First Presbyterian Church Of Baton Rouge

Christ has come to redeem your toil and striving because now all that you do is done in service to him. Only when we bow to Christ as Lord and master can we work with purpose. Why? Because our purpose is not in what we accomplish but in the God who has conquered. Christ’s advent redeems the fact that nothing seems new under the sun because he has actually made—and will finally make—all things new. Christ’s advent redeems the passage of time because the endless and seemingly aimless passage of years has an end: the day when Christ returns and time itself is undone. Christ’s advent redeems knowledge and learning for all true learning and insight can only be found from learning at his feet. Christ’s advent redeems and fulfills our innate desire to find meaning and purpose in something that lasts beyond us because he came to make his people part of his story of redemption, making every detail meaningful.

The story of Ruth is a Christmas story. Blessed be the LORD I Am, who has not left you this day without a redeemer. He will be to you’re a restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age. Into Naomi’s life of famine, loss, grief and bitterness, God sent a redeemer. She was no longer to identify her life as left without. God began to restore her with the love of Ruth. Then he sent a redeemer in Boaz and then in Obed. That’s a great story. But it points to an even better one. Into this dark, lost, shattered world, God sent a Redeemer named Jesus, a descendent of Ruth. It is still the This Day of his arrival. He has come to redeem his people. We are the community who belongs to Christ. We don’t let people get lost and stuck in the despair that evil and bitterness and grief have the last word. They do not. The Redeemer has come and will come again. Will I, can I, trust this news? Will I trust myself to him? Will I embrace the identity that matters: I do not belong to myself but to my faithful savior born this

Jesus has already established the grounds for redeeming us. He became our kinsman in the flesh. He shed his blood in an offering for our sin. He rose still joined to our humanity. He created reconciliation between God and man. He is the redeemer who has given his life for us. Now everything depends on the question, “Will I give my life to Christ?” Perhaps for the first time. Perhaps after a long season of wandering and disobedience. Perhaps by giving a secret, cherished sin that I have long held back from him. Perhaps by trusting and releasing to him at a new level. There is a redeemer. Can I say as Ruth did, “All that you say, I will do?” Can I say, in this present moment, as Mary did to Gabriel, “Let it be to me according to your Word.”

We are but gleaners after scraps, if the truth be known. But when we come to shelter under the wings of the God of Israel, we discover the startling transformation. He does not give us scraps. He gives us himself. For his very nature is steadfast love and kindness. The echoes of the Christmas story in Ruth resound all around us. Boaz acts like Joseph, protecting and providing for a vulnerable woman. Ruth acts like Mary, giving herself completely into God’s care. Loving with an open heart. I can hear Ruth saying Mary’s words, “Behold the handmaiden of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word.” And everywhere the sovereign God is weaving the surprises of his extraordinary grace reaching the world through ordinary people. So come to the table, dear ones, in great expectation that the sovereign God will bless you today. Discover anew that in Christ, it’s a wonder-filled life. 

Jesus is no stranger to anything you are going through. He has been all the way to the far, foreign country of our lives. He did not turn back from us then. He does not turn away from us now. He still wants to go with you every step of the way. He still clings to you. He will not be shaken off. He will not be dissuaded. He will not stop loving you. He has already paid the ultimate price, getting skin in the game all the way to death on a cross. Now he calls to you through his Spirit from heaven, “Do you see me coming to you? Do you hear me pledging myself to you? Turn to me! Answer me! Embrace me.” This, dear ones, is the heart of Christmas. When we welcome his arrival and accept his love, everything changes. Even our sorrows and sufferings become woven into what can only be called a wonderful life. 

This week, as you sit down to a Thanksgiving feast, give thanks above all that you have received the faith once for all delivered, the truth upon which eternal lives can be built. Give thanks for all God has brought you through. Give thanks that the season of your suffering will not endure forever, maybe not even for much longer. The Father, Son and Spirit himself has undertaken to restore you, confirm you, strengthen and establish you. I will give thanks for you, dear ones. Your faith and love are a shining witness and constant encouragement. And may we all say with Peter, even as the turkey gets carved, “To Christ be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” 

Live as those who are free. Live as servants of God. Endure suffering by entrusting yourself to the God who judges justly. Remember that to this you have been called, because Christ suffered for us, leaving us a pattern of love to follow.

On your own, you were lost, isolated. In Christ, you are a treasured possession. You have been called out of darkness into his marvelous light. So that . . . So that you can now proclaim his excellencies with affection and joy. There’s no going back to the cave. My name is Lazarus, and I live!

So this is who we are: a spiritual temple built of living stones upon the cornerstone of Christ. Our gathering, our faithfulness comprise the church which the world will see. We are joined to him and one another. When we gather, the music soars and the praises rise. When we disperse, we do not lose our connection. We go out still as living stones, part of the temple of Christ, declaring the news of his arrival in the world until we meet again.

Your being remade into Christ, being called as living stones of the New Temple, priests to God offering spiritual sacrifices, is all of grace. Let that truth sink in and bring humility and compassion for the lost. For those who perhaps have rejected Christ, or even just have desired to sit on the fence and live a good enough life to get into heaven, know this. The Lord is just as able to save you as he is for any person in this room, but there is no middle ground with him. You must either embrace and shelter under the cornerstone or you will, as Jesus himself said in Matthew 21, fall upon it and be crushed. Don’t put him off any longer. Don’t harden your heart anymore. This day, this hour has been given to you to turn to him. Won’t you heed the call to become who you were meant to be? Won’t you grow up into Christ?

If you are in Christ, he has planted an imperishable seed in you. A new life grows in you. You’ve been born anew into the person you were meant to be. Only Jesus can do that for us. But if you are in Christ, the work of peeling old scales remains. There are things we need to strive to strip: malice, slander, hypocrisy, deceit and envy. For we have been made new for a purpose: to love one another earnestly from the heart. The old life tastes so bitter. But we who are in Christ have tasted how good he is. Live from that sweetness. Share it with others that the world might magnify our savior with us.

We are the captives. And we are the captors. Our sinful choices have delivered us into permanent bondage to our sinful nature. We’ve enslaved ourselves! But we do not have the power to free ourselves. So God foresaw a plan before the world was made. A man sinned and brought the human race to ruin. A man would have to free the human race. A man would have to arise to break the generational captivity to sin and self. A man would have to come who would be faithful to God’s design his whole life. He would be the obedient child of his loving, just heavenly Father. He would love God with all his heart, soul, mind and strength. His faithfulness would make him the first truly free human being since the Garden of Eden. But more, he would have to exhaust the power of captivity to self-centeredness. He would have to go to where our attempting to be our own gods always leads. He would have to go to utter forsakenness and isolation, to the very hell of separation from God and all human communion. The most obedient man wou

Though for a little while, you suffer trials. But the suffering is brief in light of eternity we will spend with Christ. Trials, suffering, and hardships are like gold in the refiner’s fire becoming purified. Your faith is proved genuine, and this brings praise, honor, and glory to Jesus.