A little girl, dressed as an angel in a Christmas pageant was told to come down the center aisle. The child asked, “Do you want me to walk or fly?” You feel as though she almost could have flown. Don’t ever lose the wonder and mystery of Christmas.
Every year I’m reminded of those words of the late Peter Marshall: “When Christmas doesn’t make your heart swell up until it nearly bursts and fill your eyes with tears and make you all soft and warm inside, then you will know that something inside of you is dead”
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Friday, December 12, 2008
Christmas Food for the Soul
With Christmastime comes lots of good food. Christmas candy, cookies, cakes, pies, and Christmas dinner are all part of the special nature of our Christmas celebrations. It’s commonly noted that on average, people gain between five and ten pounds during the holiday season. Yikes! But, while we’re enjoying stuffing ourselves with Christmas goodies, how about doing some thinking on our spiritual nourishment?
Christmas is a wonderful time to remember that Jesus is the “bread of life.” It’s a powerful illustration of what Jesus is meant to be to our lives. He’s the source of life. He’s the food our souls need!
Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again.” John 6:35
This Christmas, make sure you’re feeding your soul a healthy diet of Jesus.
Going Deeper:
What are you doing this Christmas to make sure you are filling your soul with Jesus?
Can we ever have too much of Jesus? Why or why not?
Family Time: Bake and decorate homemade Christmas cookies. Allow everyone in the family to participate if they want. Everyone should be able to request their favorite kind of cookie. As you make cookies, use the content above to remind your family that Jesus is the “bread of life.”
Christmas is a wonderful time to remember that Jesus is the “bread of life.” It’s a powerful illustration of what Jesus is meant to be to our lives. He’s the source of life. He’s the food our souls need!
Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again.” John 6:35
This Christmas, make sure you’re feeding your soul a healthy diet of Jesus.
Going Deeper:
What are you doing this Christmas to make sure you are filling your soul with Jesus?
Can we ever have too much of Jesus? Why or why not?
Family Time: Bake and decorate homemade Christmas cookies. Allow everyone in the family to participate if they want. Everyone should be able to request their favorite kind of cookie. As you make cookies, use the content above to remind your family that Jesus is the “bread of life.”
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Happiness
Happiness
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Matthew 6:21
Has it ever struck you that you have been programmed to be unhappy and so no matter what you do to become happy, you are bound to fail?
If you wish to be happy the first thing you need is not effort or even goodwill or good desires, but a clear understanding of how exactly you have been programmed. This is how it happened: First, your society and your culture taught you to believe that you would not be happy without certain persons or things.
Once you have swallowed your belief, you naturally developed an attachment to this person or thing you were convinced you could not be happy without. Then came the efforts to acquire your precious thing or person, to cling to it once it was acquired, and to fight off every possibility of losing it. This finally led you to abject emotional dependence so that the object of your attachment had the power to thrill you when you attained it, to make you anxious lest you be deprived of it and miserable when you lost it.
This is an exhausting task that leaves you little energy for the business of living and enjoying life fully. It is also an impossible task in an ever-changing world that you simply are not able to control. So instead of a life of serenity and fulfillment, you are doomed to a life of frustration, anxiety, worry, insecurity, suspense and tension.
Life is not giving you what you have convinced yourself you cannot be happy without.
Now as I have thought about this passage, it has opened up all kinds of implications for life. Perhaps the reason that we often do not see our lives as being filled with “happiness” it that we have bought into a culture that tells us what we need to be “happy” or, as I puts it, we’ve been programmed.
The culture we live in is great at programming us to yearn for “things” that cannot truly satisfy. Just look at the messages we hear, see or read everyday: “Buy this”; “get that” and your desires will be met. You’ll finally be happy. But, the reality is, when we do “buy” or “get,” we just yearn for something else. So this has opened up all kinds of questions for me…
What might it look like for me to live with enough?
What might it look like for me to live simply, humbly, content, happy, fulfilled?
What might it look like to live at peace, true abiding peace?
Jesus came, not to affirm the programming, but to shatter it - to say that there was a better way to live, a better way to embrace life to the fullest. He came to remind us that life, true life, is not found in the abundance of things, but is found in living the kingdom kind of life. Happiness is freedom.
Like He said one day on a Galilean mountainside, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Matthew 6:21
Has it ever struck you that you have been programmed to be unhappy and so no matter what you do to become happy, you are bound to fail?
If you wish to be happy the first thing you need is not effort or even goodwill or good desires, but a clear understanding of how exactly you have been programmed. This is how it happened: First, your society and your culture taught you to believe that you would not be happy without certain persons or things.
Once you have swallowed your belief, you naturally developed an attachment to this person or thing you were convinced you could not be happy without. Then came the efforts to acquire your precious thing or person, to cling to it once it was acquired, and to fight off every possibility of losing it. This finally led you to abject emotional dependence so that the object of your attachment had the power to thrill you when you attained it, to make you anxious lest you be deprived of it and miserable when you lost it.
This is an exhausting task that leaves you little energy for the business of living and enjoying life fully. It is also an impossible task in an ever-changing world that you simply are not able to control. So instead of a life of serenity and fulfillment, you are doomed to a life of frustration, anxiety, worry, insecurity, suspense and tension.
Life is not giving you what you have convinced yourself you cannot be happy without.
Now as I have thought about this passage, it has opened up all kinds of implications for life. Perhaps the reason that we often do not see our lives as being filled with “happiness” it that we have bought into a culture that tells us what we need to be “happy” or, as I puts it, we’ve been programmed.
The culture we live in is great at programming us to yearn for “things” that cannot truly satisfy. Just look at the messages we hear, see or read everyday: “Buy this”; “get that” and your desires will be met. You’ll finally be happy. But, the reality is, when we do “buy” or “get,” we just yearn for something else. So this has opened up all kinds of questions for me…
What might it look like for me to live with enough?
What might it look like for me to live simply, humbly, content, happy, fulfilled?
What might it look like to live at peace, true abiding peace?
Jesus came, not to affirm the programming, but to shatter it - to say that there was a better way to live, a better way to embrace life to the fullest. He came to remind us that life, true life, is not found in the abundance of things, but is found in living the kingdom kind of life. Happiness is freedom.
Like He said one day on a Galilean mountainside, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
The Greatest Gift of All
For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
—Luke 2:11
When you were a child, you probably looked forward to receiving Christmas gifts, just like children do today. And if you were like I was, you peeked underneath the wrapping paper well before Christmas just to find out what your parents were giving you. As you’ve grown older, you have probably found more joy in giving a gift than in receiving one. You’ve begun to understand what Jesus meant when He said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).
But this business of gift-giving can get very expensive. I remember one year when I said, “Let’s do the 12 days of Christmas. We’ll give a gift every day for 12 days.” Now we are back to the one day of Christmas. Someone has actually calculated what it would cost to give all the gifts mentioned in “The 12 Days of Christmas,” and it added up to $18,920. A partridge in a pear tree was relatively reasonable, only about $100. The biggest expense was nine ladies dancing. That would run in the neighborhood of $5,000.
We can get caught up in the excitement of it all, but the true message of Christmas is not the gifts that we give to one another, but it is the gift that God has given to us:
For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6)
What a wonderful verse that is. It speaks of God’s gift of His only begotten Son. That gift was the greatest gift of all.
—Luke 2:11
When you were a child, you probably looked forward to receiving Christmas gifts, just like children do today. And if you were like I was, you peeked underneath the wrapping paper well before Christmas just to find out what your parents were giving you. As you’ve grown older, you have probably found more joy in giving a gift than in receiving one. You’ve begun to understand what Jesus meant when He said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).
But this business of gift-giving can get very expensive. I remember one year when I said, “Let’s do the 12 days of Christmas. We’ll give a gift every day for 12 days.” Now we are back to the one day of Christmas. Someone has actually calculated what it would cost to give all the gifts mentioned in “The 12 Days of Christmas,” and it added up to $18,920. A partridge in a pear tree was relatively reasonable, only about $100. The biggest expense was nine ladies dancing. That would run in the neighborhood of $5,000.
We can get caught up in the excitement of it all, but the true message of Christmas is not the gifts that we give to one another, but it is the gift that God has given to us:
For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6)
What a wonderful verse that is. It speaks of God’s gift of His only begotten Son. That gift was the greatest gift of all.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
"He remembers that we are dust" (Psalm 103:14).part1
RELATED BOOK
In the Shadow of the Cross: The Deeper Meaning of Calvary
Perhaps there is no mystery in the
universe so monumental as God
dying a death of shame to
redeem mankind.
Get more details
Have you wondered what God really thinks about you?
Our greatest barrier to knowing God better may be how much we know about how much God knows about us. We struggle with God because we feel so bad about ourselves, and if we know the truth about ourselves, think of how much more God knows us!
Follow The Christmas Star (30:40)
There is a danger from viewing the sweetness of a Christmas pageant where everything
is so clean and neat and nice instead
of how it really was.
Does Prayer Make a Difference? (47:43)
We might call this story “the preacher and the prostitute” because it’s a lesson about pride and humility. It’s also about how God welcomes those who aren’t ashamed to admit how much they need him.
We can’t fool him.
Sometimes we don’t want to pray or read the Bible or think about God because when we look in the mirror, we feel like saying, “You’re a big disappointment” or “You ought to be a lot better by now.”
We’ve all felt that way from time to time, and I imagine that many people reading these words feel that way right now. It’s been a hard week, or a bad month, and now we’re near the end of what seems like a wasted year.
I think we run from God rather than to him because we know our own hearts all too well and his barely at all.
I probably don’t need to spend any time convincing you that you are a sinner. You probably know the truth about yourself all too well. But it’s the other side that we need to talk about. We don’t know God’s heart very well.
You probably know the truth about yourself all too well.
That’s where Psalm 103 can help us tremendously. Perhaps no other chapter in the Bible so clearly reveals God’s compassion for his people. If you’re wondering what God thinks about you, let’s take a journey through Psalm 103 and discover seven liberating truths about God’s heart.
In the Shadow of the Cross: The Deeper Meaning of Calvary
Perhaps there is no mystery in the
universe so monumental as God
dying a death of shame to
redeem mankind.
Get more details
Have you wondered what God really thinks about you?
Our greatest barrier to knowing God better may be how much we know about how much God knows about us. We struggle with God because we feel so bad about ourselves, and if we know the truth about ourselves, think of how much more God knows us!
Follow The Christmas Star (30:40)
There is a danger from viewing the sweetness of a Christmas pageant where everything
is so clean and neat and nice instead
of how it really was.
Does Prayer Make a Difference? (47:43)
We might call this story “the preacher and the prostitute” because it’s a lesson about pride and humility. It’s also about how God welcomes those who aren’t ashamed to admit how much they need him.
We can’t fool him.
Sometimes we don’t want to pray or read the Bible or think about God because when we look in the mirror, we feel like saying, “You’re a big disappointment” or “You ought to be a lot better by now.”
We’ve all felt that way from time to time, and I imagine that many people reading these words feel that way right now. It’s been a hard week, or a bad month, and now we’re near the end of what seems like a wasted year.
I think we run from God rather than to him because we know our own hearts all too well and his barely at all.
I probably don’t need to spend any time convincing you that you are a sinner. You probably know the truth about yourself all too well. But it’s the other side that we need to talk about. We don’t know God’s heart very well.
You probably know the truth about yourself all too well.
That’s where Psalm 103 can help us tremendously. Perhaps no other chapter in the Bible so clearly reveals God’s compassion for his people. If you’re wondering what God thinks about you, let’s take a journey through Psalm 103 and discover seven liberating truths about God’s heart.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
A FORGOTTEN HERO
Read Acts 9:20--25
The transformation is stunning. Saul, no doubt with blood stains still on his garment from Christians he had tortured, now stood with arms outstretched announcing, "I'm here to testify to you that Jesus is the Messiah, God's Son." And the people who heard it were amazed. The Greek text uses the term from which we get the word ecstatic. They responded with nothing short of ecstatic astonishment at the swift reversal of Saul's life.
Imagine sitting in the synagogue. In front of you, preaching Jesus as the Messiah, is the very man responsible for condemning innocent Christians to death. Others he had taken into prisons, perhaps some of them relatives and friends. The room was full of jaw-dropped stares. The next statement assures us he didn't slow down: "But Saul kept increasing in strength and confounding the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that this Jesus is the Christ" (Acts 9:22).
It gets better. Not only did Saul preach about Christ, he preached with remarkable skill. The word translated proving comes from a Greek verb, which means, "to knit together from several different strands." Saul's sermons were skillfully woven together, seamlessly delivered with compelling logic---all signs of a gifted expositor.
Word by word, sentence by sentence, point by point, Saul walked his listeners through the powerful passages of the Old Testament Scriptures, including the writings of the prophets, presenting an airtight case for believing in Christ as their promised Messiah. Until Saul made his case, most had never made that connection. What a convincing communicator!
Before we go on, let's pause and remind ourselves, none of these remarkable events could have been witnessed, or even recorded for that matter, had it not been for Ananias's courageous faith. You may have never thought of that until now. Saul would have remained blind and trembling had the disciple of Damascus refused to obey and go to Straight Street. All this was set in motion because God used the memorable faith of a little-known but faithful hero. His trembling but faithful obedience changed the destiny of millions, including you and me.
The transformation is stunning. Saul, no doubt with blood stains still on his garment from Christians he had tortured, now stood with arms outstretched announcing, "I'm here to testify to you that Jesus is the Messiah, God's Son." And the people who heard it were amazed. The Greek text uses the term from which we get the word ecstatic. They responded with nothing short of ecstatic astonishment at the swift reversal of Saul's life.
Imagine sitting in the synagogue. In front of you, preaching Jesus as the Messiah, is the very man responsible for condemning innocent Christians to death. Others he had taken into prisons, perhaps some of them relatives and friends. The room was full of jaw-dropped stares. The next statement assures us he didn't slow down: "But Saul kept increasing in strength and confounding the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that this Jesus is the Christ" (Acts 9:22).
It gets better. Not only did Saul preach about Christ, he preached with remarkable skill. The word translated proving comes from a Greek verb, which means, "to knit together from several different strands." Saul's sermons were skillfully woven together, seamlessly delivered with compelling logic---all signs of a gifted expositor.
Word by word, sentence by sentence, point by point, Saul walked his listeners through the powerful passages of the Old Testament Scriptures, including the writings of the prophets, presenting an airtight case for believing in Christ as their promised Messiah. Until Saul made his case, most had never made that connection. What a convincing communicator!
Before we go on, let's pause and remind ourselves, none of these remarkable events could have been witnessed, or even recorded for that matter, had it not been for Ananias's courageous faith. You may have never thought of that until now. Saul would have remained blind and trembling had the disciple of Damascus refused to obey and go to Straight Street. All this was set in motion because God used the memorable faith of a little-known but faithful hero. His trembling but faithful obedience changed the destiny of millions, including you and me.
Christmas - A Personal Promise
Matthew 1:18-25
Christmas is more than an event. It is a promise that has been offered to mankind - a personal promise that is applicable 365 days a year. And when we understand its significance, Christmas takes on a whole new meaning to us.
In this scripture, there are two names that help us to recognize the true importance of Jesus' birth. The first is the name Jesus which means "God is salvation." In giving that name, the angel was indicating the work that Christ was coming to do. The second name - mentioned only 3 times in the Bible - is Immanuel, which means "God with us." In the name of Jesus, we find forgiveness for our sins, and Immanuel delivers the wonderful promise that God will be with us forever.
On the night Jesus Christ was born, the eternal God was motivated by love to enter the human family. He was conceived of the Holy Spirit and supernaturally born to a virgin in order to be one of us. But He never ceased to be God. Apart from the incarnation (the birth of God in human flesh), there is no hope and no future for anyone who has ever lived. Without Jesus, we would have to stand before Almighty God with all of our sin resting upon us.
At Christmastime, I want to encourage you to pray before you plunge into the packages. As you look at the Christmas tree, remember THE TREE. (Galatians 3:13) When you see the lights, remember THE LIGHT. (John 8;12) And when you look at the gifts, remember THE GIFT. (John 3:16)
Christmas is more than an event. It is a promise that has been offered to mankind - a personal promise that is applicable 365 days a year. And when we understand its significance, Christmas takes on a whole new meaning to us.
In this scripture, there are two names that help us to recognize the true importance of Jesus' birth. The first is the name Jesus which means "God is salvation." In giving that name, the angel was indicating the work that Christ was coming to do. The second name - mentioned only 3 times in the Bible - is Immanuel, which means "God with us." In the name of Jesus, we find forgiveness for our sins, and Immanuel delivers the wonderful promise that God will be with us forever.
On the night Jesus Christ was born, the eternal God was motivated by love to enter the human family. He was conceived of the Holy Spirit and supernaturally born to a virgin in order to be one of us. But He never ceased to be God. Apart from the incarnation (the birth of God in human flesh), there is no hope and no future for anyone who has ever lived. Without Jesus, we would have to stand before Almighty God with all of our sin resting upon us.
At Christmastime, I want to encourage you to pray before you plunge into the packages. As you look at the Christmas tree, remember THE TREE. (Galatians 3:13) When you see the lights, remember THE LIGHT. (John 8;12) And when you look at the gifts, remember THE GIFT. (John 3:16)
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