Audio Transcript

Good day, everyone, and welcome to this sermon clip Wednesday on the podcast. As most of you know, for a few weeks we have been looking at a two-part sermon series Pastor John delivered in the spring of 2010. Historically, the sermons are interesting because they come in the days leading up to his eight-month leave of absence, away from the pulpit, to work some things out in his own heart and in his own family. We talked about this leave itself, and the lessons he took from it, on the podcast, particularly in three episodes: APJs 138, 220, and 1227. It was a defining season for him.

Leading up to his leave, we get these two interesting sermons. In them, Pastor John explained what makes him tick. Why does he do ministry the way he does? Remember that? We heard the answer in APJ 1769. And then we looked at a related theme. God makes much of us. He does. He really makes much of his children. But why? Why does God make so much of us? That was APJ 1772. And then we looked at how God makes much of us. In six or seven profound ways, God makes much of his children, and Pastor John walked us through those points last time, last Wednesday, in APJ 1775.

And now we return to that theme first brought up in APJ 1772. There Pastor John said this: God “makes more of you when he makes much of you for his sake than if he were to make much of you only for your sake.” That’s a profound point worth thinking about deeply. But it also raises a question in a lot of minds, because if God makes much of me, if he saves me, because he is doing it to make much of himself, doesn’t that remove some of the luster of his love? That’s the question on the table today. It will be answered in both sermons, the one on April 18 and the other on April 25, both preached in 2010. I’m going to put two brief clips together here in this episode. To begin, here’s Pastor John, near the end of his first message.

Now, last question. The final, decisive question: Why does God, who loves us so much, who makes much of us so extremely, why does he remind us over and over and over again — when he tells us how much he loves us and how much he’s making of us — why does he keep reminding us that he’s doing it for his glory? To ruin it? No.

Why does God remind us over and over that he makes much of us in a way that is designed to make much of him? The answer is that loving you this way is a greater love. God’s love for you, which makes much of you for his glory, is a greater love for you than if he ended by making much of you. If he just made much of you as your greatest treasure rather than him as your greatest treasure, if he did everything he could do to help you feel like a treasure rather than helping you feel like he’s the greatest treasure, he would not love you so much.

Hearts Made for God

I’ll tell you why. The reason this is a greater love is that self, no matter how glorified, cannot satisfy the heart that is made for God. I’ll say it again — bottom-line answer. The reason it’s a greater love to love you for his sake, and a greater love to make much of you that he might be made much of — the reason that’s greater is that a self, no matter how gloriously it looks in the age to come, cannot satisfy a heart that is made for God.

“Self, no matter how glorified, cannot satisfy the heart that is made for God.”

If he is to satisfy the magnificence of the human heart, which is made for him, he must make much of himself for you in making much of you. He will not let your glory, which he himself creates and delights in, replace his glory as your supreme treasure. If he did, he would not love you so much.

So, Bethlehem, I’ll be away in a little over a week, and I want you to feel this. I want you to feel massively loved while I’m gone. I intend to feel massively loved while I’m away. And I would like to know that here, because the Holy Spirit is coming down, there’s a tide rising on how much we are loved as a people. That’s what I would like to know.

You, Bethlehem, are precious to God. And the greatest gift he has for you is not to let your preciousness become your god. I’ll say it again. You, Bethlehem, are precious to God. I don’t know if it would be theologically overstated to say infinitely precious, since he paid Jesus — but let’s just say, immeasurably, unspeakably, gloriously precious to God. And his great gift to you, which brings his love to its apex, is that he will not let your sense of being precious to him become your god. He will be your God forever.

Amen. So that was near the end of sermon one. But the topic carries over. So I’ll fast-forward one week later and pick up this same discussion in the beginning of his next sermon. That’s where we pick up right now.

To Know the Love of Christ

Here’s a prayer from Ephesians. You don’t need to look it up; just listen carefully. This is Paul now, praying for the Ephesians — and the way I pray for you, for myself, for my family: “[I pray that you] may have strength to comprehend . . . the love of Christ” (Ephesians 3:18–19). You can’t know it without power. Does that strike you as odd? You should give a lot of thought to that. Why can’t I know what it is to be loved without divine power?

I’ll keep reading that prayer. “[I pray that you] may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge” — surpasses the powers of the mind to comprehend and the powers of the human heart to experience. It surpasses our fallen capacities to handle with our brain and to experience with our heart. It goes beyond what you’re able to do, which is why Paul is praying — and why I pray for myself this way and for you this way.

May you have strength to comprehend the love of Christ — soul strength, heart strength, mind strength. May God give this to us now. Now, Holy Spirit, come. This is why Paul said in Romans 5:5, “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” The love of God pours into you, not by any human agency, but by the Holy Spirit. It’s a divine thing to know yourself loved by God. You’re not able to on your own.

Bottom of Our Joy

Now, the question I posed last week was, Why is it that the Bible reveals the love of God for us, including God’s making so much of us, in ways that constantly call attention to his own glory? Why does he do it that way?

And the answer is this: If God didn’t do it that way, if he didn’t love us in a way that constantly called attention back to his glory as the source, as the essence, as the goal, we would be so much more likely to turn the love of God into a subtle means of self-exaltation. We would use his love to make ourselves the deepest foundation of our joy instead of himself. God would become the servant of our slavery to self. We would take our preciousness to God and make that very preciousness to God our god.

“God himself will be the beginning, the middle, and the end in his love for me.”

But, I argued, God loves us so much, we are so precious to him, that he will not let that happen. We are so precious to God that God, in great mercy, will not let our preciousness to him become our god. Hear this carefully: we will indeed, through all eternity, enjoy being made much of by God. That will be a profound ingredient in our joy in God — that he makes so much of his sons and his daughters.

But he will work in us such a holiness, such a sanctification, such a freedom from sin, that he will protect us from making that the bottom of our joy. The bottom of our joy will always be that he’s the kind of God who delights in us. The bottom of our joy will always be that he’s the kind of God who makes much of the likes of me. This grace, this grace, will be the apex of my joy, the apex of my praise forever. It will never terminate here. It will always go back there. “For from him and through him and to him are all things” (Romans 11:36). God himself will be the beginning, the middle, and the end in his love for me.

Over three hundred years ago, Blaise Pascal observed, “All of the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber” (Pensées, 39). Pascal attributes this inability to our love of endless amusement, which distracts us from our doubts, worries, and discontent. And so, for most people, “The pleasure of solitude is a thing incomprehensible” (40). Now, even if Pascal overplayed his hand, the point he makes echoes the value that Scripture places on silence.

Isaiah records one of God’s invitations to be quiet: “Thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, ‘In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength’” (Isaiah 30:15). God invites his people to be quiet and connects that quietness to strength, rest, and finding our home in him. On the other hand, Isaiah warns, “The wicked are like the tossing sea; for it cannot be quiet, and its waters toss up mire and dirt” (Isaiah 57:20). The wicked rage like an ocean in a storm, unable to be still.

Therefore, those who want to avoid the unhappiness that Pascal describes and pursue the stable satisfaction that God promises learn to practice the habit of quiet.

Quiet Soul, Quiet Mouth

What is quietness, according to God? First, biblical quietness is not simply a lack of noise. External silence is often part of the habit of quiet, but true quietness goes much deeper. Biblical quietness refers primarily to a quiet demeanor or quiet heart — a restful silence of soul — because often a noisy mouth is the overflow of a noisy heart.

Thus, Proverbs says the wise man both restrains his words and quiets his soul (Proverbs 17:27; 29:11), his outward silence matching his inward peace. But the fool is loud and restless, a lover of noise (Proverbs 7:11; 9:13). Moreover, because we are body-soul creatures, what we do externally affects us internally and vice versa. So, the habit of quiet involves cultivating inner quietness by creating rhythms of outer quietness.

Second, biblical quietness does not negate the need to speak. Scripture places a high premium on well-timed words (Proverbs 25:11). There is a time to be zealous. There is a time to speak with unction and conviction. There is a time to herald from the mountaintops. There is a time to declare, “Thus says the Lord!” And there is “a time to keep silence” (Ecclesiastes 3:7).

Our Default Volume: Loud

The need for quiet is not new to the modern age. Man’s default volume has always been loud. Four hundred years before Jesus, Plato lamented that most people live “a distracted existence” led in circles by the songs and sounds of society (The Republic, 164). And earlier still, David expressed the need for silence by saying, “I have calmed and quieted my soul . . . like a weaned child is my soul within me” (Psalm 131:2).

Distraction, from within and without, is not novel, but modernity has amped up the volume. We live in a society that often hates quiet, one in which the loudest hearts are awarded the largest platforms. We are besieged by the newest news, harried by busyness, drowning in noise, endlessly accompanied by devices of endless distraction. And even if much of the content we consume is good, it is always on. Too often, we know neither inner nor outer quiet.

Yet wise men have always celebrated silence. Some 150 years ago, Charles Spurgeon said, “Quietude, which some men cannot abide because it reveals their inward poverty, is as a palace of cedar to the wise, for along its hallowed courts the King in his beauty deigns to walk” (Lectures to My Students, 64). Indeed, the King did hallow those halls. King Jesus created rhythms of quiet during his time on earth. It was his custom to create space to be alone with his Father (Luke 22:39).

How will we hear birdsong, that symphony of the Father’s care for creation, if we are never quiet? How can we attend to God’s still, small voice whispering wisdom in his word if our hearts never stop murmuring? We have a great need for silence.

Call to the Deeps

Imagine life as an ocean. Waves constantly toss the surface of that sea and assault the shore — waves of sound, waves of worry, waves of work and entertainment, waves of deadlines and events, waves of stubborn children and sinful parents. Waves, waves, waves. And yet, peace is never far off. Even the mightiest waves that march across the face of the ocean cannot disturb the water 150 feet below the surface. Peace ever reigns in the deeps. And it is to those deeps God calls us through the habit of quiet.

Spurgeon enjoyed those depths. He knew from habitual experience the “pleasure of solitude” that Pascal speaks of. In one of his lectures to aspiring pastors, Spurgeon delivers this perennial advice:

I am persuaded that . . . most of us think too much of speech [and action], which after all is but the shell of thought. Quiet contemplation, still worship, unuttered rapture, these are mine when my best jewels are before me. Brethren, rob not your heart of the deep sea joys; miss not the far-down life, by for ever babbling among the broken shells and foaming surges of the shore. (Lectures to My Students, 64)

We are often blown and tossed by waves, beaten and battered by the pounding breakers of life, because we fail to dive below the surface with God. We rob our hearts of deep delights because we never stop babbling.

Yet for Spurgeon, the speech and action that we spend so much time thinking about flower from the leaf mold of a quiet heart. And the rewards of that quietness are unfathomable, in the fullest sense of that word — inexpressible rapture, awestruck worship, treasure to contemplate, the far-down life. Oh, and deep-sea joys! Surely this is enough to motivate Christian Hedonists to be still before the Lord. Indeed, God is magnified when we are silently satisfied in him.

Handful of Quietness

Seeing how high the stakes are, the question naturally arises, “How do I practice the discipline of silence?” How do we seize what Ecclesiastes calls “a handful of quietness” (Ecclesiastes 4:6)? Whole Christian traditions have been devoted to nurturing a life of calm contemplation. But I will simply offer two suggestions.

First, sometime this week, set aside fifteen minutes to create external quiet in order to cultivate internal quiet. Pascal’s advice to stay quietly in your own chamber is a good place to start, but inner rooms don’t have a monopoly on silence. I recommend taking a walk in the woods. Few places resonate more with God’s presence and songs of silent praise. Or get up early enough to watch the sunrise. Quiet abounds when most people sleep. Or if all else fails, don some noise-canceling headphones. Whatever you have to do, create spaces and rhythms of stillness.

Second, practice the discipline of silence on Sunday morning. This may sound paradoxical, but remember the primary goal is a still heart, not a lack of sound. How often do you sit in a worship service with a heart closer to Plato’s “distracted existence” than David’s weaned and quieted soul (Psalm 131:2)? Don’t miss the far-down life enjoyed in Christian community by harboring a babbling heart. Instead, let your worship overflow from satisfied silence before God (Isaiah 14:7). Sing loud from a quiet heart. As your pastor heralds the word of God, calm your soul and put away your phone. Don’t be distracted by lunch plans or tomorrow’s work or endless waves of worry. Be quiet to enjoy the deeps.

Perhaps Pascal did not overstate his case. We do forfeit much happiness when we refuse to practice the habit of quiet. After all, our Lord bids us, “Be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). And when we do so, he will quiet us with his unfathomable love (Zephaniah 3:17).

Words alone could never fully capture the meaning and wonder of Christmas — but we can sure do a whole lot better than the card aisles in stores today. “Many blessings and wishes to you.” “May your life be filled with warmth and good cheer this holiday season.” “Sending lots of peace and joy to you and your family this Christmas.” “It’s people like you who make this season so magical and bright.”

No, it’s not people like you (or me) that make this season merry, magical, or bright. In fact, by increasingly thinking we’re what makes Christmas so merry, we’re slowly siphoning off its true power. The Son of the living God was born human in a small town in the Middle East, sent to bear the awful weight of sin and shame, overpower Satan’s terrifying forces of evil, place death itself in the grave, and clear the narrow path to paradise, and yet how many settle for something superficial and fleeting instead — for greeting cards, newly released electronics, and a few LED lights?

Read enough cards and watch enough movies, and you begin to wonder if the actual “magic” of our modern Christmas is avoiding the real Christmas altogether.

Unfeigned Magic

The world can have its makeshift magic over these next couple days; we’re praying for a spiritual miracle — in us, freshly and more deeply, and then in everyone we love:

Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory. (1 Peter 1:8)

Do you still love the King lying in the manger? Does your heart still rise to see him serve his friends, heal the sick, deliver the possessed, and then die for the world? Do you recognize yourself in the verse above, rejoicing “with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory”? If not, come and look again at the deeper, earth-shaking, heaven-filling magic of Christmas, all from just one paragraph in Colossians 1.

1. This Christ shows us God.

He is the image of the invisible God. (Colossians 1:15)

Those eight words really ought to be enough to drive the banality right out of our homes and pews. The man who was born to a real woman, with a real womb, in a real city, during a real time in history has made the infinite and invisible God seeable. Recognizable. Huggable. Human. This Christ was in the beginning, and all things were made through him. And then he took on the flesh that he had made, and ate the food that he had made, and walked over hills that he had made, and loved the people that he had made — all so that we might see God.

And not only did God make himself seeable in the child born in Bethlehem, but he’s opened our eyes to see his glory — in the manger, at the cross, on the throne. Before we believed, “the god of this world” kept us from seeing what we now see. And then, whether suddenly or slowly, we saw him differently. We came to see “the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Corinthians 4:4). In this Jesus, we’ve seen God.

2. This Christ created and upholds all things.

By him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities — all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Colossians 1:16–17)

The man at the center of Christmas changes how we see God — we actually see him — and he changes how we see every other thing we see (and everything we don’t). Christmas isn’t only an opportunity to place Christ above all else, but to see him in and behind all else. “All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made” (John 1:3). The one who came to live on earth invented earth and life. This makes everything around us, everything in the universe, everything beyond our universe its own Christmas devotion about Christ.

He assembled the trees in our yards, wrapping their rings, stretching their branches, carefully placing leaves and fruit — billions and billions of trees, and yet each of them their own. And over all those trees, he painted a sky, that cosmic canopy of blue. And over that canopy, he taught the sun how to rise each morning and dance, in all its colors, each evening. And beneath that dance, he wove together the people we love, all the people we love, for all the reasons that we love them. Everything that is or will be, he made. He was and is the great Carpenter of creation.

This carpenter was in the beginning, but he wasn’t only in the beginning. He made all things, but he didn’t only make all things; he also holds them together — right now, as you read, and eat, and unwrap presents, and sing. “He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power” (Hebrews 1:3).

3. This Christ came to receive the wrath of God.

And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. (Colossians 1:21–22)

As genuinely miraculous as his coming was, we celebrate what happened that night in Bethlehem because of why he was born. This Christ came and lived to die. The Son of Man did not come merely to be born, “but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). He received the wrath of God so that we might enjoy his presence and favor.

In the end, it’s the death of this human Son that sets a Christian Christmas apart from all its pagan and commercial imitations.

We preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. (1 Corinthians 1:23–24)

Some may join us in celebrating the cute baby in a domesticated manger, but only Christians find peace and joy beneath the bloody cross. Their stumbling block is our cornerstone. We were once alienated from God and hostile to him — not neutral or indifferent, but venomous — and yet Jesus laid down his life, paying for all our hideous hissing and defanging our mutiny against him. Christmas is about the canceling and dethroning of sin.

And he died not merely to forgive an enemy, but to have his bride — “he is the head of the body, the church” (Colossians 1:18). He’s not a mercenary Savior, but an adoring and devoted husband. He entered the filthiness of a stable, the indignity of human life, “that he might sanctify [the church], having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing” (Ephesians 5:26–27).

4. This Christ holds the keys of Death.

He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. (Colossians 1:18)

You could of course argue that we celebrate what happened on Christmas morning less because of how he died and more because of how he rose. The man who was born in Bethlehem did in fact die, but then he was “born” a second time when he shook off his grave clothes and walked out of the tomb. He didn’t merely come to die, but to put death itself in a grave.

“Fear not,” this Christ says again this Christmas, “I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades” (Revelation 1:17–18). He’s not the cuddly, defenseless baby the world would prefer. No, his resurrection announced his awesome power and authority over all rivals. None can withstand this Christ, and none will avoid his judgment.

And all who take refuge in him will never die (John 11:25–26). Because of Christmas, death will now kneel to serve you, one day lifting you into the life you’ve always wanted and never deserved. In fact, God has already “raised us up with [Christ] and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:6–7).

5. This Christ will inherit and transform everything.

In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. (Colossians 1:19–20)

He may have been raised in the humility of a remote and obscure town, but he came to capture the world, to unite every throne on earth under his rule. And not just the cities and governments, but everything that is — mountains and oceans, grizzly bears and goldfish, evergreen trees, snow fall, and reindeer. And not just everything that’s here on earth, but everything in every realm, all the spiritual realities and forces that invade human life without being seen. “All things,” verse 16 says, “were created through him and for him.”

Christmas is as good a moment as any to stop and remember that God has already made known his “plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in [Christ], things in heaven and things on earth” (Ephesians 1:9–10). When this world comes to an end, we’ll look back at it all and see him. We’ll see how the wildness of creation and the even greater wildness of history all ties together into one stunning tapestry of the glory of Christ. Christmas, then, is the beginning of the end of history — the inbreaking of the one who both makes sense of it all and owns it all.

So, from all the depths and riches of all this Christ is and means for us, merry Christmas! As you prepare your heart and family to remember him, resist the safe and comfortable seduction of worldliness, and press into the Christ-exalting, world-offending, heart-stirring words God himself has given us for this wonderful day.