Our Christmas Presence

Isaiah 9: 6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor , Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Jesus Christ; the greatest gift ever given. The way, the truth and the life for all who seek God. The King of Kings and Lord of Lords. The Alpha and Omega; beginning and the end. The author of salvation and lover of our souls. The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world and the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. The chief cornerstone and chief shepherd. The Hope of Glory and Immanuel God with us. The Morning Star and Light of the World. Our Prophet, Priest and King. Jesus Christ is all of this and more. He is our Christmas present and our Christmas presence in our lives.

The Prophet Isaiah, writing hundreds of years before Christ would be born, uses four descriptions of our Lord and Savior we can rely upon this Christmas and beyond. First of all, Jesus is our Wonderful Counselor. The dictionary defines wonderful as "great, amazing, astonishing, excellent and marvelous." Jesus surpasses all of that and more. For these are definitions we use in our temporal existence and Jesus transcends that to bring us eternal blessings and life.

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23

The usage of "wonderful" by Isaiah however is in relation to the role Jesus is supposed to play in our lives as our counselor. Let's face it folks. The advice we often get from the world is not wonderful. It is usually far from wonderful. The world gives advice that is contrary to God. The world tells you to look out for yourself while Jesus tells you that it is more important to care for others. The world espouses greed and materialism while Jesus advises that it is better to give than receive. The world tells you to seek revenge upon those who wrong you but Jesus says to turn the other cheek. The advice of the world will often lead to more problems yet we continue to seek out the answers of this world. We turn to the so-called experts of the world's theology and think that somehow it is being responsible. Or we turn to our friends, who may be in no better condition than we are.

And why? We have 24-7 access to the Wonderful Counselor Jesus Christ! He is always available:

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Psalm 46:1

We need to look no further than our right hand:

I have set the LORD always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Psalm 16:8

Yet we can reserve God or place restrictions on Him. We can only take to Him the problems once they are out of control, instead of relying upon the Wonderful Counselor. Who better to counsel you than He who is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient? Who better to counsel you than He who made you?

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. Psalm 139:13

And as a bonus, as a counselor He is wonderful! His counsel unto you will be marvelous, amazing and astonishing. Oh beloved, forget the counsel of the world; come to the wonderful counselor!

Secondly, Jesus Christ is the Mighty God. The dictionary defines mighty as showing superior power, size or strength; exceptional. That is the God we serve! Whatever you face, God is superior to your problem in power, size and strength. The world will have its gods but they will all fade with time and pale in comparison. Fame is fleeting and often the most famous are the most lost and hopeless just read the tabloids. Money is another popular god of this world but so many of the richest are the most miserable. In the days of Elijah the Prophet the popular worldly gods were Baal and Asherah. Many strayed from the one true God to follow these false gods as they do today with money, fame, or self-actualization. Elijah challenged 450 prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel to see who the Mighty God was indeed. He set up two altars of sacrifice and decreed that whoever's god answered with fire would be the true God. He even allowed the prophets of Baal to go first. For the first six hours they called on their false god, dancing around the altar. Elijah was so amused he mocked them:

At noon Elijah began to taunt them. "Shout louder!" he said. "Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened." 1Kings 18: 27

The Bible says they continued to call on Baal for six more hours and started cutting themselves as well. But no response from the false God. It was then Elijah's turn. He doused the sacrifice with water to make it that much harder. He prayed to God and the real God, the Mighty God, answered with fire. The 450 prophets of Baal were slain that day as the Mighty God answered the cry of Elijah and He still answers our cries to Him today.

God is bigger than our problems! He is bigger than our diagnosis. He is bigger than our relationships. He is bigger in power, size and strength. The world has many gods to choose from. We can fall into the trap of making any number of them gods in our lives. Maybe it is fame and fortune. Maybe it is drugs both legal and illegal. Maybe it is our significant other. They are all as poor a god as Baal was so many centuries ago. Fame and money are hard taskmasters. Drugs and addiction come with unseen costs. Significant others can always let you down. The gods of this world are not mighty, only the one true God is!

The Prophet Isaiah also points out that Jesus Christ is the Everlasting Father. He is our creator beloved! He knows all the minute details of our lives:

And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Matthew 10:30

As our Father, God sees everything we are going through. Sometimes it can feel as if we are alone but the Bible assures us that He never leaves us. If we feel more distant to God at any point in our life we must remember that it is not God who moved. No matter what we are going through, God is acutely aware of it all and even more so:

You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book? Psalm 56: 8 (ESV)

God actually counts the times we toss and turn in this life. Our very tears He saves. We are precious to God as His creation. The tossings and the tears build our character and help mold us into the image of God Himself. It is through Him alone that we will find the victory. The key to that victory is in the adjective used with Father in our key verse everlasting! God is not just any father. He is the Everlasting Father. Jesus was there at the beginning of time and He is coming again. Whatever we choose to put our faith in this world, it will fade with time. The greatest nations have all fallen to the sands of time. The most powerful rulers have all passed away. Entire civilizations have come and gone through the pages of history but only God is constant. Only God is everlasting to us. He will not change. He will not fade. What a gift we have in that!

Lastly, the Prophet Isaiah also teaches us that Jesus Christ is the Prince of Peace! Hallelujah! We can almost boil down any problem we face personally or as a nation to a lack of peace. Wars are started and waged to acquire peace. Problems in relationships stem from a lack of peace. The addicted have no peace in their lives, so they seek out something to numb the lack of peace.

And what is peace? The dictionary defines it as a freedom from any strife, dissension, annoyance, distraction, anxiety, or obsession. What are all of those things we seek freedom from? Bondages. The world wants us wrapped up, entangled, and weighed down by the chains of bondage. We can be overly obsessed, suffer from anxiety or live in a constant state of strife. That is how the enemy wants us. BOUND. No freedom in life. This is true for believers and non-believers. Christians can understand their salvation, be assured of their eternal life, and yet still crawl through this world bound by the enemy. The Bible is filled with stories of people who were bound only to be set free by the Prince of Peace. The woman with the issue of blood was bound by her medical condition for 12 years before she came to Christ. The woman at the well had spent her life bound by lust and inappropriate relationships before the peace of God rest upon her. We too can walk through our lives bound by the very things Christ came to earth to free us from. Galatians teaches us:

Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. Galatians 5:1 (NKJV)

Stand fast in the liberty Christ makes us free by! Not only does Christ possess and grant peace, but according to our key verse, He is the Prince of Peace. Besides the definition of nobility, inferring Kingship, prince is also defined in the dictionary as someone who is the preeminent or chief of anything specific. Jesus Christ is not only then a giver of peace but He is peace itself. He is the prince, the king and the preeminent authority of peace!

Unfortunately, some fall for the trappings of the worldly definition of peace. We can fool ourselves into thinking that peace means that we will have no hardships in our Christian walk. That is unscriptural as Jesus Himself said we would have tribulation in this world. Peace is not the absence of tribulation but the assurance that God is bigger than it. It is why Jesus taught that we need to build our spiritual house upon the rock. If our foundation is in Christ then no matter the size of the storm in our life, we have the peace to know that God is bigger! What does peace actually do for us?

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4: 4-7

The peace the world offers is false and fleeting. It erodes with time and pressure. The peace of God however, transcends all understanding. What does it do? It guards your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. That is the core of what peace really is. Not the absence of problems but the assurance that those problems will not adversely affect our hearts or our minds because the peace of God is guarding them! That is what the Prince of Peace can do for you today!

So as we draw ever closer to Christmas 2009 let us never forget that hundreds of years before Christ would walk the earth, the Prophet Isaiah described who He would be and what He would provide for us. These are just four attributes out of an immeasurable character but what a start we have in Isaiah 9: 6. As we unwrap the temporal gifts this year, let us reflect on the eternal ones already given to us. These represent His awesome presence in our lives. Jesus is wonderful, mighty and everlasting. He is our counselor, our father and the ruler of the peace we so desperately seek in our lives.

We do not have to struggle as the world struggles. We do not have to wake up with despair in our hearts and doubt in our minds. We do not have to suffer from anxiety or depression. We do not need the solutions the world offers because we already have all of the eternal answers at our right hand. We need only remember who God is and allow Him to be the promises He has made. Just allow the present we so eagerly want to open up, be the very presence of God in our lives.

Reverend Anthony Wade Merry Christmas 2009