December 28, 2024 • 26 mins
Today on Bold Steps Weekend, Pastor Mark will be helping you to rethink your priorities for this Christmas season. Oftentimes, Jesus goes missing. And so, this message is about not letting Jesus go missing from this important celebration time. The message is titled, “How to Return Jesus to Christmas.”
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S1 (00:00):
Today on Bold Steps weekend. We're rethinking our priorities for
this Christmas season.
S2 (00:06):
We get caught up in barely surviving, feeling like you're
just keeping your head above water with all the demands
that you have on your life. But we wake up
one day and realize, hey, in all this doing, in
all this busyness, even in the good stuff, have I
lost what is really important?
S1 (00:38):
Welcome to Bold Steps Weekend with Mark Jobe. Mark is
president of Moody Bible Institute, and he's also senior pastor
of New Life Community Church in Chicago. I'm Wayne Shepherd,
so Mark, every year it seems like no exaggeration, Jesus
gets pushed further and further into the background of this
Christmas season.
S2 (00:54):
You're right. I mean, you could literally walk downtown Chicago
practically and not realize that Jesus is a part of
this celebration.
S1 (01:03):
Amidst all the lights and all this tinsel, there's no Jesus.
There's no.
S2 (01:07):
Jesus. And I think it's well, I think it's symbolic.
We talk a little bit about this in the message,
but Jesus in certain churches is being stolen from the
manger scenes out in front.
S1 (01:20):
You mean they're taking the baby Jesus?
S2 (01:22):
You're taking the baby Jesus. And one church, they did
it so many times that they decided they would put
a GPS tracker in baby Jesus and put cameras. And
I guess, you know, it's harder to still steal Jesus
with a GPS tracker.
S1 (01:37):
Did it work?
S2 (01:39):
Well, the imagine the police showing up at your house
and saying, do you have baby Jesus? Yeah, but, you know,
I think it's symbolic a little bit in this busyness
and this Christmas season, oftentimes Jesus goes missing. And so
this message really is about do not do not let
Jesus go missing from this important celebration time.
S1 (02:02):
Mark's message how to return Jesus to Christmas. Let's get started.
S2 (02:07):
As you turn there in your Bibles, I was also
aware that there's a lot of misconceptions and myths about
Christmas that we buy into. Some of those have been
perpetuated by movies that we see about the birth of Jesus,
or images on the front of postcards that we see
(02:28):
about that night. I think we've romanticized that night. We've
cleaned it up. We've made it glow. We've made it
glitter and sparkle. But in reality, what happened 2000 years
ago in that little cave or that little stable was gritty,
was smelly, was dark, was ugly. If you didn't understand
(02:54):
what was happening. Uh, for example, we we sing a
song which is one of the most famous songs in Christmas.
Which one is it? The most famous song Silent Night,
and it goes something like this. Silent night, Holy night.
All is calm, all is bright. And here's what I
(03:18):
think about I've had three children. I've been at the
birth of those three children. And I'm going to tell you,
there's nothing calm or silent or bright about it. It
is loud and it is painful, and it is. It
is not a calm, quiet thing when a baby is born.
(03:42):
In fact, even after the epidural, it's not that calm.
After our first baby was born, my wife said, don't
rub my back. Next time, don't give me soothing words.
Don't hold my hand. Just go get an epidural from
the anesthesiologist as fast as you can. And so that
was my goal next time around. There's another hymn that
(04:05):
we sing that's called away in the manger. One of
the other famous songs that we sing, and there's a
line in the song that says, the cattle are lowing,
the poor baby wakes, but little Lord Jesus, no crying
he makes. Now, I thought about that for a moment
(04:28):
and think, I've had a couple of newborn babies and
they always cry first of all at night. So there
is no like, lulling cow that puts them to sleep.
That's not the way it works. Babies wake up through
the night. They cry. I've heard cows too and their
lowing does not put babies to sleep. It is a
(04:49):
loud lowing. They're smelly animals in the cave, in the stable.
And so I think that we've sanitized it. We've romanticized what?
the birth of Jesus was all about. But I think
that was it was more gritty, smelly, and down to
earth in what we think. The other thing that mythology
(05:13):
about our our Christmas. And I don't want to mess
you up here, but I know that at your nativity scene,
many of you have a baby Jesus, a Joseph, a Mary,
a cow, a sheep, and three wise men. Right? The
problem with your nativity scene is that the three wise
(05:34):
men were not there when Jesus was born. I know
I'm messing it up for you. In fact, the wise
men started their journey, most likely on the day of
Jesus birth, and it took them months to get to
the site of Jesus. So if you really want to
have a right nativity scene, you need to eliminate the
(05:56):
wise men. By the way, we don't know if there
were three. There could have been 20 Also, because the
Bible doesn't tell us how many wise men they were.
So if you really want to have a good manger
scene in your house, you need to take the three
wise men and you need to put them in another
room in your house, and six months from now, you
can bring them to the manger scene because they weren't
there actually when it happened. And one other thing Jesus
(06:23):
was not born on December 25th. I know I'm messing
up your Christmas for some of you. More than likely,
Jesus was born. We don't have the exact date of
Jesus birth, but most scholars believe that Jesus was born
in the early fall, so he was not born in December.
(06:45):
In fact, December was December 25th was a pagan holiday.
And when Christians started to become massive, amounts of Christians
started to come to Christ. During the early Roman Empire,
there was a holiday on December 25th in which they
basically celebrated the sun God and Christians decided, we're not
(07:08):
going to celebrate the Sun God anymore. There's only one
God that we should celebrate, and that is Jesus, the
Son of God. And so they confiscated December 25th. And
now we celebrate the birth of Jesus on December 25th. Yeah.
And so let me tell you, this shouldn't take away
from your Christmas, because I think that the birth of
(07:30):
Jesus should be celebrated on whatever date we can find,
because it is an amazing, powerful, life transforming event. In
Luke chapter two, it tells us about the birth of Jesus.
But the final verses of Luke chapter two tell us
(07:53):
about an event in the life of Jesus that occurred
when he was 12 years old. Now there's very little
in Scripture about Jesus pre-adolescence or even his adolescent years,
but this happens to be a snapshot of Jesus at 12.
So think about Jesus as a junior high boy. This
(08:18):
gives us an image into that. And the thing I
like about this story is that here are parents that
actually lose Jesus for three days. Doesn't that make you
feel better as parents? They lose their. This is Joseph
and Mary. I mean, they're really good parents, yet they
(08:40):
lose Jesus for three days. Their 12 year old boy
is lost for three days. Thank God there was no
DCFS back then, right? We could have had a whole
different story. But what I like about this story is
how they discover Jesus again. And I think in this story,
there's parallels to how we lose Jesus in our lives.
(09:03):
And so I want to make some parallels between the
losing of Jesus, of Joseph and Mary, and what happens
to us sometimes in the distraction and the busyness of life.
I'm reading out of Luke chapter two. I'm beginning in
verse 41. It says, every year Jesus parents went to
Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. When he was
(09:26):
12 years old, they went up to the festival according
to the custom. After the festival was over, while his
parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem,
but they were unaware of it. Thinking he was in
their company, they traveled for on for a day. Then
(09:47):
they began looking for him among their relatives and friends.
When they did not find him, they went back to
Jerusalem to look for him. After three days, they found
him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening
to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him
(10:07):
was amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his
parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, son,
why have you treated us like this? Your father and
I have been anxiously searching for you. Why were you
searching for me? Jesus asked. Didn't you know that I
had to be about my father's house? But they did
(10:29):
not understand what he was saying to them. Then he
went down to Jerusalem with them and was obedient to them.
But his mother treasured all these things in her heart.
And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor
with God and man. I want to talk to you
today about how we lose Jesus in the hustle and
(10:52):
bustle of life. And if you're taking notes today, I
want you to jot this down. Number one, we lose
Jesus when we get so busy and distracted with the
urgent in life that we forget the important. Think about
it for a moment. Joseph and Mary were going to
(11:14):
a party. It was a religious festival, but it was
a festival in which they were going to see their
long lost relatives, family members that they did not normally see.
And so they would be with their cousins and their
aunts and uncles, and there was food and festivity and
catching up and parties and things to, uh, places to
(11:37):
go and things to do and travel arrangements to make.
And in all of this busyness that they were involved in,
Jesus was a part of it. But they got distracted,
preoccupied so that in the busyness and distraction they sort
of lost track of where Jesus was and ended up
(12:00):
actually losing their very own son.
S1 (12:10):
You're listening to Bold Steps Weekend with Mark Jobe. A
special message for the Christmas season called How to Return
Jesus to Christmas. If you'd like to hear this message again,
you can do that by visiting our website at bird-stamps.org
and Mark will continue in a moment. You can also
listen and even share the message directly from your smart
device by subscribing to our podcast. Search for Bold Steps
(12:31):
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Steps Minute and Our Spanish Minute Pasos Addthis. You'll find
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(12:54):
Hit that subscribe button to unlock a treasure trove of
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So don't miss out! Follow us on social media and
join our growing online community. All right, let's get back
into the second half of this message now with Mark Jobe.
S2 (13:17):
Many of you during this season of life, and not
just this season, just life in general. Life is busy,
isn't it? I mean, there's bills to pay and appointments
to make, and there's people to see, and there's always
a thousand things that seem to have to be done.
(13:42):
And it's very easy in our life to get caught
up in the urgent, the thing that has to be
done because something screaming or telling us it has to
be done today, it can't wait. And so we get
caught up in barely surviving. Feeling like you're just keeping
your head above water with all the things that have
(14:03):
to be done, all the demands that you have on
your life. And sometimes we live our life in the
busyness of life, but we wake up one day and realize, hey,
in all this doing, in all this busyness, even in
the good stuff, have I lost what is really important?
(14:30):
Have I forgotten what life is all about? Have I
missed out on something that I thought I would never lose,
never abandon, never let go? Not because I wanted to
let go of it, but because I got so busy
and distracted that I inadvertently lost one of the most
(14:56):
important things in my life my relationship with God through
His Son Jesus. I think every parent here has felt
the panic of losing or thinking that you lost a child.
How about it? I remember when my daughter was probably
(15:21):
about two years old. My wife had dragged me to
a store and I wasn't happy to be there, but
I was dragging along with her, wondering how long it's
going to take. And I was supposed to be watching
my little daughter, two years old. And so as I
(15:41):
looked at my watch, as I wondered where we were going,
my wife, who was ahead looking at some clothes, turned
around and she said, Where's Marissa? And I looked around. Oh,
there was a moment of panic. How about it? I
looked around and I said, well, she was just here.
(16:04):
Where is she? Thousand things go through your mind. I
start looking around to see if I see any suspicious
looking characters. See if someone has a big overcoat if
they took her. I look at the front door to
see if someone's running with my daughter. You start thinking
a thousand things. Like. How could I have lost my daughter?
Where is she? Are they shaving her head right now?
(16:26):
And and and putting boys clothes on her to try
to take her away. And I. I ran back and forth.
She was just here. I don't know, my wife is
looking at me. How could you lose our daughter? And
the panic and adrenaline. Like she should be around here
somewhere close. And there she was. Finally she poked her
(16:47):
head out. She had gotten under some coats in a
rack and she said hi. You want to spank her
and hug her at the same time, you're not sure
what you want to do, but it's that panic of
losing something, realizing at a moment that you think you've
(17:08):
lost something that was really, really important. And so it
is with our walk with God. Sometimes we're so distracted
by life that it's not until someone stops, a tragedy happens.
We encounter an old friend that's really walking with Jesus.
(17:32):
Something occurs in our life that we need God, and
we wake up and we say, hey, hold on, where
is my walk with God? Where did it go? I
remember when I prayed fervently when I opened up my
Bible and God would speak to me when I worshipped
with abandon. When I was excited about living on mission
(17:58):
with God. What happened to my life that I've lost
that which was so vital, so important in my life?
And I believe that oftentimes, like Joseph and Mary, if
we're not careful, the busyness of life can drown out
(18:22):
that which is really important. By the way, it doesn't
just happen in our walk with God. It can happen
with important things in your family as well. You may
have a marriage that you count as really important, but
you've gotten so busy in life that you take very
(18:44):
little time to cultivate it. Maybe you have a son
or daughter, and you're so busy in life that when's
the last time you sat down and really talked with
them and heard how they're doing? Maybe you have a
friend that you were close, really close to. But you've
gotten so busy in life that you've haven't taken much time, really,
(19:07):
to focus on what is important in life, not just
what is urgent in life. So not only do we
get distracted with the urgent, but we also get disconnected.
In verse 44 it says, thinking he was in their company,
they traveled on for a day. Secondly, if you're taking notes,
(19:30):
write this down. We get disconnected and we make assumptions
about our relationship. I want you to see what was
happening with Joseph and Mary. They assumed that Jesus was there.
They just assumed that he was in their company. They
(19:51):
left Jerusalem and started traveling, assuming that Jesus would always
be there like he's always been there before, just assuming
that he would follow along with them. But because they
had little communication with him, they assumed he was there
when actually they had left Jesus behind. You see some
(20:18):
of us in our spiritual walk, I think we assume
because five years ago you had an encounter with God,
a powerful encounter with God, that that you're always going
to have the same relationship that you had five years ago.
You assume that your spiritual life is still doing well,
like it was because you knew him, but you travel
(20:41):
along in life without realizing there that you're actually neglecting
one of the most vital, important relationships in your life,
making assumptions that nothing has changed. I sat down and
talked with married couples all the time, in which a
(21:03):
husband assumes that his wife feels like she's loved. Assumes
that she knows that she's appreciated. Assumes that things are
just the way they were when they got married. But
he's forgotten to remind her that she's important to cultivate
(21:25):
that relationship. He's just kind of gone, assuming that things
are like they've always been. And he wakes up one
day and he realizes, hey, I just assumed she was happy.
It's the same in our walk with God.
S1 (21:42):
Our thanks to Mark Jobe for today's message. What a
great perspective to have in our relationship with God, needing
it to be cultivated to avoid disconnection. You're listening to
Bold Steps Weekend with our Bible teacher, Mark Jobe, and
you'll find this message and others from our series, Jesus
The Story Behind Christmas when you visit bold steps org. Well, Mark,
when journalist Lee Strobel first began his investigations into the
(22:04):
claim of the gospel. He was an atheist. Isn't that remarkable?
S2 (22:07):
It is remarkable. And I love that an atheist trying
to disprove Christianity ends up being converted by his investigative
great story.
S1 (22:19):
It really is.
S2 (22:20):
I love that.
S1 (22:21):
Lee is with us because our bold step gift is
his book, The Case for Christ.
S2 (22:26):
Lee, tell us, what are some of the key points
in this journey of discovery that made you go? Now
wait a minute.
S3 (22:34):
Well, thanks for having me, guys. I you know, the
key point for me was the resurrection of Jesus. Even
as an atheist, I recognized that if Jesus claimed to
be God, which he clearly did, then if he died
and then rose from the dead on the third day,
that's pretty good evidence. He's telling the truth. Yeah. So
I figured if if I had good historical data that
(22:56):
Jesus not only claimed to be God, but backed it
up by his resurrection, then I could trust what he
said and what he did. And so I really focused
a lot of my investigation on this historical data concerning
the death and the resurrection of Jesus.
S2 (23:11):
And, Lee, I know you've stated this in your book,
but this is one of the most heavily proven facts
and history, isn't it?
S3 (23:21):
It really is. I mean, I was absolutely dumbfounded by
how much evidence historically that there is. Honestly, I was
I found nine ancient sources inside and outside the New Testament,
confirming and corroborating the conviction of the disciples that they
encountered the resurrected Jesus. I mean, that is an avalanche
of historical data.
S2 (23:41):
It is. You're going to love this book. And I
love the angle that Lee takes on this.
S1 (23:46):
It's a great book to share with our non-Christian friends. Mark.
S2 (23:49):
Absolutely. This is the kind of book that someone that
is seriously and honestly exploring the faith can start to read,
and I think this would be a great opener.
S1 (24:01):
Lee, we're so happy to partner with you in making
this book available to our listeners. Thank you so much.
S3 (24:05):
Oh my pleasure. I'm thrilled that how God has used
it through the years and excited by what he might
do with it in the future.
S1 (24:11):
Please let us send you a copy of Lee's book,
The Case for Christ Today by simply asking for the book.
When you make a donation of any size to Bold Steps,
just go online to Bold steps.org or call us at
800 D.L. Moody. That's (800) 356-6639. Now you can also send
your gift through the mail of course. And our address
(24:31):
is bold. Steps 820 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 606 ten. Well,
these daily messages and the resources we offer, like Lee's
book The Case for Christ, are made possible by the
generous financial gifts of listeners just like you, who choose
to give on a monthly basis. We call them bold partners.
And today we're looking for more people to join the team.
(24:53):
So come alongside us as we prepare to share the
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800 DL Moody. That's (800) 356-6639. And before you go, let
(25:14):
me invite you to join us throughout the week on
our daily Bold Steps program. Hear Mark's insightful teaching all
week long on your way to work or at home
by listening to bold steps on your local station, and
you can also hear it online by going to Bold Steps.
Org or by subscribing to the Bold Steps podcast. That
is our time for today. I'm Wayne Shepherd, wishing you
(25:34):
and your family a merry Christmas. I don't think it's
too late to say that. And Happy New Year! We'll
see you again next weekend to hear another encouraging message
from Mark Jobe. That's next time right here on Bold
Steps Weekend with Mark Jobe. Bold Steps Weekend is a
production of Moody Radio.
UU (25:51):
A ministry of Moody Bible Institute.
Today on Bold Steps weekend. We're rethinking our priorities for
this Christmas season.
S2 (00:06):
We get caught up in barely surviving, feeling like you're
just keeping your head above water with all the demands
that you have on your life. But we wake up
one day and realize, hey, in all this doing, in
all this busyness, even in the good stuff, have I
lost what is really important?
S1 (00:38):
Welcome to Bold Steps Weekend with Mark Jobe. Mark is
president of Moody Bible Institute, and he's also senior pastor
of New Life Community Church in Chicago. I'm Wayne Shepherd,
so Mark, every year it seems like no exaggeration, Jesus
gets pushed further and further into the background of this
Christmas season.
S2 (00:54):
You're right. I mean, you could literally walk downtown Chicago
practically and not realize that Jesus is a part of
this celebration.
S1 (01:03):
Amidst all the lights and all this tinsel, there's no Jesus.
There's no.
S2 (01:07):
Jesus. And I think it's well, I think it's symbolic.
We talk a little bit about this in the message,
but Jesus in certain churches is being stolen from the
manger scenes out in front.
S1 (01:20):
You mean they're taking the baby Jesus?
S2 (01:22):
You're taking the baby Jesus. And one church, they did
it so many times that they decided they would put
a GPS tracker in baby Jesus and put cameras. And
I guess, you know, it's harder to still steal Jesus
with a GPS tracker.
S1 (01:37):
Did it work?
S2 (01:39):
Well, the imagine the police showing up at your house
and saying, do you have baby Jesus? Yeah, but, you know,
I think it's symbolic a little bit in this busyness
and this Christmas season, oftentimes Jesus goes missing. And so
this message really is about do not do not let
Jesus go missing from this important celebration time.
S1 (02:02):
Mark's message how to return Jesus to Christmas. Let's get started.
S2 (02:07):
As you turn there in your Bibles, I was also
aware that there's a lot of misconceptions and myths about
Christmas that we buy into. Some of those have been
perpetuated by movies that we see about the birth of Jesus,
or images on the front of postcards that we see
(02:28):
about that night. I think we've romanticized that night. We've
cleaned it up. We've made it glow. We've made it
glitter and sparkle. But in reality, what happened 2000 years
ago in that little cave or that little stable was gritty,
was smelly, was dark, was ugly. If you didn't understand
(02:54):
what was happening. Uh, for example, we we sing a
song which is one of the most famous songs in Christmas.
Which one is it? The most famous song Silent Night,
and it goes something like this. Silent night, Holy night.
All is calm, all is bright. And here's what I
(03:18):
think about I've had three children. I've been at the
birth of those three children. And I'm going to tell you,
there's nothing calm or silent or bright about it. It
is loud and it is painful, and it is. It
is not a calm, quiet thing when a baby is born.
(03:42):
In fact, even after the epidural, it's not that calm.
After our first baby was born, my wife said, don't
rub my back. Next time, don't give me soothing words.
Don't hold my hand. Just go get an epidural from
the anesthesiologist as fast as you can. And so that
was my goal next time around. There's another hymn that
(04:05):
we sing that's called away in the manger. One of
the other famous songs that we sing, and there's a
line in the song that says, the cattle are lowing,
the poor baby wakes, but little Lord Jesus, no crying
he makes. Now, I thought about that for a moment
(04:28):
and think, I've had a couple of newborn babies and
they always cry first of all at night. So there
is no like, lulling cow that puts them to sleep.
That's not the way it works. Babies wake up through
the night. They cry. I've heard cows too and their
lowing does not put babies to sleep. It is a
(04:49):
loud lowing. They're smelly animals in the cave, in the stable.
And so I think that we've sanitized it. We've romanticized what?
the birth of Jesus was all about. But I think
that was it was more gritty, smelly, and down to
earth in what we think. The other thing that mythology
(05:13):
about our our Christmas. And I don't want to mess
you up here, but I know that at your nativity scene,
many of you have a baby Jesus, a Joseph, a Mary,
a cow, a sheep, and three wise men. Right? The
problem with your nativity scene is that the three wise
(05:34):
men were not there when Jesus was born. I know
I'm messing it up for you. In fact, the wise
men started their journey, most likely on the day of
Jesus birth, and it took them months to get to
the site of Jesus. So if you really want to
have a right nativity scene, you need to eliminate the
(05:56):
wise men. By the way, we don't know if there
were three. There could have been 20 Also, because the
Bible doesn't tell us how many wise men they were.
So if you really want to have a good manger
scene in your house, you need to take the three
wise men and you need to put them in another
room in your house, and six months from now, you
can bring them to the manger scene because they weren't
there actually when it happened. And one other thing Jesus
(06:23):
was not born on December 25th. I know I'm messing
up your Christmas for some of you. More than likely,
Jesus was born. We don't have the exact date of
Jesus birth, but most scholars believe that Jesus was born
in the early fall, so he was not born in December.
(06:45):
In fact, December was December 25th was a pagan holiday.
And when Christians started to become massive, amounts of Christians
started to come to Christ. During the early Roman Empire,
there was a holiday on December 25th in which they
basically celebrated the sun God and Christians decided, we're not
(07:08):
going to celebrate the Sun God anymore. There's only one
God that we should celebrate, and that is Jesus, the
Son of God. And so they confiscated December 25th. And
now we celebrate the birth of Jesus on December 25th. Yeah.
And so let me tell you, this shouldn't take away
from your Christmas, because I think that the birth of
(07:30):
Jesus should be celebrated on whatever date we can find,
because it is an amazing, powerful, life transforming event. In
Luke chapter two, it tells us about the birth of Jesus.
But the final verses of Luke chapter two tell us
(07:53):
about an event in the life of Jesus that occurred
when he was 12 years old. Now there's very little
in Scripture about Jesus pre-adolescence or even his adolescent years,
but this happens to be a snapshot of Jesus at 12.
So think about Jesus as a junior high boy. This
(08:18):
gives us an image into that. And the thing I
like about this story is that here are parents that
actually lose Jesus for three days. Doesn't that make you
feel better as parents? They lose their. This is Joseph
and Mary. I mean, they're really good parents, yet they
(08:40):
lose Jesus for three days. Their 12 year old boy
is lost for three days. Thank God there was no
DCFS back then, right? We could have had a whole
different story. But what I like about this story is
how they discover Jesus again. And I think in this story,
there's parallels to how we lose Jesus in our lives.
(09:03):
And so I want to make some parallels between the
losing of Jesus, of Joseph and Mary, and what happens
to us sometimes in the distraction and the busyness of life.
I'm reading out of Luke chapter two. I'm beginning in
verse 41. It says, every year Jesus parents went to
Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. When he was
(09:26):
12 years old, they went up to the festival according
to the custom. After the festival was over, while his
parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem,
but they were unaware of it. Thinking he was in
their company, they traveled for on for a day. Then
(09:47):
they began looking for him among their relatives and friends.
When they did not find him, they went back to
Jerusalem to look for him. After three days, they found
him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening
to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him
(10:07):
was amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his
parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, son,
why have you treated us like this? Your father and
I have been anxiously searching for you. Why were you
searching for me? Jesus asked. Didn't you know that I
had to be about my father's house? But they did
(10:29):
not understand what he was saying to them. Then he
went down to Jerusalem with them and was obedient to them.
But his mother treasured all these things in her heart.
And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor
with God and man. I want to talk to you
today about how we lose Jesus in the hustle and
(10:52):
bustle of life. And if you're taking notes today, I
want you to jot this down. Number one, we lose
Jesus when we get so busy and distracted with the
urgent in life that we forget the important. Think about
it for a moment. Joseph and Mary were going to
(11:14):
a party. It was a religious festival, but it was
a festival in which they were going to see their
long lost relatives, family members that they did not normally see.
And so they would be with their cousins and their
aunts and uncles, and there was food and festivity and
catching up and parties and things to, uh, places to
(11:37):
go and things to do and travel arrangements to make.
And in all of this busyness that they were involved in,
Jesus was a part of it. But they got distracted,
preoccupied so that in the busyness and distraction they sort
of lost track of where Jesus was and ended up
(12:00):
actually losing their very own son.
S1 (12:10):
You're listening to Bold Steps Weekend with Mark Jobe. A
special message for the Christmas season called How to Return
Jesus to Christmas. If you'd like to hear this message again,
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and Mark will continue in a moment. You can also
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(12:31):
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join our growing online community. All right, let's get back
into the second half of this message now with Mark Jobe.
S2 (13:17):
Many of you during this season of life, and not
just this season, just life in general. Life is busy,
isn't it? I mean, there's bills to pay and appointments
to make, and there's people to see, and there's always
a thousand things that seem to have to be done.
(13:42):
And it's very easy in our life to get caught
up in the urgent, the thing that has to be
done because something screaming or telling us it has to
be done today, it can't wait. And so we get
caught up in barely surviving. Feeling like you're just keeping
your head above water with all the things that have
(14:03):
to be done, all the demands that you have on
your life. And sometimes we live our life in the
busyness of life, but we wake up one day and realize, hey,
in all this doing, in all this busyness, even in
the good stuff, have I lost what is really important?
(14:30):
Have I forgotten what life is all about? Have I
missed out on something that I thought I would never lose,
never abandon, never let go? Not because I wanted to
let go of it, but because I got so busy
and distracted that I inadvertently lost one of the most
(14:56):
important things in my life my relationship with God through
His Son Jesus. I think every parent here has felt
the panic of losing or thinking that you lost a child.
How about it? I remember when my daughter was probably
(15:21):
about two years old. My wife had dragged me to
a store and I wasn't happy to be there, but
I was dragging along with her, wondering how long it's
going to take. And I was supposed to be watching
my little daughter, two years old. And so as I
(15:41):
looked at my watch, as I wondered where we were going,
my wife, who was ahead looking at some clothes, turned
around and she said, Where's Marissa? And I looked around. Oh,
there was a moment of panic. How about it? I
looked around and I said, well, she was just here.
(16:04):
Where is she? Thousand things go through your mind. I
start looking around to see if I see any suspicious
looking characters. See if someone has a big overcoat if
they took her. I look at the front door to
see if someone's running with my daughter. You start thinking
a thousand things. Like. How could I have lost my daughter?
Where is she? Are they shaving her head right now?
(16:26):
And and and putting boys clothes on her to try
to take her away. And I. I ran back and forth.
She was just here. I don't know, my wife is
looking at me. How could you lose our daughter? And
the panic and adrenaline. Like she should be around here
somewhere close. And there she was. Finally she poked her
(16:47):
head out. She had gotten under some coats in a
rack and she said hi. You want to spank her
and hug her at the same time, you're not sure
what you want to do, but it's that panic of
losing something, realizing at a moment that you think you've
(17:08):
lost something that was really, really important. And so it
is with our walk with God. Sometimes we're so distracted
by life that it's not until someone stops, a tragedy happens.
We encounter an old friend that's really walking with Jesus.
(17:32):
Something occurs in our life that we need God, and
we wake up and we say, hey, hold on, where
is my walk with God? Where did it go? I
remember when I prayed fervently when I opened up my
Bible and God would speak to me when I worshipped
with abandon. When I was excited about living on mission
(17:58):
with God. What happened to my life that I've lost
that which was so vital, so important in my life?
And I believe that oftentimes, like Joseph and Mary, if
we're not careful, the busyness of life can drown out
(18:22):
that which is really important. By the way, it doesn't
just happen in our walk with God. It can happen
with important things in your family as well. You may
have a marriage that you count as really important, but
you've gotten so busy in life that you take very
(18:44):
little time to cultivate it. Maybe you have a son
or daughter, and you're so busy in life that when's
the last time you sat down and really talked with
them and heard how they're doing? Maybe you have a
friend that you were close, really close to. But you've
gotten so busy in life that you've haven't taken much time, really,
(19:07):
to focus on what is important in life, not just
what is urgent in life. So not only do we
get distracted with the urgent, but we also get disconnected.
In verse 44 it says, thinking he was in their company,
they traveled on for a day. Secondly, if you're taking notes,
(19:30):
write this down. We get disconnected and we make assumptions
about our relationship. I want you to see what was
happening with Joseph and Mary. They assumed that Jesus was there.
They just assumed that he was in their company. They
(19:51):
left Jerusalem and started traveling, assuming that Jesus would always
be there like he's always been there before, just assuming
that he would follow along with them. But because they
had little communication with him, they assumed he was there
when actually they had left Jesus behind. You see some
(20:18):
of us in our spiritual walk, I think we assume
because five years ago you had an encounter with God,
a powerful encounter with God, that that you're always going
to have the same relationship that you had five years ago.
You assume that your spiritual life is still doing well,
like it was because you knew him, but you travel
(20:41):
along in life without realizing there that you're actually neglecting
one of the most vital, important relationships in your life,
making assumptions that nothing has changed. I sat down and
talked with married couples all the time, in which a
(21:03):
husband assumes that his wife feels like she's loved. Assumes
that she knows that she's appreciated. Assumes that things are
just the way they were when they got married. But
he's forgotten to remind her that she's important to cultivate
(21:25):
that relationship. He's just kind of gone, assuming that things
are like they've always been. And he wakes up one
day and he realizes, hey, I just assumed she was happy.
It's the same in our walk with God.
S1 (21:42):
Our thanks to Mark Jobe for today's message. What a
great perspective to have in our relationship with God, needing
it to be cultivated to avoid disconnection. You're listening to
Bold Steps Weekend with our Bible teacher, Mark Jobe, and
you'll find this message and others from our series, Jesus
The Story Behind Christmas when you visit bold steps org. Well, Mark,
when journalist Lee Strobel first began his investigations into the
(22:04):
claim of the gospel. He was an atheist. Isn't that remarkable?
S2 (22:07):
It is remarkable. And I love that an atheist trying
to disprove Christianity ends up being converted by his investigative
great story.
S1 (22:19):
It really is.
S2 (22:20):
I love that.
S1 (22:21):
Lee is with us because our bold step gift is
his book, The Case for Christ.
S2 (22:26):
Lee, tell us, what are some of the key points
in this journey of discovery that made you go? Now
wait a minute.
S3 (22:34):
Well, thanks for having me, guys. I you know, the
key point for me was the resurrection of Jesus. Even
as an atheist, I recognized that if Jesus claimed to
be God, which he clearly did, then if he died
and then rose from the dead on the third day,
that's pretty good evidence. He's telling the truth. Yeah. So
I figured if if I had good historical data that
(22:56):
Jesus not only claimed to be God, but backed it
up by his resurrection, then I could trust what he
said and what he did. And so I really focused
a lot of my investigation on this historical data concerning
the death and the resurrection of Jesus.
S2 (23:11):
And, Lee, I know you've stated this in your book,
but this is one of the most heavily proven facts
and history, isn't it?
S3 (23:21):
It really is. I mean, I was absolutely dumbfounded by
how much evidence historically that there is. Honestly, I was
I found nine ancient sources inside and outside the New Testament,
confirming and corroborating the conviction of the disciples that they
encountered the resurrected Jesus. I mean, that is an avalanche
of historical data.
S2 (23:41):
It is. You're going to love this book. And I
love the angle that Lee takes on this.
S1 (23:46):
It's a great book to share with our non-Christian friends. Mark.
S2 (23:49):
Absolutely. This is the kind of book that someone that
is seriously and honestly exploring the faith can start to read,
and I think this would be a great opener.
S1 (24:01):
Lee, we're so happy to partner with you in making
this book available to our listeners. Thank you so much.
S3 (24:05):
Oh my pleasure. I'm thrilled that how God has used
it through the years and excited by what he might
do with it in the future.
S1 (24:11):
Please let us send you a copy of Lee's book,
The Case for Christ Today by simply asking for the book.
When you make a donation of any size to Bold Steps,
just go online to Bold steps.org or call us at
800 D.L. Moody. That's (800) 356-6639. Now you can also send
your gift through the mail of course. And our address
(24:31):
is bold. Steps 820 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 606 ten. Well,
these daily messages and the resources we offer, like Lee's
book The Case for Christ, are made possible by the
generous financial gifts of listeners just like you, who choose
to give on a monthly basis. We call them bold partners.
And today we're looking for more people to join the team.
(24:53):
So come alongside us as we prepare to share the
unfiltered truth of the gospel in One, 2025. Signing up
is simple and easy when you visit bold steps. Org
or ask to become a bold partner when you call
800 DL Moody. That's (800) 356-6639. And before you go, let
(25:14):
me invite you to join us throughout the week on
our daily Bold Steps program. Hear Mark's insightful teaching all
week long on your way to work or at home
by listening to bold steps on your local station, and
you can also hear it online by going to Bold Steps.
Org or by subscribing to the Bold Steps podcast. That
is our time for today. I'm Wayne Shepherd, wishing you
(25:34):
and your family a merry Christmas. I don't think it's
too late to say that. And Happy New Year! We'll
see you again next weekend to hear another encouraging message
from Mark Jobe. That's next time right here on Bold
Steps Weekend with Mark Jobe. Bold Steps Weekend is a
production of Moody Radio.
UU (25:51):
A ministry of Moody Bible Institute.
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