So have you done your last will and testament? Yeah, I know how to kick off a christmas sermon. Right. I was reading a story recently about a man telling about his grandfather's last will and testament and in his grandfather's last will and testament, something kind of crazy happened. It seems that his grandfather had a neighbor that he hated. I mean hated the guy. They lived next door to one another for more than 20 years, couldn't stand each other. He had never heard his grandfather say anything nice about that man and he had never seen either one of them actually speak to one another. And yet when his grandfather died, he left in his last will and testament. His golf clubs $10,000 and a car to the neighbor that he hated. The family was dumbfounded. They had no idea what was going on. Well, come to find out. The two guys were good buddies all along. They knew each other in the army and then coincidentally they ended up buying houses next door to one another and they decided to scam their families and that was the plan. So they acted like they hated each other for more than 20 years. They played golf together two or three times a week, had a monthly poker game that they played. I mean they were good friends, but no one in their families had a clue. Now that is a weird long scam. But it's interesting when you think about what it means to leave something for somebody. So, so what are you going to leave, what, what are you going to allow other people to inherit from you? I think sometimes we think that's just money or it's just just land, but it's not what is your family going to inherit from you in terms of attitude, what is your family going to inherit from you in terms of of how you lived and and how you thought the investment that you made in their lives, that has nothing to do with money. We start a new series today called this, this and we're going to be looking at several different passages this morning. We'll be looking at john chapter 14 Now, this series title comes from him that you may hear in the weeks to come, christmas, carol that is often sung and it's the one that talks about what child is this. And this was the question in the song, what child is this, who laid to rest on mary's lap is sleeping. And then the song answers the question and it answers it like this, this, this is christ the king Over the next few weeks, we're going to be looking a little more deeply into the deepest meaning of christmas and the deepest meaning of christmas is this, that the thrill of hope and the thrill of peace and the thrill of joy and the thrill of love that your heart longs for the most can only be found and ultimately be found in the baby that was in the manger, Our message today is this piece and we'll be looking and listening, not to the stable story, but the other end of the story. We don't begin in the Bethlehem tonight we this morning, we actually begin at the end, we begin where jesus is leaving something to his disciples, where he's passing on his inheritance. And what is it that he's going to leave them? Well, let's find out. Listen, as we begin this, this with john 14 verse 27 jesus says to his closest friends, Peace, I leave you peace. What is that you imagine sitting at the reading of the will of your, you know, rich family member then? All right, he's left you peace. What in the world? You know, you're thinking where's where's the money? Where's the land? Where's the, you know, 1952 mickey mantle baseball card? I mean, come on. What, what in the world, what what is being given here? What what is peace that's like getting a can of loss or sweet piece? You know, what am I going to do with that? So what is this piece? Well, consider this reality about jesus when jesus died, what did he have? He had nothing, right? He was homeless, jobless and penniless. Now, that sounds like something that's okay for back then, But put it in context, what if you're a follower of jesus, I mean, would you join a church where the pastor is homeless? Would you join a church where the pastor was not receiving a salary from the church? Nor did he have some other kind of job. He he just kind of didn't work. Is is that the church that you're going to be a part of jesus, didn't have cash, he didn't have land, he didn't have a 52 mickey mantle baseball card, But he did leave something for his disciples. He did give them an inheritance, it wasn't 500 acres of hunting land, it wasn't money, it wasn't a family heirloom, it it wasn't even a gift of fine art, a fancy painting. What he left was a lot better. In fact, what he left for them is one of the most satisfying things that any person could ever have in it. And it seems kind of mystical out there at times, but it is something we long for more than anything else, jesus left them his peace. What does that mean? Does it mean he left them peace? What is the peace of jesus like? Well, he kind of tells him in his next sentence, verse 11, my peace I give you not as the world gives. Do I give you See, we live in a world that is hungry for peace from the recently divorced mother of four from the Ukrainian refugee. Just just trying to escape the terrors of war to the widow or widower who's who's just trying to to make it through christmas, to all of our lives, whatever we're going to be facing, we're looking for peace? We're wanting a little bit of peace and a little bit of rest. We're wanting to experience something that that helps our hearts feel feel calm and bright for lack of a better word. And there have been times throughout history where where world council's got together and and peace treaties were formed and and those things brought some temporary peace for a time. But the reality is we all woke up this morning and there's still war and there's still rumors of war and there's, there's still plenty of things that are not right in the world Back in the late 50s and early 60s and even into the 70s, the the Vibe was, you know, to flash the peace sign, you know, peace was was something that was talked about all the time, someone described it this way. Everybody went around flashing the peace sign, they smoked pot to find peace. They dropped acid to find peace. They started a sexual revolution hoping to find peace. But did they did that generation really find pieces is war and crime and and all the things that are those things just disappeared because we talked about peace because a peace sign was flashed. You see every generation has their own notion of, of pursuing peace and it's not wrong by any means, but the reality is we see generation after generation chasing peace in so many different directions. If if we look at today, it it doesn't feel a lot different than the sixties, right? People today, they are still looking for peace and a lot of different things, prescription medication, illegal medication, adult beverages, hobbies, sports shopping, even family and friends, we have so many different things that we're pursuing peace and and at best all the different things that we try to find peace and they only help us for a little while, right? I've told you before that you know, there is something fun about going to the movie theater, you know, and you go in and you get to escape, you know, you've got an hour and a half or some of them are three hours now, you know, and you and you have this this movie and you enjoy the movie and and everything's great and then you walk out and guess what, whatever was happening before you went in the movie is right back, you know, it was just an escape. So it's not wrong that we have some temporary places of escape, but the reality is the piece that our hearts are longing for the most will not be found in anything in this world. We see a picture of this in proverbs where it's talking about a drunkard, uh there's a paraphrase of this in the, in the message, paraphrase of proverbs 23 35 when I read it earlier this week, I felt like I was in the scene of Andy Griffith, I felt like this was Otis talking to barney, okay, this this is how the paraphrase goes barney, they hit me, but it didn't hurt, they beat on me, but I didn't feel a thing when I'm sober enough to manage it, bring me another drink. In other words, he got beat up while he was drunk, but he didn't really feel it because he was drunk, he was fine, no big deal. And then we woke up and he had all that pain, he's like, no big deal, I'll just get another dream. In other words, it's easy for us to say, oh that drunkard, you know, it's a little harder for us to say, oh I'm just going to play another nine, you know, or I'm just going to go one more hour at the mall, you know, I'm just going to get that fourth piece of carrot cake, you know, we, we tend to not, I think that we are like the drunkard, we're all like the drunkard, we all have that one thing that we just have to have a little bit more of and again, at best, all it does is bring us temporary peace, but then we have to look for the next thing, we have to reinvent it all over again, the more we look for temporary peace, the more we will want more temporary peace and the world has tons of temporary peace to give us, they have tons of things that that they offer to us and we'll chase after and it kind of moves us to loving other things first and most instead of loving God first and most and every single one of us can fall into it. It kind of sounds like this. Well look, man, if you'll just get that education, you'll have everything you need. If you will just get that promotion, everything's going to work out. If you'll just try that new medicine, you'll start feeling great. If you'll just get that new car, man, you'll you'll feel like a brand new person and there's nothing wrong with a promotion. There's nothing wrong with an education. There's nothing wrong with medicine and surgery and a new car. There's nothing wrong with any of those things. But all of those things still require some commitment from us. They require money and time and devotion. And sometimes the money and time, devotion that we have to commit to, The things that we feel like are giving us peace. Actually take our piece away, Right? I mean, we're a little disturbed that this temporary peace doesn't last. And oftentimes it's just external. See it can't actually reach your soul. I heard an actor a few months ago, a comment was made about the soul and and and they just kind of chuckled. They're like, ah, let's don't talk about soul. It was almost like it was it was make believe it was a fairy tale, but we know that's not true, right? I mean, I I don't care if you if you love God or hate God. All of us understand that there's there's something inside of us. There is this soul that can't be defined in some ways in human terms, but it's there and that's why Jesus said, look, I'm leaving you my piece for your soul, but I'm not leaving you the kind of peace that you get from the world because the piece that you get from the world is it's different, it's not going to satisfy you. So what is the peace of jesus like paul is writing in the church at room and he said this therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord, Jesus Christ. So bare bones, what does it mean to be a christian? It means that things are right between you and God. It means that whatever separation has happened is no longer there, it means that God is now for us. He is our God and and we are his people, we are safe and we are free. No matter what happens in life, no matter what we experience, what it means to be right with God is that we are safe and that we are free. That no matter what happens to us this week, to be in christ means that we are safe and we are free yesterday, I was part of a funeral for a family friend and and one of the things that kept bringing to mind more and more and more as I sat was was it really was a great funeral. I had people come up to me afterwards, I feel bad saying this, but I really enjoyed this funeral and I thought to myself, you know the reality is part of the reason that they were able to enjoy the funeral is because of the faith of the person we were remembering. It's tremendously hopeful when someone has a confident faith in jesus, when they live their life as if they are safe and free in jesus when they live because the peace of God has truly found their heart to have the peace of God means that the well deserved penalty of sin has been erased. That jesus has taken care of it. Think of it this way are you more at peace or less at peace when there's money in the bank? I mean really just think about it practically. I mean I am much more at peace when I know the checks and the debits and the cells and the Venmo and whatever else is going to actually clear there's a sense of peace there. How much more So when we think about the spiritual accounts of our souls, part of what it means to be a christian is that your account is full and part of what it means to be not a christian is that your account is is spiritually empty and so this picture of jesus giving us his peace, it's it's defining because see when we are spiritually empty, we we can't put anything in the account, there's no way for us to make a deposit, something has to be put in. We are spiritually bankrupt. But the reality is there's something much worse than just having an empty spiritual account. There is according to the language of the bible. This this time bomb, so to speak, of impending separation from God, separation from all that's good and holy and happy and joyful forever. And so to not have the peace of christ is not great. But the story doesn't have to be that way to repent and believe in Jesus Christ to follow after. Jesus christ means that he takes his everlasting perfect perfections and he deposits them into our account, the one whose life was indestructible. He deposits that indestructible life into our life so that we in turn become, in a sense indestructible meaning we're safe and we're free and that time bomb is defused forever. That's good news. That's good news. Because true faith in Jesus Christ means that we have true peace. It's not just that that someone's flashing us a religious peace sign. It means that peace has been assigned to our souls. And once it has it, it can't be taken away True faith means your account with God is settled. It means that it has been satisfied and you are now satisfied in and with jesus, that's some real peace, that you're taking any single moment of life. If you fail the test, you still have peace. If you don't get the promotion, you still have peace. If your team loses the game, you still have peace. There's this piece in jesus, that's that's unexplainable. And yet it's satisfying. I was listening to a song this week and it's written by a man who lost his son at a young age and and he's writing about his grief. And and one of the lines of the song says this when I cried out to you, jesus, you were there faithfully. I remember when I heard that, I remember thinking, what's that mean? You know, it sounds so christian, you know, cried out to jesus and you were there faithfully. What does it mean? I mean, how was jesus there? I mean, Jesus wasn't standing there in a robe in Birkenstocks. So so what what was it? What was it that that caused him to say, look, this, this is real because again, to non christians and even to some professing christians, jesus being there, it just sounds suspect. And the more I thought about it, I thought about the whole work of the trinity, the whole work of of who God is that there is this sovereign provision from God the father, there is this saving power from God the son and there is this satisfying presence from God the Spirit in the middle of everything falling apart. I can't explain it in you know three steps, but I know what it means as Billy Graham famously said, I I can't really explain the Holy Spirit to you, but I can see the effects of the Holy Spirit, just like I can see the effects of the wind, can't see the wind, but I see the effects of the wind. So when we say oh yeah, well I cried out to jesus and jesus was there, what we're saying is this that in the moment when everything is falling apart, part of the reason that we do this, part of the reason we come to church and we gather together and we, we go to bible studies and we read the bible and we have devotions is we are pre preparing our hearts, so when we get to the moment we will already have in our hearts and our minds oh yeah, this this, this is christ the king, I won't need to wait till christmas for us to sing that carol, I'll have it in my heart, I'll have it in my mind, this is christ, this is him, see what jesus is leaving to his friends and really what jesus is leaving to us, he is leaving to us. If we will believe in him and rely on him and trusting him and cleaning he is leaving to us. The one thing we need for every situation and we'll have some of those situations this week, won't we? We'll find ourselves in some moments with aging parents. We'll find ourselves in some moments with difficult Children. We'll find ourselves in some moments with, with frustrating spouses. We'll find ourselves in some moments of, of traffic and crazy christmas shopping. We'll find ourselves in some moments that at the doctors office we'll we'll have some moments this week where we will need peace. So I'm inviting you now to pre prepare for those moments to, to sing in your heart right now. You know what? This, this is christ the king, I can't shake it. Think about it this way. Imagine that you are on the front porch of a cabin. And since the weather is kind of mild right now, let's let's just say it's tonight, Okay? Um, if you need to leave now to get there, go ahead. It's fine. I won't be offended. You're in a cabin somewhere outside of Asheville, up on the side of the mountain and you're sitting there on the porch and you just, you know, poured some coffee from your little french roaster thing and man, it's just great sun's about to go down and man, you, man, it's a moment, right, a moment like that. It it feels beautiful and and it feels peaceful and it's like, yeah, yeah, I can do that. Here's the thing though. There's nothing necessarily christian about that. Okay. An atheist can have that moment of peace. You know, someone who hates God can sit on the porch in the mountains and experience peace. So let's compare that with this In 1571 and Hendrix was arrested and tortured for being baptized as a Christian, she was told that she needed to recant her christian faith, but she would not. And so they said then you will die for your sins. They tortured her more and then they tied her to a ladder, they put gunpowder in her mouth, They had prepared a huge bonfire and they lifted up this ladder and they were going to set the ladder down in the bonfire and that was how she was going to lose her life for being a Christian. This is no fairy tale, okay, happened in 1571. So whatever we think, we're not getting in our supposed christian nation, I promise. We have no clue what religious persecution is. So an as they raise up the ladder, the bailiff and the other authorities looking up, they see her very quietly cupped her hands in prayer and with amazing peace on her face, they could not believe what they saw. So which one is a deeper picture of peace. Coffee on the porch in the mountains, our knowing you're about to die for following jesus and all is well you're safe and you're free. That's what an was thinking, you know what, I'm safe and I'm free as that ladder went up because her savior had the power of an indestructible life. She was thinking this, this is christ my king I'm safe, I'm free. Someone may say, yeah, I can I can tell you a story like that about a muslim person or a buddhist person or some other religion, someone who died just like that for what they believed in. Okay, sure, probably can. But the difference is those spiritual leaders of those religions, they're dead and and they didn't come back to life. But Jesus, the story is different, right? Jesus died, but he didn't stay dead. It was impossible for jesus to stay dead. There was never a millisecond where he was going to stay in that tune. And so because Jesus is alive, everything changes. See Jesus being resurrected from the dead, it changes what we say. When we say I have peace with Jesus, that's why when Isaiah was prophesying about the baby, jesus that was to come, what did he say in Isaiah 96, he said his name shall be called What? The Prince of Peace. In other words, there's something about the peace of jesus that goes beyond our comprehension. There's something deeper about the peace of jesus and part of the deepness of the peace of jesus is that he is alive now. He guaranteed his peace by coming back from the dead. It sounds so fairy tells us and and so fantastic and it sounds like, well that just can't be true. It sounds silly and yet all of the hope of what we believe is found on the beauty of this miracle that we can't explain because if we could explain it, it wouldn't be a miracle miracle. And if we could explain it, this piece would not be there for every single moment of life, including the moment when we die. So what does that kind of peace look like and and how we do life on a daily basis? Well let me just share a couple of stories, one personal and uh, and one not personal. Um, my dad is 87 years old and back in May, uh, he was diagnosed with a tumor on his bile duct. The diagnosis they gave was was six months to a year And so through lots of consultation with assigned doctors and also a family friend, doctors looked into all of the chemo and all the surgery that would be involved and and all the things that we kept hearing back was man, your life is going to be miserable and it might help you know, you know, we can do this surgery, but as as when our family doctor said, that would be brutal for a young man. And so my dad made the brave choice to say, you know what, I'm not going to be miserable for the rest of my life. I'm going to go where I go and eat what I eat and do what I wanna do. And I've always been proud of my dad, but I don't think I've ever been more proud of him than in the bravery I saw in him to say, you know what, I'm just going to enjoy the rest of my life and we are watching and seeing all the positive realities of that now. We're we're seeing just the kindness of God. I mean, you know, my dad's still doing his own yard work and he's still taking great care of my mom. He's, you know, after last night, I don't think he's as frustrated about Clemson's offense anymore, you know, so I feel like he's probably doing a little bit better now. But you know, he's, he's doing life, he's enjoying life on behalf of my parents and my sisters. I've had to try to help them make sure all, all the things are in order and I have great parents. So, so everything pretty much is in order. I haven't had to do a whole lot, but we've had to take some trips to the lawyer in the last few weeks. And uh and I know the first time we went, my my dad, you know, we know the lawyer from, from a long time. He's part of my mom and dad's church, the church I grew up in and and dad said, well, you know, I've got some cancer, there's nothing they can really do about it. So I guess I'm just, you know, kind of living one day at a time. And the lawyer said me too and I thought thank you for that gracious response because it's a good reminder, right? I mean we we know that none of us are promised the end of this day. I mean we know it, but we kind of don't really believe it, you know, we we kind of think well God deserve, you know, I deserve for God to give me a long life, you know, but but we know that that's not reality, you know that that may not happen and and I would probably give a gracious plug because I'm in this. If you have not got all of your final thing Together, I don't care if you're 80 or 18 um it'd be a good thing to do that. And you know what if you love your family, will you please plan your funeral right now? I mean do it before the end of the day, I'm serious. Just do it. It's the kindest thing you could do for your family is to plan your funeral. Cause you know what if you don't it's going to be chaos alright. I promise. Just be kind to your family and get the get those things together. The reality is we we know that we're not promised forever but we kind of feel like I don't know, I think God God needs to give me a little bit more in christ. We may not be promised that we're going to live on this earth for a long time, but we are promised peace. We promised a peace that passes understanding Some of Y'all may remember the story of care tip. It's she was a young mom, 38 years old, she had four kids and she died from breast cancer. But she was recording in her journal and putting it out on the internet for for all to see kind of the, the end of her journey and and the things that she wrote were just mesmerizing. Um this is what she said. Her book that was published is called the hardest piece expecting Grace in the midst of life's hard. I love that subtype expecting Grace expecting peace in the middle of life's hard. And this is what she said about the prince of peace. What she said about the peace of jesus, He bought me that day he died and he showed his power when he overcame death and rose from the grave. He overcame my death in that moment. He overcame my fear of death in that unbelievable, unbelievable, beautiful moment. And the fruit of that death, his death, that resurrection and that stunning Grace is peace as death was upon her. She found peace in knowing that jesus had bought her. He had purchased her peace. She goes on to say this. It is the hardest piece because it's brutal, horribly brutal and ugly and we want to look away. But it is the greatest, greatest story that ever was is the greatest story your story. I'm not I'm not saying you know how to tell me about the baby in the manger. I'm not saying you have to tell me some stories about jesus healing people or or that you can tell me the story of easter, I mean, is this story your story when you breathe your last, are you safe and free and are you safe already? Today, is there this confidence in the person of Jesus Christ? Do you truly know the Prince of Peace? Look, he's not going to stand in the room with you with a robe and Birkenstocks. But do you know him? Are you experiencing the sovereign provision of God? The father? Are you experiencing the saving power of God? The son? Are you experiencing the satisfying presence of God? The spirit Is there this thing in your soul that says yes, I have received the Prince of Peace? He is my king, He is my God. Maybe put more practical. Have you overcome your fear of death? I'm not saying that it'll be perfect, you know I mean, we're all going to have our moments and we may have our moments when we get close. But have you overcome the fear of death? Because you know, the Prince of Peace, jesus was about to leave the world from the manger to the cross to the empty tomb? He completed his mission and one of the things he left his closest friends was his peace. Peace on earth and peace after Earth. So can you, with confidence, Listen to the truth of the Prince of peace and build your life on the simple reality that this this is christ the king.