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Christmas: What If?

Sermon Transcript

The following is a lightly edited transcript generated from the audio; it may contain small errors.

Matthew 1:18–25

Morning, how are you? So if Justus is an old person. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That’s right. He’s old. I am prehistoric. Open your Bibles to Matthew 1. I’m going to talk again about the birth of Jesus, ’tis the season, amen. Amen. Matthew 1:18 through 25. It reads, “Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: After His mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit. Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not wanting to make her a public example, was minded to put her away secretly. But while he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.’ So all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying: ‘Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,’ which is translated, ‘God with us.’ Then Joseph, being aroused from sleep, did as the angel of the Lord commanded him and took to him his wife, and did not know her till she had brought forth her firstborn Son. And he called His name Jesus.”

Let’s pray. Lord, we thank You for Your Word. We pray that as we contemplate Your Word, as we contemplate the birth of Jesus, our Savior, I pray that today we would leave with a new appreciation of what He did for us by becoming a man, being born as a child, living a miraculous life, dying for our sins and rising from the dead. We acknowledge now, Lord, that He is at Your right hand in glory. And we ask that He would be honored and glorified today. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.

So, it is the Christmas season and all around America people are going to church to celebrate Christmas, or should I say celebrate the birth of Jesus. Next Saturday and Sunday our churches will be filled with millions and millions of people. Unfortunately, many of them will not know Jesus. Now you may say, wait a minute, that’s not unfortunate. That’s good. We want unbelievers to go to church. The problem is I’m not talking about the unbelievers that go once a year. I’m talking about the unbelievers that go every week. I’m talking about those who are going to celebrate Christmas this year without the recognition that this person that we’re celebrating was actually the human and divine Savior. As I pointed out before, the stories of Jesus, you might say stories, I don’t mean fictions, I mean the histories. The stories of Jesus are replete with miracles. Everything about the birth of Jesus is miraculous, especially the person that was a product of the miraculous virgin birth. This Jesus was both God and man, God with us. But He was truly human and truly divine. That is a true miracle. He was born of a virgin. That is a true miracle. And we see many other, what we could call lesser miracles in the accounts of the birth of Jesus. Unfortunately, many professing Christians these days do not believe in the miraculous, yet they still celebrate Christmas and in some sense celebrate Jesus. So I was thinking about the fact that when you read through the New Testament, there’s another miracle in the Bible that’s very prominent and it’s the resurrection of Jesus, right? When do we celebrate that? Easter, right? Now, there was a problem in the church in Corinth where some were denying the resurrection. And, excuse me, Paul, he directly confronts the problem and he says to them, okay, if what you’re saying is true, if the resurrection isn’t true, what if? What if? In other words, what are the results of what you’re saying? Because apparently they hadn’t thought this all through. Right? And I think many people who believe in a merely human Jesus haven’t thought it all through. So my question this morning, and really my sermon title is the question, what if? What if the virgin birth and the incarnation are not true? What if this Jesus person in the Bible is not divine? What if? What are the results?

Then the Scriptures Are False

Well, the first result is the Scriptures are false. Scriptures are false. Here in Matthew, Luke chapter 1 and 2, we have depictions of the birth of Jesus, clearly stating He was a divine person and He came from a miraculous birth. All throughout the Bible, not just these texts, it’s clear that this Messiah person was divine. It’s taken for granted in many texts in the New Testament. Let’s just look at a couple. Go to Philippians 2 if you have your Bible with you. And we’ll just read and we’ll see how the deity, it’s called, of Jesus, is all throughout Scripture. Here Paul talks about the incarnation, but then he talks about the results of the incarnation. In verse 5 he says, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God.” So he’s asserting that Jesus was equal with God, “but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” So here’s the incarnation resulting in the death of Jesus. As we know, the atoning death, and I’ll explain more about what that means in a moment. So clearly, if this person was able to die, He was human, but Paul says at the same time, He was equal with God. So we have the divine-human Jesus. Verse 9, “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Amen? This universal admiration and submission to the Son is a clear recognition of His deity. That this text is from the Old Testament in Isaiah where this text is applied to Jehovah, the one true God, so Paul is saying this Jesus and this Jehovah are the same, the same God. Pretty amazing, isn’t it?

You know, I was thinking about when we read our Bibles, it’s funny, reading of the Bible, because reading the Bible is like reading a novel, but you’re going to know the ending. You know what I’m saying? Now, one of the fun things about reading a novel is you don’t know the ending, right? And so, you know, we’ll figure it out. Did you ever watch a movie two or three times that had a surprise ending? It’s just not quite the same. It’s good, but you know the ending, right? You know, we know the ending. When we read the Bible, we know so much that we read passages, we gloss right over things that we would miss. I mean, the fact that Paul, a Pharisee, trained in Judaism, would claim that Jesus was Jehovah is so shocking. The fact that all of His disciples as good Jews who are monotheists, not pantheists, would so easily assert that this Jesus was divine. I mean, that is just totally miraculous in itself. Because polytheism was abhorrent to Jews. Totally abhorrent. But we see this idea that Jesus is divine permeating the entire New Testament. If we had time, we could look at many texts. But in Romans 9, Paul refers to Jesus as God, as God blessed forever. He’s referring to Jesus as God. In Titus, go to Titus 2. This is a great passage in the book of Titus. Timothy and Titus, in that order. Here in Titus chapter 2, here’s what Paul says. It says in verse 11, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” What’s His name? Jesus Christ or Christ Jesus, same thing. Our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. These texts are not unusual because undergirding the entire New Testament is really the assumption that this person born, that first Christmas morning we say, was truly a divine person. So if we say that Jesus, that the miraculous is removed from Scripture, if we say that Jesus was not divine, was not the divine God-man, then what are we left with? We’re left with the New Testament which is full of lies, full of lies and therefore is completely unreliable. That’s bad news, amen. But then it gets worse. You’re like, oh great, I came here to church, I get depressed hearing bad news. No, there is good news at the end, don’t worry.

Then Jesus Himself Is a Liar

But if Jesus were not divine, if the story is false, not only are the writers and the apostles liars, but Jesus Himself is a liar. Jesus is false. Why? Because all throughout the Gospels we see Jesus saying things and doing things which clearly imply, in some cases He just states, that He’s divine. That there’s no other way around what He is saying. Just in the Gospel of John alone Jesus says things like, I am the way, the truth, and the life. I am. Not I just teach the truth or I’ll show you the way, but I am the way. I am the truth. I am the life. And another, and when the disciples were like, well Jesus, where are You going? Because He was talking about the fact that He had to die and leave, and He said, I’m going to the Father, and they’re like, we want to see the Father. And Jesus said, well, here you go. Here you go. In other words, by looking at Me, you’re seeing the Father. I and the Father are one, Jesus said. Can you believe that? Now imagine you go to work tomorrow, some guy walks up and says, hey, I’m God. Just want to let you know. I mean, it’s crazy. We have institutions where people are put away, and if you go in those institutions, you will find quite a number of them saying, I am God. And some of them say, I am Jesus, and they mean the same thing. Jesus said, I and the Father are one. Not just one in purpose, but one in person. One in nature, shall I say. Jesus said that He was the resurrection and the life. Not just I provide these things for you, but I am the resurrection and the life.

Really the most outstanding statement by Jesus is in John 8, if you want to turn there. Many, many claims that Jesus made, this one is just really over the top, if you will. Look what He says here in John 8. Well, first He says in John 8:12, He says, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.” That’s pretty bold. I am the light of the world. I know all things, I enlighten all people. That’s pretty bold. But then He goes on and He says this. The Pharisees here were disputing with Him, challenging Him. And He says this, He says, they say to Him in verse 53, “Are You greater than our father Abraham, who is dead? And the prophets are dead. Who do You make Yourself out to be?” Now that was the question, wasn’t it? That’s the question we’re discussing today. Who is this Jesus person that supposedly was born of a virgin, that supposedly was both God and man? Who was this person? They’re saying to Him, well, who are You? Who do You claim to be, Jesus? In 54 He says, “If I honor Myself, My honor is nothing. It is My Father who honors Me, of whom you say that He is your God. Yet you have not known Him, but I know Him. And if I say, ‘I do not know Him,’ I shall be a liar like you.” So Jesus just called them liars. “But I do know Him and keep His word. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day.” Now the significance of Abraham here is that to the Jews he was the father of the faith. I mean it was like Moses and Abraham. These were the guys, Moses and Abraham. And so you see in the Gospels references to Moses and Abraham because these were the, in some ways idols, the exalted religious figures of the day. He says, “Your father Abraham,” verse 56, “rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?” Now, remember Abraham had died thousands of years before. Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you,” or truly, truly, verily, verily. In other words, what I’m going to say is really important and it’s true. “Before Abraham was, I AM.” Well, what did the Jews do then? They took up stones to throw stones at Him to kill Him. Why? Because He was blaspheming, because He was claiming to be God. Jesus did not say before Abraham was, I was, which is possible, in Greek you can say that. No, He said before Abraham was, amen, I AM. Well, what’s the significance of that? In the Old Testament God appeared to Moses and Moses said, well who should I say is sending me to Pharaoh if they say who’s your God? What’s Your name? And God says My name is I AM. Jesus takes the name of Jehovah, the first name of Jehovah, Yahweh, that was revealed to Moses, I AM, and says that’s Me. Wow. And the response of the Jews is the normal expected response if you’re a believing Jew. This is the response. This man is a heretic. He needs to die the death of a heretic. So they understood. But somehow we moderns are just so enlightened that we don’t see what they saw. Many scholars do not even see what they saw. I’ve read scholars who say Jesus never claimed to be God. I’m not sure what version you’re reading. Maybe The Message? No, I’m just kidding. So if Jesus was not divine, if He was not incarnate, then number one, the apostles and the biblical writers were false, meaning the Scriptures are really false. But then secondly, the portrayal of Jesus is such that in light of His claims to be divine, that He Himself was a liar. He is false.

Then There Is No Atonement

The third result is if the Scriptures are false, if Jesus is false, then we certainly have no atonement. Now what do I mean by atonement? Well, what I mean is that when Jesus died at the cross, He was not just dying a normal human death. Now He was dying, He was going through the experience of death as a human, this is true. And He was hated by, they wanted to kill Him here, He was hated by the Jewish leaders. He was despised even by many Romans. He was considered a threat. So they hung Him on a cross and they killed Him. He died a real death, but something else was going on while Jesus was dying. And it wasn’t just that He was dying a natural death, but that this death was a death not for Himself, but it was a death for others. It was a vicarious death. Vicarious means representative. It was a vicarious death. When Jesus was dying, He wasn’t just dying for Himself. He was dying in the place of others. So when He was dying, God and God and Jesus were transacting something. Something was happening that you couldn’t see with the human eye. To the human eye, this was just another criminal being hung on a cross with other criminals. But something else was happening in the economy of God. God was putting His wrath upon Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ was dying for the sins of the world. That’s why Jesus said, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” That giving was not just He gave Him to live a moral life or He gave Him to be an example. He gave Him as a sacrifice. So He dies on a cross and the sins of the world are placed upon Jesus who, although He Himself was sinless, is bearing the sins of others in their place so that they might not bear those sins before God. “He who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” Meaning we might be acquitted, we might be declared not guilty, because when He was on the cross, He was punished as guilty. The Bible tells us in Romans 3, well, let’s turn there, it’s such an important verse, I want you to read it in your Bible. Romans 3, Paul says this, in verse 23, we’ll say, it says, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Do you know what all means? All. It means you. It’s not like all, well, yeah, I believe He died for all except, or, yeah, people are sinners except, no, all, all of us. We all have fallen short. We’ve all sinned, okay? But then notice, “being justified”—now justified means it’s just-as-if-I’d never sinned. Means that when God looks at me as a believer, He doesn’t condemn me, He doesn’t judge me. Now yes, I sin, but my sins have been forgiven. My sins have been atoned for, they’ve been paid for by Christ. So although He sees my sin, He doesn’t condemn me for my sin because He condemned His Son in my place. That’s what it means, amen. Everybody else want to say a praise to God? Amen. This is why the gospel is called the gospel, which means good news. I was brought up in a religion where you had to be perfect to get into heaven, meaning perfect by your own efforts. But the good news is you are made perfect in the sense that you are acquitted before God by the death and resurrection of Jesus, and it’s a gift. It’s a gift. Notice he says, “being justified freely by His grace.” Freely by His grace. Now, grace means you don’t deserve it. Grace means you don’t earn it. Now, this Christmas is all about grace, right? So I’m going to get presents that I didn’t earn. I’m going to get gifts I don’t deserve. And that’s grace. I receive it, I’m given things, I didn’t pay for these things. They were given to me freely. I didn’t even ask for them. Well, I asked for one last night, actually. There is one I want. Except for that one, no. Free. Grace means we get something that is undeserved that we didn’t earn. And Paul is actually being redundant here when he says that we’re justified freely by His grace. Because if you understand grace, you understand that it’s free. So why would he say freely by His grace? If Paul doesn’t understand grace, what’s going on here? Well, he’s emphasizing the freeness, but he’s also, I think, saying this for a reason. Because there’s a very subtle error that can creep into our thinking about grace. In other words, we think of grace as God’s love and goodness and kindness and maybe forgiveness and all this we bundle things together as grace. But then we start thinking we need to earn grace. I have to deserve grace. And so we say, okay, I have to be good enough and I’ll get some more grace. Or I have to take the sacraments and then I’ll get more grace, or I have to do this and get grace. Well, as if doing these things merit grace. The whole point of grace, if you don’t get anything else out of today, hear this, the whole point of grace is you don’t merit it. You don’t earn it and you don’t deserve it. It is free. Unfortunately, even the church itself has fallen at times in these errors. I’m saying, yes, we are saved by grace, but you have to do this, this and this. Once there’s a but there, you have a problem. I’m not going to make a joke. I’d love to, but I won’t. Okay. Once you put a qualification on grace, it isn’t grace anymore. I mean, can you imagine Sunday morning—and Sunday morning, when did we have Christmas? Monday morning. You get up, all these presents, awesome. You’re opening your presents, and the very last present is a little bitty box, wrapped really beautiful. You open it up, and it’s a receipt. [audio unclear] I pay and that makes it a gift to them. Well, salvation is a [audio unclear] So he refers to the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. The redemption has this idea of payment, okay, payment to free somebody, what we might call a ransom, “whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood.” Now propitiation is a big word, it means satisfaction. In other words, His blood was going to satisfy somebody. Who was it going to satisfy? It was going to satisfy God because His blood satisfied the claims of God’s requirements, His law. But notice he says, so he says He sets Him forth as a propitiation or satisfaction by His blood through faith to demonstrate, et cetera, et cetera. Now some versions reverse the words and you can do this in the Greek because, you know, it’s a matter of translation. It could say, He set forth, God set forth Jesus as a satisfaction through faith in His blood, which amounts to the same thing. In Romans we’re told—well, Hebrews—that without the shedding of blood there’s no remission of sin. So if my sins are going to be forgiven by the shedding of blood, whose blood is it going to be, is it going to be mine or someone else’s? Well the Bible tells me that God has provided someone who shed His blood for me and for you. And He was the human and divine Jesus Christ. You say well why does His divinity matter? Well, think about this. Imagine a gentleman is being tried. I shouldn’t call him a gentleman. A criminal is being tried for murder, and he’s found guilty, and he gets a death penalty. And so I walk in and say, I want to take his place. You can execute me in his place and let him go. So assuming the judge allowed that, which you probably don’t want to let a murderer go, right, then I would be executed. I could take his place. The problem is, after that transaction, I couldn’t take anybody else’s place. Right? If Jesus was merely a good human, let’s say Jesus was even a perfect human, but He wasn’t divine, He could have died on the cross in someone else’s place, but only in one person’s place. Because the value of His blood was limited to the value of one human life. [audio unclear] many for many. Lastly, let me say this. If the incarnation is not true, if Jesus were not God and man, one, the Scriptures are false, two, Jesus was false, thirdly, there is no salvation. And the sad result of that is we are now in our sins. What I mean by that is if there’s no divine Savior, there’s no salvation. And no salvation means there’s no peace with God. There’s no forgiveness. There’s no power over sin. There’s no gift of the Holy Spirit. There’s no love, no joy, no peace. There’s no freedom from Satan. There’s no future hope. And as Paul said regarding the resurrection, it’s also true of the incarnation. If it’s not true, we are of all men most pitiable or miserable. Why? Because we believe a fairy tale. We sacrifice and even suffer for this fairy tale. But it’s all a fairy tale. And there’s no hope. There’s no reality. But God, the incarnation is true. Amen.

All or Nothing

The first regarding the Bible. When it comes to the Bible, our choices are this, all or nothing. I’m going to say it again. Our choices are all or nothing. Now the predicament we’ve gotten into these days is even in churches they’ve decided that they can pick and choose. So 150 years ago Christians decided they could get rid of some of the things they didn’t like, like the deity of Jesus. And then they got rid of other miracles, His physical resurrection, and then we got rid of all the miracles, the gospel stories are all pretty much Christian myth that have developed over the centuries. And so what we get is a natural book with a natural, I would say Savior, but if He’s natural, He can’t really be a Savior. We’re left with a purely human book, and a purely human moral teacher, if you will. When it comes to the Bible, though, we don’t really have the option of picking and choosing. When it comes to the Bible, it’s really either all or nothing. Because once you start picking and choosing, who’s to say you can’t take out anything in the book you don’t like? Right? Now, there’s passages that I’d love to take out. Let’s all be honest. Right? We all have our besetting sins. I would love to remove those verses that address my sins. There’s some weird stuff in the Bible. There’s no doubt. I mean, let’s be honest. I mean, really, the whole Jesus thing is really weird. The virgin birth, the star, that’s pretty weird. You know, there’s things in the Old Testament, miraculous things, the parting of the Red Sea. That’s pretty weird. Go down the line of weird things in the Bible, right? Yeah, maybe I’d like to remove some of those because maybe they’re a little bit embarrassing. But once you start doing that, there’s no end to it. There really isn’t an end to it. If the Bible is full of mistakes and errors, then on what text can you rely? That’s really the question. [audio unclear] important, very important teachings of the Bible. So the lesson here for us is if we’re going to believe in a divine-human person named Jesus, let’s just believe in all of it. I mean the truth is, that’s our only option. If the Scripture’s true about that, then why isn’t it true about everything else? And if it’s false on that, why isn’t it false about everything else? Well, we need to realize that when it comes to the Bible, it’s all or nothing, and I would suggest it’s all. And if it’s all, then we need to believe it all. All of it. And not just assent to it, but I mean believe it. I mean really believe it, all of it, and embrace it, and then live it like we believe it, amen? Do not be ashamed that you have a miraculous Savior. Do not be ashamed that God has given you a miraculous book. Rather, be glad and rejoice. It is good news.

Secondly, when it comes to Jesus, the same principle applies. It’s all or nothing. It really is all or nothing. You’ve all heard the famous quote by C. S. Lewis, I want to read it to you again before we close. In his book, Mere Christianity, which I encourage all of you to read, he says, “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him,” meaning about Jesus. They say this, “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon, or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend, excuse me, neither, and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God. Those really are the options. And if we’re going to say He is God, if we’re going to say this babe born in the manger was truly divine, then let us believe it fully. Fully. Let’s fully embrace the claims of Jesus and let’s fully live by His teaching, amen? And we can because He gives us the power to fully do so. There is the Holy Spirit. The glorious thing about the gospel is that it’s not a moral improvement program, it is a total renovation project. God doesn’t just come down and say here’s some good things for you to do, and if you do these things, your life will be better. Bye-bye. When Jesus was ready to depart the world, He told His disciples, I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you. Well, did He come? Yes, He did, on the day of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit came down. And everyone who believes in Jesus Christ receives the gift of the Holy Spirit, and they are born anew, they are born again. And that new birth with the Holy Spirit living in the heart of a person empowers them to follow Jesus as a true disciple, amen? We have a supernatural Savior who calls you and I to live a supernatural life. And we can because this supernatural Spirit dwells in us, amen?

Lastly, regarding salvation, it really is all or nothing. It’s all or nothing. The gospel of grace is not a gospel of trying. It’s not a gospel of achieving. It’s not what is called white-knuckle Christianity. Hold on, you might get in. Grace is grace is grace. It is not earned, it is not deserved, it cannot be earned, it cannot be deserved, it is free. You’re like, that’s hard to believe because you’re saying, I can just believe in Jesus and live as I please. Well, actually, I’m not saying that. I’m saying that if you believe in Jesus, your heart will change. You will be a new creation, the Bible says, a new creature. The new birth changes you on the inside, and you want to live differently because God has changed your heart. Anybody here see The Grinch? The new Grinch movie, the newer one? Raise your hand if you’ve ever seen The Grinch movie. Man, you guys are… I don’t know. Anyway, Grinch gets born again. He does. He hated Christmas, right? Well, he gets a new heart. He gets a new heart. God will give you a new heart. Those who trust in Christ receive a new heart. And if we believe in this glorious gospel, we Christians ought to be sharing it, amen? Let’s believe it fully. Let’s follow Jesus fully, and let’s share the good news fully. Amen? Amen.

Let’s stand, we’re going to pray. Bow your heads and close your eyes for a moment. Maybe today you came in not knowing the real meaning of Christmas and the real meaning of Jesus’ birth, but I want to encourage you to take a moment and just talk to God yourself from the silence of your own heart. Jesus came for you. Jesus was born for you. He died for you. He rose from the dead for you. And He’s now inviting you to come into a relationship with Him and His heavenly Father. We are saved. We are forgiven, we are renewed, we are changed by faith in Christ. Faith just means you trust Him. You rely upon Him, not yourself. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. That is the good news of the Bible. So I encourage you now to take a moment and just talk to God. God, I don’t understand all that we shared, but I know enough that I’m a sinner, I’ve done things wrong. But I understand You’ve made a way for me through Jesus Your Son. Dear Lord, save me. If you can pray that prayer genuinely, God will hear you and answer you. He will send His Spirit into your heart and change you and renew you, and give you love and joy and peace and forgiveness. So many great, great blessings. So many presents God wants to give you this Christmas. And I pray that you might receive them. Dear Lord, we thank You for this season. We thank You for reminding us just all that You did for us. Lord, I pray that we, who profess Your name, would totally embrace a total Bible. That we would totally follow a total Christ. That we would totally believe in a total gospel and share it with others. I ask, God, that we would truly be able to celebrate this Christmas in the right spirit of really appreciating, honoring, and glorifying You and Your Son, Jesus Christ. We pray all these things in His name. Amen.