If you’ve been to almost any store lately, you know that Christmas is on its way. Given the stakes for many retailers, it’s not surprising that so many stores begin their preparations for Christmas earlier and earlier every year. According to the National Retail Federation, the holiday season of November and December can account for as much as 25-40% of annual sales for many retailers.
Some of you who aren’t procrastinators have already begun your preparations for Christmas as well. And many of the rest of us will be joining you soon. There is the cleaning, the re-arranging of furniture, the decorating, the baking, and, of course, the shopping. And while there is nothing inherently wrong with any of those things, I wonder how many of us put that same kind of time, effort and resources into preparing spiritually for Christmas. Because for our unchurched and unsaved family members, co-workers, neighbors and friends, the stakes could not be higher.
The reason that I’m taking a break from our journey through the book of Revelation to share a series of three Christmas messages so far before Christmas is because I want to challenge all of us to approach the Christmas season differently this year. My prayer is that all of us will use this season as an opportunity to focus on how we can take advantage of this time of year to share the gospel of Jesus with those whom God has placed into our lives. And that is going to take some advance planning, preparation and prayer that can’t wait until we’ve already been caught up in the worldly hype of the season.
Someone once said that Christmas is a time when we exchange a whole lot of gifts we really like for a load we don’t want. I don’t know about you, but the greater challenge and source of stress over the years for me has been to try and find just the right present to give to others. So like many others, it seems like I’ve just resorted to buying gift cards that will allow others to buy whatever they want for themselves. But there is one gift that really lives up to the claim that “one size fits all”, a gift that every single person regardless of age, gender, religion, skin color, position, or financial position actually needs. It is the gift that Paul wrote about in 2 Corinthians:
Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!
2 Corinthians 9:15 (ESV)
Over the next three weeks, we’ll take some time to look at three aspects of that inexpressible gift. It is a sacrificial gift. It is a relational gift. And it is an eternal gift. It is a gift that has been offered by God to every person here on the face of this earth. But the problem is that there are a lot of those people who have never opened up that gift. And it is our responsibility as well as our privilege to help them open up that gift.
Since we know that people tend to be more open to think about spiritual things and about Jesus during the Christmas season, I want to encourage all of us to take advantage of that opportunity over the next month and a half or so. The messages over the next three weeks are designed to both encourage us and equip us to be able to do that. As part of that process, we are also planning a Christmas Eve service that is specifically designed to be a safe place to bring unchurched family members and friends to hear a clear presentation of the gospel. So I want to encourage you to begin thinking right now about those you can invite and to begin to pray for those people on a consistent basis.
With all that in mind, let’s begin this process by looking at the first aspect of God’s inexpressible gift to us:
JESUS’ SACRIFICIAL GIFT
There are many Scriptures that we could go to this morning that would demonstrate what a sacrificial gift God gave to us that very first Christmas, but we’ll look at just one this morning. Go ahead and turn in your Bibles to Philippians chapter 2.
This morning, we’ll be reading a portion of what may very well be the first recorded Christmas song. I agree with many Bible scholars who believe that verses 5-11 of this chapter come from a hymn which was well known in the early church. Follow along as I begin reading in verse 5:
5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Philippians 2:5-8 (ESV)
I think that we some time lose our sense of awe about what Jesus had to sacrifice in order to provide us with His inexpressible gift.
But this passage reminds us of how much it cost Jesus to come to earth and provide us with the gift of eternal life. Although that gift is free for us, Jesus paid an extremely high price in order to make that gift available to us.
Jesus sacrificed:
• His position
Although Jesus was 100% God, He willingly sacrificed that position in order to leave the glory of heaven and put on a human body and come down and live among the filth of this world.
There is really no way to illustrate just what a sacrifice that this was by using a human example. About the closest we could come would be to imagine if the President of the United States left all the privileges of his office – the Secret Service protection, the use of Air Force One, his driver, his personal chef, all of his other aides – and went down to South Tucson to live on the streets with the homeless. But even that doesn’t even begin to compare with Jesus sacrificing His position as God in order to come to earth and live as a human being who was subject to all the effects of sin in this world.
Jesus gave up everything that came with His position at the right hand of God the Father – the glory of being worshipped day and night, the unlimited power that He used to create the universe and his perpetual fellowship with His Father and the Holy Spirit among others.
• His privilege
Jesus’ privileges, His rights, were very much a part of His position as God. But as we see here in Philippians, Jesus made Himself nothing and took on the form of a servant. The word that Paul uses here is literally a bondservant – one who gives himself up to another’s will and who is devoted to the interests of another to the disregard of his own interests. In other words, Jesus was willing to give up all His rights so that He could serve the will of His Father.
Jesus left the total security of heaven to come to the earth and have His life be threatened by King Herod so that His family had to flee to Egypt. He came from the glory of heaven where He was worshipped by angels to have people hurl insults at Him. He came from heaven where He was the creator and sustainer of life to die a horrible death on a cross.
• His possessions
When Jesus left heaven to come to earth, He left behind all of His heavenly possessions. The God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills, the God who owns all the earth and everything in it, gave all that up to come to earth and be born to a family that was so poor that they had to lay him in a feeding trough when he was born. Instead of leading a life with unlimited resources in heaven, Jesus gave all that up to lead a life of poverty here on earth.
We can’t even begin to imagine the tremendous sacrifices that Jesus willingly made in order to provide His inexpressible gift. When I think about that, the question I want to ask is this: What was it that motivated Jesus to make these sacrifices? Although there are certainly many factors that motivated that sacrifice, let’s just focus on one of them this morning:
Jesus’ sacrifice was motivated by joy
The writer of Hebrews reveals that Jesus was motivated to make all these sacrifices by His joy:
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
Hebrews 12:1, 2 (ESV)
We are told that Jesus was able to endure the cross because of the joy that was set before Him. Although many of our English dictionaries equate joy and happiness, the Greek word for joy that the author uses here refers to more than just some emotional giddiness. Jesus certainly wasn’t happy about going to the cross. He didn’t have some warm, fuzzy feeling about that. So what was this joy that He experienced that allowed Him to make the sacrifices that He made?
It’s interesting that the Greek word “joy” comes from the same root word as the Greek word for “grace”. The idea here is that when one is a recipient of God’s grace, then joy is the natural byproduct. Jesus could have joy in the face of trials because He could look forward to the operation of God’s grace that would be demonstrated in His resurrection and ascension. And it is that joy that was the motivation for the sacrificial gift that He offers to all of mankind.
If we want to help others open up that inexpressible gift this Christmas season, then we too must be willing to make some sacrifices. So let’s see how we can use the example of Jesus to guide us as we make the sacrifices that are necessary to share the gospel with others over the next several weeks.
OUR SACRIFICIAL GIFT
Perhaps the best Biblical example of sacrifice for the sake of sharing the gospel is found in the words of Paul written to the church in Corinth. Turn in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 9 and follow along as I read beginning in verse 19:
19 For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. 20 To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. 21 To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. 22 To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. 23 I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.
1 Corinthians 9:19-23 (ESV)
In this passage, we find that Paul was willing to make exactly the same sacrifices that Jesus made in order to open up Jesus’ inexpressible gift to others – the same sacrifices we need to be willing to make to share the gospel with others.
I must be willing to sacrifice:
• My position
Even though Paul was a Jew and a Pharisee, he didn’t let his position keep Him from sharing the gospel with anyone who God brought into his life.
Near the end of his ministry, Paul emphasized that idea again. After he recounts all of the different positions he has achieved, he makes it clear that he is willing to give all of that up for the sake of the gospel:
Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ
Philippians 3:8 (ESV)
Our position in life can often be an obstacle in opening up the gift of eternal life to others. That can actually occur at two opposite ends of the spectrum.
First, the prospect of somehow losing a position of power or prestige can often inhibit us from being open about our faith in Jesus and in sharing the good news with others. When Paul writes that he became all things to all people, he doesn’t mean that he ever abandoned his identity as a follower of Jesus in order to get along with others. In fact, just the opposite was true. He was willing to give up whatever position he might have obtained in order to be identified with Jesus instead and to make sure that his position would never be a stumbling block to others.
There is also the other extreme in which many of us don’t feel adequate to share the gospel with others due to a lack of position or because of our inferior position to others. Perhaps we’re leery of sharing our faith with our boss because we are in an inferior position. Or maybe we’re reluctant to share the gift of eternal life with a parent or grandparent because of their position in the family.
Do you hold some position that you are reluctant to let go of? Is that keeping you from sharing Jesus with someone? Or have you been reluctant to share your faith with someone else because they are in some position over you? If either of those is true, then I want to challenge you to sacrifice your position so that you can help someone else open up God’s inexpressible gift this Christmas season.
• My privilege
Just like Jesus, Paul made himself a bondservant. He gave up his own rights in order to serve the interests of others at the expense of his own self interest. Paul had every right to hold onto his Jewish roots. But when He was sharing the gospel with non-Jews, he willingly surrendered those rights. Because he was mature in his faith, he had every right to look down upon those who were weak in their faith. But instead, he gave up that right and came down to their level in order to win them to Jesus.
I don’t know about you, but for me this may very well be the area of my life that is the most serious hindrance to my efforts to share my faith with others. Because we live in a culture that is so focused on our rights, it is easy for even those of us who are Christ followers to allow that attitude to permeate our lives.
But how many of my rights get in the way of sharing Jesus with those God brings into my life? I suppose, in a sense, we all have the right to spend our money as we see fit. We have a right to a time of peace and quiet where no one will bother us. We have a right to unwind after a hard day of work. We have a right to watch our favorite TV shows. We have a right not to be bothered by the loud music from our neighbor next door. We have a right to be angry with the person ahead of us in the express line with 42 items in their cart. We have a right to honk at the person who cut us off in traffic.
One of the things that we learn from Paul is that sharing our faith with others requires a commitment on our part. What Paul is describing in this passage is not some short term, one-shot approach. That is clearly demonstrated by the tremendous amount of time and effort that Paul invested in others in order to develop mature Christ followers.
Developing disciples of Jesus requires that same kind of investment in the lives of other people. And that is often messy. It requires us to get outside of our comfort zone and be willing to give up whatever rights are preventing us from making that commitment. If we want to be effective in developing disciples, we must take the time that is needed to build up trust with other people so that they will be willing to listen when we share the gospel with them.
What privileges, what rights, are you holding on to that are hindering your ability to share Jesus with others. Are you willing to give up those rights to help others open God’s inexpressible gift this Christmas season?
• My possessions
In spite of being in the midst of an economic recession, Americans plan to spend $714 million to buy Christmas gifts this year. And many Christians will be right in the thick of that as they sport their “Jesus is the Reason for the Season” buttons and t-shirts while they elbow others out of the way so they can buy some cheap foreign-made goods to give as gifts. And to make things even worse, many will buy those gifts with money they don’t have by using their credit cards. Somehow that just doesn’t seem to be the right way to honor the birth of our Savior.
Several months ago as I was thinking about how we could all be more effective in using this Christmas season to proclaim Jesus, I came across a movement called Advent Conspiracy that was developed by a group of three pastors in 2006 to redirect the commercialism of Christmas into efforts to actually serve the needs of people in the name of Jesus. Although I don’t necessarily buy into their whole program, the one thing that caught my attention was their encouragement to “spend less so we can give more.” The overall idea is that we should strive to spend less this Christmas so that we have more to give to serve the needs of people in the name of Jesus.
Although I certainly don’t want to establish some kind of legalistic program the idea of spending less so that we can be more effective in reaching others for Jesus is something that we all ought to consider. There are several ways that we might be able to do that:
o Spend less on decorations and entertaining. About the time I was working on this message this week, I was looking at an advertisement for some spiffy new Christmas decorations that were on sale. But I thought to myself: what a hypocrite that would be if I went out and bought those. I decided that our old decorations are just fine and I’ll save that money to put to better use.
o Spend less on gifts. That doesn’t mean that I have to completely give up giving gifts to others. Next week, we’ll talk some more about giving gifts that are relational and the good news is that those kinds of gifts are usually much less expensive than what we usually go out and buy at the store.
We’ve found some things in our family over the past several years that have really helped us to accomplish this. First, Mary and I have agreed not to by expensive gifts for each other. We limit our gifts to something inexpensive and then we’ve committed to use the money we save to buy toys for the Christmas party at the Gospel Rescue Mission. In our extended family, we decided a few years ago to quit buying gifts for all the adults. Instead, each person brings one inexpensive gift and we have a white elephant gift exchange. Not only have we all saved a lot of money, but we’ve had a lot of fun in the process.
I’m sure many of you have some ideas in this area, too. But whatever you do, are you willing to make sacrifices of your material possessions so that you can use those resources to help other people open God’s inexpressible gift this Christmas season?
In addition to these four elements that were demonstrated by the sacrifice of Jesus, there is one more element in our lives that we must be willing to sacrifice in order to share the gospel with others this Christmas season.
• My pride
Last week, we watched an episode of the TV show “Undercover Boss” in which the CEO of Lucky Strike Bowling put on a disguise and went undercover in his own company. In one segment, as part of his training for a new job, he was required to put on a bowling pin costume and go out on the street to promote the local franchise. As I watched that, I thought to myself that must be a pretty humbling experience for the CEO of the company. But I also wondered just how willing I would be to humble myself for the purpose of promoting my Savior, Jesus.
We certainly see that Paul was willing to go to whatever lengths he needed in order to share the gospel with others. He was not about to let his pride get in the way of his commission to make disciples. He was willing to associate with all kinds of people regardless of race, economic status, gender, heritage and spiritual maturity.
And the other thing we note is that Paul didn’t let the possibility of rejection keep him from his task. Look at verse 22 again. Paul says that he had become all things to all people so that he could win them all to Jesus. Right? No, he said he had become all things to all people so that he might win some. Paul understood that there would be those who rejected the gospel. But he didn’t allow that to become a blow to his pride that would deter him from the task that God had given to him.
The fact is that the more you share your faith with others, the more opportunities there will be for people to reject Jesus and the gospel. And that can be a terrible blow to our pride. But there will also be more opportunities for people to commit their lives to Jesus.
Are you willing to sacrifice your pride in order to help someone else open up Jesus’ inexpressible gift this Christmas season?
The idea of making sacrifices is not a real popular one in our culture today. And my goal this morning is not to try to get you to make these types of sacrifices out of a sense of duty or guilt. Instead, I want to encourage all of us to follow the example of Jesus.
I need to be motivated to make these sacrifices by joy
The reason that we ought to make these sacrifices in our lives is because, like Jesus, we can look forward to the results that our sacrifices will bring about. Even though these kinds of sacrifices aren’t easy and aren’t without some pain, we look forward to how God can use those sacrifices to help others open God’s inexpressible gift.
Paul writes something very interesting at the end of verse 23. He begins that verse by saying that he has made all these sacrifices for the sake of the gospel, but then he shares that the reason he did it was that he had the privilege of sharing in the blessings of the gospel for those who came to know Jesus as a result of his sacrifices. In other words, there was great joy in what he had chosen to do.
As we know from our study of Revelation, the apostle John certain suffered more than his share of trials and difficulties in his life. And yet when he considered the sacrifices that he had made in light of how God had used them, he wrote these words:
I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.
3 John 1:4 (ESV)
I pray that as we consider making the sacrifice of our position, our privileges, our possessions and our pride during this Christmas season in order to help others experience the great gift of all that we will be able to look back one day and say those very same words as we share in the blessing of the gospel with our spiritual children.
