Word Keeper

This is the final sermon in a 4 part series about Christmas and reconciliation.

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All is Well

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The Audio

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Romans 5:9-11

In the final clip, we see (or rather hear) the ending.

So far, we’ve seen Kevin be left behind, alienated from his family, his mom try to get back to him, and the story of Mr. Marley. … In this clip, Kevin wakes up on Christmas morning expecting his mom to be home, but is soon disappointed and then his mom walks in and they have good mother-son moment. After that, the rest of the family walks in and Kevin looks out the window to see Mr. Marley’s son’s family visiting Mr. Marley for Christmas. … Then Buzz, Kevin’s brother, finds what Kevin did to his room.

Has reconciliation come to this family? Yes and no. … They are all back together, but there will still be conflict, such as the tension between Kevin and Buzz.

Has reconciliation come to our world? Yes and no. … We can know God now! Jesus has provided a way for us to be reconciled with God. The Gospel gives power for reconciliation between families, between family members, and between friends as well as between us and God. … But it isn’t complete. There’s still war in the world and there is not total harmony in the world yet……

Theologians say that there are two phrases that describe the Christian Gospel:
1. already
2. not yet
…
We live between the already and the not yet. … There is a present dimension of the Gospel that we can take joy in and find peace in because Jesus has already come to Earth. … There is also a future orientation of the Gospel. Jesus is not done. The reconciliation is not yet complete. There’s still tension and the world is still out of harmony.

v. 9 – We can already know God. We can know God now! But there’s also still more to come! Our salvation and reconciliation is not yet complete.

v. 10 – Paul says the same thing in this verse … We can already know and experience God now! But we still have to be saved on the day of judgment.

v. 11 – We can have joy right now because of what Jesus has already done.

Maybe you have been depressed by the real world after the holidays or have had a bad couple of months or years. The way to have joy is to hold onto then already and the not yet. … There is joy in what happened when Jesus came to Earth once before, and there is hope what has not yet happened because we know He will come back and complete our salvation and reconciliation.

Isaiah 11:1-10

v. 1-3 – Prophecy of the Messiah that has already happened … Jesse is the father of David. Jesus is a descendant of David. All of this has already happened!

v. 4-10 – Prophecy of the Messiah that has not yet happened … Judgment day has not yet come. Wolves do not live with lambs. Leopards do not lie down with goats. A child does not lead a calf and a lion to eat together. Cows and bears do not get along well. Lions do not eat straw like the ox. Babies and young children do not play with snakes, much less poisonous snakes. … The serpent in the garden of Eden had the spirit of the devil in it and led Adam and Eve astray. But one day little kids will be able to play with snakes without risk of harm. … Jesus was before Jesse and after Jesse. Jesus is the root and the shoot! … All of this is already in progress. It started on that first Christmas, but it is not yet complete. One day, all of these tensions will be gone.

Jason Holidays, No Longer Home Alone, religion, Series, Sunday Sermon

Here’s part 3 of the Christmas series

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Mary Did You Know – One of the best Christmas songs of all time.

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The Audio

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Ephesians 2:11-18

We’ve been going through clips from the movie Home Alone (without the video on here sadly). The clip for this sermon is about Mr. Marley.

In the movie, there are all these rumors about Mr. Marley being a pretty bad man. Then, on this Christmas Eve, Kevin runs into the local church and finds Mr. Marley there watching his granddaughter sing. Mr. Marley tells Kevin about himself, explaining why he lives alone and never has family over or goes to visit family, and why he sits there every Christmas Eve. His wife had died long ago and he had a falling out with his son. For many years, he didn’t talk to his son and the only time he could see his granddaughter was Christmas Eve night as she sang in the church. The truly sad thing is that he never tried to reconnect with his son. … Kevin gives Mr. Marley some advice. Kevin tells him to call his son, but Mr. Marley is afraid of rejection. So, Kevin explains that maybe Mr. Marley’s son feels the same way. Maybe they both want to be reconciled but are afraid the other will reject him. Kevin tells Mr. Marley that he’ll never know unless he tries. … On Christmas morning, Mr. Marley’s son and his family go to Mr. Marley’s house with big smiles on their faces and the granddaughter runs into the arms of her grandfather.

The point of the story? Reconciliation isn’t only for the vertical relationship between you and God, but also for all those horizontal relationships between you and your family; you and your friends.

v. 11-12 – Before Christ died on the cross, Gentiles were separated from God, “without hope and without God in the world.” Jews thought they were better than the Gentiles. But also throughout history, Gentiles have looked down on the Jews. There has been name-calling going both ways. … This is just an example of alienation in human relationships that represents all the different problems we have in our relationships.

v. 13 – Now, through the blood of Christ, Gentiles can be close to God and can have hope! … At Christmas we celebrate Jesus coming to Earth in a human body so that He could die for our sins and set us free. He had to have a physical body to die.

v. 14 – Jesus is our piece. He came to reconcile everyone and destroy barriers and the wall of hostility. … In Jerusalem, the temple had several courts around it, the first of which was the court of Gentiles. Anyone could enter this court. But the Gentiles could go no further. There were steps and a large wall separating this outermost court from the rest, along with signs that said Gentiles might be stricken dead by God if they went any further. The wall was literal.

v. 15 – But there were also walls of superiority. … The Jews had all these laws, commandments, to follow that could keep them right with God, but Gentiles had nothing. When Jesus came and died on the cross, He abolished that wall of spiritual rituals, thus putting Jews and Gentiles on even ground.

v. 16-18 –  Both, Jews and Gentiles, are reconciled to God the same way now. The wall of superiority is gone.

How does this apply to us?

In all our conflicts between one another there is always (or at least almost always) a sense of superiority over the other person. … Jesus has leveled the playing field by reconciling us to one another. We can all access God the same way. We have no grounds for superiority over one another. … We all make mistakes, often the same mistakes even. We have more in common with each other than we have differences. And there is a common solution for all our problems, Jesus Christ.

Jason Holidays, No Longer Home Alone, religion, Series, Sunday Sermon

Here’s the second of 4 Christmas sermons.

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Sound of the Round – sounds like a fun song to sing.

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The Audio

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2 Corinthians 5:17-21

In the video clip, Kevin’s family has already arrived in Paris and his mom realizes they left him at home. So, she tries to get a flight back home, but she can’t get a direct flight and resorts stringing flights together until she just can’t  get another flight that would get her closer to home. As she frantically tries to decide what to do, a polka band offers to take her home. So she spends all Christmas Eve night riding in a van with a polka band just to get home to be with the son she had accidentally left behind.

v. 17 – A new Christian is a whole new creation. The old has gone and the has come.

v. 18 – God is like Kevin’s mom. He’ll do anything to be with us, his children who are alone and separated from the Father. He even let his own Son die on the cross so He can reconcile Himself to us. And here’s the the thing that sets Christianity apart from other religions: God is the one trying to get to us. In other religions, the person has to enough good deeds and follow a certain daily routine of prayer to get close to God, but for us, we believe that God is the one trying to come to us. … We should be like Kevin’s mom. Now that we have been reconciled with God, we are use the ministry of reconciliation to reach others and mend broken relationships.

v. 19 – In case you didn’t get it the first time, Paul tells us again the God is like Kevin’s mom. … God is reconciling the world to Himself through Christ. God came to us, reached out to us, through Christ. And God doesn’t count our sins when we become reconciled with Him because of Christ, but that does not give us the right to sin as much as we want because we are to be new creations in Christ. … We are to be like Kevin’s mom. We are to pass on the message of reconciliation and show others that God is trying to reach them.

v. 20 – And Paul tells us once more, but in reverse order. … We are ambassadors of Christ. God makes His appeals to others through us. … God has already done the work of reconcilition, and all we have to do is accept it.

v. 21 – Imagine Jesus is standing next to you and you both have signs. Your sign says “SIN” and Jesus’ sign says “RIGHT WITH GOD.” Jesus is offering to swap signs with you. He will take your sin so that you can be right with God. … Jesus becomes sin for you so that you can become right with God. All you have to do is accept the transaction.

Jason Holidays, No Longer Home Alone, religion, Series, Sunday Sermon

So, I’m really far behind on here, but it’s Spring Break! So, here we go!

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I know Christmas is past on the calendar, but there’s reason why we shouldn’t celebrate it all year.

This is the first of a four part series on the message of Christmas. In this series, Dr. Cox uses clips from the move Home Alone to help teach the message of Christmas. … Unfortunately, the whole movie is not online, at least not in places I would link to.

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The Audio

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The clip that was shown with this sermon is at the beginning of the movie and it’s Christmas eve. Kevin (the main character) has been a brat in the days leading up to Christmas. On the morning of Christmas eve, the family with 11 kids is doing last minute packing and leave for Paris. In the confusion, the oldest sister counts one of the neighbor’s kids as a sibling and the family (minus the neighbor’s kid) leaves for the airport. They get on the plane and the plane takes off. … The scene switches back to the house, where Kevin is just now waking up and looking for the rest of the family. … Back on the plane, the parents enjoy a first class flight. … At home, Kevin realizes he is home alone.

This movie is a story of reconciliation. Kevin was seperated from his parents. He was alienated from his family.

We’ve all been seperated from our heavenly Father. We’ve been isolated from God because of our sin (Colossians 1:21). … This is our root problem, our biggest problem. Sin and seperation from our Father. For some reason, we’ve turned our backs on God. … The way we think is evidence that we are alienated from God. Our action also show that we are seperated form God. … In the movie Home Alone Kevin likes not having his family around at first because he can do whatever he wants to. He is free from the rules. But then, even with all the toys, he gets lonely and wants his family back. The relationships are more important. … Maybe this is where you are in life. You’ve enjoyed breaking the rules and doing whatever you want, but you finally realize that something is missing and nothing can fill its void. You miss the relationship. You want God back. Even with all the toys, you’re still empty.

But God has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body (Colossians 1:22). … This is the message of Christmas: That even though we are seperated from God by a vast ocean of sin, He loves us. He has come for us. Enemies can become friends. That’s what reconciliation is. Jesus was born to die for our sins.

God’s entirety was in Jesus, so He could reconcile us to Him (Colossians 1:19-20). … Jesus was, and still is, the perfect sacrifice for everything, not just people, but the whole Earth and the Heavens are redeemed with His blood.

Jason No Longer Home Alone, religion, Series, Sunday Sermon