My 2011 Christmas Wish for You (and for myself)
May all of the “gifts” that we give to one another (both today and throughout the coming year), originate only from God (James 1:17), honor him (1 Corinthians 10:31), and help others grow in maturity in Jesus Christ (1 Thessalonians 5:11).
Merry Christmas!
Scripture… As We Live It #188
This is the 188th passage in “Scripture… As We Live It.”
And going into the house while they were standing outside the stable they saw the child with Mary his mother along with Joseph and shepherds, plus sheep and donkeys, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him one another gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh whatever each person had asked for or whatever had been on sale on Black Friday. (Matthew 2:11 re-mix)
(Please read the first post for an explanation of this series.)
Replay: Jesus is the Reason… for our lack of unity?
I originally wrote the post “Jesus is the Reason” to be published three years ago on Christmas Day, December 25, 2008. If you have been reading my blog for even a short time, I hope you have noticed that I am very concerned about the rampant divisiveness among the followers of Jesus Christ. There is a lack of unity among the church that is apparent not only to believers, but also (and perhaps even more so) to those who are not Christians.
Even something like Christmas – to celebrate or not to celebrate – is a cause of division. I hope this post helps us move toward unity in Christ – even if it’s only in a small way.
———————————-
Jesus is the Reason
So, it’s Christmas Day [or Christmas Eve in this “Replay”].
If you believe that this is the most holy day of the year, then I have a request of you. Please remember that Jesus is the reason for you to live every day – he’s not simply a slogan to tack on to your life on Christmas Day. Celebrate this day as unto the Lord. Also, remember your brothers and sisters who choose to view all days as equally holy. They also celebrate all days as unto the Lord.
If you believe that Christmas Day should not be celebrated as the most holy day of the year, then I have a request of you. Please remember that Jesus is the reason for you to live every day – including today. You do not have an excuse to be unkind or ungenerous simply because you do not choose to celebrate Christmas Day. Celebrate this day, as all days, unto the Lord. Also, remember your brothers and sisters who choose to view this day as special. They also celebrate this day as unto the Lord.
Even the hearts and minds of unbelievers are turned toward God and spiritual things during this time. Look for opportunities to speak of God’s grace and truth to those who need to hear.
Live today for the glory of God. Love him and love those around you. Serve the people that God brings across your path. Serve them before they can serve you. Accept those who are different. Be patient with those who are less mature. Follow those who are more mature. Walk in Spirit. When you come together with your brothers and sisters in Christ, seek to build them up, to stir up love and good works within them, and to mature them in Christ Jesus.
Have a Merry Christmas!
Overwhelmed by Love
Now, I know what you may be thinking, and, yes, I am overwhelmed by the love of God for me and for others (for others mostly). And, yes, I’m even overwhelmed by the love of my wife, my family, and many friends.
But, that’s not really what this post is about.
Instead, it’s about our response to God, to Jesus Christ, to the Holy Spirit, to the gospel, to our salvation, etc. Love. Have you ever noticed how many times Scripture talks about our response of love?
I mean, we all know that Jesus said the greatest commandment (and, thus, the greatest response) is to love God and love our neighbors. But, really, even this only scratches the surface.
The prevalence and importance of love to Jesus and the authors of Scripture is overwhelming. It’s almost impossible to find a page in the New Testament that doesn’t include some aspect of love as our proper response to God, his work in our lives, and other people.
Love. God’s love is definitely overwhelming. But, lately, I’ve also been overwhelmed with thinking about, contemplating, and meditating on the extent of the commands, principles, and examples to us toward a life of love.
For you, what is an “overwhelming” verse/passage in Scripture about our love response to God, to his work in our lives, or to others?
Did she just say Happy Holidays?
Merry Christmas! Feliz Navidad! Fröhliche Weihnachten! Joyeux Noël! Buon Natale! Feliz Natal! Mele Kalikimaka!
What!?!? Did she just say, “Happy Holidays”? That just won’t do…
Ok… so, just to be clear, I tell people, “Merry Christmas.” But, I’m not upset or offended when someone says, “Happy Holidays.” In fact, I do not assume that someone is a nonChristian if that person says, “Happy Holidays.”
What would happen if Christians actually talked with (and listened to) people talk about how THEY celebrated the “holidays” instead of responding in more negative ways?
I could imagine a conversation kinda like this…
—————————–
“Happy Holidays,” she said as she handed me the receipt.
“Thank you,” I said with a smile. The story was almost empty, and there was no one in line behind me, so I continued, “Which holiday or holidays are you celebrating?”
She seemed a little surprised, but I stopped and made sure she could tell that I was truly interested in what she would say.
“ummm… What do you mean?” she answered with a question, obviously a little unsure of my intent.
“Well, different people celebrate this time of year for different reasons: Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Christmas, New Years. Some people just enjoy this time of year by taking a break from work or school and spending time with family. Others recognize the change of seasons or the winter solstice. What are you celebrating during the holidays?”
She stopped for a moment, and looked at me funny again. “You know, no one has ever asked me that before. My family got together for Thanksgiving, and we have several different Christmas traditions…” She told me about some of her family’s plans including travel and parties.
For some reason, I’m always surprised, but I know that people love to talk about things that they care about, especially to someone who is really listening. So, I listened, and made a couple of comments about corresponding traditions or places that I’d been before.
As she stopped talking about herself and her family, I thanked her for telling me about her holiday plans, and started to turn away out of the store.
“What about you?” she asked. “What are you doing for the holidays?”
I turned back toward her and smile. I don’t know if she was as interested in hearing my reasons to celebrate or not, but she had asked. So…
—————————–
The way I see it, this kind of encounter – any time of year – must be preceded by the following:
1) An earnest concern for the other person and a desire to hear what the other person has to say. (In other words, don’t ask the other person about her beliefs ONLY so that you can share your own.)
2) A willingness to walk away without sharing your own beliefs/plans/whatever if the person does not ask.
So, what about you? Have you ever had an interesting conversation with someone because you reacted in a way that showed you genuinely cared about them (especially when your response was different than what they may have expected from Christians)?
Send out your… wait, did you say “dead” or “best”?
Felicity at “Simply Church” is at it again in her post “They dirty secret of missions.”
Most of the post is a quote from Rick Wood, editor of Missions Frontier magazine. In the quote, Wood laments that many of the “missionaries” who are sent out by churches and organizations have very little (or no) experience actually discipling other people.
But, then, Felicity asks two pointed questions and makes an astute observation:
Will we in the simple/organic church do any better? The church in Antioch sent out their best when they sent out Paul and Barnabus. Are we training up people who can make disciples and start churches in our own context before we send them out onto the mission field?
We’ll never know whether or not Paul and Barnabas were “the best” in Antioch. However, we do know this: Paul and Barnabas were already serving others in Jesus name when God and the church in Antioch sent them out. (See Acts 13:1.)
I especially like Felicity’s second question. We begin by recognizing that God is sending all of his children out – whether across the street or across the globe.
Replay: Christmas 1993 and Eternity
The first Christmas after I started this blog (Christmas 2006), I wrote a post called “Christmas ’93 and Eternity.” I re-posted it in 2007 and 2009, every 2 years. Since I’m not one to break with tradition (ahem), I thought I would post it again today.
But, there’s another reason to “replay” this post today. The post is about the birth of my son, Jeremy, in 1993. And, today, he turns 18. So, when you read the post below, remember these 2 things: 1) I wrote this post when Jeremy had just turned 13. And 2) we plan to celebrate by going to Red Robin so that Jeremy can order a Royal Red Robin hamburger. (Point #2 is not important in reading the post; but it is important if you know Jeremy.)
—————————————–
A few days ago, we celebrated my son’s 13th birthday by taking him to see the movie Eragon. He and his friends enjoyed it, though the story was a bit predictable for me.
Anyway, celebrating his birthday and preparing for Christmas reminded me of the Christmas of 1993. Our son was born on the 22nd of December that year. We brought him home on Christmas eve, stuffed in a red stocking. The next morning, we gave him his first Christmas gifts: clothes, a stuffed animal, and a full-size football (autographed by Bo Jackson, which is only important to half the population of the state of Alabama).
My wife was surprised that I would get my newborn son a football. But, he quickly outgrew both the clothes and the stuffed animal, but he can still play with the football! So, the football turned out to be a better gift than she thought at first. True, a three day old baby can do nothing with a football but drool on it. But, eventually, he grew to love football.
As I was thinking about his first Christmas and his first Christmas gifts, I wondered how often I focus on things that will truly last. I don’t even mean things that will last a few years or even a lifetime. But, how often do I focus on things that will last eternally? As I understand it, the only things on earth that are eternal are people. Do I give gifts that will make an eternal difference? Do I give things that will eventually fade? Or, do I give of myself to people who will last for eternity?
One day, I will join with multitudes around the throne of God. I hope that even this year I am giving eternal gifts.
p.s. Last year, we give our (then) 12 year old son a special gift. We asked several men who had impacted his life to write him a letter. We asked them to tell him something that they wished someone had told them when they turned 12. We then took all of the letters and bound them in an album. It turned out to be a very special gift!
Old friends go; new friends come: the life of a pilgrim on the Way
Yesterday, I noticed with much interest that Josh at “Called to Rebuild” had written a new blog post called “Reflecting on three years in organic church life.” I’ve been following Josh’s blog for a while (probably not for 3 years), and I always enjoy his post. So, I was looking forward to reading this “reflection” post.
Now, to begin with, I have to admit that Josh’s post is not what I expected – it’s even better. He does not go into the details of his “organic church life” nor does he talk about how much better it is than traditional/institutional church life.
Instead, Josh talks about some of the current struggles that he’s having. What are those struggles? Well, the brothers and sisters that he and his family have been gathering with are no longer going to assemble together.
Here is that part of the post:
Alas, however, in our case the old adage came to pass that “all good things must come to an end.” One couple moved, then another, and others who were meeting with us decided to pursue other courses, and now there is nothing in the way of a visible gathering left to show. Cue the sad music. Not really.
(Make sure to jump over to Josh’s post and read the rest. It is all very good, and includes some details about how all these people came together in the first place.)
When I read this post – and especially the paragraph above – I was reminded of something. According to Scripture, the very first Christians referred to themselves as “The Way.” They knew that they were on a path, a journey, living a way of life. And, they knew that was the life of a pilgrim – to go wherever God sent them.
Now, this does not always make it easy for us – such as in Josh’s case. But, we can trust God that as some brothers and sisters and opportunities move out of our lives, others will move in. The brothers and sisters and opportunities will be different… but they will be exactly what we need.
As difficult as it is to do sometime, when people move out of our lives – for whatever reason – we should look back to the many things that God taught us through our relationship with them and look forward to the new things that God is going to do through new relationships.
Has anyone else experienced this or is anyone else experiencing this now?
The Video Edition of The Assembling of the Church?
I published my first blog post at “The Assembling of the Church” in March 2006. I published the first audio file here a couple of years later in April 2008. That audio file was from a lecture that I presented in a New Testament class, and it is now on my “Resources” page along with a few other audio files, pdf files, and PowerPoint presentations.
Last year, I published my first video. In fact, around this time last year I published three video interviews with my friend Jason who was getting ready to move to South Africa. Those three video file are now on my “Videos” page (as well as on my Vimeo channel).
I love using video. In fact, recently I’ve made two videos while running. I’ve included those videos on my running blog as well as on the Vimeo channel. I would love to use video here. But, I don’t want to use video just for the sake of using video. And, so far, I haven’t found a good way – that is, a way that I like – to use video on this blog.
I could video myself giving lectures or talking about some of the content that I write about here on this blog. But, to be honest, that seems boring even to me. (I rarely read my own posts; why would I watch a video of me?)
I could do more interviews like I did with Jason last year. I like that idea much better than the idea of videoing only myself talking. But, still, when we were making those videos last year, they seemed somewhat forced.
I think I would prefer to just video a conversation, but that’s a little harder to do. I mean, the way I usually talk with people, you’re likely to get 30 minutes of us talking about our favorite Star Wars character in the middle of a discussion about the church. (Of course, I would find that very interesting, but other people might not.)
I suppose that I could edit those “irrelevant” parts out of the video, but wouldn’t it end up being forced again? And, there would always be references back to the “irrelevant” parts that wouldn’t make sense. (But, then, maybe everyone could recognize the reference to the discipleship implications of Obi Wan Kenobi…)
The way I see it, I can not use any videos… ever. I can use videos only at special times, like if I give a lecture or something like that. Or, I can figure out a way to incorporate video more regularly into my blog.
So… what do I do? As always, I’ve talked with a few friends. But, I still haven’t come up with a good solution.
I thought that I would turn to you. My readers are almost always more wise than I am when it comes to things like this. So, what do you think about adding video features to this blog? Good idea? Annoying? Could care less?
Then, if I do video, what kind of videos should I do? Obviously, the possibilities are endless… well, maybe not endless. But, my creative juices are dry at the moment. Do you have any flashes of inspiration or brilliance that you’d like to share?
(By the way, if you know someone who is using video well, please share a link with that site as well.)
Fighting the War on Christmas… in Jesus’ Name, of course
Skye at “Out of Ur” has written a very insightful article called “The Wrong War on Christmas.”
The article traces how Christians responded to Christmas only a hundred years ago (or so), and compares that to how Christians respond to Christmas today. (Of course, I’ve always said that Christians – Evangelicals in particular – have a short memory.) In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, many Christians did not accept Christmas as a “religious” holiday.
When did this change? When the American culture (society) began to accept Christmas more widely, then Christians and the church began to accept and celebrate it as well.
Today, many Christians fight to “keep the Christ in Christmas.” (I wonder how many are also keeping the “Mass” in Christmas…)
Anyway, the last part of Skye’s article should cause all of us to think… whether we celebrate Christmas or not:
Sadly, the “War on Christmas” and “Christmas Under Siege” campaigns pushed by some conservative Christians says more about the church’s captivity to consumerism than its commitment to the love of Christ and their neighbors.
Just something to think about…