If you have your Bibles, I want you to turn to Isaiah chapter 9.
! Isaiah chapter 9.
That's so good, I wouldn't even need to preach.
We could just go home, but we're not.
When I was a kid, I didn't get a whole lot in the mail.
But there were two exciting things that came in the mail every year.
The most exciting thing that came in the mail was a department store catalog.
Now, I'm not sure about part of this,
but I think that Alexander's on Pleasantburg Drive used to have one.
I think we got one.
I'm seeing some shagings of their heads.
And man, they had a killer toy section.
And I loved it.
But I know that we got a Sears and Roebuck catalog.
Now, let me explain.
If you call it Sears and Roebuck, you're old, okay?
The time I came around, it was Sears on Stone Avenue.
And they had dropped the Roebuck.
But I always knew when I was talking to old people,
they'd say, we're going to Sears and Roebuck.
And I'm like, who's Roebuck?
But Sears was the place.
And man, they had a catalog.
And I would get that catalog and turn to the back of it that came close to Christmas time.
And I'd get that catalog and circle all the toys.
I mean, if you wanted to know what I needed for Christmas,
just go check out the Sears catalog, you know?
Because you knew what that was.
It was fabulous.
And the second most exciting thing that ever came,
and I don't know if it came in the mail or they left it on the doorstep,
but that was the phone book.
And every year we'd get a phone book.
And I loved the phone book because it proved I existed.
We were real.
And when you've got a name like I've got,
you wonder if it's even going to be in there.
And if you are, can you even find it?
Will they spell it right?
Well, they send you a bill.
Old Mama Bell sends you a bill every month.
They knew how to spell your name.
They got it right every time.
But you get the phone book.
Now, since I've been back in Pickens,
I think I've got one phone book.
And I don't know if that was because the people before me had a home phone,
and I just stayed on the line.
And I don't know if they just every now and then go,
hey, I think we'll send out some phone books.
And that thing was minuscule.
I mean, it was tiny because it has home phone numbers in it,
and nobody has home phones anymore.
Now, if you do, you're not a nobody.
I don't mean that.
But I'm just saying, not many people have a home phone anymore at all.
And so the reality is we don't get them.
But listen, there were no cell phones.
Now, some of you are shocked.
There were no cell phones in those days, okay?
So if you had a phone, it was either sitting on a table
or it was sitting on a wall, one or the other,
and your number was in the phone book.
That is unless you paid to have it unlisted.
And if you paid to have it unlisted, you were either very important
or you just didn't like people, one or the other.
I mean, just one way or the other.
But on the front page of that phone book was the number for the police,
the number for the fire, the number for the ambulance, medical treatment.
And in case of emergency, you either had to go find that book
or a lot of people, they didn't have Post-its in those days,
but a lot of people would make them a Post-it.
They'd take a piece of paper, write down the police number,
write down the fire number.
You got to have the city police, the county police, fire,
write all that down and tape it on a wall beside their phone.
There was a lot of that going on in people's homes, you know?
But if you didn't know, you better know where the phone book was
because if you had emergency, you had to go look up that number.
Now, some of you all are looking at me like, he's lost it.
It's a different world.
And the rest of you know exactly what I'm talking about.
Today, if you need anything, just call 911.
They started trying to create that number before I was even born,
but it didn't come around until after I was grown.
But now all calls to 911 go to the same dispatch service
that then sends it where it needs to go.
And the needs that come in are interesting, to say the least.
But someone has summarized those calls
into four different type of calls that they get.
Some call for guidance.
They just don't know what to do.
There's a situation.
They just don't know what to do, and they won't guide it.
So they call 911.
Other people call because they can't help themselves.
They're in a situation where they need somebody with greater power
than they have to take care of something, and so they call 911.
Then there are calls of, for lack of a better term, relational collapse.
I mean, it may be a domestic disturbance.
It may be a child worried about a child,
or maybe somebody's ran away and they've been gone too long,
or walked away and been gone too long,
or we're concerned about somebody's safety,
and so we call, or custody crisis, and those types,
all those things.
They get those kind of calls, ugly calls, okay?
And then other calls come because of chaos.
There's just confusion and panic,
and they just need peace.
Now, we hadn't been here long when we woke up one morning,
I mean, woke up one evening after we went to bed,
to carbon monoxide detectors going off, okay?
We had two of them, and both of them were going off,
and they were going off in stereo,
so it was like it was reverberating.
And the first thought that I have,
if a fire alarm goes off,
is just wave at it a little while,
and it'll go off, you know?
It's kind of what my thought is.
What do you do with a carbon monoxide detector?
How do you handle that?
And so, what do you wave?
And you can't see it, and you can't taste it,
and you don't know,
and you just grow real tired thinking about what it is.
You know, that's what carbon monoxide does to you.
So I couldn't ignore it,
even though I wanted to go to bed.
I had to do something.
So what did I do?
I called 911, and I called them apologetically, you know?
I'm sorry to bother you,
but we got carbon monoxide detectors going off,
and if it was one of them,
if my family would have let me,
which they probably wouldn't have,
I probably would have unplugged it and went back to bed,
but it was two of them,
and so it was a different matter.
So they said, no, we'll come, you know?
It was about this time of year,
and so they, and it was cold outside,
and so they came,
and they had a detector.
The firemen came,
and they had a detector,
and they walked in the house,
and yeah,
so you got some things going on.
It's not bad,
but you got some things going on.
They went down in our basement,
our utility basement,
and they walked around,
and they went,
oh, yeah, yeah, yeah,
you got a problem.
You need to go outside,
and I said,
it's cold outside.
They said,
no, you need to go outside.
You need to get out of here.
So I said,
Lord, I hope I filled up the car.
So we went out
and sat in the car for a little while,
and they brought in a fan,
a big fan,
and he told the guy with the fan,
he said,
don't put it in front of that Christmas tree.
You'll blow it out the door.
Thank God they didn't do that.
That would have been interesting,
but anyway,
they put that fan down
and blew that through the house.
I don't know,
for quite a while.
They hung out a long time,
and then they said,
all right, yeah, all right,
and we figured out
what was the problem,
and we had to get some things worked on
and all that stuff,
but we worked out all that stuff,
and they said,
I think you'll be all right.
Crack a window,
and so we cracked some windows
and went to bed freezing,
but it was scary.
I mean,
it was just,
it was kind of chaotic.
We just didn't know.
Didn't know what the deal was,
and didn't know how to handle it.
That's a 911 call.
They're used to that kind of stuff,
so it seems like
that every emergency call
that is made
is a search for
someone who knows,
someone who's able,
someone who cares,
or someone who can bring order.
Well,
I know somebody
who can handle all that,
and the prophet Isaiah
spoke of him
700 years
before he came
as a babe
in a manger.
Jesus came to us,
and what a blessing we have,
and it's worth celebrating
this Christmas.
Isaiah chapter 9,
verse 6 says,
For to us
a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government
shall be upon his shoulder,
and his name
shall be called
Wonderful Counselor,
Mighty God,
Everlasting Father,
Prince of Peace.
Let's pray together.
Heavenly Father,
I pray this morning
that you'll help us
not only to enjoy
the babe in a manger
and what all
that Christmas means,
but God,
I also hope
that you'll allow us
to see the Savior
and how you're involved
in our lives
and what you are for us
and help us
to respond in obedience
as you speak to us.
In Jesus' name,
amen.
If you are in search
of one who knows,
we have in Christ
a wonder
of a counselor.
That is literally
what it says.
And when it's translated
wonderful,
what does it mean
by wonderful?
Well, the word there
for wonderful
in Hebrew
is Pele.
Much like the soccer star
of, I guess,
the 70s,
one of the great ones,
is pronounced
and transliterated
in the same way
as that old soccer star,
but it means
marvelous
beyond human expectation,
something
that only
God
can do,
something we can't explain.
It is a word
that is used
in the Hebrew.
It is reserved
for the holy things
that God
can do.
And he is
truly wonderful.
I mean,
everything about him
is full of wonder.
He was born
like no other
from a virgin.
He lived
like no other.
He was sinless.
He knows
like no other.
He's all-knowing.
He is able
like no other.
He has all power.
He loves
like no other.
He actually
is love.
He died
like no other.
He is
he was innocent.
He rose again
like no other,
unprompted,
unassisted,
independently.
He rose.
And he gave
victory like no other
because his victory
is consuming
and eternal.
It is
the wonder
of the God-man.
Not 50%
God,
50% man,
but 100% God
and 100% man.
He is
beyond our
understanding,
beyond our
comprehension,
more than we
can imagine.
He was brought
into the world
by a woman,
yet he formed
her in her
mother's womb.
He was laid
in a manger,
yet the tree
that made
the manger
came from
wood that
existed because
he spoke it
into being.
a star
marked
his arrival,
yet he's
the one
that flung
the stars
into their
places.
And we're
not even out
of the manger
yet,
folks.
I'm telling
you,
our God
is amazing.
Yet it says
he came to
the earth
as to be
our counselor.
Wouldn't it
be nice to
be able to
go to a
counselor that
knew all
things?
I know
one.
I mean,
wouldn't it
be great to
go to a
counselor that
knew our
problems before
we even spoke
them?
I know
one.
One that
would,
we could
hide nothing
from,
and yet
still accepts
us as
we are?
I know
one.
One who
would be
thorough,
and one
who would
be just,
and one
who would
be honest,
and one
who would
be loving.
Thank God
I know
one.
And
scripture
tells us
how he
can understand
us.
It reassures
us again
and again
all over
scripture.
Isaiah
chapter 53
verse 3
says,
he was
despised and
rejected by
men, a
man of
sorrow and
acquainted with
grief as
one from
whom men
hid their
faces and
hide their
faces and
he was
despised and
we esteemed
him not.
You go to
the New
Testament and
the Hebrew
writer in
Hebrew 4
verse 15
says,
for we
don't have a
high priest
who's unable
to sympathize with
our weaknesses
but one
who in
every respect
has been
tempted as
we are
yet without
sin.
I understand
something about
that friend.
The reality
is he
understands our
circumstances.
promises.
I love what
1 John 1
9 says that
if we confess
our sins he's
faithful and
just to forgive
us of our
sins and
cleanse us
from all
unrighteousness
and what that
passage means
is so powerful
because I'm
thankful if he
was able but
not willing we'd
be in a mess.
and if he was
willing but not
able we'd be in
the same mess.
But scripture
says that he's
faithful and
just.
That means he's
willing and
able to
forgive us of
our sins and
then to cleanse us
from all
unrighteousness.
And I'll tell you
we get so good at
sinning that if we
go home and try to
write down every
sin that is in our
life and every sin
that we commit we're
going to miss some.
And that's why I
like the last phrase
in that passage.
Cleanses us from
all unrighteousness.
You see that's the
high priest that
goes on our behalf
understands our
circumstances and
has been there.
Don't ever think
well I'm in sin but
my sin's different.
It's justified.
Somehow nobody else
has ever experienced
this and mine's a
unique case and
somehow it's okay.
All of that is of
the evil one.
There's a Greek word
for that.
Baloney.
It's a bunch of
baloney.
It ain't true.
And the reality is
a sin's a sin and
thank God we serve a
savior that understands
us better than we
understand ourselves
and can sympathize
with our weaknesses
and in every respect
understands what we're
going through.
It don't stop there.
Psalm 34 verse 18
says the Lord is
near to the broken
hearted and he saves
the crushed in spirit.
And then Jesus said
in Matthew 11, 28, 29
come to me all who
labor and are heavy
laden and I'll give you
rest.
Take my yoke upon you
and learn from me for I
am gentle and lowly in
heart and you will find
rest for your souls.
You know what a yoke is.
You put a pair of oxen in
a yoke and they will pull
the burden whatever it may
be.
And what he says is you
get yoked up with me.
My yoke is easy.
I'll take the weight.
I'll take the burden.
That term also is used
of those who sat under a
rabbi and took upon his
teaching and his
instruction and did what
he told them to do.
He took on the yoke of the
rabbi.
In the same way, if you'll
dedicate yourselves to
follow what the word of God
says, he'll guide you all
the way.
He'll make it easy along
the way.
We serve a wonderful God, a
wonder of a counselor in
Christ.
When we're in crisis or the
weight of life itself comes
upon us, we need somebody
who's able.
We need a mighty God.
I call it the God of all.
He is a mighty God.
The passage we looked at
last week in the first part
of this verse talks about a
royal son that would be
given and he'd take charge of
the government and he'd be
not only that but a
wonderful advisor and as we
just talked about, a
counselor.
Now how do we know that he
was talking about Christ and
not some earthly king?
Because you've got to be
careful with prophecy.
A lot of people are not
careful with prophecy and it
sells to write books about
prophecy.
People are enamored with
knowing what's going to
happen around the corner of
tomorrow because we don't
know what's going to happen
tomorrow.
So man, if somebody can tell
us and they can base it on
scripture, we'll buy it up and
eat it up, okay?
But we need to be careful with
prophecy because the reality is
when Isaiah spoke, he was
speaking to people that were
sitting before him when he
spoke.
And God gave him a message
for those people.
When Paul wrote the book of
Ephesians, you know who he
wrote it to?
He wrote it to the church of
Ephesus.
He didn't write it to us
directly.
He wrote it to the church of
Ephesus.
It helped us a lot to
understand what was going on
in Ephesus and understand how
they heard it.
And then as the seminary
professor told me years ago,
filter it through the first
audience and then understand
how it relates to you.
Now, through the power and the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit
and through the perfection of
scripture, it does relate to us.
And there is a message there,
but we need to understand that
when folks spoke hundreds of
years ago about what was to
come, are they talking about
what was coming in their day?
Are they talking about what was
coming in the next generation?
That's been many generations
ago.
Or were they talking about our
future?
It's fascinating how people deal
with that.
So it's very easy to look at
this passage and think,
Isaiah must be talking about a
king that's coming soon, you
know.
Well, this passage, this phrase
gives it away.
He's not talking about an
earthly king.
He's talking about a mighty
God.
It exposes the real issue.
It's not just a promise that a
king is coming, but that God
himself is incarnate.
The mighty God.
That word might is often used
when speaking of a fierce
warrior, unbeatable, one that
wins the battles.
We should never believe that we
can win our own battles on our
own.
The spiritual battles that we face
are beyond our strength and
beyond our ability.
The apostle Paul put it this way
in Ephesians 6 verse 12.
He said,
For we don't wrestle against flesh
and blood, but against the
rulers, against the authorities,
against the cosmic powers of this
present darkness, against the
spiritual forces of evil in the
heavenly places.
Folks, this is beyond us.
This is not a battle for us to
fight on our own.
And I'm thankful today that we
have a mighty God who's taken
upon our battles.
He's taken them upon himself and
won them.
And the question is, do we rely
upon him to have victory in our
lives?
Because some of us are fighting the
same battles that we've been
fighting since before we knew
Christ.
On January the 8th, 1815, there
were many skirmishes and smaller
territorial battles that the
Americans profoundly defeated the
British in the Battle of New
Orleans.
And it was the last chapter in the
war of 1812, or so it seemed.
What a chapter it was.
The British suffered 2,000
casualties in that battle.
The Americans suffered 71.
Thank you very much.
It seemed to be the tell-all.
But what those soldiers did not
know on that battlefield was that
the war was already over.
The treaty of Ghent had been signed
on Christmas Eve two weeks before
that ended the war.
And due to a lack of communication
in those days, the message did not
get out.
And hundreds died fighting a battle
that they didn't have to fight
because the war was already over.
Folks, when I read about that, I
think, how many Christians do the
same thing?
How many of us are fighting battles
that we don't have to fight?
We're continuing in hand-to-spirit
combat, trying to win battles.
When the war's over, we serve a
mighty God.
A mighty God that came to this earth
to live, to die, to rise again, to
claim us victory.
So fight no more.
Your mighty God has already run.
Just surrender to your mighty God.
He's claimed your victory.
When we're in a crisis or the weight
of life itself is upon us, we need
somebody to not only be mighty and
win the battles, but we also need
somebody who's able and somebody who
cares.
We need the Father of time, the
everlasting Father.
With the promise of Jesus came the
promise of the revelation of God the
Father, the Trinity of the Godhead.
It's hard for the finite man to
grasp.
However, it is well worth pondering.
God in one being in three distinct
persons.
The Father gives all authority to the
Son and bears witness to Him, as does
Jesus to Himself.
Yet the Son claims nothing for Himself.
He gives all glory to the Father who
has sent Him.
The Father glorifies the Son.
The Son glorifies the Father.
The Father and the Son defer to the
Holy Spirit, who in turn glorifies and
defers to the Father and the Son in the
oneness that is eternally dynamic and
inexhaustible.
It is an amazing wonder.
And if you tell me that you understand all
of that, you're lying.
Because it is beyond us.
We believe it by faith.
As the Word of God teaches us.
But the question is, if they're distinct, why
is Christ called the everlasting Father here?
Well, let the Word speak for itself.
Colossians 2 verse 9 and 10 says this,
For in Him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.
In Him is Christ, by the way.
And you've been filled in Him who is the head of all rule
and authority.
Jesus Himself put it this way in John 14, 9.
He said, whoever has seen me has seen the Father.
In John chapter 10 verse 30, He says, I and the Father are one.
The title Father means originator.
It means the source.
In other words, God is the source of all of eternity.
He's the Father of all time.
The origin of all existence.
If you look at the front of your Bible, you'll notice in the
beginning it says that God said, let us make man in our own
image.
In our own image.
Who's He talking to?
He's not speaking to the angels.
We're not made into the image of angels.
And I don't want to go down this rabbit hole, but we don't
become angels when we die.
So don't say God needed another angel when somebody that you
love dies.
Because you don't become angels.
You weren't an angel on earth.
You ain't going to be an angel in glory, you know.
He wasn't talking to the angels.
Was He speaking to the animals?
We're not made in the image of animals.
Some folks act like it, but we're not.
We're not made in the image of animals.
We're not made in the image of trees.
Now what we see there in the very beginning of the book is we see
the Godhead.
That Christ was in the beginning.
As John chapter 1 tells us, the Word was with God.
The Word was God.
He's always been.
I mean, it may look like a manger born boy died on the cross and
is gone, but don't be deceived.
He died, but He rose again.
And He rules and He reigns as the everlasting Father.
He is forever God.
Forever present.
Forever sovereign.
And He'll never leave us.
He'll never forsake us.
He'll never let us down.
He'll never die.
He'll never disappear.
He is forever.
Forever.
And the promise of the manger is this, that the eternal Father is
so personal, so loving, so caring for you and for me that He
stepped down onto our level, into our time, through our world,
and in our flesh to make us eternally His.
And when you need someone who knows, you may say, nobody gets me.
You're wrong.
When you need somebody that knows He's a wonder of a counselor.
Literally what it says, a wonder of a counselor.
When you need somebody who's able, He's a mighty God.
And when you need somebody who will never leave you, people will let you down.
Even when they try their best, they'll let you down.
He'll never let you down.
He's an everlasting Father.
All we need is found in the hope of Christ.
I heard about a hiker who was hiking in the mountains.
And he had a good map, and he had what he thought was a reliable compass.
But the compass apparently had been put in his pocket with other things,
and it had something else metal or magnetized, had magnetized the needle in the wrong direction.
Just a little bit, but in the wrong direction on that compass.
And so every time he checked it, it looked right.
It didn't act chaotic.
It looked right.
But every time he checked it, it looked right.
But it felt right.
The needle settled just like it was supposed to.
But it was always pointing in the wrong direction a little bit, just a little bit.
Now, I want you to understand something.
If a compass is supposed to point this way and instead points this way,
the average hiker in the mountains after an hour will be 1,000 feet from where he's supposed to be.
And this fellow had been doing it for hours and hours.
And thankfully, a ranger found him.
And when the ranger found him, he explained to him.
He said, your compass did not fail dramatically.
It was just off enough to take you far from where you needed to be.
And that's the way life is.
We follow our feelings.
We follow our instincts.
We follow our best guesses.
And sometimes they look right.
And sometimes they feel right.
And sometimes they seem right.
But they can lead us where we never intended to go.
And it does not have to be that way.
Because Jesus is a wonder of a counselor.
He knows the right path.
He is the mighty God.
He has the strength to rescue us.
He is the everlasting Father.
He walks with us and guides us all the way home.
And I can't wait next week to tell you for Christmas about the Prince of Peace.
He is our Christmas hope.
He is our life hope.
The gift of Christmas is Jesus.
And the hope that we have in this life is Jesus.
Unto us, he is exactly what we need.
And I'm thankful today that he's here for us.
If you've never surrendered your life to the Lord Jesus Christ.
You've never confessed your sins to him as I mentioned a little while ago.
You've never asked him to forgive you, to come into your life and to save you and to change you.
I want you to know, he'll meet you where you are if you'll surrender your life to him today.
He hears your prayer.
Lord, I need you to forgive me, to cleanse me, to change my life.
And from this day forward, I'll live my life to please you in all I do.
I won't do it perfectly.
But your word tells me that the Spirit of God will empower me to be what you would have me to be.
If you've never done that, I encourage you in a minute, we're going to stand and we're going to sing.
And you come and say, Pastor, I need to give my life to Christ.
Maybe you have done that, but you've never acknowledged it publicly.
You've never told him about it.
And Jesus, by his commission and by his example, tells us that the way that we tell other people to do it is through baptism.
If you've never been baptized as a believer, as we stand and sing in just a moment, you come and say,
Pastor, I'd love to join this church by baptism.
I want to publicly profess my faith as Scripture dictates for me to do.
We won't do that today.
We'll line it up later.
But you come today.
Maybe you're like the Stale family that went on earlier worship today that God drew to this church.
Maybe you say, I've been visiting here and I feel like God would have me to be a part of this church.
You come.
As we stand and say, you come and obey God in that.
Or maybe you're here today.
And you know you're a Christian.
And you know you've been baptized.
And you know you're where you're supposed to be.
But yet there's something in your life that ain't where it's supposed to be.
Whatever it is, he can handle it.
You may not be able to handle it.
I may not be able to handle it.
We may not be able to handle it.
He can handle it.
So give it to him.
Where you stand at this altar with a pastor praying for you.
However, give it to him today.
Lord Jesus, I love you.
Thank you for your word.
Thank you for the gift of Christ.
Help us to respond in obedience, God.
In Jesus' name, amen.