Wonderful Counselor

 “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given…. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”  – Isaiah 9:6

Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year. And honestly, this year I need Christmas more than ever. I plan to savor every minute of this special season. How about you? I think it would do everyone good to soak it all in. Walk or drive through your neighborhood and look at all the Christmas lights. Listen to Christmas music. Watch some uplifting Christmas movies like “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “Miracle on 34th Street” and “Elf.” Bake some Christmas cookies … and bring some to me. Enjoy this Christmas season to the fullest!

But most importantly, keep Christ at the center of your Christmas celebration. Read the Christmas story from Matthew 2 and Luke 2. Talk with others about why we celebrate Christmas. Be a blessing to people around you who are feeling sad or alone. Being a Secret Santa is fun, but God has called you to bring Jesus to those who are hurting.

2020 has been filled with doom and gloom. But God has a plan—a good plan to prosper us and not to harm us, a plan to give us hope and a future. He has a plan to head off the doom and gloom. And that plan was foretold in Isaiah 9, written some 700 years before Christ was born.  God promised His people: “Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress…. in the future He will honor Galilee of the Gentiles, by the way of the sea, along the Jordan. The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned” (vs. 1-2).

And what’s most amazing of all is who God tells us will carry out His plan: not a massive army, a league of nations or a great political leader. God’s amazing plan rests in the hands … of a child. “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” (v. 6). This promised child would be a king unlike any other king who ever lived, a lord unlike any other lord who ever ruled. This child would be King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

Let’s take a few minutes to wrap our minds around this first kingly title of Jesus in verse 6: Wonderful Counselor. What does this title mean? The word “wonderful” in Isaiah 9:6 is a translation of the Hebrew word “pele,” which is defined as  “a phenomenon lying outside the realm of human explanation; that which is separated from the normal course of events; a miracle, a marvel, something extraordinary, incomprehensible, inexplicable.”

I really like what GotQuestions.org has to say about the wonder of Jesus: “Jesus demonstrated His wonderfulness in various ways when He was on the earth, beginning with His conception in the womb of a virgin (Matthew 1:23). He showed He is the ‘wonderful’ One in His power to heal (Matthew 4:23) … His perfect life (Hebrews 4:15), and His resurrection from the dead (Mark 16:6). Jesus taught many wonderful things that are counterintuitive to the human mind: ‘Blessed are those who mourn’ (Matthew 5:4). ‘Rejoice and be glad’ in persecution (Matthew 5:11–12). ‘Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you’ (Luke 6:27). Jesus’ kind of wonderful is awe-inspiring and superior to any other kind, for He is perfect in every way (Matt. 5:48).”

Next, “counselor” is a translation of the Hebrew word “yoez,” which means “to advise, counsel, devise, purpose.” In ancient Israel, a counselor was portrayed as a wise king, Solomon, who gave guidance to his people. But Jesus’ counsel is in a category of its own. His wisdom and his counsel are “a phenomenon lying outside the realm of human explanation” -- “a miracle, a marvel, extraordinary, incomprehensible, inexplicable.”

Jesus knows you better than anyone else, because he alone created you. Jesus understands you better than anyone else, because he alone knows every thought in your mind and every motive in your heart. Jesus cares about you more than anyone else, because his love for you is perfect. And he understands the unique circumstances and people around you better than anyone else, because as the all-knowing Son of God, in him “are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” So, he is the first one you should go to with your questions. He is the first one you should go to with your problems. And he is the first one you should go to with your depression, anxiety, fears, failures, and your sin. 

Jesus Christ came to earth on Christmas morning to be your Wonderful Counselor. No question is too hard for him to answer. No problem is too big for him to handle. No family drama is too dramatic for him to deal with. No soul is too lost for him to save. There is only ONE Wonderful Counselor, and His name is Jesus. So, go to him this Christmas season.

Dane Davis is the Pastor of Impact Christian Church. Please join us for this Sunday's worship service, online at 10 a.m. on our YouTube channel (Impact Christian Church) or on Facebook. And we hope you’ll join us for our online Christmas Eve candlelighting service, Dec. 24^th at 8 p.m.

The Peace of Christmas

 “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.” 
– Isaiah 53:5b

A wise man once gave a young, discouraged coworker this advice: “The way to achieve inner peace is to finish all the things you’ve started." So the young man went home and took his mentor’s advice. The next day at work the man asked his young friend if he felt more at peace, and he responded, “You have no idea! I went home and looked around the house to see all the things I had started but hadn’t finished. And before I left this morning, I finished off a bottle of red wine, a bottle of white, some cheesecake, a box of chocolates, and the rest of my Prozac. I totally feel at peace!”

Well, that’s not REAL peace, is it? Let’s take a look at the REAL peace that Jesus offers us at Christmas. A marvelous prophecy about Jesus is recorded in Isaiah 53:5, where God tells His people, “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

Think about these powerful words for a moment: “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him.” The Hebrew word for peace is “shalom”--one of the most important words to the Jewish people. For centuries, orthodox Jews have greeted each other with the one-word greeting “Shalom!” To the orthodox Jew, “Shalom!” is used both for a “Hello!” and a “Goodbye!” But it means so much more. Shalom is most often translated into English as “peace” or “harmony.” But shalom more literally means “wholeness.”

So, when a Jewish man wishes his neighbor “shalom,” he is wishing him wholeness—in his health, in his marriage and in his walk with God. And when God tells us in Isaiah 53:5 that “the punishment that brought us shalom was upon Jesus,” He is telling us that because of our sin, our relationship with God was shattered into a million pieces. Our relationship with God was hopelessly broken. And because our broken relationship was absolutely, 100% our fault, we rightly deserved to be punished.

The wages of sin is death. But because of God’s amazing grace through Christ, we don’t have to experience eternal brokenness and punishment. Because Jesus never sinned, he didn’t deserve any punishment and his relationship with God was perfectly whole. Jesus traded us his reward for our punishment, and his shalom with God for our brokenness. Is there any doubt that Jesus got the short end of the stick on that trade?

When the angels shouted in the Bethlehem sky, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth shalom to men on whom His favor rests” (Luke 2:14), they were talking about wholeness. Yes, they wanted us to know that Jesus offers us peace with God! Yes, they wanted us to know that Jesus offers us harmony with God! But perhaps most of all they wanted us to know that Jesus offers us wholeness with God. Jesus had come into the world to put back together what we had irreparably broken.

But I find it interesting that Jesus, at times, gives a mixed message about the shalom that he brought to mankind. In John 14:27 Jesus tells his disciples, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” But then he says in Matthew 10:34-36, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’”

Well, that doesn’t sound very peaceful, does it? But think about it. When it comes to true peace, the world doesn’t get it. The world thinks that peace comes on the heels of anti-bullying campaigns and by eliminating politically incorrect words from our vocabulary and reducing greenhouse gases. And this Christmas season, many seem to think we’ll have more peace if we stop singing “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” and stop watching “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”!

None of these things can bring true, lasting shalom. Anti-bullying campaigns can’t make a person whole. Stricter emissions standards cannot make a person whole. Only Jesus Christ can make a person whole. That’s the truth. But the problem is, many of our family members and coworkers and neighbors don’t want to hear the truth. So, when we embrace the shalom of Jesus Christ and receive peace with God and peace with others, many unbelievers around us will say, “Thanks, but no thanks! I want nothing to do with you or your Jesus.”

The Prince of Peace came to bring wholeness, but to those who reject Him, he actually ends up bringing division. The Good News of Jesus Christ is rightly called the Gospel of peace. But the Gospel of peace—when it is bitterly rejected—becomes more like a gospel of war. The gospel of peace does not bring peace to those who harden their hearts.

But to those who are willing to accept it, the word of God is clear: Jesus IS the Prince of Peace. Jesus is the only One who offers true, lasting peace—peace and wholeness within our own broken lives, peace and wholeness within our relationship with others, and peace and wholeness in our relationship with God.

Dane Davis is the Pastor of Impact Christian Church. Please join us for our live worship service Sundays at 9 a.m. at 17746 George Blvd. in Victorville. Or, join us online at 10 a.m. on our YouTube channel (Impact Christian Church) or on Facebook. 

What a Wonderful World

“The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them.”  - Isaiah 11:6

In 1968 our nation was in the midst of the Vietnam War, and two men—Bob Thiele and George David Weiss—wrote a song that was recorded by the great jazz musician Louis Armstrong. You’ve all heard it sung many times. The song was “What a Wonderful World.”

I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world. 
I see skies of blue and clouds of white
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world. 

The colors of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces of people going by
I see friends shaking hands, saying, “How do you do?” 
They’re really saying, “I love you.”
I hear babies cry, I watch them grow
They’ll learn much more than I’ll ever know
And I think to myself…what a wonderful world
Yes, I think to myself…what a wonderful world.

The world Louis Armstrong imagined was, without a doubt, a wonderful world. But Jesus’ world will be…EVEN…BETTER.

I don’t know about you, but after the past six months of COVID, social unrest and constant political squabbling, I’m ready for a better world. Sometimes it seems impossible. But the Bible tells us a day is coming that will be like Christmas, our birthday and the 4th of July all rolled into one. Jesus Christ will touch down on planet earth once again, and this time he will set up his throne here on earth for 1,000 years. Under his leadership, we will finally experience perfect righteousness, justice and peace. I can hardly wait for this wonderful new world!

We can read about it in the Book of Isaiah, written by the great prophet who lived about 700 years before Christ was born. Isaiah’s name means “Yahweh is salvation.” That’s the perfect name for him, because many of his prophecies highlight the salvation that Jesus Christ will bring to Israel. Like most prophetic books, the Book of Isaiah speaks of judgment. But Isaiah’s prophecies don’t just talk about judgment. Like most prophetic books, they also speak of blessing.

Some of the most encouraging prophecies in the Book of Isaiah are those that deal with Jesus’ second coming—when he will set up his earthly kingdom and reign for 1,000 years. Isaiah 11:6-10 describes what Jesus’ earthly kingdom will look like: “The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them” (vs. 6).

Finally … perfect peace here on earth. No more pandemic lockdowns. No more religious persecution. No more ruthless dictators. No more constant bickering between Republicans and Democrats. No more abortion, sexual perversion, poverty or racism. We won’t need to lock our doors, because nobody will steal our stuff. During that thousand-year reign of Christ, it won’t quite be heaven. There will be a certain amount of temptation, difficulty and pain. There will be death. But without a doubt, it will be BY FAR the best this world has ever been since the Garden of Eden.

At long last, our government will be perfectly right and perfectly just. And all creation, which for several thousand years has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth, will let out a sigh of relief and rejoice with us as we—for the first time since the Garden of Eden—experience true rest and peace on earth. I can hardly wait!

But remember, the same Lord who will one day bring peace to this world is living inside of you. He wants to speak through you and work through you to bring peace to our broken world—today. People around us need to be at peace with God and with others. And we can bring them peace—because we carry with us the Prince of Peace.

Until that day, here are some things you and I can do: #1: Although Jesus isn’t yet king of this world, make sure that he is king of your heart. #2: The righteousness and justice that you long for in our world should be lived out in your home. #3: Since Jesus’ kingdom is a kingdom of peace, you as Christ’s follower must be a peacemaker.

Passages like Isaiah 11:1-10 leave us thinking, “What a wonderful world it will be!” But because Jesus lives inside us, every single day of our lives, we have the ability to bring much of that wonderful world into this broken world. So, let Jesus Christ work through you to make the lives of those around you a little more right, a little more just, and a little bit more at peace. Jesus is with you, so go and make this world a little more wonderful!

Dane Davis is the Pastor of Impact Christian Church. Please join us for our live outdoor worship service tomorrow at 9 a.m. at 17746 George Blvd. in Victorville. Or, join us online at 10 a.m. on our YouTube channel (Impact Christian Church) or on Facebook.

The Peace of Christmas

“The punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.” – Isaiah 53:5b

A wise man once gave a young, discouraged coworker this advice: “The way to achieve inner peace is to finish all the things you’ve started." So the young man went home and took his mentor’s advice. The next day at work the man asked his young friend if he felt more at peace, and he responded, “You have no idea! I went home and looked around the house to see all the things I had started but hadn’t finished. And before I left this morning, I finished off a bottle of red wine, a bottle of white, some cheesecake, a box of chocolates, and the rest of my Prozac. I totally feel at peace!”

Well, that’s not REAL peace, is it? Let’s take a look at the REAL peace that Jesus offers us at Christmas. A marvelous prophecy about Jesus is recorded in Isaiah 53:5, where God tells His people, “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

Think about these powerful words for a moment: “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him.” The Hebrew word for peace is “shalom”--one of the most important words to the Jewish people. For centuries, orthodox Jews have greeted each other with the one-word greeting “Shalom!” To the orthodox Jew, “Shalom!” is used both for a “Hello!” and a “Goodbye!” But it means so much more. Shalom is most often translated into English as “peace” or “harmony.” But shalom more literally means “wholeness.”

So, when a Jewish man wishes his neighbor “shalom,” he is wishing him wholeness—in his health, in his marriage and in his walk with God. And when God tells us in Isaiah 53:5 that “the punishment that brought us shalom was upon Jesus,” He is telling us that because of our sin, our relationship with God was shattered into a million pieces. Our relationship with God was hopelessly broken. And because our broken relationship was absolutely, 100% our fault, we rightly deserved to be punished.

The wages of sin is death. But because of God’s amazing grace through Christ, we don’t have to experience eternal brokenness and punishment. Because Jesus never sinned, he didn’t deserve any punishment and his relationship with God was perfectly whole. Jesus traded us his reward for our punishment, and his shalom with God for our brokenness. Is there any doubt that Jesus got the short end of the stick on that trade?

When the angels shouted in the Bethlehem sky, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth shalom to men on whom His favor rests” (Luke 2:14), they were talking about wholeness. Yes, they wanted us to know that Jesus offers us peace with God! Yes, they wanted us to know that Jesus offers us harmony with God! But perhaps most of all they wanted us to know that Jesus offers us wholeness with God. Jesus had come into the world to put back together what we had irreparably broken.

But I find it interesting that Jesus, at times, gives a mixed message about the shalom that he brought to mankind. In John 14:27 Jesus tells his disciples, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” But then he says in Matthew 10:34-36, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’”

Well, that doesn’t sound very peaceful, does it? But think about it. When it comes to true peace, the world doesn’t get it. The world thinks that peace comes on the heels of anti-bullying campaigns and by eliminating politically incorrect words from our vocabulary and reducing greenhouse gases. And this Christmas season, many seem to think we’ll have more peace if we stop singing “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” and stop watching “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”!

None of these things can bring true, lasting shalom. Anti-bullying campaigns can’t make a person whole. Stricter emissions standards cannot make a person whole. Only Jesus Christ can make a person whole. That’s the truth. But the problem is, many of our family members and coworkers and neighbors don’t want to hear the truth. So, when we embrace the shalom of Jesus Christ and receive peace with God and peace with others, many unbelievers around us will say, “Thanks, but no thanks! I want nothing to do with you or your Jesus.”

The Prince of Peace came to bring wholeness, but to those who reject Him, he actually ends up bringing division. The Good News of Jesus Christ is rightly called the Gospel of peace. But the Gospel of peace—when it is bitterly rejected—becomes more like a gospel of war. The gospel of peace does not bring peace to those who harden their hearts.

But to those who are willing to accept it, the word of God is clear: Jesus IS the Prince of Peace. Jesus is the only One who offers true, lasting peace—peace and wholeness within our own broken lives, peace and wholeness within our relationship with others, and peace and wholeness in our relationship with God.

Dane Davis is the Lead Pastor of First Christian Church in Victorville. For more information,

visit www.YourVictorvilleChurch.com and join us for church Sundays at 10 a.m.

Spiritual U-Turns in Prayer

“‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.’” – Isaiah 55:8-9

David thought he’d really had it this time. He was running for his life from his own son, Absalom, who was leading a coup to overthrow David. So what did he do? He turned to God–but not, at first, in the way we might expect.

In the first two verses of Psalm 3, David writes, “Lord, how many are my foes! How many rise up against me! Many are saying of me, ‘God will not deliver him.’” David sounds overwhelmed and scared. He feels surrounded by his enemies, he hears his critics saying, “God will not deliver him”—and David seems to be thinking that maybe they’re right. Maybe God won’t save him this time.

Sounds like a strange prayer from a man after God’s own heart, doesn’t it? So tell me: Is David sinning in these first two verses? Is it a sin for him to be afraid, to wonder if the pessimists around him are right? I don’t think so. But his perspective needs to turn. His faith in God needs to be strengthened. You could even say David needs to repent.

That may seem like an odd choice of words. But you see, most of us have a very narrow understanding of repentance. We may tend to toss up a prayer that sounds something like this: “Lord, I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Forgive me! Forgive me! Forgive me! In Jesus’ name, amen!” Well, nice try … but that’s not repentance.

The word “repent” means to change your mind, and it always leads to a change in your behavior. So, whenever you think of the word “repent,” immediately think, “change.” True repentance involves a change in your thinking. A change in your priorities. A change in your decision-making. And that adds up to a change in your behavior. To say it another way, repentance is a turning. When we repent, our thoughts turn from something old to something new. As a result, our behavior turns from one course of action to another. That’s why I like to describe repentance as a spiritual U-turn. Repentance is a 180 – a spiritual U-turn that always includes a turning FROM and a turning TO.

Now, let’s get back to David. As he prays in Psalm 3, notice the change that happens in verses 3 and 4: “But you, Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high. I call out to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain.”

Do you see how prayer changes David? He goes to God with his finite thoughts and his finite ways, then takes hold of God’s higher thoughts and God’s higher ways, and it’s absolutely transformational. In the words given to us through the prophet Isaiah: “’For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.’” 

You see, true repentance arises from a deep-seated conviction that God’s thoughts are always higher than our thoughts, and His ways are always higher than our ways. So, from a broader perspective, repentance is not just for the times when we sin and turn to God for forgiveness. As we go to God in prayer, whether or not there is unconfessed sin in our lives, repentance is a re-aligning of our priorities with God’s priorities, a re-aligning of our ways with God’s ways. And isn’t this, in a very real sense, the heart of prayer?

There are certain things God will not do unless we pray for Him to do them. So our prayers do move God, and prayers do change God’s actions. But even more so, prayer changes US. We go into prayer thinking one way, and we should leave prayer thinking another. Effective prayer changes our thoughts. We go into prayer behaving a certain way, and we should leave prayer behaving differently. Effective prayer changes our behavior.

Prayer changed David. And it will change you, too, if you are absolutely convinced the God’s thoughts are higher than your thoughts, and His ways are higher than yours. So, go to Him humbly in prayer. Confess your sins to him. Grieve over your sin, and turn. If you are ready for God to change you, He will change you … for the better. That’s a promise.

Dane Davis is the Pastor of First Christian Church in Victorville. For more information,

visit www.YourVictorvilleChurch.com  and join us for worship Sundays at 10 am.