The God Who Comes Near | Francis Chan

Hey, I don't know about you, uh, I feel like I've sung those songs my whole life, but they meant more this year than ever. >> Amen. >> I I I just I don't know. I'm picturing the angels singing. I'm picturing, you know, as they're c, you know, shouting together to the shepherds and and and that he's here.

And I don't know, the words just meant so much more. Even the come let us adore him. It's like to really come with adoration like no not just I believe in him. Oh, I'm going to celebrate Christmas. I'm going to sing this song. But adoring, adoring, adoring. I feel like the adoration keeps getting better in my life.

I hope that's true with you because I feel like a lot of times it's the opposite. It's like, oh, this Christmas song again. >> And it becomes less and less every year rather than gosh, it's more and more meaningful each time. I mean, even when I say the Lord's Prayer, it means more to me now.

And so I'm going to read from Matthew chapter 1 the Christmas story, you know, and and I I love that David when he started us off was talking about Emmanuel, God with us, because that that's exactly what I'm going to be talking about today. And we don't plan these things.

Um we don't we don't have time to plan. We just uh it's like Lord what what what are you putting on my heart? It's like Emmanuel, God with us. It's Matthew chapter 1. So please let's listen to the word of God and not go, "Oh, I've heard this before.

I've heard all my life." But each year when we hear these stories, hopefully we've grown so much in the Lord that it means even more to us every year. >> That's what communion, which we're going to celebrate in a little bit, it can't become a meaningless tradition or ritual.

It should mean more each time. So, actually, honey, why don't you read it? I don't I don't read real well. Just Matthew 1:18-23. And let's uh if you notice, we keep communion at the center because that's sacred. When I read from the Bible, we read here because the word of God is sacred.

When I teach, I teach from the side because I'm not sacred. Um, this is what we revere. God is about to speak. And so, we honor these words differently than how we honor any human being or any sermon or any thoughts from a preacher. >> Amen. Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.

When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which means God with us.

[clears throat] Let's read it again, honey. There's just something about God's word that can minister to us. It's living and active. And somehow these words are different than all the other words on the earth because this came straight from the Lord. So let's just receive this again. >> Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. when his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph.

Before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which means God with us.

God with us? Why is God with us right now? Think about that word. Why? Why is God with us? Emmanuel, God with us. Why do you think he's here with us today? >> Any answers? >> Because he loves us. >> Because he loves us. Amen. >> That was it.

Wow. You nailed it. It's kind of the same thing. But because he wants to be with us. I was writing that down this week. Like what so much of my life I've just noticed something about me and it's it's off where I keep trying to [snorts] like be more holy and be more reverent and be more devout.

Let me get up earlier. Let me spend more time with him. Let me make sure everything's out. and maybe if I do all of this, then he's going to bless me. Like I I would never kind of say that out loud or or or necessarily. It just it just kind of happens.

It It's almost like I think if I initiate, he'll respond to me. But is that what happened at the birth of Christ? Was it the whole world going, "Please God, please send us a savior." No. He initiated. He [clears throat] wanted to be with us. He loves us. What What does First John tell us?

We love because he first loved us. He decided to send his son to die for the sins of the world. He wasn't responding to us. He was initiating. I mean, David in the beginning was talking about Adam and Eve. Why did he create Adam and Eve? >> He wanted to and he wanted to walk in the garden with them.

He wanted to be with them. Then even after they sinned against him and rebelled against him, he says, "No, I'm going to send a savior one day because I'm going to be with you. I want to be with you." And the story ends with with the new heavens and the new earth.

And God says, "And I'm going to walk with you again. I'm going to be with you." Look, think through history. Was Moses crying out to God? Therefore, God responded. No. God initiates in that burning bush and calls to Moses. Then he tells Moses, "I want you to make this tent of meeting because I want to meet with you.

I want you to build this tabernacle because I want to tabernacle. I want to dwell amongst you and this ark of the covenant because I want my presence there. Then I want this temple because these are all God initiating saying I want to be with you." And then then he gets to Jesus and it says that he he came and he dwelt or the word tabernacled amongst us.

He says, "No, I want to be closer. I want to be closer. I want to be closer." And then there's the amazing truth in John 14 where Jesus says, "The Holy Spirit is with you." But then he's going to be in you. And he says in John 14 uh uh 16 and 17, he says, "I'll ask the father and he'll give you another helper to be with you forever.

Even the spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him for he dwells with you and will be in you. You see the the the progress, you know, it's it it's like the in the garden he was with them, but then they rebelled and he says, "Oh, you know, but I'm going to I'm going to send I'm going to send I'm going to send.

I'm going to I'm going to I'm going to I'll put an arc there so so my presence will be there with you." And then No, I'm going to go further. I'm going to put Jesus, my son. He's going to take on flesh so that he can be with you.

And then he says, "Now the Holy Spirit is with you, but there's going to come a time when he'll actually be in you." And then a few verses later in verse 23, Jesus answered, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word and my father will love him and we will come to him and make our home with him.

This isn't a response. This is God initiating, man. This is this is this has been something God's been teaching me this year. These last two months, my prayer times have hit another level. My enjoyment of God has been in another place because he's finally just revealed like just shown me at the core of my being that he wants me. and that he loves me.

And I look back now at everything in my life and I go, "Oh, that's why you did that. You were coming after me even back then." What does Acts 17 teach? It says he determined the time and the place where you would be born. And it says that he he would orchestrate the events of your life.

It says, "So that you might feel your way towards him and find him even though he's not far from you." >> Amen. >> That's him. James 2, no, James 4:E 5 explains that he jealously [snorts] yearns. So God jealously yearns for the spirit that he put in us. Revelation 3 verse 20 says he knocks on the door.

Who's initiating? It's like I'm knocking. Please, please, if anyone will will hear my voice, if anyone hears me knocking, he goes, then I'll come and I'll eat with you. It's like I want to be with you. If someone's knocking on your door saying, please let me in. you're you're the responder in this.

You know, I've been a a pastor for like 40 years now, and I I hear a lot of people I've heard a lot of people say, uh, I'm not ready to get baptized yet. I want to get some things in order before I get baptized. I'm not ready yet.

Once I get these sins out of my life, then I'll be ready. Well, I I don't want to I don't want to just say I'm going to commit to the Lord. I want to get these things right first. And it's like, no, that's not the way it works.

God's knocking on the door. He's a God of mercy. He's a God of grace. And when you recognize his kindness in receiving you even while you were a sinner that he loved you even when you were a sinner that the world was so ugly at the time when Christ came it was not a world that was seeking him.

There were a couple, you know, there were there's always a few. You had Anna who was waiting. You had Simeon who was waiting. You had a few that believed. But really, it says that he came to his own and his own didn't even receive him. But to those who did receive him, he gave them the right to become children of God. >> You know, it's just this amazing story.

So, here's what's changed in my prayer life. When I go in my prayer room just to seek the Lord rather than going in and just believing like, "Okay, God, I'm going to go after you." I mean, I still do that, but it's I I go in ready to receive because God is the one that's jealously yearning for me.

He tells Moses, "I'm the Lord. The Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. This is what I am. I'm just I'm I'm rich in mercy." So, I'm like, I want to forgive. That's God's desire. He wants to forgive us. He's a God of grace.

He wants to give to us. He's abounding, overflowing with steadfast love. He just wants to pour his love on us. And so coming before God, I don't go in as an initiator. I go in as a responder. I go in and with a faith going, "God, you are crazy about me.

You're like jealously yearning for me. This is insane. you are knocking on the door right now asking if you can come in and I'm just going that'd be the stupidest thing I could ever do is to say no I'm going to keep that door closed. I just say come in come Lord come Lord Jesus pour your mercy on me.

Pour your grace on me. I need you. Yes God I receive you. I receive your love. I receive your grace. And I'm just learning that God can minister to the core of your being. He wants to. He's jealously yearning for this. And that means like in uh in 1 Corinthians 2, he says, "What no eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him." >> But God has revealed these things to us by his spirit.

So he says there are things that no eye has seen. So your eyes have not seen what's in store for us. Your ears have not heard what's in store. In fact, he says, "No mind has conceived what God has prepared." So it's not like in your mind you can see what heaven is like.

No mind has seen that. No one has seen this this future. Your mind has not conceived it. But then he says that peculiar thing, but God has revealed it to us by his spirit. So there's some way that God can reveal things to our spirit, to our souls that we don't get to see with our eyes.

We may not hear a voice from heaven. Our minds may not intellectually understand anything new, but somehow he reveals it internally to us and he ministers to our very spirit and there's some way that my spirit connects with God and he just he just pours pours this love into me.

That's what Romans 5:5 is about. that he pours his love into our hearts and we actually get to taste somehow this peace and this love, this joy. And it's like, oh, this is what the future's all about. What I'm tasting right now in this room of God ministering to my soul where I am in his presence and he is in me and there is nothing to fear.

I get to feel that exponentially. And then one day my eyes will see also and my ears will hear his voice and my mind will finally get it. Because right now I just see in a mirror dimly, but one day I'm going to see face to face. But that doesn't mean that we don't actually get to experience him right now.

There's just something spiritual that goes on. And I'm praying for this for all of us this year that we would have faith when we come in the presence of God that he's there. He's been waiting for us and he wants to minister to you. He wants to minister to your soul.

This is the good news. God is with us >> and he just wants to be even closer, closer, closer till we see his