All right, amen. Some Christmas trivia for you, does anyone know what instrument that song was first sang with? First time Silent Night was ever sung. Miss Nola? A guitar! First time it was ever sang was with a guitar, if I remember the story right. The organ was broken and they were having a Christmas service and the pastor was thinking about how quiet things would be without the musical accompaniment and Without enjoying the peaceful night, wrote the song Silent Night and played it on the guitar. First time that it was sung in church was with the guitar there. Or first time it was sung anywhere, I guess. Let's take our Bibles to the book of Matthew. Matthew chapter 2, going back there, took our last three weeks here in Matthew chapter 2. not the plan at the beginning but was how the Lord led and a little bit of crowd participation in that. One of last week's lesson was a special request last week so I was able to honor that but looking today at kind of what we've been Gearing up towards the last couple lessons, we'll talk today about the wise men. They've been involved in the last two lessons because they're involved in this part of the story. But today we're going to be looking at the claim of the wise men that Jesus is king. Jesus is king and we see that in Matthew chapter 2 verses 1 and 2. Let's go ahead and read those as we begin this morning. The Bible says in verse 1 of Matthew chapter 2, Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east and are come to worship Him. Let's open with a word of prayer. Lord, we love You. We thank You for Your Word. We thank You for the wonderful gift of Your Son that we take time during this time of year to remember that He was sent to earth, Lord, to die on a cross to pay for our sins. Lord, to go back to heaven victorious and then one day come to earth again to set up his kingdom and reign forever. I pray you'd be with us as we study your word this morning looking at the idea of the fact that Jesus is King and the men who brought that message to Jerusalem so long ago. I pray you bless this time and your word this morning. I ask in Christ's name, Amen. Amen, so we have, looking at the Christmas story and this is kind of the theme of this series of lessons is looking at the different characters involved and I listed on the bookmark that's available in the back if you haven't gotten one or if you don't have yours from last year. There are a couple more left, the 12 Claims of Christmas and kind of a play off of the popular song. But we have different people and what they had to say about the Lord. But even though we have 12 listed here, I was thinking about it yesterday, there's really a lot of other people that were involved as well. And you look at all the different people and how they were impacted, how they were affected, how they responded to the news of Christ's birth. Of course, there was the young Jewish couple that became his parents. There were the elderly relatives that were parents of his cousin John. There was the distant king who required a census and a taxation that required this family to travel to Bethlehem. There was a businessman that didn't have any more room in his inn. There were the angels that announced His birth. There were the shepherds that came to see Him. There were the people that marveled at the news shared by the shepherd. There were two elderly people who were waiting at the temple for His arrival. There were the chief priests that knew about the prophecies of His birth. There was a king who wanted to have Him killed. There were wise men that wanted to come and worship Him. All of these had their own way that they either accepted or rejected the news of Christ's birth, the different way that they responded to it, different ways that they heard the news. Some heard it from angels, some heard it from the wise men, some heard it from the Word of God, some heard it from the shepherds, and these folks heard the news in different ways. The gospel was shared in lots of different ways to lots of different people and everybody had their own personal response to that, their own motives, their actions, and it showed how much faith they had in the news that Jesus had been born. They all had something to say about Jesus, and it's interesting to consider their stories, but the more I study the Christmas story, and it's kind of a habit I've made over the last 15 or so years to take a lot of time at Christmas to really delve into the Christmas story and explore some new truths or ideas there that maybe I hadn't noticed before or been a while since I had considered, and I really enjoy looking at the Christmas story, but the more I do, the more I'm amazed at this group of men that are called here the wise men. They only take up a couple verses here in the book of Matthew, some right here at the beginning, and then a little bit more later on in the chapter, and they're gone. They just show up, and then they leave, and they're not part of the story anymore, but they had a profound impact on the Christmas story, the story of Christ's early years, and the news that they brought to Jerusalem. And as I look at them and looking at them compared to everybody else, and we'll do this for a minute in the lesson, they had more faith than perhaps any other person in the account with what they had to work with and how they responded to the news that they had. It's an amazing demonstration of faith comparable to some of the greats of faith in the Bible. And we will look at that as part of the lesson today. And they were probably among the least likely of candidates to exhibit such faith. So today we're gonna be concluding this series for this year by looking at the claim of the wise men and the claim that he is king. So first of all, as we look at this series, the same outline that we've had before, we're gonna look at the messengers. Who were these men? Who were the wise men? Where did they come from? What were they here for? How were they responding to the news? So first of all, who were they? We'll look first of all at the men. Who were these men? The wise men would have been part of a group commonly known as the Magi. The magi is a word that is translated here as wise men, and it is the word that we get our English word magician, not for the sleight of hand tricks that we are familiar with today, but they were learned men. They were wise men, as it says in the passage. They had positions of prominence in different kingdoms. and governments, we see them mostly in the Bible in the book of Daniel. That's where we have the best introduction to the wise men. Why don't we go there and look at a couple verses in Daniel to understand this group. Now the wise men in Daniel's day lived a long time before the wise men of Jesus' day, but it was the same type of group, the same type of people. Ezekiel, Daniel in the Old Testament there. Daniel chapter 2, we see that the wise men were a group of men who were counselors to the king. And this group as a whole encompassed many different skills or specialties that they had when it came to advising the king. Daniel chapter 2, verse number 2, the Bible says, then the king commanded to call the magicians and the astrologers and the sorcerers and the Chaldeans for to show the king his dreams. and they came and stood before the king." Now we know these are all wise men, this whole group that's described here, because if you look down in verse number... 13, the decree went forth that all the wise men should be slain. So this group listed off here in Daniel chapter 2, verse number 2, you have the magicians, you have the astrologers, you have the sorcerers, you have the Chaldeans. These are different categories or specialties of these men who were advisors to the king. And if you remember the story from Daniel 2, Nebuchadnezzar had a dream and it disturbed him and he couldn't remember what it was. So he called his counselors together and said, all right, here's the deal. I need you to tell me what this dream means. And this is something that they were used to doing. These men, one of their jobs or responsibilities was to interpret dreams. We see Joseph used in this capacity with Pharaoh in Egypt to come and interpret what the dream meant. But the king had a special request for this group. He said, well, I can't tell you what the dream is because I forgot, but what I need you to do is I need you to tell me what the dream was and then tell me what it means as well. And the wise men respond by, nobody can do that. Only the gods could do something like that. No man's ever done it. Nobody's asked us to do something like that before. That was not in the job description. I don't know if these men had unionized yet, but that was not in their job description is to tell the king what he had dreamed. and then what the dream meant as well. And the king said, well, if you can't do that, what good are you to me? I'm just gonna have all of the wise men killed. So that's this group coming in to advise the king. They were considered to be magicians, astrologers, and sorcerers. Now, they did not have these abilities at their command. Perhaps some of them, and very likely some of them, had satanic power to do some sort of miraculous ability. Many of them probably were just very skilled in sciences and could do things that looked miraculous based on their scientific understanding that they had, but we know they didn't have it at their command because when the king asked them, they said, we can't do that. If they had it at their command to do magic, they could have come up with something to demonstrate to the king, but they said, well, that's not something that we can do. That's not an ability that we have. So they did not have a magical ability at their disposal, a sorcery that they could conjure something to happen, but that's just the way they were described in this passage. Perhaps some were having these abilities, but demonically inspired, but they didn't have it at their command. They didn't think that they could do this. We see these wise men were really a specialized group of educated men and we understand that because Daniel and his friends were part of this group. If you look at verse number 13, there it says, the decree went forth that all the wise men should be slain and they sought Daniel and his fellows to be slain. So Daniel wasn't called in before the king with the other wise men, but when they said, let's kill all the wise men, they went to go get Daniel and his friends. So Daniel's part of the wise men. How did Daniel get into this group? We find that in Daniel chapter one, go back a chapter and you see the specialized training that Daniel received in chapter one, verse number four. This is where the king tells the master of the eunuchs to bring certain of the children of Israel of the king's seed of the princes, to bring them in, verse number four, children in whom was no blemish, but well favored and skillful in all wisdom, cunning in knowledge, understanding science, such as had the ability to stand in the king's palace, whom they might teach the learning and the tongue of the Chaldeans." You remember the Chaldeans, they were a group that was part of these wise men. So the king said, I need some well-educated young men from Israel, bring the best, the brightest, bring them in and we're gonna specialize their training so that they can be part of this group. who are the Chaldeans, who are part of the Wisemen. So the Wisemen were a specially educated group of men that were given governmental power and gave assistance to the king in his leadership here in the country of Babylon. We see in Daniel chapter 2 that after interpreting the king's dream, Daniel became the leader or the head of this group of Wisemen during his time in Babylon. Verse number 48 of chapter 2, there the Bible says, Then the king made Daniel a great man and gave him many great gifts and made him ruler over the whole province of Babylon and chief of the governors over all the wise men of Babylon. So this was a group who had authority in the country and Daniel became the head of those. The wise men that we see in the book of Matthew, we can go back there to Matthew chapter 2. The wise men we see there were very likely wise men who were from Babylon. It could have been, but very likely, we don't know for sure, but very likely came from the area of Babylon. Most nations had this type of a group of trained advisors to the king known as wise men. When Moses was dealing with Pharaoh to get the children of Israel out of Egypt, the magicians that Pharaoh called that were replicating the miracles that God was doing with the plagues, they are called in Exodus, the wise men of Egypt. And so different countries had these groups, but very likely the wise men who came to see Jesus are from the country of Babylon. So that's the men, who they were, educated, Smart, talented, skillful, specialized, and men of authority. They weren't just advisors to the king, they had authority over different aspects of their country. The king was in charge of all of it, but you'd have a wise man in charge of this area or this area, and that's going to come to play here in another part of the story that we're going to look at. So these wise men, people who had political authority and who had great wisdom. Then we have number two, that's the men. Number two is the multitude. One question that always comes up when studying the wise men is how many were there? So that's our question. We often see three portrayed in Christmas cantatas and in manger scenes, and you always set your wise men off to the side because they weren't at the manger, they were on their way, and so you set your manger scene up that way at your house. So the wise men, we see three, and the reason for three is because the three types of gifts that were brought. But we know for sure that there weren't just three people who came because people wouldn't travel in that day, especially political leaders wouldn't travel by themselves. They would have had servants, they would have had slaves, they would have had soldiers, they would have had this entourage coming with them to provide for them on the journey, to protect them from thieves or from enemies of the state or government that would be after them. So there would have been a large entourage accompanying these men, but very likely there would have been more than just three wise men. Babylon had a lot more than three. Daniel and his friends were four of them, and they weren't even part of the group that were called in before the king. So there were a lot of wise men in Babylon. We're not told, though, how many people came with the wise men. So we don't know for sure. One other... A bit of information that shows us there were more than just three men who came was Herod's response to them. When the wise men did not come back, and Herod was wroth because he was mocked of the wise men, we saw Herod last week, what was his nature? He'd have gone out and killed them. But he didn't do that. Why didn't he send his army after them? Well, because there was probably this large entourage that included a lot of soldiers. He went to kill the babies in Bethlehem and left the wise men alone. So that's evidence that these wise men were not just the three men by themselves. But again, we're not told for sure. And then we have the month. The other question about the wise men is when did they come? So we saw the men, the multitude, and the month. We have three things that point to the timing of the wise man's arrival. And the first is the appearing of the star. We know that Herod inquired about the appearing of the star for the purpose of determining the age of the child. We see this in verse number 16. says there, he slew all the children that were in Bethlehem and in all the coasts thereof from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. So he asked him, when did the star appear? And so the appearing of the star had taken place sometime in the last two to three years, depending on how Herod's command would be interpreted. If it was those who were under two, there would be a two-year time frame. If it included those that were two, it could go up to almost three years, because two years old is three years of time. So two to three years earlier, the star had appeared at least. We see We see because Herod held the number a little higher, it was likely that the star had appeared at least more than a year prior to the wise men's arrival, but somewhere in that one to three year time frame, the star had appeared. So again, it's evidence this didn't take place at the manger, but gives us a clue of when they came. We see secondly, the age of the savior as another clue to when the wise men got there. We see a few things about his age, first of all, and primarily the term young child is used instead of the term babe. In Luke chapter 2, the angels told him, you shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And here we see they came to the place where the young child was. Very different words and the words indicate it was a toddler aged child, kind of a one to five year old range. is the way that that word is used in the Greek for understanding the child's age. We also see that they were living in a house instead of a stable, so that they had established a more permanent residence. And they hadn't been in Bethlehem the whole time. Anybody know where they went before the wise men got there? That's after the wise men got there, they went to Egypt. They went to Jerusalem when he was eight days old to be circumcised. So they had come from Bethlehem, he was born, and then they made this travel to Jerusalem, and then they returned to Bethlehem, and they remained there. We're not told how long it took to do this census or this taxation, but we do know that Joseph and Mary were not well off. and he couldn't just afford to take this long pilgrimage and enjoy a long vacation. He would have had to bring some tools with him. And as a carpenter, he'd had to find some work in Bethlehem. And as he gets some commissions, he starts working. He establishes a home while they're there and continues to work. They get a house that they get to move into. So he would have started his business up so they could make their ends meet. And he likely remained in Bethlehem doing work while the baby and his mother continued to grow. in their strength before the plan returned to Nazareth, where they came from. But they were here, he was working, they had money, let's let the baby grow a little bit before we make this long trip back to where we came from. And then we have, thirdly, the average of the sojourn, how long it would have taken the wise men to get here. As we said already, the wise men were very likely from Babylon, and this means that they would have traveled about 900 miles to get to Jerusalem. The travel with a typical caravan of camels at the time would have been, on average, about 18 miles a day. So this trip from Babylon to Jerusalem would have taken between eight and 18 months of travel. Now, you don't just wake up in the first century and say, hey, I'm going to take an 18-month trip. I'll be back. We're leaving tomorrow. No, you can't do that. There's a lot of preparation. They had to make plans. They had to put other people in their positions. They had to request for the king to make this trip. They had to gather provisions. They had to buy camels and supplies. They had to plan their route. And maybe the time of year wasn't conducive to travel. there had been some time of preparation and then there had been 8 to 18 months of actual travel before they arrived in Israel. So somewhere 8 to 18 months, possibly a little bit longer, but in that time frame of 1 to 3 years based on the appearance of the stars, that kind of gives us an idea of when the wise men got there. So those are some questions about the men and who they were. Secondly, I want to look at why they came. Why did these men travel, leave their country, and make this arduous journey just to visit this baby? We see first of all, and we've talked about this, especially two weeks ago, the idea of fulfilled prophecy. They came because of fulfilled prophecy. They knew, as a reminder, we looked at all these prophecies in that lesson, but as a reminder, they knew that a star would announce the arrival of a king in Israel based on Numbers chapter 24 and the prophecy given by Balaam. And this is something that they would have had access to. when Babylon again conquered Israel they would have taken the sacred writings and brought them back and that would have been one of the responsibilities of the Magi to study these writings and they had these prophecies about his arrival in Numbers 24. They knew the timing of his arrival about when he would get here based on the prophecies in Daniel chapter 9. They, however, did not know the place of his arrival because they didn't have access to Micah chapter 5, otherwise they would have just traveled to Bethlehem. So they knew the when, they knew what to look for, they just didn't know where to go. But they also would have known a lot more Bible prophecy based on the other books that they would have had. And as they had studied the prophecies relating to this promised king. in other parts of the Pentateuch and other prophets they would have had access to. We aren't told about it here, but these men had obviously studied the Word of God and knew about this prophesied king that was coming. These men had a little bit of the Bible, we don't know how much, but they believed it enough to travel 1,800 miles over a period of one and a half to three years just to see it for themselves. Some portions of a book from another country's religion that promised a coming king, they believed it enough to go a 900 mile and 900 miles back. one-and-a-half to three years of their life, leaving their families, leaving their kingdom, leaving their positions, and going to see it for themselves. What amazing faith these men had to believe the fulfilled prophecy. That's why they came, to see it for themselves. Secondly, we see that they came to worship the king. We see this in Matthew chapter two, verse number two, saying, where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we have seen a star in the east and we are come to worship him. That's what they came for. They came to worship Jesus. That was the motivation for their travel to Herod and to Jerusalem. And that's what they told Herod. That's what they told Jerusalem that they were there for. It's amazing. This reveals their humility. As we mentioned already, they were royalty in their own right. They had authority. They were used to telling other people what to do. They had servants. They had slaves. They were prominent in their positions, yet they traveled this way to worship a young child. It shows their humility. It's also a recognition of this child's religious importance. You see, they came to worship Him. Worship is something that you do in a religious sense. And they understood from the prophecy they had, this is someone who deserves worship. And they came to do that and recognize His religious importance. These wise men understood the prophecies and they acted on that belief. This is evidence of their salvation. Salvation, prior to Christ's death and resurrection, was a matter of belief, just like it's a matter of belief today. They believed in the prophecy, the promise of the coming Messiah. And how did we know if somebody in the Old Testament believed? Based on their actions. James chapter 2 goes into that in detail, that their faith is evidenced by their works. Was not Rahab justified by her works when she hid the spies? And we have the other examples given there that you see If somebody believed it, they did something about it. And when we look at the wise men, they had the prophecy, they believed the prophecy, and they acted upon that belief. They were saved men because they believed God, and we know they believed God because they acted on that belief by traveling to see and to worship the Messiah. So they came because of the fulfilled prophecy. They came because they were here to worship the king. Another reason that they came was to be a reprimand to the unbelieving Jews. See, God could have revealed to the wise men where Jesus was living. He could have told them. He could have given them the prophecy of Micah, so they would have known. He could have told them directly, because He did talk to them directly. After they saw Jesus, He told them not to go see Herod, not to go back. He could have revealed that to them, but He didn't. He sent them to Herod and to Jerusalem. to talk to the chief priests and the scribes, to talk to Herod, to be there to show the Jewish religious leaders, these men have the same word of God that you do, although you have more of it, and they believe it enough to act on it, and you're not doing anything about it. And God coordinated the arrival of the wise men. Another way God could have directed the wise men to Bethlehem was just let the star lead them there, which He did after they saw Herod and the chief priests. We have Again, with this idea of the star, this is another evidence of their faith, because from the text, it appears that the star had gone away after they saw it originally. And so the Bible says, when they saw the star, they rejoiced. Like, oh, look, there it is again. It's kind of the idea we see. An amazing faith that they saw this star, and then it likely went away, and they traveled 900 miles anyway, just knowing, I'm heading to Jerusalem, because that's where this king's supposed to be born. And they didn't have the visual reminder of that star. And you know, 18 months into that trip, 10 months into that trip, like, What are we doing this for? Are you sure we're going the right way? Did we really see that? I mean, as things got hard, as things got tough, but they still acted on faith. They went, listen to this, this is neat. Without the star to remind them of their faith, they left their home, they went anyway, and they left home not knowing exactly where they were going. I told you their faith puts them on par with some of the other greats of faith in the Bible. What are we told about of Abraham in Hebrews chapter 11? He, by faith, he believed God and he left his home not knowing where he was going. That's the same position these wise men were in. Well, we're not quite sure where we're headed. We're going to Jerusalem because God sent us this star and we believe God, we're going to go act on that belief. Amazing, amazing faith that they had. So we see this example as far as these pagans being used to reprimand unbelieving Jews. God has done that several times in the past. In the story of Abraham, when he goes down into Egypt and he sojourns there and he lies about his wife, what happens? The pagan king reprimands him. says you're not acting right, you're not doing right and then his son Isaac does the same thing he travels and he goes to there and he lies about his wife and Abimelech says hey look this isn't the way you should be acting and God used these pagan kings to reprimand his people and here we have these people from a pagan land coming to Jerusalem to say hey we're here to worship your king that's in your book and the chief priest didn't do anything about it. So God used them in that way. Another reason that the wise men came was to be a witness to a pagan king They were, as we said already, they were regional authorities in their kingdom, just like Herod was in his. They had, in this instance, they gave Herod the same opportunity that they had to hear and accept the truth of the word of God. These men who were vassal leaders of their districts in their country came to Herod and said, hey, you're a vassal leader for Rome, let me tell you the news that we were told a year or two ago, and you can hear about this king, and Herod rejected it. But Herod had the opportunity. He had the opportunity because God sent him a witness, sent him a missionary from out of country to come and tell Herod about the news that Christ had been born. So they came to witness to a pagan king, and they also came to give him gifts. This is what we really know the wise men for, is that they brought these gifts to to Jesus. What was the motivation of these gifts? Well, one motivation, why would one king travel to another country to give a gift to another king? That's tribute. That's recognizing that, hey, you're the greater authority. I am underneath you. And that's what these kings traveled to pay tribute, not to Herod, not to Rome, but to Jesus, saying, you're the king that we're underneath. You are the king that has authority over us. They came to give tribute, and they came to give worship. These gifts were sacrifices in a religious sense, that they came to worship the baby. So that's the motive of the gift. The message of the gift, we have the gifts of gold. Gold points out the fact that Jesus was a king, has a relation to his royalty. We have frankincense. That's a fragrance that is used in worship in the sacrificial system, and it points to Jesus in his office as a priest. You have myrrh. Myrrh is associated with death and with suffering and it was a symbol of Christ as a prophet that would suffer for his people. We looked at this in our lessons on Rightly Dividing the Word that Christ fulfills the three offices of prophet, priest, and king and we see these typified in the gifts given by the wise men. Whether they knew it or not, they were pointing out the prophetic positions that Jesus would hold as prophet, priest, and king. So we saw the motive of the gifts was to give tribute, to give worship. The message is that Jesus is a prophet, a priest, and a king. And we have the meatness. Meatness meaning the appropriateness of these gifts. What was going to happen as soon as these wise men left? They were going to get up in the middle of the night, this poor family, and flee out of country. How would they survive? Well, God was going to finance the trip by bringing them gold and frankincense and myrrh and provide for them for the years that they would be out of country until Herod died. They were able to live off of these gifts that had been given, so very appropriate gifts that they needed, and God was providing for them in that. Looking at these wise men and I mentioned already just how their faith compares to other folks in the Christmas story. I mentioned they likely had the most faith of all those who interacted with the birth and the early years of Christ. Because again, they operated on only a portion of the Bible. They had a portion of the Bible and they believed it enough to travel 900 miles and then 900 miles back and spend one and a half to three years of travel just based on this faith that they had. You compare that to Mary and Joseph. They got the news directly from an angel that they were able to see. The shepherds, a message from an angel and all the angels came to tell the shepherds and they only had to come in from the field. to see the baby. You see Simeon, it was revealed to him by the Holy Ghost that he would see the baby. Anna came in while Simeon was prophesying and saying, this is the salvation of Israel. She heard his prophecy. She had been revealed to herself by the Holy Spirit and she knew who he was, but these wise men, they weren't there already. They weren't, hey, I'm going to Jerusalem anyway, might as well check out this baby while they're there. They intentionally made this trip by faith in the Word of God. And amazing to see that. And then a contrast. Some people didn't react in faith to this news. We have those who heard the shepherds. The Bible tells us that when the shepherds went away from seeing the baby, they noised abroad the things that were told them concerning this child. And the Bible says, all they that heard it marveled at those things which were told them by the shepherds. They said, they got news. Hey, listen, we saw angels and they told us that the son of David, the prophesied Messiah is a baby and he's right here in Bethlehem and he's right down the road in the manger and he's in the stable. That's neat. Then went back to bed. They had this news brought to them directly, and all they had to do was get up and go see it for themselves, and they couldn't be bothered. It was the middle of the night. They were resting. Don't bother me. I can't get up at this time. And they had the news, and they had a message, but they didn't respond to it. The chief priests and the scribes, they had all of the word of God, and they had all of the prophecies. They knew the prophecies. They understood the prophecies. They just didn't believe them. And on top of that, they got some foreign missionaries. These wise men came in. They didn't respond to that either. And we have Herod. Herod believed it all. He believed every word that he was being told. He just rejected it because he wanted to be his own authority. So contrast of faith. These men responded based on faith in the word of God and responded to that. What's the message these wise men brought? They're amazing people looking at the messengers, looking at how they responded and the stories surrounding them. But what was this message that they came to bring? This was the claim that Jesus is King. Jesus is King. That's the claim being made by the wise men. They're here to announce, they're here to tell us that this baby is the King of the Jews. But there's a lot more in that statement than just Jesus is King. We see it, first of all, it's a message of Christ. Message of Christ, the word Christ is the anointed one, is the Messiah. Then when they're announcing, here is he born King of the Jews in fulfillment of prophecy, it's very clear who they're talking about. Because when Herod heard it, he asked the wise men, hey, this prophesied King, where is he supposed to be born? This is the Messiah who has arrived. Where is he at? And the chief of Sunnis, he's always over in Bethlehem if you want to go check it out for yourself. But the wise men brought the news, this is the Messiah. This is salvation come to Israel. This is salvation come to earth. It's a message of salvation. They were foreign missionaries bringing the message that God's son had come to earth to fulfill the prophecies that were given to the Jews of old. By claiming that he was born King of the Jews, they're pointing out that he was the Messiah. Jesus came to die. That was His purpose. That was why He was here. He came to do the will of Him that sent me. That was Jesus' purpose, from the manger to the cross. In the little house where He was at this time, Jesus knew, as a toddler walking around, that He was here to die for man's sin, to be the promised Messiah that would suffer on behalf of us and for our sin. It was not an afterthought, it was not an accident. The Bible tells us He's the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. From the manger to the house, to Egypt to Nazareth, to Galilee to the cross, Jesus never lost sight of the purpose He was here, and that was to bring salvation. And that's the message that the wise men shared when they said, We are come to worship Him that is born King of the Jews." They're saying there is the Messiah here in Israel coming to offer salvation to man. So they brought the message of Christ. They also brought the message of the covenant. If you remember and if you weren't here or you don't remember, we taught a whole lesson on the covenants that were given between God and men and most of those are in relation to Israel. And the covenants were in relation to Israel are a promise that God made to them concerning two things primarily, a seed and a kingdom. That's the covenants that God made with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Solomon. These covenants that were made and reaffirmed between God and his people were promises. God says, I'm going to do this, a promise God made. I'm going to provide a seed and I'm going to provide a kingdom. And this was a promise specifically to God and the Jewish people, and the Jewish people missed it when the promises began to be fulfilled. Wise men from the East, they didn't miss it. It wasn't their promise. But they came anyway, they got to partake in the promise. And we talked about in that lesson of how we get to enjoy an aspect of the covenants because of our relationship with the mediator of the covenant. And that's what the wise men got to join in on, but the Jewish people missed it. They missed the fulfillment of the covenants that God made with them. Here in this baby that was born, where is he that is born? That's the fulfillment of the promised seed. That is King of the Jews. That's the fulfillment or the beginning of the fulfillment of the promised kingdom. Now, we know Jesus hasn't established his kingdom yet. That will take place after the tribulation period when he comes back to earth and sets up his thousand year reign here on earth. But the beginnings of it took place right here in Bethlehem. And the wise men told the Jews about it. You know, them covenants, those promises that God made with you, they're being fulfilled right now. Yet they couldn't take time to accept the covenant, or the message that was brought to them. So it was a message of Christ that salvation would come to earth. It was a message of the covenant, that God was fulfilling his promises. And it's a message of coronation. Notice again, and I pointed this out last week, what they said about him, where is he that is born King of the Jews? Born King, not born to be King. He is the King. We're announcing it right now. Here and now, Jesus is King. Amazing, when he was a young child, he was visited by governors who announced to the Jews that he was their king. And at the end of his life, when he was about to be crucified, another governor said, would you like me to crucify your king? Hey, when we crucify him, put up a plaque. And on that plaque, here's what I want you to write. I want you to write King of the Jews. King of the Jews. They had the message written clearly before them. It was given to him by two pagan kings. Here's your king when he's born. Here's your king when you're putting him to death. And they couldn't accept it, but it didn't change the fact. Just because the Jews rejected it didn't change the fact that he is king. Jesus is the king. So what does this mean? That's kind of where we're gonna jump into the next point. What's the message or the meaning of this message? The meaning is that Jesus is king. He's a king who has authority. He's a king with authority. He had a greater authority than the wise men. These wise men were kings in their own right. They had people who had to bow down before them, but when they came in the presence of Jesus, they're the ones that bowed the knee. He had greater authority than the wise men. He had greater authority than Herod. Herod wanted to have him executed. But when we look at the wise men, who they recognized as the authority, Herod said, come back when you're done. God said, don't. They said, okay, we're not listening to Herod because this king has more authority than that king does. So he had more authority than Herod and he has more greater authority than Satan who's the god of this world. Satan could not stop what God was doing when he came to dwell among men. He's a king with authority. He's a king with a kingdom. He's the king of kings. All things are under his authority and one day he will have a physical kingdom on this earth. And he is a king with subjects. He's the king of the Jews. It's told us right there. He is the king of the Jews, whether they accept or not, he's their king. And he's also a king to any of those who are willing to accept them. When the wise men left, they had a new king after meeting with Jesus. And anybody that meets with Jesus and accepts them, they also can have a new king. He's a king with subjects. He's a king whose kingdom is eternal. We think about prophetically, when will Jesus be king? Well, after the tribulation period, he's gonna come to earth. He has set up his kingdom, but he's born king. He doesn't have to wait. You know, any other king has to get to that place where they have to grow up, and the other king has to get out of the way, and maybe they have to have conquest, and not Jesus. Jesus is born king. His kingdom's not limited to a place or a time. His kingdom's from everlasting to everlasting. Jesus never started being king. He'll never stop being king. Jesus is the king and he is divine. This message of the king, he is divine. Jesus is Immanuel, God with us. He was God in heaven. He was God coming out of the tomb. He was God on the cross. He was God doing miracles. He was God in the temple as a boy. He was God in the manger. He was God in the house being worshiped by wise men. He is God. He didn't realize later that he would one day be a king. He didn't realize later that one day he would die on the cross. He knew it. from the moment he was conceived, before that even. Slam, slam, before the foundation of the world. Something we can't even begin to comprehend. But just came to earth and had his eyes on the cross. That's the message of the painting that's on the back of this bookmark here. There's a baby in a manger looking through the crossbars of the stable here and they're forming a cross. It's a painting my dad had commissioned to be made of the eyes on the cross, even from the manger. So he is divine. Another message that we have about Christ from the wise men here is that he is victorious. Again, most kings have to have a conquest before they can be named king. He, but he was born into an enemy kingdom and he was king the moment he arrived. When we think of the story, Pastor preached on this a couple weeks ago, but the story of Joshua. Joshua, before he went into Jericho, he had an interaction with Christ, Christophany, before Christ came to earth. He saw him there. And when he saw Christ, he said, now, who are you? What are you here for? Are you for us? Are you for our enemies? And Jesus answered and said, Nay, but as captain of the host of the Lord, I am come. And in one of my Bibles I have written in the margin and it says, he didn't come to take sides, he came to take over. And that's King Jesus that we have. He's a victorious King. Revelation chapter 19, verse 16, we see him named again as the King. He hath on his vesture and on his thigh written, King of kings and Lord of lords. When was he written down as king of kings? Before the battle even started. Why? Because he was victorious. He was victorious before the battle even began. And if you are a subject of this king, you're on the winning side. There's two types of victory that we have when we're in this king's kingdom. The first is victory over death through salvation. Because on all people, when they're born, they're born going to die. They're dying because of a curse of sin. But we can overcome death through the power of the cross, through the power of this king, and that's salvation. That's coming to the king and believing who he is and accepting him for who he is, repenting of your sin, and you become part of this king's kingdom. and he can give you salvation, he can give you victory over death. And then once you're part of his kingdom, he has victory for you over sin as well. That sin that wants to get a hold of you, and as Psalms 107 describes, they are holden with the cords of their sin. The Bible says that we can get victory. We can have victory through the power of Christ, through the power of the cross, because he's a king that's victorious. The wise men came and announced it, and it's just as true today as it was when they said it. We've come to worship the king. Let's have every head bowed, every eye closed. We'll close in word of prayer this morning. Lord, we love you. We thank you for this wonderful message that was shared by these wise men so long ago. And Lord, nothing's changed. You're still the king. You're still victorious. And Lord, we get to participate in your kingdom and we get to participate in your victory that you have for us. Thank you so much. that Christ came to earth to die on a cross, Lord, and to be victorious. Lord, Jesus is King, and Lord, we get so distracted by all the turmoil that goes on in life, Lord, but we have to remember, Lord, that we are on the winning side. No matter how dark things get, no matter what the King tries to do, the King of this world, Lord, He's already lost because you are victorious. Thank you for those promises from your word, Lord, that you have promised to keep. And we ask that you bless us now as we go into the morning service. Speak to our hearts there as well. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. Thank you. You are dismissed this morning. Amen. Well, like I said, we got a lot of announcements. Um, if you need a high chair, we've got a couple actually had a number of them downstairs and we're trying to clean up the kitchen a little bit, organize the storage. And so If you need a high chair, maybe you're planning to restart, you know, go again with another generation, we've got a high chair for you. You know, I don't know if John and Stephanie have one yet, but we've got one for them. So we have a couple that we're willing to, I don't, I just, they're nice high chairs. I don't want to just get rid of them. If you would like one, we've got it. So that's available. or one of the ushers. If in that, they can get it johnson, she's been to ch needs to go to the hospita at 11 o'clock. She needs s to the hospital, stay wit she has to have is going t probably about an hour, h then take her back home. that she can't drive herse because of the procedure s that's january 4th at 11 she's going to is ST jose in Briarcliffe North. So in Cockeysville. So runnin If you can do that, you can see me and we'll try and get you her phone number and information so that you can get set up with her to try and help meet that need. That's in January 4th. All right, I think that covers the announcements this morning. Don't have anything else. So why don't you get your Bibles, turn your Bibles to 1 Corinthians chapter number six. 1 Corinthians chapter number six. Alrighty. Just make sure I turn this on because I have a tendency to walk away from the pulpit. And if I don't have a microphone, it drops out quickly. So First Corinthians chapter number six, look down with me this morning at verse number 12. And follow along as I read through verse number 20. This is a text for our message this morning where we'll try and draw some truths from the word of God for our individual lives. Beginning in verse number 12, he says, all things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. Meats for the belly and belly for meats, but God shall destroy both and it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord and the Lord for the body. And God hath both raised up the Lord and will also raise up us by his own power. Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid. What? Know ye not? that he which is joined to an harlot is one body, for two saith he shall be one flesh. But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit. Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doth is without the body, but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. What know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For you are bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are his. unusual text maybe for Sunday morning, this time of year, you look at it and read the thoughts there and you think, oh boy, I wonder what direction Pastor Caleb is going to go this morning. How does that tie to Christmas or what does this have to do with, well, We have been looking at or pondering some things. We began the month here with pondering heaven, taking some time and just thinking about the day that because we've put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ and him alone, and he's forgiven us of our sin, we have been guaranteed a place in heaven because of what Christ has did for us. And we know that heaven's our home when our time here on earth is done. And then last week we spent a little time and pondered, or tried to answer the question, what is your life? And if you were to answer that this morning, outside of the answer given to us by James, that it's a vapor that appears for a little time, then vanisheth away. If you were to answer that, we tried to provoke some thought last week on what is your life? What is it accomplishing? What is it fulfilling? What does it mean? What is it all for? Why are we here? What are our days filled with? What is it about? We took some time to ponder and think about our life. Beloved, the Bible has a lot to say with regards to our thought life, with regards to what we are pondering, to what we think about. We know Philippians 4, 8 says, if there be any virtue, if there any praise, think on these things. He's telling us, here's some good things you need to think about. And we know that in Proverbs 23, 7, the Bible says, for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he. God says, listen, what you're thinking about is going to dictate who you are, what you are as a person. He tells us, let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus. We're supposed to have the mind that Christ had. That's a, what are we thinking about? What are we pondering? We know that he tells us that we are to renew our mind. Have a new mind in Christ. And so the Bible gives a lot of emphasis on the idea of what are we thinking about, and that's the foundation of the thoughts for this month is what are some things that we should be pondering? What are some things that we should be thinking about? Why is this so important? Because, beloved, what you're thinking about is gonna direct your life. What you're thinking about is what you're going to invest in, what you're going to pursue. It's what you're gonna go after. the young man or young lady who is in love, they can't think about anything else. Their mind is consumed. They're supposed to be working, but they're thinking about her. You know, she's supposed to be helping, and she's thinking about him. And everybody is tired of hearing about him or her, right? Everybody else is like, do you talk about anything else besides him or besides her? Now that is no inflection upon my daughter, okay? This is not the case in our home. I don't want you to think I'm preaching to Alicia. Those of you that don't know, her young man that she's interested in visited us for a couple days this week. And I didn't kill him. He got to drive home. He got to go home safe. So, yeah. No, he's a good young man. But no inflection on that. But you know how, what I'm saying is that kind of thing, it consumes their mind. It's like, what are you, you know, making potatoes? You're like, you're gonna just mix those forever? Oh, oh, yeah, I guess they're done. Yeah, you know, you're just distracted. Something's filled your mind. Beloved, we need to control what we think about. If heaven is real and we know it is, and if life is short and we know it is, then beloved, we've gotta take the time that we have here on earth and live it with some well thought out and guided priorities. So this morning I would like to ask you to ponder your priorities. What priorities do you have in your life? I would like to open with a word of prayer and you ask God to just help you to just think about what is it you're making a priority right now? and is it what God would want you to have as a priority? Let's open with a word of prayer. Lord, we come to you and we commit this service to you. I ask you to guide my thoughts. Give me clarity, Lord. Help me to be able to speak clearly the thoughts that you've directed in preparation for this message today. And I ask you, Lord, that our life would be lived with some well-guided and thought-out priorities. That those priorities would not just be our want list, but they would be, Lord, your want list. not my will but thine be done. And Lord, would you bless our time in your word here this morning, in Jesus' precious name, amen. I would like to begin with a small and simple illustration, I think, in this kind of way, you know, just clear and I try and find ways to picture things. This is a very well-known illustration. Some of you probably have seen something like this or similar, but we're going to use this jar here to represent your life. This picture is the sum total of the days that you have to live. This is the quantity of time that you have, and we know that our life is short. We only have so much time and there's a cap on that. We know that it's not gonna go forever. We've only got so much time. And as we ponder or contemplate or think about our priorities, we understand that we should say, that we would say, anybody would say, well, who should be first in our life? God, right? God should be first in our life. So if we're gonna establish our priorities, if we're gonna set our priorities in order, we say, here's most important, here's second important, whatever, we would say, well, God should be part of our life first. We put God in. He's part of our life. If we're gonna leave anything out, we wanna leave that out, amen? So God's part of our life. Then we have, this morning, other things that begin to take up our time and that we have to establish or decide are part of our life. And we have, let's say, next on our priority list might be family. So you have your mate and you have your child or, you know, several childs. When should I stop? I don't know. You've got your children. They're a priority, you know. You've got mom and dad. You know, maybe the kids have grandma and grandpa, and you've got your immediate family, or maybe you've got some extended family. Say, oh, I've got brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles and grandma and grandpa that's still part of my life, and I want to put them in there, make sure they get in, and they're important, and I want to make sure I have time for them. Then, of course, we have maybe a job. You got to fit the job in there somewhere. It's pretty important to at least, you know, earn a living and the job has different responsibilities. Maybe you have to divide and balance and work off of. And maybe you've got some things around the house you've got to do. You've got to maintain the house, right? Get things done around the house and do that honey-do list. Got to squeeze that in and you get that done. And then maybe you've got some personal growth and personal development that you would like to have. And you kind of squeeze some of that into your life. And you think, man, I've also got some hobbies, some fun things. And man, I'm getting a lot into my life. And so we take those things that are High priority for us. And we make sure we get those in. I got a couple more here. Somebody tell me, what else do you squeeze into your life? Oh, food, vacation, yeah, exercise. What did you say? Somebody say a barn? Oh, yeah, your livestock, you got to care for those. Joe and Ken know all about that. Sleep last, yeah. Amen. So you squeeze all of those things into your life. But how many of you know that in a given day, there are a lot of things that arise that you weren't planning on? We have all of those ancillary things. We have all of those little emergencies, those little things that just kind of squeeze in. They start crowding other things, but they're coming and you think, man, I don't know where all these things are, but we're gonna squeeze all these things in. And our life's getting full, right? We've got all these things in there. fill in our life, one thing after the next. You know, we get it all in if we have our priorities correct. And it's amazing that you can continue, when you have the right priorities and you do it correctly, you can continue, maybe fit a little of this in or a little of that in. The problem comes, beloved, when we live our lives and we fill it with the ancillary things. Too many of us are letting our life, our time, be robbed by the little things that really don't matter that much. All of the time that we have in this short life we have to live is being stolen. It's being taken away by, I mean, we're busy. We're so busy, it's like we can't even get it all done. I mean, how in the world? We're almost frustrated to no end. And then we're wondering, what is it all about? And what is it all for? And why am I going through all this? But all of our time is filled up with ancillary things. And we say, but God is supposed to be first. but now there's no room for God. Now there's no room for family and friends and those things that really should be high priority. Our time has been robbed and taken by things that if we had the choice, we would say, that really doesn't matter, I don't need it. There's too many of these things that are robbing our life. So I wanna ask you this morning to ponder your life and let a couple principles guide you as you think about your priorities. First of all, the principle of expediency. He says in verse number 12 there, all things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient. I think that everybody understands here this morning that Paul is not saying that there is no law. He said, all things are lawful for me. I think we understand that Paul's not saying you can just do whatever you want without any consequences. It doesn't matter. You have free reign. I think we understand that Paul very clearly tells us in other passages, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we continue in sin? We know we're not supposed to do that. So he's not telling us that. you know, all things are lawful, you can just, hey, just do whatever you want. Are we in agreement? But among those things that are lawful for us to do, among those things that we do have the choice or the option, we have a lot of things that we could put into our life that would be acceptable, there are some things that aren't expedient. There are some things that would be perfectly okay to do, but probably not best to do. Among those things that are lawful, some might be best, some might be good, and some might be bad for you. You have to establish priorities in your life and determine what is gonna be best, what is gonna be good, and what is not really expedient. You remember the story of Jephthah. He needed help from God. You know, the enemies were attacking, and they called on Jephthah and said, hey, come and help deliver us. And he said, God, listen, I gotta go into battle, and if you'll give me the victory, if you'll allow me to come home safe, God, I will sacrifice the first thing that comes out of my house. Now, it's a good thing to make covenants with God. It's a good thing to promise God that you will fulfill and do things for him. But that was not an expedient promise. If you remember the story, God gave him victory, he came home, and the first thing that walked out of his house was his only daughter. His only daughter. And he walked up to her and he says, man, you have broken my heart. Let me tell you why. I promised God that I would sacrifice the first thing out of my house. It's a good thing to do, but was not what he should have done in that position. What I'm saying is there's things in our lives that would be perfectly acceptable that God would look at and say, well, that is fine, but maybe that's not what you need to do here in this circumstance, in this situation. We have to look at the fact or the principle of expediency when we're establishing our priorities. We never want to sacrifice what is best on the altar of what is okay. God has that which is best for you. But a lot of times we're taking time with the family and sacrificing it on the altar of time with YouTube. This is ancillary. It doesn't really matter. It doesn't mean anything. And now we don't have time to play ball with the kids. As you look at those things in your life that are lawful for you to do, and you determine what is good, better, or best, what you need to do is ask yourself, what will bring the most glory to God? What is going to bring the most glory to God? I have these two things that I can do, both of them are acceptable, both are okay, neither one would necessarily be sin. But of those two choices, which is gonna bring the most glory to God? that'll help you to determine that priority. Sometimes our relationships in life are a real struggle. Balancing all of life's demands and you have a friend or a loved one that lashes out at you, you can respond in a number of ways. You can respond in kind. I mean, he lashed out at you, or she lashed out at you, and you can respond. And many people would say, boy, you're justified. I mean, look at what he did, or look at what she did, and you're justified to respond and give it back to them. You say, well, that's not really Christian, Pastor. You can't include that in the acceptable responses. You know, we can't really do that. But maybe we could do, you could say, well, let's answer like Christ answered when they attacked him. Bible says that he answered not a word. So maybe you could answer that way. That would be an acceptable response. Or another biblical principle is a soft answer, turn of the way wrath. Do good to them that despitefully use you. So you could go one step further and say, okay, which one is gonna bring the most honor and glory to God if I respond in kind, if I just don't say a word and walk away, or if I respond with kindness? You can respond with kindness, and this would bring the most glory to God. I'm saying in our lives, there's so many situations that we face that we need to establish a priority in how we're dealing with and handling these things. You need to put your priorities in order this morning, and it starts with God. Otherwise, God gets left out. You say, well, I would never let my whole life get filled with all of this ancillary stuff. But if you let your life get filled with even many good priorities, but don't remember to put God in first, he doesn't fit. Secondly, I want you to see the principle of enslavement. He says, all things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. Among the choices that you have to choose whether you're going to do that which is good, better, or best, or you're going to make a decision in establishing the priorities for your life, you have to wonder or ask yourself, what is going to be in control of me? You see, God wants to be in control of our life. It's God's plan that we submit and yield to him. So can you be submitted to God and do that which you have on your list? Would you have to adjust your priority? Would you adjust your priorities to put God first and do that which he wants you to do? We know that we can be controlled by things that are destructive. An addiction by nature is destructive. Any addiction that we have. We see the results of addictions in our society with commercials and billboards everywhere advertising the help that is out there for those that are addicted to gambling, those that are addicted to drugs, those that are addicted to alcohol. There's programs and government-funded resources that can help you overcome this addiction which is destroying your life. We also know there's some things in our life that can control us that we wouldn't necessarily say are bad, but are they controlling your life? You know the old saying, too much of a good thing can be too much. I mean, there's some things that are good, but in excess, it's not right. I think about the example today of kids that are growing up in this sterile environment. And, you know, we have this desire today to protect our children. And so we don't let them get dirty. make sure their hands are washed with alcohol wipes constantly, and don't let anybody else touch them, and keep them out of the nursery, and sure, don't let them play on the playground because there's germs there. And the more sterile, I mean, it's good to keep the kids clean, right? I mean, that's a good thing. It's a good thing that you don't let your child eat whatever he finds on the ground outside. I mean, I wouldn't recommend that. Although my son has eaten a couple crickets. We only knew that because Mary found them later. But, you know, kids, the fact of the matter is, is what happens when you put them in such a sterile environment is they have no immune system. And then they're sick all the time. And it's a compounded problem. So all of a sudden now they're sick all the time and you say, well, he gets sick really, really easy, so we got to protect him more. And so you keep him away from even more stuff. But he gets sick so easy, we gotta protect him more. And now you've completely deteriorated and destroyed his immune system, and he's gonna catch every little bug that's out there. Where if he was out on the playground and playing around and around other kids and participating in things, he wouldn't have that problem. You know, God made dirt and dirt don't hurt, amen. That just eat a little bit. I mean, you know, kids are gonna eat some dirt, whether on purpose or accident. I mean, it's okay. They're gonna be all right. We could talk about some of the older folks in here and what, you know, their childhood was like in comparison to what kids are like today. And you guys weren't sick all the time, were you? Hardly ever got sick as a kid. You know, I was in college before I ever knew what a headache was. Never had a headache in my life till I was in college. People talk about a headache, and I thought they were just whining. Just babies making it up, you know? Yeah, right, it's an excuse. I mean, I never had a headache, and now we got six-year-olds. I got a headache. I got a headache. I can't function today. What I'm saying is too much of a good thing can not be a good thing. What are you allowing to control and dictate your life? Kids today at times are involved in many extracurricular things. So busy, mom and dad running to and fro. I mean, hey, it's great that your kid can go know how to camp and go out in the woods and knows how to fare for himself. I think that's wonderful. If he's doing that, and then also be involved in baseball, and also involved in football, and also in dance class, and also in chess club, and also in, there's so many things they're involved in, all of a sudden, oh wait, no, we don't have time to get there for cantata practice. No, the kids can't make it to music class. No, I'm sorry, we're gonna miss church this week because we have an outing with the boys club. But see, where does God fit? Oh, well, we've got to get to boys club. We've got to get to dance class. We've got to get to, I guess God's going to have to wait. Where do we put? What's controlling and dictating our priorities for our life? Physical fitness can be such a high priority for some that they miss work. This is physical fitness. You see, we're talking about the principle of enslavement, about something that's dictating or controlling our life and controlling what we're going to do and establishing our priority. Is there something controlling your life that shouldn't be controlling it? Some relaxation. I think you ought to relax. There ought to be a time and a place for rest. We need rest. You guys are going to be excited. Next year, our theme is going to be rest. Now all God's people said, amen. The theme for the year for our church is gonna be rest and revival. Rest and revival. And we've looked at our church calendar and we've adjusted some things and tried to make it so that there's less going on overall. We've removed some things from the calendar to make it a little lighter. We need rest. But you know what, if relaxation is the highest priority, then you're neglecting your responsibility. And we got responsibilities. Maybe some are controlled by social media. The addiction to that feed. Gotta know what's going on. I got to know what my friends are doing in all the other parts of the country. Got to know who went out to eat. I got to know what happened at their get together. You know, the feed, the constant bombardment of that social media connection with people that, you know, you haven't seen in many, many years. And you're plugged into that, but disconnected from this. You know more about what's happening with people across the country than you do about people in this room. And this is your church family. So what is it that's controlling your life? And I obviously can't touch on everything or impact or get into every particular scenario that might be dictating or controlling your life, but is there something that you're putting before God? Is there something that is dictating your responsibilities or your priorities that shouldn't be? the principle of enslavement, the principle of expediency, and lastly this morning, I wanna talk to you about the principle of expectation. He says in verse number 13, he says, meats for the belly and belly for meats, but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord and the Lord for the body. He's saying there is some established expectations that I have for you. There are some things that by God's design and God's plan, this is how it's supposed to work. This is God's design and here's how you're supposed to be living. Here is what you're supposed to be doing. God has an expectation for us. How many would agree? God has expectations for us. He built us, He created us. He has made you and you are fearfully and wonderfully made and God knows exactly who you are and exactly what your personality is and what strengths you have and what weaknesses you have. And God has an expectation of how you're gonna live your life. When you establish your priorities, consider, am I using this for its intended purpose? You know, my dad grew up on a farm. He's always said he feels sorry for any kid that didn't get to grow up on a farm. Because the workload on a farm is good for a kid. But not only that, he said it was a lot of fun. Growing up on a farm was so much fun. He said all the stuff they got into, and he has so many stories of growing up on a farm, things that I shouldn't tell you. You'll think less of my father if I tell you that. He was a kid like anybody else. You can let your imagination go, OK? You know, Dad talks about growing up on the farm, when you're out there on the tractor and you're miles from the house working in the field and something breaks on the tractor, that basically the tool you have is the tool you need. That's the way he put it. And that's the way he's always lived his life. Whatever tool I got, that's the one I need. I mean, if he really needed a hammer, but all he had was a screwdriver, well, then he had a hammer. You know, if all he had was a crescent wrench but he needed a hammer, he had a hammer. What I'm saying is you just find a way that old get her done mentality. Just get it done. Just find a way to get it done. And he, you know, that carries over into a lot of other areas of his life. It's just a matter of let's just get it done. Do what we got to do. I remember as a teenager driving my dad's Cadillac DeVille with a tow rope. and pulling the church bus back to the church. Dad's in the bus, I'm in the Cadillac, and we're pulling the church bus with the Cadillac. Now, yeah, we made it home. But how many of you know that's not what a Cadillac's used for? That's not really its intended purpose. Probably not the best thing for that. And I work hard against that, but I've got a little bit of that in me. And I try and fight against it and be careful and use, let's use things for their intended purpose. Let's try and get the right tool for the job, you know. I got a little bit of that in me. Now, my Toyota Sienna that we had, the transmission went out at 279,000. Now, that's pretty good. But I think I could have got 300 plus if I wasn't using it to pull trailers full of firewood. We pulled some heavy, I'll tell you what, coming out of the crane's backyard one time, we pulled a trailer full of oak that was, I pulled, Greg, your trailer, which is heavy by itself, full of oak firewood with my Toyota Sienna. Yeah, that's not good for it. I'm saying you might be able to get it done, but it's not the best thing. What we're talking about is priorities. using what God has designed for its intended purpose. Paul gave us an example here of food. He describes the, hey, God made the stomach for meat and meat for the stomach, God's plan, God's design, that simple example. I mean, that's what it's for. Food is for nourishment. But how many use food as a therapy? You know, we've heard people talk about, oh, I'm depressed, I'm gonna go eat a whole gallon of ice cream, you know. It's therapy. That's what this is. I have therapy tonight. I gotta go sit down and eat, you know, a whole box of chopped cookies, right, Pastor Gus? That's not what food is used for. Food is for nourishment. Use it for its intended purpose, but not beyond. The use of drugs, which are given for medicinal purposes, have now become used for recreational purposes. And we know it's destroying lives. I heard one guy, I think he said he was from Canada, he says, we've got so many allergies in Canada that we're going out and buying meth so we can turn it into allergy medicine. That's supposed to be a joke, OK? Just joking about the allergies. But they're taking regular medicine that's supposed to be to help you and not using it for its intended purpose. And it's destroying lives. And when we take things that God intended and planned for one thing and use it another way, it's destructive. He gives three or four verses here and he talks about the physical relationship between a man and a woman. By design, God has made that intimate relationship, which is the miraculous union of two people, that the Bible says here become one flesh, And I'm not gonna, we were in a mixed audience, I'm not gonna get into the details here, but you understand the principle here of one flesh? It describes the fact of going into an harlot and you become one flesh. Some people think that the one flesh happens at the marriage altar where you join together and you're married. No, you become one flesh with one person that you're joined with. And doctors have described and talked about what happens physically between you and another individual when you become one flesh. And what he's saying here is God had an intended purpose for how we're supposed to use these physical bodies. And when you use it in some other way, it's destructive. It's destructive. Young people, don't let Satan take you down that road. There's an amazing pull of that physical attraction and the desire to be touched. Inside of marriage, it's amazing. It is supposed to be the glue that helps hold your marriage together. But when you get to have that anytime, anywhere, what's your motivation for staying married? describes and talks about fornication. That's not God's plan. We're taking what God intended for a particular thing and using it another way. And it's destructive. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. But we can take those gifts that God has given us and use them in the wrong way. As you establish your priorities in your life, ask yourself, is this God's given intent? Is this what God would have me do? Paul reminds us that, in fact, really, we are just stewards of the things that God has given us. In verse number 19, he says, what? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God? Ye are not your own, for you are bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. Very popular statement today is, it's my life. I get to do what I want. But not according to that. According to the word of God, God, the one who created us, if you're here and you know Jesus is your Lord and Savior, he's the one that saved you. He's to be the priority. We're to use our life in a way that is fitting to him because he has given us these things to be stewards of, to care for. All we have, including our very life, is something on loan from God. And God has an expectation as to how we're going to use it. I know we say it, but I wonder, do we really Understand these, we look down here, several of these young people down here, I'd say are my kids. But I've got to keep in mind that they're really God's kids. They're on loan from God. They're children God entrusted to me, but they belong to God. Therefore, I have a responsibility, not just for me as a parent, but to raise them how God would want them raised. I don't have a right to just treat them however I want to treat them. I don't have a right to just to yell and scream at them or to mistreat them. They're God's children. But I have a responsibility to raise them correctly, how God would want them to be raised. Because they're God's children and everything in our life belongs to God and we need to think about that. and think about our priorities and establish them with regards to that principle. Even my paycheck is God's. I'm not going to take God's money and spend it on things that are displeasing to him, things that he would not want me to spend my money on. You guys know I have some investments. You know, there's some things, because the money that I've invested, I believe, is money that was given to me and trusted to me by God to be used for his honor and glory, ultimately, for him to do with what he wills. There's things that I will not invest in. You know what? Very profitable company in the last couple years. Could have made a lot of money on it. Called DraftKings. I don't know if you guys know what that is, but it's online gambling. Very successful, very profitable investment had you invested in it. But I wasn't gonna put God's money in that. I watched that go up and up and up and up, and the people that invested that, all the money they made, in my mind I said, I'd rather lose money than fund that. We gotta think about what we're doing, the priorities we have in our lives. Everything we have belongs to God. As we conclude this morning, can I ask you to take a ponder on your personal priorities. As Christians, our responsibility is not an exercise in following the law. I know that popular thought today is church is the place you get your list of do's and don'ts. Am I right? Is that what, that's the way people view it today? Church is a place you get your list of do's and don'ts and that's all it is. It's just this and this and do that and don't do this and don't do this and don't do that. No, beloved, Christianity and your relationship with Jesus Christ is not restrictive. The Bible says he shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. It's freeing to know Jesus. You have a lot of liberty in Christ. But we've gotta establish some priorities inside those things that are all lawful, that I could do, but what is gonna bring the most glory to God? He says there in verse number 19, verse number 20, for you're bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body. So as you're establishing your priorities, ask, what's gonna bring the most glory to God? I got this I could do or this I could do? Which one should I do this Christmas? Well, this one's gonna glorify God. Let's do that one. That's what's going to help you decide your priorities. You know, when I was young, dad would ask me a question about something I did. And I knew what he wanted to know. But my priority at that moment was self-preservation. It was not glorifying God. I knew I should respond with the truth and tell him, yes, this is what I did, but self-preservation, a faulty priority, led me to look at my dad in the eye and say, no, I didn't do it. Even though I knew that in the end, that was gonna result in much worse situation, it'd be far better to just own up right now and just take whatever's coming because that's the right thing to do. But my faulty priority caused me to look at my dad and lie. Sometimes in our lives, beloved, we know what we should do, but our faulty priority caused us to do that which we shouldn't. I'm not pointing at anybody tonight, this morning. I'm not accusing anybody. I'm asking you to ponder in your own heart, where are my priorities? What am I living my life by? I've only got so much life to live. What am I putting in first, second? Am I letting the little mundane things of life take over and I'm no longer accomplishing what is of most value? Am I living my life by some well-thought-out and guided priorities? Would you stand with me with your heads bowed and your eyes closed? Lord, as we have this moment of invitation, I pray, God, you take your word and apply it to our hearts. Allow us to see the truths of the scripture this morning. Not just the comments made by a man up here, but the power of your word would rest in our hearts. We would realize that you've got an expectation of how we're gonna live and what we're gonna do with our lives, and every priority that we establish should be guided by that. Lord, that we would live Answering the question, what's going to bring the most glory to you? I pray, God, you would just use this in our church. In Jesus' name, amen. As the pianist plays, we want to have a moment of invitation. You come if God spoke to you. You come and do what God wants you to do.