matthew 28 fits in that future kingdom! That’s the kingdom commission! That’s the commission where saved, regenerated Israel will take God’s Word out of Zion—out of Jerusalem—into the nations.

“As Isaiah 2:2-3 says, ‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.
[3] And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.’

“By the way, in Acts 2, Peter refers to the day of Pentecost as the ‘last days,’ meaning the ‘last days’ over there in that future kingdom program. Pentecost is not the first days of anything! It’s the last days of Israel’s prophetic program!

“Once they’ve been redeemed into their kingdom, they’re to go out and take God’s Word to the nations, like Isaiah 2’s talking about, baptizing in the name of the father, son and Holy Ghost. Now, why would you baptize Gentiles? Never say baptism is Jewish because there’s Gentile baptism in that passage.

“I know sometimes people say water baptism is part of the Jewish program, and that’s true, but there’s the Gentiles getting baptized. Why? Baptism is a part of the kingdom program. The kingdom belongs to Israel but it’s also going to extend out to the nations.

*****

“Luke doesn’t say a thing about baptism in Luke 24. He says, ‘For repentance and remission of sins.’ In Acts 3:19, he doesn’t say ‘repent and be baptized’; he says ‘repent and be converted,’ because they’re looking at the core issue of the spiritual status of the nation, and the outward expression of that was obedience to the Word.

“What was water baptism? You remember we looked at Ezekiel 36:25—boy, you've got to get this concept! The difference between the individual and the nation and how can you be a part of the redeemed nation . . . individually you have to have faith, and you expressed your identification with other Believers through baptism for the remission of sins, but water baptism was simply a ceremonial cleansing. Water never washed away sins. If the blood of bulls and goats can’t, neither can water.

“Well, what was it? It was a like figure unto Noah’s Ark. Peter said it’s a ‘like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ’? In Ezekiel 36:25, God said, ‘I will sprinkle you with clean water and cleanse you of all the filthiness of your idolatry.’

“Baptism was the way God set them apart and identified them as people who recognized Christ. They repented; they changed their mind. They realized, ‘He wasn’t a fake; He wasn’t an impostor. He’s the Messiah! We made a mistake when we crucified Him. We’ve broken the covenants.’ And they did exactly what Daniel did in Daniel 9. He says, ‘I confessed my sins and the sins of my people.’

“Those who rejected it, rejected it by refusing to be baptized because the heart of faith believes God’s Word and that’s why Christ says, ‘He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.’

“The heart had to believe, and without faith the work’s of no value. That’s why God could tell Israel repeatedly in the Old Testament, ‘I don’t want your sacrifices.’

“You say, ‘Well, He told them to bring ’em!’ He never commanded them to bring them, though. He always said, ‘If a man will bring them . . .’ In other words, you had to bring them in faith: ‘If you want to approach me, here’s how you do it, but you got to do it by faith. These sacrifices don’t do anything; it’s your faith bringing them that’s valuable.’

*****

“Jesus says in Matthew 5:17, ‘Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.’ Now, I know people erroneously—and I emphasize erroneously—take that passage and say it’s referring to the Cross. But that passage is not referring to the Crosswork because all of the law and all of the prophets are not fulfilled on the Cross! How do I know that? Two ways.

“First, there’s Matthew 16: 21: ‘From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.’

“If at this point, Jesus Christ BEGAN to tell about His death, had He told them about His death prior to this? Well, that’s not hard to figure.

“That means in chapter 5, He wasn’t talking about His death, right? If He was talking about His death there He couldn’t have begun to talk to them about it 11 chapters later! He would have already been talking about it! You see, there’s more to be fulfilled in the law and the prophets than just the accomplished Crosswork, okay?

“The Crosswork did fulfill things in the law and in the prophets but that doesn’t completely fulfill everything in them!

“The other way you know is by looking at what the Apostle Paul writes in Colossians, in the dispensation of grace after the transition period’s over with. Colossians 2:16-17 says, ‘Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.’ ”

We three 'Fear Nots' orient you

There are three times the expression “fear not” is used in connection with the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. First it's the angel who comforts Joseph in a dream with, “Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.”

Under Israel’s Old Testament economy, an “espousal” was more than being engaged; it was equal to being married. Mary was Joseph’s intended wife, it’s just that their commitment hadn’t been consummated yet, and the fact she was “found with child” was a crime punishable by stoning death by Israeli law.

“Now, you got to think about Joseph’s perspective in all of this,” says Jordan. “He’s usually rather ignored (in the nativity story), but he was quite somebody. Joseph’s got this young girl, he’s looking forward to marrying her, they’ve fallen in love; she’s won his heart and he’s won her hand. Everybody knows they’ve already gone through the formalities (the announcements and the invitations are out) but she comes up pregnant.

“Joseph’s in the dark about why. He doesn’t have ANY idea what’s happened. He doesn’t know HOW she got pregnant! I guess maybe he has an idea about how she can get pregnant, but he’s completely in the dark. He doesn’t know this is something God is going to do to fulfill Isaiah 14. He just gets the news she’s pregnant.

*****

Matthew 1:19 says, “Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a publick example, was minded to put her away privily.”

Jordan explains, “That verse is fascinating about Joseph. He’s in a tough situation. He wants to do what’s right. He’s not going to sweep this under the rug and act like it didn’t happen. He’s a just man.

“He wants to deal with it properly, but in Israel’s economy, if she’s found with a child, legally in the law they could stone her; give her the death penalty. At the very least it would be publicly shameful!

“It says Joseph wasn’t willing to make her a public example. The guy’s got a kind spirit; he’s got a loving heart and so it says ‘he was mindful to put her away privily.’ That word ‘minded’ there it’s not just ‘the thought occurred to him.’ It’s the idea that he sat down and gave some serious thought to what was going on and he thought it through and came to a selfless decision to just handle this quietly between her and him.

“I don’t know about you, but my mind kind of imagines things like that. I sit around sometimes thinking about these verses. You can just see Joseph wondering, ‘Why did something like this happen?!’

“He’s having to deal with the hurt of the betrayal and the disillusionment that would come from this kind of thing. You can just see him sitting there trying to figure out exactly how to get out of the mess that Mary’s gotten him into. You can see his heart all filled with turmoil. ‘How am I gonna fix this mess?! How are we ever going to get beyond this?!’

“There’s Joseph in this impossible situation. The things he’s thinking about are testing his mettle; his goodness. And in the midst of all that, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in his sleep.

“Suddenly God broke into Joseph’s predicament and the explanation He gave him was a doozie! If you think it’s unbelievable that an angel would show up, that kind of message from an angel even sounds stranger! Here’s something that’s never happened before!

“He’s told, “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins.’ It even gets stranger but then the angel gives Joseph something he can hang onto: ‘Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.’ (Matt. 1:23)

“You see what that angel really did for Joseph was he said, ‘Here’s a verse of Scripture that’s God’s fulfilling in YOUR life right now! You don’t need to be afraid! I know it’s outrageous! Here’s what God’s Word says, though.’

“The message was ‘fear not for God said.’ The message is you can hang your life on God’s Word and you’re never going to get rid of fear in your life except that way.”

*****

The other two times the angel-sent encouragement of “fear not” shows up in relationship to the birth of Christ is in Luke 1:13 (‘But the angel said unto him, Fear not, Zacharias: for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John) and in Luke 1:30 (‘And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God.’)

Jordan says, “Now, if you think Joseph was little upset, can you imagine how shocked Mary must have been when the angel Gabriel started talking to her!

“Luke 1:26 tells us, ‘And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth.’ That’s six months after John the Baptist had been conceived. In the 6^th month in the pregnancy of Elisabeth, John the Baptist’s mother, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to the city of Galilee named Nazareth.

“By the way, Luke was a medical doctor, so the specificity of terminology here is not being used casually. It’s being used very specific with precise meanings. Luke starts out his book saying, ‘I’m a good historian.’

“In the first four verses, the little preface to his book, if you wanted to capsulate in one sentence, Luke was saying, ‘I was a good first-hand researcher and historian; I went and talked to the eyewitnesses; the people who were there.’

“There’s this little thing he writes in Chapter 2 that I’ve always been touched by. Luke says, ‘But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.’

“I think, here’s a little mother that when Luke met her, recounts the nativity and the birth of the child, and there’s certain things that she never told anybody else. She just kept them hid and thought about them and pondered them in her heart.

“I don’t know about you but I think, ‘How’d Luke get her to tell him that! He must have had a wonderful bedside manner.’ Because when you read his book, you can tell he’s talked to these people and he’s picked up all these little details.

“In fact, you ever heard anybody say you can’t know the date of the birth of Christ? If you just read Luke 1, you can literally figure out within a three to five-day time period the date of the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ! It’s not December, by the way, but there is something that took place in late December in this chapter.

“The real miracle of Christmas was not the nativity; it was the conception. By the way, if you look at the first verse in Chapter 2, it says, ‘And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.’

“Those kinds of references are often located in the Book of Luke. They are historically verifiable data that you can go into secular history and find.

“Sometimes people give you the idea that the Bible is just a willy-nilly book concocted by a bunch of guys who along the way somewhere just wrote books and made all this stuff up.

“Well, you certainly can’t believe that when you read the Book of Luke! You see this is put together by men who thought carefully who researched thoroughly and who documented what they were saying in such a way that you could go behind them and check the footnotes.

“Luke 1:27-30 is a great illustration of Luke’s penetrating thinking and looking. Can I recommend to you, when you read the book, read it slowly and let those kinds of things into your mind.

“Here’s something Mary shared with Luke about what was going on in her mind. I have a hard time putting myself in her situation. The questions that must have been in this little girl’s mind at the time!

“She’s told, ‘Hey Mary, you’re going to be the mother of the Messiah!’ Whoa! I mean, what a privilege, but what a shock! Mary asked the logical question: ‘How shall this be, seeing as how I know not a man?’

“In the presence of something that’s obviously going to be supernatural that can’t be understood in human terms, you can just imagine . . .  but verse 37 is the answer: ‘For with God nothing shall be impossible.’

“Mary’s fear turned to faith in what God’s Word said. So Mary, like Joseph, trusted God’s Word. When it says she found ‘favor with God,’ that’s undeserved favor. That’s a definition of grace: ‘Mary you’ve got nothing to be afraid of; you are perfectly loved.’

“Come down to Luke 2 and you’ll see this time he says it to the shepherds. It’s one of those fascinating chapters in scripture. The first seven verses explain how God was going to fill Micah 5:2.

“Seven hundred years before the birth of Jesus Christ, God through a little prophet . . . Micah and Isaiah were contemporaries. Isaiah wrote 66 chapters; he’s a big dude. Micah got to write seven and significant portions of the Book of Micah are repeats or echoes of the Book of Isaiah.

“Somebody reads Micah and says, ‘He hardly had an original thought. He’s just working with Isaiah.’ But God takes that ‘little insignificant prophet,’ as it were, and reached into his ‘little book,’ and in Micah 5:2 writes down 700 years before the event the town in which the Messiah is going to be born in: Bethlehem Ephratah.

“There were two Bethlehems in Israel at that time. One was in the tribe of Zebulun. One’s down in the tribe of Judah. So Bethlehem Ephratah, that’s Bethlehem in Judah. That’s the one were talking about.

“That little town in Judah is so insignificant that if you go back to the Book of Joshua, when they polled the tribes of Israel to get soldiers to man the armies of Israel, Bethlehem and Zebulun are mentioned and the one in Judah isn’t.

“But God says that’s where my Messiah is gonna be born! Where did you read back in Luke 1:26 that Mary lived? She didn’t live in Bethlehem. She lived in Nazareth up in Galilee over a 100 miles north.

“The week before Jesus was born, you know where Mary was? She was at home in Nazareth. Now, you people that have had babies, you can understand in that verse when it says she was ‘great with child.’ That last week before the baby’s born, it’s just get around the best you can.

“Her husband, he don’t even know it yet, but he’s got to get her from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Can you imagine she says, ‘How we gonna get there?! Donkey Express?!’

“You think about it, if you’re down to the last week of your pregnancy and your husband is putting you on a donkey and walking you a hundred miles . . .

“What God does is He uses a pagan emperor who had no thought of what was going on . . .  if Caesar Augustus had known what was going to happen as a result of what he did, he’d have never done it! The last thing he would have wanted is to work out the birth of Israel’s Messiah! But it turns out to be Caesar Augustus’ fault that they have to move from Nazareth down to Bethlehem!

“The message is the God of history works through history. You see, God can take care of His Word; you don’t have to worry about it. The God of history isn’t just going to come to reside in humanity; He works out the circumstances so, at exactly the right moment, that young couple is moved from Nazareth to Bethlehem where He had said 700 years before He was going to be born.”

Loaded with lots of toys and goodies

"Point is, there's not a single fictional character whose reputation is greater or spread more widely. Quite simply, Santa Claus is a legendary figure, and I couldn't imagine a better role model for all the kids around the world"--Top Ten Most Influential Fictional Characters In History

Psalm 68:4, about the Second Coming, says, [4] Sing unto God, sing praises to his name: extol him that rideth upon the heavens by his name JAH, and rejoice before him.

Verses 17-18: [17] The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels: the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place.

[18] Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive: thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the LORD God might dwell among them.

*****

As we know, Satan is the great imitator of the Lord Jesus Christ. His whole M.O. and methodology is to counterfeit what God's doing, trying to look like and take the place of Jesus Christ.

So take a look at this sermon outtake of Pastor Richard Jordan (Shorewood Bible Church, Rolling Meadows, Ill.):

"Someone asked me this morning, 'Where's Santy Claus in the Bible?' Well, look at Zechariah 2:6. It reads, 'Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north, saith the Lord: for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the heaven, saith the Lord.'

"This is God calling Israel back to Jerusalem (for Jesus Christ's return to set up His kingdom), and when He does, He says, 'Ho, ho.'

"He's not Jolly Old St. Nick, He's 'Jolly Jehovah'! He's excited about regathering Israel and putting them back into their land.

"Isn’t that interesting—that excitement of the Lord? Most people think about God, "He's this gray-haired old man up in heaven looking around trying to find someone who doesn't believe to tell him, 'I've got a Coke bottle here; I'm gonna fix you with it.' 

"How many times have you talked to someone about salvation, and life, and peace, and forgiveness, and liberty, and happiness, and purpose and meaning in their life, and they say, 'Well, you're just trying to take something away from me'?

"I talked to a guy not long ago in the airport in Detroit who pulled a pack of cigarettes out and said, 'If I get saved, can I still smoke these?'

"Imagine, the guy's going to let that pack of cigarettes take him to hell. The answer is, 'Sure you can still smoke 'em.' You may smell like you've been to hell, but you're not going to be sent to hell.

*****

"So people get this idea of God being an ogre, but the Bible talks about God being the happy God—the God, who when He sees His purposes being accomplished, says, 'Ho, ho!' And you just thought that was Santy Claus. But you know people mistake Santy Claus for God anyway. Sure they do.

"If you take the name Santa, and make an anagram out of it (an anagram is where you confuse the letters to hide a word), just moving one letter, isn't it interesting?

"What about Claus? Who has claws? Doesn't a cat have claws? Didn't you ever read that verse that talks about Satan going around as a 'roaring lion seeking whom he may devour'?

"I'm just playing with you now. You can do this stuff on down through. But isn't it interesting, the Great Counterfeit of Jesus Christ, and what's he doing? He's 'ho, ho, hoing' from the land of the north, when that's really God doing that. That's the thing that strikes me.

*****

"In Revelation 1:14, talking about the Lord Jesus Christ, it says, 'His head and his hairs were white like wool.' So what kind of hair does this guy have?

"Verse 15 says, 'And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace.' So when this guy comes to your house, what does he come down? The chimney. Did you ever look up the word 'chimney' in the dictionary? It means 'a furnace of fire.'

"Come with me to Isaiah 63:2. This is talking about the Lord Jesus Christ coming. It says, 'Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel.' What color clothes does he wear?

"You got a guy in red clothes with white hair, shouting 'Ho, ho, ho' when he's coming, and who is he?

*****

"Look at what Deuteronomy 33:26 says about the Lord Jesus Christ when He comes back to establish His kingdom.

"And, by the way, if you notice verse 24, it says, 'And of Asher he said, Let Asher be blessed with children; let him be acceptable to his brethren.' Asher is the name of the boy Leah had back in Genesis when she said, 'Happy am I, for the daughters will call me blessed.' Asher means 'happy.'

"So when the happy God comes to accomplish His purpose, verse 26 says, 'There is none like the God of Jeshurun, who rideth upon the heaven in thy help, and in his excellency on the sky.'

"You know how He comes back? He's riding in the sky. So we've got a guy with white hair and a red suit, riding in the sky, going, 'Ho, ho, ho,' from the land of the north. And when I describe him to you, who do you think of?

"In Matthew 7:7, when Jesus Christ's speaking to the 'little flock' in Israel, talking about when He comes to say 'Ho, ho, ho' to the nation Israel—when He comes with that white hair and red garment, riding in the heavens to establish His kingdom—He says to that kingdom group of saints, 'Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.'

"You take your kids down to the mall and what do you tell them  to tell this other guy in a red suit and white hair? You say, 'Tell him what you want.' Because whatever you want, he'll give it to you.

"In Genesis 18, the question's asked, 'Is anything impossible with God?' Whatever you want, this dude will get you.

"In Matthew 28, Jesus said, 'All power in heaven and earth is given to me.' This other guy over here, we say, 'Well, he knows everything. He knows when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake, he knows when you're bad, he knows when you're good. He's making a list and checking it twice.'

"Revelation 20:12 says men are going to stand before God and the books are going to be opened, and they're going to be judged out of the things written in the books. God's got a list.

"Gets kind of spooky, doesn't it? Think somebody's trying to counterfeit something along the way here?

*****

"Psalm 102 talks about God being 'throughout all generations.' Everybody in this room, every generation in here, has had that same exact guy in the white hair and red suit, etc. 'ho, ho, hoing' every Christmas.

"Titus 2:13 says, 'Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.' You know what believers ought to be? You ought to be as excited about the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ as you tried to talk your kids into being last night about Santy Claus coming.

"That's how excited you ought to be. By the way, in John 10:42, it says about Christ 'many believed on him.' I took my kids to the mall when they were small and a lady walked up to my son and said, 'Oh, sonny, do you believe in Santa Claus?' What you have to do with kids, you have to tell them to believe in Santa Claus.

"People say, 'It's just a fantasy; it's just a joke. It's just fun.' I used to tell my kids if you want Santa Claus to bring it to you, let him bring it, but there's no big fat guy in a red suit with a white beard gonna get credit for money I spent.

"The most important time in the life of a person to reach them with the gospel is when they're children. It's the most fertile time, but it's also the most important time. Because why would you want to wait until you're an adult?

"Why would you want your kid to have to lose an arm first, as it were, before they came to Christ and learned to have His life live in them?

"Little kids are impressionable. I've heard testimony after testimony from people who say, 'When I grew up, the stuff I was learning about God, and Jesus, and all of that, it was just like all this 'Santa stuff.' The stuff I learned about Satan was just that kind of stuff too, and when I gave up believing in Santa Claus, I gave up believing in Him (God and Jesus Christ). It was all the same fantasy.

"When we talk about the incarnation of Christ, and the Cross work, and the resurrection, we're talking about historic realities—things that happened in history that prove God's love is not a hoax and it's not a fantasy.

"You know, the thing about Santa Claus, and all the merriment associated with it, it just isn't true. Nobody can even tell you where it came from. They argue about it. They don't know where it came from.

"About 70-80 years ago in America, some merchants hit upon the idea we can make more money. Dress the dude up and have the kids come. A lot of it's commercial driven.

"Your faith, the Christian faith—being complete in Christ—doesn't rest on a pathetic echo from the bygone past. It rests upon historic realities that are as real in history as you sitting in this room this morning.

"Remember the 'Ho, ho, ho' is God Himself rejoicing in what He's doing in His Son, not some bearded clown dunce trying to get your money or your soul."

Most wonderful, er, lonely time of the year?

"Baby boomers are aging alone more than any generation in U.S. history, and the resulting loneliness is a looming public health threat," read a front-page story in the Wall Street Journal earlier this week. "About one in 11 Americans age 50 and older lacks a spouse, partner or living child, census figures and other research show. That amounts to about eight million people in the U.S. without close kin, the main source of companionship in old age, and their share of the population is projected to grow.

"Policy makers are concerned this will strain the federal budget and undermine baby boomers’ health. Researchers have found that loneliness takes a physical toll, and is as closely linked to early mortality as smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day or consuming more than six alcoholic drinks a day. Loneliness is even worse for longevity than being obese or physically inactive . . .

"The University of Chicago’s General Social Survey, which has tracked American attitudes since 1972, asked respondents four years ago how often they lacked companionship, felt left out and felt isolated from others. Baby boomers said they experienced these feelings with greater frequency than any other generation, including the older 'silent generation' . . . 

“  'I don’t like being by myself,' Ms. Paula Lettice says. 'I wish I were dating. I wish I had somebody significant.' She recently gave up two tickets to a beer-tasting fundraiser when she couldn’t find a date . . . 

"In a review of 148 independent studies on loneliness, covering more than 300,000 participants, Julianne Holt-Lunstad of Brigham Young University and colleagues found that greater social connection was associated with a 50% lower risk of early death . . .

"Research suggests that those who are isolated are at an increased risk of depression, cognitive decline and dementia, and that social relationships influence their blood pressure and immune functioning, as well as whether people take their medications."

*****
J.C. O’Hair once wrote in a poem:

If we’re on the way to glory,

Joy should fill our soul;

‘Tis done by the Holy Spirit when

The Spirit has control.

There are burdens, trials, sorrows,

But God’s abounding grace,

He says, is all sufficient for

Every single case

In an old sermon, Jordan said, “I’ve been telling you for four decades, I don’t care how high you get in your understanding of truth and about what God’s going to do and how exciting it’s all going to be, the first step in ‘getting out of the closet’ is just believing in God’s love for you.

“The Book of Ephesians is full of this stuff. Ephesians 1:6: ‘To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.’

“You go out in the world today and there’s a cry to be accepted, to belong, to have a connection. People spend time, money, energy, resources to gain acceptance.

"You see young people giving their lives away—drugs, sex, etc.—because they want to be accepted; they want to be loved and valued and they’ll give away their future for the fulfillment of that.

"And you know what it is—it’s an illusion because it only lasts until, ‘What have you done for me lately?’ shows up.

*****

“There’s an acceptance that never goes away when God Himself accepts you; when He meets that need, that yearn, that drive, that thirst deep down in your heart and He accepts you.

"If no one else ever did, so what?! Who’s going to last the longest? Them or Him?! Whose opinion is going to be the one that really counts in the long run?

“I know how it is—you look at yourself and you say, ‘Who could accept me?!’ You know where God the Father finds you today if you’re saved? He doesn’t find you in a performance system where you’re living up to standards and pleasing Him because of it.

“He finds you in the one place in all the universe that He’s absolutely, sublimely pleased and that’s His Son. Whew! You can relax. All that tension, all that stuff the world, the flesh and the devil throws at you.

"You can say, ‘You know what, I’m enveloped in some ever-lasting arms of love, not because of what I do, but because I’m in Christ.’

“Satan knows that no temptation’s going to succeed in your life when you remember who you are; that you’re God’s beloved.

*****

“You remember what the name ‘David’ means? Beloved. It took a David to defeat a Goliath. It took David to destroy the giant. Listen, it takes someone who KNOWS that he’s God’s beloved to win the fights in life!

“When you understand that you’re God’s beloved, what that does is it makes you a victor no matter what the Adversary . . . no matter what the world, the system, the culture, the satanic drive and flow behind that culture; no matter how your old sin nature attacks, the answer and the victory is in being God’s beloved.

"One of the things the Holy Spirit prays through Paul who prays for you and me is Ephesians 3:18-19: 'That you may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
[19] And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.’

“Notice that word ‘comprehend.’ God desires that you be able to get your mind around something and understand it.

“Colossians 1:27 says, ‘To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.’

“That’s what God wants you to know. What do you think the Adversary would want to hide from you?

"The devil doesn’t care if you pack a Bible and study it--just don’t comprehend out of that Bible what is the breadth, and the length, and the depth, and the height, and to KNOW the love of Christ, which passeth all knowledge.

“Why does He want me to know? ‘That you may be filled with all the fullness of God.’ You see, the goal is to get to know something that will result in God Himself controlling your life. Even the mundane things of life, every area of your life.

“Then you move into the places where there are real challenges and struggles. The injustices of life, the harshness of life, the things that happen just because you were a bonehead, and yet He says that in all of it, 'We’re more than conquerors through Him that LOVED us.' "