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I.
One Day
 Merry
Christmas, church! It is amazing, when we look back at 2001, how one
day has so changed the scope of what's happening in our country. We
look at everything now in terms of 9/11 - everything before and everything
after. I just received a magazine and here's what the cover said:  "Fresh
start in 2002 because 2001 can't stop soon enough." Historians are calling
the time since 9/11 "The Era of Terror." Who knows what's going to happen
next? Are you aware of Flight 63, Saturday night, coming from Paris,
and the passenger with explosives in his shoes? The mayor of New York
City was on television this morning saying they're expecting another
major terrorist event in New York. Last night on the news they announced
that there's a possibility that the terrorists have two nuclear suitcase
devices in America. You don't know what to expect. Who hasn't thought
of their mail this Christmas? I've wondered if the mail has gone through
some kind of contaminated facility. This one day - before and after
9/11. Can you remember before 9/11 that Gary Condit was the center of
national attention? My, how things have changed because of one day. |
John 1:5
5: The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has
not understood it. |
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 We are here today to celebrate
another day - a day that changed the course of history. Everything is
based on this one day. Everything before this one day we call B.C. (before
Christ). Everything after this one day we call A.D. (in the year of
our Lord). It was a day when the everlasting light penetrated the darkness.
Darkness can't put it out.  I
have a watch that has one of those illuminated dials that you are supposed
to be able to see in the dark. But the problem is that it's never quite
dark enough. So in the middle of the night if I really need to know
what time it is, I have to turn on a light to read my watch. One time
we were on a mission trip with the church and we went underground in
a cave. We were several hundred feet underground. They turned out all
of the lights and it was total, absolute darkness. I was shocked at
the light coming from my watch. I could read the brochure that the people
had given us from the light of my watch. That's the characteristic of
light. The darker the darkness gets, the more intense the light becomes.
It's a summation of September 11. In our darkest time, light is most
visible. Light allows us to see what really matters. Jesus said, "I
am the light of the world." Isn't it amazing, the bittersweet result
of what happened on 9/11, that people are more focused on what really
matters?
Have you noticed that this
Christmas has taken on a little bit different kind of characteristic?
A retailer told me the other day that they do Santa Claus every year
at their establishment. He said this year is not a year that people
are getting into Santa Claus. He said there's more seriousness about
this year's Christmas. People are not into the Santa thing but they
are into the more everlasting things this Christmas.
America is a culture of conspicuous
consumption. People are all about buying. Me, me, me, me, me, me. But
this year people are more open to giving than they have been in recent
history. We saw what happened after the devastation of 9/11 with people
giving the Red Cross more money than the Red Cross could use. People
are going back to places of worship. Do you know that our worship attendance
has been up an average of 400 people a weekend since 9/11? One day!
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