Christmas Eve

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info, visit us at thrive-fl.org. This is the year that we choose a Florida Christmas as a theme, and it feels nothing like a typical Florida Christmas. Isn't that amazing? Yes, of course. This feels a little too much like the Christmases I grew up with as a child up in Michigan. A little too much. But I will tell you this, it's still warmer here. It is still warmer here. And actually, weather, meteorology has so little to do with the real Christmas and the first Christmas at all. No more to do with the first Christmas than Frosty, or Santa, or Olaf, or Rudolph. I don't know where all of this stuff came from, but we've kind of added all sorts of things to it. And it's okay. It's great. I loved it as a child. It didn't hurt me to have all that stuff. But we're looking at how the first Christmas is a little more like the way it feels in Florida often than what we typically think of as the holiday season. And one of my favorite Christmas carols, I think others have it, is In a bleak midwinter, frosty wind and cold. Now the only problem with that song, it's great, I love the melody, and the words toward the end, is we don't know if it was bleak, we don't know if it was midwinter, and we doubt if there was frost, wind, or cold. In fact, from what we understand, with the shepherds in the hills abiding in Luke 2, most likely Jesus was born in the springtime. Because that's when the hills had green grass in Palestine. And so Florida's Christmas, okay, makes a little sense that it's usually warm and green and nice. But why in the world did we pick, if we didn't know when Jesus was born, why did we pick this time of the year? Probably one of the reasons, and I think that comes in this passage, it is the darkest time of the year in the Northern Hemisphere. And Isaiah chapter 9, the most famous of Isaiah's prophecies about the Messiah, talks about how in the midst of the darkness a light shines. But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali. But in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shown. You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy. They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. For the yoke of his burden and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor you have broken as on the day of Midian. For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult, and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. 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. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end. On the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness, from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. One of the most famous passages in all of Isaiah, and there's so much in this section of Isaiah 9, we just can't get to it all tonight. But the one thing I want to mention is how we do it in Florida and how a lot of the United States does it. We do like to light it up, right? Light shining in darkness. And that probably is one of the few traditions that we have outside of the, you know, that really makes sense for the story and the message of Christmas. We are going to look up at how God lights up the darkness of this world. And tonight we're going to do that by looking at these three themes from Isaiah chapter 9. That the people walking in darkness, our first point. And then B, have seen a great light. And then finally C, to us, a child is born. People walking in darkness. About a month ago, I think, Ashley, we talked with some of our college students on Wednesday night and we asked, do you think we're living in a time that's filled with a lot of darkness? And almost all the college students, you could see their heads were nodding and they said yes. This is a dark time in our world. And there's a lot of darkness going around. Can you name anything yourselves? What are some of the things, would you agree with that? We're living in a time of quite a bit of darkness. And what are some of those things that are dark in this world right now? Pardon? The political atmosphere, I would call it pretty dark, yes. What else? Ukraine, right now. The violence, the war, that makes no sense. Like, there's no, it's just ridiculous. Anything else? Times of darkness. Pardon? The traffic. The traffic. Yeah. Wow, I've seen many people running red lights. I haven't done it. Recently. Yeah. Now, there are s...