<font color='black' size='4' face='Times New Roman, Times, serif'><span><a shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001dYEB-FLeIF6hHYInNPyndoDO2NDc0VZPxY1M92HDLbvRwtxqsazHcDBfieRE0ejbygwy7lb8v3RIqeIld0Z9KMAg3YyaJNNMJntJ9CVp_ICb3ZohgObhRwSnzKrpygUo"><span></span></a></span><span></span><font color="black" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif" size="4"><font color="black" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif" size="4"><font color="black" face="Times New Roman, Times, serif" size="4"><span>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px">Sermons for Advent 1</div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Luke 21:25-36</span><span> - <strong>"</strong></span><strong>Lift Up Your Heads"</strong></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Luke 21:25-36 </span><span>- <strong>"</strong></span><strong>All Roads Lead to Bethlehem"</strong><span> by Leonard Sweet</span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Luke 21, the sermon title "</span>Lift Up Your Heads"<span> </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>A. J. Gordon was
the great Baptist pastor of the Clarendon Church in Boston,
Massachusetts. One day he met a young boy in front of the sanctuary
carrying a rusty cage in which several birds fluttered nervously. Gordon
inquired, "Son, where did you get those birds?" The boy replied, "I
trapped them out in the field." "What are you going to do with them?"
"I'm going to play with them, and then I guess I'll just feed them to an
old cat we have at home." When Gordon offered to buy them, the lad
exclaimed, "Mister, you don't want them, they're just little old wild
birds and can't sing very well." Gordon replied, "I'll give you $2 for
the cage and the birds." "Okay, it's a deal, but you're making a bad
bargain." The exchange was made and the boy went away whistling, happy
with his shiny coins. Gordon walked around to the back of the church
property, opened the door of the small wire coop, and let the struggling
creatures soar into the blue. The next Sunday he took the empty cage
into the pulpit and used it to illustrate his sermon about Christ's
coming to seek and to save the lost -- paying for them with His own
precious blood. "That boy told me the birds were not songsters," said
Gordon, "but when I released them and they winged their way heavenward,
it seemed to me they were singing, 'Redeemed, redeemed, redeemed!'"<br>
<br>
This is Advent. And the message of these times is the song of those wild birds...</span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>The rest of this sermon can be obtained by joining <a shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001dYEB-FLeIF6hHYInNPyndoDO2NDc0VZPxY1M92HDLbvRwtxqsazHcDBfieRE0ejbygwy7lb8v3RIqeIld0Z9KMAg3YyaJNNMJntJ9CVp_ICb3ZohgObhRwSnzKrpygUo"><span>http://www.sermons.com/signup</span></a></span><span> </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>_______________________</span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span> </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span><br>
</span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Luke 21, the sermon titled "</span><span>All Roads Lead to Bethlehem</span><span>"</span><span> by Leonard Sweet </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span> </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Jesus came to
save humans from being rat packs feeding on each other instead of sheep
feeding with each other. This was never made so clear than in the recent
"Black Friday" images of people stomping on each other and fighting it
out, all done to the musical background of Christmas music.</span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Our sentimental</span><span> - </span><span>yet always cynical</span><span> - </span><span>culture
likes to start singing Christmas carols the moment Thanksgiving turkeys
come out of the oven. But listen carefully: You're hearing a lot more
choruses of "Jingle Bells" and "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" than
carols like "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" or "O Little Town of
Bethlehem." The world wants, the world needs, to celebrate Christmas.
But the world does its best to keep Jesus out of it.</span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Perhaps the first
"Christmas carol" Christians should sing, in keeping with the theme of
"Advent," is the Willie Nelson special "On the Road Again." As stores
keep having cut-rate sales and on-line deals; and as holiday partying,
parades, and posturing swamp every level of our lives: it is good to
stand back and look at the bigger picture. What is the purpose for which
Jesus came into this world in the first place? </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Let's get "on the road again" with the first journey to Bethlehem, and the reason that journey was taken...</span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span> </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>The rest of this sermon can be obtained by joining <a shape="rect" target="_blank" href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001dYEB-FLeIF6hHYInNPyndoDO2NDc0VZPxY1M92HDLbvRwtxqsazHcDBfieRE0ejbygwy7lb8v3RIqeIld0Z9KMAg3YyaJNNMJntJ9CVp_ICb3ZohgObhRwSnzKrpygUo"><span>http://www.sermons.com/signup</span></a></span><span> </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>_______________________</span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span> </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Wait and Watch</span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Our text
concludes with the counsel, "When these things come to pass, stand up
and lift up your heads, for your redemption is drawing near." That's
been the experience of Christians for all these years. Whether they are
in exodus, or in exile, we are not alone. </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Our four year old
grandson has provided me a wonderful illustration of this. His mother
was going to go away for a couple of days. The night before she left, as
she was in the two boys' room to hear their prayers, she told them she
was going to go away, and asked if in their prayers they would like to
ask God to protect her on her journey. </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Jesse, the six
year old, thought not. But Luke, the four year old, prayed this prayer:
"Dear God, if buffaloes or bears, or other mean animals, come near
mommy, can you handle it? If you can't, just call on Jesus." </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Luke attends a
Nazarene preschool. I suspect that is where he got he got that accent.
But the words are universally Christian. There is a new covenant now, a
new promise, since Christmas, that he will be with us, "Lo, I am with
you always till the end of the age." That's our hope. There is a way of
living with that hope. It is found in two words that are always
associated with Advent: wait, and watch. </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span> </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>Mark Trotter, Collected Sermons, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.</span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span> </span></div>
<div style="MARGIN-TOP: 0px; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0px"><span>_____________________<br>
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</span></div>
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