I’ll Be “Home” For Christmas

Give him a hand clap of praise. It's Christmas time. Y'all like Christmas? Hey, you're still standing for a second.

I want us to worship God for just one moment. I'm not going to make them sing. Just play behind me for a second. I know sometimes we get into the kitschy nature of Christmas where we think about the 6 [music] lb 8 oz baby Jesus, but there's something much more I think robust happening in the ancient world at the time when Jesus comes [music] to to dwell among men.

And what this is the the word [music] that we would use that none of us really understand is the word incarnation where God [music] becomes man. He robes himself in flesh dwells among [music] each one of us. And Luke 1 37 gives us a really heavy indicator of what Jesus is going to do on earth. He's going to do impossible things.

Luke 1 137. I memorized it when I was at a vacation Bible school way back in the day. If you don't know what a vacation Bible school is, it's a place where you go learn from a bunch of older people about the Bible. It was cool.

I enjoyed it. Um, I didn't learn it. I wasn't in the Bible school. It was the first time I actually served uh in any capacity.

It was at this Bible school. And they they made us memorize this verse. Luke 1:37. It's so simple.

It says, "For nothing is impossible with God. He is more than able to do abundant things [music] in your life. And when he came down to earth, this isn't just something where we get to celebrate around a Christmas tree by opening gifts. This is the recognition that God can do impossible things.

And that was sealed when Jesus surrendered himself on the cross, died, rose again 3 days later to prove to us that not even death can keep him down. For nothing is impossible with God. He is more than able. Father God, we thank you for your innate capacity to do impossible things.

And so I pray right now while we're all gathered together that the spirit of the living God would impact us in a very positive and profound way today. Be with me as I deliver this message. Be with the people in this room as they hear it. God, I know this is just a reality of the world we live in.

I know as we get closer and closer [music] to Christmas, all different types of emotions fill us. Whether it's sadness about loss that has happened in the past, it's sadness because of expectation [music] that is left unmet by the end of the year. [music] Whether it's guilt, shame, frustration, God, I know that that creeps in as it gets colder and as Christmas comes closer. But I pray right now that your spirit would make us alive together in Christ Jesus.

Give us excitement. Endow us with more energy and optimism this Christmas. It is in Jesus's name that we pray and all God's people said. Amen.

Amen. You may be seated. I am excited for today. I'm so excited that I am not going to spend a lot of time introducing my topic.

I'm going to jump right into the text. Many of you have probably read this text before. Maybe you any of you have Christmas traditions where you like read the Bible together as a family. Me neither.

I I feel you. I I totally feel you. It was one of those things that I think my mom tried a couple times. I'm going to get rid of this.

And uh it wasn't something that we continued to do. It's not her fault, it's mine. When you have two twin ADHD kiddos, there's only so much you can do. You know what I'm saying?

Um so many of you may not have read this before, but it is the Lucan Luke's narrative of the birth of Jesus. I'm going to read to you seven verses. Then I will spend a little bit of time introducing my topic for today. Is that cool?

You can say yeah or just give me a thumbs up. You should say yeah because thumbs up I can't see right now. That's what I'm talking about. [gasps] I'm not going to make you stand for it, but it will be on the screen behind me.

Starting in chapter 2 verse one. In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. This was the first census that took took place while Corinius was governor of Syria. And everyone went to their own town to register.

So Joseph, the father of Jesus, also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, specifically to Bethlehem, the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him, betrothed to him, uh, and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born. And she gave birth to her firstborn, a son.

She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger because there was no guest room available for them. Just say, "Yeah, if you've heard that story before. " All right, cool. We're all in the same boat.

I was reading through that and I was praying and I was thinking about the message God wanted me to bring to you guys. This is only I guess this is our third Christmas. Uh we didn't we hadn't been we weren't launched in 2023, but we did do a Christmas service. So this is technically my third Christmas.

Um getting to take these texts that we all go through every Christmas and figure out a way to recycle them in a way that is lifegiving and fresh for you all. And this is just for us as a church. There have been many years where I've taught on Christmas and every year it's it's almost like this little challenge that God gives me or any other pastor to look at the same thing that you've preached before and do it in a way that is unique. You don't do it for creativity sake.

You do it because you desperately want people in the room to understand something deeper about who Jesus is. And so, as I was praying about what we were going to do and I came across this passage, there was something that the Lord was kind to me in pointing out. I've been hearing a lot lately from different people about what they're going to be doing for Christmas. You know, their Christmas plans and growing up, depending on what city you're in, kind of dictates how people tend to operate.

And Phoenix is a transplant city. So, a lot of people will actually go somewhere else for the holidays. But over time, if you live here long enough, you find that it's more fun to be in Phoenix over the holidays cuz nobody likes to shovel snow off their front porch. Um the snowbirds don't like to stay up there for Christmas, so they come down here for Christmas.

And so it's kind of this weird mixture of what people are doing for Christmas. And one phrase that I've heard a lot when it comes to Christmas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day is, I'm just I'm going to be at home this year. And as I was praying and thinking on how I wanted to share, I felt led to do a redub of a recent series where I would select song titles for you remember that? It was recent.

It was fairly recent. Right before the money series, so some of y'all just came back. So you're just like, "This was the last series. " It's a joke kind of, unless it fits.

[laughter] Uh, hey, I know how life is. Um, so what I'm going to do this this Sunday, next Sunday for Christmas Eve, is I'm going to have song titles. I've already got them selected and I'm super excited about it. So, you're going to want to make every single one of those, not because of song titles, but because the spirit of the living God and his ability capacity to impact you positively in life and start your year off strong.

But also, I'm going to do song titles, so it's going to be fun. And so for today, I've been hearing a lot of people say, and here's my so uh my my sermon title, I'll be home for Christmas. Y'all know that song. I don't know how it is.

All I remember is the contemporary version where the girl said Christmas. And you know, it's I'll be home for what do they call that young person in here? What do they call the way she was singing? No.

Cursive. That's what it is. How do you sing in cursive? They can't even write in cursive these days.

I have some weird mixup of of capitalization. Uh what do they call it when you're not cursive? Is it just manuscript? Just printing writing?

I don't know. So So I have this weird thing where I do capitalized, non- capitalized, cursive, and non-cursive. And it just they say smart people can't write. So I just tell myself I'm smart every single day.

But anyways, my sermon title today is I'll be home for Christmas. And as I was I was I was thinking about where many of us decide we're going to be for Christmas. And I think a lot of times, and I'm not trying to judge anybody or speak negatively or ill of you, there is absolutely nothing wrong with being home for Christmas or being away for Christmas, whatever you decide to do for the holidays. As long as it's not outright sin as communicated through the scriptures, I'm sure you're going to be just fine by the end of it.

But I was thinking about this concept of being home for Christmas. And many people in the room, you feel like maybe different than somebody your your meaning of home is different than somebody else's. Like some of you, you say, "I'm going to be home for Christmas. " That means putting on a Netflix show.

Because they put on like like I'll never forget when I started doing Netflix Christmas holiday. I would just put on some cooking show. Like there ain't nothing better than great British baking show when you're sitting there on Christmas day rather than putting together your kids' bicycles and all that stuff. Just sit there and watch these guys make pie.

Like it's great. I love those cooking shows. There was another one that I would put on periodically and then in the evening you'd go watch whatever movie came out which this year maybe it'll be Avatar for some of you. I don't know.

I'm I'm going to go see Avatar. It seems pretty cool. You going to go see Avatar? Mom, I'm going to invite you.

Maybe you can come with me cuz none of my family wants to go see it. So, will you go see it with me, Mom? Okay. Thank you, Mom.

See, I got a good mom, don't I? That's my version of Home for Christmas. For some of you, your version of Home for Christmas is like the the stereotypical one where you spend all day cooking stuff and you you hang out at the house and you got your entire extended family there and you planned it. Maybe it's not Christmas Day.

Maybe it's Christmas Eve and you've got this tradition that you celebrate. This is what we do. None of us really enjoy spending time with one another, but this is what we do. Maybe you do enjoy spending time with one another.

Some of you, you like to watch football. How many of you watch football on Christmas? See, I don't pay for cable. And now I can watch football because Prime and so like I don't have that tradition currently.

All of our traditions are so different. Some of you home for Christmas used to be great but now because of loss uh because of dysfunction because of kids getting older and just going to in-laws houses instead of your house. Christmas isn't as fun as it once was. And now you're sitting there waiting by the phone.

Your cell phone. No one if you're waiting by the phone. No one's going to call you on that phone. But the cell phone, you're sitting there just hoping the kids call up and say, "Hey, I'm gonna come visit.

" Or, "Hey, would you like to come visit us, right? I don't know what home is for you, but I know this. I know whatever your version of home is right now, it's going to change a few years from now. And you might have the same traditions, but the traditions feel trit after a time when things change.

" And as I kept thinking about all of these things, because I'm not really a traditional person, my life is a lot more like that. Y'all remember Rudolph Christmas? You You know the creepy one? You know the creepy Rudol?

What is it called? Is it just called Rudolph? Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Or maybe that's the cartoon, but that's Frosty.

No, I don't know which one it is. I watched them all when I was a kid. But the one that I always remember is the one with the creepy claymation abomination abominable snowman. You know what I'm talking that creepy one with that creepy little elf who you would never want to hang out with in the real world and and Rudolph who sounds like whatever.

They just it was just creepy. Claymation anything is creepy to me. And so that I remember that and my life is very similar to that. I feel like I'm one of those things on the aisle of misfit toys because nothing like perfectly fits my style of doing things and my home has always shifted and family situations have shifted.

My family's not huge or extended. It's very small. And I've always felt like I just don't have really a tradition. So home for Christmas for me doesn't mean what it means for you.

All that to say, home is so different. And home sometimes is very superficial. But as I was praying and thinking on this stuff, the Lord reminded me, don't just make them feel bad about staying home for Christmas. it was.

How about we redefine what home is? And what I want to do for a few moments is I want to redefine what home is because when you look at the Christmas story, you you see something pretty clear. Was nobody home in the Christmas story? Have you noticed that?

You ever thought about that for about two seconds? I'll just walk you through it really quickly. All right. So, there's a there's um a census going on.

If you don't know what a census is, a census is where they get everybody together and they start organizing the thing that's been disorganized because of a bunch of different battles and conquering uh and and conquests and all that other stuff. And so uh while Corinius was governor of Syria and Augustus Caesar was there, he says, "We're going to do a census. " Why? Because we've conquered a bunch of different places and we want to know who exists here.

Right? So they do the census and in order to do the census you had to go to your hometown and so Joseph the father of Jesus goes to his hometown because he was in the line of David. So that was the town of Bethlehem. So he went home but in order to go home he left his home.

He wasn't where he was comfortable. He wasn't where they were spending time. He wasn't where the friends and family were. And you can make an argument that, you know, he probably had friends and family in Bethlehem.

And then you get a little bit further in the story and you're like, ah, if he did have friends and family in Bethlehem, they weren't very nice because they didn't sleep at their house. So where's Joseph? Joseph's not home. Joseph's abroad, if you will.

And so you look at Joseph, he's not home. If you were to take it further, starting in verse 8, it says there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby. Now, if you know ancient culture when it comes to shepherds, you know that they're living there for a period of time away from home because you had to sleep where the sheep were. So, were they home?

Yes or no? They weren't home. The shepherds weren't home. If you were to expand it to the Matthew narrative, you'll find out that they got three wise men.

I'm just going to ask you yes or no. Were they home? No. No.

They came from afar. Just about every single person in the Christmas story is abroad. They're not home. They're they're disjointed.

It's almost like they're the aisle of misfit toys. And it was that revelation about the story of Christmas that really made me feel comfortable for the first time because for many years of my life, I've been trying to develop. And we just finished a series called Don't Settle. And it was about this idea of moving beyond this American dream mentality that says, "I'll be good once I attain a certain level of wealth.

" Picket Fence was the example I kept using. And for me in my life, I've been trying to get to this place where when it comes to Thanksgiving, Christmases, holidays, beyond that, I'm trying to get to this place where I feel connected and comfortable and able to just relax. Put my legs up or put my feet up. I don't know how the phrase, put your feet up [sighs] and and [clears throat] just enjoy that holiday.

And I've gotten close, don't get me wrong. My in-laws are great. My family's great. I've been in some relaxing moments in my life, but every year around this time, there is something about staying home for Christmas that actually feels subpar to what my deepest desires are.

And when I look at this Christmas story, I see that there were people from all different walks of life who came together to celebrate something much deeper. The pinnacle of all creation, God made flesh, the incarnation where God decided to dwell among us. And it was different types of people who came together to celebrate that incarnation. is not just this homogeneous group of people that are related by blood.

It was something much deeper than that. Radically different and distant people coming together. Not rooted in blood, not rooted in lineage, but based on based on a belief that this was the son of God. And and and so for me it was really exciting to start thinking about home in a new way because many of us we think about home as this roof over our head.

We think about home as a place where our blood relatives can come together. We can kick our feet up who maybe they don't believe in Jesus but I'm just going to relax cuz they're my blood relatives. But I probably shouldn't relax. I probably need to think of them the way that Christ thinks about them rather than thinking of them as a person that I've known for the last 20 years.

And it's actually not really relaxing when you realize half your family doesn't have a saving knowledge of Jesus. And so that home shifts when your relationship with Jesus shifts. And so now all of a sudden this home that was relaxing is now a place where you're trying to help people understand something deeper. The home that you have found in Christ.

See, because the message of Jesus is so much greater than the message of come put your feet up, open some gifts, hang out, drink some eggnog or some apple cider, and call it a day. No, the home that you have found is one that starts with a message that says, "Come all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest for your soul. " I I [clears throat] don't I don't want just I just I don't want rest from the year for a couple days and then I got to stress out about the beginning of the year. No, I want rest for my soul.

This is what Christ Jesus offers us. And so when we look at this passage of about Christmas, I I think I think we do it a disservice because we because we think it's about the the combination of of a cool cultural moment and a little bit of the Bible. But Joseph wasn't up in Galilee. He wasn't in Nazareth.

He was down there getting counted for a census and he wasn't connected enough to his extended family, assuming his blood, like his blood relatives were there with him at the time. He wasn't connected enough with them to get the guest bedroom. So, he went and found an inn. And there wasn't enough room at the Y'all know that part of the story.

There wasn't enough room at it. And so they had to take the baby that was born that evening and lay him in a manger. You would think maybe Mary's got some clout. Not after this whole betroal mess that she was in.

You would think that Mary could could be comfortable, but it was angels who comforted her. It wasn't her family. I could I could teach a whole message to you guys on the situation with Mary. I'm not going to spend a lot of time talking about betroals in the ancient world.

Uh, but suffice it to say, when it says betrothed to be married, they considered it married already. It was just kind of a grace period before they officially tied the knot. But when they found out she was pregnant, Joseph was going to divorce her quietly. But he didn't.

God made that clear to him to stay with her. But the rest of her family, I don't know that angels disclose themselves to the rest of her family. I don't know that the angels disclose themselves to all her friends. She was young.

She's probably hanging out in the high school age and they're like, "Yo, Mary, did y'all hear about Mary? " And so when Christmas is coming around, they're not trying to hang out with her and go to like the lights at the Fairmont. Hey, we'll see you later. Hope it all goes well.

And then they show up in Bethlehem. She has a baby. Just her. just Joseph and then a bunch of weird shepherds who live out in the fields.

That was where Christmas occurred. Yet most of our one most of our biggest desire around Christmas is just to be comfortable. I don't know. I don't want to I don't want to feel bad about it because we have developed a culture around Christmas that incorporates gifts.

It incorporates different levels of superficiality which aren't inherently bad unless we forget the true meaning of Christmas. But for me, I'm learning that the being home for Christmas isn't this place of superficial comfort. It's this place of supernatural calling. It's not this place of a homogeneous group of people that look like me, act like me, talk like me, sound like me, make me feel comfortable naturally that I don't have to make adjustments for in my verbiage.

Like people make fun of this at Thanksgiving and stuff like this. But picture if your family isn't homogeneous and you're sitting at dinner and then someone starts talking about Trump and the other person starts talking about Kla Harris or whoever. I don't know. Stop there, right?

Like picture that. It tension happens. And so for Christmas, what we're trying to do is remove tension and create comfort. But what if I told you that the goal of Christmas was to do the opposite of that?

It's to increase tension so that you could reach your calling. Ain't that that'd be a crazy way to view Christmas. It's a very unattractive way to view it when I'm viewing it from my flesh. Home for Christmas should be relaxing.

My wife and I were talking about this just yesterday. She said, 'Hey, would you like to open up present? My kids aren't in here, are they? She's not either.

Okay, where's she at? Oh, come on, Hannah. Get to church. I'm kidding.

She's back there serving in the back helping them out today. In fact, she's she's helping out in the back. And she's very valuable to me up here. So, if anyone feels led by God to get uncomfortable during Christmas time to help out with kids for the whole of 2026, feel free, you know, jump into that so she can sit here and my sermons will be a little bit better cuz I can look at her instead of all of you.

You know what I'm saying? All right. We were talking about, hey, what if we open Christmas presents on the 22nd because her parents are going to be here and they're going to be leaving uh right before Christmas, so she wants to open presents with them. And my gut was like, no, I don't want to do that.

But then she said something that was really attractive. She said, and then on Christmas, you don't have to put nothing together. [laughter] And and then I was like, you mean I could spend the whole day just celebrating my savior and reading the Bible? That'd be [laughter] a It's a joke.

Y'all don't want to laugh. It was a joke. It was a joke. We should totally do that.

I will do that. But it was it was still a joke as as if I'm going to spend the whole day. Anyways, I was Now I sound unspiritual for making a comment about that joke. I love reading my Bible just to be clear.

But also I Okay, I'm done with that part. [laughter] But that superficial comfort, it feels like I get excited. I salivate at that idea. And if God made himself flesh, which that's exactly what Christmas is about.

If God made himself flesh, stood in front of me right now and said, "Hey, I actually want to make you uncomfortable for Christmas. " So, what if you invited some other people over that you don't know very well that are going to be disconnected from their friends on Christmas? What if you did a whole weird claimation Christmas and invited the aisle of misfit toys to your house? What if you did that?

What's your gut feeling right now? I don't want to do that. [laughter] No, it's just me, my family, and my dogs. I'm good.

I don't want to I don't want to go farther than that. I don't want to be uncomfortable. But look at my son. Look at the shepherds.

Look at the wise men. Look at Joseph. Look at Mary. Look at the entire scenario.

They weren't comfortable. So why would you create this holiday that prioritizes comfort and ignores calling? Your home is not your house. Your home is not your line.

Joseph understands this cuz he's going there and he's sitting in an inn when his entire line is probably there doing the census alongside him. No, your home is something so much greater than that. is something that is Jesus actually left his home in heaven so that you and I could find our home in him. [clears throat] That's what this is about.

So yeah, celebrate. Yeah, stay home for Christmas. You can do all of that, but remember what it took to get you even a little bit comfortable at Christmas. The fact that you get to celebrate the birth of your savior meant that Jesus had to leave his comfort to step down into our stuff.

So when you celebrate Christmas, if there's not just a tinge or a little bit of you that is broken, maybe even like discomforted by the fact that you're so comfortable, I would encourage you to open up the text and read it again. I would encourage you to invite God into your conversation about what you're going to do for Christmas. This isn't me telling you you got to do it in the most selfless way possible. This is me telling you that you need to put Jesus at the center of every bit of your decision-making process about Christmas.

Whatever your tradition is, it's trit without Jesus. It's pointless without Jesus. It's kind of dumb. Without Jesus, you're going to judge these you don't judge these kids.

Do you lie to your kids uh about uh different things like Santa Claus and Tooth Fairy? If you're in here and you believe in that, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to ruin it. They're totally real.

Um so like, but the way you treat Christmas is the same thing. If Jesus isn't in it, it's just some madeup holiday that you celebrate for no reason. There's zero value to it other than we came together, argued a little bit, and said we were family. But Jesus offers us eternal rest when we trust in him.

So for me this Christmas, I'll be home for Christmas, but I'll be trying to understand the weight of what Jesus means by the fact that I'll spend eternity with him in heaven cuz my home is not here. Ultimately, my home is with him. And so there's another layer to this. It's not just the eternal home that you have in Christ Jesus.

The the other layer is that while Joseph and Mary and Jesus were alone for the holiday and Jesus was laying there in a manger. I don't think they were alone. I mean the the images always have like goats and stuff there, right? So he went by himself.

He had some comfort. It was just for them it was bad. It's just stupid. So dumb.

H. Sorry. Yeah. I thought it was good.

I was trying not to be too sheepish with it, but yeah. Yeah. [snorts] Everybody's sick these days. It's probably pretty horse and fall.

[laughter] Now I'm just No, I need I think they had cattle back then. Or do you just want me to move on? Um, this is all on the spot, just FYI. But they they were alone until God surrounded them with a group of people who they would not have anticipated probably not have selected.

I don't know about you, I'm not going to select a bunch of random shepherds. I'm not going to select some weird Eastern Zarastrianism type people from the east who are just like we all star. That's not me. I'm just that's not who I surround myself with with [laughter] gold's cool.

Frankincense, I got this stuff. You need to chill out with those weird gifts. I I'm not naturally going to surround myself with those people, but the people that God brought around them intentionally, like it was so interesting. The cool part about these people, it's not that that they were eastern.

It's not that they were shepherds. It's it's not that they had some specific personality trait. It was that they all were willing to to listen to a subtle suggestion. The wise men, it was a star.

The shepherds, they're just laying there like, y'all see that? That's a Is that an angel? It's interesting. Okay, cool.

We should listen to it. Like you you say, "Well, if I saw an angel, I'd listen. " No, you wouldn't. We talked about this last week.

[laughter] No, you wouldn't. cuz cuz we've entertained angels unawares. That's Hebrews. This a direct quote.

And and and so for many of us, we're not seeing as messengers from God the very things that are messengers from God. But for some reason, the shepherds could see it. And so they weren't home. And their posture enabled them to hear from God.

And so they surrounded Mary, Joseph, the baby. And I know there are different historical structures that we can look into. The wise men came a little bit later. It's not all at once in one sitting.

But we do know through this that God surrounded them with people that they would not have anticipated. And so while the first layer is you need to find your home in Christ Jesus, the second layer is that God's provided you a home in this world. And I might be so bold to say that this church family is part of this process of homebuilding in your life. And so while the first layer is wherever I'm at, I'm going to be home in my relationship with Jesus.

He's offered me peace. He's offered me sustenance. He's offered me abundance. He's offered me himself.

But number two, I'm gonna be with you all because I love my family, but just like Jesus said, it's neither like like it's different in the kingdom. It's not blood. It's it's it's a different type of mentality that combines us together and makes a new home. And so for me, I I want to be with you all.

So on Christmas Eve, I don't know what your traditions are, um, but I'd encourage you to move from trite tradition to true worship. And so on December 24th, sorry, let me be clear. December 21st, I think it's that Sunday, December 24th, I think that's next Wednesday, we're going to be worshiping God in spirit and in truth together. So after worship, I'll go to my physical home.

Um, but during worship, I'll be with you all who are my home away from home, if you will, cuz I don't have any family other than my mom who moved out here with me and my wife and my kids. So, I'm going to be with you all. And my encouragement to you is maybe you feel like the aisle of misfit toys. Maybe you feel like you have never been able to really connect at a deeper level to God and to others.

What I want to tell you is whether you're a weird looking Rudolph, I'm just being real. Whether you're a weird sounding elf, whether you're the abom abomin [laughter] cuz didn't he come good at the end? Like he was sad too. He was all by himself.

Wasn't that part of the whole process? Whether you're the abominable snow bass snowman constantly posting on Facebook things you probably shouldn't be posting. I don't care where you come from. Wherever you come from, Jesus has already prepared a place for you to find home.

And it's in him and it's with us. I'm not trying to cause you to depart your blood family, hang out with them, but the family you are building in Christ Jesus is one that he is calling you to. And I got to be clear, it is not comfortable. Anyone who serves on our setup tear down team knows you can't just put up your feet and relax and watch Great British Baking Show.

It takes work. It takes effort. It takes sitting here and being silent and thinking about how should I respond properly in a way that's edifying and wholesome to this person who just said something that I thought is crazy. Like how do I honor God in this moment?

They're different than me. They don't look like me. I prefer to go run marathons. This person prefers to go to Arby's.

I don't know. They're different. But I need you to know just like the shepherds, just like the wise men, just like Joseph and Mary who were different, just like the people who surrounded Jesus. And although they all came from Galilee, there was Matthew the tax collector, there was Peter the fisherman, there was the sons of Zebedee, all of these different types of people came together.

And at Pentecost in the book of Acts, you saw people from all over the known world speaking in different languages, understanding one another. The incarnation is this. While we formally misunderstood who God was, Jesus shows us in flesh who he is. And he has come to break down the dividing wall of hostility between us and him and between you and me.

So at Christmas, I'm going to celebrate that I have a new home. And I love you, Mom. Is that you, Mom? Yeah.

Okay. It's not some other old lady. [music] I love you, Mom. But you and I both know that it's a bigger family than just you and me and my brother.

[music] If it was just me, you and Andy, it' stink, wouldn't it? It'd be terrible. You'd be miserable. I'd be annoying.

He'd be annoying. But now we can all be annoying to each other. And there's somebody in here. I don't know if it's that many, but there's somebody in here.

You [music] don't have a family. Your family is disintegrating by the moment. There's somebody in here. You still think your home is physical, but it's spiritual.

And the only way you encounter [music] that spiritual home is by trusting in Jesus who's your Lord and Savior. But you got to believe he came, died, rose on the third day and commit your life to him in [music] order to understand the the beauty and the blessing of that home. [music] The peace that surpasses understanding. And whatever category you find yourself in, right now is a moment for you to move from point A to point B.

I'm believing someone's moving from divided in Christ to connected [music] to Christ. I'm believing someone's moving from isolated to connected to others who are building their lives around Christ. Whatever that is for you, I want you to know prayer team's going to come up right now. They're going [music] to stand here and I want to be so clear.

If you're ready to trust in Jesus, I'm going to lead you in that in a moment. But if you're ready to find a deeper home, maybe receive prayer, maybe you're just sad this Christmas [music] because of loss over past years, we're here to pray for you. In [music] fact, more than the prayer team, anyone who feels led to pray for somebody else right now, I'd encourage you guys to come up. And I'm going to give those of you who are ready to trust in Jesus [music] a moment to do so.

So, if you would bow your heads, close your eyes, I'm going to lead you in a prayer. And we tend to do that together out loud for the benefit of those of you who have never done it before. So repeat after me. Say, "God, I believe [music] that Jesus is your son.

I believe you died on the cross and rose from the grave. Forgive me of my sin. Make me new. And I commit right now to follow you.

" It's in Jesus's name that we pray. And all God's people said, "Amen. " Come on, let's celebrate those who just trusted in Jesus.