Luke chapter 14, verse 21, part B, if we can call it that.
In this chapter, Jesus is telling a story.
He's telling a parable about a banquet.
And in the story, God is the one who has established the banquet.
It is God who is inviting people to come into the banquet.
In the story, the first group of people that are invited to the banquet don't want to come.
They find a lot of excuses as to why they're not going to come to this banquet.
They're representative of the Jewish people we see in scripture, many of which rejected
Jesus Christ.
They rejected the invitation.
But Jesus didn't come just to save the Jewish people.
Jesus came to save all people.
Now when the master who had sent out the slaves to come into the banquet finds out that the
first guest invited weren't going to come, he becomes angry.
And then we see here in Luke chapter 14, verse 21, about halfway through the verse, it says,
go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the city and bring in here the poor, maimed,
blind, and lame.
Master, the slave said, what you have ordered has been done.
And there's still room.
Let's pray.
Father God, we come to you this morning and we thank you that we have the freedom to come
into your house.
We thank you for your word.
We thank you for your love.
We thank you for your grace.
And most of all, dear Lord, we thank you for your son, Jesus Christ, who gave his life
on the cross so that our sins may be forgiven, dear Lord.
I pray, God, that you would hide me behind the cross today, that you'd take away my pride
and my fear, dear Lord.
I pray that you'd forgive any sin that's in my life, dear Lord, that you would speak through
me this morning, that it would be your Holy Spirit who brings about the words that we
need to hear.
And I pray that you prepare our hearts.
God, I know that our minds are full of distractions and just the normal everyday stresses and
the worries of life.
And then on top of that, the stresses of Christmas and the holiday season and all the stuff that
goes on with that, dear Lord.
I know there's a lot on our mind today, but I pray that in these few minutes that your
Holy Spirit would just speak to each one of us, that you free us from those distractions.
I pray that you lead and guide every word that comes out of my mouth today, all for
your glory, for your kingdom.
And I ask these things in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Most of you have probably noticed at this point this beautiful Christmas tree.
I put this tree up yesterday and you can tell me how good it looks after church.
But this tree, you probably noticed that it doesn't really look that good.
And that's because it's about as old as I am.
This tree has been put up at this church at some point, just about every year since I
was a child.
And so I put this beautiful tree up for you yesterday.
And you'll notice a lot of ornaments on the tree.
I was thinking a few weeks ago, as Michelle was putting up our tree, what all these different
ornaments mean.
Now, you have trees at your house, most of you, if not all of you, and you've got a lot
of ornaments on those trees.
And those ornaments probably mean something to you.
They probably have a story.
And so it is for Michelle and I.
When we first got married, which has been 10 years ago now, it doesn't seem like that,
we pretty much had a tree that was full of ornaments like this.
Very simple, nothing spectacular, a lot of green and red and silver balls.
And that's what our tree consisted of.
Was a lot of beautiful balls, but they didn't really have a story.
They were just balls that filled up the tree.
But as we began to go along in our years, every time we would go somewhere, and we started
this almost instantly from the time we got married, we would get a Christmas ornament
when we would visit to a different place.
And this is the most recent Christmas ornament we got.
This is a little Dominican girl that we got from when we went to the Dominican Republic
back in September.
And so we look at this and it'll remind us of this trip and when we had that good time.
And there's a memory for all of these Christmas ornaments.
There's a story for all of these Christmas ornaments.
One of the first Christmas ornaments that we ever got, Michelle got me this one right
after we first got married.
This Christmas ornament's a snowman with a Philadelphia Eagles helmet on running a football.
That's my favorite football team.
And on the years when they're doing bad, it goes on the back of the tree.
But they're doing pretty good this year.
So we'll set this snowman on the front of the tree for this year.
And all of these ornaments have some meaning to me.
They have some story to me.
Some of them are from the last 10 years and some of them are from much further in the
past.
Take for instance, this Christmas ornament.
This is a sand dollar.
Now there's nothing particularly fancy about a sand dollar, but it brings back a memory
to me.
I remember when I was a child of probably around 10 years old, we went to a family reunion
in Carabelle, Florida at my Aunt Pete's house.
And I remember you could walk probably 150 feet out into the ocean and the water wasn't
this deep.
But as you walked into the ocean, you'd see all of these sand dollars, which is where
this one come from.
We collected probably 100 of those things on that trip.
And when we got back home some months later, it was Christmas time and my grandma Irene
had taken all of those sand dollars and had hand painted poinsettias on every one and
given them to everybody in the family.
We have other ornaments on this tree that remind me of people that I knew, not just
in my family, but other people who were dear to me.
Take this little popsicle stick cross for instance with 23 pennies glued on.
Doesn't really look like much and it's not really that fancy, but this was given to us
by Miss Margaret Laird a couple of years ago.
Miss Margaret was always crafty and always doing things like this.
And she was a beautiful lady, a very special lady.
And this cross will forevermore remind me of who Miss Margaret was.
Take this beautiful red bird for instance, this sparkly and shiny.
This came off of a flower arrangement that was at my mother-in-law's funeral.
And every time I see a red bird I can't help but think about her.
She had red birds all over.
And even though this ornament will certainly remind me of my mother-in-law, there's no
fear of me forgetting about her because as long as Michelle is alive, Joanne Roten will
live forever because she's just like her.
And as the years go by we have more and more red birds and more and more sparklies and
shinies in our house.
You look over here, you see this neat little Snoopy ornament.
We got it back in 2019, one of our trips to the Shoebox Processing Center.
We went into this room where all of the Snoopy characters were carved out of ice.
It was cold as could be.
Snoopy growing up, for me and my sister, we loved Snoopy, still do.
So not only does it remind me of vacations past, it reminds me of a childhood in which
we would watch Charlie Brown cartoons and even still to this day when it comes Thanksgiving
and Christmas, as I'm sure many of you do, we watch Snoopy.
Now as Michelle was putting these ornaments and many more on our tree a few weeks ago
at Thanksgiving, I was watching her put them on there and I thought to myself, I said,
you know, these ornaments really don't mean anything to anybody else.
Now you come in today and you saw the tree and you might have commented, oh, it's a pretty
tree.
But these ornaments don't mean anything to you.
They have really no value to you.
There's no story in them to you.
Here's this little reindeer or whatever it is from a trip to a place that you've never
heard of.
We wanted to buy an ornament there and there was not even a store in the place, but a Dollar
General.
We wanted something, we found this.
This is our ornament.
It's cheap, it's worthless, it's not worth a whole lot to anybody else, but it's worth
something to me.
It's worth something to us.
And I thought as Michelle began to place our ornaments on our tree, I began to notice that
we don't have many of the playing balls anymore.
That now our tree is full of almost entirely of ornaments that have some story, that are
of some value to us.
And as she placed them on the tree, I thought, you know what?
These ornaments being placed on this tree is not so different than the kingdom of God.
It's the kingdom that's built up of people that all have a story.
There's some story for everybody in here.
Your life is a story.
The way you've lived and the things you've done, they mean something to God.
There are some value to God.
That God looks at every single one of us and there is something that God sees in you.
There's something that God knows about you.
And even if everybody in the world doesn't see any value in you, there is a God who loves
you and you are precious in his sight.
In Isaiah chapter 43 verse 4, God tells his people there that you are precious, you are
honored, and you are loved.
And God goes on to tell his people, I'm paraphrasing here, that I'm going to do whatever it takes
to take care of my people.
And so God did that.
God sent Jesus Christ, his only son, to dial the cross so that we could be forgiven.
And for what purpose?
Because you are valued in the sight of God.
And the kingdom of God is made up of just the type of people that we read in Luke chapter
14 this morning.
There's an invitation that God has given through his word.
There's an invitation that God has given through Jesus Christ.
And we praise God that Jesus Christ has come.
Jesus Christ came to be the light of the world.
Jesus Christ came to establish the kingdom of God.
And it is Jesus who established the kingdom of God.
And it is Jesus who has become the light of the world.
It is Jesus who has established the kingdom.
And like this Christmas tree that was one day barren, it has been added to year after
year with all of these things that are of value.
And so it is for the kingdom of God that's been established by Jesus Christ to come and
be the light of the world.
Jesus built the kingdom of God, but Jesus wants to fill the kingdom of God with you
and I.
And so the invitation is open today.
The invitation that came in Luke chapter 14 when God said, go and get the worst of the
worst, the ones that everyone else has turned away, the ones that no one else sees value
in, the one that no one else loves.
God says, I want them to come into my kingdom.
What a beautiful invitation that that is for us in the word of God.
God says, I want you to go out into the highways, in the byways.
I want you to tell everybody to come because the servants went out and they did what God
said and they came back to the master in that parable.
And they said, master, we've invited all these to come and there is still room.
And I want to tell you today that all these hundreds of years later after that parable
was given by Jesus, that there is still room in the kingdom of God, that there is still
room in the kingdom of God.
No matter how broken you may be, there's still room in the kingdom of God.
There are some ornaments on our Christmas tree and probably on your Christmas tree.
Through the years, they've gotten dropped, they've gotten banged up, they've gotten broken,
but they've been glued back together.
They've been restored and they're right there on the tree.
And so it is in the kingdom of God.
There are some of us in here today that our lives are broken, broken because of our sin,
broken because of our choices.
But there's good news for us today that God heals those who are broken, that the kingdom
of God is made up of those that are broken.
The kingdom of God is made up of people who have a story.
The kingdom of God is made up of people that God knows.
I know that one.
That was the one who was about to end it all, who was ready to give up.
And they heard about me at the last moment and they gave their life to me and they became
part of my kingdom.
I know that one.
That was the one who was abandoned by their family, abandoned by everyone around them.
And there was somebody that took them in and showed them the love of Jesus Christ and they
became part of my kingdom.
I know that one.
That was the one who lived for the world.
Didn't care anything about scripture, didn't care anything about Jesus, only desired to
live for themselves.
And one day when their life came crashing down, they heard the gospel of Jesus Christ
and they came to me.
God's got a story to tell for every single one of us who have entered into the kingdom
of God.
And we are precious in God's sight.
Like ornaments on a Christmas tree, there are some that are sparkly and shiny and there
are others that are plain and simple.
It doesn't matter whether it costs a lot or whether it costs a little.
All these ornaments that we see on this tree are valued by me.
This cross with these 23 pennies, you might say, well, that's worth 23 cents, but I'll
tell you, there is no value that can be placed on it.
So it is for those of us in the kingdom of God.
No matter how fancy we may be or how simple we may be, we are valued by God.
We are valued so much by God that he sent Jesus Christ to die on a cross so that we
could be forgiven.
If you're part of the kingdom of God, praise the Lord today.
Praise the Lord that we can be part of God's kingdom, that we can know that we have a God
who loves us.
But if you're not part of the kingdom of God today, I'll repeat the invitation of Luke
chapter 14.
There's still room.
And what did God say in the parable?
God said, invite more to come in.
Invite all to come in.
There's still room.
There's a lot of empty spots on this tree.
There's a lot of more ornaments that can go on this tree and there's no limit to the
spots that are in the kingdom of God.
The kingdom of God is available for us today through Jesus Christ that our sins would be
forgiven if we would just repent this morning.
Maybe you come into this room today and you don't feel like you're worth very much.
Maybe the world has told you that.
Maybe the world has led you to believe that.
Maybe the devil has placed that lie on your mind and you don't feel as though you are
of much value.
Well, I can assure you, no matter what the devil has told you and no matter what the
world has told you, you are of great value in the eyes of God.
You're precious in his sight this morning.
So I pray that you would seek God today.
Pray that you would seek the kingdom of God today.
I pray that you would know that you are precious and you are loved by God.
And I pray today that you would know that there is room in the kingdom of God.
That our Savior came, the Savior who came for which there was no room for him, has died
on the cross in that room for you and I.
The invitation stands.
Would you enter into the kingdom of God today?
Sadly, in the parable, there were some who received the invitation and rejected the invitation.
They decided that living their life was more important than living in the kingdom of God.
I pray today that we would not make that mistake.
I pray today that we would hear the words of scripture, that we would know that unto
us a child is born, that unto us a Savior has come into this world in Jesus Christ and
he gave his life on the cross so that you could be forgiven.
Jesus came to be the light of the world and to establish his kingdom and I pray today
that you would enter into that kingdom.
Let's pray.
Father God, we come to you.
We thank you for your good work.
I pray that you would help us to see you in everything, dear Lord.
We know that Christmas trees ain't got nothing to do with scripture and we're not implying
that they do, dear Lord, but even in simple things like this, dear Lord, the things of
this world that we enjoy, even the beauties of this world, God, we can see you all around
us if we look.
So, I pray, dear Lord, that you would be with any in this room this morning that do not
know you.
God, maybe there are some that do not know Jesus Christ.
Maybe there are some today that they feel pretty right and they feel pretty worthless
and they've given in to that lie, dear Lord.
I pray today that they would know that they are valued by you, that you love them, dear
Lord, that you are precious to them.
God, I pray that you'd be with those today that are part of your kingdom.
I pray that we would continue to seek you and live by you, dear Lord, and trust in you.
God, I pray that you'd be with those that are here today that are not part of your kingdom,
that maybe today they would know that there is still room, dear Lord.
God, the invitation is there.
The invitation of scripture that we see in Luke 14, the invitation that we see throughout
your word, the invitation that we see of Jesus Christ, that we would just come to you, dear
Lord.
And Jesus says, come to me, you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest, dear
Lord.
That if there are some today that are burdened with their sin, they would find rest and peace
in Jesus Christ.
God, I pray that you would help us all to be part of your kingdom today.
God, I pray that if there are any that don't know you, that your Holy Spirit would work
on their heart right now.
That they would come, that they would accept the invitation of scripture, that they would
accept Jesus Christ and who he is and what he has done, that they would repent of their
sins.
God, there is room today in your kingdom.
So I pray that they would enter into it.
I ask these things in Jesus' name, Amen.