Christmas With Crossroads

What happened in a tiny village outside of Jerusalem 2,000 years ago was no ordinary childbirth. It changed the entire world. And it can change yours. Join Crossroads for a 60-minute, family-friendly, immersive Christmas experience. Live music and a look at the Christmas story like you’ve never seen it before.

  • 00:00:01
    - Well, hey, I'm Andy,
  • 00:00:02
    and this is Christmas with Crossroads.
  • 00:00:04
    I just want to wish you a very merry Christmas.
  • 00:00:07
    I heard somebody say recently that the Bible
  • 00:00:09
    isn't just stories of things that happened
  • 00:00:11
    thousands of years ago,
  • 00:00:12
    they're stories of what God is still doing today.
  • 00:00:16
    And today we're going to be looking at how
  • 00:00:18
    God wants to bring light into the darkness
  • 00:00:20
    and bring breakthrough into your life and world.
  • 00:00:23
    And Christmas is a perfect representation of that.
  • 00:00:26
    To participate today, there's two things
  • 00:00:28
    we want you to grab that we'll use later.
  • 00:00:30
    First, your phone. It's already in your hands.
  • 00:00:31
    Secondly, go find a candle.
  • 00:00:33
    And if you have kids with you, like I do,
  • 00:00:36
    I've got a seven, five and three year old,
  • 00:00:38
    head to Crossroads Kids Club for some amazing videos
  • 00:00:41
    and content just for them.
  • 00:00:43
    Merry Christmas. Let's get started.
  • 00:00:48
    [music: Silver Bells]
  • 00:01:57
    [music: Joy to the World]
  • 00:04:22
    [music: Hark! The Herald Angels Sing]
  • 00:05:48
    [music: The First Noel]
  • 00:07:09
    - Throughout time, the way we celebrate Christmas
  • 00:07:12
    has changed, but the story of Christmas hasn't.
  • 00:07:17
    2000 years ago at Christmas, Jesus broke into our world.
  • 00:07:26
    There is something under the surface
  • 00:07:28
    hidden in the Christmas story for us to uncover.
  • 00:07:37
    Jesus didn't just break through at Christmas 2000 years ago,
  • 00:07:42
    He's still breaking through in lives today.
  • 00:07:47
    And He wants to break through in your life, if you let Him.
  • 00:07:56
    When Jesus is here, everything changes.
  • 00:08:22
    [music: When Jesus is Here]
  • 00:11:48
    - An angel of the Lord came to Mary and said,
  • 00:11:52
    "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
  • 00:11:56
    Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son,
  • 00:12:00
    and you shall call his name Jesus.
  • 00:12:03
    He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.
  • 00:12:08
    And the Lord God will give to Him
  • 00:12:10
    the throne of his father, David,
  • 00:12:11
    and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever
  • 00:12:15
    and of His kingdom there will be no end,
  • 00:12:18
    for nothing will be impossible with God."
  • 00:12:21
    When the time came for her to give birth,
  • 00:12:24
    and she gave birth to her firstborn son
  • 00:12:26
    and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths
  • 00:12:29
    and laid Him in a manger,
  • 00:12:30
    because there was no place for them in the inn.
  • 00:12:34
    And in the same region, there were shepherds
  • 00:12:37
    out in the field keeping watch over their flock by night.
  • 00:12:40
    And the angel said to them, "Fear not,
  • 00:12:44
    for behold, I bring you good news of great joy
  • 00:12:47
    that will be for all the people.
  • 00:12:49
    For unto you is born this day in the City of David,
  • 00:12:53
    a savior who is Christ the Lord.
  • 00:12:56
    And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby
  • 00:12:59
    wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger."
  • 00:13:03
    And suddenly there was with the angel
  • 00:13:05
    a multitude of the heavenly host praising God
  • 00:13:09
    and saying, "Glory to God in the highest and on earth,
  • 00:13:12
    peace amongst those with whom He is pleased."
  • 00:13:17
    Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea
  • 00:13:20
    in the days of Herod the King, behold wise men
  • 00:13:23
    from the east came to Jerusalem saying, "Where is he
  • 00:13:27
    who has been born king of the Jews?
  • 00:13:29
    For we saw His star when it rose
  • 00:13:32
    and have come to worship Him."
  • 00:13:44
    - Hi, my name is Brian.
  • 00:13:45
    I am what's known as the senior pastor
  • 00:13:47
    here at Crossroads.
  • 00:13:48
    Welcome and Merry Christmas.
  • 00:13:51
    Yeah, let's pray before we go any further. Okay?
  • 00:13:54
    God, I'm thankful for this holiday.
  • 00:13:56
    And more importantly,
  • 00:13:57
    I'm thankful for what it represents.
  • 00:13:59
    And I pray that today we get a better sense
  • 00:14:02
    of Christmas, a better understanding of You,
  • 00:14:04
    and an actual breakthrough in every life that's with us today.
  • 00:14:08
    And I pray these things according to the character
  • 00:14:10
    and identity of Jesus. Amen.
  • 00:14:15
    Why did Jesus come?
  • 00:14:17
    Why do we celebrate this holiday known as Christmas,
  • 00:14:21
    or originally as Christ's Mass?
  • 00:14:23
    Why is it?
  • 00:14:25
    Was it because we needed another national holiday
  • 00:14:27
    to celebrate, is that why it is?
  • 00:14:30
    Is it because we all needed obligations
  • 00:14:32
    to buy things for people we didn't have enough money for
  • 00:14:35
    and go into deeper credit card debt?
  • 00:14:36
    Is that what it was?
  • 00:14:38
    Do we have this time because we all just love
  • 00:14:41
    seeing nice Christmas lights?
  • 00:14:43
    All those things may be true, to a degree,
  • 00:14:46
    but we have this time set up all across the world
  • 00:14:50
    to celebrate the birth of Jesus because
  • 00:14:53
    it represented a breakthrough.
  • 00:14:56
    I'm wondering if there's anybody with us
  • 00:14:58
    who wants a breakthrough.
  • 00:14:59
    Anybody want a breakthrough?
  • 00:15:00
    I mean, a breakthrough in your family,
  • 00:15:03
    in your personal life, physically, intellectually,
  • 00:15:06
    emotionally, your relationships, your finances, your job.
  • 00:15:10
    I just find again and again and again
  • 00:15:12
    I'm not satisfied with where I am.
  • 00:15:14
    I want to go some place else.
  • 00:15:17
    And sometimes we want to go some place else
  • 00:15:19
    and we just don't have the capacities
  • 00:15:21
    in and of our natural selves.
  • 00:15:24
    That is the message of Christmas.
  • 00:15:28
    Christmas is about God breaking through
  • 00:15:31
    to come to this world, to take you and I spiritually
  • 00:15:35
    to a place that we can't naturally go.
  • 00:15:39
    To come to an understanding of God,
  • 00:15:41
    come to a place of spiritual potency,
  • 00:15:43
    come to a place of shalom, of wholeness in our lives.
  • 00:15:48
    Why is it that we don't have more breakthroughs in our life?
  • 00:15:53
    One reason, I believe, is that we're afraid to.
  • 00:15:58
    We don't have a breakthrough
  • 00:15:59
    because we're not at that place yet
  • 00:16:01
    and we're not sure exactly what that might be like.
  • 00:16:04
    We maybe want to get rid of the pain and difficulty
  • 00:16:07
    of where we are right now, but that would cause us
  • 00:16:10
    doing difficult things that we haven't done before.
  • 00:16:13
    That is tough.
  • 00:16:14
    That would cause us to fear different practices
  • 00:16:17
    that we haven't incorporated in our lives.
  • 00:16:19
    That would cause us to maybe picture a place
  • 00:16:22
    that we've never been before.
  • 00:16:23
    And when there's a place you haven't been before,
  • 00:16:25
    there is understandably fear.
  • 00:16:29
    Our country is wracked with fear.
  • 00:16:31
    It's wracked with anxiety on a bunch of different levels.
  • 00:16:33
    Doesn't matter who you are, how old you are,
  • 00:16:35
    or what side of the aisle you sit on,
  • 00:16:37
    what your skin tone is, what your economic status is,
  • 00:16:40
    there's never been a people,
  • 00:16:42
    according to studies I've seen,
  • 00:16:44
    that's more anxious and more fearful
  • 00:16:46
    than we are right now in modern day America.
  • 00:16:51
    I think that makes it difficult for us to have a breakthrough.
  • 00:16:55
    When Jesus came into the world, it was a breakthrough.
  • 00:17:01
    And over and over, people who encountered Him
  • 00:17:03
    or that Christmas story had fear.
  • 00:17:06
    Let me read you this.
  • 00:17:08
    We actually we just saw this on this video.
  • 00:17:09
    Let me just highlight one of the verses.
  • 00:17:11
    It says this in Luke chapter two, it says:
  • 00:17:27
    Filled with great fear.
  • 00:17:29
    And the angel said to them, "Fear not, for behold,
  • 00:17:33
    I bring you good news of great joy
  • 00:17:35
    that will be for all the people."
  • 00:17:38
    The shepherds had fear.
  • 00:17:41
    This was a breakthrough moment and they were a bit scared.
  • 00:17:44
    So if you feel scared, if you have a little fear,
  • 00:17:47
    hey, you're in good company.
  • 00:17:48
    Somebody hears the Christmas story felt the way you do.
  • 00:17:52
    And then the book of Matthew, we see how Mary
  • 00:17:55
    has miraculously been given a child inside of her womb.
  • 00:18:01
    People don't believe this.
  • 00:18:03
    She's going to be accused of things for the rest of her life.
  • 00:18:06
    Jesus is going to be accused of not having
  • 00:18:08
    a natural father for the rest of His life.
  • 00:18:10
    It's going to be a very tenuous situation.
  • 00:18:13
    Joseph, her future husband, knows about this.
  • 00:18:16
    Joseph is freaked out.
  • 00:18:19
    "I don't want to go through with this marriage.
  • 00:18:21
    This is too much."
  • 00:18:23
    And here's actually what happens to Joseph,
  • 00:18:25
    while he's sleeping there's a dream that comes to him
  • 00:18:29
    and it says this in Matthew 2:10.
  • 00:18:34
    Oh, no. Wrong one. I'm sorry. Not that one.
  • 00:18:37
    Don't you hate when you have the wrong place
  • 00:18:39
    in your Bible marked?
  • 00:18:41
    It's just you have a nice, finely tuned service
  • 00:18:44
    with nice lighting cues and videos,
  • 00:18:47
    and you realize you have the wrong one in your Bible.
  • 00:18:51
    But that's all right, because you've actually been
  • 00:18:54
    to seminary and you know the Bible a little bit.
  • 00:18:56
    So you just turn the page.
  • 00:18:58
    You turn the page, and here it says:
  • 00:19:01
    But as he considered these things, behold,
  • 00:19:04
    an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream,
  • 00:19:07
    saying, "Joseph, son of David,
  • 00:19:09
    do not fear to take Mary as your wife."
  • 00:19:14
    Do not fear.
  • 00:19:16
    This was a breakthrough
  • 00:19:21
    of cataclysmically cosmic proportions.
  • 00:19:25
    And everybody who is connected with it
  • 00:19:28
    that we read about has fear.
  • 00:19:30
    I want you to know, if you're looking
  • 00:19:32
    for something different and you're looking for God
  • 00:19:34
    to bring you a different gift this Christmas
  • 00:19:36
    and you're looking for a breakthrough
  • 00:19:37
    and you feel a little tentative or uncertain about it,
  • 00:19:40
    it's oh, okay.
  • 00:19:43
    God can handle your fear.
  • 00:19:46
    He's not judging you because of your anxiety.
  • 00:19:49
    In fact, He may have come just because you and I are anxious.
  • 00:19:55
    This may be the very reason Jesus came.
  • 00:19:58
    It was a breakthrough into the world
  • 00:20:00
    for God Himself to come into the world.
  • 00:20:03
    Yes, it was a virgin birth. I know that sounds crazy.
  • 00:20:07
    A lot of us are afraid to believe that because
  • 00:20:09
    we might be ridiculed or accused of being uneducated.
  • 00:20:12
    The Bible is not an easy book to justify and understand.
  • 00:20:17
    If the Bible wanted it to be easy to believe,
  • 00:20:20
    stories of virgin births wouldn't be in the Bible.
  • 00:20:23
    The biblical writers knew they were writing something
  • 00:20:26
    that would be hard to understand, but they wrote it
  • 00:20:29
    because it was history, because it was true,
  • 00:20:31
    because it was God breaking through right here.
  • 00:20:37
    God can do miraculous things.
  • 00:20:40
    If He can bring a baby to a virgin,
  • 00:20:43
    He can bring a breakthrough to you.
  • 00:20:47
    And the way He brings the breakthrough is through Jesus,
  • 00:20:51
    not through our hard work, through Jesus.
  • 00:20:54
    Now, when you came in today, you got --
  • 00:20:56
    You got a little card with you.
  • 00:20:57
    And we're going to do something with that card.
  • 00:20:59
    I want us to --
  • 00:21:00
    I want us to have a minute of reflection,
  • 00:21:02
    as much as we can reflect with little squirmy kids
  • 00:21:06
    who are in our room with us right now.
  • 00:21:09
    And I wanted to take a minute,
  • 00:21:12
    and I want you to write down over the next minutes,
  • 00:21:15
    identify and tell God what is the breakthrough
  • 00:21:20
    that you're waiting for, or the breakthroughs?
  • 00:21:24
    Let's identify them and give them right now to God.
  • 00:21:31
    - There's something that I'd love for you to do for me.
  • 00:21:33
    I want you to reflect.
  • 00:21:34
    I want you to consider what's an area of your life
  • 00:21:37
    that you want to experience breakthrough in.
  • 00:21:38
    We'd love to see God show up and bring breakthrough for you.
  • 00:21:43
    Second, I want you to do something with that.
  • 00:21:45
    I actually want you to text the word breakthrough
  • 00:21:47
    to 301301 and follow the prompts.
  • 00:21:50
    And do this right now, because later in the service,
  • 00:21:52
    there's actually going to be an interactive moment.
  • 00:21:54
    There's really good stuff.
  • 00:21:55
    But take this seriously.
  • 00:21:56
    God wants to meet you in this place,
  • 00:21:58
    and I believe you can experience breakthrough this Christmas.
  • 00:22:25
    [Silent Night]
  • 00:26:16
    - Growing up as a child, I knew of God,
  • 00:26:19
    but I didn't have a relationship,
  • 00:26:21
    didn't have parents, didn't have any siblings
  • 00:26:24
    or anyone to take me to church.
  • 00:26:26
    At the age of 20, I started searching for a church home
  • 00:26:30
    and searching for something more because
  • 00:26:32
    working a life in emergency service,
  • 00:26:34
    I was witnessing death on a regular basis.
  • 00:26:36
    At the age of 41 and at Man Camp in the woods,
  • 00:26:40
    away from all the distractions, that is where God found me.
  • 00:26:45
    - I asked God for help.
  • 00:26:46
    God broke through my life when I attended Man Camp.
  • 00:26:50
    I prayed for healing and He restored me.
  • 00:26:52
    I needed that direction and He gave it to me.
  • 00:26:55
    - He restored my relationship with my bonus kids.
  • 00:26:58
    Jesus broke through my life in a real way,
  • 00:27:00
    showing me that love can flow in blended relationships.
  • 00:27:10
    - Jesus didn't just break into the world
  • 00:27:14
    and break through 2000 years ago,
  • 00:27:16
    Jesus is still breaking through
  • 00:27:19
    and giving breakthroughs today.
  • 00:27:22
    And he could do that for you today, this year
  • 00:27:25
    or next year, in about a week or so.
  • 00:27:29
    This is a part of my story this past year.
  • 00:27:31
    You might be like me, you might not be like me.
  • 00:27:34
    But I'll tell you one thing about me,
  • 00:27:35
    the last two, three years has been incredibly difficult,
  • 00:27:40
    very difficult, very tense, a lot of second guessing,
  • 00:27:45
    a lot of regrets, a lot of just difficult stuff.
  • 00:27:49
    It's been a period of time
  • 00:27:50
    in which I've just gone through the motions.
  • 00:27:53
    And I've gone through the motions
  • 00:27:54
    as an act of faithfulness.
  • 00:27:56
    Not like I'm faking it, like, I know the right things to do.
  • 00:28:00
    I'm just going to do the right things
  • 00:28:01
    even though I'm not feeling it.
  • 00:28:04
    And it has been incredibly difficult.
  • 00:28:06
    And then about halfway through this past year,
  • 00:28:09
    I had a significant and massive breakthrough.
  • 00:28:12
    I've been, the last six months have been some of
  • 00:28:15
    the best six months I've ever had of my life.
  • 00:28:18
    Say, like, "Brian, what kind of breakthroughs?"
  • 00:28:20
    Well, I'll give you a few.
  • 00:28:22
    Lib and I had a breakthrough in our marriage.
  • 00:28:24
    And I can't even say when it happened
  • 00:28:26
    or how it happened.
  • 00:28:28
    I can say that we've had a lot of conversations.
  • 00:28:31
    We've been -- we've seen people.
  • 00:28:33
    We've tried new behaviors, we've done new behaviors,
  • 00:28:36
    and we've always done those kind of things
  • 00:28:37
    to one degree or another.
  • 00:28:38
    And they've had some good effect.
  • 00:28:40
    But something happened within the last six months
  • 00:28:43
    to give us a breakthrough.
  • 00:28:44
    We are more intimate and more in love
  • 00:28:46
    and having a better marriage maybe than we ever have.
  • 00:28:49
    It was a breakthrough by the grace of God,
  • 00:28:51
    not a breakthrough by me, not a breakthrough by her,
  • 00:28:55
    a breakthrough by the grace of God.
  • 00:28:56
    And it's not like things were awful either,
  • 00:28:58
    they just went to another level.
  • 00:29:01
    I had -- I've had in the last year,
  • 00:29:03
    I've been a part of more miraculous healings
  • 00:29:06
    than I ever have in any other year.
  • 00:29:08
    It's been a crazy year with that.
  • 00:29:10
    One time I was around praying with a group of people,
  • 00:29:13
    a person who was sick.
  • 00:29:14
    We had our hands on him and we were praying for him
  • 00:29:17
    and we got done, "Okay. And anything different?"
  • 00:29:19
    He said, "No, nothing different."
  • 00:29:20
    Asked him the next day, "Anything different?"
  • 00:29:22
    "No, nothing different."
  • 00:29:23
    I said, "Okay, well, that's the way it goes most of the time.
  • 00:29:25
    It's called a miracle.
  • 00:29:26
    It's not called a way you pray to always have what you want."
  • 00:29:29
    Well, what do you know?
  • 00:29:30
    One of the people who was there around that group
  • 00:29:32
    as we were praying has had a hearing problem,
  • 00:29:34
    she's had no hearing in one of her ears for,
  • 00:29:38
    I think, her whole life, at least years and years.
  • 00:29:40
    As we were praying for God's healing,
  • 00:29:43
    she got healed of her hearing.
  • 00:29:44
    And she has a 100% hearing in both ears.
  • 00:29:47
    That is, friends, is called a breakthrough.
  • 00:29:49
    That's what that is.
  • 00:29:50
    And it's not something that you can manufacture.
  • 00:29:53
    It's not something that you can strong arm.
  • 00:29:56
    I am right now -- I am --
  • 00:30:00
    Well, I'm officially part of
  • 00:30:02
    the Association of American Retired People. I am.
  • 00:30:06
    I'm not actually paying dues,
  • 00:30:09
    but I've been getting their letters for years now.
  • 00:30:12
    Bothers me every time it comes in the mail, bothers me.
  • 00:30:15
    But yes, I am 57 years old.
  • 00:30:17
    And to many of you, that makes me a very, very old man.
  • 00:30:21
    And at minimum, I'm older than I was last year.
  • 00:30:25
    And you are, too.
  • 00:30:27
    And you're going to be older next year
  • 00:30:29
    than you are right now.
  • 00:30:31
    Something happens to you as you age,
  • 00:30:33
    where you get more set in your ways
  • 00:30:36
    and you justify the beliefs you've always had
  • 00:30:39
    and you try to conserve what you have,
  • 00:30:42
    you try to conserve your way of life.
  • 00:30:44
    And what this does is it keeps you from having
  • 00:30:46
    a breakthrough and dreaming about a future.
  • 00:30:50
    It keeps you from stretching yourself
  • 00:30:53
    and trying new things to bring about something that is new.
  • 00:30:58
    And the Book of Acts Chapter one it talks about
  • 00:31:01
    what happens in later times when the Spirit of God
  • 00:31:05
    gets upon His people who have Jesus.
  • 00:31:07
    Here's what it says:
  • 00:31:25
    What does it mean to dream a dream?
  • 00:31:26
    It's not the stupid crazy ones I have
  • 00:31:28
    that mean nothing inside of my bed at night.
  • 00:31:31
    It means old men, old women, older people
  • 00:31:35
    who are set in their ways and who just have
  • 00:31:37
    a certain belief and conviction about things,
  • 00:31:40
    new things will pop up in your minds.
  • 00:31:42
    New ideas.
  • 00:31:43
    I've had more new ideas and new things I want to do
  • 00:31:45
    over the last five months I've had since I was 40,
  • 00:31:48
    30 years old, I've had in this area a breakthrough.
  • 00:31:51
    Now, these are just three of my legitimate,
  • 00:31:53
    real breakthroughs that I would not have seen coming
  • 00:31:56
    six months ago or 12 months ago.
  • 00:31:59
    And I say this to encourage you.
  • 00:32:00
    There are things that
  • 00:32:01
    you may not be able to understand and fathom.
  • 00:32:04
    I tell you what, if Jesus can come and break into the world,
  • 00:32:09
    He can break into your life
  • 00:32:11
    and He can break something through your life.
  • 00:32:14
    The birth of Jesus in a town called Bethlehem
  • 00:32:18
    with a baby placed in a manger tells us about
  • 00:32:26
    the love of God for you and how God has come for you
  • 00:32:29
    and how God is for you.
  • 00:32:32
    We have to believe that He loves us
  • 00:32:35
    and believe that Christmas means there is
  • 00:32:38
    a new breakthrough coming.
  • 00:32:40
    Now, again, I want us to have another minute here,
  • 00:32:42
    and I want you to take out your little paper
  • 00:32:44
    that you got again.
  • 00:32:45
    You wrote down
  • 00:32:46
    maybe something you want to break through before.
  • 00:32:48
    And now I'd like you to take that paper
  • 00:32:50
    and I'd like you to pray.
  • 00:32:52
    Just write down a prayer.
  • 00:32:53
    Maybe just tell God right now how you're feeling,
  • 00:32:55
    what you're thinking.
  • 00:32:56
    Or tell Him just silently, if you want to murmur it,
  • 00:32:59
    where you are right now.
  • 00:33:01
    God, I pray, as You have a mind to read
  • 00:33:04
    all of these sheets of paper
  • 00:33:07
    and you have the ear to hear every prayer.
  • 00:33:12
    Lord, we're wanting breakthrough.
  • 00:33:37
    [music: God of the Breakthrough]
  • 00:37:31
    - The other thing that happens in the Christmas story
  • 00:37:33
    again and again is worship.
  • 00:37:36
    Whenever you have a breakthrough,
  • 00:37:38
    whenever something happens that you can't determine,
  • 00:37:41
    that you can't dictate, that you can't control,
  • 00:37:44
    you're reminded that there's a God and you're not Him.
  • 00:37:48
    And you're reminded that there's an entity
  • 00:37:50
    that's brought about the miracle of Christmas
  • 00:37:52
    and maybe bringing about the breakthrough for you,
  • 00:37:54
    and He's worthy of being worshiped.
  • 00:37:56
    Just like earlier I mentioned that time and again,
  • 00:37:59
    people are afraid at this initial breakthrough
  • 00:38:01
    of Christmas, the other thing that happens
  • 00:38:03
    over and over again is they worship.
  • 00:38:06
    That means they choose to put themselves
  • 00:38:09
    under a God who always has been above them,
  • 00:38:12
    they just recognize it.
  • 00:38:13
    They put themselves under God,
  • 00:38:15
    and then they lift their hearts up to God.
  • 00:38:18
    They say things to Him as the angels say things to God
  • 00:38:22
    in the presence of the shepherd of,
  • 00:38:24
    "Glory to God in the highest."
  • 00:38:26
    They sing things, or as the Magi, they kneel down.
  • 00:38:31
    They kneeled before this child,
  • 00:38:34
    who they may be older than,
  • 00:38:36
    but they are far, far less than.
  • 00:38:40
    They actually bring gifts and blessed Him with them.
  • 00:38:43
    It says this in the book of Matthew 2:10:
  • 00:38:46
    And when they saw the star,
  • 00:38:48
    they rejoiced exceedingly with joy.
  • 00:38:50
    This is what worship does for us.
  • 00:38:51
    We put ourselves under God, we rejoice.
  • 00:38:55
    And going into the house,
  • 00:38:57
    they saw the child with Mary, his mother,
  • 00:38:59
    and they fell down and worshiped Him.
  • 00:39:01
    And then opening their treasures,
  • 00:39:03
    they offered Him gifts,
  • 00:39:06
    gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh.
  • 00:39:10
    The greatest gift that we can give
  • 00:39:12
    the one who is giving us or will give us a breakthrough
  • 00:39:16
    or already did give us a spiritual breakthrough
  • 00:39:19
    over 2000 years ago is our hearts,
  • 00:39:22
    and our hearts in worship.
  • 00:39:24
    That's we're going to do right now.
  • 00:39:25
    We're going to spend some time
  • 00:39:26
    worshiping Him with our voices.
  • 00:39:29
    He doesn't care how bad your voice sounds.
  • 00:39:32
    He doesn't even care how great your voice sounds.
  • 00:39:34
    He just loves to hear your voice.
  • 00:39:36
    And He knows that your voice is you give it to Him,
  • 00:39:38
    you're giving it to him as an offering of worship.
  • 00:39:41
    You're telling him, "God, I want your power
  • 00:39:44
    and I want to acknowledge Your power.
  • 00:39:46
    That's what I'm putting myself under You and singing."
  • 00:39:49
    So why don't we stand right now?
  • 00:39:52
    And why don't we worship Him together?
  • 00:40:04
    - All right, let's put our hands together.
  • 00:40:07
    Kids in the room, why don't you stand on a chair.
  • 00:40:09
    We're going to have some fun. Let's celebrate. Come on.
  • 00:40:13
    [music: Joy to the World]
  • 00:43:34
    - Let's sing to this King Jesus.
  • 00:43:37
    [music: Reign Above It All]
  • 00:48:55
    - Those words, you reign above it all, they're true.
  • 00:48:58
    They're true and they're true about
  • 00:49:00
    those dark spots in your and my life.
  • 00:49:02
    Those dark spots in your and my history.
  • 00:49:05
    And so what we're about to do, lighting candles,
  • 00:49:08
    isn't just a Christmas tradition.
  • 00:49:10
    It's actually a beautiful representation of God
  • 00:49:12
    bringing light and life to those dark places.
  • 00:49:16
    A candle on its own is nothing to write home about.
  • 00:49:18
    It's inert, it's dead, there's nothing there.
  • 00:49:21
    But when you light it, it can spread.
  • 00:49:25
    It can bring light and life and peace to whatever space.
  • 00:49:30
    And that spreads from person to person.
  • 00:49:31
    So I want you to light those candles now
  • 00:49:34
    as a spiritual representation of the breakthrough
  • 00:49:36
    and the light that God's bring into your life.
  • 00:49:38
    And watch as we do that together.
  • 00:49:58
    [music: O Holy Night]
  • 00:55:13
    - Go ahead and blow out your candles.
  • 00:55:14
    We're going to continue worshiping.
  • 00:55:31
    Let's sing this song together.
  • 00:55:34
    [O Come All Ye Faithful]
  • 01:00:07
    - Well, hey, we hope you enjoyed today
  • 01:00:08
    and that something impacted you in a powerful way.
  • 01:00:11
    If that's the case for you, I'd love to hear from you.
  • 01:00:14
    Shoot me an email, Andy.Reider@crossroads.net.
  • 01:00:16
    I want to connect with you.
  • 01:00:17
    And we want to do anything and everything we can
  • 01:00:19
    to encourage you in your spiritual adventure with God.
  • 01:00:22
    Hey, we do stuff like this all the time.
  • 01:00:24
    We actually have an amazing New Year service
  • 01:00:26
    coming up next week.
  • 01:00:28
    Make sure you check it out. Merry Christmas.

Dec 23, 2022 1 hr 33 sec

Recent Series