Cypress Church

Grace is a key quality of Jesus, He is full of grace and extends grace to us. The questions is how do we respond to His grace? Matthew 20:1-16 give us 3 aspects of grace and how we might receive this grace and give out this grace for; Grace is Available so Receive, Grace is Beneficial so Celebrate, Grace is Educational so Absorb.

Jesus is the Glory of God (John 1:14) and in Matthew 17:1-13 Jesus’ glory is revealed giving us Four Choices to Behold Jesus’ Glory; Be Lead to Glory, Be Awed by Glory, Be Touched by Glory, Be Instructed by Glory.

Jesus is trust-worthy; He is true, He is love, He cares, and He is in charge! Yet it takes of us Surrender, denying self to embrace the life He has for us. In Matthew 16:21-28 Jesus gives Three Truths of Surrender in Following Jesus; Surrender is Painful, Surrender Requires Self-Denial, and Surrender Yields Reward.

The Lord is generous providing great and precious promises to live by (2 Peter 1:4). These generous blessing are there before us all we need to do is have the faith to receive and live in them. Matthew 15:21-31 give us 5 aspects of faith to take on, for faith in Jesus; Requires Knowledge, Realizes Perseverance, Receives Testing, and Reflects Generosity...Rabbi Jesus is generous and the dust that should settle on us a true faith that moves is to be generous like Him.

Living pure/righteous is a necessity of faith, it is a desire mixed with our self-focused-sinful-self where we complicate it and see it as something we put on rather than grow from within. Jesus our Rabbi/Teacher kicks up some dust/wisdom on this matter and in Matthew 15:1-20 give us three truth of purity: Life Purity is a Heart Issue-Jesus is the Heart Transformer, Inner Purity is Not Outwardly Altered-Jesus is the Inner Converter, Pure Living is Behaviors from a Pure Heart-Jesus’ Way Leaders to Pure Actions.

Being in the dust of Rabbi Jesus is to see Him as an authority in our lives, to acknowledge that Jesus is The Validated Authority with allegiance & commitment, that Jesus is The Proven Authority in the Physical Realm with reverence and great faith, that Jesus is The Confirmed Authority in the Spiritual Realm with surrender and life-change.

The unfortunate reality of life is it is like the dark side of winter; cold, dangerous, dark, deadly...and like the Narnia prior to Aslan there was winter and never the joy of Christmas...Jesus, like Asland can bring love, peace, joy, and hope to a cold world, for Christ is Born - Respond to God’s Provision, A Savior is Given so Avoid the Evil Within, Immanuel is Present - Follow God’s Leading, and Redeemer is Offered – Choose to be Different

The Christmas season is full of lights that being joy. The Christmas story is a full-light display of hope in Jesus. Join us this week as we ball in the True Light of Christmas, Jesus, the Hope of the World. Dig deeper by reading John 1 and Mark 1:1-8.

Life brings on darkness; Ebola, Isis, wars, floods, droughts, severe weather, sickness, crimes, people doing hurtful things, us doing harmful things to ourselves, relationship issues, and not following God’s will or way. Yet even when the darkness is great, there is hope, there is a Light we can flip on. That Light is Jesus and His earthy step-dad Joseph flipped it on, and so can we as we Believe Jesus Saves and Make Immanuel Enough.

Christmas is the celebration of Jesus as He brings the ‘light of life’ to us and our world. The illuminating truth is we need a Savior to deal with the darkness of our sinful condition (Matthew 1:21), and we need the bright reality that there is an amazing life for us when we set Jesus as our highest affection (Matthew 6:33, John 10:10, 1 John 5:12). We were created to thrive in the light of Jesus. That is our hope. That is the Light of Christmas.