A Message in the Dark – Contagious Joy - Purity 1846

Welcome to the M.t. for Christ 24/7 podcast. I am M.t. Clark, and this is today's photo. Good morning. Today's photo of a pillar of cloud and the silhouette of trees in the horizon against the backdrop of dawn's early light comes to us from yours truly as I captured this magic moment walking along Waite Road early yesterday morning. Well, it's Monday. It's the Monday before Christmas, and all through my space I can hear the sound of silence and bask in God's amazing grace because of this morning. Because as of this morning, my gift shopping is done, and I can sit back, relax, and enjoy the Christmas time fun. All the presents are wrapped, the gift cards addressed, and somehow by the Lord's provision, my finances aren't a mess. Praise the Lord! Anyway, enough with the rhyming. I don't know how Dr. Seuss does it. Although I have the secular materialistic part of Christmas tradition taken care of, I still am addressing the matter of how to worship the Lord at a Christmas service this year. My schedule is busier than usual this year because of my suspension from work. Due to my own negligence, I've had to scramble to attempt to meet my financial needs until the end of next month. So somewhere in the figuring, uh, I failed to realize the Christmas Eve Eve, December 23rd service that my wife selected to go to is in conflict with a prior ministry commitment. While my wife and her children will be singing Silent Night at Starpoint Church, I'll be hosting the last installment of the online grace course that I started 7 weeks ago. I have to honor my commitments, and I can't be in two places at once. So as much as it pains me, uh, I won't be with my wife in Christmas worship this year. To honor our parents, we do Christian Christmas Eve apart as it is. So I'm currently deciding between two options for an actual Christmas Eve service that I could attend in Hudson. I'll be adjusting my work hours to make sure I get to church for sure, but still waiting for a word from my son. To determine when and where I will go to worship the Lord. And right now, uh, it looks like we're going to Rock Solid Church, 6:00 PM to 7:00 PM on Christmas Eve. So be there if you want to see me. I wish I could go to Spartan Star Point Church with my wife. Um, yesterday Pastor Chad Clem did a great job at the 10:00 AM service because despite a sudden power outage Chad handled the situation, handled the sudden plunge into darkness expertly as he first assured the congregation of their and their children's safety, led us in prayer, and then resumed and completed his message on waiting on God. Despite the lack of electrical lights or the use of microphones or visual aids, Pastor Chad directed us through the examination of Simeon and Anna's delayed part in the Christmas story, preaching from Luke 2, Chad explained how both had, uh, both Simeon and Anna had waited most of their lives for the coming of the Messiah and how the Lord had blessed them with the revelation of Jesus Christ. Simeon and Anna were led by the joy of the revelation to prophesy and give thanks to God for their waiting, for their waiting on God was not in vain. Chad used these, um, first-century saints as an example, you know, for us to follow, acknowledging that we will often go through hard times and long periods of waiting on God. Uh, Pastor Chad encourages us all to wait through the dark, uh, and to trust in the Lord to bring us into the light of his love, mercy, and grace, and to rejoice because we, we as Christians have the hope that Christ gives us. Speaking of rejoicing in the Lord, the In Touch with Dr. Charles devotion, uh, or from December 18th, spoke about the topic of contagious joy, and I'm sharing it on the blog today to encourage us all to reflect on the joy of our relationship with God. Dr. Charles Stanley writes, contagious joy, joy naturally flows from knowing Christ and it draws others to him, and he references 1 John 1:4. 1:1-4, uh, where he— and he also writes, Jesus calls us to be his witnesses. On hearing this, some Christians worry that they need special skills or charisma in order to explain the good news to someone else. Yet to bear witness is not merely to share the plan of salvation. The phrase literally means to know by personal experience or testify to. In today's passage, John wrote that he was sharing things he'd experienced firsthand. What he was saying is this: I'm full of joy because of the experience of knowing Jesus, and I want you to share in that joy. When you're in love with someone, you're excited about the relationship and enjoy spending time together. Likewise, when you're in love with Jesus, you can't keep to yourself the joy that comes from knowing him. It just spills over, bearing witness and strengthening other believers. People around you will pick up on the deep, genuine gladness in your heart that goes beyond natural happiness. And some who don't yet know the Lord will find themselves hungering for the joy you have. Witnessing is not a matter of eloquence or talent. It's an overflow of the relationship— of our relationship with Jesus. As you allow the Holy Spirit to increasingly express his life and power through you, contagious joy will be the fruit of his indwelling presence. That was from Dr. Charles Stanley, and I say amen. You know, at Christmas time we sing "Joy to the World." Although we celebrate Jesus coming as a baby at Christmas, that song actually is looking forward to the joy that we will have at His second coming when Jesus returns to rule and reign. Although He will come in judgment, the Christian is not afraid of punishment because we have been redeemed and joined with Christ in His life ever since we first believed. The old fears of an angry and wrathful God have been taken away because Jesus came to save us and to give us peace with God. When our guilt and shame have been taken away by faith in Jesus, we can not only rest easy, we can rejoice because we have received the love that the Lord has for us. When we understand who God is and who, who he makes us to be in Christ, we experientially know that we are accepted, secure, and significant, and the joy of the Lord becomes our strength. Christmas is only a few days away, so don't forget about how the Lord has chosen you, saved you, and wants to help you through the periods of waiting that you will have to endure. Celebrate your relationship with God and let the joy you have in the Lord flow through you and pour out of you for all to see. Today's Bible verse comes to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling, or, uh, For Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation verse comes from the section on prayer, and today's verse is Nehemiah 4:9, which says, but we prayed to our God, and because of them we set up a guard against them day and night. Today's verse falls under the 14th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on prayer. That 14th point is pray and work using the means available to you. Today's Bible verse highlights a time when believers were challenged to pray in hostile circumstances. Nehemiah was leading the nation of Israel in the construction project of rebuilding the walls around Jerusalem after being in exile for 70 years. And if the project of rebuilding a city's walls wasn't challenging enough, Neemiah and his crew were threatened with their enemies attacking them while they worked. So they prayed for God's help and prepared a watch to look out for the enemy. God answered their prayers, and Neemiah and his crew were able to rebuild the city walls despite intense enemy opposition. So let this encourage us to pray for God's help in difficult times. The Lord can't answer prayers we don't make, and our relationship with him can't thrive unless we spend time in his presence in prayer. As always, we encourage everyone to go to mtforchrist.com, where we always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist our brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. And today we continue sharing from Day by Day Along the Way by J.E. Adams. It's a 365-day devotional. We're on day 300. 45, where Adams shares a portion of Acts 22:21, which says, 'Go, I am going to send you far away to the Gentiles.' And J.E. Adams writes, 'We read in the next verse that up until that word they listened to him, then they shouted for his death. They so hated Gentiles that they couldn't even stand hearing the word spoken. Such bitter hatred has seldom been seen in the world's history. Yet through the years, the Jews developed such a superior attitude that they despised all of those who differed from them. Such hatred should never characterize God's own, either in those days or today. Of course, as a whole, that generation of Jews was about to be destroyed for their sin, of which bitterness was a large part. We who look back on this attitude with amazement must remember that all are capable of all sin. So guard against it. You too may have a strong antipathy towards someone or some group. Bitterness can become hatred, and that is so strong it would, as in Saul's case, lead to murder. So yeah, don't hold on to bitterness. You know, we're supposed to love one another, not hate one another. So that is, you know, it might not be easy. The world tells you to get, you know, to get mad and get even. But the Lord tells us to forgive and to, you know, love one another. So that's why we always ask the question: Have you fully surrendered to God? Are you living by faith in the power of the Holy Spirit? And are you forgiving your enemies and praying for them? You know, that doesn't come natural. It comes from a relationship with the Lord. And that's why we encourage people to follow the Lord earnestly and to seek his will for your life. Um, because we've discovered that when you seek that path and follow that path, it leads to peace and joy, quite frankly. And, um, you know, it makes you want to tell people about it, and that's why we do the blog and podcast. But, um, even the blog and podcast isn't enough for me. Um, I like to share my joy in other places too, like at the Celebrate Freedom support group Um, that meets on Wednesdays at Star Point Church. Due to holidays, we have a 2-week break, so we'll be resuming on January 7th. Uh, we'll be starting the program all over again. So if anyone is new to recovery or Christian discipleship and wants to get a fresh start for 2026 and the rest of your life, join us to celebrate freedom. We'll be in the K-3 classroom, um, on January 7th. Um, let's see, if you can't make the local meeting and wanted to learn something about Celebrate Freedom, you could read the books I wrote. Um, they both have Celebrate Freedom in the title, and they're about, you know, discipleship, what I think is important for us to know as Christians to help us to live a victorious life. And if you want to check those out, you can go to amazon.com and buy them today. Um, beyond that, if you don't want to buy the books, we understand, but Well, uh, we'll encourage you for free all the same. We invite you to check out the playlist that we've created from our podcast in the past. We have every episode, every Bible study, every teaching, uh, available in different playlists, and, uh, we encourage you to check those out. And if they encourage you, we encourage you to mtforchrist.com and to give a donation to support our ministry today. Um, 2025 has been somewhat of a rough year, and we greatly appreciate your support. Beyond that, we end every little message with the question, are you empty for Christ too? And what does that mean? Well, it just means, are you trying to follow the Lord with the way you live your life? Are you trying to empty yourself of the things of this world and be filled with the things of God? We hope the answer to that question is yes, and if it is, we say great. Keep on walking and talking with God. But if it isn't, we understand, and we encourage you to seek the Lord in prayer like we do every day, like right now. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you so much for the joy you set before us, uh, the joy of knowing you and the joy of being forgiven and living according to your ways. And then seeing you face to face, Lord, when your kingdom comes. You've given us a hope that covers our past, our future, and our present. And Lord, we just pray for you to be with us today to represent your kingdom and to, uh, do our jobs expertly, or the best we can. And, um, to keep us safe, Lord, we pray for that too. We pray for anyone reading, listening, or watching this message, that you come alongside them and their prayer requests, their walk of faith. And, uh, you'd help them too. We're all trying to represent you the best we can, Lord. We definitely need your help with that, so we're praying for it. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.