(upbeat music) - Well, Merry Christmas to all of the Ask Pastor John podcast listeners out there. On behalf of John Piper and the whole team at Desiring God, we pray that your Christmas is filled with the glorious beauty of our Savior, Jesus Christ. And thank you for joining us for another year on the podcast.

Thanks for all the great questions and your engagement. We can't do this podcast without you. Well, the great Christmas hymn, Joy to the World, is a celebration of the glory of our sovereign Savior and the global joy that he brought in his birth in the little town of Bethlehem.

That same hymn calls for every heart to prepare him room. What's that mean exactly, to receive Christ? That's the question Pastor John took up in his 1986 sermon, Preparing to Receive Christ. Here's what he said. - We regard divine things as stupid, folly. Let me bring it into the Christmas setting.

By nature, as flesh and blood, we recoil at the humiliating implications of Christmas. And therefore, we redesign Christmas. Christmas is humiliating because it means I'm cursed and need a Savior. Christmas means that I am lost and I need a shepherd. It means I'm sick and I need a physician.

It means I'm a rebel and I need a reconciler. And it means I'm dirty and I need a purifier. Now, when that message about Christmas is heralded, the natural man or flesh and blood hates it so much that it becomes blind to it, to protect itself from it. And then redesigns Christmas in a secular way to cope with it.

Why does the human heart not run to the light when the light comes into the world? Jesus told us why in John 3:19. He said, "Light has come into the world, "but men loved darkness rather than light." They loved darkness. No person in the world is spiritually blind against His will.

You got that now? Put that in your computer and processing what you hear from this pulpit. No person in the world is spiritually blind against His will. Spiritual blindness is hate of the light. Spiritual blindness is the recoiling from the light and the loving and the embracing of the dark.

And loving and embracing is an act of the will. No one is blind against His will. The will is corrupt in blindness. If any of you or I have seen the sun for who He is, something more than flesh and blood has been at work in our lives. Amen?

What is it? Matthew 16, 17, "My Father in heaven "has revealed this to you." Now the question is, how? Because all of us want to affirm what the Bible says. We want to say, "Yes, yes." But how? What was it like? I'm not sure what to point to in my experience.

I know I'm saved. I believe Jesus. I trust Him. I love Him. I make every effort to obey. I confess when I sin. But I can't remember that ever happening to me. So I want to ask with you, what's it? What is it? What was it like for Peter and for us?

Was it in a dream where God Almighty, the Father comes to you and says, "When you wake up, read the Word "and what you see there of Christ, believe it, it's true." Or was it perhaps that you were reading a verse about the divinity of Christ and it thundered outside.

"Whoa, that's a sign that this is true. "He is God." Or many other such external constraints on your will. If so, if that's what you think it means or has happened to you, be very suspicious of this. Why? Because it doesn't honor Christ. If Christ comes and knocks on your door and you open the door and you look at Him, just an ordinary man, nobody attractive, nobody marvelous, nobody beautiful, nobody divine, nobody good enough to rip you away from your sins, nobody great to fall on your face and kiss His feet, but then the phone rings and you pick up the phone and it says, "Hello, this is God Almighty, the Father.

"That's my son at your door, let him in." And you, "Whew, okay, okay." And you go, "Come on in, Jesus. "You may come into my life." Sure, I don't want to go to hell. You can't be saved if that's the way you welcome Jesus into your life. If you open the door and you saw nothing beautiful, nothing glorious, nothing attractive, nothing matchless, nothing to free you from your sins, but under someone's constraint, you said, "Well, this is what you're supposed to do.

"You go to church and you call Him God "and you pray to receive Him." You're not saved. Christ is not honored like that. There's no glory for Christ in that. Where is another illustration where Jesus expects somebody to recognize Him for who He is? And how does He expect that person to recognize Him?

And then we'll get insight into how God reveals the Son. All right? The person is John the Baptist. Where is he? He's in jail. And he's starting to doubt. Don't condemn yourself for doubting. Jesus called John the Baptist the greatest of men. The greatest man born of woman was doubting in His last hours.

However, he didn't sink into despair. He sent disciples to Jesus and He asks Him, "Are You He who is to come or shall we look for another?" Now, what's that question mean? That question means, "Are You the Messiah?" Now, what has Jesus just told Peter about how to find out if He's the Messiah?

Get a revelation from God, right? So what Jesus says to these disciples is, "You go back, tell John to get down on his knees "and ask for a revelation from God, right?" Wrong. This is very important. How does Jesus help this man in desperate torment about whether He is the Christ?

"Go tell John what you hear and see." "The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, "lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, "the dead are raised up and the poor have good news preached to them, "and blessed is He who takes no offense at me." Now, if you can only recognize the Son for who He really is by a revelation from the Father, why does Jesus answer this man's desperate, doubting question by sending a human report of the deeds and words of Jesus?

Here's the answer, as far as I can see. The indispensable work of God the Father in the life of John, Peter, you and me, the indispensable, revealing work of God the Father is not, I repeat, is not an adding to us of information that we can't see in Jesus.

Rather, the indispensable work of God the Father revealing the Son is the opening of the eyes of our heart to see Him for who He really is. At the door. So that when we welcome Him, He's honored because we have fallen on our face. We have kissed His feet, we've seen His glory, and when He sits on our couch, it's not because of any authoritative constraint over the phone, it's because He's real.

He's God. He's glorious. He's my treasure. He satisfies. Has God the Father Almighty revealed the Son to you? How does it happen? It happens along the lines of the written, inspired Word of God. So what should you do this Advent season to prepare to receive Christ for who He really is?

Two simple things, and they are simple. The Gospel is wonderfully simple. Number one, look. Look. Look at Jesus. Consider Jesus. Meditate on Jesus. Fix your sights on Jesus. Open the Bible to Luke and read it again and again and again and again this Advent season. Read a Gospel a day if you have to, if you think you're outside Christ.

Expose yourself to Jesus. And then secondly, pray. "Open my eyes, Father, that I might behold the beauty of Christ." Because God loves to open the eyes of people who are looking at Jesus. Because then, when their eyes are opened, they see Him and He gets the glory. They get the salvation.

And this could be the greatest Advent season of your life. Amen. Those words are still true. And if you haven't, embrace this Christ. He is extraordinary. He is marvelous. He is divine. He is beautiful enough to rip you away from your sins. He's glorious enough for all of us to fall on our faces before Him, to kiss His feet, and to anoint Him with oil.

He is, in Himself, that precious. Such a good word for all of us this Christmas. This clip was pulled from John Piper's 1986 sermon, "Preparing to Receive Christ." Well, I hope you enjoy what remains of your Christmas break. We're back on Friday, and many of you will be back to work.

We'll look at the pressures of Silicon Valley on tech professionals and ask whether or not Christlikeness can survive in an environment that sees the virtues of Christ to be weaknesses. Interesting. That's on Friday. Again, Merry Christmas. Thank you for joining us for another year on the Ask Pastor John podcast.

I'm your host, Tony Reinke, and we'll see you on Friday.