"Following The Star: Gifts That Can't Be Bought"

Now, work with me, what ‘s on your list? For the guys, maybe some tools, a saw, a grinder or truck accessory? For the girls, maybe some house accessory, art, or shoes? Maybe an Ipod?

What’s on your list?

What’s on my list? A subscription to the Western Producer, a big old flat screen T.V, and a trip to the NFR in Las Vegas next year. That was fun!

Well, at Lakeview this Christmas, we want to try and reorder our thoughts about Christmas a little bit and rediscover what it was really meant to be.

What we’re gonna do is take some of the most famous words of Jesus from the Book of Matthew, called the Beatitudes, and we’ll connect Jesus’ words on how we are to live to this Christmas season and the Christmas story.

Listen to what Jesus said in Matthew 5, verses 5-8. Today, we want to start rediscovering Christmas by focusing on just one verse:

5:5 “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.”

Meek is a word we just don’t understand too much and it’s not a positive word in our minds. Meek means gentle, considerate, unassuming, humble, unpretentious, and honest. Another definition I read this week is “a gentle, low key yet confident approach to life.” Another version of the Bible says this:

"You're blessed when you're content with just who you are, no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought.”
Matthew 5:5 (Message)

The key word in that sentence is content. Today, I just want us to explore contentment a bit as we get into Christmas.

Christmas is a funny time of the year because our heart and our head are often in conflict. Let me explain. See, we all believe in our hearts that this is a season built around giving and not receiving, and that it’s a time to be others oriented not self-oriented. We know in our hearts that Christmas is a time to remember those that are poor or less fortunate in their state of life. We all get that with our hearts, right? But when it comes to our heads, Christmas can really mess with us. With our heads we’re being inundated with our societies pressure to be good consumers. After all, we hear it every night on the news.

December is, by a country mile, the biggest month in retail sales all year! Christmas is really good for the economy and we get five times as many flyers stuffed in our mail, five times the number of T.V. ads and Superstore and Walmart are open 24 and 7 for the next 11 days just during Christmas.

Flyers are an amazing phenomenon. Does anyone like to read flyers? At our house, Pam and Sharaya read flyers, every one that comes in the door. I just don’t get it.

I just don’t need to know that Superstore will give you 10lbs of potatoes for $0.88 if you buy $ 200 worth of groceries. My mind does not need that tidbit of useless information.

So the other night I came home and its cold outside and there’s a fire going and the tree is lit up and Pam and Sharaya are listening to Christmas music. I’m thinking they’re having some very cool mother/daughter women’s kinda moment and I was really tickled. I was just about to tip toe into the other room to give them some space when I heard Pam say to Sharaya, “did you see those slippers you can get that will also clean the floor? Look at how cute they are and they’re only at Walmart.”

In my mind I went, “what! You’re reading flyers together?” And sure enough there was a pile that deep with flyers from nearly every store in town.

Christmas is a crazy time of year where the pressure to look and shop and get to buy is huge and the advertisers are coming at us in full force.

My point is simply this; something happens during this month of December in Canada that starts first in our heads. If we’re not careful with it, it will take over our hearts. Now, whether it’s just because of this barrage of advertising or because of a buying tradition, as in we’ve always done it, somehow we just end up thinking in our minds about flat screen LCD TV’s, and fancier flip phones that are also Ipods, that are also cameras, that are also video games, that are also day-timers with internet access . And in some ways, we can’t help it. It’s like we can’t stop the inundation.

My wife got a new phone last week, and when she brought it home the kids rushed to see if it played games or had video capabilities or whether it was the “I-phone” that could play music. Right when I walked in, one of the kids said, “Mom, your phone is pretty lame. It doesn’t even play music.” And I said, like an old man, “well maybe she just wanted a phone.” That child just rolled his eyes and walked away and said, “like whatever Dad. That phone isn’t cool.”

See, our heads get caught up in what Christmas isn’t really about. Our minds get caught up in what’s next for me to buy. After all, that bigger, fatter, juicer flat screen T.V. would be awesome to watch the super bowl on wouldn’t it? Only 4 weeks after Christmas! All I’m saying is that we’ve just gotta watch where our heads go because where our mind dwells, our hearts will soon follow. Then pretty soon it will be January and we will have lived through December, and through Christmas, without understanding the blessing of meekness; without really understanding the blessing that comes with contentment.

That’s what Jesus was talking about, right? Blessed are you when you’re content with just who you are. Jesus’ words here are so powerful. We will be blessed by God in life if we learn contentment. But those words seem a little bit beyond our reach. It’s like we might be able to kinda hear what he’s saying but not quite understanding it. And how do we connect those words of Jesus to our world and the hype of Christmas? It’s like we’re just a quarter turn out from getting what he’s saying.

So, what I did is make it practical. What is the first thing we’ve gotta do to become content? We’ve got to get our minds thinking on a bit of a different track than we are.

So, let me talk to you about a word to focus your minds on during this season that I believe will keep your heart, our hearts, in the right spot.

The word is gratitude and then thankfulness. What if over the next 17 days until Christmas you personally made a point of taking 5 minutes by yourself every morning, be disciplined with this, to just focus on gratitude and count your blessings. And then, what if you took 5 minutes with your family or your roommate at night to simply cultivate thanksgiving.

What if you and I just spent a few minutes thinking about all the stuff that we already have and then, work with me here, what if we thought about all the stuff you and I have that can’t be found in a flyer. So, when you walk into your home or apartment or condo today after this service, just take 5 minutes and gather whoever you’re together with, and if its just you that works too, and just talk about what you’re grateful for. Then give this a try to take it up a notch. It’s what we do in our home. Somebody just prays a simple prayer of thanksgiving after we’ve counted our blessings. “God, thanks for our house, and for our beds, and thanks God for friends and for food, and for laugher, and for a warm fire, and for a sense of love in our family. God we know that all good things come from you and we’re humbled by how good you are to us. Thanks God.”

And you know, when we do that, something changes in the direction of our minds and our hearts because suddenly we’re just not as anxious about looking at flyers to see what we don’t have. But, we’re incredibly grateful to really get, for even just a minute or two, how much God has already done for us. Then our heads and our hearts are truly thankful, and we really are content with just who we are and what we have and we realize all of a sudden that we’re so blessed. But, without turning that gratitude corner, without counting our blessings and then sending the thanks back to God, I’m not sure we’ll get to the same level of contentment this Christmas.

Those thoughts play nicely into the second word I’d like you to remember in order to find a little meekness this Christmas: satisfaction.

What was it that Jesus said about meekness? “You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are, no more, no less.”

In another place, the Bible says this: “But godliness with contentment is great gain.”
1 Timothy 6:6 (NIV)

The book of Proverbs tells us over and over and over again to learn the path of wisdom and satisfaction and to be humble. It’s out of a humble contented gratitude filled place that our hearts have a chance to grow.

You could find another one hundred scripture verses that speak the same truth about our level of inner satisfaction and contentment and how that is connected to our souls.

Here’s a great story I read the other day about how American Thanksgiving is also the kick off of the Christmas shopping season. There are huge sales and massive advertising campaigns to get people to come to whatever store or buy whatever item they’re trying to sell. Anyway, somewhere in Kentucky I think, a local K-Mart advertised easy credit along with their many sales. People were able to sign up for a K-Mart credit card at a reduced rate of interest; buy now–pay later. Well, what K-Mart didn’t know is that the particular store had a computer glitch that automatically approved everyone that weekend for a minimum $4000 credit limit and it approved them immediately. Well word got out within minutes of this easy credit and there was a huge rush on signing up for credit cards. There was this $4000 limit/person pandemonium that broke out in the store. There were people arguing with each other about who got to what item first and there were people racing down the aisles just sweeping things off the shelves. Finally, the police had to be called because two women had a fight right at the till because one woman got to an item first; an item that the other woman wanted. Crazy. They said within just a few hours the store was depleted of stock.

That’s the world we live in. A world where free credit turns us into frenzied one day-spend-it-all-shop-a-maniacs and then we hear the word satisfaction and we try to put it together with that picture. We can’t. I mean do you think any one of the hundreds of people that rushed K-Mart two weeks ago woke up that morning really needing any of the things they bought? Do you think any one of them woke up content and with a feeling of deep satisfaction for where their life was at? I don’t think so.

But Jesus said, “Blessed are you this Christmas when you’re content with just who you are, no more, no less.”

You know, I think soul satisfaction is what Jesus was talking about here. I think He was saying that if you want to be content it’s not gonna happen by running off to K-Mart or buying into some deal with no payments until March. I think what Jesus was getting at had a whole lot more to do with internal soul stuff than external buying stuff.

In another place in scripture Jesus said this to his followers, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed. A man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions." Luke 12:15 (NIV)

That’s just another way of saying life isn’t about flat screen televisions, and that contentment will never be found by owning the next new phone or a sofa that you don’t have to pay for until March.

I gotta tell you, this past 8 months has been a quest for me to find and then nail down what contentment looks like for me. Since the day I was born I was a wee bit unsatisfied. It’s true actually. My mom says that I was a very high maintenance baby.

Well, this past spring and summer as most of you know, I was on a leave away from work. I was pretty much isolated from everything that might have given me even a false level of identity and or satisfaction for the last 20 years. I found myself in a spot with no career to work at and nothing external to lead or do and nothing to develop in my life except my own soul. And, I gotta be honest, for the first couple weeks it was very hard to be content and satisfied without anything external going on. But over the course of the next few weeks and then months, I felt a change begin to take place; first in my thinking, then in my heart, and finally my actions.

What I realized over those months is that real deep down contentment and satisfaction had nothing to do with what I do or what I own or even who my friends are or aren’t. Contentment has nothing to do with any of that outside stuff, but had everything to do with my soul. That is a remarkable lesson to learn.

I guess what I want to plead with you to understand this Christmas season is to pursue the contentment of your soul. Chase hard after God during these days and expand the depth and breadth and width of your soul. Find Jesus this Christmas amidst all the hype and all the external stuff. Find Jesus, and once you’ve found Him, follow Him. If you have already found Him and are already following Him, don’t get sidetracked and bombarded this Christmas by the barrage of big screen T.V.’s and lay away plans. Just say no to that stuff for a bit or at least get to the place where you can say no. Getting to that place is part of finding some soul contentment and soul satisfaction. Sometimes saying no intentionally helps us to be able to say yes to God.

Here’s a couple of ideas to say yes to Jesus and to work through this contentment thing:
Start a journal. Write down some contented thoughts this season.
Take more time to pray; to get quiet and just pray.
Go to Tim Horton’s or Starbucks and just sit alone and think about your life and soul; about how content, satisfied or unsatisfied you really are. Talk to God about those feelings.

Whatever it takes, we’ve got to wrestle with this satisfaction thing.

Here’s one more word. Ready? Simplicity. Here’s what Jesus said: He said when we discover contentment inside by following Him closer then we ever have before and cultivate gratitude on a daily basis, we start to see what it might actually mean for us to live meekly in a not at all meek society. You and I start adding confidence to our contentment. It’s at that moment of action when we are truly blessed.

When you actually lead yourself in such a way that you begin to live out meekness and gratitude-filled-confident contentment by our actions, that’s when we become proud owners of what cant’ be bought. There’s a moment, Jesus says, when that truth becomes reality in our lives.

"You're blessed when you're content with just who you are, no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought.
Matthew 5:5 (The Message)

So when I wrote that out I said to myself, “that’s good preaching. “ It’s all true, but my next thought was a wee bit more practical. I thought, Dean, how in the world are we ever gonna live this out? I mean we live in a world that screams at us 24-7 to get more stuff and do more things and buy more useless items everyday, especially at Christmas. We live in a world where we succumb to that pressure everyday. We live in a world where it is very hard to be content, at least I do. I am not easily satisfied. There is huge temptation for me everyday to try to find contentment externally instead of internally.

So how can we live out the truth about meekness, because everyone of us wants to be blessed by God, right? Everyone of us wants to own what can’t be bought deep in our souls. Here’s the word that can help us: simplicity.
I don’t know all this for sure. I haven’t at all conquered this simplicity thing, but I think it’s a start.

I reread the Christmas story this week a few times and watched the movie too. The Nativity; walk your kids through it since it follows the Biblical account. You might need some help! But when I read about Mary and Joseph and the weeks and months surrounding the birth of Jesus, I was amazed again at the ordinariness of it all. That God would choose to send His son into the world in such a humble way and to such ordinary people is really quite amazing. Think about it; a stable, a manger, a donkey, some shepherds and two teenage kids really, unmarried and pregnant in a strange town.

That’s how Jesus came to the earth. That’s the way God entered the world. Pretty basic - pretty ordinary – pretty simple. Through that simplicity the world was forever changed.

So I got thinking, if the way Jesus came into this world was that simple, maybe the way to really find and follow Him is simple too and ordinary and basic and humble.

Maybe the way to find Him this Christmas is easier than we think. In fact, maybe our souls will become proud owners of everything that can’t be bought and maybe we can even open the treasures of heaven. Not by some complicated, super sophisticated, only understood by the elite kinda deal. No, maybe, just maybe, it’s through simplicity and faith.

By meekly living our lives with gratitude and by searching hard for contentment inside not outside, and by living much simpler lives, maybe we’ll see Jesus more clearly this Christmas by just doing less. Maybe our souls can become proud owners of the things of God without buying a single thing this Christmas.

Maybe it’s not about having to put up the Christmas lights at -23 degrees or grinding through the mall on a Saturday or fighting traffic with 3 kids in the van to get that deal that’s now only at the Walmart across town. Maybe you and I will see Jesus clearer this Christmas by not wanting that flat screen as much as we do, but really being okay if we get it or not. Do you see what I’m saying?

Folks, my bet is that you and I will see life more clearly and we’ll see Jesus more clearly, our loved ones more clearly and even the desire of our souls more clearly this Christmas simply by living just a little out of the rush; just a little bit away from the crowd and out of the noise.

In fact, I think we need to choose that kinda faith in some way, even some small ways this Christmas. Think with me on this and let’s make this practical.

What if you made a conscious effort as a family to choose just a couple of simpler actions in the next three weeks leading up to Christmas? What if you decided to take three full nights between now and Christmas to just be together as a family and laugh and play games and enjoy being together?

Instead of saying yes to every Christmas function, what if you intentionally said no to one or two and gave that time, energy, or money to a family in need this Christmas? What if you did whatever it took to carve out a day to just be by yourself this Christmas? Not to shop, or have anyone to meet, or to have to get all done up for or have to rush to? To do nothing external. If it was just you and God for a day, what would you do to celebrate Christmas with Jesus, just you and Him? Focus on internal things.

Folks, I hope you hear what I’m saying and I hope you hear what I think Jesus was saying. Somehow, we’ve got to live internally and find contentment internally this Christmas season.

So, battle the noise a bit this Christmas and choose gratitude on a daily basis. Choose to gain greater understanding of what satisfaction and contentment really are in your life this Christmas
and then just dial back the rush of Christmas and choose a bit of simplicity and faith.

“Blessed are you, Jesus said, when you’re content in just who you are, when you are meek. That’s the moment where you become proud owners of what can’t be bought.”