Advent Rest

Exodus 34:21

 

As I’ve been reading about the Sabbath, I’ve seen that there are a lot of ways God uses it for my good. But above all, the Sabbath is a day of rest. After six days of ordinary work we have a whole day to rest.

This Christmas I want the Advent season to be a Sabbath rest. There has been so much written and preached and said about slowing down during this season, not letting our cultural celebration distract us from the true meaning of Christmas. I get that.

But I want more. 

Resting on the Sabbath is putting God first. It’s setting aside one day in seven to focus on Him. I don’t just want to slow down this month; I want to set aside huge chunks of time to focus on Him. I want to rest from an entire year of ordinary life. I want to be refreshed this season.

But I love all the Christmas traditions. I love decorating the Christmas tree and baking cookies and wrapping presents. I love singing Christmas carols and hosting parties and reading How the Grinch Stole Christmas. But even though these things are special for Christmas, they’re part of the ordinary life from which I need to rest.

I need to find a way to enjoy the Christmas season and set aside chunks of time to rest in Him.

I need to celebrate Advent.

So this is what I’m going to do:

I’m going to choose an evening to turn off all the lights except the Christmas tree and listen to Handel’s Messiah – the whole thing, not just the Hallelujah Chorus.

I’m going to set aside one morning to read and meditate on the entire Christmas story, including the prophecies in Isaiah.

When I plan my prep for each of the three parties I’m hosting, I’m going to schedule an hour to pray for each of the guests.

On Christmas morning, before I get out of bed, I’m going to thank God for His amazing gift of salvation. And when I think of my son during the day (he won’t be joining us this year), I will stop and thank God for His Son.

This Advent I don’t want to just anticipate the celebration of Jesus’ birth; I want to spend some quality time with Him.

Gates

Psalm 118:19-24

In Guatemala City, rich people live behind high walls. You can’t see their gardens or their houses from the street. If you’re a curious little kid, you can peek through wrought iron gates but you won’t see much. With just a glimpse of stone houses and colorful gardens, I used to imagine fairy tale style lives happening behind those walls.

But gates aren’t for looking through. They are a way for the residents and their guests to go into their home. They are also a reminder that what is on the other side is forbidden to those who don’t belong.

In the Bible there are numerous mentions of the King riding through the gates. He gets to go in because the gates open into His home. What’s exciting about this passage is that the King has invited me through the gates. I don’t have to stand out in the street and peek through the bars, hoping to catch a glimpse of Him and imagining what it’s like inside.

The gates are standing open for me. When I go through them I go right into His presence. I’m one of the guests who’s welcome in the house.

This passage also tells us that the cornerstone is the stone that was once rejected. I’m not going to analyze the metaphors here, but I will point out that Acts 4:11 says that Jesus is that rejected cornerstone. The Psalm is about Jesus. He’s the King that welcomes me; He’s the King that the gates lead to. 

But not everyone is welcome through the gates. They’re opened for the righteous to pass through. And here’s the really amazing part. King Jesus came out through the gates to find me, even though I wasn’t righteous. Then He made me godly and invited me in. I’m a welcome guest because the King made me into the kind of person who can be in His presence. 

So when I go through the gates that lead me into the presence of the Lord, I will thank Him. 

And on the day I go through the gates that lead me into the presence of the Lord, I rejoice. In fact, any day I spend in His presence is fully joyful (Psalm 16:11). 

I get to do that every day.

How to be a Good Priest

I Peter 2:9 & Malachi 2:1-9 

I had a Catholic friend who was petrified of priests. I’m not sure what her childhood experience was, but she was convinced that a priest would somehow just know the sins she hadn’t confessed. When we were at a conference held in a Catholic facility, every time she saw the priest she would clutch my arm and look away from him. I didn’t understand, since I’m not Catholic and I have very positive relationships with the ministers and pastors in my life.

It’s interesting to contrast good priests with bad ones. Peter says we Christians are a royal priesthood who show others God’s goodness. The priests in Malachi’s time, on the other hand, had left God’s path and corrupted His covenant with them.

The priests were God’s messengers to the people and their job was to bring life and peace by instructing the people the truth He gave them, thus preserving the knowledge of God. They should have been the first to honor His name, revere Him and stand in awe of His name.

Instead, they left God’s paths and caused many people to stumble into sin. God had made a covenant with the Levites – the tribe that produced priests. He promised to bring them life and peace, but they must revere Him and stand in awe of His name. When they broke their part of the covenant He not only withdrew His peace, He said He would splatter their faces with the manure from their festival sacrifices and the people would despise and humiliate them. As priests, their job was to lead the people to God through the rituals of worship. When they didn’t, God used the desecrated rituals to turn the people away from them.

So what can we, as royal priests, learn from those wicked priests?

We must speak truth and preserve God’s word; it’s where we learn about God. Study it, know it and rely on the Holy Spirit to make sure we understand it correctly.

We must honor His name, revere and stand in awe of Him. He is holy.

We must walk in God’s paths so that we don’t lead others into sin. Don’t let our example cause someone else to stumble.

There’s a personal dimension to this priestly relationship too. God told those priests that even their blessings would be cursed. I think that means that they no longer enjoyed the blessings. If I depart from God’s path, I may not literally have my face spattered by manure, but I will stop enjoying what God has given me. If I’m not walking with Him closely, I’ll look at what the world has and desire it. I’ll stop appreciating what He’s done for me and instead I’ll want what I don’t have.

I want to enjoy His blessings. I want to walk in His paths. I want to be a good priest.

Worth Celebrating

Psalm 62

Ten years ago, it looked like my son had no future. He lay in a hospital bed in a coma, having suffered a stroke. If he recovered there was the possibility of brain damage and he would face a battle against leukemia. Although that week was the worst of my life, in one way it was the best. I was closer to God than I had ever been or have been since. I learned what it truly means to pray without ceasing as I poured my heart out to Him. 

Like the Psalmist, my soul found rest in God alone. He was my fortress and I wasn’t shaken. Even though my heart was broken, I could honestly tell a friend, “It is well with my soul.”

I also clung to the promise in Romans 8:32 that God, who had given me His son, would also give me all things. I’m still in awe of the loving God who gave me His Son and then gave me back mine. On Mother’s Day, the doctors said there was no more hope. That afternoon, our church elders anointed him with oil and prayed for him. The next day, Neal woke up. He slowly recovered from the stroke and survived two bone marrow transplants. Today, he’s in complete remission, a college graduate, a writer and a loving husband. He’s a living reminder that God is powerful and God is loving.

Ten years is a milestone worth celebrating.
 

Ten years of hope. 

Ten years of mercy. 

Ten years of love and life and joy. 

Ten years of resting in God’s strength and unfailing love.

Celebrate with me.

Always Giving Thanks

Colossians 3:17

I never jumped on the WWJD bandwagon. It’s a good quick reminder that I should try to please God in everything, but I think it’s too pat. If we think through its implications, we might not be so quick to proclaim it. Long before the acronym became popular, I read a book by Charles M. Sheldon called In His Steps. In it, a group of Christians decided to ask “What would Jesus do?” before doing anything. They agreed to live this way for a whole year. I actually don’t remember a lot of the book, but I thought the concept was crippling. If I remember right, the characters encountered unexpected and difficult situations. I was quite young when I read it and didn’t have the spiritual maturity to see the good in that.

But even now, I’m not sure the scriptures teach us to ask that question quite so literally. Philippians 2:5 tell us to have His attitude and then Paul goes on to describe His humility and self-sacrifice. Ephesians 5:1-2 agrees, telling us to imitate God in everything we do. If I have the same attitude that Jesus had, I will imitate Him in my actions. But that's copying what He did, not guessing what He would do.

So maybe a better question would be: What would Jesus have me do?

The Colossians passage makes it clear that everything I do reflects my attitude. As an imitator of God, I represent Him. My attitude should not only be loving and self-sacrificing, it should also be thankful.

So how do I apply this to my daily activities? What I do or say during my day depends on my calendar. When I have class, I lecture about communication, specifically communicating orally. When I’m at a Bible study, I talk about the lesson and the Bible. At Weight Watcher meetings, I talk about food and healthy eating. Other things I do, in no particular order, are: Sleep, eat, read, play games, write, watch TV, feed the cat, talk to my family, pray, clean my house, garden, grade speeches, run errands, bake cookies, attend Church, pay bills, exercise, cook dinner, babysit, prepare my Sunday School lesson.

And in all these things, I am representing Christ. 

I need to always be conscious of that. How? By giving thanks to God the Father through Jesus. A thankful heart underlies living for Him. Instead of focusing on what action I should take, I want to ask God to give me a thankful heart.

I need a bracelet that say AGTTGTJ. 

Always Giving Thanks to God Through Jesus.

El Emunah

Psalm 138:1-3

I did a search for God’s names and found this website: Lilyof the Valley Virginia. It lists the Hebrew names of God in the Old Testament and the verses where they can be found. It would be exciting to do a study of these verses, but for now I just used it to find the name this Psalm is referring to.  

El Emunah – the faithful God. 

It’s used in Deuteronomy 7:9

Understand, therefore, that the LORD your God is indeed God. He is the faithful God who keeps his covenant for a thousand generations and lavishes his unfailing love on those who love him and obey his commands. (NLT)

I’m blessed to be a recipient of God’s faithfulness in this regard. I know enough of the history of my family to know that my ancestors have loved Him and obeyed His commands for many generations. Maybe even 1000. A 17 times great-grandfather founded a church in Rhode Island that is still active. Another ancestor was a circuit rider in the old west. The last three generations have been missionaries. These generations are evidence of God’s faithfulness. God has faithfully kept His covenant with my family.

This truth not only humbles me and makes me aware of my responsibility to love and obey Him. It also reminds me of His promises and gives me hope for future generations. I can trust that He will lavish His love on my children and grandchildren, that they also belong to Him because He keeps His covenant with a thousand generations.

With this assurance, I worship and praise Him and I thank Him for keeping His promises, promises that are backed by the honor of His name.

His name is El Emunah. His name is The Faithful God.