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Dec 27, 2020

Heaven Has Come

Heaven Has Come

Passage: 1 John 1:1-4

Speaker: Andrew Kerhoulas

Series: Heaven Has Come

Keywords: joy, incarnation, fellowship

Our worship service will revolve around the emotion which evades us now more than ever: joy. The birth of Jesus means that heaven has come to earth, and along with it, its ensuing joy. Merry Christmas, indeed!

Order of Worship

CALL TO WORSHIP: (from The Worship Sourcebook)
OPENING PRAYER
GOSPEL READING: John 1:1-5,14,16-18
MESSAGE TITLE: Heaven Has Come
CENTRAL TEXT: 1 John 1:1-4
RESPONSE: “My Joy Is Complete”
BENEDICTION: Romans 15:14

Readings & Scriptures 

CALL TO WORSHIP: (from The Worship Sourcebook)

Leader: God is here! The Messiah has come!
All: We open our eyes to see him and lift our hearts to worship him.
We have come to exalt the name of Jesus, our Savior and King,
and to bring glory to God the Father.
Leader: In our worship we demonstrate the mind of Christ in declaring to God that he is the supreme authority in our lives. We bow before him in submission to our Lord and King.
All: Come, worship the Lord!

OPENING PRAYER
Glory be to God in the highest,
and on earth peace, goodwill toward those he favors.
For unto us is born a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
We praise you, we bless you, we glorify you,
we give thanks unto you for this greatest of your mercies,
O Lord God, heavenly King, God the Father almighty.
O Lord, the only begotten Son, Jesus Christ.
O Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father,
who was made human to take away the sins of the world,
have mercy upon us and turn us from our iniquities.
You who were made manifest to destroy the works of the devil,
have mercy upon us and enable us to renounce and forsake them.
You who are the great advocate with the Father, receive our prayer. Amen.

GOSPEL READING: John 1:1-5,14,16-18
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it....14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth...16 For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known.”

CENTRAL TEXT: 1 John 1:1-4
“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life— 2 the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us— 3 that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4 And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.” This is the Word of the Lord

BENEDICTION: Romans 15:14
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.

ADDITIONAL SCRIPTURES:

  • Psalm  65:11-12; 104:15; 105:43
  • Proverbs 23:24-25; 27:9
  • Isaiah 51:11
  • Jeremiah 33:11.
  • Matthew 5:12
  • Luke 2:10; 10:21
  • Acts 5:41; 13:52  
  • 2 Corinthians 6:10
  • Philippians 1:3-5; 3:1
  • Hebrews 12:2

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. What brings you joy lately? Has anything paused your joy lately? 
  2. What sort of joy does the world offer us? How does it compare to what Christ offers us? 
  3. What in essence is biblical fellowship? In what way(s) have you experienced it at Grace during the pandemic? How can you help someone feel your fellowship with them this week?
  4.  What happens when our habits don’t match our beliefs about joy (or anything else)? What is one habit you can adopt to match the joy we have been given in Christ?

QUOTES:

  • “Joy may seem to pause as grief tak†es its course, but those whose broken hearts are bound by him will experience it again.” Germaine Griffin Copeland
  • “God cannot give us happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.” C. S. Lewis
  • “God refuses to be God without us.” Will Willimon
  • “The heart of true fellowship is self-sacrificing conformity to a shared vision. Both John and Adam have a shared vision and put their savings into a fishing boat. They share that vision to start the business together. Christian fellowship then is self-sacrificing conformity to the gospel. [It is] this shared vision of what is of transcendent importance, a vision that calls forth our commitment. He’s saying he’s grateful and thankful with joy for their fellowship in the gospel from how from the moment of their conversion until now they have rolled up their sleeves and got involved in the advance of the gospel. They supported Paul financially, prayed for him, and witnessed which all testified to their shared vision of prioritizing the gospel.” D.A. Carson
  • “The Christian gospel is more than a bridge to heaven; it is a sledgehammer that breaks down divisions.” Rich Villodas
  • “The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends, are but shadows; but God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams, but God is the ocean.” Jonathan Edwards
  •  “The believer feels no shame, as though he were still living too much in the flesh, when he yearns for the physical presence of other Christians. Man was created a body, the Son of God appeared on earth in the body, he was raised in the body, in the sacrament the believer receives the Lord Christ in the body, and the resurrection of the dead will bring about the perfected fellowship of God’s spiritual-physical creatures.”  Dietrich Bonhoeffer 
  • “If we deny our happiness, resist our satisfaction, we lessen the importance of their deprivation. We must risk delight. We can do without pleasure, but not delight. Not enjoyment. We must have the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless furnace of this world. To make injustice the only measure of our attention is to praise the Devil. If the locomotive of the Lord runs us down, we should give thanks that the end had magnitude. We must admit there will be music despite everything.” From Jack Gilbert’s poem, “A Brief For The Defense”
  • “You see, it’s not just the Christmas story; rather, the entire redemptive story hinges on one thing—the eternal willingness of Jesus. Without his willingness, you and I would be without hope and without God. Without his willingness, we would be left with the power and curse of sin. Without his willingness, we would be eternally damned. During this season of celebrating don’t forget to stop and celebrate your Savior’s willingness. His willingness is your hope in life, death, and eternity. Right here, right now, he is willing to love you on your very worst day. Right now he is willing to forgive you again and again. Here and now he is willing to be patient as you continue to grow and mature. Right now he is willing to battle on your behalf against evil within and without. Here and now he is willing to teach you through his Word. Now he is willing to supply every one of your spiritual needs. Now he is willing to be faithful even when you’re not. He, right now, is willing to empower you when you’re weak and to restore you when you’ve fallen. He is willing to comfort you when you are discouraged and protect you when you’ve stepped into danger. And he remains willing to do everything necessary to feed, guide, sustain, and protect you until eternity is your final home.” Paul Tripp
  • “To be human is to be on the move, pursuing something, after something. We are like existential sharks: we have to move to live. We are not just static containers for ideas; we are dynamic creatures directed toward some end [author’s emphasis]” James K.A. Smith
  • “For it is not possible to have a Christian gospel apart from place and person. The gospel is not an idea or a plan or a vision. It works exclusively in creation and incarnation, in things and people. Disincarnation is the work of the devil.” Eugene Peterson
  • “The incarnation is a kind of vast joke whereby the Creator of the ends of the earth comes among us in diapers... Until we too have taken the idea of the God-man seriously enough to be scandalized by it, we have not taken it as seriously as it demands to be taken.” Frederick Buechner
  • “You can read every fairy tale that was ever written, every mystery thriller, every ghost story and you will never find anything so shocking, so strange, so weird and so spellbinding as the incarnation of the Son of God.” John Piper
  • “The Word become flesh. Ultimate Mystery born with a skull you could crush one- handed. Incarnation. It is not tame. It is not touching. It is not beautiful. It is uninhabitable terror. It is unthinkable darkness riven with unbearable light. Agonized laboring led to it, vast upheavals of intergalactic space/time split apart, a wrenching and tearing of the very sinews of reality itself. You can only cover your eyes and shudder before it, before this: ‘God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God . . . who for us and for our salvation,’ as the Nicene Creed puts it, ‘came down from heaven.’ Fredrick Buechner, Whistling in the Dark     
  • “The incarnation was God’s locking himself into death row. Christ did not risk death, he embraced it. . . Jesus took our nature in Bethlehem to die our death in Jerusalem. If death is no longer a fear, we are really, really free.” John Piper
  • “He became what we are in order to make us what he is.” Irenaeus

BOOKS / DOCS / SONGS

SERMONS / TALKS: