What do we bring?
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What do we bring?

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What gifts do we bring Him?

The Shepherds brought their time.
The Magi brought their riches.
The disciples brought their lives.
His parents brought their faith and obedience.
So what do we bring Jesus?
He gave us everything we have. Hope, joy, healing, sustenance, peace, grace, love. He gave His dignity and His relationship to God. His pain is ours to unwrap, His grief and suffering, His sorrow. We can untie the bows on His glory and goodness. We can shake the box full of His kingdom and receive all He has given us. So, what are we giving Him?

What part of us does He ask for? All of us. Our heart, soul and mind, right? It can be a difficult request to fill, but isn’t that what He brought us? His heart, His soul, His mind. Ask and you shall receive, so maybe what we should ask for is the will and ability to be like our Savior. If we are more like Jesus then perhaps we will be able to bring Jesus more.

Love you all!

May your season and year be filled with Christ’s peace, His hope, His love, and His joy!

Merry Christmas

Listen to the voices of the stars
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Listen to the voices of the stars

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Star

The cold mountain air burns the lungs of the young astronomer as her eyes take in the night sky. Orion winks at her playfully and her gaze swings as she grins back at him; she sees a star larger than the rest and her heart takes her back to a time when a similar star drew men from far and distant countries to a small town called Bethlehem.

These days we don’t have a star to help us find Jesus, but we do still have guides. The Bible, word of mouth, pastors, musicians, artists. God sends us ‘stars’ to guide us. Little lights that show Jesus.
Many say to look to the sky for your answers, read the stars, listen to their voices. I am no astronomer, but that night when God sent a special star to guide people to the stable must have been wild. Angels dropping from Heaven into our night sky and praising their God?!? It would have been a light show like no other. Look to the sky to for your answers? why not? Look up and see 100 billion or more Galaxies and hear them answer you. ‘Yes! There is a God, and He made all this… and He made you!’ Follow the stars around you to the stable and find Jesus.
Life, Death, and Resurrection all held within this baby’s tiny hands.
The very first Christians led to the stable, by a star.

When all the lights go out
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When all the lights go out

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When all the lights go out

Crunch, crunch, crunch. Each footfall leaves another indent in the snow, a small trace that you were once there. A tiny blaze is nestled close to your chest as you carry a candle for just a little added light. There are other lights around you, barely visible, just a flicker, like woodland sprites dancing among the trees. The lights make their way softly through the woods and into the town. There, in a single window, is a candle; like the one you carry except for the meaning behind it. Your candle is for light, this candle is for hope. Inside the house you know you will find others like you, Christian worshippers gathering secretly to praise Jesus. You blow out your candle and step inside.
This story you have entered feels like it happened a lifetime ago to someone you will never know; But even today Christian families are having to hide from those who would seek to harm them. I wonder how many are gathering tonight? Slipping through the streets with candles to light their way?
Surprisingly I found many different opinions on the origin of lights on Christmas trees, but the one that I like the best is the one that says that Christians used to come and gather in the woods, to worship in secret because the Government wanted one religion and Christianity was not it. They would put lights deep in the branches of a tree so that the glow would be muted but visible. Even if that is not the origin I wouldn’t be surprised if it did happen. Maybe that is why lights on the Christmas tree feel so warm and homey. I would go so far as to say they make one feel secure.
On this Advent Sunday I want to send out a simple feeling. Gratitude. I am grateful for the Christian people who are faithful to the point of meeting under the cover of a midnight sky, maybe even outside in the cold, so they can keep the candles of Faith burning. Isn’t that the first place Jesus was worshiped? A cold manger stall, the only light probably a candle. Think of that as you feel warmed by your Christmas tree lights and let it fill you with a sense of wonder.

The bare feet of the shepherds
Blog · Christianity · Christmas · Devotional · Jesus

The bare feet of the shepherds

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Have you ever noticed that when you buy a manger scene these days there are 3 Wise men and maybe 1, or sometimes 2 shepherds? I was contemplating this while fiddling with the presents and staring at our lit – up manger when suddenly the answer whispered in my ear. The Wise men are prettier than the Shepherds. The Wise men are powerful and high class with elegant clothes and sparkling gifts. The Shepherds are low class, even looked down on. Bearing no presents and wearing no shoes as they peek into the manger. The Shepherds were afraid, the Wise men were not. The Shepherds smelled like travel; That Is one thing they shared with the Wise men. The other thing they shred was a sense of awe at the wonder of the baby. The Shepherds were invited to come, the Wise men were not. God knew that the Wise men wouldn’t get there until Jesus was around 2 years old. If He had wanted the Wise men at the manger God would have made sure they were actually there, but this was the Shepherds’ moment. Their night. They were the first to see the baby, the Messiah, our Emmanuel, no one else. I think God kept the Wise men back for more than one reason. One of those reasons being that He knew they would upstage the Shepherds, like they do every year on our manger scenes. God loves the dirty and unloved. He lifts high the fearful and those considered of low value. They are His precious , unrefined treasures. His favorite treasure to work with. Don’t worry if you are not a Wise man. Shepherds hold the highest honor anyway.

Open heart
Blog · Christianity · Devotional · dreams do come true · encouragement · free · Jesus · searching

Open heart

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Open heart

We all have a seed inside our hearts. A part of us that is undiscovered and trying to grow. A potential. A dream left to the wear of time and long since forgotten. Deep down in your heart, however, that dream left a seed. We all have someone we want to be. A chef, a weatherwoman, an accountant, a movie star. But to fulfill a dream takes hard work, good people, and a bull dog drive. Stats say that over 90% of people give up on their dreams instead of seeing them fulfilled. I think that is very sad. A dream is something important to us, and things that are important to us should be things we fight for. Sometimes we dream of being something that other people say we can’t be. An artist who can’t draw, or a musician who doesn’t know how to play. It is possible that maybe that means your true seed is growing into something else. Perhaps a music teacher or an art studio director. Don’t drop your dreams where you stand and move on. Sometimes the true dream is a vine of the original one. Fight for your dreams and water them. See what your seed grows. Like buying a surprise packaged of flower seeds at the plant store. All you can do is scatter them in the dirt and care for them. You know you want a flower, but what that flower looks like is entirely up to the seed. So you care for it and as it grows you love it more and get more excited to see what it will be.

Let your seed grow, and never give up on it.

Getting back up
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Getting back up

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We don’t always spring back up, sometimes we need to kneel first and that’s okay too.

When we fall, to get back up, first we have to get onto our knees. Sometimes on those knees is all we can do until someone comes and offers us a hand to lift us back onto our feet.
When we fall in life and spiritually, first we must climb to our knees and turn it all over to Jesus in prayer. Sometimes it takes a long time of prayer and kneeling before we see an answer, but that is waiting in God’s timing. As my Poppa says, ‘in the waiting we gain sustenance from the knowledge that God is doing something.’
Eventually we will look up from our folded hands to see Jesus reaching down an open hand and smiling brilliantly as He lifts us to our feet.

Soldiers
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Soldiers

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Soldiers

Home is behind, the world is ahead, (J.R.R. Tolkien). I usually see this phrase of this song as a sentence of awe and thrill. Images of camping and wooded trails, tall mountains and pounding waterfalls overtake my mind and I breathe deeply. However that was not the scene around this statement. In the Lord of The Rings masterpiece epic, ( I mean the novels) Pipin sings a song of what would seem to be great adventure, in fact it is a song of war. They left their homes behind and took to war. Trenches and hill tops and beaches. Skies, oceans and forests. Deserts and mountains and jungles. Comfort left behind, loving arms and gentle words long forgotten as feet ache in heavy boots and backs sweat under heavy packs. You almost don’t dare make friends because you don’t know how long you will get to hold to these people around you, but you become family. Our soldiers learned the line Jesus said about true friends, and what Paul said, Rare for a person to lay down their life even for a righteous person; perhaps for a good man one would dare to die for.-Paul ( this is not a direct quote)
Our soldiers dared to die for those they never met. War is UGLY! Suffering and death happen and it is awful! But freedom doesn’t come by hoping for it. We should always honor those who suffered and died, AND those who suffered and live, because our freedom came from their blood. Hate war always, hate our soldiers NEVER! They did not ask for the wars they fought and fight in, but they saw the suffering of the innocent and had the courage to stand up and do something about it. God bless our soldiers! Semper Fi.

I found the cover image on the internet and hope that it is okay that I used it because it is so powerful. My uncle was in Vietnam and this painting reminded me of the few stories that he was able to tell when he got back.

A push and a pull
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A push and a pull

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A push and a pull

I have heard it said many times that the Holy Spirit is a gentleman who whispers. If I am perfectly honest there are many days when I feel that I need a great big shove to get me to listen and obey, not a gentle nudge. There are many things that God asks us to do in a day, or a week, that we just do not want to do. Like those days when being honest might get you into trouble, or when the lady at the checkout CLEARLY needs an encouraging word and all we can muster is a grunt that we hope no one heard. Being ‘Jesus’ was never listed in the “easy” column of your favorite magazine; but it is something we are called to do. If you ask God to give you an opportunity be prepared that one may drop in your lap. If you don’t ask God for an opportunity one may drop in your lap anyway so still be braced. If you are asking for patience, DUCK, and do it now because I feel God finds great pleasure in helping us be more patient. It doesn’t matter what the need is because we all need to be better at something. I don’t mean learning how to play Chopin on the organ. We all have ‘be better Christians’ needs and God gets that. He also understands when we get stage freight and freeze when we should be pulling out Excalibur, and like a good master God is never too far away to lend a hand. So, ask the Holy Spirit to give you a push today and see what, or whom, you stumble into.