What If Peace Is A Person, Not A Plan | Pastor Will Hawk | December 14th, 2025

If pressure has been your constant companion—calendar stacked, budget tight, mind racing—this conversation in Isaiah 9 might feel like a hand on your shoulder. We zoom in on a world of deep darkness and real fear and discover that God answers not with a program, but with a person. A child is given. A Son is placed into the very gloom that wears us down, and He takes the weight we can’t carry.

We slow the pace to read Hebrew poetry the way it asks to be read, noticing how Isaiah “rhymes” ideas to show both our choices and our conditions: we walk in darkness and we dwell in it. Then the light comes on. We talk about what God’s light reveals—clear paths, dangerous traps, and our own cracks—and why that exposure is grace. From there, joy builds. Isaiah’s twin images of harvest and spoil become living metaphors for shared abundance and surprise provision, the kind of joy that grows when pressure drives us closer to God and each other.

At the center are the names that tell us how His rule feels in everyday life: Wonderful Counselor for the decisions that keep you up at night, Mighty God for battles you can’t win alone, Everlasting Father for the ache of absence or loss, and Prince of Peace for anxious hearts. We wrestle with the timing of His kingdom and land where Jesus does: it’s already among us. That truth changes posture. Instead of waiting for peace, we walk with the One who creates it and become light for others by refusing to hide our limp. The increase of His government and peace will not end, and the zeal of the Lord will see it through.

Lean in, lay down the backpack, and let Christ shoulder what He came to carry.

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Chapters

• 2:19 Reading Isaiah 9 And Opening Prayer
• 8:41 Anguish Explained: Pressure Outside And In
• 16:13 Darkness And Light: Hebrew Poetry Slows Us
• 24:32 When God Turns On The Lights
• 30:21 Joy Multiplies Under Pressure
• 37:26 Harvest And Spoil: Pictures Of Joy
• 44:11 To Us A Child Is Given
• 49:58 Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince Of Peace

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 1:33

Uh please turn into your Bibles to Isaiah chapter 9, which is on page 573 in the Pew Bibles, and follow along as I read God's Word. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who've dwelt in a land of deep darkness on them has light shone. You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy, the rejoice they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil.

SPEAKER_03: 2:09

For to us a child is born, for to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonder for Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

SPEAKER_01: 2:23

Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and with righteousness. From this time forward and forevermore, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

SPEAKER_03: 2:40

This is the word of the Lord.

SPEAKER_00: 2:47

Thank you, guys. I appreciate that. Now let's take a moment, y'all, and I invite you to turn to Isaiah. Let's focus our time on Isaiah 9. Particularly, let's look at verse 6. And just join me in prayer. So I'm going to read these first these verses, this verse aloud, and then let's pray through it. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called. Wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Lord, thank you for being a God that keeps his promises. God, we're reading here in Isaiah, Lord, how you will send a Savior. Lord, even back in Genesis, you promised to redeem your people, God. Father, I can't help but think about Luke. As Nick read in Luke 2, that, Lord, you came, that this promise was fulfilled. You are the Lord of promises, God, and you keep each and every one of them. Lord, you don't keep us wanting or wondering. But God, we know that you will come through and you have come through. That we have the gift of your Son, Lord, that we have the gift of Christ. The greatest gift, Lord, that we could ever ever imagine is being reconciled to you, God, and you have done that. And Lord, His kingdom is your kingdom is everlasting. He says you will bear the government upon your shoulder, Lord. That is from everlasting from to everlasting, Father. That this isn't just some mere government God, but it is eternity with you, that all things will be set right. Lord, everything will be made right. There will be no more tears, Lord, because now we have a way to you, a way to spend eternity with you, Father. Lord, wonderful counselor. Lord, you are a God that gives our hearts peace, Lord. And not only that, God, you give us wisdom. You counsel us through your word. You give us yourself through your word, Father, to allow us to walk in the days that you have blessed us here on earth, Lord, as you point to an eternity. You are mighty, God. You do wondrous works, God. You call down, Lord, fire. You you are a God. You cover the earth with water, Lord. You set every single star in place to show your might. Yet you know us. Lord, you are the everlasting father. Lord, you are a father to the fatherless, Lord. Lord, you keep us safe, God. You provide for us generously as a good father. And Lord, you are the Prince of Peace. God, not only, Lord, uh among men, God, but for us to you. And you've extended that grace, Lord, through your Son. And so, Father, I just pray, God, that we would reflect on that reality, Lord, that you have made peace with man through your son. And that there's nothing that we can do to be reconciled with you. Lord, we can't be good enough. Lord, we can't do it through our striving. But God, we would have peace because of you, God, because of what you've done and what you've done alone. And Lord, because of that, that we would spend eternity with you, and your goodness and kindness will reign on us forever and ever. Amen.

SPEAKER_02: 7:00

Amen. Thank you, Larry. Good to see you, brother. Well, how's everybody doing? Merry Christmas, guys. Y'all doing all right? Okay, so uh we have been in the book of Isaiah. That's what we've been doing uh sort of for our advent season. Hopefully you've already turned there. Let me just give you one little sort of pro tip. I'm not gonna point to this for a few minutes, uh, but if you are a digital Bible kind of a person, which I am, you're going to at least for a moment want a paper Bible. So uh if you want to go ahead and grab a paper Bible, start flipping to Isaiah 9. You're always allowed to use the table of contents here. Nobody's gonna look down on you for that. Uh, and just keep it next to you. I want to point out something to you as we work through it. But as we're looking at the gift through Isaiah, let me just point out the very first verse in Isaiah chapter 9 because it feels like it's gonna be a heavy chapter. We've got anguish, we have gloom tucked into this, but the little negative hanging out before the gloom is setting the tone for this chapter as well as our time in God's Word today. My hope is this, that this would be a very encouraging, uplifting passage that simultaneously deals with the pressures of life, the pressures of this season, uh, and sort of just the reality of wanting to be a people of light, living in a world that is dark. And many times we choose darkness ourselves. And so Isaiah begins this way, but there will be no gloom, none, not even a little bit, for her who was in anguish. Now, when when you see her who was in anguish, a lot of times in the Old Testament, you are thinking something along the lines of a woman being in birth, or uh it's usually carrying a maternal type of a feel. Yeah, I'm not gonna ask this one because I'll be honest, I don't think I'd get good answers on it. Um, the reason that God's people are in anguish in Isaiah chapter 9 is because they're surrounded by the Assyrian army. Now, most of us cannot relate to that experience. The closest I ever got would have been seventh grade, Fort Middle School, trying out for soccer, and knowing that at some point the eighth graders were going to try to jump all of the seventh graders, which if you don't know what that term means, sorry for you, you missed out on a wonderful public school experience. And me, like trying to do practice, get to my locker before all the eighth graders got there, so that I could change my clothes, get on my shoes, and get out of there before the lowly seventh graders got jumped by the eighth graders. That's the closest I can come to. If you're a soldier in the room, you may fully understand what this would have been like. But I can tell you something that I think God would recognize and knows all of us can experience. As this is being written, God's people have pressure in two different places. They have pressure on the outside and they have pressure on the inside. The pressure on the outside reminds me of a student with a backpack. Um, when I started Hardway High School in the ninth grade, if I remember correctly, I got a new five-star black backpack. And it had a triple zipper, had the big compartment, then it had the little one that just gets junk and trash in it, and then it had a secondary compartment in it. What I didn't know in going to high school and having seven classes, which is what we did back then, was how many books I was gonna end up carrying. And on day one, you're going to class and you're getting your book. I did I it's so funny being at a time where so many people are homeschooled and so many people are private schooled, and now schools don't do as many classes at the same time, I think. But out of curiosity, do any of you guys remember having seven subjects in a single day? Okay, great. And you're going through class, and back then you checked your book out. Your teacher would give you your book, you would see all of the students who had it the years before. Maybe you you recognize somebody, and then you put it in your backpack. Well, by the end of the day, that backpack is about to blow out. The zippers have begun praying, and this brand new thing that you're so excited about, it's not only causing you to lean backwards, but there's like books and trapper keepers that are digging into the inside of your back. This to me is what I think of when I see the word anguish, because the word anguish here in the Hebrew it means pressure. The idea is God's people have been going through life, and on the outside of them, they feel like they're about to collapse. Their backpack is about to blow. This is the way my backpack is this morning. I went and grabbed it. This is uh the backpack I travel with whenever I fly. I try to fly with one bag, no matter how many days I'm staying wherever, because I hate lugging stuff and I never trust the airline. No offense, Tori, who I saw sit down somewhere over here. And so I this I have been hanging on because of my dumb dog. I've been hanging on by a thread on every trip that I've gone to. When I see this word anguish, that's what I think of. There is so much stuff being packed in. Now, by the time God's people get to Isaiah 9, their backpack is full. It is splitting at the seams. They've had generations of unfaithful kings, a kingdom that's divided, they're entrenched in idolatry, and now the Assyrians' boot is beginning to press on their neck. But this word anguish also points, there you are, also points to another kind of pressure. In the event, uh let me just sorry, I'm gonna be a little gender specific here. Men, in the event that you don't realize this, in the next two nights, the temperature is gonna drop below freezing. Now, I don't know how your house operates, but whenever our the temperatures hit 30 degrees or below at night, it changes my night before. Faucets are dripping, okay? And if something or someone has torn the insulation off any of my exposed pipes, I've got to get there because if I don't, that pipe is going to burst. It's gonna freeze up and it's gonna pop. This word anguish should also, I don't know which it is for you. It's either a heavy backpack or a pipe that's about to burst. It might be both for some of you, and praise God for the nine of you that it is none. And you're just like Christmas season and gingerbread cookies. I love you, I want to hang out with you, let's get coffee, okay? But but for many of us, it's either the backpack digging into us, holding on by a thread, and we can't take one more of anything. We can't take one more expense, one more activity, one more calendar appointment, one more person saying, Can you help me? It's like I'm so Christian, but please don't say that to me right now. That's the backpack person. But for some of us, like a pipe about to burst, it looks the same. It's in the exact same place, color hasn't changed, but inside the pressure is growing, it's intense, and you are pleading with yourself, maybe I can hold it together. Maybe nobody will notice, maybe it won't crack. But inside is anxiety. This was God's people on Isaiah 9. It wasn't just the full backpack around them, it was the fear of what is going to happen. All of this anxiety, all of the fear, for us, it may be secret sin, shame, self-condemning thoughts that we continue to repeat over and over and over again. So I'm not sure if for you it's the quiet, invisible, intense pressure inside or the obvious, heavy, everybody can see it pressure on the outside, but you can understand Isaiah 9, even though you couldn't pick an Assyrian out of a lineup of two people, and you have maybe no clue what it's like to have a city surrounded by an army, because what God through Isaiah does in this passage is he does not try to remove the pressure. He sends a person, not a policy, not a program. He sends a child into the darkness. And this Assyrian onslaught, all of this pressure becomes the dark backdrop for the light of the world to be seen. And this is how we see it play out. Isaiah chapter 9, verse 2. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them light has shown. Quick time out. I told you I expect this to be encouraging, upbeat, and uplifting. I do. We gotta start here. What we have to start with is a recognition that the people, all people, including ourselves, have done two things when it comes to darkness. Number one, we have walked in it. That means you have willfully chosen things that crack your pipes. You have willfully chosen to put in the backpack things you were never intended to carry. Things that are either too heavy for you, that ought to be given to God, or things that really shouldn't come near you because they will erode you away. All people have walked in darkness, but it does get one step worse. It's not just that you have chosen sin, chosen brokenness, that all of us make foolish decisions from time to time. Check out the bottom half. We live in this place. We dwell in a land not just of darkness, but of deep darkness. This is the reality. This is what causes the pressure. Who am I going to be? What am I going to choose? How am I going to live? What am I going to act like? And what am I going to say? And every time, Christian, there are two worlds colliding inside your soul. The Holy Spirit's just pleading with you to choose righteousness and light for your own good and his own glory, but also a world and people who will give you every excuse to walk and dwell in sin. And this, this sort of reality of sin in us and on the outside of us is inescapable. But please notice this. Somehow, God is able to say the verses that come after it with no dismissing, no disappointment, because God Himself is excited that His Savior, His Son, is coming. I asked you guys to grab a paper Bible. I want you to pull it out right now. I didn't do this. I didn't follow my own instructions. So let me flip to Isaiah. I want you to see something really neat that you can't appreciate. I would have won the Bible drill on that one. Awesome. Didn't mark it. Still feeling it. I feel like I've gotten so bad at flipping through my Bible since going to an iPad. And so that was, thank you, Lord. That was a fun moment. All right. What I want you to do is I just want you to look at Isaiah chapter 9, verse 2 in your paper Bible. All right. I'm looking. Most eyes are down. Some of you are like, Will, I've given up on this. You always put it on the screen. I'm blaming you for this. I want you to notice how everything in the text changes in verse 2. Everything around it is in paragraph form. Do you see that? All of chapter 8, except for verses 9 and 10, chapter 7 before it. Do you see how it's in sort of a story format? And then you squeeze down to verse 2 and all of a sudden it changes. If you see it, say I see it. Okay. The reason I want to point this out is to teach you two things about God's word and how it works. The first thing that I want to teach you is that this is poetry. What we are reading is intended to be a poem, which means slow down. For some of us, we haven't read poetry since we were in college or maybe even high school. But there is something about poetry with all of its flowery language that forces you to slow down. If all you're reading is the fox ran over the hill and the fox saw a chicken and the chicken ran up the hill, so the fox, man, you're just zooming along. But if all of a sudden all of these colors and pictures and ideas start coming in, you must read slower or you get three stanzas in and you're completely lost. Everybody, anybody ever read Shakespeare before? Okay? What this means is when we hit verse two, the prophet Isaiah and the Spirit of God is saying, Hey, I'm writing this visually. Slow down. Slow down. The other thing that I want you to notice, and this is not my favorite, Hebrew poetry does not repeat it. Hebrew poetry is not built on rhyming. My favorite stories, especially around Christmas, are the ones that rhyme from beginning to end. I feel like taking the effort for things to rhyme just blesses my soul. Hebrew poetry doesn't do that. It doesn't rhyme sounds, it rhymes ideas. And you may never have known this. You may have just thought, God's word sure is repetitive. He says everything twice. And then you've probably thought God was being mean to you. He's like, Well, it's because you're such a bad kid. I gotta say everything two times, or you're not gonna listen to it once. What's actually happening is our poetry is made to rhyme. Hebrew poetry is built to repeat, which is why you will see in verse 2 the people who walked in darkness drop down those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness. This is the way poetry works. They have seen a great light, drop down on them, light has shone. This is the way Hebrew poetry works. So when we slow down, here is what we find. It's not just that we walked in darkness or dwelt in a land of deep darkness. What God wants us to see is this. We have seen a great light. I I've told y'all this, but um my habit, my dad always told me to turn off the light in the room that you were leaving. Ever since Mythbusters came out, I was like, it didn't really matter. It was like 12 cents a year for that one room or whatever it was. Air conditioner, that's a different story. But turning off the lights, it was a habit. So whenever people would spend the night, we'd be hanging out in my bedroom or hanging out downstairs. And every time I walked by, I would flip the lights off. Well, I don't walk many places, I run places. I still run up the stairs at my own house like an eight year old child. And so if I had three guys spending the night, whoever was on the tail end was Was absolutely navigating my parents' house in the absolute pitch black dark. Because I would walk by and I would hit it and I would hit it and I would hit it. And Keller would probably remember tripping on the stairs a couple of times because we would I would sort of force them by habit to go through the dark. This idea of seeing a great light, it brings to mind being in a dark room or a dark corridor where you're trying to find your way, and all of a sudden there's this bright gleam of light shooting from a distance, and you at least know which direction to go in. Okay, that's the direction that God is calling me to. That's the direction God is calling my life to. My hands might be in front of me. I may not want to trip, but when the Hebrew poetry repeats itself, it says, it isn't just that you have seen something, it's that this light has shone on you. The idea is Truman's story version. This beam of light comes and illuminates everything around you. So to a people with pressure on the outside and pressure on the inside, darkness on the outside and darkness on the inside, God could have left the lights off, but he didn't. He could have just sent this one light to Bethlehem for people to see and follow and go. He did, but he doesn't stop there. Then all of a sudden the light comes into the world and it begins expanding and expanding and expanding so that not only are we no longer in darkness for those of us who seek him, not only do we see enough to know which direction to go in, I can see the world around me. Now, one downside, if you can call it that, is that when this great light shines on us, we also see ourselves. We see the darkness and the brokenness within us. We're not just walking toward a crack of light down the hall. God's word says that it is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. This is how I know where to go. So when the pipes are about to bust and the backpack is about to tear, God says, I'm doing two things for you, and both of them are for your good. I'm illuminating the world around you so that you would be less enticed by things that aren't actually going to give you life and joy. I'm also going to show you yourself so that you would recognize what you are carrying in your backpack, the pressure inside of you that I never put there so that you would be able to see the brokenness in you, but I am also illuminating myself. Of the three things that we see in Isaiah 9, the very first is this when pressure increases, God responds by enlightening our path. And that is a good thing. Now let me just hit pause here, real quick. I'm giving you guys lots of categories to walk through. Pressure on the inside, pressure on the outside, darkness around you, darkness within you. When it comes to this one, I would I I would feel like I was being an unbiblical, unkind pastor not to say this. All of us can see the darkness on the outside. The darkness on the inside is real my bad, my bad, my bad. I I should have shaved my beard. That's what that meant. That's exactly what that just meant. The darkness on the inside, it's very easy to fake. It is very easy to fake. But I'm telling you, when that pipe busts, it always seems to happen in the middle of the night. It always seems to happen when there's not somebody there to see it or hear it. And by the time we get our eyes on it, it has done 10 times the damage it would have. If you feel like you are cracking on the inside, please just hear me on this. We say it like every single week. We got a group of people who walk outside to pray whether anybody shows up or not. And can I just say this? We are not assuming that if you go to get prayer, it means you're not a Christian and you've just figured it out. We are not assuming that your marriage is about to end in divorce. Here's what we're assuming: that person wants to meet with a holy God who illuminates darkness and cares about them. That's it. And so if you have grown up, and maybe I did, grown up in a church tradition where to go and receive prayer means, oh, we're not going to talk about them because we don't gossip as Christians, but in the back of my mind, what I'm really thinking is their life's horrible. My hope is their life is wonderful and they're coming just to share the goodness of what God is doing. But let's not be a people that are too scared to say, hey, I feel like the backpack's about to blow out and I feel like the pipe's about to crack. Do it here with people who love you, with pastors who want to pray for you, lift you up, fill you up with scripture so that we can see the drip coming out before the damn breaks. This is what God does when pressure increases. What does God's intervening care and his direction actually look like? This is what it looks like. I'm not even gonna read the whole thing to you. I just want you to notice. I mean, this is like repeat on repeat on repeat. This is a CD skipping in your walkman while you're trying to jog. Twelve of you. You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy. They rejoice before you as joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they defied the spoil. The concept here is when the lights come on and we're not walking in the darkness, even though we see ourselves pressure within and pressure without. This is where the God of the universe wants you to be. This is where the one who sent his own son wants us to be. Joy, rejoicing, joy, and gladness. This is the hope. Now, bonus points to the camp store. If somebody can tell me why this matters, and I will give you a hint. Last week we were on Isaiah 7, and it was bring your kid to work day. And what was Isaiah's kid's name? You don't have to give it to me in the Hebrew. What it what come on, come on, come on. Remnant. I think I brought it. Boom. His name was Sheer Jeshub. Isaiah brings his kid, whose name means remnant, and we did a little bit of math, and we remember we realized, oh, he's like the remainder. This was chapter seven. Hey, there's only gonna be this little piece left. Sin is going to divide you, it's gonna separate you, but the promises of a good God are I will always keep a peace. However, by the time we get to this, we have moved from division to multiplication. Now there is joy. The lights have been turned on. We can see ourselves clearly, we can see the world around us clearly, we can see one another. And the concept is when the pressure increases, God multiplies. Why is it that the gospel is exploding in Africa right now? Pressure. Why is it that the gospel is exploding in China right now? The pressure. Why is it that churches in the United States are dwindling? There's not that much pressure. It is a funny thing to be a Christian. I'm not telling you not to praise God for this and pray it. I hear it all the time. Thank you that we live in a nation where we have freedom to worship as we please. I agree with that prayer. And I will also tell you this God has never needed a nation to have that kind of freedom to expand his own. He does not need our permission for his kingdom to expand. My prayer is it would continue to be that for all of my days, my children and my grandchildren, until the end of time. But pressure, oddly, in the life of the Christian multiplies. There are two different kinds of pressure that we bring to ourselves. The stupid kind because you're sinning, and then the kind because you're wanting to grow as a leader. Now, God will use both. I prefer option two personally. But I remember in the in early youth days, Thomas, I don't know if you experienced this or not, I would always try to get people, students, to get out of their comfort zone. If you've been coming to Midtree for any amount of time, you already know that about me. Dave reading scripture with Emma, like just so you know, Dave wasn't there for Emma. Emma was there for Dave. Like that's can it can I just say that, Dave? Is that all right? Okay. Uh Emma did such a great job uh the other week that I was like, hey man, let's get that, let's get her up here and get her reading. And Dave was up here and we were kind of figuring out how's this gonna work because Emma's pretty short and we wanted y'all to be able to see her, so we're trying to figure that out. And Dave was more nervous than Emma was. I love stretching people, but I will tell you this. There was this notable thing when a student came to youth ministry, especially if they were new to the church and they were wanting to grow in their faith. The the common wisdom is you don't give them too much. Like give them a Bible and encourage them. But I always wanted to give them an extra step. I wanted them to multiply, I wanted them to grow. But it it was always an egg on the roof, not knowing which way it was going to roll off. Where if you gave someone something to grow in, they never stayed the same. They either stepped into it in faith or they withdrew. And I don't think it changes when you age out of youth ministry. And I would just encourage you: difficulty and stress and pressure in the life of a Christian is expected to multiply God's goodness as you take steps forward. And if you want to know what that joy actually looks like, Isaiah gives us two different illustrations. You want to know what the joy of trusting God with your pressure is, whether it's on the outside or the inside. Let me tell you what it's like. It's like joy at the harvest. It's like soldiers who are glad when they devoid the spoil. Now, farming, soldier, farming will be easier for us. Okay. All right. I said the word, you know what it says. Solder when you're soldering. Okay. Farming we can get behind. What you may not be able to get behind is this. Imagine being a farmer who goes out, it's the time of harvest, everything is ready at the same time. You grab it, the whole family works together, maybe even the whole community. And you have this huge bounty of God's goodness who provided the sun, provided the seed, provided the rain, and you provided your own labor. And here it is, except you got no refrigeration, man. You're not able to keep that thing forever. Sure, you can pickle some stuff and you can salt some stuff and dry some stuff, but the majority of that you better get to enjoying. Why do you think it is that feasting was so much a part of their world than it is for ours? Because you can throw that ham in the freezer and eat it next year for Christmas. They weren't doing that. So they bring it out, and the farmer looks and he says, Look at what God has given to me. And then this is the next thought. This is too much for me. I need to share it with others. That's what happens when you live in a world like this. The joy of what God did in the life of an individual had to expand onto others. Now, the soldier one is a little bit harder for us to get our minds around because our soldiers have a set pay. If you're an E3 or an O4, whatever it is, you know what you're getting paid. These soldiers many times had no clue what they were getting paid. They were going to fight, they were going to battle to do what it was that God called them to do, but they didn't know what they were getting paid until the end. They were all on commission. It depended on who they defeated and what they found in that village when they overthrew it. And the concept here is that the soldiers have been faithful, they've done what God told them to do, He protected them, and they walked into a city and it was filled with riches. And their first thought was, Timmy's getting a new bicycle and my wife's getting this. And they're all about to divide it up. But this makes me think that one day, while they're going through the village, they open a door and they realize we didn't even know that the king had this treasury. In Scrooge McDuck style, they just start diving into this stuff because they are so blown away. The amount of multiplied riches because of the goodness of God is so great that they can't even begin to know how they're going to spend it. Do you see how quickly this goes from darkness to light, from division to multiplication? This is the joy that the Christian ought to have when we open up our backpack and let the Lord take the stuff out. When we realize that the pressure within us is something He will never make too great for us to be able to handle. Any of you guys familiar with the Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens? Okay. All right. Josh, I told you, I hoped you were going to be here this Sunday. Josh and I, not just Josh and I, our families, uh watch the Christmas Carol every Sunday or every Christmas. That would have been weird if Josh and I did it every Christmas. Our families get together and we watch the Muppet version of the Christmas Carol. And one of the things that we see is that this joy begins to rise in Ebenezer Scrooge. But I want to teach you something because many of you will see that from year to year. Have you ever wondered why it was called a Christmas carol, but it's a story? There's a reason I wanted you to look at Isaiah in the text. When Charles Dickens wrote it, he wanted it to be like a song. He wanted things to repeat in your head over and over again, which is why he doesn't use chapters, he uses stanzas if you read it. It's intended to be like a song. It's a long song, but that's what it's intended to be. It has a chorus. The chorus is Tiny Tim saying, God bless us, everyone. It's repeated throughout the entirety of it. There's this one moment in a Christmas carol where the narrator breaks from his third person and he begins talking about Tiny Tim. And he he says this little line, it says, Spirit of Tiny Tim, thy childish essence was from God. And in that one line, it moves from the third person, and you're hearing Charles Dickens' own voice speaking to this very thing. It's called a Christmas carol because it was intended to be something that is repeated and sung over and over. But there's one phenomenal reality that he tucked into it, this gospel reality. Before I point it out to you, do you remember what caused Ebenezer Scrooge's heart to turn? This, by the way, is a theological analysis of Charles Dickens' Christmas Carol. What happens is he sees not his own grave. It's what happens right before it. It's when he sees, if I remember quoting correctly, oh spirit, I see an empty chair sitting at Bob Cratchit's table with a crutch leaned against it. Tell me, is Tiny Tim going to die? That's what changes his heart. The death of an innocent son. Do you think that was an accident when Charles Dickens was writing it? That he sees this empty chair? You see, the same reaction honestly, Isaiah should take some credit for the writing because long before we get to this kind of a concept, there is someone pointing to giving of himself and giving of his son. And that would be the third thing I would want you to notice from Isaiah chapter 9. Not only does God respond to our pressure by enlightening us so that we can see around us, see our brokenness, not only does he send deep joy by multiplying what would divide the person through his son, he gives all of himself. You don't need a tiny Tim story because to us a child is born. To us, a son is given. And what's amazing is this repetition. The concept here is me. God cared about me like this. He saw my brokenness, he saw my pressure, he saw the junk I put in my backpack, and to me, a child's been given. To me, a son is born. And somehow God is able to say this without one hint of disappointment because God Himself is excited. It is finally time for the light to enter the world. And it gets better. The government will be on his shoulder. No more pressure in us, no more pressure on us, no more backpacks breaking, because the entirety of the government, the world, the nations, the decisions, all of it, it's on Jesus' back. The concept is you see that ninth grader struggling to get to his seventh class, can't get his locker to open, and a senior comes by, picks him up by the little loop on the backpack, and says, Buddy, I got you. That's what this is. This is, of course, you're overwhelmed. You were never made to manage this world. Of course, you can't figure out the combination to open up how this goes. But I got you. I will not only get you there, give me the backpack, let me throw it on my shoulder, and I will carry it for you. This is the invitation of Christ. Take off the backpack. Turn on the faucet, let the pressure out. Share with me your fears, your anxieties, your hidden sins, and the things that you are ashamed of and will tell nobody about. Why let the crack, why, why let the pipe crack and burst when you have somebody who is willing to step in? But it gets better than that. And his name will be the very things that Larry prayed over. As you decide if you want to hand your stuff off to Jesus, your sin, your brokenness if you're not a Christian, your sin if you are a Christian, and maybe just some laziness, you should have been stepping forward and multiplying, but you have been instead taking a step back. This is who Christ is. Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. This is the exchange of backpacks. I've I've aced every test, I've written every book. I don't like to carry anything, I've got it all. Take this backpack instead. Learn from me. I'm gentle, I'm lowly in heart. You will find rest for your soul. My yoke, easy. My burden is light. Why? Because of who he is. He is a wonderful counselor. When we read this little phraseology, we think of somebody in an office with like wood grain and Edison bulbs about to talk to us about our broken. That's not actually what this means by counselor. I've got a whole thought on counseling that I don't have time to share here, but I'll just give you the punchline. Older men and older women, there's an expectation in Christian in scripture that you lean and counsel those younger than you. That the expansion of counseling, which can be a good thing, has turned into the diminishing of older men and older women in church congregations feeling the need to do this. Please don't. You are called to do that. But there's a whole sermon that I'm not going to preach now. When we read counsel, or the concept here is somebody who is on a presbytery. Presidential cabinet. I can go to God as the expert in all things. God, I don't know how to do this. I'm a mom and I can't keep my life together. You have a wonderful counselor. And it's not a sit on the couch kind of counseling. It's a I can do this, and if I am with you, so can you. It's the dad who isn't sure if he's going to be able to pull off the purchase of that pipe or fill in whatever goes in your backpack or expands the pipe. That is who he is, and he is wonderful at it. Mighty God is pointing to power. There is nothing in your life he can't lift and he can't carry. There is no brokenness or no evil that he cannot extinguish or crush. Come to the one who is not only these things, but is the father that every one of us desired to have. And some of us had phenomenal fathers, and some of us did not. But I was talking with somebody pouring a cup of coffee today, and I said, those who are able to have great fathers, who are looking forward this Christmas to spending time with them, if you're a Christian, that is the icing on the cake. Because for every believer, we have a father whose goodness to us is everlasting. And for those of us who are going through a Christmas season without a father who has passed away or a grandfather who has passed away, come to the father who is always there. That is who he is. When you see these words of who Christ is, what you should feel is this the pipes dripping rather than cracking. What you should feel is the backpack lifting rather than sagging. Because who he is is a prince of peace. Anxiety is not something God expects of you, Christian. Whatever it is that you have built, and it makes sense for anxiety to be a part of your world, that is not the Christian theological perspective. The perspective is we give our burdens to Him. And can I just tell you, this is not fairy dust Christianity. You choosing to recognize God this way is a daily, if not hourly, if not minute by minute decision. Some of you need a wonderful counselor a hundred times a day. Some of you need an everlasting Father. You need a God who is powerful because the sin that is approaching you feels far too powerful. This is not Christian pixie dust. This is a conscious decision to walk toward or not to. This is who he is. And of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end. Why? Because many of you have read this book before. And you're like, well, uh every time I read it, it gets good, and then and then really it gets good and then it gets really, really bad, right? I know you guys have read your Bibles, alright? Okay. That's how this works. Now, the further we get towards Christ, the further we get towards the New Testament, the longer the good periods go. But generally, if we're in Isaiah, here's what we're all expecting. Okay, give me some hope, but I know what's coming, all right? I know it's coming. They're gonna screw it up again, they're gonna mess it up again. So Isaiah includes this. Yes, we do botcha and we mess up, but the increase of his government, there will be no end. On the throne of David over his kingdom, he will establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from this time forevermore. So the concept is not only is all of this offered to you, it's gonna last forever. And you can bank on it. And then the question comes up fine, what do I have to do? And Isaiah says, Have you not been listening? You don't do anything. You open the door to the vault, you you walk into the banquet and realize why am I sitting at a table with these amazing people telling amazing stories with this amazing bounty that I didn't do. This is the idea because it's the zeal of the Lord that will do this. God does it. You don't do it. You don't do anything but receive, you don't anything but raise your hand. You don't do anything but say, Hey, I got a lot of pressure. Can we let this thing out? You don't do anything but unzip the backpack and let the one who carries the burdens step in. This is who the son that is given is. And somehow God is able to say this without a hint of disappointment because God Himself is excited. This kingdom, real question, and you guys have not been real responsive today, all right? When does that kingdom begin? Now you don't have to answer it out loud, but I want you to answer it before I close this out. When does that happen? I'm gonna give you five seconds to come up with an answer. When does it happen? Some of you are getting real nostradomis in here, and you're like, we're not supposed to pick a year. For most people historically, and I would argue for most Christians today, you would say later. Not now. Jesus was walking through and being Jesus and doing what he did, and he healed a man of an incurable disease in the day called leprosy. And the religious leaders of the day came to him and being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, I don't want you to miss this. They want to know when. We've read Isaiah. When's it gonna happen? The kingdom of God would come. He answered that the kingdom of God is not coming in ways that can be observed. Nor will they say, Look, here it is, or therefore, behold, my favorite word maybe in all of Scripture. Lean forward, take out your pencil, take notes. That's what behold is telling you to do in Scripture. Behold, what's it say underneath it? Anybody feeling bold? It's right here. When does this kingdom begin? It already did. You see, we live in this really weird time. It's a wonderful time, but it's a weird time. Christ is no longer on a cross, he's also no longer in a grave, he's no longer in a manger either. He's on a throne. I can tell you where Jesus is right now. He's on a throne. And if he is on a throne, this is what he is doing today. He is increasing his government, he is increasing peace. It isn't gonna stop, by the way. You're just already caught up in it. And if your Christian concept is, I'm waiting, you're gonna lean back. But if your understanding of scripture is God's doing this right now, in my midst, in my home, in my neighborhood, in my school, all of a sudden we take steps forward. This is what Jesus would say. Isaiah 9 may be pointing forward to full completion tomorrow, but the increase has already begun. The people who walked in darkness, they saw a light, and then I turned them into that light. You are, not will be, you are the light of the world, Christian. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. You shouldn't try to be. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket but on a stand, and it gives its light to everyone in the house. You're no longer trying not to stub your toe, you're the one helping others. You're no longer, uh, I've got this brokenness. You've given it to Christ, and you keep giving it to Christ, and you bring the light lovingly into the lives of others, and you love them when their cracks show, and you love them when their pressure is great, and you love them when it is a mess. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good works and give glory to the eternal Father who is in heaven. I haven't forgotten that I told you that there's this cool tiny Tim quote, so I'm gonna finish it. His mom is wondering how they did at church that day, which I only include because I think, isn't that wonderful that all those years ago moms were still wondering? By the way, she stayed home to cook. We can have conversations about if you should miss church to get your uh dinner going or not. This is neither here nor there. But Bob Cratchit's wife turns to him and says, And how did little Tim behave? Asked Miss Cratchit when Bob had hugged his daughters to his heart's content. This is my favorite part. Mercy, Josh. As good as gold, said Bob, and better. Somehow he gets thoughtful sitting by himself so much, and he thinks the strangest things you've ever heard. He told me coming home that he hoped the people saw him in the church because he was a cripple. And it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day who made lame beggars walk and blind men see. Our brokenness, once overcome by God's grace, tells the world a story of hope. Do you know how different this is than church today? Where we try not to show our cracks, not to show that our backs are bending, not to let people see that our backpack is about to explode. In comes Tiny Tim, and he says, in a sense, I'm grateful that I'm sick and crippled because it would remind people at church who my God is. He cares about the sick, he cares about the crippled. And it doesn't matter if it's physical or emotional or mental or spiritual. We ought to quit hiding the fact that we're limping through life, whether it's from pressure within or pressure without, and instead come to the one who heals those who are limping through life. And when you do, bring others with you. The answer God gives to bursting pipes and breaking backpacks is not a change of circumstances. It's not, hey, let me give you a new way or a new process. He sends a person, a child, into a world of pressure and gloom, weights that we could never afford to carry. And when you feel like you're about to crack or the backpack's about to blow out, God never says, try harder. He almost always says, try less and let me carry you farther. This is the good news of Isaiah 9. For a people who may not know much about an Assyrian army, but know an awful lot about pressure. A couple of things for you to think about as we respond to God's word today. Prayer team, as I said, will be on the other side. We would love for you to join us if there's any way that we can be praying for you. But let's think about these things as we get ready to worship.