Christmas was Never Perfect | How To Find Christmas Joy Outside the Ideal (Christmas Vacation)

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- That's a real nice surprise.

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It's good, it's good, it's good,

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it's good, it's good, it's good.

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Yes, we have the cult of Christmas Vacation fans in here,

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and other people go, "What? I don't understand."

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Well, hopefully you'll be able to understand

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by the end of our time today.

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Christmas Vacation is a classic movie,

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and it's a conundrum that illustrates

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so many of our desire for a perfect Christmas,

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just like Clark Griswold is trying to give his family.

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Let's pray, before I get any further into this.

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Okay. God, thanks for just giving us a mind to grasp

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with, gosh, things that are on opposite sides of the spectrum.

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On one side, we want all want a great Christmas.

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The other side is, man, I don't want it to be too stressful.

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One one side, we want to have great memories.

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On the other side, we want to, at least I believe

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we're here today, we could be any number

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of different places because we want to know more about You.

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We don't really want to know more about Christmas.

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We want to know more about You.

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And so I pray that You would help me to facilitate

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the process of us being more like You.

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And I pray these things according to

00:26:53

the character identity of Jesus. Amen.

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Well, the movie Christmas Vacation came out in the '80s,

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and it's all about Clark Griswold,

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who wants his family to have a perfect Christmas,

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just like he remembers when he grew up.

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The idea for the movie comes in part from John Hughes,

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who's one of the producers who is a part of

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National Lampoon.

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That's why it's called National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.

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And John Hughes talks about his own childhood

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and how the memories of what he saw on film

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and what we see in media aren't really what happens

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in real life in any of our lives.

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Here's what he says: All in all,

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it was a pretty exciting Christmas,

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what with the relatives and the presents

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and the fun and the cops

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and Aunt Hazel's dog blowing up in our living room.

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Mom and Aunt Martha wanted to have one of those fun

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old fashioned Christmases that people on TV have,

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where everybody wears ties and sweaters

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and sits by the fireplace

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and makes Christmas tree ornaments out of food.

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But as dad said, the only reason those people have fun

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is they're getting paid for it.

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Most of us have stressed lives.

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Most of us wouldn't say we have a lot of room to breathe.

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And then the holidays comes and puts more expectations

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and more stress on us

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and it can be really, really, really rough.

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Clark Griswold has an unattainable ideal,

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and I think many, many of us do here today.

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This is the first idea.

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I want to give you three of them today.

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Perfection leads to tension.

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The higher your expectations are for Christmas,

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the greater the amount of tension you're going to have

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in your life and in everybody else's life.

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Perfection is an unbelievably high standard.

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And here's one of the tension points I'm going to hit today.

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Here's the if. If you put just a fraction of the energy

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that you put into Christmas, what to buy,

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what to decorate, what to wear, what cards to send,

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thank you notes, the lights.

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If you put just a fraction of the effort

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you put into Christmas every year,

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into your spiritual formation and development,

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you will be astounded by your level of spiritual growth.

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Utterly astounded.

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The problem isn't that we want our Christmas to be perfect.

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The problem is we put more energy into Christmas

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and into a perfect Christian --

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Or into a perfect Christmas than we do a perfect faith.

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The problem is, we're so fascinated and passionate

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with having all the right stuff on and looking good,

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and buying all the right things, but do we have

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that same level of passion and innovation

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the rest of the year to come closer to God?

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The big idea I've been on for a while.

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I'll hit it to you again.

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The main thing God wants is for you to be like Him.

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That's what He wants more than anything.

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Everything is orchestrated in your life,

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and He'll use everything in your life to do that.

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Which is why Romans 8:28 says, God causes all things

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to work together for good for those who love Him

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and are called according to His purpose.

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All things, including He'll even use your quest

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for a perfect Christmas or your anger

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over having horrible Christmases after horrible Christmases.

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He'll use that for your spiritual formation

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to become more like Him.

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Jesus says in Matthew 5:48, Jesus says:

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You therefore must be perfect, as

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your heavenly Father is perfect.

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Wow. This is the greatest teacher of all time

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telling us what God wants for you,

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what Jesus wants you is for you to be perfect.

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He doesn't want you to have a perfect holiday,

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doesn't want you to have a perfect family,

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wants you to be perfect.

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Now this can be stressed.

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This is more of an aspirational statement

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than the way you have to be.

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I mean, our understanding of perfection

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is not God's understanding perfection.

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But I'm just going to let this sit here for a while

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and just say this again.

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What kind of energy do you have in your life

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going towards becoming like Christ,

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going towards becoming perfect?

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I'm not talking about perfect moralism.

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I'm not talking about, you know, having

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some extreme sense of moralism, you make stuff up,

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make up stuff in the Bible,

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like many people who are religious do,

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make up things that aren't even in the Bible.

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Like, you know, you can't play cards.

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Why can't you play cards?

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You can't. You can't dance. Can't. You can't dance.

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You can't have tobacco. Can't.

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Why can't you? You can't.

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We have any Baptists in here? Any Baptists?

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One, two.

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It's the old joke, I was struggling with it before.

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I couldn't. I couldn't remember.

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Why do Baptists --

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Why are Baptists so upset about premarital sex?

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Because it leads to dancing.

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That's an old joke.

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Someone else told me that last year and said,

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"Why do you want to have two Baptists

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with you on your fishing trip?

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Because you have two of them,

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they won't take any of your beer, you know,

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because they're watching out for each other."

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I'm not talking about some from standard --

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We're like --

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Well, stop hating on the Baptists, man.

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Real eggnog too, by the way, Baptists. It's wonderful.

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I wonder if I'm gonna get hated on for eggnog

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the way I get hated on for having a beer on stage.

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We'll find out. Merry Christmas.

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God has expectations for you. He really does.

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One of His expectations is not

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for you to have a perfect holiday.

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One of His expectations is not for you

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to have a perfect family and to fit the American ideal

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of of whatever it is.

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And that's kind of the cool thing

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about Christmas Vacation, the movie,

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is there's stuff that's chaotic, that's real life.

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Like, true story, there's a scene where

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Snots, the Rottweiler goes after a squirrel

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that's in accidentally in the family tree.

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And little known secret is, for a year,

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an animal trainer was working with the Rottweiler

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and a trained squirrel to pull off that scene.

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And the morning, the morning of the shoot,

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the squirrel died.

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And the director is all freaked out, like,

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how could this happen?

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And he said, "Squirrels die. It's just this thing."

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So they went out and captured a squirrel in the wild,

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and they let it loose on the set

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and all that calamity took place.

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It was wonderful. It was fun.

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When God says, be perfect, be perfect

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like your heavenly Father is perfect,

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it's an aspiration. It's not condemnation if you're not.

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Aspiration like you want to be like God,

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you want to be like Jesus.

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And the good news is, there's a bunch of things

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in your life that can be messy

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that God doesn't care about at all,

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doesn't care how messy your hair is,

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doesn't care how messy your Christmas is,

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doesn't care how messy your standard is compared to

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what your mother, your mother-in-law gave you.

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In fact, the messier and more imperfect your Christmas is,

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the more likely you're in line with the OG Christmas.

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The original.

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In the Book of Matthew 1:18, we'll look at two,

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two different accounts of Christmas.

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Matthew is one of them.

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And here's what it says: Now the birth of Jesus Christ

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took place in this way.

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When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph,

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before they came together she was found

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to be with child from the Holy Spirit.

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And her husband Joseph, being a just man

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and unwilling to put her to shame,

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resolved to divorce her quietly.

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This is an imperfect, messy, stressful Christmas.

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Mary is pregnant out of wedlock.

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God comes her, says, "I'm going to something unique.

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I'm gonna place my seed in your womb."

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It's a pretty crazy, miraculous thing.

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And this makes for a messy life for Mary,

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at least the beginning, because now

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there's scandal around her and her friend,

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who she's betrothed to.

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Being betrothed is basically an engagement

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on steroids, industrial strength.

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It's not the same as our engagement,

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but somewhat similar.

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And Joseph doesn't believe her.

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What are you talking about? What? What?

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This is messy. This is difficult.

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But as he considered these things, behold,

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an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream,

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saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear

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to take Mary as your wife,

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for that which is conceived in her

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is from the Holy Spirit.

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She will bear a son, and you shall call His name Jesus,

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and He will save His people from their sins."

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He will save his people from their imperfections.

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He will save His people from their messy areas.

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This is who He is. This is what He does.

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And the whole Christmas story is a mess.

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It's a mess to give birth in somewhat of a barnyard.

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It's a mess to give birth in very unsanitary conditions.

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And yet this is what happens in the very first Christmas.

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So if your Christmas is unideal,

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if your Christmas is chaotic,

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welcome to maybe the true original spirit of Christmas.

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The home run scene in the Christmas story scenery.

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According to the directors and producers,

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the home run scene is a scene where

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Clark gets trapped up inside of his attic

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and his family abandons him and he can't get out.

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And he's trying to pass time,

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and he finds an old projector and movies

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where he's looking at images of Christmases

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long, long, long ago, which aren't

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as good as he remembers them to be.

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But he gets the feels in this scene.

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Here's the home run scene, so the

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directors say, of the Christmas story.

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- [music] Christmas is the time of year

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for being with the ones we love.

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Sharing so much joy and cheer.

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What a wonderful feeling

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watching the ones we love having so much fun.

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I was sitting by the fireside,

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taking a walk through the snow,

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listening to a children's choir

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singing songs about Jesus.

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- Mother, please stop complaining.

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[music] The blessed way that He came to us.

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Why can't it remain all through the year

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each day the same, ah, that's what I wanted.

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- [chuckling]

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Perfect memories, sometimes the good old days

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aren't that good because our memory is really bad.

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But Clark is all about giving everybody

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the perfect memories, the perfect family gathering.

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He wants to buy them the perfect pool.

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He's waiting for his boss to give him

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the perfect year end bonus so he can afford the perfect pool.

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He is in a quest for perfection

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and it doesn't get him anywhere.

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It actually brings him destruction.

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Perfection, the thirst for perfection

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actually will lead to destruction.

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He's crushing people around him.

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His kids don't really want to be around him.

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His kids are rolling their eyes.

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They're shrugging their shoulders.

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When someone expects you to actually perform

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all the time and be perfect, it crushes relational things.

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And that's why many of us get away from God.

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Many of us were born in into a religious environment

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or got into a religious environment was all about

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the rules and the crushing, the crushing expectations

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that aren't in the Bible that you can't uphold.

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And what's left is not to find

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a different understanding of who Jesus was.

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What's left for many people is just abandon the faith entirely

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because they get destroyed.

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Because this zeal, we just can't do it.

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Clark gets a delivery, and as he gets this delivery,

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he's sure that this delivery is going to be

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the bonus check that he needs to fulfill

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the perfect family memories of having the perfect pool.

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But it isn't quite a bonus check. Here it is.

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- Clark. What's wrong?

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Honey?

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It's bigger than you expected?

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Smaller?

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What is it?

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- It's a one year membership in the Jelly of the Month Club.

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- Oh, God.

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- Clark, that's the gift that keeps on giving the whole year.

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- That it is, Edward. That it is indeed.

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- I'm sorry, Clark.

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- This isn't the biggest bag over the head,

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punch in the face I ever get ever --

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- Son.

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- Ah! Hey, if any of you are looking for

00:41:11

any last minute gift ideas for me, I have one.

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I'd like Frank Shirley, my boss, right here tonight.

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I want him brought from his happy holiday slumber

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over there on Melody Lane with all the other rich people.

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I want him brought right here

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with a big ribbon on his head.

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And I want to look him straight in the eye

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and I want to tell him what a cheap, lying,

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no good, rotten, four flushing, low life,

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snake licking, dirt eating, inbred, overstuffed,

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ignorant, blood sucking, dog kissing, brainless,

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dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat, bug eyed,

00:41:45

stiff legged, spotty lipped,

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worm headed sack of monkey *** he is.

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Hallelujah! Holy ***. Where's the Tylenol?

00:41:58

- I guess you can find out some of our standards

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based on what we decide to bleep

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and what we don't bleep there, can't you?

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Yeah, not too perfect according to some of you, is it?

00:42:10

Nothing about our lives is perfect. Nothing.

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Our families aren't perfect.

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Our kids aren't perfect.

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If we don't have kids, that might not be perfect with us.

00:42:20

The person we're dating, they're not perfect for us.

00:42:22

Sorry to break the news to you.

00:42:25

The friends that we have in our life.

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They're supposed to give us a family feel.

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They're not perfect towards us.

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They seem like transient.

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They treat us sometimes like

00:42:32

a horrible family member treats us.

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Nothing is perfect.

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And if you take a look at the first Christmas,

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nothing is perfect. Nothing.

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I already mentioned Mary having a child out of wedlock,

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Joseph not being excited initially about raising

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somebody else's child that didn't have his DNA.

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And then we look in the book of Luke,

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another version of what the Christmas Story was

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and the interesting thing about Luke,

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Kyle brought this out a couple of weeks ago,

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which is really strong for him to do so.

00:42:57

Is Matthew is, from Matthew's perspective,

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the first book in the New Testament,

00:43:03

one of the four authorized biographies of Jesus.

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Matthew, his source material is mostly Jesus

00:43:08

who is with with him all along.

00:43:10

Mark, Mark and John there in, close to the inner circle.

00:43:14

But then Luke, he's kind of like a second generation.

00:43:17

He's not in one of the quote unquote original 12 apostles

00:43:19

or real close to Him.

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And historians are very united that

00:43:22

one of his source materials, one of his interviews,

00:43:26

if you will, the place he got his information

00:43:29

was from Mary.

00:43:30

He leaned very, very heavily into Mary.

00:43:32

So Mary has a very interesting perspective

00:43:34

on what took place because she was there and she lived it.

00:43:36

Here's what says in Luke 2:1.

00:43:40

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus

00:43:43

that all the world should be registered.

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This was the first registration

00:43:47

when Quirinius was governor of Syria.

00:43:50

And all went to be registered, each to his own town.

00:43:54

And Joseph also went up from Galilee,

00:43:56

from the town of Nazareth to Judea,

00:43:58

to the town of David, which is called Bethlehem,

00:44:01

because he was of the house and lineage of David,

00:44:04

to be registered with Mary, his betrothed,

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who was with child.

00:44:08

So they're hanging out in Nazareth.

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That's where they are, their adopted hometown.

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That's why Jesus is known as Jesus of Nazareth.

00:44:15

But He's born in Bethlehem because one of

00:44:17

the imperfect things of Christmas,

00:44:21

this original family had to deal with is there's a census.

00:44:24

And the way they would figure out

00:44:25

if they counted everybody right

00:44:26

is everyone's got to migrate to where they were born.

00:44:29

And so since Joseph is the guy,

00:44:31

sort of the head of the household in ancient times,

00:44:34

he, they went to his hometown of origin,

00:44:37

which was Bethlehem.

00:44:38

Let me tell you something.

00:44:39

The last thing you want to be doing

00:44:41

when you're eight, seven, nine months pregnant,

00:44:44

the last thing you want to be doing is taking a long trip.

00:44:47

This is not good.

00:44:48

I mean, jostling around and riding a camel,

00:44:51

or walking with extra weight.

00:44:52

This is a horrible experience for Mary. Horrible.

00:44:56

The first Christmas was horrible for her.

00:44:59

Ever give birth? I never have.

00:45:02

I've been to four births. Three of them I remember.

00:45:05

The first one was my own. I've been to four births.

00:45:08

And I'll tell you what, I'm always accused of

00:45:11

not having a good memory.

00:45:12

Yeah, I do not remember that first birth at all.

00:45:14

But I'll tell you my other three kids, man,

00:45:16

if you ever get to be in a waiting room

00:45:18

or in a birthing room. Whew.

00:45:20

Man, you're talking about sounds and smells

00:45:24

and blood and at least grunts, if not shrieks.

00:45:28

You're -- it is -- It is a chaotic scene.

00:45:31

There is no perfect birth the way you'd like to think of it.

00:45:37

And this is what Christmas is about.

00:45:39

Was it perfect to give birth to Jesus the way that he was given?

00:45:43

And then here it goes. Let's keep going. Verse six.

00:45:46

And while they were there, the time came

00:45:48

for her to give birth, and she gave birth

00:45:49

to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths

00:45:53

and laid him in the manger,

00:45:55

because there was no place for them in the inn.

00:46:00

Oh, this sounds kind of perfect, little baby Jesus.

00:46:06

All balled up his little fists, having a good time

00:46:09

and wrapped in swaddling clothes. Swaddling.

00:46:12

I mean, I like to -- swaddling just sounds so nice.

00:46:14

I'd like to swaddle, so I'm going to go home

00:46:16

and just do some swaddling.

00:46:17

Just comfortable just swaddled.

00:46:21

This is -- this is not good.

00:46:22

This is not good for Jesus at all.

00:46:24

Now I said that Jesus says be perfect

00:46:27

as your heavenly Father is perfect,

00:46:28

because what else is the standard going to be?

00:46:30

You know, He's got to give us some aspiration.

00:46:32

We want to be like Him and He's perfect.

00:46:34

So if He wants to be like Him, He's perfect.

00:46:36

So that's the kind of course we're on.

00:46:38

But what's really important to understand is

00:46:40

when we knowingly give Him something

00:46:43

that is less than our best,

00:46:45

it's not just imperfect, it's less than our best.

00:46:47

We're not giving Him our heart, He is not happy at all.

00:46:49

There's a part in the book, in the Old Testament

00:46:52

book of Malachi where God says,

00:46:53

"Why do you keep insulting me

00:46:55

and bringing these horrible lambs to sacrifice?"

00:46:59

Because they knew that there had to be payment

00:47:01

for their imperfections and their payment,

00:47:03

God said, "I'm not going to take your life

00:47:05

whenever you make a mistake, but I would like

00:47:07

you to be reminded that it's a bloody affair

00:47:09

when you dishonor me and you go the opposite direction.

00:47:11

So you're going to bring an animal

00:47:13

and we're going to kill an animal

00:47:14

who's going to be a substitute for you.

00:47:15

You don't have to get killed,

00:47:17

but you're going to be reminded of my grace

00:47:19

and mercy that I'm not taking this out on you."

00:47:22

So they had the whole sacrificial

00:47:23

system was brought up in it.

00:47:25

Now, here's where it gets really interesting.

00:47:28

These people knowingly wouldn't give God their best.

00:47:32

So they would bring lambs that had spots on them,

00:47:34

who were ugly, they would bring lambs

00:47:36

that had broken a knee or something like that,

00:47:38

lambs were going to die in two days or something like that.

00:47:41

"So I gotta give a sacrifice.

00:47:43

Let's give the one that's that just worn out,

00:47:45

and I don't have any use for it anymore."

00:47:47

And God says, "That's ridiculous. What are you doing?

00:47:50

If you if you had the governor over at your house,

00:47:52

you'd give him a good lamb, but me, you dishonor me."

00:47:56

Have you ever considered that God's heart breaks

00:48:01

when He looks at many of us and sees the interest

00:48:03

and creativity and passion we have around Christmas,

00:48:07

and we don't have that same interest, creativity,

00:48:09

and passion around our relationship with Him?

00:48:12

The Christmas gets our best,

00:48:14

Christmas gets our best finances.

00:48:16

Christmas gets our best, our best planning.

00:48:19

Christmas gets our best beauty.

00:48:22

Christmas gets our most time, just focus time.

00:48:25

Like focus, Christmas gets our best.

00:48:29

And maybe God sometimes goes,

00:48:30

"Hey, I'd like a little of that.

00:48:32

I'd like you to be as interested in our relationship

00:48:35

as you are your relationship with Christmas."

00:48:38

And so the wrapping of swaddling cloths,

00:48:40

the reason why the cloths were there was to keep

00:48:43

the lambs, who before the temple sacrifice

00:48:45

they were raised here in Bethlehem.

00:48:47

That's where they were raised.

00:48:48

And they would wrap their hooves in swaddling,

00:48:52

in cloths, which came to be those swaddling cloths,

00:48:54

to keep the animal perfect for the sacrifice.

00:48:58

Which is why when John the Baptist sees Jesus

00:49:01

for the very first time.

00:49:03

Well, not for the very first time.

00:49:05

He sees Him at a baptism.

00:49:06

John's baptizing and he sees Him, and he says,

00:49:09

"Behold, the Lamb of God, who

00:49:11

takes away the sin of the world."

00:49:13

Because Jesus is going to be the perfect lamb.

00:49:15

So the swaddling cloths that are made to wrap

00:49:19

around the lamb's feet, to keep them perfect,

00:49:23

to keep them, those same swaddling cloths

00:49:25

are wrapped around baby Jesus.

00:49:28

Except this was not a moment of perfection for Mary,

00:49:31

because she didn't have enough money

00:49:33

to have a full sized blanket for Him.

00:49:35

So wrapped in swaddling cloths,

00:49:36

I don't think Mary understands here at all,

00:49:38

"Oh, this could be the perfect Lamb of God

00:49:40

that's has come to take away the sin of the world

00:49:42

and die in people's places."

00:49:43

I don't think she understands that at all.

00:49:45

She just grabs something that's close by

00:49:46

and wraps around Him.

00:49:47

Because Jesus is born in a place where there was livestock.

00:49:52

We read that verse. There's no room at the inn.

00:49:54

Not perfect Christmas, not a perfect birth.

00:49:56

I'm going to get out of the cold and I can't get a room.

00:50:00

The innkeeper says, "Well, you can go

00:50:02

where the livestock goes."

00:50:04

And we think of a manger as like, you know,

00:50:06

a nice, beautiful, barndominium, beautiful creative thing

00:50:10

with snow on top of it and animals around

00:50:14

that are smiling and perfectly coifed

00:50:17

and then Jesus putting this like beautiful,

00:50:19

like a rustic wooden cradle.

00:50:23

The manger is not that scene.

00:50:25

The manger. The manger was a feeding trough

00:50:28

which in this area of the world there was not a lot of trees,

00:50:31

there was a lot of stone.

00:50:33

In all likelihood was a rock with a hole dug out of it

00:50:36

that Jesus is placed into a livestock cereal bowl.

00:50:39

That was his first crib.

00:50:42

He was born likely in a cave.

00:50:43

You wouldn't -- There's caves all over the region.

00:50:45

I've been to Bethlehem a bunch of times.

00:50:47

There's caves all over the place.

00:50:48

If you had livestock, stick them in a cave.

00:50:51

It keeps the sides, you know, keeps them in the sides.

00:50:54

You don't have to build a fence and everything.

00:50:56

So, Jesus, the birth is an environment

00:50:59

where there's dirty livestock animals.

00:51:01

And his first crib has got slobber from a cow on it.

00:51:06

And he doesn't have full size blanket to wrap around Him.

00:51:11

Friends, you get the picture here, it's not perfect.

00:51:14

So when your life isn't perfect,

00:51:17

you're starting to look like Mary herself.

00:51:19

You're starting to look like Joseph himself.

00:51:21

You're starting to be in the conditions

00:51:23

in which Jesus was born into this world.

00:51:28

Now the lights of Christmas have a significant meaning,

00:51:32

and in the Christmas Vacation movie,

00:51:35

they also have a significant meaning.

00:51:37

For Clark Griswold, the meaning of Christmas lights

00:51:41

is for everything to be perfect, so he's got to overdo it.

00:51:45

He takes his Christmas lights

00:51:46

and he staples them to the shingles,

00:51:48

which as a former roofer I still can't believe

00:51:50

you would do that even on a movie set.

00:51:52

It's just it's a crazy, crazy scene for him to,

00:51:56

again, attain the level of perfection.

00:52:00

And let's see what happens as he tries

00:52:02

to attain this level of perfection.

00:52:05

- Wait a minute. I don't believe this.

00:52:07

- What's all the yelling about?

00:52:09

What the -- What's going on here?

00:52:15

- 25,000 twinkle lights.

00:52:18

- What's he doing, Clark?

00:52:20

- I haven't the foggiest.

00:52:22

- What? What the hell? What is wrong?

00:52:30

Damn it, damn it!

00:53:02

[singing] Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

00:53:08

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

00:53:14

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

00:53:36

- It is beautiful. It is beautiful, man,

00:53:38

the stress to get there may not have been worth it.

00:53:41

At some point you have to wonder, Clark, what is --

00:53:44

What is so broken in your life

00:53:45

that you need Christmas to be perfect?

00:53:47

Is it the rest of your life is in shambles?

00:53:49

Is the rest of your year is so

00:53:50

boring you need a perfect Christmas?

00:53:51

I mean, what is? At some point you've got

00:53:53

to start asking those questions, all of us.

00:53:55

At some point, we need to ask questions of

00:53:57

why do I keep having these base drives I don't want to have?

00:54:00

At some point we have to ask ourselves,

00:54:01

why do I keep doing the thing that I know is not good for me?

00:54:04

At some point we have to ask ourselves,

00:54:06

why can't I follow through on things that are good for me

00:54:08

and others that I think God wants me to do?

00:54:10

At some point we have to ask ourselves deeper questions

00:54:13

like why is it that we're broken?

00:54:14

Why is it that things aren't connected?

00:54:16

Jesus says in Luke 5:31, He says

00:54:19

it's not the healthy who need a doctor,

00:54:22

not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.

00:54:25

Now if you read this, you take it at face value.

00:54:29

It seems what Jesus is saying is, hey, if you're healthy,

00:54:33

you don't really need me and read Christianity.

00:54:35

Christianity is for the weak.

00:54:37

Christianity is for the sick.

00:54:38

The healthy don't need a doctor. Sick.

00:54:41

So if you if you if you need to go on rehab

00:54:43

and you've got a dependance issue. Yeah, He's for you.

00:54:46

Okay. Yeah. If you, uh, if you're really, really sick

00:54:49

and weak and you can't hold together a marriage,

00:54:51

you're you're just hurting. Yeah, there you go.

00:54:54

It's a crutch for you. Jesus is there for you. Yeah, yeah.

00:54:56

If you just aren't a person of self-discipline

00:54:59

and you need to believe in something ethereal

00:55:01

because you need that for yourself,

00:55:03

you need that for yourself.

00:55:04

But other people, they're just fine.

00:55:06

But you, you feel like you need that, then Jesus is for you.

00:55:09

Is that what Jesus is saying?

00:55:11

He's not here for healthy people only for sick people?

00:55:13

This sentence means no sense, makes no sense to you

00:55:16

unless you understand that Jesus

00:55:17

has a sarcastic personality at times. This is sarcasm.

00:55:23

He's saying, if you want Me around,

00:55:26

you have to admit your need.

00:55:27

But if you're perfect, if you --

00:55:29

If you're Mr. and Mrs. Perfect, if you have no needs,

00:55:31

then I guess you don't need me.

00:55:32

He's not saying, He's not saying there's people who are healthy.

00:55:35

No. In and of our natural selves,

00:55:37

all of us are destructive in our natural selves,

00:55:39

in our natural selves all of us will look for ourselves,

00:55:42

our own interests, instead of God's interests.

00:55:45

In and of our natural selves, all of us

00:55:47

will be about ourselves and try to manipulate things

00:55:49

for ourselves instead of things for God.

00:55:51

In and of ourselves, all of us will bring harm

00:55:54

onto people around us.

00:55:56

If we're not bringing harm onto ourselves,

00:55:58

we're bringing on to others because our standards

00:56:00

for them and our expectations for them are way, way too high.

00:56:04

Jesus is saying, if we want to have Him,

00:56:07

if we want to have God, we have to admit that

00:56:10

we are imperfect and we have to admit that we have needs

00:56:13

and we have wounds and we are weak.

00:56:18

There's holy sarcasm.

00:56:19

I admit, I need Jesus as much or more now

00:56:24

than I did when I was 15 years old and I gave my life to Him.

00:56:26

I grew increasingly aware of my shortcomings,

00:56:30

shortcomings. I don't even know that I had.

00:56:32

But the deeper I go with God, the more I understand

00:56:34

how far away from Him I am.

00:56:37

I become very, very aware that I cannot do it on my own.

00:56:42

More aware now than I was actually when I was 15.

00:56:45

More aware of my need for Him. I need Him. I want Him.

00:56:49

Everybody has wounds. Everybody has needs.

00:56:52

Everybody has sins. Everybody.

00:56:56

All of us have a need for healing. All of us.

00:57:00

There's a guy I know who runs a Christian search firm,

00:57:04

is what he calls it, which helps nonprofits and churches

00:57:08

find senior level talent, if they need

00:57:10

a new senior pastor or something like that,

00:57:12

and you haven't developed anybody inside,

00:57:14

then you can go to him. He'll go out and find them.

00:57:16

He'll bring you, like, three candidates.

00:57:18

He doesn't want to call himself a headhunter.

00:57:20

If you're a Christian, you can't call yourself

00:57:22

a headhunter, I guess. But that's what he is.

00:57:24

He's a Christian headhunter.

00:57:25

And so he, you know, as he's gleaning people

00:57:28

and trying to figure out him or the people he works for him.

00:57:30

One of the questions they ask, because

00:57:33

it would be horrible to present somebody to the church,

00:57:36

you should hire this guy, or here's these three people,

00:57:38

and then you find he or she's got skeletons in their closet.

00:57:41

They've had an adulterous affair some time not too long ago,

00:57:44

or they've embezzled funds or something like that.

00:57:46

So standard question is, he said:

00:57:49

have you had any moral failures?

00:57:53

And one guy he asked that to late in the process,

00:57:56

have you had any moral failures?

00:57:57

The guy thought to himself and he said,

00:58:02

"My whole life is a moral failure."

00:58:05

And that's when he realized, "Oh, yeah,

00:58:07

that's the whole heart of Christianity.

00:58:09

We are all moral failures. We are all imperfect.

00:58:12

And that's why we need Jesus."

00:58:15

All of us need Him. All of us are moral failures.

00:58:19

And if you can't see how you're a moral failure,

00:58:21

there you go, you're a moral failure right there.

00:58:23

Because you can't even see where,

00:58:26

you are so deluded about who you are thinking

00:58:28

you're so incredible. No you're not.

00:58:30

God's not impressed with you. Not at all.

00:58:33

It's why your righteousness, the Bible says,

00:58:34

like filthy rags compared to his swaddling claws.

00:58:37

Filthy rags. They mean nothing to Him.

00:58:42

But this is where He excels. This is where Jesus excels.

00:58:45

It's His thing, like the thing we think

00:58:46

would disqualify us from Jesus is the very thing

00:58:48

that caused Jesus to draw us close to Him.

00:58:50

Like, "Okay, I'm dirty." He says, "Oh you're dirty.

00:58:52

Yeah. You get that? Oh.

00:58:54

I'm coming to dwell in your neighborhood,

00:58:56

is what I'm going to do.

00:58:57

I'm going to come and be around you right now."

00:58:59

I've never, fortunately, had the kind of moral failure

00:59:02

that would get me into the papers and make me lose my job.

00:59:05

But, man, I have moral failures.

00:59:06

I failed God regularly.

00:59:08

I'm hopefully trying to have less and less of them.

00:59:11

I'm getting closer to looking like Him.

00:59:13

That's called the sanctification process.

00:59:15

I want to look like Him.

00:59:16

I'm working hard at it.

00:59:18

But every step I go, because I get deeper with God,

00:59:21

I see things I hadn't seen before.

00:59:23

I'm like, darn it. Didn't see that their. Shoot.

00:59:28

And all the while, you feel accepted by Him

00:59:31

and you know He's for you and you know He wants you.

00:59:33

And I know that, not because my emotions are telling me.

00:59:36

I know it because that's the message

00:59:37

here in this book, the Bible.

00:59:39

Okay, here's my final push for this book for this year for you.

00:59:44

2026 I want the best for you.

00:59:46

I want -- we want you to read the Bible regularly.

00:59:51

Again, some of you read Charles Dickens

00:59:53

very regularly at Christmas time.

00:59:55

Do you have any regular Bible reading plan?

00:59:57

Do you have a Bible reading plan?

00:59:58

Is it a goal of yours? Do you follow through on it?

01:00:00

Is there a way to help you?

01:00:01

Because this is how you know what is right perfect

01:00:04

and what is wrong perfect.

01:00:05

This is how you know how much God loves you.

01:00:07

It's here, this Jesus is about you

01:00:10

and where you are in your life right now.

01:00:12

It's wonderful. So in 2026, we're going to have a time

01:00:15

to go through the Bible in a year.

01:00:16

If you've never done it before, great, go through it with us.

01:00:19

We're going to have a special section in the app

01:00:22

where if you want to follow along

01:00:23

and read out of your paper Bible, fine.

01:00:24

But please, please put some effort in 2026

01:00:29

into your spiritual formation.

01:00:31

If you just take a 10th of the effort you put into Christmas,

01:00:34

put that into reading the Bible,

01:00:36

you'll have it done in a year, no problem.

01:00:38

Just a 10th of what you put into Christmas.

01:00:39

It doesn't take that long, a little bit every day,

01:00:42

but you'll find you'll start looking more and more like Him.

01:00:47

Perfection leads to restoration. Third thing I want to say.

01:00:51

Jesus is the perfect one, that's the irony.

01:00:55

He's the perfect one.

01:00:56

He gets born in imperfect circumstances.

01:00:59

He has an imperfect life as far as family dynamics.

01:01:02

I mean, they're an unideal family dynamic situation.

01:01:06

Yet, as only God could, He lives as the unblemished lamb.

01:01:10

He lives a perfect life.

01:01:13

And what He does is He takes people who are different,

01:01:17

people who are apart.

01:01:19

He takes God. He takes God and He takes us,

01:01:24

and we're not connecting.

01:01:26

That's the natural state of things.

01:01:28

God and people are not connecting.

01:01:31

And the Savior, the Messiah, He comes into the world

01:01:34

as God Himself. He understands God,

01:01:36

and born of a woman, as a woman, He understands both.

01:01:40

And he comes in to connect us.

01:01:42

He comes in to connect God, to --

01:01:46

[grunting]

01:01:50

[singing] Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

01:01:54

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

01:02:09

- He is about restoration.

01:02:12

Why does He restore?

01:02:13

He restores because things are broken.

01:02:15

People are imperfect. People are broken.

01:02:18

If you have any needs, you are in the game where Jesus plays.

01:02:22

That's the game where He plays.

01:02:24

If you've got anything that's dirty in your life, He's very --

01:02:27

If you did anything that was shameful last night,

01:02:29

He is so excited you're here, whatever site you're at

01:02:31

He's is in the house and He is for you and around you.

01:02:34

If you've got wounds, if you've got scabs,

01:02:37

it keeps, someone keeps picking off.

01:02:39

Maybe Christmas is so hard for you because

01:02:40

the scab just barely got healed over from last year.

01:02:45

And now Aunt Ethel is picking at it again

01:02:47

or digging or whatever.

01:02:49

He understands you, He's a physician.

01:02:53

This is what He does. He is the light.

01:02:57

Light reveals and light heals.

01:03:00

And I'm hoping that He is revealing

01:03:02

something to you this holiday season,

01:03:05

and He's going to be healing something in you as well.

01:03:09

I got one final word. Let's first all stand.

01:03:11

Let's stand because I feel like right now

01:03:13

it's the best time to just respond with a song.

01:03:17

Let's just give Him a song before I give my final 2%.

01:06:48

- This Christmas, may God be gracious to you

01:06:51

in this imperfect world.

01:06:54

This Christmas may He lift up His countenance upon you,

01:06:57

may He make His face shine upon you,

01:06:59

may He bring His light into your dark places,

01:07:02

now and forevermore. Amen. You have a great week.

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