living for eternity today
As we journey closer to that joy-filled morning, we pause and reflect on what this new family went through to give us something to celebrate. This week’s Music Monday is another favorite of many and has undoubtedly been sung in churches around the world as part of their Christmas celebrations. But what do the words mean? Where was Jesus born and why was he born there?
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Why do we celebrate Christmas? Why do we gather around a tree with our family and give each other gifts? Why is it ok for a large man in a red suit to invite children to sit on his lap and no one finds that wrong? Why is it that we tend to fill our churches on Christmas more than on the Sunday after Christmas? This week in our Adventually series we address the idea of love by asking the question why.
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As children we focused on getting presents! And it really was all about the presents and the bows and the stockings and the fun new toys. But as I got older, I started to act like Christmas was still about the presents. Just in a little different way. I started to treat Christmas like it was all about how much I could give to my family and friends at Christmas time. But that’s not the point either.
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This week we take on another one of those old favorites for our Music Monday. Sung in churches around the world is the hymn O Come, O Come Emmanuel. The focus of our song this week is to help us see the waiting that takes place inside all of us as Christmas draws ever closer.
Continue readingThis year as we journey toward Christmas we are looking at Christmas from different angles. Our theme is It’s all about the presence. Yes I know. It’s a fun play on words. But it should get us thinking a bit. We live in a world that thinks Christmas is all about the presents when in actuality they’re just a few letters off! So if Christmas is all about the presence, can we have Christmas without all of the normal stuff?
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In the start of the Gospel of John, we read a peculiar little account. But before we dig into the meaning of the first few verses of this book, let’s take a quick glance at why this book exists in the first place. In the New Testament of the Bible there are four letters known as Gospels. These four books account for the life of Jesus from different perspectives. They certainly say the same thing just with different thrusts. Matthew is writing to Jewish people who were expecting a king so he writes mostly about what Jesus said. Mark is writing to Roman people who saw Jesus do some pretty amazing things, so he’ll focus on what Jesus did. Luke writes to a guy named Theophilus, and he’ll spend his account focusing on what Jesus felt. And not to be left out, John writes to anyone and everyone, and he’ll focus on who Jesus was.
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It’s that time of year again! We can’t stop it if we try, so we may as well jump on the Christmas preparation train and see where it leads. This week for our Music Monday time we’ll pick up an old familiar hymn. This hymn was first written as a poem and later put into song form about fourteen years later. The poem turned song was intended to help the Christian to understand teh power of the reality of Christmas. It demonstrates one of the core truths of the Christian faith – the incarnation.
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It’s pretty easy to give words to Jesus. It’s way to simple to twist the words of the Bible to make them say just about anything we want. Over the past few weeks we’ve touched on just a couple of these statements that Jesus never said but we kind of think he said. The goal of the series was to show that we should be glad Jesus never actually said them! This week we wrapped up the series with the realization that life isn’t fair and that’s probably a good thing!
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In my journey through my bookshelves to find something good to read, I tend to find an author and stick with them for a few weeks. Last week we took a look at Follow Me by David Platt and Francis Chan. This week we tackle another David Platt book titled Counter Culture. If I’m being honest, and why wouldn’t I because this is my website, this one was challenging. It was challenging because Platt is calling Christians, and me specifically, to the task of living the faith I claim to possess.
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Never been to Jerusalem. Never been to the Jordan River. Never walked through the holy waters of the Bible. But after listening to this song, perhaps I can say that I have experienced something far more powerful than any of these locations could have given me. In church world we call this sweet holy water stuff – forgiveness.
I’ve never walked through a super hot desert without water but I have worked outside on hot summer days when the heat just zaps all of the energy out of me. When I come back inside and drink that tall glass of ice-cold water it’s like new life is breathed back into me.
This week’s Music Monday is a song called Holy Water. The beat is catchy and the words are powerful. Take a few minutes and listen to the words. Listen closely because when we really focus on what’s being said in this song we’ll realize that our lives are a lot like that desert I mentioned earlier. We go through life dry and parched. We try to fill ourselves with drink after drink but all it does is leaves us even more thirsty. It’s kind of like the Bible story of the woman at the well. She kept having to go back and get more water for herself. But Jesus offers her water that will make her never thirst again. This is the water of forgiveness.
When we realize the dry and parched nature of our souls when we keep going back to the well of sin, then receiving this fresh and life-giving water of forgiveness is like the sweetest water we could imagine. Listen. Think. Then receive this water for yourself as you turn and focus on what He is doing in your life.
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