Well, what is up, Heights? Good to be with you this morning. Welcome, welcome. Those of you online, our online fam, welcome to you guys as well. So glad that you're joining with us. Hey, some of my favorite people in the world are grandparents. I think grandparents are amazing. Yeah, give it up for grandparents. Man, we're pumped today. I was privileged enough to grow up with both sets of grandparents, being able to pour into my life, being able to spend time with them.
And I remember every Tuesday, my grandpa would pick me up. We called him Pops. And Pops would pick me up. And he said, we could go to eat wherever you want. And every single week, I would pick the same Denny's right off the freeway. We'd go eat there and order the same thing. And we would hang out. And then he would say, OK, well, you want to go walk the dog? And he didn't just have a dog. He had what was a hybrid wolf. And this thing was huge.
And so his walks weren't like a nice little walk down the street. We would go basically on giant hikes. And it was off leash. The dog would be running. It was this long hike. And then afterwards, we'd go back to his house. And he had a rock polisher. And so every week, we would do a different step in polishing rocks. And then when they were finally done, we would divide them up. And he would choose one. And then I would choose one. And we'd go back and forth. And every week, we would do that.
And I would head home. And my parents would go, well, how was it? What did you and Pops talk about? I'm like, well, I don't know. Not really anything. And the thing about Pops is he was one of those people that didn't really have an agenda of what he wanted to talk about. He was just happy to be in the same room with you. He would sit there and not even say anything and just be as happy as he could be to spend time with you, happy to just be with you. And the truth is that's God.
We serve a God that's just happy to be with us. Oftentimes, we get it backwards. And we think God is out to get us. We think God is angry with us. We think if we mess up, then God's there to condemn us. And the truth is, is God is happy to be with you. And that's the collection of talks we're in right now. It's called Happy to Be, because the idea is that God is happy to be with you. God is happy to just spend time with you.
And it's no coincidence that we're doing this through the Advent season, because we get to talk about things like joy. We get to talk about things like peace. We get to talk about things like hope, things like love, and understand that the Advent season is so important, because this idea that God wants to be with us, that he's happy to be with us, is shown all the time, but especially through these things that we unpack at the Advent season through this Christmas season.
How many of you guys like Christmas is your thing? Like this is your go time. This is your jam. You're like, it's time, baby. Right, like you've been just setting up your house. You've got everything decorated and perfectly laid out at your house at all times. And you've got a list of these are Christmas things that we have to do. The house has to be perfect. All right, we have to bake as many cookies as we can. We have to give some of those cookies to Pastor Todd. We have to.
I'm just adding that to your list for you, OK? I'm just saying. All right, we've got to go see all the lights that exist. Every single one of them, we've got to go see all the lights. We've got to go to all the places. Maybe you were at a parade yesterday. Maybe you were at a lighting downtown last night. Maybe you were somewhere to see it because it's got to happen. And then you've got to find the perfect gift for everyone.
And you've got like every day is an adventure for the Amazon driver pulling up to your house. And there's just boxes. And you've been shopping at stores and online and everywhere. And you've got to find the perfect thing. And you've got to do all the things because Christmas is coming. And man, does that sound like peace on Earth to you. Right, we Christmas ourself out of peace. We do so much stuff. We jam it all together.
And when it comes to this idea of peace, when it comes to all of that, it's kind of hard. But we're talking about peace today. And so I'm supposed to read this because it's Christmas and we're talking about peace. Luke 2 says this, suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest heaven and on Earth peace to those on whom his favor rests. And this is an absolutely beautiful Christmas wall hanging. This is a wall hanging.
This isn't real life, people. Peace on Earth. Are you kidding me? This is a thing you bought at Hobby Lobby. Right, you were walking down the aisle in July when they put their Christmas stuff out. It's a sin, I'm telling you. But you saw it and you had to get it. And it's hanging in your house. And you've got this peace on Earth. Peace, oh my goodness, it's so beautiful. But that's not true. Peace, that's so much, are you kidding me? This time is crazy.
And in fact, that first Christmas, I don't know if there was peace there. You know why? Because there was a baby being born. And I've seen a couple babies being born. There ain't no peace happening. I remember when my third daughter was born, my wife was at that stage of pregnancy where she's just like, man, I gotta get this thing out of me. I am done, everything hurts. And so I remember we went in, she was like, I'm in labor, we gotta do this.
So we took her into the hospitals about three in the afternoon. We get there and I don't know if the nurse was having a bad day or what, but she looks at her, she checks her and she goes, you're totally fine, go home, you're not having a baby. And my wife's like, I'm gonna kill you right now. And so we get her, we go home. And in fact, we're only home for a little bit. And then we went to run youth group that night. I've been a youth pastor for a really long time.
So we went to run youth group that night. My wife and I ran it together. And for some reason, thought it was a good idea to put her on a stage with a microphone. While she was in active labor, room full of high schoolers, she's like yelling at them the whole time. It was awesome, all right, it was awesome. So we leave youth group and she's like, man, I'm gonna have this baby right now. And I'm like, I'm taking you in. She goes, no, they're just gonna send me back home. I was like, okay.
So we go home, by this time, she's like on the floor in a ball in so much pain. And I said, I'm taking you. She said, they're just gonna send me home. I said, I don't care. So we got in the car and every bump is an adventure. We're like, oh, baby gonna pop out? Nope, all right. We got to the hospital and she is in so much pain. Baby had flipped upside down and all these different ways. So she's having back labor. She's in extreme pain.
And she doesn't have any time to have a medicine or anything. So she goes in, she's there, she's screaming. I'm standing over here, I'm screaming. And we're trying to figure out how this is gonna work. I'm like, why does a sheet in the corner? Just like, oh my goodness. And the nurse comes over to me and she looks at me. She goes, dad, you get in there and you give your wife a pep talk right now. I'm all right. So I go over, I'm all, you can do this.
And she looked at me and she goes, I can't do this. Now I don't know why I said this. I said, it's okay, you don't have to. The nurse comes over to me, she looks at me and she says, dad, you get back in your corner. I always stood in my corner. Turns out I was right though. They actually didn't need me at all. She had the baby just fine without me. All right, they didn't need me. Listen, there's no peace if there was a baby involved.
And for most of us in this time of Christmas, we don't have peace either because our life is crazy. Our life is insane. The reality is we live messy lives and we have messy situations. And for some of you in the middle of the busyness of your life, your schedule is so packed that you're going from one thing to the next all the time. And you're like, there's no way peace can show up in my schedule.
For some of you guys, you're in the middle of the marriage problems that you don't know if your marriage is still gonna be standing a year from now. You don't even know if it's gonna make it a month because every single fight that you get in that is inevitably gonna happen, you feel like you're walking on eggshells and you're going, there is no peace in my marriage. For some of you, or you're raising kids right now, there is no peace there.
And you're in the middle of it and every day there's something different. And you're going, there is no peace in this situation. And some of you have already raised kids and your kids are estranged from you now and nothing highlights that more than this time of year. And you're sitting in so much pain because of that and you're going, there is no peace right now.
And some of you guys are dealing with illness and sickness and you're walking through situations in life where you're going, I just want peace. But the truth is, is our lives is messy and situations that we encounter are messy. And your life feels a lot more like a storm than it does peace. It feels a lot more like a storm, like you're in the middle of a storm, in the middle of absolute chaos in your life.
And the truth is we set out and we go, okay, I'm following Jesus, I'm following Jesus, here's what I'm going for. And then life happens. And then we go, Jesus feels really distant right now. And we're not alone in that. There are some people in the Bible who followed Jesus very closely, who found themselves in the same situation in Luke chapter eight. It says this, one day, Jesus said to his disciples, let's go over to the other side of the lake. So they got on a boat and set out.
They were following Jesus. Jesus said, let's do this. And then they said, let's go, we're following you. So they get in a boat and as they sailed, he fell asleep. And a squall came down on the lake so that the boat was being swamped. And they were in great danger. It says they're in great danger. And I think sometimes we think, oh, they're just overreacting. They're just being dramatic right here. No, it says they were in great danger.
In fact, so much so that the disciples went and woke him saying, master, master, we're going to drown. Trained fishermen who do this for a living, this is what they do, are at a point where they go, this is too much, we might not make it out. This storm is too big. Some of you might be in a place in your life where the storm is so big that you're going, I don't know if I'm gonna make it out. I don't know if I'm gonna get through this right now. So they went to Jesus and it says he got up.
Jesus got up and he rebuked the wind and the raging waters and the storm subsided and all was calm. Jesus brought peace to their storm. What if Jesus could bring peace to the storm that is your life? What if you could experience the type of peace that the disciples experienced when they were on that lake? When the storm came up, when they were following Jesus and then all of a sudden life happens and then Jesus feels distant and they're going, man, I just need some peace in this situation.
Jesus brings peace to our storm. And when we're going through a storm, a lot of times we go, God, I just need your peace in this situation. Whatever situation it is in your life, we're going, God, I need your peace in this situation. I need your peace in this situation, but the truth is that God wants to give you peace over everything. He wants you to experience a state of peace, not just peace for a situation, but living in a state of peace, regardless of the situation that you go through.
Man, I was thinking this last week about greetings. Greetings are kind of funny. They're so different. There's different ways that you are greeted. In fact, on this campus right now, this morning in this building, you might've got greeted and someone shook your hand and said, good morning. It's good to see you this morning. But if you go over to H3 where our youth meet, you might get greeted like this, sup. Sometimes they don't even use words. They just go, uh.
All right, and if you go down a little further and you go to H4 where our kids are at, you might've got greeted this way where you say hi to a kid and you go, hey, how's it going? And they look at you and they just go, ah, and just run right past you. And you're like, hey, good to see you too. All right, greetings are so different. But a couple years ago, I had the privilege of going with a group from the church to Israel to tour around Israel.
And one of the greetings that they have in Israel is they greet people with the word shalom. They say shalom, which is so much cooler than what we do. Our tour guide in Israel, his name is Yoel. And a couple months ago, Yoel got to come and speak here on this stage. And so I hadn't seen him since we went to Israel and I was super excited to see him. And I go to see him and he goes to me and he goes, shalom, my friend. And I said, what's up? It's so much cooler what they do than us.
But the reason they say this word shalom, what it is is it's peace. I'm wishing peace on you. It's a wish of peace. And in fact, the state of peace, wishing peace on them is one that we see all throughout scripture. In fact, Paul, as he opens or closes his letters, it's a greeting hello or it's a greeting hello or it's a goodbye of peace. He closes or starts his letters with these same things. It says this at the end of 2 Thessalonians 3.16.
Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you. It's a greeting that he gives. In fact, Jesus himself used to greet people this way. The resurrected Jesus after he had gone to the cross, he had died on a cross, he was put in a tomb, he rose again and he would show up and talk to people in person. It says in Luke 24.36, while they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, peace be with you.
What did he say? He said, shalom. That's what he said. He said, shalom, peace be with you. And so I started thinking, well, where did this come from? Where does this originate, this idea? Because in order to truly understand what this greeting of shalom means, we have to understand what shalom truly means. So we have to dig deep into that and understand that the root word of shalom is shalam. And what this has, it shows up. And this week I was super excited to figure out what this is.
And so I saw it and I was sharing it with one of the other pastors at our church. And I'm like, hey, this is super cool. The root word of shalom is shalam. And he goes, shazam. I was like, what? And he's all, shazam. I'm like, okay. And that's Pastor Ben. So those of you at Prescott Valley, that is your pastor. I'm just saying, that's who you're stuck with. But this root word is super important because the uses of this word show us what this means.
In the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, we see this come up in the book of Exodus, in chapter 21 and 22. We see this word used 14 different times in regards to theft or loss of property. If something is stolen or you have a loss of property, this word is used in the law to describe how the Israelites are to go about acting when it comes to this situation in their life. And so the translation of this is to make full restitution, to make it good, to make something whole, to restore.
And if you're with us through Center of All Things as we went through that, we ended in Revelation and we talked about how the restoration, the making everything whole, the bringing everything to how it should be is what God's plan is for the earth and for humanity and for all of us. To restore it to what it is, an overall sense of completeness in mind, body, and estate. The overall sense of completeness. So I think there's different things in our life that help us feel completeness.
I was thinking about it like this. I have a younger daughter, she's two years old and her whole life she has really enjoyed her pacifier. She's loved her pacifier. Okay, she wants all about it. But when she hit two years old, we're like, okay, we gotta take this away from her. Now listen, I know there's different strategies in parenting and different thought. I don't need to hear your advice on what to do with the pacifier or not to do with it, okay?
I only say that because I love you guys, okay? And so she gets to two years old and we say, hey, you can only have it when you're sleeping. You can't have it when you're awake. And for her, she's like, no, no, no, I love this thing. I'm like, no, no, no, we're gonna enforce this rule. And so I was sitting on the couch with her the other day and she's sitting next to me and she keeps getting off the couch for like 20 seconds and then getting back on. I'm like, what is going on here?
So I look down and there's a backpack on the floor at the edge of the couch. And she keeps going down there and she's sticking her head in the backpack for about 20 seconds and then she pops up. And I'm like, what in the world? So I look down there, in the bottom of this backpack, there's a pacifier and she'll stick her head in there like a little drug addict to getting her fix. And then she pops up and she gets back on the couch. And I'm like, child, what is wrong with you?
But she's like, man, I'm not complete without this. I need it. Some of you have things in your life that make you complete and you go, okay, if I have this, then I'm complete. For me, it's when our whole family is together and we don't have anything on the calendar and we can just relax together. I sit there and I go, okay, I'm feeling wholeness. I'm feeling completeness. This idea of shalom, this idea was meant to say, hey, it's all about being complete.
It's all about being whole in mind, body and estate, all of it. All right, but this greeting that is used, it has evolved. It's evolved from this true meaning to just kind of saying, hey, I hope there's no turmoil in your life. I hope everything's okay. I hope nothing bad is happening. Shalom, I hope that there's no war, there's no issues, there's no storms of life happening. But that's not what this greeting or what this blessing was originally meant.
We see it this clearly given in Numbers chapter six. It says this, this blessing is, the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you. The Lord turn his face towards you and give you peace. Which is amazing and beautiful and wonderful, but we have to understand the context of this is spoken to them before the Israelites were going into the promised land to conquer the promised land, before they were going into war. They can experience war in the middle.
They can experience peace in the middle of war. It's not in the absence of war. It's not the absence of tumultuous situations in our life. It's not about that. It's not saying, okay, I hope everything's good for you because we live in a world where things are not gonna be good for us. We are gonna be going through storms and we can experience peace in the middle of that. And you need to understand that just because you don't have a storm doesn't mean that you have peace either.
Because some of you go, as long as I don't have conflict, everything's fine. And that's not peace either. The absence of a storm doesn't mean that there's peace in the same way that in the middle of a storm doesn't mean that there can't be peace. Because as we look very closely in this, it's an inner peace. It's a completeness that's brought on by sharing in his countenance. Israel themself as a nation, Israel has spent most of their time not at peace.
They rarely experienced times of outward peace, but even in the midst of the battle, even in the midst of the storm, even in the midst of the trial, even in the midst of the turmoil, even in the midst of what they're going through, they were to have an inward rest brought on by the presence of the Lord to experience shalom.
That means that in the middle of your busyness, in the middle of when your calendar is full and you've got things that you're running to from one to the next, you can experience shalom. That means in the middle of your marriage issues where you're going, I don't even know if we're gonna make it through, in the middle of the fights, in the middle of difficulty, you can experience shalom.
That means in the middle of raising your kids and the difficulty that that presents, in the hard days, you can experience shalom. That means in the middle of the pain of an estranged child that's highlighted by this season, you can experience shalom. That means in the middle of sickness and illness and difficulty and storms of life, you can experience shalom. Why can you experience shalom? Back to where we started.
Luke two, suddenly a great company of the heavenly hosts appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests. You know why this isn't just a wall hanging? Because it says on whom his favor rests. What does that mean? Well, as Pastor John talked about last week, the favor of God is expressed through God's face upon you.
All throughout scripture, we see when God's face is showing upon them, when God's face is turned to them, when God's face is upon them, they have now gotten the favor of God. So who does God's favor rest upon those whose face God's face is turned towards? Shalom is found in front of God's face, which is great news because God is happy to be with you. God is happy to be with you. God is happy to turn his face towards you. God wants to be with you. He loves you. He desires you.
And because of that, we can experience shalom because of God's favor and Christmas, Christmas is God putting his face in front of you in the form of Jesus. That's what it is. It's the God of the universe saying, I'm going to send myself in Jesus and put my face in front of you. But why? Because peace comes upon those whom his favor rests and who does his favor rest upon those whose face is turned to. And what do we know about God is that he is happy to be with you.
That's why we can experience peace. And the good news is we need peace. We need peace because we all have this void inside of us. We have this missing piece that's longing for something to fill this void. And we go, nothing else can fill it. It has to be the right thing in order to fill that void. One of my daughters, she can't go to sleep without her BB and puppy. BB is her blanket and puppy is her stuffed animal. She has to have them.
And you would think for something that she has to have so much, she needs this puppy. You would think she'd keep better track of it because every single night, puppy seems to be missing. I'm not kidding you. I have spent more hours searching for this stuff dog than most of you have done anything. I'm telling you. And sometimes while I'm searching for this stuff dog and I'm like, she's gotta have this puppy or she's not gonna sleep.
I get to a point where I go, okay, how about this stuffed animal? Will this work? And she's like, nope, not gonna work. What about this one? Nope, not gonna work. What about this one? And finally I go, okay, listen, we're just gonna try it. You gotta try this one tonight. And she'll go to sleep and the next morning, she'll wake up and I'll go to her and I'll say, how was it? She goes, it wasn't good, didn't work. It didn't work. I tried it and it didn't work. I still have this missing piece.
There's this void that can only be filled by one thing. And for a lot of you, that's your story because we have a void inside that you've tried everything to fill and you go, okay, I wanna try this thing. And if I just eat this or I eat enough of it, then I'll feel good. And if I can just drink this or I can drink enough of it, then I'll feel good.
And if I just try this drug and I just get in this relationship and if I just have this, am I accepted by these people, then it'll fill the void in my life. And if I just try this, I'm not accepted by these people. Then it'll fill the void inside of me. And then I'll be okay, but you're always gonna be chasing the thing that'll fill the void because you are missing something. And none of those can fill the void. The missing piece is peace.
The missing piece is peace and you can search for it forever, but what the missing piece is, is completeness. It's wholeness. That's what peace is. That's what shalom is. You know, 600 years before Jesus showed up on the scene, there's this book written, this book of Isaiah, and it's full of prophecies of what's going to happen, what's gonna come.
And we see in Isaiah chapter nine, verse six, it says, for to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders, and he will be called wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting father, prince of peace. So he's coming. This Jesus guy is coming and he's the prince of peace. He's the prince of shalom. The best translation I found for this this week is this.
This is 600 years before Jesus showing up, knowing that we are gonna need peace in our life, understanding what peace truly is, and this is the translation, the prince of inner fullness. The prince of inner fullness. And this is the only one who can give you this type of internal peace. This is the only place you can find this type of internal peace. This is the only fix for the brokenness that you experience and the hole that's inside of you, and the difficult situations.
And here's the thing, it's not to take the situation away. It's in the middle of your storm. You can experience shalom. You can experience you can experience peace. So here's my question. Is peace a wall hanging for you this Christmas? Is peace just a wall hanging for you this Christmas? Or is it real? Is it shalom? Because what you do with Jesus is what will determine the answer to that question. And what we know about Jesus is that He's longing to be with you. He's longing to be with you.
The gift of Jesus is given to us at Christmas. What you do with that gift, that is for you to decide. And what you do with that gift is what determines the peace that you experience. So will you step in? Will you step in? Because today I know there's people in this room that need to experience the peace that comes from Jesus because you've never stepped into a relationship with Jesus. You've never accepted the fact that Jesus died on a cross for you.
That Jesus went to the grave so that you could have a relationship with God. That is the good news, that is the gospel. And today some of you need to take that step and say, yeah, I need to do that. But what I also know is there's some of you in here who've made that step before, but you've walked away. Life has happened, the storm has happened, and you've walked away. And you need a re-upping of sorts.
You need to rededicate and say, I'm gonna stand firm on the commitment that I once made and I wanna recommit, rededicate my life to Jesus today. And I'm gonna stand firm on that commitment and I'm gonna stand firm on that commitment and I'm gonna stand firm on that commitment and I'm gonna stand firm on that commitment. And then I know there's people in here that you've done that, you're walking with Jesus, but man, you just need to refocus today. You just need to refocus this Christmas season.
And you need to realize that Jesus is happy to be with you. And the only source of peace that you will get is through Him. The only source of peace is not through everything else that we try to fill it with. It's through the shalom, the true inner wholeness that comes from Jesus.
If you made a decision like that today or you know you need to, there are gonna be people up front after the service that wanna pray with you, that wanna talk with you, that wanna help you as you've made a decision or a commitment. But I wanna just end like this. I wanna just read this verse over you today. Jesus says He was explaining to His disciples that He was gonna leave and that the Holy Spirit was gonna come. These are the words that He said to them.
And I want you to just close your eyes right now and I wanna read this over you today. John 14, 27 says, peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give it to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. God, we just love you. God, we come before you. As broken humans in need of peace, in need of true shalom, God, I pray that you would help each one of us to truly find shalom in you.
I pray for those in here today that need to make commitments and need to stand up and step out of your way and step out and say, God, I'm willing to say that I stand for you. I pray that you would prompt them to make those decisions. God, I pray that your love, because of the fact that you are face to face with us, would be shown bright and shown strong to those of us in this room that need that reminder this morning. God, you are good. We praise you, God, we worship you.
We continue to sing of your goodness. We pray all of this in Jesus' name, amen.