Join Pastor Rick Warren as he delves into the true meaning of Christmas in this moving series, ‘Will I Make Room for Jesus?’ Hear how the innkeeper’s choice echoes in our own lives when we overcrowd our hearts and push Jesus aside. From personal anecdotes about unexpected vacations to thought-provoking reflections on cultural shifts, Pastor Rick urges us to examine how we can make space for the divine in our daily lives.
Hey everyone, welcome to Pastor Rick Warren’s Daily Hope. We are so glad you’re here with us in this very special season. You know, on the very first Christmas, when Mary was just about ready to give birth to Jesus, she and Joseph were turned away by the innkeeper because there was no room. Today, Pastor Rick begins his Christmas series, Will I Make Room for Jesus?, And he shows us just like the innkeeper, we can miss out on being a part of God’s greatest plans if we don’t make room for Jesus in our everyday lives. All right, let’s join Rick now for part one of a message called, Will I Make Room for Jesus?
SPEAKER 01 :
You know, a number of years ago, my wife decided that I would get to choose where we went on vacation. And the kids were little at the time, and she said, we’re gonna let daddy decide what kind of vacation we took. And I said, I’d like to do a vacation that is totally spontaneous. No planning. I said, you know, I’m a leader, I’m a pastor. Every day of my life is planned. Every hour, every second. And to me, planning a vacation doesn’t sound like more fun. I’d like to do one that’s just totally spontaneous. Let’s just get in the car and we’ll just say we’re gonna drive over the western states. You know, we’ll go to the Dakotas and we’ll go to Wyoming and Montana and Utah and Colorado and Arizona and New Mexico. We’ll just drive around and we won’t do any planning. That sounds fun to me. That’s a great vacation for a 17 year old single guy. But not when you’ve got a wife and kids to bring along with you. Because as it turned out, without making any plans, on the first five nights of that vacation, in five different cities, four of those nights, we could not find any motel with a vacancy. and we spent four of the first five nights sleeping in the car. That did not create happy campers for my kids. And so along about the fifth night, we decided from then on we would plan ahead and order. I mean, we were in some big towns. We were in Denver one night, and at 11 o’clock at night, I’m going, I can’t find an open motel. And at 1.30 in the morning, we still didn’t have one. And I said, what’s going on? I mean, they said, well, actually, it’s the rodeo. and people for months have been planning and it’s all been booked in advance so i understood what it meant when they said for jesus there was no room in the end now we’re going to look at that story tonight there on your outline luke chapter 2. in those days caesar augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire roman world This was the first census that should take place while Quirinius was governor of Syria. And everyone went to his own town to register. So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem, the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. That was his family tree. So he goes back to Bethlehem. He went there to register with Mary who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. Now while they were there, the time came for the baby to be born. And she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. And she wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger. because there was no room for them in the inn. Now I want you to circle the phrase no room. There was no room for them in the inn. So he’s born in a manger. Now what’s a manger? Well the Greek word here actually can be used to refer to a stall that cattle are in in a stable, or it can actually refer to a feeding trough that cattle use which was usually made of wood or stone. Either way, Jesus is born in an unsanitary area. He’s not born in a palace. He’s not born even in a motel. He’s born in a barn, in a stable with a bunch of other animals. Now think about this. This is the eternal God. This is the Son of God, the promised Messiah. This event has been anticipated for hundreds, no, thousands of years. There have been all kinds of predictions and prophecies. and advanced notices where people say, one day God is sending the Messiah. God is going to send the son of God. God is gonna come to earth in human form and he’s gonna die for all of our sins. He’s gonna be the savior of the world. It had been predicted, it had been studied, it had been anticipated literally for thousands of years. This birth would split history into AD and BC. In fact, your birthday is dated in relationship to the birthday of Christ. So this is the most important event in history. It splits AD and BC, and yet when God does actually show up and he sends the Messiah, there’s no room for him. There’s no room for him to be born. Now, I have to think of this from a businessman’s point of view, and I think this innkeeper missed the biggest bonanza of his life. Because if Jesus had been born in his inn, he could have got one of those big, you know, signs like they have in Vegas that points down, you know, and says, son of God born here. And you could stay in the Jesus suite for only $129.95 and we’ll throw in the buffet and it could have been, you know, it could have been a Graceland. That’s probably why God didn’t do it. But he missed the biggest blessing of his life because he said, sorry, no room. We don’t have any room. And the savior of the world is born in a barn because they didn’t make room for him. Now, before we get too harsh on the innkeeper, We do this all the time. You do it, I do it, our culture does it. We don’t make room for Jesus. In fact, we kinda wanna push him out of the way. We certainly don’t want him to be viewed in public. In 1963, the courts decided that Jesus should be banned from the classroom, and prayer in classroom was outlawed, so there’s no room in the classroom. And then systematically over the last 40, 50 years, we have been taking Jesus out of each of the rooms of our culture, out of the courtroom, out of the state room, out of the classroom, out of the workroom, you can’t talk about him at work, out of the newsroom and all these other areas. So much so that even today, Jesus doesn’t even get to celebrate his own birthday anymore. It’s no longer Christmas, you take the Christ out, you put an X in the middle of it. That’s kind of obvious. We’re gonna take Christ out of his own birthday and just call it Xmas. On Monday, USA Today, front page, this was the headline. It said, Jesus is no longer the reason for the season. Christmas is no longer, I’m reading a quote, Christmas is no longer about Jesus’ birth. It’s just a month-long party with friends. At Christmas, you take a break, you go on vacation. Quote, it’s been downgraded on the religious calendar, end quote, said Barry Kosman of the Institute for Study of Secularism. Come, oh come all ye partiers, now trumps, oh come all ye faithful, for nearly a third of Americans. And they did a survey and this front page article said that today more parents tell their kids the Santa myth than actually tell them the true story about Jesus’ birth. This national survey revealed that kids today are more likely to learn the story of Jesus’ birth from Linus on a Charlie Brown Christmas than from their own parents. The Huffington Post’s James Martin wrote that even though retailers owe their year’s entire profits to Christmas, they now treat Jesus as quote, he who must not be named. Like the villain in the Harry Potter books. What’s going on here? We’re making no room for Jesus. You can say season’s greetings, say happy holiday, but you cannot say Jesus. and you take Christ out of Christmas. Now I really don’t wanna talk about culture tonight. What I want us to look is why don’t I make room for Jesus in my daily life? Why don’t you make room for Jesus in your daily life? And I wanna ask three questions. Why don’t we make room? Why should we make room? And how? How do you do it? How do you make room for Jesus? Now, the reasons we don’t make room for Jesus in our daily lives are the same three reasons that the innkeeper had. You need to realize that your heart is like an inn, and in your heart you have many different rooms. Your heart is compartmentalized from the different, or your brain, if you wanna say so, the way you think about different things. You have a family room in your heart, and that’s the time you give your family. You have a workroom in your heart and that’s where you give your work interest. You have a bedroom, that’s your sex life. You have a dining room, some of us have a very big dining room. You may have a study where you study. You certainly have a garage in your heart where you pile all the trash and all the junk and all the stuff. And if you’re going to invite Jesus into your heart, you’ve got to make room in your heart just like the innkeeper needed to make room in his own life. Now, why don’t we make room for Jesus? Well, there are three reasons. The first reason is we don’t pay attention. We don’t pay attention and we’re not even aware when Jesus shows up around us. You’re not aware when God’s in your life and yet he’s around your life all the time. God shows up in your life all the time in opportunities you didn’t know you were gonna get. In problems you didn’t know you were gonna have and he allowed them so you can grow. In words that other people say to you, Jesus shows up in your life all the time, you just don’t see him. It’s just like radio waves and TV waves. Right now, there are radio and TV waves going through this building. They’re actually going through your body. And if we had a tuner and tuned it in, we could get a picture of the TV pictures. But you can’t see them. That doesn’t mean they’re not real. They’re real. You’re just not tuned in. And so much of the time, we’re not tuned in. We’re not paying attention to Jesus being around us. Now, this is a common problem. In the Bible, it happened all the time. Jesus would show up and be talking to people, they didn’t realize who he was. They didn’t know he was the son of God. One time a couple guys are walking down the street on the road to a mace, Jesus starts walking with them, and it tells us this. They saw him, but they didn’t recognize him. They didn’t realize it was Jesus. Another time, Jesus is sitting by a well, and a woman comes up to get water, and he asks her for a drink of water. She doesn’t recognize him, she doesn’t know he’s the son of God, she doesn’t know he’s the savior of the world, and she gets involved in a religious debate with the guy. And Jesus then says this, it’s there on your outline, he said, if you only knew the gift that God has for you, and if you knew who I am, you’d be asking me for a drink and I’d be giving you living water. She didn’t notice, she didn’t pay attention, she didn’t recognize. And when Jesus shows up in our lives, we often do the same. We’re unaware of it. The clear example is the last month. I mean, it’s hard to not miss Jesus. during December. I mean, there are nativity scenes everywhere. There are Christmas specials on TV. There are, you know, posters and there are pictures. And there is the ubiquitous Christmas carol singing about Jesus on in every mall, in every office, doctor’s office, dentist’s office. But we’re not tuned in. Right now there are people out at a mall doing their last minute Christmas shopping, or they’re in a grocery store and they’re pushing a cart around, and overhead are words like this. Born today is the king of kings. Oh come all ye faithful. Come let us adore him, Christ the Lord. Christ the Savior is born. Hallelujah, hark the herald dangerous sling. The Savior has come to earth for you. And they’re pushing a cart around and buying, totally oblivious. We’re not noticing even Jesus when he’s around. Now, let me just bring a focus to this story. In Bethlehem, there was an inn. There was an inn there. Inns are created for the purpose of taking care of travelers, obviously. And so there was a place for the travelers to go. It’s designed for that purpose. It’s already there. The problem wasn’t that there wasn’t an inn. The problem is it was already booked. There was no vacancy. Other guests had occupied it. The spaces had been filled. It was there, but it wasn’t available. Now this is a parallel to your heart. Your heart was made to hold God. You were created to have God inside you. You were made by God and you were made for God. And until you understand that, life isn’t gonna make sense. But what happens is we fill our lives with other things, we invite other guests in, we rent our heart out to other things, and there’s no room for Jesus. The heart’s there, but it’s filled with other ideas, other interests, other values, other loves, other commitments. And that leads me to the second reason why we don’t make room for Jesus. First, we don’t pay any attention. The second is we crowd our lives with other things, and then there’s no room. There’s no room for God in our lives. Now, they may be good things, but they’re just in the way of God being in our lives. We crowd our lives with other things. We fill it with stuff. Have you noticed this? This is a profound truth. Stuff accumulates. Everybody agree with that? In fact, I’ve discovered that in garages, stuff multiplies. In the dark. I’ve tried to catch it doing it, but I haven’t been able to. But I know that the next morning, I go out there and go, where’d all this come from? It multiplies, it accumulates. My wife loves to watch this show Clean House on TV. You bring in a probe, they take all the stuff that’s a mess in your house, they put it out on the front lawn, they clean it all up, they put it back together, and it’s all in place, it’s really cool. And I go, yeah, how long is that gonna last? And there are these other shows about these hoarders who just cannot let anything go, and they keep stuffing and stuffing and stuffing, which is a parable of life for most of us. And they keep adding more and more in. And we say, well, I’m not that, and I’m very self-righteous. Okay, let’s just have a little Christmas confession. How many of you right now cannot park your car in your garage? Raise your hand, be honest. You can’t, I rest my case. The rest of you are liars. And you’re all going to hell. Dirty rotten liars. The fact is, garages are made for cars. That’s the purpose of a garage. They’re not made to contain stuff. They’re made for cars. Your heart was made for God. That’s the purpose of your heart. It was not made to hold all this extra other junk that we kind of cram in there and then we don’t have any room or any time or any thought for God. Our hearts are unavailable. You’ve rented out your heart to other borders. And so God can’t get in. No room in your car garage for a car, no room in your heart for a God. So you have no place, you have no space. You’ve overbooked your life. Now that might not be so bad, except the results are tragic. Why? Because when your life is filled with other things, you don’t have room in your life for the gifts God wants to give you. Did you know that God wants to give you gifts? Did you know the Bible says every good gift comes from God? And God, before you were born, planned the gifts he wants to give you. Relational gifts, emotional gifts, spiritual gifts, financial gifts, health gifts, all these other career gifts. Before you were born, God planned your life. And he made you for a purpose. God has never made anything without a purpose. You were made for a purpose. But here’s the catch. You can miss it. Because God doesn’t force you to follow his plan. He wants you to choose to love him by faith and in love and not be forced. He could have made us all puppets, but he didn’t. And so he says, okay, here’s my plan and my purpose for you. You go with my plan and purpose. You get all the gifts that I’ve planned during your lifetime. Or you can go it with your way. And the problem is most of us say, I’m going my way. I’m going to do my own thing. I’m going to be my own God. I’m going to call my own shots. Thank you very much, God. I think I’ll do it on my own. Well, how’s that turning out? Not too good, not too good. Because fact is, when you don’t go God’s way, what do you end up with? Broken lives, broken relationships, broken health, broken dreams. You end up hitting yourself against a dead-end wall over and over again, banging your head against the wall. You end up with disappointments and discouragements and things in life that you never even needed to have, but you brought them into your life because you said, I’m gonna go my way instead of God’s. You miss the gifts of God by having your heart too crammed with other things. Look at what the Bible says. 1 Corinthians 2.14, the unspiritual person has no room, there’s that phrase, no room for the gifts of God’s spirit. In fact, to him, they’re folly. He can’t even recognize them. I can’t put anything more in there because it’s already crammed full of stuff. You’ve probably got closets like that. Somebody bought you a whole new wardrobe, you’d have no place to put it because your area’s crammed. Now, Jesus described this kind of overcrowded life, and it perfectly describes Southern Californians. We overbook our lives, we overspend our budget, we overestimate our strength, and all of these things, and we walk around tired all the time because we’ve overbooked our heart. Jesus describes it in Mark chapter 4, verse 19. He says, “…they are overwhelmed…” with worries. They’re overwhelmed with worries about all the things they have to do and all the things they wanna get. That sound familiar? And the stress strangles what they heard and nothing comes of it. Their life is overbooked, their life is overcrowded. And by the way, the reason why somebody can go to church their entire life and it doesn’t change them is because of this crowded heart syndrome. You come and you hear a truth, you know, a kernel of truth. You get a little seed of wisdom and it is planted in your heart. You think, yeah, I need to do that. But you go home and immediately you’re distracted by all the things you have to do, all the things you want to get and you forget it and that seed is choked and it never grows into a fruit producing tree. You need to do less, not more. You just need to make sure it’s the important stuff, not the trivial stuff that isn’t gonna matter five years from now, much less 50 years for eternity. I want you to have more enjoyment, more fulfillment, and less stress by simplifying your life. You see, I’m not talking about evil things here. You can fill your life with good things, really good things, and still not have any time for God. I mean, you could go to church six days a week. You could be involved in ministry all the time, and you’re so busy working for God, God doesn’t have any time to work in you. That’s why the Bible says, be still and know that I am God. Translation, sit down and shut up. They say, chill out, you need to relax. Stop trying to do so much. Let God do more in you. It’s much more relaxing and much more fulfilling.
SPEAKER 02 :
Such a great message by Rick today and every day. I sure hope you were just as encouraged as I was. And now here’s Rick with a special message.
SPEAKER 01 :
I know I tell you this all the time, but again, I want you to know how much I thank God for you and appreciate your support of Daily Hope. We couldn’t do this without your prayers. And we can’t do it without your financial gifts. And I know that for many of you, this is a real sacrifice in order to be able to support the ministry of Daily Hope as we take the message of Christ literally around the world into places that nobody else is going to. As you consider your year-end giving, I want to ask you to consider about sending your greatest gift to Daily Hope that you’ve ever given. You know, the great news is that in this month, your financial gift will be doubled because a generous friend is offering a $100,000 matching grant. And they’ve challenged all of the rest of us to give as much as we can, and they will match it up to $100,000. That means that every dollar you give to Daily Hope in December, up to $100,000, will be doubled. You give $25, it’s like giving $50. And if you give $100, it’s like giving $200. And if you’re able to give $1,000 or more, it will be doubled. Your generosity, and of course, Christmas is all about the spirit of generosity. God so loved the world that he gave. Your generosity makes this ministry possible. It allows us to reach into refugee camps. It allows us to reach out around the world, overseas. It allows us to reach people who could not ever afford to pay for any discipleship tools or materials. So your donations matter. Let me ask you a personal favor. Don’t forget to pray for us during this season. We’re praying for you. Let me know that you prayed. It really blesses me to hear from you. I love the letters, the emails, the cards, the stories that come in, because it helps me realize we truly are partnering together in this ministry. It’s not about me. It’s about the Word of God, and it’s about what we can do together that none of us could do on our own. We are more effective together.
SPEAKER 02 :
We’re better together. This matching grant is only available until midnight on December 31st. So please act now by going to pastorrick.com. That’s pastorrick.com. Or you can just text the word HOPE to 70309. That’s the word HOPE to 70309. And thank you so much for your support. Be sure to join us next time. as we look into God’s Word for our daily hope. This program is sponsored by Pastor Rick’s Daily Hope and your generous financial support.
