​Thanks to Christmas, we all end the year with new things—new toys for the kids, new clothes (not always the right color or size, but still new), new pounds on our bodies. We start the year off with new things, a new calendar on the wall, new bills, new resolutions for the days ahead.  Everybody likes new things, including God. He’s called the Ancient of Days, and He says,

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”
​         (Is. 43:18-19)

An earthly perspective is vastly different from a heavenly perspective.  We see dimly.  God sees with clarity.  We see a small slice of the truth.  God see eternally.  We only see now.  God sees beyond.  Perspective changes our perceptions. 

Try walking into our worship service/building with the eyes of a first time person.  What do you see?  What is confusing?  What makes sense?  How easy/difficult is it to figure out about the nursery if you have children?.... a thousand questions.  Over the years I have brought people into this building on a Saturday or week-day encouraging them to return on a Sunday.  I want them to see it ahead of time so they can visualize where they might sit, what they might see, the fellowship hall.  Perspective.  If you desire to share the gospel with another person it is incredibly important to understand who they are, /background.  The words I say to one of the wonderful Summer blueberry pickers from Texas is different from the depressed woman in the foothills or from the seven year old child.  The need for salvation is the same, the message of the cross is constant, but the questions being asked, the needs that need to be met are different. 
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Perspective.  Here is how you change your world: Ask the Lord Jesus Christ to enlarge your heavenly perspective so that you can see the world through the eyes of God. 
The coming of Jesus allows us to gain a heavenly perspective.  God has made it easy for even those of us with the thickest heads to penetrate.  God sent his one and only Son into the world that we might see the One that has lived forever with God.  We grow by leaps in our faith as we begin to see the world from God’s perspective.  

My daughter Bianca told the story of some of her friends in college that were coming home from a trip back to Newberg, OR.  They went right instead of left, heading east instead of west.  100 miles later they discovered their error.  That’s lost! 
 
This is the season of Advent, anticipation of the coming of Jesus Christ at Christmas.  Many Christmas sermons focus on the WHO of the Christmas story and the wonderful lessons of Joseph, Mary, Shepherds, The Wise Men, Baby Jesus and the other inspiring characters of the Christmas story.  Other sermons emphasize the WHEN, the coming of Jesus foretold through the prophets, the times in which he was born.  The HOW of Christmas, the virgin birth, the flight to Egypt, the search of Herod, the worship of the Magi.  WHERE involves Bethlehem, Egypt, Jerusalem, Israel, Egypt…

This Advent season, a simple reflection of WHY Jesus came.  The story of the birth of Jesus Christ is more than a heartwarming story of a young couple that traveled to Bethlehem and gave birth to Jesus in a stable and was greeted by ordinary folks from near and royalty from far.  WHY Jesus came is the bottom line truth the world needs to hear.  Not Who was at the stable, not When it took place, not the details of How it happened, those are all wonderful elements of the Christmas season, but if we stop there then we have missed the point.