The One Thing Thing You Must Have This Christmas. UNITE Linky

The morning is still. Only sound, Golden Retriever eating her breakfast. The winds rage. Insulated walls keep out the noise, bring a hush that breaks the chaos going on outside.

My Father-in-Law just got diagnosed with Parkinsons, my sister-in-law lost her family in a car wreck on Christmas Eve years ago…

We would be foolish to believe any of us are immune to suffering, just because it’s Christmas…

Or worse yet, immune because we call ourselves believers.

And yet, a Savior reigns, He came just like a babe in a manger, to enter our chaos, and give us a way, a ray of hope to cling to as an anchor in the ocean.

• Why did the world fail to see Him long ago?
• What were they doing to keep them busy?
• Where they filled with schedules and self-sufficiency, missing the King of Kings, Lord of Lord, coming like they had anticipated for centuries?

And in our own world of Herod’s men out to kill what’s good and perfect; in a world where sometimes the only way to hear Him is through dreams like Joseph or through the pages of scripture….

We must fix our eyes on The One who saved us. He has already come, was willing to die, and is returning inevitably, soon.

The winds rage outside, clouds so thick, you can’t see the sky. Tress bend to the force of it’s power. Yet….

Is there really any way we can doubt there is a God, when the effects of Him are everywhere?

• And where does a story of two-thousand years last?
• Why do some promise all suffering ends, when we meet Him at the manger, hold him in our hearts, bring to Him our gold, frankincense, everything we have…
• Didn’t Jesus’ difficulties increase the moment he took his first breath?
• Wasn’t he in exile through His childhood?
• Didn’t he walk the earth only to know His crucifixion was near?

And didn’t Jesus say, “Take up your cross and follow me?” Or was that only in theory? Yes how do, in reality, some of us think we are immune to suffering?

And yet, we need Him near; here, in our stories.

In the stories of children lingering in a system. The story of a boy named Johnny from Chi*a, trying to get to America. The story of the mother from Aleppo scanning the earth in dusty clothes, looking for her children that were buried amid the rubble…

Standing in disbelief that everything she knew now stands disintegrated…

• And where is God, when walls shatter, earth crumbles, children are pulled and plundered like possessions i nstead of people?
• Where is this Savior in a manger, when hearts are torn, there is loss at Christmas, when the pain of sin and the effects of hard relationships rip through people excruciatingly?

Could it be when walls fall, storms blaze, people suffer…God came so that He could sympathize with our suffering? Could it be in the breaking of our souls, the shaking of the earth, in the heartbreak of it all….

That is when He is most near? 

And don’t we serve a God who got low, out of love, and came to meet with us…Not some God who sits up high, laughs, punishes heartlessly, and cruelly judges us?

Could it be that broken manger, in that ragged cloth, the wriggling child, alone with Joseph and his mother was the price He showed for His wild and outrageous love for us?

And doesn’t Scripture tell us, “There is no greater love than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”(John 15:13)

And yet Jesus tells us, “I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends.” (John 15:15)

And some may lay their life down for the righteous but, “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.” (Romans 5:6)

“While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) Not for another. Not for the perfect. Not for those “good enough” or those deserving….

But for us. For each of us. And that include you and me.

And oh, the awesome-ness of that concept. Our God coming like a baby; loving, risking, losing, being betrayed, and yet dying and resurrecting that we might be saved…

For our sins, our selfish ways, for the life that we arrogantly thought we could live as we pleased…

Aw yes, He rose, so that we could be free.

He came that His life abundant could live and reign in each of us. His sacrifice turning us from slaves to sons and daughters.

His breath inside us breathing, “Abba, Father.” (Romans 8:15)

The power of the storm, doesn’t touch the resting lights twinkling on our Christmas tree. It doesn’t stir my sleeping angels. It doesn’t touch anything we have set up, behind these walls protecting each of us.

And yet, in Aleppo, the walls have crashed down. And who knows how, each of us got set in place, why some live with danger, and others wake as if placed in peace and tranquility.

And if this imperfect world does one thing, it leads us to a perfect Savior, if the wars and chaos, and heartaches has any purpose, it is to drive us to the place a baby came in a manger, and lived sinless, for you and me.

If the unsettling can stir anything in us, it’s to drive our faces to that place where God took on flesh and left the comforts of heaven, for us…

So that we might experience, His redemption. So that the people of God could live in hope and purpose…

Walk empowered by the Holy Spirit, not crippled in doubt and fear, but rising whole and healed and trusting He is Sovereign in all His goodness.

I look out at the sky as I write this. The storm has ceased, the clouds have parted. All I witness is a cloud like an angel hovering. I turn to my tree and see the star that lead them, all the way to Bethlehem…

And I know the time is near. He is coming. And the hope that rises, overcomes all that’s in us. His heart convicting…

Will we see the Savior this Christmas, or just a reflection of our world’s brokenness?

His promises are sure. He is The One who rises over us and in us like a cloud of glory. His mercies new each and every morning.

Joy reaches us when we surrender and find ourselves under His authority…

Trusting Him. Regardless of what tomorrow brings.

He has come. He is in us. He is coming.

Do you see Him….this Christmas?

UNITE LINKY

UNITE Linky is underway. Please link back. Wishing you all a Merry Christmas.  (Oh ya, and we won’t have UNITE next week, due to the holidays)

Thanks for being here!