The Hope of the King
If you’re a first time guest we want you to know City Awakening is a place for both skeptics and believers to seek truth, find joy, and live with purpose in our city. We believe that truth and joy is found in Jesus, but we also realize some of you don’t believe that. In fact part of my story is that I was the skeptic who didn’t believe in Jesus. But I came to faith in Jesus through an invitation my wife gave me to attend a church service like this, and so if you’re a skeptic we want you to know you’re welcome to come back to our church in 2025. If this Christmas Eve service impacts you, we welcome all of you to come back in 2025.
But here we are at the end of the year, and it’s the last week in a teaching series we’ve been doing called Advent. The word advent means to arrive or to come, so we’ve been exploring some of the gifts King Jesus brought us with the arrival of his 1st coming, and what it means for our lives today as we’re waiting for the arrival of his 2nd coming. The specific gift we’re exploring tonight is the gift of hope. It’s the gift of hope that Jesus came to give us, and everybody needs hope at some point in life. Both skeptics and believers need hope at some point in life. When your marriage is struggling, you need hope...When your family is struggling, you need hope...When your in-laws are coming over, you need a lot of hope...When you’re struggling financially, suffering emotionally, facing a sin or situation in life you can’t control, you need hope...Both skeptics and believers need hope at some point in life, and the good news is the Christmas message is all about hope. So let’s turn to Isaiah Ch 8 and check it out. You can find Isaiah located in the middle of the bible, and we’ll start in Isaiah 8:18-22. Title of the message is The Hope Of The King, and the big idea of the message is you can always find hope in the King...You can always find hope in Jesus...
Here’s your context. The book of Isaiah is a book of the bible that was written by a man named Isaiah, who’s considered to be a great prophet. He wrote this book during a time when the Jews were devastated by the Assyrian army, which would be similar to us going to war and getting completely devastated by another superpower like China. If that happened everything in our lives would suddenly change leaving us feeling defeated and discouraged. Well this is exactly what the Jews were feeling at this point in history. They were feeling defeated, discouraged, hopeless, as they were facing this dark time in their lives. Now the temptation for them and the temptation for us when we’re feeling hopeless, when we’re facing dark times, is to try to find hope in other things instead of in the Lord. But Isaiah’s about to warn against that temptation, and so let’s check it out.
Isaiah 8:18-22 states, “Here I am with the children the Lord has given me, to be signs and wonders in Israel from the Lord of Armies who dwells on Mount Zion. 19 When they say to you, ‘Inquire of the mediums and the spiritists...,’ shouldn’t a people inquire of their God, instead of inquiring of the dead on behalf of the living?” Notice Isaiah’s warning against the temptation of trying to find hope in other things instead of the Lord. The people are being tempted to find their hope in mediums and spiritists, to find their hope in psychics and other things, instead of the Lord. We do the same thing when we try to find our hope in things like the election of a new president, the advanced technologies of Elon Musk, or the advice of people like Dr. Huberman and Dr. Phil. Those people can certainly give us a little hope for some things, but they can’t be our primary hope for everything. It’s because eventually everybody faces problems in our lives and world that are too big for our human intelligence or artificial intelligence to fix. But when everything you’ve placed your hope in fails, you can still have hope for your life if God is the primary hope in your life. You can always have hope for your life, if God is the primary hope in your life. Isaiah is about to warn the Jews that they’ll wander deeper into hopeless darkness, if God isn’t their primary hope.
Vs. 21, “They will wander through the land, dejected and hungry. When they are famished, they will become enraged, and looking upward they will curse their king and their God. 22 They will look toward the earth and see only distress, darkness, and the gloom of affliction, and they will be driven into thick darkness.” In vs. 21 Isaiah mentions people cursing God for the darkness they’re in, but it’s really their own fault for turning to other things instead of God. They’re blaming the very God they didn’t put their hope in. But Isaiah warns if they don’t seek God as their primary hope, then they’ll wander even deeper into hopeless thick darkness. They’re walking in darkness now, but that darkness will get thicker if they don’t seek God as their primary hope in this situation.
Isaiah 9:1-2, “Nevertheless, the gloom of the distressed land won’t be like that of the former times, when he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali. But in the future, he will bring honor to the way of the sea, to the land east of the Jordan, and to Galilee of the nations. 2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; a light has dawned on those living in the land of darkness.” There’s the hope for the Jews and for us on this Christmas Eve night. It’s that a great light has dawned, and notice it doesn’t dawn from them, it dawns on them. Isaiah says this great light doesn’t dawn from them, it dawns on them, meaning it’s a light that doesn’t come from human origins. If it comes from human origins then it can’t be a great light, because it’ll eventually fail us like I said before. But if it’s a light that comes from God to shine on them, then that’s a great light that’ll never fail us. Now this great light that Isaiah’s talking about here, is the light of Jesus. He’s making a prophetic claim that’s pointing to Jesus, and Jesus later affirms Isaiah’s claim 700 yrs later when he says in John 8:12, “I am the light of the world!” This is exactly what the Christmas story is about! It’s about a hopeful light that doesn’t come from us, instead it comes from God and shines on us. It’s about finding real hope from God in the light of Jesus. This is important because if you put your hope in anything else, you’ll eventually lose hope since those things aren’t eternal. If you put your hope in things like your career, your wealth, your health, or even in people, you’ll eventually lose hope since those things aren’t eternal. There’s no person who can eternally save you, no product that can eternally satisfy you, no career that can eternally fulfill you. So the only way to never lose hope, is to put your hope in something that’s eternal.
Viktor Frankl realized this when he was put in a Nazi death camp during WWII. He was a Jewish doctor who survived the brutal darkness of the Holocaust. Something he noticed as a doctor living in these death camps, was that some people remained strong while others withered away, and the difference was hope. He said if a person lost hope they’d wither away faster than those who kept their hope. He gives many examples of this, one of them being his friend. Frankl states, “One of my friends in the camp had a dream the war would end on March 30th. He was convinced the dream was a revelation, but as the date drew near, it became clear the war wasn’t ending. On March 29th he began running a temperature. On March 30th he lost consciousness. On March 31st he was dead. His loss of hope lowered his body’s resistance to diseases in the camp.” His point was his friend and many others quickly withered away when they lost hope. If we don’t want to lose hope and slowly wither away in this dark world, then we need to put our hope in something eternal. We need to put our hope not in the lesser lights of this world, but in the greater light of Jesus.
Again vs. 2, “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; a light has dawned on those living in the land of darkness. 3 You have enlarged the nation and increased its joy.” Notice Isaiah says when the greater light of Jesus shines on us there’s increased joy. There will always be increased joy in the areas of your life where you let the light of Jesus shine, but there will be decreased joy in the areas where you don’t. This is why as we go through the day and we’re hit with some darkness our joy decreases. As we go through the day our family has a fight, an unexpected bill comes in, something happens at work, your teacher gives you homework for Christmas break, and your joy meter drops. It reminds me of the movie Christmas Vacation where Clark Griswold starts his day with joy, but then the Christmas lights stop working and cousin Eddie shows up...For many of us this is what our lives are like as we go through the day. We’re hit with dark things and our joy decreases. One of the reasons this happens is because we aren’t letting the greater light of Jesus shine in those dark areas of our lives. Instead of trying to fill and refill the joy void in our hearts with the greater light of Jesus, we’re trying to fill and refill it with the lesser lights of this world. It’s like the famous physicist and philosopher Blaise Pascal once said. Pascal states, “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every person, which can’t be satisfied by any created thing. It can only be satisfied by God the Creator, who was made known through Jesus.”It can only be satisfied, by the greater light of Jesus. Some of us try filling the joy void in our hearts with things like marriage, having kids, having a successful career with financial stability. Some of us try filling the joy void in our hearts with things like drugs, alcohol, sex, or possessions. But it’s all temporary lesser lights that can only give us a little joy in the moment, which is why we need an eternal solution to fill the eternal joy void in our hearts. That eternal solution is Jesus.
Now the reality is even when the light of Jesus shines on us, that doesn’t mean we won’t ever have any more dark days. I mean if you notice Isaiah doesn’t say we won’t have any more darkness in our lives and world, instead he says we’ll have increased joy despite the darkness in our lives and world. So we’ll still have dark days in our lives, but those dark days won’t wreck us if we shine the light of Jesus in those dark areas of our lives. No matter what happens in our daily lives we’ll always have hope, we’ll always have the great light of Jesus to keep us from withering away. That’s what the great light of Jesus is meant to do for our lives. It’s meant to increase our hope and joy despite the darkness in our lives. It’s similar to what happened in 2018 when the Thai middle school soccer team got trapped in a cave after a storm flooded the entrance. Those 13 middle school boys were scared and started losing hope after being trapped in total darkness for 10 days. But suddenly a light appeared in the cave, and the boys started cheering! Why did they start cheering? It’s because they knew that light meant they weren’t alone. They knew that light meant there was hope that they’d eventually be rescued. They were still surrounded by darkness, but that little bit of light was just enough light to increase their hope and joy in the darkness. This is exactly what the greater light of Jesus is meant to do for us. It’s meant to increase our hope and joy, because it lets us know we aren’t alone in the darkness of our lives and world. It lets us know we aren’t alone in our sins, sufferings, and struggles, since a greater light has dawned on us.
Vs. 6, “For a child will be born for us, a son will be given to us, and the government will be on his shoulders. He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.” Isaiah’s making a prophetic claim here about the future birth of Jesus. It’s a prophetic claim that when Jesus comes, he’ll shine his light on us and be our Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. Like I said before this prophetic claim gets fulfilled 700 yrs later through the incarnate birth of Jesus, and in vs. 6 Isaiah says Jesus is given to us. Christmas is all about how Jesus is a gift that’s been given to us. It’s about how Jesus is our incarnate God who put on flesh and entered human history as a baby boy, to shine his light on us beginning the process of saving and redeeming our dark world. He came to give us his eternal forgiveness, eternal love, and eternal hope that leads to increased joy the deeper we walk in our relationship with him.
Now I know some of you might have come in here looking at the darkness, looking at the struggles in your life, and thinking God doesn’t care about you. But that can’t be the case because if Jesus didn’t care about you he wouldn’t have entered human history to die on the cross for you, but he entered human history to die on the cross for you because he cares for you! The entire Christmas message displays his love for you, because it’s all about Jesus being a gift that’s been given to us. He’s a gift that’s been given to you! But just like any gift you have to receive it to enjoy it. If you see a gift under the tree tomorrow with your name on it, that gift can’t be enjoyed unless you receive it and open it. It can be a gift that’s bought for you and given to you, but it can’t be enjoyed by you unless you receive it and open it. Isaiah teaches us that Jesus is the greatest gift that’s ever been given to us, but the question is will you receive him, and enjoy your daily life with him? Will you receive him, as the greater light in your life over the lesser lights of this world?
The big idea of the message is you can always find hope in the King...You can always find hope in Jesus, and like I said before everybody needs hope at some point in life...When your marriage is struggling, you need hope...When your family is struggling, you need hope...When you’re struggling financially, suffering emotionally, facing a sin or situation you can’t control, you need hope...When you’re facing dark days in your life, you need hope...So what are the dark areas in your life, where you need hope?...What are the dark areas in your life, where you need the light of Jesus?...What are the dark areas in your life, where you’ve started turning to lesser lights instead of turning to Jesus?...Deep inside your heart and my heart there’s a desire to have a greater hope and joy that the dark days can’t ever take away. That desire is a sign that the greater light of Jesus is dawning inside the dark cave of your heart. It’s a sign that the greater light of Jesus is wanting to break through whatever dark spots are in your heart. On this Christmas Eve night instead of trying to be your own savior and turning to lesser lights, turn to Jesus as your greater savior and your greater light. He’s the greatest hope and joy you can ever turn to in life, because he’s the eternal greater light that’ll never stop shining! When all the temporary lesser lights of this world stop shining, his eternal greater light is the only light that’ll still be left shining...Let’s pray...
In response to this message we’re going to pass out some candles and worship Jesus. When you receive your candles go ahead and turn them on, and let that light remind you of the light Jesus wants to shine in the dark spots of your life. In fact the tradition of Christmas lights actually started in Germany around the 17th century, when the Germans put candles in Christmas trees to remind them of the light of Jesus. Some claim Martin Luther started this tradition, and that it continued with Thomas Edison’s business partner Edward Johnson creating the first strand of Christmas lights. But Christmas lights started out as a reminder that Jesus is our greater savior, our greater light who came to save us and shine his light into the darkness of our lives. So when you turn your light on, let it be a reminder that no matter how dark your life gets and our world gets, you can always find hope in the greater light of Jesus. Let’s stand, turn our lights on, and worship Jesus...