One of my absolute favorite things about having family worship days like today is when you all are singing so loud that I can't hear myself sing. No, no, no, no. I'm telling you, it's beautiful. And so just lean over and tell the person beside you, that was me. That was me.

Hey, thank you guys for being here. Let me be the first to say happy New Year. I know with a New Year's Day comes lots of plans and, and good intentions. But I hope that maybe something that said in this message today might impress you a little bit differently. As you saw today, we had another baptism.

How many of you still have your ping pong ball? Raise your hand high. Let me see. Today was number 64. 64.

So if you have, if you have one through 64, bring it back. Like, write your name on it. I'm keeping them in a jar. And when we reach 100, we're going to have a big old party now. We're going to celebrate every baptism that comes through Talon.

Thank you so much for your testimony. It just, you know, it actually leads us into what we're going to talk about today in Luke, chapter 2, verse 21. We've taken this journey through this Christmas holiday and we've unwrapped different aspects of the Christmas narrative. The first week we looked at Joseph's dream where the angel spoke to him and we unwrap the idea that hope comes because we have forgiveness of our sins. The very name of Jesus, Yahweh saves, should give us hope today that no matter what kind of situation I'm in, Jesus saves.

He saves you, and he can save me if we put our faith in him. Then we looked when Gabriel appeared to Mary and how that the pronouncement that he made, that she would bring into this world the very Son of God, gives us confidence, man. We need confidence in this world today. The one thing that you and I can have confidence in is this. The very words that were uttered in that passage.

Nothing is impossible with God. Do you believe that? And then as we looked at John the Baptist's birth and Zacharias getting his voice back, how he proclaimed forgiveness based solely on the mercy of God, John said in his prophecy to give to his people the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of their sins. That's what salvation is. Our sins are forgiven, therefore we will not face the judgment and wrath of God.

And. And it's all based on the tender mercy of God leading us into the way of peace. And then last week, what an incredible day to celebrate. And have joy. We discovered with Jesus birth and the Shepherd's coming, that when we unwrap that part of the Christmas story, that we have joy because Jesus came, because Jesus was born, because Jesus left heaven, put on human flesh the God man who came and lived among us and then went to a cross and died to pay the death that we deserve for our sin.

We, like Mary, should treasure these things and ponder them in our heart. We have had hope, we have confidence, we have forgiveness, we have mercy, and we have joy. What greater things can we have in our lives today to drive us, move us, to challenge us, to give us focus, to give us life, to give us purpose? What's your purpose in life? No, seriously, a lot of us ask, like, why am I here?

Some people sometimes when they're down and out, will say, why am I still here? You know why? Because you have purpose. Purpose is the reason that something exists, that something is done, or that something is created. Can I ask you, do you know your purpose in this life?

Do you know your purpose in this life? And does it bother you that you don't?

Because all of us have purpose. We have a collective purpose we're going to talk about. And then for each one of us, God has a purpose for your life. It's kind of like the knives in your drawer. If you had kids that woke up.

Kids, where are you today? I know you're in the room. On the count of three, say I'm here. Ready? One, two, three.

They're all over here in the bat cave. Y' all know y' all are in the bat cave, right? That's your nickname.

Probably one of your kids went to your drawer and pulled out one of your kitchen knives to open something they got for Christmas. That's not what it's for. There's a thing called a box knife. Or your daddy probably carries a pocket knife. As you get older men, your knives get smaller in your pockets so your pants will stay up.

No, really. I've got one about this big and it's got a plastic handle. Because of that reason, you know, my brother in law got a knife for Christmas. It had like a sheath and he put it on his belt and he walked around like he was like, Crocodile Dundee. That's not a knife, that's a knife.

But each one of those had a purpose. The purpose for a knife is to cut things. The box knife cuts boxes and the kitchen knife cuts chicken. There's a collective purpose and then there's an individual purpose. I love the scene in Revelation, chapter 4, verse 11 where it talks about the four living creatures and the 24 elders.

And that every time the four living creatures would say holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come, declaring the eternal state of God. That every time they would do that, the 24 elders would drop down and they would throw their crowns at his feet over and over again, never exhausting and always with joy, saying, worthy are you, O Lord our God, to receive glory. Say glory and honor. Say honor and power. Say power.

Listen. Because you created all things and by your will they existed. You want to know your purpose in life because God intended you to be here. That is your primary purpose in life. God willed you to exist.

Whatever other purposes in your life, who you marry, what job you have, where you live, what kind of car you drive, how much money you make, how many kids you have, all of that is secondary to the primary collective purpose of God. That you and I were created to give him glory, to give him honor and to give him power. That is why you and I exist. We exist for the glory of God. The Westminster Short Catechism says it like this, that we exist to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.

How do I do that? Like there's times in this life I want to give God glory, but I'm not enjoying it too much. I mean, sometimes we're in church singing and this is what we get. Blessed be your name. What time is lunch?

I cannot sit. I mean, like we're in this mode of discipline. But there is joy eternal when we tap in to God's divine purpose for our life. And I believe this passage in Luke helps us to unwrap that. That God has called us to glorify Him.

And my question for you today is, I don't know what you think your purpose in life is, but whatever it is, if it doesn't have at its primary goal to glorify God, that purpose is meaningless because you're not in God's will. If I'm pursuing my honor and my glory and my power without pursuing His, I'm out of align in my life. Glory is this idea of recognizing the very weight of his presence, his worth, his manifested magnificence. The idea of honoring God is how we respond in recognition to who he is, who he was and who he will be. He never changes.

And so we honor Him. It's one of our core values at this church. To honor God. How? By giving him glory and to give him power.

How does God get power from us? He's an eternal being. When we relinquish our power and rely on his power to him be glory and honor and power. Because of his will, we exist. When you read Two Philippians, chapter 2, verses 9 through 11, it says this.

For this reason, God exalted Christ and bestowed on him the name above every name, so that the name of Jesus every knee would bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth. And every tongue confessed that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Every knee will bow either in submission to relinquish our power to his, or by force when he returns. Because we were existed. To do what? To glorify God. Kids, what's the word I just said?

Say glory. We glorify. To know God is to know His Son, where we release our control, honor God, declaring his position, his power, and living that way under his leadership, giving him the honor and the glory that he so rightly deserves. See, this is the big truth today. What's my big individual purpose in life?

Before I figure that out, I need to focus first on the big things that God has already made clear. I need to stop majoring on the minors and start majoring on the majors.

Can I meddle? Kids are in the room. Y' all let me get by with it, right? We'll focus more on what translation of the Bible to use and what songs to sing. And we'll never forgive our brother.

And these two things are not in Scripture when this one is. But I'll focus and get hung up on this stuff and hold back the love and the grace of God from my brother and my sister. Major on the majors because I believe that what we're going to see with the characters that are in this next narrative is how they lived out their purpose. There was a primary purpose, and there were three things that should have excused them from fulfilling that purpose, but they didn't let it distract them. Pick up with me and let's read in verse number 21, I got turned backwards myself.

Verse 21. This is after the shepherds. They have gone home. Mary's treasured things in their heart. They're glorifying God.

And we stop with the Christmas story for some reason right there. Well, eight days after Christmas, his birth. It says, when eight days had passed before his circumcision, they gave him the name Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. Which angel? Angel Gabriel.

The angel had appeared to Joseph. The will of God. You can see right there that they were obeying the word of God gets better. And then, when the days for her purification according to the law of Moses were complete, they brought Jesus up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord. And then Luke starts quoting the Old Testament.

Let me read these. He says, as it is written in the law of the Lord, every firstborn male that opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord. And to offer sacrifice according to what was said in the law of the Lord. A pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons. Let me paint this picture for you.

What we see is faith, covenant, living. All the way back in Genesis 17, God told Abraham, according to the Abrahamic covenant, you will circumcise every male that is born and everyone that lives in your household. Moses had. I mean, excuse me. Abraham had already been credited righteousness by his faith.

So being circumcised didn't do anything magical or mystical. Just like this baptism water didn't do anything magical or mystical. It was a circumstance. Sign. Say sign.

Here's your sign. Right. The sign of circumcision was to mark the covenant community under the Abrahamic covenant. See, they believed in three primary covenants. The Abrahamic covenant, which was land and people.

God said, I will give you land, and I will make a people out of you. And then you get the Mosaic covenant, which was the law that they received on the top of Mount Sinai. And before the law was given, before they left Egypt, God said, set apart for me every firstborn male. And do you know when he gave that command? When he was about to kill every firstborn male in the city with the plague of death.

And do you remember how they didn't die? What did they have to do? They had to mark the doorpost with the blood of a perfect lamb. And then the death angel would pass over. So God said, generation after generation, set apart from me, the firstborn male, they were living.

Mary and Joseph lived in covenant community because of one main thing, the one main thing in our lives that determines whether or not we have figured out God's purpose for us. Are you ready for this? It's very easy. It's only one word. It's called obedience.

Honor God by obeying his word. If you're taking notes, you want to scribble that down. Honor God by obeying his word. Jesus says, if you love me, you will keep my commands. First John, five, two, three.

Listen to how this covenant community is painted. By this, we know that we love the children of God, which are other believers. When we love God and observe his commandments. My following the command of God is intricately connected to how I love my brother and sister. What did Jesus say were the two greatest commandments?

To love the Lord God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. All of the law and prophets hinge on those two things. If we want to find our purpose in life, we've got to start by obeying what he's already said. If you think for one moment you're going to go up on the top of Mount Currahee and God's going to appear in some kind of Shekinah glory and tell you your primary purpose in life, but you're not keeping the commands. That ah, moment doesn't matter.

God wants us to obey his commands, honoring him, giving him glory through our obedience. And so my question to you today is this. How are you obeying the Lord?

You may feel guilty sometimes and come down to an altar and repent, but then there's no change in life, no intention to pick up and follow and do what the Lord has told us to do. And if we glorify God, we will proclaim him to the nations. You can go share your faith all day long, but if you're not living in covenant community with the Lord, there's nothing to reinforce the gospel you just preached. Maybe. Maybe that's why we don't see salvation.

Maybe the reason why we don't see revival is because the people of God haven't turned to the Lord, haven't turned to obey him, have lost their purpose. But when people turn their back away from the Lord and they turn back to Him, God opens up the portal of revival in his people and sets them ablaze to take the glory of God to the nations.

Because they honored God, their purpose in obedience. So where are you in that? How are you honoring God in your obedience? They specific. They were so specific they took Jesus back to circumcise him.

33 days after he was born, she completed her purification time and she went back and made sacrifice. Mary and Joseph followed the covenant law and the covenant for us. Is Jesus Christ, the Spirit, living inside of us. Are you obeying the word of the Lord by the Holy Spirit? Because the rest of this gives us three reasons why we could say that I'm not going to do this.

I'm not going to follow the Lord, I'm not going to fulfill my purpose, you see, because Mary and Joseph could have said, you know, he's the Son of God, surely we'll get a passion. Do you notice it said that they brought Turtledoves or two young pigeons. Do you know why they did that? Because in Leviticus 5, this was under the heading of sin and guilt offering. And it was talking about ceremonial being ceremonial clean.

And because she had birthed Jesus, she was declared unclean. It might be why nobody wanted to give her a room, by the way. They didn't want their house unclean, not because it was messy, but because they were around her in her period of time of being unclean, they would be unclean, too.

Aren't you glad that when she went to make sacrifice, she brought a poor man's offering holding the king of the universe, who, according to Isaiah 53, would be our sin and guilt offering?

She followed the law, and she didn't let her poverty keep her from doing what God had told her to do. If we honor God by obeying his word. Here's the second thing. We can honor God regardless of your socioeconomic status. They set the bar.

They challenge us. What if Mary and Joseph simply said, well, we have privilege because of Jesus. We're just not going to do that?

That's called disobedience. It's called disobedience. The point here is not so much how much money they had. Joseph was a carpenter. He didn't have livestock.

He couldn't go out there and say, well, let me just take this lamb and we'll sacrifice this one. That wasn't the case.

He had to pay for it. And if they couldn't afford a turtle dove or a pigeon, they could have brought a measure of flour that was the poorest of the poor. But they gave out of their poverty, and they gave their first fruit. They honored God by setting Jesus apart as the firstborn. They honored God by bringing the sacrifice, and they didn't let their socioeconomic position hinder them.

Jesus wasn't born in the palace to the rich. He came to people who knew what it was like to sacrifice. You and I were challenged on a daily basis, what will we give unto the Lord? The first thing and the primary purpose in your life and mine is to obey the word of the Lord. And if I let my socioeconomic position hinder that, I'm not fulfilling my purpose in the Lord.

You may say, well, I'll just wait till I get a better job. No, no, no, no, that's not going to change things. Well, I'll wait till I move to a better side of town. No, that's not going to change things. If you're not willing to obey God when you don't have, you won't obey God when you do have.

Because that leads us to the third. I love these two. This is the story of Simeon and the story of Anna, because they give us two pictures too. And I'm just going to warn you, I'm not trying to step on toes when I say these. Here's the third one.

Honor God until your dying day. Honor God until your dying day. Your purpose does not end when you start drawing Social Security.

Verse 25. And there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. And he was righteous and devout, looking for the consolation or the comfort of Israel. There's a. There's a bookend here that happens when we get to Anna.

I'll point that out in a minute. Now, notice this. He says, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. Verse 26. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

Simon lived his purpose to his dying day. Simeon could have died the very next morning. But the Holy Spirit had promised, you will see Lord's Christ. Now, let me stop for a moment. Up to this point, we've been introduced to four senior adults.

Zacharias, Elizabeth. All right, that's two. Simeon. And in a few minutes we'll be introduced to Anna. If you do the math.

They knew what life was like before Roman occupation.

They knew what it was like to semi thrive as a nation. Even though maybe the Hasmonean legacy wasn't very nice before Rome came in, they longed for freedom. They longed for comfort. Until his dying day, he did not give up that hope. He would prophesy and say that salvation had come for all of Israel to bring comfort and consolation, but then also to the nations.

But he would also prophesy that Christ would suffer. And because of that, Mary would suffer too. Why is that important? I remember years ago, a man I wanted to help me in the youth ministry came and we were talking about him helping me. And.

And he wasn't at retirement age at this point. And I'm just like, hey, I'd love for you to come. Wednesday night was our only environment. That was it. And he said, nah, man, I retired from all that stuff.

I said, retired from? What do you mean? He said, no, all I do is come to worship now. I said, but man, you connect so well with the students. Like, why would you give.

And he said, no, that time was over when my kids graduated. And I thought, you're missing so much. Guys, we don't retire from our faith. What would life look like if we Said, until the last breath that I draw, I will glorify my God. Laura and I were talking.

I've shared this story before. I'll share it again. That a few years ago, when her grandmother died, we went to see her in the nursing home about a week before she passed. And she'd had a stroke, and it left her blind. She couldn't see.

And you know what she did in that nursing home? You know what she did with her time while she was sitting there? She prayed. She prayed. And Laura, the last time I think you spent with her, she sat there with joy.

She said, you know what? It's not going to be much longer. She, to her last breath, was glorifying her God. What would it look like, Church? If with our breath now, if with our breath now, we decided that with every breath I take, I'm going to glorify my God.

I'm going to exalt my Jesus. What would it look like in this community if people could meet Jesus through us? He did not let his age hinder him. What difference would it make? Some of us in this room, there's a tragedy.

Some of you in this room, you're saying, someday I will. But you never will. And some of you, that day has come. And now you say you can't. I'm telling you, everybody in this room joining me online, if you've got breath in your lungs, praise the Lord.

Cause you can. The last one I want to give you here comes from Anna's story. So we're going to honor God by obeying his word. We're not going to let socioeconomic position or status keep us from doing that. We're not going to let our age keep us from doing that.

But also don't let your crisis keep you from doing that. Honor God out of your crisis. Verse 36, it says there was a prophetess named Anna, the daughter of Phu, the tribe of Asher. Why does that matter? Like, we read that, we're like, I don't even know what that means.

Well, there were 12 tribes of Israel, and Asher was one of them. And when Rehoboam became king and the kingdom split, Asher was part that went into the Northern Kingdom. When Simeon said he wanted to see the consolation, the comfort of Israel, she had been praying. Anna had been praying for the redemption of Jerusalem or Israel. Bring us back together.

The word Jew comes from the tribe Judah. It wasn't just for the Jews. It was for the Israelites. And if it was for the Israelites, and it was for the Gentiles, Because Jesus had come to bring light into the world. She was, it says, had been married seven years and then her husband died.

Seven years and her husband died. But check this out in verse 37 to the age of 84. Now, there's two different ways this can be interpreted. You ready? Either A, she's 84, which means she'd been widowed about half a century.

Some translators believe she lived 84 years after she was widowed, which makes her about 100.

She never left the temple, serving night and day with fasting and prayer. Do you think Anna knew what her purpose in life was? She did. And she did not let the crisis of being a widow keep her from doing that. Some of us in this room, we've.

All of us have faced tragedy at some level. Abandonment, abuse, loss. But if I decide God, I'm hanging up my purpose with you because you took this from me, then I'm missing out on God's plan for my life. We can minister out that crisis. She got invested in the Covenant community and was glorifying God with her life.

What if Simeon would have stayed at home, rather listening to the Holy Spirit? He would have missed seeing the Christ. What if Anna would have stayed at home? What if Anna would have stayed at home? She would missed out on the fullness that God had intended for her.

What if Mary and Joseph decided they weren't going to follow the law and didn't come? What if. How would that have set up the Christ if they would have disobeyed your purpose in life? And my purpose in life is to obey the word of the Lord. As you're sitting here thinking about the New Year's, let this sit in your mind in your study guide.

Two blanks. That's all I gave you this week. The purpose unwrapped, your purpose. And my purpose in life unwrapped should provide motivation through his sacrifice.

A lot of you in this room, you've had an experience where you made a profession of faith. But now the next step of you is to have an experience of grace such that it lights a fire under you for Jesus. Can I tell you about Marvin? Marvin was an elderly guy in our first church and he was a joyful guy. He was a happy guy.

I mean, we loved him. Marvin was awesome. He went in to have knee replacement and it got infected and he ended up. It was so weird. I know medicine changes over time.

They took the stuff out and put something in there as a spacer so he could get over the staph infection and then re. Replace the knee. And this time frame was from May to Thanksgiving, six months. He ended up in a convalescent home. Now, Marvin could have felt sorry for himself, but he didn't.

Marvin could have sat there and let every day just be a waste and just sitting there going, gosh, man, I wish they'd hurry up. Why won't this hurry up, God? Why won't you heal this? But what he did was he sat there and he started getting to know the other patients. When he graduated and went home for years after that, he couldn't stay away because that experience spurred him.

That crisis spurred in him a renewed purpose to go love on people and tell them about Jesus. Some of you, you've experienced a crisis in your life, and you have yet to embrace that as a door that God will allow you to be able to glorify Him. Some of you have used the excuse long enough. I'm just too old or I don't have the time. It's time today to decide.

Will I follow Jesus? Will I choose to make him my Lord? Would you do that today? Because here's the truth. Would it take an experience like Isaiah being in the temple and God filling up the room with his glory, his weight, for you and I to be able to give him honor and to relinquish our power to Him?

How will that look different for you? Not in 2006. Not starting on Thursday today, leaving this room, how will it change your life? Father, as we sit and ponder this, I challenge us to all examine our lives, to first see where we stand in the faith. To you, but also, Lord, we're to examine, Lord, how.

How am I obeying you, Lord? We know there's grace for when we stumble. We know that there's mercy because we will never measure up and be perfect. Caveat. We know that.

We know that, Lord. What I'm praying is, is that we would with intention pursue you with everything that we have. To love you with our heart, mind, soul and strength, to love our neighbor as our self and to let it be in such a way that we give glory, that we give honor and we give power, and that when we hear those things, it won't be us to stand up on our soapbox, but to fall on our face and to cast our crowns before you. We love you in Jesus name.