The Australian Christmas Tree, Moojar, taps into the roots of other trees, we need to spiritually tap into God and draw from His goodness.
Sermon Transcript:
I have a little personal Christmas tradition, which my husband, Luke, my children and my older grandchildren can testify to. And that is, every December (without a miss) when I’m travelling in the car, I make it my business to search for an Australian Christmas Tree.
Up near Henley Brook there are scores and scores of Australian Christmas trees which are currently proudly displaying their fiery blossoms.
Could we have that first picture please?
Aren’t they beautiful? Without the blossom it’s a rather gnarled, dreary looking tree but the blossom, the blossom makes it come alive! This tree needs no outside decoration. It’s perfectly stunning on its own.
You probably already know this, but I’m going tell it because we’re talking about God’s amazing creation here and I love talking about God’s creation.
The Australian Christmas tree (WHICH IS ALSO CALLED – Ps Vicki, come up here and give us the botanical name please)
The Australian Christmas tree is believed to be one of the largest parasites in the world! This tree’s greedy roots stab victims up to 110m away. It’s true, the Christmas tree has blades for slicing into the roots of plants to steal their sap. The blades are sharp enough to draw blood on human lips. They actually can cause power failures when the tree attacks buried cables by mistake. And telephone lines can get cut as well.
The Christmas tree is indiscriminate, stealing juice from almost anything green. We’re talking – grasses, carrots, weeds, vines, shrubs, eucalypts. It sometimes attacks its own roots, by mistake, and even fallen twigs as well. When one of its roots meet another root it forms a collar of tissue around it, like a swollen wedding ring, and a hydraulically operated blade then forms inside.
Let’s have a look at the next picture
Look at that, interesting isn’t it?
Each tree attaches to hordes of victims.
The Christmas tree is an icon of south-western Australia because it blooms so dramatically in summer. It’s beautiful! The showy orange flowers have been likened to ‘a bushfire without smoke’.
When bush is cleared to create pastures, Christmas trees are often left standing because of their beauty (and also, I think, at one stage they were protected – because horses love the juicy sap that drips from their bark and they were getting eaten).
But even though land would be cleared of other trees and bushes around them, the Australian Christmas trees continued to live because they simply fed off the grass that would grow around them.
The indigenous people of south-western Australia, the Noongars, call the Australian Christmas tree, Moojar. Apparently, before European settlement, when the Noongars would see this tree bloom, it was a sign for them to move from inland towards the coast because this was a sure sign that the searing heat of summer was on its way!!
I challenge all of you, this December, to take a drive, with the kids, if you have some (borrow some if you don’t, I’m sure parents would be grateful) and look for an Australian Christmas Tree. You could even count them, or take a photo and send it to me 😊
Let us pray
Dear Lord, our wonderful and awesome Creator, let today’s sermon be a spiritually refreshing moment for all who hear. And as a result, may we all move closer to You, may we all tap into your love, joy, peace and hope. Amen
We had a lovely time-sharing Jesus in our Christmas concert last week didn’t we?
Of course, the over-riding message of the concert was that the account of the birth of Jesus clearly demonstrates to the world that JESUS, the Son of God, is THE gift of love, THE gift of joy, THE gift of peace and THE gift of hope to a lost and fallen world. This is the Christmas story in a nutshell. JESUS, the Son of God, is THE gift of love, THE gift of joy, THE gift of peace and THE gift of hope to a lost and fallen world.
I mean, who in their right mind wouldn’t want to have everlasting love, joy, peace and hope? What amazing gifts!!
They’re priceless. People can spend a lot of money in attempting to acquire these wonderful treasures.
This message of what Jesus is, is indeed a powerful one that we as Christians must embrace whole heartedly to get the most out of our relationship with God.
Listen to me, I want you to get the most out of your relationship with God. All the elders and pastors in this church, want you to get the most out of your relationship with God.
This is why it is good for Christians to revisit the Christmas account on a regular basis. Jesus came to bring true love, true joy, true peace and true hope to each individual who is willing to receive Him, Him, Him, Him. These wonderful treasures are HIM. They are who He is.
I did a search on google this week and there is so much advice on how to enjoy Christmas even if you don’t like it? Actually, that was the name of one of the articles I read – How to enjoy Christmas even if you don’t like it?
Here’s another one – 10 ways to have a happier Christmas even when you’re not feeling merry
Another – 10 tips for beating the holiday blues (holiday blues! Isn’t that an oxymoron? Holiday YAY Blues sob sob)
And here’s another title, – How to enjoy Christmas day spent all by yourself.
I wanted to cry with that one.
It makes me feel sad just reading the titles, truly!
People everywhere are desperate to have good feelings at Christmas time. So, they google search for ‘some sort of advice’ to inspire them to do something that will deliver a short-term good feeling fix. “Please someone give me a good feeling fix; is it too much to ask!!?”
But the true, the real message of Christmas is not about a short-term good feeling fix.
It’s about us entering a real relationship with our Creator which will result in us permanently experiencing His love, joy, peace and hope for eternity. But in the words of Mary, the mother of Jesus, “How can this be?”, isn’t that what she said to the angel Gabriel? – How can this be? It all seems too good to be true. Is it really possible for Christians to experience this?
I was talking about Christmas with my 5 and a 1/2-year-old grandson, Harvey. Harvey has very good theology. Thanks to his parents, and this church, this community he has been raised in, he is very certain in his understanding of who God is. To the point where his conversation and questions make me think.
Anyway, we were discussing Christmas and how God shows His love. And Harvey said that God is a God of love because He does lovely things for people. I replied, “Yes Harvey this is true, I totally agree with you on that point. But the Bible specifically says, God IS love. God IS love! Not just because of what He does but it is WHO HE IS. What does that mean?” Harvey’s eyes lifted to the ceiling, and I could see he was really trying to figure that one out.
It’s not an easy one for a 5-year-old, it’s not an easy one for a 59-year-old!
God is love. God is an invisible Spirit who fills the universe, He’s omnipresent, and He is love.
God doesn’t just demonstrate love or give love.
He is love!
All true agape love (agape love is the highest form of love because it’s a sacrificial love that unites and heals) this amazing agape love stems from the Spirit of God. It originates with Him; it comes from Him because it is who He is.
1 John 4:16 New Living Translation
16 We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in His love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.
Let’s read it again because this is a beautiful powerful scripture.
1 John 4:16 New Living Translation
16 We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in His love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.
In John 13:35 New Living Translation
Jesus said, “Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”
That’s how people will know we are Christians because of the agape love we demonstrate towards one another!
Becoming a Christian is trusting in the love of God, and it is having an assurance that His love is growing in us throughout our lives
1 Thessalonians 3:12 New Living Translation
12 And may the Lord make your love for one another and for all people grow and overflow, just as our love for you overflows.
We are loved and we have love because God IS our source of LOVE.
Well, if God is our source of love, what does He say about JOY? I’m so glad you asked!!!
Let me tell you about the God I know and have read about in the Bible.
God is not a sour puss deity looking for someone to smite!
My God is a joyous God who takes delight in the works of His hands. The rejoicing in heaven when a lost one is saved is certainly led by God!
In Zephaniah 3:17 it says, “The Lord your God is in your midst, a victorious warrior. He will rejoice over you with joy…, He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy.”
In John 15:11 Jesus said, “I have told you this so that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
John 17:13 says “I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of My joy within them.
1 Thess. 1:6 Paul says – You (the church) became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.
Nehemiah 8:10
The joy of the LORD is my strength
Romans 14:17
For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.
God is full of joy. Undoubtedly He is the most joyous being in the universe. The abundance of His love and generosity is inseparable from his infinite joy.
We as Christians can experience and live in joy because joy is a part of the very nature of God. We can know joy because God is joy.
He is our source of JOY. It originates with Him; JOY comes from Him because it is who He is.
What about peace?
I loved the little spiel that Diana read at the Christmas concert last week.
She said, “What does peace look like in your life? Is it the last vacation you took? The precious minutes in the morning you get before the rest of your family wakes up? The 90 seconds it takes to sing Silent Night on Christmas Eve? If you’re carrying around a frustrated heart today because of the lack of peace in your life, there’s good news in the Christmas story for you. And it’s more than a fleeting moment of peace. The Bible calls Jesus the Prince of Peace. He literally becomes our peace when we receive Him as our gift of peace.”
Ephesians 2:14 says,
For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down, in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility.
Philippians 4:7
And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Colossians 3:15
And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts…
2Thess 3:16
Now may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times in every way.
And of course, Isaiah 9:6 calls Jesus the Prince of Peace.
Jesus/God is OUR peace. He is our source of peace! It originates with Him; PEACE comes from Him because it is who He is.
The peace we have is not affected by the condition of the fallen world. Our peace is not reliant upon our surroundings or happenings. We have peace, because God is peace, He lives in us, and that peace grows as we move closer to Him.
And finally, HOPE.
Allow me to tell you that Biblical hope is not wishy-washy, or desirous of the unlikely. Rather, biblical hope is a confident belief and expectation in the truths and promises of God. Hope in God always has a positive connotation.
In fact, the Bible has much to say about God Himself being our hope.
For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. Psalm 71:5
“And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. Psalm 39:7
Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. Psalm 43:5
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in Him.” Lamentations 3:24
And why is God our hope?
He is our assured hope
Because of His power
Because of His provision
Because of His promises
Because of His person
His person is such that He is merciful, forgiving, faithful, good and righteous.
Our hope is founded on His character. He is indeed the best source of hope in the whole universe. In fact, He’s the only source of eternal hope. He is hope!!!
1 Tim 1:1 says,
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our Saviour and of Christ Jesus OUR HOPE.
God is our HOPE, God is LOVE, God is our PEACE and God is our JOY.
If you’re a Christian this is your reality. So, live like it.
Don’t become swamped by the things of this fallen world.
Evaluate yourself. If you feel like you’re running on empty.
Tap into God more —–Tap into God!
Please show the Australian Christmas Tree one last time.
Like an Australian Christmas Tree – Moojar – taps into the roots of another tree – tap into God and draw from His goodness. Draw from who He is.
Love, joy, peace and hope. Amen?