Happy Christmas Eve, everyone.

Thank you for joining us on the podcast.

Pastor John, last time in the last episode, I shared a clip from you preaching on Christmas

of 1981, 40 years ago, at the youthful age of just 35, a clip that's older than you

were when you've reached hit amazing to hear your voice as a rookie pastor back then.

We're now zoomed into real time here in the studio.

You are 75 now, and Christmas 2021 is tomorrow.

For a lot of Christmases, you've been thinking about the implications of Christ coming,

but particularly this year. I know you've been giving a lot of thought to the holiday

over these past several weeks, leading up to Christmas. Tell us why and what's on your mind

on this Christmas Eve. Tony, I learned back in October that I'd be preaching at my own church

at Bethlehem the Sunday before Christmas, last Sunday. From that time in October until now,

the wonder of Christmas that has taken hold of me in a fresh and powerful way is the amazing

reality that the personal, infinite, eternal, holy creator of the universe sent his son

into this tiny speck of human habitation called Earth in order to be condemned to death in my place.

Sometimes we just have to do what Psalm 46 says, namely, be still and know that I am God. In other

words, we have to just pause and let staggering reality sink in. Christmas Eve is a really good

time, I think, to do this. So what reality do we need to let sink in today? Reality like this,

before and above and outside of all created reality, outside of the entire scope of the universe

with its countless light years of expanse, outside of all that, there is and there always has been

a personal, infinite, eternal, holy God. He is absolute reality. He is the most real, real,

the most ultimate thing he ever said was, I am, who I am. He is simply there. He's there,

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