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Wonderful Counselor, Part 1

From the series The Hope of Christmas

Are you discouraged? Feeling down? Maybe even wondering if there’s any HOPE these days? Chip begins this series with a reminder that in Jesus, whose birth we’re celebrating soon, we have all the hope anyone could ever need. How do you experience that hope? Don’t miss this program!

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Message Transcript

What’s your hope this Christmas? Now, there are two kinds of hope. We use that word in English. Hope is, in fact, here’s a definition of hope the way we use it in English. It is a wish or desire with anticipation for a specific positive outcome.

It’s a wish or a desire. And I think we ought to hope. Hope is, someone said, “The oxygen of the soul.”

But when you hear the word hope or read the word hope, biblically, that’s not what it is. It’s not a wish and it’s not a desire. In fact, a good definition of biblical hope is an unshakable promise or guarantee from God concerning a future event or outcome for your good.

So, when the Bible talks about: this is our hope, it’s not like wishful thinking and maybe something will happen. When Scripture says the return of Christ is the anchor or the hope of your soul, when Scripture says He is our hope, what it means, there is an unshakable promise, there is a guarantee that you can bank your life, your priorities, everything about your life because it’s not up for grabs. It will occur.

Let me give you an example. It was about 700 B.C. Israel had turned away from God, they are worshiping idols, they are consulting mediums. God has told them repeated times that – this is about fifteen years before the Assyrians actually completely take Israel out and then later, Judah. And the people are just far, far from God.

And so, Isaiah is telling them, “You need to turn back to God. You need to turn back to God.” And so, when people don’t, God brings what I call the velvet vise of His love that are consequences. And so, Jerusalem is up on this mountain and it was like a fortress.

And so, what would happen is that you would surround this city and then they would build barricades or ramparts and sometimes it would be a year or two and they would just pile up the dirt and they would hold the city hostage until they would come and take it over. And that’s what was happening during this time and all the false prophets were saying, “Hey, everything is going to be okay,” and Isaiah is saying, “Actually, it’s really not. This is God’s judgment.”

And then, he talks about how terrible life is going to be for God’s people because they have turned away from Him. And then there’s this little window. And this little window says, “But I want you to know there is still hope. All the promises I made to Abraham, all the promises I made to David – God never gives up on us, even when we are really disobedient and far from Him.” And so he says, “Someday, a little bit later, here’s your hope. You’re going to be taken to exile, there’s going to be consequences, but here’s what I want you to know: a child is going to be born and His name will be Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.” Seven hundred years before Jesus was born, he made this prophecy that there is going to be hope.

If you have your notes, you might pull them out because I have put that passage on there. And so, there is an absolute sense that this is what is going to happen and we get to be in on the side of looking back two thousand years when that child was born of that virgin that was prophesied in Isaiah 7.

Now, the circumstances when that was written was the Assyrians. The circumstances when Jesus came was a world that was in absolute turmoil. They had the ISIS of their day. They were called Barbarians. The economy was going in the tank. The false gods and the religion of the day and the corruption in the Roman government, it was unbelievable. The taxes were overwhelming. You had a very, very small group of elite people, over seventy, almost eighty percent of all the Roman Empire was slaves.

And so, into this, Galatians 4 says, “When the earth,” or, “history was pregnant,” is the word, literally. At this pregnant moment, God sent His Son. And He sends Jesus into a world where there is, people are looking for hope. Economically, spiritually, relationally, morally, it looked a lot like today. And this Son was going to bring peace. This Son was going to be a Savior. And He was going to be a Wonderful Counselor.

“What does it mean, ‘A Wonderful Counselor’?” If the hope of Christmas is that we have a Wonderful Counselor, what do counselors do? They give you wisdom, don’t they?

Early in our marriage, we, everybody gets stuck. So, we went to a counselor. And this counselor helps us see blind spots, they helped us see our family of origins and why Theresa and I would argue and why she would shut down and I would get upset. Counselors give you tools to work through issues. They give you insight about how you are wired.

See, a great counselor is an amazing thing. And this word, wonderful, it literally is supernatural counselor. The other time, you might jot in your notes there, by the way, I gave you a blank sheet of paper so you all could do a little work with me this Christmas season.

Judges 13:18, there’s an angel that comes and it’s the father of Samson. And the father asks, “Who are you?” And he says, “Well, why do you ask me? Because you know that my name is wonderful.” The Hebrew word is it’s supernatural. We have a supernatural Counselor.

Jesus came. In the body of this little baby that was born of the virgin Mary, He was fully God and He was fully man. And one of His major roles would be to come and give you supernatural, wise counsel. Wise counsel about relationships, wise counsel about your future, wise counsel about dealing with problems like finances and kids that aren’t doing well or aging parents that you don’t know what to do with or what treatment with this kind of cancer you should take. He is a wise counselor that wants to help you.

And so, what I wanted to do in our time today is to look at maybe three quick counseling sessions that Jesus had that I think really relate to maybe some things we need to hear during this Christmastime.

So, turn in your Bibles if you would to Mark chapter 10 where Jesus in the counseling session. Mark chapter 10.

And we will pick it up at verse 17. Counselors show us our motives, our blind spots, give us insight and help, and here’s the deal: good counselors are objective. They tell us what we need to hear, not always what we want to hear.

“And He was setting out on His journey, and a man ran up,” and notice, “knelt before Him, and asked Him, ‘Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone. Do you know the commandments? You know them, “Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.”’ And he said to Him, ‘Teacher, all of these I have kept from my youth.’ And Jesus, looking at him,” and in your Bible you might circle this little phrase, “loved him.”

Sometimes counselors tell us things, in fact, the Wonderful Counselor, the supernatural counsel of God, at times, tells us things that feel so hard and so painful and so impossible to obey, but notice His motive. He loved him.

“And He said to him, “You lack one thing: go sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” And so, like a good counselor, He has a presenting problem, right?

I used to do, actually I did a major in psychology, so I’m not a very good counselor, but at least I know what you’re supposed to do.

And so, people come and they say, “I have a presenting problem.” And so, you ask questions and you find out about them. So, you find out. And this counselee is wealthy, he is young, he is moral, he is successful, he is kind of the kind of person that you think, Man, he’s got it all together.

In our day, he’s driving a great car, he’s got a good looking family, he’s morally pure as far as we can tell, high integrity, very wealthy, super successful.

And, yet, he is restless. Something in his soul says, I have been doing and doing and doing and doing and doing. In fact, You tell me what you’re supposed to do? Man, it’s a target on the wall, I go get it, I’ve done it, but something is missing. This isn’t an unusual counseling situation.

Here’s the lie – “if I do this, if I did that, if I achieve this, if I do that, if I go to that school, if I finally get married, if/then, if/then, if/then,” it’s scary if you ever achieve to a great degree and then you just stop and go, Is this all there is? And that’s the situation.

So, Jesus thought, Well, you know the commandments.” And He lists them. “So, how are you doing there?” “Got them! Man, I learned that as a little kid. I have been tracking. I do all those things.”

Now, it’s interesting, if we had time to study this a little bit more carefully, you would notice that He mentions almost all the commandments, but He doesn’t touch on the tenth one. Anybody remember what the tenth commandment is? “You shall not covet.”

And He doesn’t emphasize the very first one either, does He? “You shall have no other gods before Me.”

And so, Jesus listens, He has the presenting problem, and like a good Counselor, I’m sure they had a little conversation and the guy even has a great attitude. Notice, he came, he knew Jesus. He knelt before Him. And so, He says, “You know what?” He doesn’t give him a list of things to do. He says, “There is one thing that you lack.”

See, in counseling people have presenting issues and then what we call it is what is the real issue? What is the core issue? What is really going on inside that needs to be addressed?

His core issue was idolatry. His core issue was materialism. His core issue was: I can do it. These things will make me happy.

So, Jesus, obviously wanted to help him, right? It said He loves him. So, in this counseling session, He says, “Well, here’s what you do.”

He got his little pad out and His prescription and He wrote a prescription, okay? “Go, sell all that you have, give it to the poor,” and then, by the way, here’s the results that are going to happen, so you know. This is a great prescription, “…so that you’ll have treasure in heaven.”

See, Jesus actually believed heaven is a real place, that there is real treasure, there’s real reward. And then, “Come follow Me.” See, the problem was you can’t have a relationship with Me when you have an idol in your life.

And Jesus doesn’t tell everyone He meets – I mean, a good counselor doesn’t tell everyone – you know, “Go sell everything you have.” That wasn’t the issue with a lot of people. But it was with this guy.

So, He gets to the core and He loves him and He says, “Look, there is a big idol. We need to address it. And here’s how we can address it.” There are a lot of things more important than money and stuff. So, do this and it’s going to be great.

And so, then you pick up the story and you find out, well, how does he respond? He only lacks one thing. And Jesus’ desire is that: “I want you to follow Me.” Let’s connect. This is great.

“Disheartened by this saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.” See, counselors, especially the supernatural Counselor, we bring Him all these symptoms. There’s this issue and this issue and there’s this and there’s that and there’s this.

Really good ones, they go, “Mm-mm, bing!” This is the one. This is the domino, this is the issue, this is the core. And when you address that, all the rest of your life is going to…

“But he went away sad, because he had great possessions. And Jesus looked around and said to His disciples, ‘How difficult it will be for those who have great wealth to enter the kingdom of heaven!’” And I think this is probably a pretty good application to get some great counsel. It’s hard for us, all of us wealthy people, to have the right focus during anytime, but especially during Christmas.

See, at the heart, the heart of Christmas, at the heart of grace, at the heart of really experiencing God left, God gave, God cares. And He counsels us. But there’s always a counterfeit, and the counterfeit is stuff.

I am a semi-avid Sports Illustrated reader. The article opens up, “For almost five days, the most decorated Olympian in history lay curled in the fetal position in his Baltimore home, crestfallen, fearful, embarrassed at his behavior, uncertain of his future.” He had another run-in with alcohol and did some outrageous things.

“Over three Olympics, from 2004 to 2012, Michael Phelps had won eighteen gold medals and twenty-two medals overall, each more than anyone ever in history.” And the article talks about checking into a rehab, the journey that he’s on. But I thought it was really interesting. They have a quote. “I was in a really dark place, not wanting to be alive anymore.” See, that’s what happens to rich, young rulers when they try and fill their soul with stuff. He is young, he’s wealthy. And he talks about the bubble that he lived in and how stuff couldn’t satisfy. We, intellectually, agree with what Jesus says, but most of us live like someday, someway, we want to be a Michael Phelps in our area.

Can I encourage you, this Christmas, to take a good word from the Wonderful Counselor? And just ask yourself, So, what are you going to do with your money this Christmas? And how much stuff? And why are your closets full?

So, counseling session number one is with a rich, young ruler that has it all. And Jesus says to him, “Address idolatry.” Don’t want what other people have, because if you got it, it would never satisfy.

And number two, “Have no other god before Me.” No other god. And it’s interesting, He almost always pokes around. Half of all, a little more than half of all of Jesus’ parables are about money. Not because He cares about money, but because it’s the other god.

Ready for counseling session number two? Turn if you will to Luke chapter 10. We have the story, not of a rich, young, successful man, but we have the story of a very stressed out, overextended, under-pressure, frazzled woman.

And we will see in just a minute that her presenting problem is she feels overwhelmed, she feels so overwhelmed like most of us do, that we start to blame other people and we are a victim and why do other people not help us? Or why am I doing all the work?

And so, she has some misguided views about God, she has some misperceptions about what really matters and what is really important. And I don’t know about you, but is there a month in all of the calendar that our calendars just go, trrrr? If you asked me for coffee right now, and most of us, you just look at your calendar – it’s crazy. And you’ve got to ask: well, what happened? Why, at a time when we would ponder and rejoice and be thankful and – well, we have got some things built in. You’ve got to buy gifts for all these people, you’ve got to write cards to all these people, you’ve got to go to parties. A lot of them you don’t even want to go to.

There’s a lot to do. You’ve got to bake, right? And there are some traditions you’ve got to fulfill and then some of you, you’ve got to travel. You’ve got to, you’ve got to, you ought, you should, you’ve got to, you’ve got to, you ought, you should.

And what Jesus is really going to say is, Really? Who made up the “gottas” and “oughtas” and “oughts” and that you should, that make Christmas season the most stressful time in many of your lives? So stressful, so busy, so overwhelming that the only thing you really forget is Jesus.

Do you find during the Christmas season that your time with Christ gets squeezed? You’ve got to shop, you’ve got to eat, you’ve got to cook, you go to these parties, you’re out a little bit later, it’s hard to get up.

What will be your game plan this Christmas to say, “Wow, if I have a supernatural Counselor that wants to give me wisdom and put His arm around me, coach me through this season, and help me for my good, what do I need to hear from Him?”