Month: December 2017

The Path to Christmas 15

Glory. It’s a word we think we grasp without really plumbing its depths. I do not profess to know the depths of such a rich and meaningful term, and believe it will take lengths measured with an eternal calendar to fully understand it.

But “glory” and “Christmas” are closely tied. We cannot truly know one without considering the other. The apostle John wrote, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we BEHELD HIS GLORY (emphasis mine)…”

So how can we behold the glory of the eternal God, who none have ever seen… or ever seen and lived to tell it… when we can’t even stare for a few seconds into the brilliant, noonday sun?

The heavens declare the glory of God, according to the Psalmist. The angels shouted of His glory Christmas evening. A beautiful sunrise or sunset hint at it. But Jesus revealed it. He showed it in a way that was unmistakable… “veiled in flesh, the godhead see…” The glory resides in Jesus. And the only way we will see it as it is will be through this One who is God in flesh.

One day, standing before the Father in Heaven, we will see the glory in its fullness. Without veil… without filter… without dilution. It thrills my heart even now as I write this to know that my sweet wife is seeing that glory RIGHT NOW, the same glory she sang and played music about for over half a century.

But now, in Jesus, we can “behold His glory….” Don’t miss this part. To “behold” doesn’t mean to glance at something and then look away. It means to stay with our gaze transfixed and to “see with understanding.”

And in Jesus, there is no greater way to see.


Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace toward men with whom God is pleased. Luke 2:14

Glorious God, as the stars and sun emanate light and power, so does your Presence so much more. Make us long for nothing greater, nothing higher, than to see and know that same glory. Through the Son who reveals it to us we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 14

I wonder how many times along the way the wise men grew discouraged by their journey? “Following yonder star.” I tried to run the moon down the other night… the super moon. I saw it as I approached my neighborhood and chased quickly to a place where I could see it more clearly. But the more I drove, the further away it seemed… and after several vain attempts… I quit.

Sometimes the goals set before us are elusive. The goal to lose weight, to get an education, to win someone’s heart and hand in a relationship, to receive a promotion. The closer we think we are… the further the line moves away from us, it seems.

I wonder if they wanted to quit. If their bread got moldy, and their wine and water ran low… if they got tired of the monotony of the same scenery… if they missed their family… their home.

Maybe you, too, are pursuing an elusive goal. A trial of health that keeps you on a return visit to the doctor’s office… a seemingly impossible task of seeing your spouse come to faith… an educational goal that pushes further and further out. The other day, I was on my first thirty-mile bike ride. I remember when I finally set eyes on the place where we were going to stop for a break and with every rotation of the pedals that goal seemed to go in the other direction… away from me and not toward me!

But I’m glad I didn’t quit… even though I kind of wanted to at times. And I’m confident that, when the wise men and their company finally arrived in Jerusalem and knocked on the door of the palace, they were glad they hadn’t turned around and returned home.

Don’t stop short. The next step, the next turn in the road, the next conversation, the next phone call… that could be the one that lets you see the finish line.  The wise men didn’t quit. And their story is told all around the world in the greatest book ever written. We make little figures representing them to place in our nativity scenes. Trust God. Take your steps. Reaching the goal will be worth it.

The wise men will tell you.


“Where is He Who is born king of the Jews…we have come to worship Him.” Matthew 2:1-2

Father, we come to Christmas sometimes weary. The goals we pursue wear us down at times. Some goals are worthy of our pursuit and some are not. Help us to pursue that which makes for godliness with our best energy. And help us, Father, not to grow weary in well doing even and especially at Christmas. The path we are on to know Jesus, as the wise men learned, is the best path to follow… because it leads us to worship the King who came for us. May this Christmas be a renewed time of falling again at His feet. Through Jesus Christ we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 13

A tent. A temporary, cloth or canvas fabric home, held together by stitches and poles, secured by stakes. A tent. Wrinkled, sometimes torn, seldom what we could refer to as “beautiful.” A tent. A place to live when you’re just passing through for a few days. A tent.

Exactly what was described when the Bible says, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…”? There’s the word. In that verse. He “pitched a tent” among us. For thirty-three earthly years the Word-Made-Flesh occupied a temporary house… flawed, wrinkled, torn. Not what we could refer to as beautiful.

I can only begin to imagine the transition this way. In Port-au-Prince, Haiti… especially since the 2011 earthquake, much of the population in and around the city lives in tents. Tent cities. Blue tarps that we use to patch a leaking roof… are their roof. Now imagine leaving the comfortable bed you woke up in this morning and flying to Haiti with nothing in your hands… and moving into a tent. To love them. To tell them about Jesus. Could you do that? Jesus loved the Father so much… loved us so much… that this is what He did.

He lived in a tent. His body. He lived in our “tent-village,” the planet earth. He camped among His own kind… like them in every way. Human, hurting, vulnerable. Our tents “groan,” Paul reminds us. They are weak, and sometimes they fold up… we call that death. The Bible calls it “moving your tent.” (2 Corinthians 5)

Christmas is about a profound event in which the Word of God, the second person of the Godhead, came to our world through the womb of a virgin… and lived in a tent of Middle Eastern variety. He was “made like His brothers” in every way, yet without sin.

And He lived in a tent. Like yours. Like mine. Because He loved us.


“The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory…..” John 1:14

Our Lord and our King, we come before You amazed by the wondrous love You showed at Christmas… and always. A love we cannot understand, that would allow Your beloved Son to occupy a tent like the one we live in to meet us where we are… in our pain… in our sorrow… in our brokenness. And to show us that, even in our “tent-ness,” we are loved by God. What wondrous love it is. Through our Redeemer we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 12

As we think about all the Christmas journeys that are described in the telling of the birth of Christ… the wise men, Mary and Joseph, the shepherds… we need to be careful that we not forget one important traveler who arrived that evening,
Jesus.

If we understand the Bible correctly, Jesus left Heaven approximately nine months before the evening that we sing of as the night of His birth. Heaven had a sendoff over 270 days prior to the first cry of our Lord on the earth.

Now I’m already in deeper water with this than I know how to swim out of, to be honest. This is pretty heavy to think about, especially for some of us this early in the morning. But it’s true that, if Jesus is both Deity (God), and He is, and human (baby), and He was, then something amazing happened, and it didn’t just happen one fateful night in Bethlehem.

It happened in the fore thought of the Father. Sometimes the coming of Jesus is portrayed almost like an emergency, rescue mission. It was a rescue mission, but certainly not one that caught God off-guard.

Mary’s nine month pregnancy was not phony. Not faked. Not photoshopped. It was a real pregnancy with a real embryo that really contained the God of the Universe drawing nourishment from her body. Just… amazing.

Jesus’ journey was downward. Intentionally downward. He came down from the heights of the heavenly throne, and walked with sandaled feet the dusty roads of first-century Judea. Just….amazing.

Don’t lose the wonder of this. Don’t lose the power of this. One old carol puts it,

Thus to come from highest bliss
Down to such a world as this.

Just… amazing.

 

(Jesus) made Himself nothing, taking on the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of man. Philippians 2:7

Lord of all, Christmas should leave us amazed. Amazed at your love… amazed at Your plan from eternity past. Amazed at the love You showed in sending Your Son…Your beloved…to become a baby for us. We can only be amazed at such an act. And for all eternity we will praise You for it. Through the name above all names we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 11

The shepherds who came that first, Christmas night deserve an honored place in our nativity scenes. It is through the shepherds that we can most easily find our place. It is hard for us to identify with a virgin mother who just gave birth… to the Son of God! It is difficult for us to identify, even if we are a step-parent, with the burden now born by Joseph, her espoused husband, as he looked down the road at the responsibility of raising God’s Only Begotten Son. How do you discipline… Jesus?

But the shepherds? Oh, we can get them. These were the “little people” who find that privilege and ease often came rarely, if at all! They were not the popular or sought after. In fact, they were often marginalized and avoided. No one put them at the top of their invitation list. In fact, their names weren’t included at all!

Shepherds in this day were non-persons in many ways. They could not be counted on to tell the truth in courts of law, and in fact were not allowed to testify. Often they were the first blamed if something in the area went missing. They didn’t just sit on the back row of the church… they weren’t welcomed at all!

So of all the unlikely to be invited FIRST to come to see the Christ child, they were the least likely. The least lovely. The least deserving.

And the most grateful.


And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child.     Luke 2:17

Gracious Father, thank You for loving even the unlovely and lowly. The shepherds stand for all of our need before You, and our unworthiness to be the focus of Your attention. May we worship, with them, in the humility that is most beautiful to You. In the Lamb of God we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 10

No one was more excited to travel the evening of Christ’s birth than the shepherds. As the wise men, the chosen family and various travelers moved about that same evening, the shepherds “watched their flocks by night.” They were at their post. Boring jobs, low-paying work and largely unskilled laborers, most shepherds were nomadic drifters with no known address.

So when the angels confronted them in the midst of their midnight shift bringing them the greatest news that could be heard, their path to Christmas began! In all likelihood, these men were watching sheep just outside Jerusalem… not far from the birthplace of Jesus. Mary had now given birth to her Son. Joseph was no doubt scrambling to find a few things in the sparse, cattle stall where his beloved and now a newborn baby lay.

The shepherds were no doubt astounded to find such a significant child born without the comfort of a room, a decent bed or a doting family surrounding and supporting the couple. The couple and the child seemed… like them. Homeless, broke, without a decent place to lay their heads.
In fact the birth of this Child that had been trumpeted by angels looked like a birth of one of their own… outcast, lowly, unwanted by society. One who was just like one of them.

And the truth is… He was.


And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby, lying in a manger.    Luke 2:16a

Father of the angelic host, may we like the shepherds make haste on our path to Christmas and arrive, as they did, with an awesome expectation of seeing a king. And may we also find that this King who came that night… is just like us.

The Path to Christmas 09

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light!   Isaiah 9:2

I suppose, unless our eyes are limited, that we don’t spend a lot of time in the dark these days. No one enjoys walking into an unlit room, or out into a starless and black night. We are drawn to light.

And yet darkness holds an attraction for some in our world today. We are warned not to participate with those who do their evil deeds in the darkness. Some look for the darkness to hide their wrongdoing.

But darkness is more than just a room or a space without sunlight or illumination. It is a condition… a spiritual condition. Many in the world live in spiritual darkness, believing lies because they have rejected truth. They justify their wrongdoing with a cloak of tolerance, calling good evil and evil good.

Our world is dark in many ways… even in places where spiritual illumination and truth are plentiful. Light terrifies those whose lives are being lived in disobedience.

But another kind of darkness exists as well. People who have no hope live in darkness. People who have no direction for the course of their life live in darkness. People who live in ignorance of God live in darkness. And for them, Christmas brings the reminder… the Good News… that the Light has come!

Isaiah spoke a prophecy thousands of years before the coming of Christ to earth as a baby. He made a promise through the Holy Spirit that, no matter how dark it may now seem, the light is on the way.

And His name is Jesus.

Our Lord and our God, Jesus Himself told us that we are to be light in a dark world. He Himself was the light and we are to continue shining it as the world around us grows darker each day. May Christmas remind us, with the glowing lights of the season around us, that we are to be lights as well, shining the way for those who are searching… and even for those who are not. We pray that the people in our lives will no longer live in the darkness of a spiritual void, but that they will find the light of the world in Jesus. For His glory we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 08

Advent is about waiting. Building anticipation. Looking forward to something better than we now have or than we now are. It is designed to formalize waiting. The little “Advent Calendar” clicks off each day building to Christmas morning.

I remember growing up, how the waiting began for me in September. The Sears Company, cruelly, sent out their toy catalogue to torment little boys and girls as they began their Christmas “wish lists,” three months early! I know that when the time came to order the gifts and fulfill the list, the catalogue was ripped at the edges from countless hours of thumbing through and probably wrinkled from sweaty, little fingers anxiously longing for the latest toy.

We waited. The agonizing last hours before Christmas morning were the toughest, in my memory. It seemed now within reach… but not quite there yet.
But I also remember this. Christmas morning was all the sweeter because of the waiting. I’m glad my parents were mean enough/wise enough to make me wait until that wonderful moment when Christmas morning came and we could finally get out of bed and go see what was under the tree!

I’m older now, but waiting still plays a part of Christmas… and of life. We still wait for something better… something that answers some of the longings in our hearts. Christmas seems to give us a place to put it…

Not under the tree… but in the deepest places of our soul.


“But when the time was full, God sent forth His Son…” Galatians 4:4

Father in Heaven, we wait, as did the people of old, for the fulfillment of many great and precious promises You have made in Your Word… promises yet to come to pass. And as we watch and wait, fill us this season of Christmas we pray with the joy of anticipating the birth of those promises, even as You fulfilled the promise to send Your Son. We thank You, Lord… even for the waiting. Through Christ our soon-coming Lord we pray, Amen.

The Path to Christmas 07

The first Christmas shared by Mary and Joseph, some ragged shepherds and an angelic host, was anything but “calm and bright,” as we sing in our carol “Silent Night.” In fact, it was disruptive, inconvenient, uncomfortable and fraught with uncertainty. Jesus did not enter the world in the calm that we portray Christmas to be.

He came into the midst of chaos. In fact, the English language corrupted the name of the village of Christ’s birth, Bethlehem, and shortened it to Bedlam… the name of a city-run asylum for the mentally ill. Bedlam entered our vocabulary as a name signifying chaos and disorder… anything but peace.

Jesus was born in “bedlam.” A cattle shelter which probably had only a roof and no sides, or, if they were fortunate, a cave where animals would be kept. Not the “stuff” of our nativity scenes today. The overcrowded village, as I have compared before, would be like getting a room in Starke if the Super Bowl was being played there!

That makes more sense to me. Jesus did not come to lie peacefully in a cattle stall. He came to dwell in our woundedness, our chaos, our hurt… in short, our humanity. What we forget is, He started His journey there. “Bedlam” captures that better than “all is calm, all is bright.”

Oh, let’s keep the song. I think it’s important, however to realize that the words “all is calm, all is bright,” do not describe the place of His coming to earth…

… it describes the heart where He is welcomed today.

“To as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become sons of God.” John 1:12

Father in Heaven, we thank You again for giving us the right to be Your children, and the right to come to You in prayer. Thank You for sending Jesus to come into the bedlam of our lives and make our hearts places of peace….”calm and bright.” The peace of Christ that You give meets us at our most broken and vulnerable places and restores and renews us. We are thankful You did not pull away when we needed You most… but came and gave and saved us. May we never cease to praise You for the ultimate gift of Your Son, our Savior, Jesus. We pray in His beautiful name, Amen.

 

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