Thrive Community Church

The Gift of Christmas - Week 1
Thrive Community Church aspires to be an Acts 2 mission living Up into God's Word, In with service and love, and out in mission. This series will explore the Apostles' Creed and the building blocks of our faith in the Gospel.
Locations & Times
Thrive Community Church
20041 S Tamiami Trail, Estero, FL 33928, USA
Sunday 10:00 AM
Our reading today, the prophecy of Isaiah, came at a time when the nation of Judah was in the beginning of a death spiral. Some people realized it. Isaiah was one. Others denied it’s reality because it was too much to handle. Yet, they all knew the powers around them would swallow them up. If it wasn’t Syria, it would be Assyria. If not Assyria, it might be Egypt. If not Egypt, it would most likely be Babylon.
Isaiah speaks to the anxiety and fears of his day by prophesying a Messiah unlike any other king or leader Israel had known. Isaiah 9 said he was going to be "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" whose reign would have no end. Isaiah 11 now speaks of a time when universal peace would be ushered in by this Messiah.
There are two words in Latin for the future: Futurus and Adventus. Futurus is predicting the future by seeing the present. Adventus is the future invading the present.
We don’t look at the present into the future, but from the future into the present. - Jürgen Moltmann
1: God does what you don’t expect. The Messiah will be a branch, a tender shoot, rather than a stately tree.
Have you ever done strategic planning? You begin with the end in mind. You visualize where you want to end up and then work backward to the best strategy to get there.
Timothy Keller shares this perspective:
What if this were your objectives, your vision:
In two thousand years from now I want to be so f
In 2000 years from now I want one quarter of the population of the world to center their life on me.
In 2000 years from now I want my teaching to be seen as the single most important body of thought in the history of the world.
How would you enter into human history and how would you live?
Timothy Keller shares this perspective:
What if this were your objectives, your vision:
In two thousand years from now I want to be so f
In 2000 years from now I want one quarter of the population of the world to center their life on me.
In 2000 years from now I want my teaching to be seen as the single most important body of thought in the history of the world.
How would you enter into human history and how would you live?
2: God does what you don’t deserve.
This is transformative, and not transactional. He doesn’t do for us so we can do for him. He doesn’t do for us as much as we can do for him. He does everything for us despite the fact we can give him nothing but grief. With the Messiah you get what you don’t deserve. That is the gift of Christmas.
This is transformative, and not transactional. He doesn’t do for us so we can do for him. He doesn’t do for us as much as we can do for him. He does everything for us despite the fact we can give him nothing but grief. With the Messiah you get what you don’t deserve. That is the gift of Christmas.
3: God does what you don’t think possible.
Isaiah says this Messiah will bring in a time of peace and harmony between rivals and competitors, between nature and human beings so that a wolf and a lamb are best buddies. A baby who can’t feed herself will be able to play with a cobra and not be harmed. That is miraculous. Nature will be healed and become what God always intended.
Isaiah says this Messiah will bring in a time of peace and harmony between rivals and competitors, between nature and human beings so that a wolf and a lamb are best buddies. A baby who can’t feed herself will be able to play with a cobra and not be harmed. That is miraculous. Nature will be healed and become what God always intended.
Application 1: Be aware that during desperate times people will look to power and politics, conventional means for magical solutions. Judah looked to Syria, Egypt, nationalism and other solutions, but not to the Lord through repentance and trust.
“In our technological age we are confronted with an ever increasing number of people who have given up hope for God’s new creation altogether. They have given up the idea of an intervention from ‘beyond,’ and they attempt to tailor the planet they inhabit according to their own ends.” - Hans Schwarz
Application 2: Leadership is servanthood. Jesus is the only leader worthy of the title as leader honestly. Any leader we have today better know who she or he is following and emulating the one who serves us completely.
Application 3: God deconstructs before he builds up. This may be a hard thing for us. Isaiah’s wonderful words of comfort and hope come in the midst of devastation and desperation. The light shines in the darkness. The shoot comes from a dead stump, the cross first then the resurrection.
Application 4: Live out Advent: Don’t think from the present into the future. See the future in Jesus Christ and then live in the present.
What does this mean practically? Live in such a way people can't make sense of it without Jesus and his future - give sacrificially, offer grace unconditionally, serve practically, and live radically.
“Jesus is the paradigm and the anticipation of our own future and at the same time the inspiration and possibility of living toward that future. In Jesus, God’s love was announced to us before his kingdom had fully come. Thus the coming of the kingdom should not cause surprise or terror. Since Jesus announced it, we are able to open ourselves to God’s future. We can find communion with him who decides the future of all things and can anticipate the final significance and essence of all things.” - Hans Schwarz
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