Category: Christmas

And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.” Luke 2:14

Songs have been written about peace at Christmastime and greeting card companies have used the quote to promote wishes for peace to all who receive their card.  It’s nice to wish someone we care about a peaceful life but is this what the angels meant when they made this announcement?

If they had just declared ‘peace on earth’, it might have been easier to misconstrue.  But the phrase ‘peace among men with whom He is pleased’ changes everything.

This phrase is connected to an event in Jesus’ life when God the Father made a pronouncement of His own.  When Jesus was being baptized, His Father’s voice was heard, “This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.”  So to whom will peace come?  To those with whom the Father is pleased.  The conditions for pleasing the Father are to love His Son, to embrace Him as Savior, and to live a life of obedience, just as Jesus did.

 For every person who does this, there is peace with God.  The birth of Jesus and the mission He came to fulfill made this peace possible because sin was dealt with on Calvary.  This sentiment from the angels can not be misconstrued to mean that, in 2022, the world will be a more peaceful place.  It won’t.  Times here will only prove more perilous until Jesus comes back and the prophecies from scripture continue to play out.  While that may sound grim, God’s plan moves along according to God’s timetable, leading us to the day when Jesus will reign on earth and we will enjoy peace – internally and externally – for the first time.

For every one of us who are citizens of heaven today, who have made peace with God through Christ, peace starts now.  It reigns in the heart of all those who have asked Jesus to bear the Father’s wrath in our place.  That’s what He came to do.  A birth in a crude stable setting was to usher in a peace-making mission.  So to all of you who are in Christ today, I send a heartfelt greeting.  “Rest in the peace of forgiven sins.  Rest in the peace that exists between you and the Father.  Jesus came to win it for us – and hand it to us on the other side of the cross.”

If you are well pleased with me, it is only because my righteousness was a gift from You, Jesus.  Thank you for peace the world does not understand.  Amen

Undoubtedly there are all sorts of languages in the world, yet none of them is without meaning. I Cor. 14:10

Christmas is the one time of year most people concentrate on a baby.  We think of Mary and then recall our own experiences of holding an infant.  Ron and I waited six years before holding Jaime, our first child, in our arms.  Three years later, Ryan joined us.  When they were newborns, neither was able to talk with intelligible words yet we enjoyed communicating as if we really understood each other.  They would coo and I would whisper back, “Oh, is that so!”  This back and forth exchange went on for as long as it took for them to fall asleep. Did it matter that we were not speaking concrete thoughts?  Not to me.  Not to them.  It was all about a language of connectedness.

Mary was like any other mother and bonded with her child, the infant Jesus.  Could she sense His divinity even though His language was yet without words?  What tender stories surrounded His infancy?  We’ll never know unless Mary feels led to share some of them with us in heaven.

Communicating with an unseen God is still a mystery.  Plunge into the depths of Him and we experience unintelligible language there, too. His glory defies words and though our hearts burst with the wonder of it, human language cannot capture it. Prayer is all about spending time in His presence; connecting, with or without words.  The resting is restorative.  The love is transformational.  The language transcends time and space.

Prayer often takes us to the place where two spirits meet to commune in silence.  We meet God on a deeper dimension.  Whether my intercession today is filled with words, or is wordless, prayer is to be celebrated.  God is a Father who holds me closely, hears my sighs, sees my tears, senses my false starts, and understands each expression perfectly.

Make me fluent in the things of Your Spirit.  Amen

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.  Isaiah 7:14

God is so gracious to give us clues that He is still accomplishing His purposes in the world.  His signs are meant for our encouragement.  He’s talking to us all the time but oftentimes we don’t recognize His voice.  His hand is always at work but oftentimes we don’t discern His fingerprints.  We chalk the miraculous up to coincidence or we just plain fail to see the holy in the mundane.

“A virgin will be with child.”  What if I had been a contemporary of Mary’s, a woman in her village?  And suppose I had been familiar with this prophetic scripture from Isaiah.  Would I have recognized Mary as the virgin God was describing?  I am pessimistic. Perhaps I would have struggled to believe her story of virginity.  When she announced that she was pregnant and told others the story of the angel’s visit, I fear I would have reacted like most folks.   I pray today for the ways my heart is closed to His revelation.

I don’t want to miss heaven’s surprises. Scripture is loaded with promises, promises of God’s daily intervention.  Today, may I eagerly look for signs of His handiwork.  A family member may be softer toward spiritual things.  I might understand a spiritual truth never clear to me before.  A political shift might occur somewhere and a world leader implements some of God’s principles of leadership.  A friend’s husband might decide that his wife is a treasure after all, and choose to value her.  An unexpected financial gift might come in the mail, relieving a financial burden that has kept me awake for weeks.

What are signs for?  To keep me on the path marked ‘abundant life’.  Signs reassure me that God is sovereign and I am to walk by faith.  What I can’t see, touch or feel should be more real to me that what is visibly tangible.

Forgive me for my unbelief.  Open my eyes, heart, senses to all of You.   Amen 

Journal: 

Where are you skeptical of God’s miracle?

Isolate the reason why you live in disbelief?

Confess it to God and ask Him for new faith and new promises to live in.

And he came to Mary and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you.  Luke 1:28

Mary was favored by God, promised His presence, but then, her life was characterized by suffering.  She left her home eight months pregnant.  She gave birth in a dirty barn.  She fled for Egypt with a husband and a toddler.  She saw her son taunted, beaten, and crucified.  How was she comforted?  There was only one way ~ through sound theology and the presence of God.

As she reviewed the stories of her ancestors, she remembered others who were favored by God, promised His presence for their journey, but then suffered greatly as they walked out their calling.  ‘A life of ease’ never characterizes the journey of a disciple.

• Joseph, shown early through dreams that he was favored by God, was then betrayed and led into slavery and imprisonment.  Many years later, he would see redemption.
• David, shown early at twelve years of age that he was favored by God, was anointed king.  But over the next decade or two, he hid in caves and ran for his life from a demented king.
• Jesus, obviously favored by His Father (a voice from heaven declared it so), was immediately led into the desert for testing.  His life ultimately ended up on a cross, by God’s design.

There are more examples than this, too.  So why have I forgotten the Bible stories I learned as a kid?  Why, when I’m suffering, do I wonder if I have found dis-favor with God?  Why do I hide my pain from other believers?  Why do I fear God has withdrawn from me rather than tucked Himself in closely?  The answer is bad theology and the shame other believers inflict because of their bad theology!

Perhaps you are in the wilderness of testing.  You may be ill and the losses that accompany deteriorating health have been staggering.  You may have been betrayed, wondered why God didn’t prevent it and instead of feeling comforted, you feel punished, deserted, and aching.  You feel you set out on a path God carved out for you ~ only to experience one set of crushing circumstances after another.  Most likely, you’ve second guessed yourself so badly that you’ve lost your footing, or you’ve second guessed God’s love and lost all confidence in His promises.  If either is true, shame and guilt are your constant companions.

Suffering does not prove dis-favor and disobedience.  In the life of an obedient believer, it proves God’s favor.  I am not advocating that we wear our pain as a badge.  I am, however, promoting rest in God’s purposes!

The One who favors us is the One who calls us to share in His suffering.  God’s glory, the point of it all, is most clearly seen when His favored ones trust Him through their tears.  Let’s renounce the lies of our accuser and run with confidence toward the heart of the Father who sustained Mary through the tumultuous events surrounding the birth of His Son, Jesus.

I want to be a spiritual giant but I forget their paths of suffering.  Shelter me in your arms of grace.  I declare that I am loved today, not despised.  In Jesus’ name, Amen

When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet: “ ‘And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.’ ” Matthew 2:2-6

Herod knew whom to ask about this new baby King, the one he feared would be a threat to his throne.  He went straight to the Jewish priests and scribes who knew the scriptures.  When asked, they immediately quoted this passage from Micah about the Messiah being born in Bethlehem.  These religious leaders didn’t even need to consult with each other nor ask for a window of time to go search the scriptures for the answer.  It was on their tongue.

So where were they at the birth of Jesus?  We hear no accounts of any religious leaders coming to bow down at the manger to worship.  Jerusalem was only seven miles away whereas the Magi, if they came from Persia, traveled a thousand miles.  This baby would grow up to reveal that the gate is wide for those who reject the Messiah and narrow for the few who actually seek Him out.  Never was this more exemplified than in the scarcity of worshipers at His birth.

The message is clear.  Knowing a lot of truth and actually being engaged with the heart are two completely different experiences.  When both are present, when my quest for knowledge is love-driven, it is a beautiful thing.  But what a tragedy when knowledge and passion are mutually exclusive.  I can easily become as callous as those who lived around the corner from Mary and Joseph but weren’t spiritually alive enough to see if Jesus was really the One they had been longing for throughout their entire Jewish history.

Jesus is the end of my quest.  Whatever it takes to journey to Him is worth any effort and any sacrifice.

I am challenged, every day, by what it means to walk the narrow way.  I will stay on my quest to search for You with my whole heart.  Amen

Save

The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh [Messiah] comes. Genesis 49:10

If I look for a human being to emulate, Joseph is always a good choice. His fidelity to God amidst great suffering has inspired us down through the ages. Of all of Jacob’s sons, Joseph gets the most attention. Yet, it is not from the line of Joseph that Jesus was born. The extremely flawed sons of Jacob didn’t mess things up so badly that God disqualified them from the promise.  God’s covenant prevailed over sin.

What was the purpose of Joseph’s life? To save Judah and His descendants. If Joseph had not assumed a place of power in Egypt, he could not have brought his father and brothers to a place of abundance. Jacob and all of his descendants would have perished in the great famine. It’s hard for us to grasp that Joseph was really used by God to save a brother who had sold him into slavery. It seems twisted to our sense of justice.

God is wild and wonderful. He is also unpredictable. He exalts the likes of Judah. He blesses adulterers like King David. He forgives betrayers like Peter. He saves persecutors and murderers like Paul. Judah, at the end of his life, offered to give his own for the life of another brother. His father, Jacob, lived long enough to see Judah choose righteousness. The common thread in all of these stories was a heart of repentance. God’s forgiveness was, and is, so radical that an entire past is put under His atoning blood.

No family is perfect.  I’ve talked with so many over the years who tell me that they have not seen their grandchildren in years.  Is the Gospel of Jesus Christ relevant to them? Is it relevant to us in the very places we long to see the righteousness of God revealed in the lives of our family members? Oh yes.

This Christmas, as we hear the Christmas story and are tempted to zone out at the reading of the lineage of Jesus, let’s wake up and sit on the edge of our seat. When Judah’s name is mentioned, we can rejoice that God works in family messes. No one is out of His reach. We should never stop praying for forthcoming repentance. God is good for every promise He has made.

For every family ‘Joseph’, there are tears of joy. For every family ‘Judah’, there are tears of faith. You are God over every family drama that is brought to your feet in prayer. Amen

Save

And the angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy offspring shall be called the Son of God.”  Luke 1:35

My biggest mistake would be to read God’s Word like a storybook and fail to see the stories as personal insights in how God might relate to me.  Can I have a burning bush experience?Can I know a Pentecost moment?  Do men and women still dream dreams and decide, upon waking, that God is sending them a personalized message? Yes.  My faith is not built on history alone but on a present day experience with Jesus Christ.

God’s Spirit hovered over Mary and she conceived.  Nine months later, she gave birth to the Son of God.  This intimate gesture of overshadowing ushered her into her most holy calling as the mother of Jesus.  But the Spirit of God must still overshadow the saints today if they are to give birth to their most holy callings.  There can be no conception of a call without this act of communion.  For years, I thought I was in touch with God’s will for my life, and in fact, I prayed for it earnestly but what was missing was intimacy with God.

Jesus said, “He who believes in me, from his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.”  The word for innermost being in the original language is ‘womb’.  Through every child, God wants to birth something for the kingdom.  Something holy is to proceed from their spiritual womb.  What is it?  There is something about the redemption of our story that is unique.  Out of our individual brokenness, and out of the way He speaks His healing Word to those desolate places, our calling will emerge.  When He reveals it to each of us, it immediately resonates.  Praise, worship, and unspeakable joy are the result; our versions of the Magnificat.

To discover my purpose and to know how to walk in it, I must be intimate.  To transcend the challenges that come with a calling, I must be intimate.  Any kingdom work done without intimacy is powerless.

Overshadow my life.  I am your handmaiden. Amen

THE DAYS AFTER

She gave birth to her first-born son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.  Luke 2:7

    The physical and emotional crash one experiences the days after any momentous event is real and often severe.  Even if the event was positive, recovery time is needed.  If the event was stressful, the exhaustion was even more of a challenge.

Having lived a lot of my life on road, I remember the trips which were difficult.  You don’t quickly forget being stranded in an airport, sleeping on the floor in the corner of a lounge, or driving hundreds of miles in the middle of the night to ensure you’ll make your next engagement on time.  Emotions are near the surface, fatigue colors everything in the dead of night.

I wonder what ‘the day after’ was like for Mary and Joseph.  They just traveled 80 miles on foot; physically demanding for anyone much less a woman at full-term pregnancy.  They said goodbye to their families in Galilee.  Did they know that they wouldn’t see them again for many years?  Were they grieving that reality as they traveled?  Finally, they arrived in Bethlehem, with Mary in final labor, only to find one inhospitable person after another.  To resign yourself to the straw floor of a barn to bring about the birth of your first child must have felt unbelievable to them, perhaps like a bad dream.

The weariness they experienced on ‘the day after’ must have been incredible.  As I remember their sacrifice, even on the days following Christmas morning, I am called to higher levels of devotion in my own spiritual life.  Many, like Mary and Joseph, have paved the road for me to follow.  I need only review their journeys.

Forgive me for any ways I have romanticized the Christmas story in order to make it more palatable.  I want to see it as it was and embrace my own call completely.  Amen

Save

Mary stirred.  She had slept quite fitfully during the night.  She thought of her home, her comfortable bed.  The ground hadn’t been very forgiving to her aching body.  She just couldn’t get comfortable.  Joseph hadn’t slept much either, trying to do what he could to soften the place where she lay.  In the middle of the night, during the hours that seemed to last interminably, he had taken his extra tunic and rolled it into a makeshift pillow in order to add extra cushioning to Mary’s resting place.  It helped but only enough to enable her to doze.

“I know this isn’t very comfortable,” he whispered in her ear.  “I’m sorry.”  She nodded, touched by his kindness.  He continued.  “By tonight, we’ll be in Bethlehem and surely we will be sleeping at an Inn.”  With the hope of that in sight, Mary closed her eyes again.  Joseph wondered about the day ahead.  They still had miles to go and he could tell that the time of the baby’s birth was near.  He felt alone and weighed down with the responsibility for their safety.  He prayed silently, “Jehovah, God of our fathers, have mercy on us.  Bring us safely to this new place.  We know no one.  I don’t have this all figured out.  Mary is trusting me and I’m trusting you!  Let your presence move with us over these next hours.”  He had a choice.  He could rise early in the morning, faith in place, or nurse his fears and worry instead of sleep.  He took a deep breath, reviewed the stories of his ancestral fathers, and trusted God.

It might have appeared to Joseph that they were alone.   But, God was the Father, just out of sight, ensuring the safe arrival of the Promise. The redemptive plans of God, from before time, were about to break open upon Earth.