Welcome to the Willow Ridge Sermons Podcast, where you can listen to audio from our most
recent sermons and more. Thanks for listening, and be sure to add this show to your library
if you'd like to automatically receive new episodes each week.
So now we're going to move into, honestly, the part of this service that I look forward to the most.
And so what I'd like to ask is if all of our kids, fifth grade and under, if you could make
your way down here and come in and hang out with me. Now, if you're a little nervous about coming,
don't be nervous about coming, because if you come down here, we got a little gift for you
at the end of this. And so you want to make sure that you can come and hang out with us. And parents
and grandparents, we're about to have a blast together. As I'm going to get to talk to your
kids about some stuff, and we can't wait to hear what their answers are. And we may use the
microphone for some of them. Well, hey, guys. Oh, y'all got to be better than that, all right?
Good evening. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. Hey, so how many of you really love Christmas?
Show me your hands. Show me your hands. Awesome. I'm going to ask you guys some questions about Christmas.
Is that okay? Not like trick questions, not hard questions, but questions about you with Christmas,
all right? So here's, what is your, one of your favorite things about Christmas?
Presents. That's a good, honest answer. That's one of my favorite things about Christmas too.
decorating the tree. Decorating the tree. Decorating the tree. Decorating the tree. Presence.
Spending time with your family. Best answer? Yeah. I know you see here all. Yeah?
Spending time with family and friends. Eating.
Tim Schultz. Tim Schultz's grandson, folks. What's that? Worshiping Jesus. Yeah, absolutely. What else?
What else? Do any of you have any like traditions, things that you like to do? Like maybe a certain
day that you bake cookies or do something like that?
Party all night.
The Bradbury party will be ending at about 8.30 so that we can wake up at 4 a.m. Right, Howard family?
Nice. Yeah. What else?
Wake up your parents super early.
Wake up your parents super early. Yeah. I mean, I think the best way to celebrate Christmas,
the best way is to wake up everybody as early as possible. All right? And then while they're like
preparing lunch, you get a nap. Right? And then we're good. What you got over here?
Do the golf cart ride? Yeah, that sounds like fun. And this is the perfect weather for it, right?
Because it's not too cold outside, right? Like we can all do that. Hmm? It's hot outside. It is.
It's like Christmas in July, right? Well, you know what my favorite thing? One of my favorite
things about Christmas? One of my favorite things about Christmas is tonight. I love being here with
you guys. I love coming and kind of having before we get into all of the presents and all of the
things. And Santa comes tonight. That's right. That's right. Yeah. And before all of that happens,
one of my favorite traditions that we started years ago, I want y'all, y'all look over and you see that
group of people over there that got all the white hair? That's my family, right? That's my family.
And so you see with the red vest there, that's my father-in-law, right? Mark, wait, there we go.
I'm going to talk about him later in the message, right? I'm going to talk about him a little bit.
You see right there, that's my mother-in-law. I call her Weezy. Her name's Kathy, but our kids
call her Nanny, right? And then you see behind her, Susan, give away, there you go. That's my aunt Susan,
right? We call her Susu, Susan. We just call her lots of things, right? And then right beside her,
that's my mom, right? Every gray hair in her head is because of my sister, right? Not because of me,
right? And do you see that guy beside her right there? Right there? That's my dad. That's my dad.
And God broke the mold after he made that man, right? Just a blessing that he is. But they get
to come over to my house after this is done, and we eat, and we eat a lot. And it's one of my favorite
aspects about Christmas is to get there with my kids, and my wife, and my family, and just sit down
and enjoy a meal together. What's some of your foods, favorite foods to eat around Christmas?
Oh, you've got to think about it. Come on. What do we got? What's that? Okay, crabs? Ham? Tim Schultz? Again, what you got? Food. All of it. All of it. Cinnamon rolls. Ooh. What's your favorite thing to eat? Cinnamon rolls? Pretty cool. Pretty cool. Well, I want to read you guys. Oh, I'm sorry. Gingerbread. Yes. Absolutely.
Well, as we talk about the favorite things about Christmas, I want to read to you guys and read to everyone. We're going to read the birth of Jesus as told by Luke in Luke chapter 2. And here's what I want you to listen for. As we read the story, I want you to listen for someone's favorite thing we find out in Luke chapter 2. All right? So y'all listen up to me, and let's read the story of the birth of Jesus. It says,
It's in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Canerius was governor of Syria, and all went to be registered, each to his own town.
And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and the lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.
And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth.
And she gave birth to her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.
And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear.
And the angel said to them, Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
And this will be a sign for you.
And you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes, and lying in a manger.
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly hosts, praising God and saying,
Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased.
And when the angels went away from there, from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another,
Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.
And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lion in a manger.
And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child.
And all who heard it wondered what the shepherds told them.
And then here's the part.
Listen for this, okay?
But Mary, but Mary treasured all these things, all of them, pondering them in her heart.
And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had seen and heard as it had been told to them.
Here's what's remarkable to me about this story.
Here's what's amazing to me about what we read.
Is that we find out what Mary's favorite was.
It wasn't just the food.
It wasn't just the friends.
It wasn't just the family.
But it was all of it.
Every single piece of it.
And do you know why all of it was her favorite?
Because it's centered around Jesus.
So my prayer for you guys, and my prayer for us, is that in all that we do, from ham, to cinnamon rolls, to presents, to friends, to family,
that it would all be centered around Jesus.
Will you guys pray with me?
God, I thank you so much for tonight.
I thank you for the truth of your word and the Christmas story.
That while it talks about Mary and Joseph and angels and shepherds, wise men, governors,
or that the story is centered around Jesus.
And God, I pray that the truth of who he is and what he's done for us,
will be the center and the focus of our life.
God, I thank you for these kids.
God, I thank you for the excitement that they'll have tonight and in tomorrow.
And God, I pray that as they unwrap pretty packages, as they get gifts and presents, God, that they'll remember the presence of Christ.
And it's in Jesus that we pray.
Amen.
All right, kids, y'all come here real quick.
Come here tight.
Because I'm going to tell y'all a secret.
I'm going to tell y'all a secret.
Okay?
You got to get closer.
It's okay.
Trust me.
After about five minutes, most of them aren't paying attention to me anyways.
All right?
So they're not going to hear at all what I'm about to tell you guys.
All right?
So when you leave and you go back, we got some candy for you.
All right?
And this is special Christmas candy.
All right?
So special Christmas candy means that you got to eat all the candy on Christmas.
Okay?
And so you're going to eat chocolate and sugar.
Right?
So y'all going to do that with me?
Are y'all good?
All right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
100%.
All right.
So thank you guys.
Why don't y'all go by, get your candy, and then go find.
Any way you go, you'll see one of these people with the white bags, and they got your candy.
Sorry, parents.
I mean, is that one of those you should only say you're sorry if you're truly sorry, right?
That's not real.
Oh, Becca just told me that that apology is not real.
Man, I love you sharing your kids with us, and just the blessing and the joy that they are,
not just here on Christmas Eve, but every Sunday at our church.
And I love their answers, and I love their honesty, right?
Like, if you're here for Christmas, like, you enjoy getting presents.
We do.
I enjoy getting presents.
You enjoy getting presents.
We enjoy the food.
We enjoy the candy.
We enjoy the fun.
We enjoy all of the things that it is.
And if we're being honest, it is really hard at Christmastime to keep the focus on Jesus.
It's hard.
There's so many things around this time.
There's the parties.
There's the schedules.
There's the get-togethers.
There's the meals.
There's so many things competing for our heart, for our attention, for our time during this time of year.
But it's not just this time of year, is it, that it becomes hard to keep our focus on Jesus.
And so what I want us to do tonight is to make Jesus our focus, not just for this evening,
but in all of who he is, that Christ will be our focus, our meaning, our purpose, our passion, our pursuit,
because he's worthy of it all.
I'll just read one verse to you here in a moment.
We're going to read out of Matthew chapter 1.
But Matthew's gospel tells the telling of the birth of Christ through a little bit different narrative
and a little different way than what we see in Luke.
And instead, Matthew's gospel starts with something a little strange.
It starts with the genealogy.
It starts out with some different people that we're going to find out about Jesus and his family
and some of the characteristics about his family.
We'll give you a little sneak peek, a little insight into our family and what we like to talk about
and what we like to laugh at and have fun with.
My father-in-law has the ability to tell some really good stories, especially family stories.
How many of you have ever heard of, I'm born, raised my entire life except for six years in South Carolina.
And I did not know that there was a town in South Carolina known as Waterloo.
Have you ever heard of Waterloo, South Carolina?
A handful, a handful.
It's on Lake Greenwood.
It's where my father-in-law is from.
And one of the things that my father-in-law likes to do even better,
one of the things that my kids like to do is to come and ask him about stories of people from his family.
And he'll tell stories of what it was like to grow up in Waterloo, South Carolina.
And he'll tell stories of people who've got nicknames that make us laugh and stories that make us laugh.
And it's fascinating to see the back story of where my father-in-law comes from and the family that he comes from
and to hear all of the stories that are there.
And we get to hear those.
What we learn about Jesus through reading through his genealogy,
we usually see the town that we focus on and the places that he's come from.
But when we look through the genealogy of Jesus, as told by Matthew,
we learn some very interesting things about Jesus.
We learn that there are people in Jesus' family who were born in miraculous ways.
We learn that there are some people in Jesus' lineage and his family that did bold things for God.
Great men and women of faith who stood firmly on what they believed in spite of what it may or may cost them.
But Jesus' genealogy, the family tree that he comes from,
is not just filled with men and women who always got it right.
Because none of them did.
When we read through and we read the names and we know the history behind them,
we learn that there are people in Jesus' family who experienced great tragedy in their life.
We learn that there are people in Jesus' family who committed horrible crimes.
We learn that in Jesus' family that there were those who were evil and corrupt.
That this is the lineage that Matthew gives us about Jesus.
So the question becomes, why does God put this in there?
Why do we see this introduction into the birth of Christ by saying,
and this is who the lineage of Jesus is?
Well, there's a lot of reasons for that.
There's a lot of reasons.
And for time's sake, for us this evening, we don't have time to go into all of the reasons.
But I think what we can see from this, one aspect that we're going to look at,
is verse 1 tells us who Jesus is before even telling us,
or in spite of, the family and the world that he was born into.
A baby born like there had never been.
And there never would be again.
A man who came to live on this earth like none had ever lived,
and none will ever live again.
Born in perfection.
Born being perfection.
Born living in perfection.
In spite of the brokenness of the world.
So why don't you look with me at Matthew 1, verse 1.
It says,
The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ.
The son of David.
The son of Abraham.
And we see in this four things that point us to who Jesus is.
And a reason for us to gather in here to celebrate, to honor him, to worship him, and to thank him.
The first thing that we see here in this verse is his name.
The book of the genealogy of Jesus.
And what Matthew points us to with this is that Jesus is the Savior.
Jesus is the Savior.
The name Jesus means literally, the Lord is salvation.
Jesus in his name means salvation.
And this goes perfectly because when the angel appears to Joseph in Matthew 1, 21,
what he tells him is,
And you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save people from their sin.
You see, to save someone, to be their salvation means you have to save them from something.
And Jesus comes so that he can save you, and that he can save me.
Not because we're good, not because we're perfect.
But because he is good, and he is perfect.
And he comes to save us, specifically from our sin.
You know, it's not just the works of Jesus.
It's not just the words of Jesus.
It's the fullness of Jesus himself.
And that's why Jesus says in John chapter 14,
He doesn't say my teaching is the way.
He doesn't say my works are the way.
Jesus, in response to what it means to go to heaven,
says, I am the way.
I am the truth.
I am the life.
Jesus is the Savior.
The second thing that it points out to us in this one simple verse
is that Jesus is the Christ.
Jesus is the Christ.
Christ means that Jesus is the chosen one, or the anointed one.
And what that means for us is that this is not of happenstance.
This is not of a moment.
This is not of a decision.
But it means that Jesus has been chosen.
When we look back at the Old Testament Messianic prophecies,
what we see in that, that Jesus came,
and that Jesus, in being the chosen one,
came and fulfilled all.
And he did.
To be the chosen one means that he would not just come as man,
but he would come fully as man and fully as God.
It's divine.
And he did.
To be the chosen one, to be the anointed one,
meant that he would come and perform miracles,
that he would come and that he would teach,
that he would come and heal,
that he would come and forgive.
And guess what?
He did.
Being the chosen one meant that he would come,
the Messiah,
that he would come,
that he would live a perfect life,
that he would die on a cross,
that he would rise three days later from the dead.
And guess what?
He did.
To be the chosen one,
to be the anointed one,
meant that he would ascend to heaven.
And he would send his spirit
to dwell on all of his followers.
And guess what?
He did.
And because he is the Christ,
because he is the Messiah,
because he is the anointed one,
the chosen one,
one day he will return.
And one day he will call all of his followers to himself.
And guess what?
He will.
Jesus is the Christ.
He is the Savior.
He is the Christ.
But also,
Jesus is King.
Jesus is the King,
not a King.
Matthew's Gospel tells us,
the book of genealogy of Jesus Christ,
the Son of David.
Jesus is not just simply a King.
Jesus is the King.
And 2 Samuel 7 tells us that his kingdom will come from David,
but be fulfilled by Christ in a different way than any other kingdom,
because God will establish his kingdom,
and his kingdom will be forever.
Kingdoms come and go.
Nations are born and they pass.
But the kingdom of God shall reign forever.
Because Jesus is the Son of David.
And unlike every other king,
and unlike every other king,
Jesus, being the King,
dies in order to make the kingdom possible.
He gives of himself.
He gives of his body
that we'll observe within the bread
to establish himself as king.
To pay the price
for our sins
that we deserve.
He takes
and he pours out his blood.
Establishes the cup,
the new covenant of grace
that is found in Christ,
in Christ alone.
To make us innocent,
new,
and born again.
Instead of a king
calling his servants to him
to sacrifice for him,
Jesus says,
no, no, no.
I come and give of myself
so that you can come to me.
And then lastly in this verse,
what we see
is that as followers,
as believers,
we are his people.
The son of Abraham.
You see,
the covenant with David
was a covenant
for a king
and a kingdom.
But the covenant of Abraham
was the covenant
for a people.
And not just a people,
not just a nation,
but a family.
And God brings you and I,
not by birth physically,
but by adoption
through faith
in Christ alone
so that we are now
his people.
Sons and daughters
of the living God.
And all of this happens.
All of it.
Because Jesus came.
We'll gather.
We'll eat food.
We'll open gifts.
And all of this
is possible
because he came.
For a day,
most of the world
will pause
and stand still
all because
he came.
And one day,
the Bible tells us,
every knee
shall bow
and every tongue
confess
that Jesus
Christ
is Lord.
And it all
is possible
because he came.
But see,
we can't tell
the story
of Christmas
without telling
the story
of Easter.
And all of this
is possible
because he came
and he lived
and he died
and praise God
he rose again.
One of my favorite
verses
in all the Bible
is found
in Matthew 20
verse 28
where Jesus says
the Son of Man
came
not to be served
but to serve
and to give
his life
as a ransom
for many.
We're going to go
into our time
of response.
I'd like to ask
our band
or worship team
if they'll make
their way
to the stage.
Thank you.
And if you're here
this evening
I would ask you
to respond
to Christ tonight.
The first way
I want to ask you
this is Jesus
Christ
your Savior.
Is he your God?
Is he your King?
And if not
would tonight
would you put
your faith
your hope
and your trust
in him
that he would
save you
that he would
forgive you
and that in that
he would adopt you
and welcome you
into his family.
That there's no
greater gift
that you could
receive
than the free
gift of grace
that is made
possible
by Jesus Christ.
And the second way
is if you are
a follower
of Jesus Christ
would you prepare
yourself
for the partaking
of the Lord's
Supper
where we
come and
acknowledge
all that he
is
and all
that he has
done.
you know
I thought
about it
when someone
gives you
a gift
when someone
comes up to you
and says
you know
I've been
thinking about
you
I had you
in my mind
I had you
in my heart
and so I
went
and I gave
this to you
I bought
this for you
now I want
to give
this to you
what they're
looking for
in response
is not
necessarily
a gift
in return
but simply
a thank you
and how many
times
have you
and I
as the
recipients
of the grace
of God
and the fullness
of what that
means
we take
on an air
of
that we
deserve it
instead of
a heart
of gratitude
and so
would you
in response
thank him
for what he's
done for you
in bringing
salvation
would you
come to him
in confession
in the fullness
of his grace
to confess
your sin
before him
so that your
heart is
ready and
prepared
to partake
in the
Lord's
supper
and then in
doing so
would you
worship him
these are
not just
songs that
we sing
but they're
responses of
our heart
the gift
of Jesus
would you
worship him
would you
pray with me
as we prepare
to take
the Lord's
supper
together
God I
thank you
for tonight
the opportunity
Lord that we
have to
gather
the opportunity
that we
have to
worship
the opportunity
that we
have
to partake
in this
together
God if
there's
anyone here
who does
not know
you
well I
pray that
tonight
would be
their salvation
birth date
tonight
would be
the night
that they
confess
Christ as
Lord and
Savior
tonight
would be
the night
that they
admit that
they're a
sinner
who needs
to be
saved
that
tonight
would be
the night
that they
believe
in what
the truth
of scripture
says
God I pray
for every
one of us
who here
is a follower
of Jesus
Lord may we
take serious
with what
we'll do
here in a
moment
may we
confess our
sin to you
or knowing
that you
forgive
that you
forgive over
and over
again
and the
freedom that
comes in
confession
and Lord
with everything
that we
think
with everything
that we
say
with everything
that we
do
God may
we
worship
you
God
would you
work and
move
in how
you do
and may
you be
glorified
it's in
Jesus name
we pray
that's it
for this
week's
message
be sure
to check
back next
week for a
new episode
and in the
meantime
you can
visit us
online at
willowridgechurch.org
or by searching
for Willow Ridge
Church on
Facebook
Instagram
and YouTube
thanks again
for listening