Thursday, December 20, 2012

2012 Advent Readings

I wrote these for our weekly advent readings at Blue Mountain Community Church. I wanted to share them with you.


 Prophesy – Week 1

Like a child waiting for Daddy to come home, or a pregnant woman ready to meet her child, a time of waiting is most marked by the arrival of what we have been waiting for. The time can be frustrating, agonizing or distracting. However, this time can also be exciting, filled with possibility and wonder, and a building sense of joy. How do you choose to wait?

Since the beginning of time, generations have waited for the coming of the promised one. The delight of God’s promise of freedom from sin, of a reunion with Him, were worth waiting for. But how long would He be? Thousands of years pass with no promised one, then God seems to be silent. Could He have forgotten his promise?  Sometimes, in the darkest of winter, hope is the only thing we have to know that spring is coming. And come he did, though not in the way that most people expected. Many people from all over the world were watching and waiting and yet when Jesus came, few took notice.

For thirty-three short years the wait was over and the Promised one came to earth and did what God promised he would do. He leaves us with another promise, “I will come again.” And so we return to waiting. Another couple thousand years of waiting. Perhaps there is something in the waiting: something that teaches us to hold on to hope and promise, that encourages us to always be preparing for the fulfillment of our longing, to keep us from thinking we have arrived and settle into complacency. Perhaps this waiting is core to the very nature of Christ- followers, of Messiah seekers.

So another winter has come and before you break into celebrating, pause and remember that the best celebration is yet to come. Embrace the wait and prepare your heart to see Christ as you’ve never seen Him before.

 

Peace – Week 2

There is nothing quite like the sound of snow falling. It makes no noise at all and yet, it has a palpable presence. When the snow begins to fall, it seems as though all the world stops. Plans change, people look up at the sky or settle in to something warm. If there’s enough snow, an unplanned holiday takes place. Schools and businesses close and a whole new world of possibilities open up. Suddenly our schedules cease their clamor and we can simply be.

It’s those moments when we are quiet, when we simply are, that God speaks. Or maybe it’s then that we can really hear him. As with the shepherds on the hillside, our encounters with God can forever change us: our perspectives, our desires, our priorities. One of his gifts in these encounters is the gift of peace. Not an absence of striving kind of peace, though that may be true, but this peace is a fullness of purpose, a sense that things are as they should be. A peace that settles in, just like a snowflake on a field.   

In our culture, quietness and peace are a rare commodity, a luxury few can afford, a short term reward for completion of a major undertaking. What if the truth is that peace is a necessary foundation, an integral part of what makes us human and a more fitting home base than busyness? What if peace was at the core of who you were this Christmas, instead of an exhausted afterthought? What would be different? What would stay the same?

Let’s approach this Christmas with the peace that God intends for us. Yes, there are presents to buy and wrap, cookies to bake and relationships to invest in. Those things can still happen, but the focus can change if you let God’s peace settle in and “be” Christmas instead of “doing” Christmas.


 

Joy – Week 3

Is there anything more beautiful than seeing the joy on a loved one’s face when we give them the perfect gift? Something that they have desired for a long time, yet could never have bought for themselves. Made more precious by the fact that this treasured item is now connected to a valued relationship.

Can you imagine the excitement God had in making his plans to send his Son? It is the perfect gift. Just what we needed and something we could never have even thought to ask, it cost so much. We could never have got it on our own. Made more precious because it gives us a relationship with God that we could never have without this gift.  Imagine His delight as you opened his gift and realized that it is just for you.

Better yet, as much as this gift is designed specifically for you, it is equally designed for the person next to you: your neighbor, your family, your friend. And God asks you to share it with them. You can keep it and give it at the same time. You can share God’s joy as you see others receive the gift.

And yet, how much of your life shows this joy, gratefulness for this perfect gift? Smack in the middle of the busy Christmas season, would those who looked at your life be able to see joy?

That’s what the angel was talking about when he said in Luke 2:10, “I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people.” This joy is radiant, life changing, bursting delight that comes from God, through you, to others. This joy is uncontainable, unexplainable, unbidden. It is the joy that started with one Christmas night, in a manger in Bethlehem. Gifted first to a husband and wife, then a strange mix of kings and shepherds, eventually a loose group of followers and finally the whole world.

 

Week 4 – Love

The heart of Christmas is love. A.W. Tozer once said, “I can no more do justice to this awesome and wonder-filled topic than a child can grasp a star. Still, by reaching toward the star the child may call attention to it and even indicate the direction one must look to see it. And so, I stretch my heart toward the high, shining love of God so that we may be encouraged to look up and have hope.”

God’s love is amazing, unconditional, transforming, sacrificial, humbling, uplifting and more. How does one even begin to describe it? It is offered, even to those who reject it over and over. It is abiding, even when circumstances overwhelm and sadness lingers. It is always choosing the best for us, even if that best is hard or unfamiliar. It is unending, unquenchable, celebratory and solemn. And it reveals itself just when we need it most.

Human love is often self seeking, emotion driven, changeable as the wind. How comforting to know that God’s love is not like ours. But God’s love could be ours, if we learned from him how to really love our world.

Imagine how it could be if each of us took the people around us and loved them like God does. How could we influence our neighborhoods, our families, our schools, our friends if we saw each situation through God’s love and used that as our guide. How would your relationships be different? How would you spend your time?

And that may be the biggest miracle of Christmas: that God, through Jesus, showed us how to love our world and re- create it to be as he first imagined it. That his love through us would change hearts and minds and actions, propelling us to be kinder, more compassionate, more accurate reflections of Christ. And as we explore that love, we call others’ attention to it, as a child grasps for a star.

 

 

Christ Candle – Christmas Eve

He came. In fulfillment of the promise and in honor of the waiting generations he came. In response to the obedience of teenagers he came. To the lowliest of places he came. During political occupation he came. Heralded by angels and shepherds, not kings or emperors, he came. From perfection and beauty and light and love to brokenness and horror and darkness and hate, he still came.

And it changed everything.

Because he came, we can know God. Because he came, we have peace. Because he came, we are free. Because he came, we have purpose.

Jesus’ coming shows us how humanity was meant to be, how we could be if we trusted and believed God. He shows us how God wants to interact with the world: intimately, individually, personally. Jesus’ coming not only tells us of a better day coming, but also includes the possibility that today could be a better day.

Christ is our model, our teacher and our hope. He is God as well as being the fulfillment of humanity. He is the first one among us, yet he valued the least ones. He is the cornerstone of our faith, the rock on which we stand.

Because of Christ, we have Christmas.

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