I want to talk about baby Jesus. If I had a subtitle, I'd call it "The Baby Grew." And the Bible says that, speaking of John the Baptist, and the baby grew. Lord, speak to our hearts tonight.

This simple word. Just a short word, a few thoughts, but Lord, we believe received it from your heart. Lord, touch me. Now, Lord, speak to those who are in this house tonight, some, Lord, that are really not right with you. Jesus, they are here tonight in this Christmas season, and their hearts are really not set upon you, but on the things of this world and others who really don't have any intimacy with you or really know you as they ought.

We pray you speak to them, convict them, and love them into your kingdom tonight, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Just a heart-to-heart talk, 15, 20 minutes. It's something God laid on my heart. This is the season where the whole world seems to give adoration to the baby Jesus. All over the world. Can you imagine what heaven must hear in a way of carols? Joy to the world. Silent night. Holy night, they speak about the lowly Jesus, so tender and mild.

Hark, the herald angels mean joy to the world. King of kings, glory to the newborn king. What a sound from the earth that must drift into heaven of the adoration of God's own son.

What do you think God thinks of all of this? Last Sunday, I spoke to you about feeding Christ. And feeding Christ is not our time, but time that we give to him. Our time is in worship and praise, making petitions. But God's time, the feeding time, is when we just sit still and let him speak to our hearts.

And I was in one of those feeding times this past week, and I was thinking about the caroling and all of the adoration of the name of Jesus. Mormons, and I'm going to show you even how the Muslims talk about giving him praise and adoration. We'll talk about it right from the words of Information Center from the Muslim Center in Ontario, Canada.

And all of this, and you say, well, shouldn't God be mightily pleased about this? I want to talk to you about the grief of God on Christmas.

He said, boy, only Pastor Wilkerson can look at the gloomy side of Christmas. I know. I'll tell you, it's one of those feeding times, though, I began to feel the grief of God, of the hypocrisy of this season, of a generation that adore the baby but have nothing to do with the man.

They worship him in the crib but not on the throne. It's an amazing thing, this hypocrisy. That goes on in the world today. You see, baby Jesus is no threat to the world. They'll sing about him being the king because you see, up to now he has no kingdom. He hasn't established his kingdom. He's made no laws, given no commandments.

He's never spoken into their lives about his needs and his demands and his commandments. He's not yet cast any money changers out of the temple. He has not had the whip at their back for their hypocrisy. No, you see, he's baby. And you can worship and adore baby Jesus because he's no threat.

He doesn't communicate yet. He's not said one word about the sins of the world at this time. He's never made a law. Let's look at this hypocrisy for just a minute, this hypocrisy that is not just in America but all over the world.

I was reading something somebody sent me from the Islamic Information Center in Ontario, Canada. You see, what's happened recently...

Islamic teachers and some of their imans have come out strongly about Jesus. Mormons are doing the same thing. Mormons now go out, all of their evangelists two by two around the world now have a little pamphlet.

They'll talk to you about Jesus and the Mormons. And it's all about the exaltation of Jesus Christ, trying to tie, trying to tell people we are Jesus people. And the same thing now with Islam. Islam has just come out and they're trying to counteract this idea that Islam is a terrorist kind of organization or violent.

And here's what they've just put out. You cannot be a Muslim, I quote them, you cannot be a Muslim if you do not believe in Jesus. He was born of a virgin. In fact, he could talk as a baby. He could teach as a baby and heal the sick.

And this is to prove that they believe in a more miracle working Jesus than the Protestants do or the evangelicals. We believe he's more a miracle worker than you do. He heals the sick still.

And it says Allah rescued him from the Jews or from Israelites who were killing him. He is to be honored. In the last line, but Jesus was not God. You see, you can adore the baby and reject the man. You see, he grew up.

The hypocrisy in the land today is absolutely amazing to me. Americans all over the nation are crying about no prayer in schools. These are people, most of you, don't pray at home. A lot of them don't pray at home, but they really take a stand.

Even in Congress now, and I'm not indicting anybody, but you see the same thing. They say we're losing our religious freedoms. You can't put a motto up of the Ten Commandments in public places. You can't put a picture of Jesus or anything else.

But you see, we have a nation that will go fight for religious freedom to put up models on the wall in school and prayer in schools without having the law written in their hearts. You can be a reprobate here, but make sure you get your motto on the wall. It's hypocrisy.

You know, we say they're taking away our religious freedoms. We can't put up in public places anymore. Nativity scenes, creches, and they're taking that away from us. But there are many, many people who put out the little models of Jesus, and there's Mary, there's Joseph, they've got some cattle spread around, and there's a little baby doll.

That's Jesus. No go to church. We have nothing to do with the Jesus who's seated at the right hand of the Father now, have nothing to do with the man, but they sure do adore the baby.

And the worst hypocrisy is probably in God's house. Those who sing, oh, come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord. These are good words to sing, but it's another thing to let him be Lord in our lives.

And that's where the hypocrisy is to sing it and not surrender to his lordship. Mary took baby Jesus into the temple to be blessed. And there was an old prophet there, an old priest, prophet by the name of Simeon, who'd been looking all his life, all his life for the Messiah.

And when Mary brought the baby Jesus in, he was able to take that baby in his arms and worship. But you see, he was not looking at a baby. He was not adoring a baby. He says, this is the Messiah. This child is going to grow up.

And he foresaw a man who would wait all this time for the birth would know about his death and his resurrection. And he said, here's the salvation of the whole world. He looked at this. This is God.

The 84-year-old Anna, who'd spent many, many years in the temple just waiting and worshiping. And at this moment, she looks at this baby and marvels. I have lived to see the day, and I rejoice now because I have met the Redeemer of the whole world. I've met the Redeemer.

Didn't meet a baby. Met the Redeemer. Hold it, please. Please, no clapping. The shepherds call came and they worshiped, but they were not looking at a baby. They were looking at the one the angels said would be the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords.

And the same with the shepherds. They worshiped, but they were not worshiping just a child. They were worshiping what he would be, what he was, yes, but what he would become.

God will accept no other adoration, but that which climaxes in your mind, in your spirit, in your heart, it must climax at the cross.

The burial, the resurrection of Jesus and Christ seated the right hand in power. It does not receive any kind of adoration. The father will not receive any adoration that just ends at the crib.

Demands you. It has to be something you perceive in your mind and your spirit by the word of the living God that this little child was with the father.

And this little child, you look at him and say, this is the one, the Bible says, who made the worlds and everything that's made was made for him.

To think that this little child is creator of all things and set aside his glory to come as a man. We celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.

And God receives this adoration from us who believe in not only his birth, not only that he came as a baby, but he was the son of the living God. Not just a miracle worker because there are many miracle workers. Not just a prophet because there are many prophets.

Not because he went about doing good. Many go about doing good. Not just because he was a baptizer. I baptize. No, you see, the issue is not whether he was a prophet. The issue is not whether he was a good man, a miracle worker, not at all.

The issue is, do you believe he is God? This separates us from every other religion. Do you believe that this baby Jesus is God? No, I'm not asking you, I'm asking the world out there. I'm preaching to the choir on that, my goodness.

You see, you can be a Muslim and believe in the virgin birth. You can belong to almost any cult and believe he was virgin born. And how they get that he could be virgin born and not God, I don't understand.

Let me take a little more time and just tell you what's on my heart. I thank God for baby Jesus, his own son. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, not just at the cross, but as a child.

He came, and that was his gift.

But you see, the shepherds, we live in an incredible time. How the shepherds and the wise men would have yearned and longed to have lived in our time.

You say, boy, it would have been wonderful to have been there when Christ Jesus was announced to the world that he came to the world. But you see, they couldn't have any fellowship with that baby. That baby couldn't talk. There was no fellowship.

There's no intimacy. You and I have the privilege of being intimacy with this man, this child who grew up.

And we have the privilege that this generation did not have. The wise men didn't have what you and I have. The shepherds didn't have what you and I have. We can talk to this man. He talks to us. We have fellowship with him. We are one with him.

This is the time to be alive. More greatly blessed we are.

And I was thinking about that while the Lord was speaking to my heart and I was feeding him. You see, feeding Christ is when you allow him to speak into your life.

You begin to speak and you hear his still small voice and he teaches you by his spirit.

And what the Lord was speaking to my heart about was that this baby Jesus grew up.

And God spoke to my heart that this was a very painful time for him. Really painful, the father to see so many millions adore his little baby, Jesus, and totally reject and neglect the man that he grew to be, the gospel that he brought to the world, and the fellowship.

And God began to speak to my heart, the Lord Jesus began to speak to my heart about his constant love.

It's coming now, knowing him person to person, knowing him intimately, the Jesus Christ who speaks, the Jesus Christ capable of fellowship.

And I began to rejoice when he began to speak to my heart about his constant love, that it never wavers. I don't care how I may fail him. The love of this man, Christ Jesus, is constant.

You can wake up in the morning, you can feel like you are unsaved. You can feel condemned. You can feel almost any feeling in the spectrum of feelings of the flesh.

But one thing you must know and one thing that brings great joy to my heart is that no matter how I feel, even if I have failed the day before, I may have lost my temper. I may have said things out of order. I may have doubted him, but his love for me is constant.

It never wavers. He doesn't fit in and out of my life, down one day on me, up with me the next day. His love is constant. And that's the fellowship I have with a man, Christ Jesus.

If you feel like clapping, just shout, hallelujah. Catherine Coleman used to give her people a flag. She said, don't clap, wave your flag. The continual presence of this man.

And I can wake up in the middle of the night, he's there. I told you what the Lord was speaking to me, that when we start feeding him, before we even go into the secret closet to meet him, he'll start talking to you at the door.

You put your hand on the door to your secret closet, I mean, to your bedroom, wherever you pray, wherever you get along. Now, some of you don't have that. Your prayer closet can be subway, bus, anywhere you want to be. Just close the door of your mind. He's there.

You don't have to conjure it or anything else. He'll speak to you. I believe that more than anything else. He'll speak to you.

And it's this continual fellowship, this continual speaking into our lives.

Something the baby, lovely, wonderful Jesus, baby, couldn't give at that time, but we have the privilege. Do you understand what I'm saying? I adore baby Jesus, and I thank God he came in flesh and all that that represents, but some better thing has been provided for us.

Fellowship. I would die without that. I wouldn't want to be here.

I enjoy talking to Pastor Carter and the other pastors here, but boy, they can't satisfy what I need. And I can't satisfy anything in their lives.

And I don't care who you are. There's nobody in the world can satisfy that hunger, that need that's in you, that hurt. Nobody.

Shout hallelujah. Don't clap.

I'm not trying to be funny. I mean it to all my heart. I thank God this Christmas that this past year especially has been such a marvelous speaking into my heart because I'm giving him that quality time and that fellowship that we have with one that I know who's just like me, who's already been through the feelings of all my infirmities that maybe Jesus had not yet experienced.

Without Jesus in your heart, where do you go? When you're in trouble, when you're blue, and you're down, and you've called everybody you know and they couldn't help you, and you've done every little trick you've ever tried to do to get rid of those feelings of hurt and loneliness and pain, and maybe some of you tried to take a pill or drink it away, and then when you wake up, it's double worse, doubly worse.

Where do you go without him? That's why you need somebody to talk to.

And that's why you need him in your life. And how sad it is at Christmas. How doubly sad for some of you listen to me now and even in the annex.

And I'm going to close in just a few moments. How doubly sad. I've been thinking about it all day today. How doubly sad that you should live in such pain that you live your life with no one to speak into your life and give you total satisfaction in times like these.

You cried probably when you saw on television those planes crashing into the World Trade Center. I cried, and I'm sure most of you cried.

And some of you who've been running away from the Lord, you cried. If you didn't cry, you had tears in your eyes and you felt great sorrow.

But you see, it's a sad, sad thing to think of so many that are living their life in a literal hell and are going to die and go to hell.

That's painful thought that you would go on in your misery when the Lord Jesus says, I have fellowship for you. I want to speak into your life. I want to be your friend.

I thought of it this afternoon before coming to church and almost too much to take to think there'd be people in the service tonight that are so unhappy, so discouraged.

And you know where to go, and you've heard the message, and you won't do it. You just put it off. I don't have time. You're too busy. You just put it off.

Now let me just say this before we pray. Some of you here who at one time said, Jesus, I give you my heart. I believe. You're not going to make it, and I'll tell you why.

You're breaking at least two or three of his commandments. If you sit here now and you tell me you're a Christian, you're a believer, you know what the Bible says?

Now, we're not going to be judged by the law of Moses, those 600 demands made by the priests. We are going to be judged by the moral law, that the commandments of the Lord.

Now, so worship the Lord thy God with all your heart, all your mind, and all your soul, all your strength. Are you?

You're a Christian, are you worshiping the Lord with all that's in you? He said, you have no other gods before me. Thou shall have no other gods before me.

Now this is a standard. God's revealed his nature. It's the mirror God holds up.

An old timer said, the law will drive you to the cross, but can't take you any further.

And I believe that it takes you right to the cross.

And some of you need to repent, even though you call yourself a Christian or believer.

Because you see the idol. He said, you have no other gods, no other idols before me.

And anything that takes up your thinking time, you spend all your time thinking. How much time do you spend thinking about Jesus? How much time do you spend talking to your friends about him?

Even your Christian friends. Forget about, for a moment, just witnessing to unsaved, but how much time do you spend even thinking or talking about Jesus at all?

What do you talk about? What do you think about? Where are you spending your time?

You stand before God one day and have to answer.

You say, well, I have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. You did that way back there.

But you see, if you really did that, if you were truly a believer, you would be walking according to his word.

You

Here is the cleaned sermon transcription:

Do you never even dig it up except when you come to church? Or when you think about going to hell, you say, well, I'm a Christian. I want you to think about it now as we close. And I felt very strongly that I should open up these altars for those in the annex to come down here and let me pray with you. And those here in the main auditorium, you know why? You may not think this as much.

You know a good time to get really saved and really surrendered is Christmas time. It's easy to remember the date. That's silly. No, it's not. A special day. Stand. I'm asking you to send the Holy Spirit now and speak to the hearts of everyone in this place, in the annex, the balcony, here in the main auditorium. Speak clearly, Holy Ghost. I'm not just giving this little heart-to-heart talk to this body, but I pray, Holy Spirit, now that you speak to us.

I want you to speak to us, every one of us hearing me, how we have been treating you. And how we spend this time adoring the baby but won't follow the man as we ought. And if you're here tonight, I've prayed this through, and I believe the Holy Spirit's already speaking.

Now, this is going to take honest speaking from your heart, dead honest before God. And I have never been more serious than I am right now in all my life. And know this to be a fact because the Holy Ghost told me.

There's some of you here, came here tonight, and it's not that you don't love Jesus. It's that you have not been walking as you should with him. And he wants you to draw near to him so he can speak into your life and lead you and direct you. Because you see, if you keep going the way you're going, you're going to get more and more discouraged, and finally you're going to walk away from him.

I'm asking you not to cross that line. And I'm asking you to cross the right line now and say, Pastor David, that's me. Deep in my heart, I have these wonderful feelings about Jesus that I neglected him. I've been neglecting him. And I want you to renew your love and your passion for Jesus tonight.

If you're backslidden, if you have... Let another idol slip into your life. And you've not been given him a thinking time, you've not been given your whole heart, I want you to come down here and repent, and I'll pray with you, and we'll believe Jesus tonight. Even while I'm talking, follow in the annex, just the ushers go to the lobby there, they'll show you how to get into this auditorium, come down the stairs and meet me right here, and we'll pray.

Up in the balcony, go to the stairs on either side, and walk down here, and we'll minister to you, and let's believe God. Come on. Don't hold back and say, well, people think I'm, who cares what people think? It's only about what Jesus thinks now. It's only what Jesus thinks now.

Hallelujah. Lord Jesus, I pray that your Holy Spirit come now and do a deep, precious and lasting work in the hearts of all those who've humbly come to this place now to say, Jesus, I need help. I need comfort and I need strength.

Lord, here's a woman who lost her brother in the world trade disaster, looking for comfort. Give her comfort, Lord, and give her grace. And we pray for others that are here needing special grace.

And others, Lord, who need to just surrender and say, here I am, Jesus. I give my all to you and I give my heart completely now to you. Would you just pray that out right loud wherever you are, wherever you stand?

And if you didn't come forward, even where you're standing right now, you can pray by your head and just breathe it out in prayer. Even if you don't say it out loud, it's good because out of the abundance of your heart, the Bible said your mouth speaks.

So it's good to speak it out. And just say, Lord Jesus, come now. I come to live my life for you. I come to obey your word. I come, Lord Jesus, to walk with you. I invite you to come and speak into my heart.

I come to give you time. I come, Lord, to make you Lord and King of my life. I come to the man, Christ Jesus. I come to him who's seated at the right hand of the Father, ready to give me all that I need in grace and support and strength.

Just thank him now. While your hands are up, just thank him. Lord Jesus, we give you thanks. We give you praise. We glorify you.