The Advent of Joy – December 14, 2013

Suggested Reading: Luke 2:22-38 and Philippians 4:4-5

Aesop told a story about a fox and a lion. The first time the fox saw the lion, he ran away and hid. The second time he saw him, he sat quietly as the lion walked by. The third time, he walked right up to the lion and chatted with him. As the fox became familiar with the lion, his awe and fear he felt at first gradually evaporated. The moral of Aesop’s story is familiarity breeds contempt.  

I have lived in several countries and have sometimes had the privilege to be the first one to share the message of Christ and Christmas with someone who has never heard the story before. You should see the looks on their faces! It really is a shocking and incredible story. God became man? God was born from the womb of a woman? This is impossible to understand and very difficult to believe.

But for many of my Muslim friends, the most amazing part of the story was that God loved us and reached out to us at all. Add to that, the incredible truth that through the miracles of the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Christ, the barrier between us and God has been removed, and you have set the stage for an explosion of joy.

The incarnation filled heaven with joy! The angel armies broke into song. The first humans to meet Jesus couldn’t contain themselves. The shepherds told everyone they met about the baby. Simeon and Anna couldn’t contain their joy in meeting the 8 day old baby messiah in the temple. The wise men told everyone about their search, and they hadn’t even met him yet.

Joy unspeakable! Rejoice in the Lord always!

There is a danger for us today. This story is no longer new. The idea that we can approach the holy and powerful King of the Universe is no longer a new or terrifying idea. The miracle of Christmas has become blasé; old news to us.

God is for us and God is with us! While this news is over two-thousand years old, it is still earth-shattering, mind-blowing, soul-stirring good news!

Let’s recover the joy this Christmas. Joy to the world indeed!

...........

Questions:

What can you do to remind yourself about the joyous news of Christmas?

Is there someone in your life who needs to hear this joyous news?

At Play in the Fields

As I was walking the other day through the fields, I realized again that my dog, Oreo, has become a part of my relationship with God. As we tramp through the fields around our town together, I notice things about her behaviour and occasionally God will nudge me to reflect on how that particular act might reflect something deeper. 

It is such an amazing adventure to live in a God bathed world. The more I realize His actual presence the more the opportunity for connection with Him becomes a reality. I am looking for Him, expecting Him to speak up at any moment. I am slowly learning what it means to actually walk with God; not just follow His principles or obey His Word, but to actually walk with God.

Yesterday, I went on a walk with Oreo and God. They were both with me the whole time, even when I wasn't consciously aware of their presence. On these rambles across the countryside, I generally let my mind wander. I don't keep a tight rein on it, but let it go where it will following the contours of the land and sky or pondering tasks and relationships. 

As I do so, particular items will come into focus and sometimes I turn toward God and start talking with Him about it; asking Him for His perspective, or a solution to a problem, or just sharing my heart about the topic. After talking for a bit, we lapse into a comfortable silence, like an old married couple.

But sometimes God breaks the silence and pipes up with something He wants me to consider. Ideas that are not my own intrude, or something unexpectedly catches my eye and draws my attention, sending me off on a different train of thought or initiating a prayerful dialogue with Him. 

Yesterday, it was the shear joy of the dog. We were walking in the wind and rain through a field of high grass when she just took off. She was leaping and running in wild circles in a sort of ecstatic dance.. She would occasionally come back to check in or just look my direction. The look of wildness and excitement in her face could only be described as joy. She was loving it, the wildness of the weather, the freedom of her body, the stimulation of the environment. She kept looking in my direction as if to say, "Isn't this great! Come run with me!" I smiled and walked on, unhurried, but enjoying her joy.

Then came the nudge...I realized that my birthright as a child of God is that kind of joy and freedom. The fruit of the Spirit is joy! I too can run with reckless abandon, playing in the fields of the Lord, because He is with me. His rod and His staff, they comfort me. 

Because He is with me and will not leave me or abandon me, because His eye is ever fixed on me, I can release my worry and hyper-vigilant self-protection. He is close, He will warn me if danger enters the field. He will call me back from my wild romp if need be. But he also walks on toward the destination that He knows, unhurried but not unmoved. 

He shares in my joy and spurs me on to love and good deeds, to the eternal kind of life that I long for! He knows the end from the beginning and He is working it all out for my good. My only task then is to walk with Him through life, tuning my ear to His voice and remaining open to His direction. All the rest is play in the fields.

Chasing Bubbles

Today was a wild day at the beach.  The wind was howling and  I was able to walk along the sandy expanse of the ocean floor exposed by the retreating tide.  The sun was still low in the sky and cast a shimmering glow over everything.  The water was choppy and the waves rough as they pounded the beach with foamy repetition.  The bubbly foam pushed up and down the beach by the waves.  As the waves retreated bits of foam and some bubbles were stranded on the wet strand.  These were blown sideways across the beach. 

As I enjoyed the wild expanse and watched the oncoming rush of clouds my dog, Oreo, ran wild.  We had the beach to ourselves and she ran here and there snapping at the wind and rushing at the waves.  But today her favorite game was chasing bubbles.  As she ran along, she would catch the movement of a bubble running across the top of the wet sand and would immediately change directions and attempt to grab the bubble.  As she pounced on or closed her jaws over the bubble, it would immediately burst and disappear.  She would pause for just a moment as if puzzled.  Then another bubble would catch her eye and she was off again.

As I watched this I began to wonder how much of our lives we spend chasing bubbles.  How many times does something catch our eye and we are off in a flash to get it?  We chase down our quarry and just as we close our fists on the object of our desire we find that it is not as substantial as we imagined.  We lay hold of it only to find that it does not deliver what we anticipated.  But, rather than learn the lesson we are almost immediately distracted by another opportunity, another thing that we can pursue.  Surely this one will be different!  Surely this time it will be the thing that makes us happy, eases our pain, gives us enduring pleasure, or fills our soul!  But again we find that it fails to satisfy.  Rather than stopping to wonder about the futility of the game, we frenetic pursue the empty spheres. 

We find that all around us others play the same game with subtle variations.  We have different preferences in our pursuits.  The bubbles we chase may be slightly different in size or color, but our perpetual idolatry is continually encouraged by our hungry flesh, the world around us, and the enemy of our souls.  God calls us to something different.  He calls us to walk with Him.  He calls us to rest in Him, to trust in Him.  He calls us to engage with Him.  He will fill our souls and leave us strangely longing for more at the same time.  He will give us substantial pleasures to enjoy as we walk with Him.  He is a wild and free Father and loves to give good gifts to His children.  Real gifts that we can sink our teeth into, the most important of which is God Himself.

Playing with God

This morning I find myself wondering about how to more fully integrate God into the playful side of my life.  I am a pretty playful person by nature.  I like to tease and joke.  I like to play cards and boardgames.  I enjoy video games and computer games.  I generally just enjoy playing.  I know how God's standards inform my choices about leisure activity, that I should only let my mind dwell on things that are true, noble, right, lovely, admirable, and worthy of praise.  It's the actual playing that puzzles me.

I am not struggling with picturing God as happy or joyful, or even laughing, but I am having a hard time picturing Jesus engaging in the kind of  frivolous pastimes that I enjoy.  I can picture Him enjoying creation, or enjoying the joy of His creatures, but I have a hard time picturing Jesus playing football, Playstation, or even checkers.  I can picture Him preaching and praying.  I can picture him serving and healing.  I can picture Him eating and sleeping.  I just can't quite see him playing, and this puzzles me and makes me sad.  Did Jesus ever just take some "down time"?  What did He do for fun?

Over the weekend, my son and I spent hours playing a variety of games together, everything from checkers, to Playstation, to Civilization on the PC.  I can picture God enjoying us enjoying each other, but what about when I just play a game by myself?  Does God smile on that?  Does He enjoy me enjoying the game?  Does He enjoy me enjoying the challenge, the problem solving?  Or does He think it's all a waste of time and that I should be doing something productive, of eternal value?  I know that I need a certain amount of just plain fun in my life, but I find myself feeling guilty about it.  I can't believe that the guilt is from God, but I can't quite dismiss it either.

A Cup

What a privilege it is to be used by God. We are rarely aware of the way that God is using us, and that is probably a good thing...at least for me. I think that it would serve to puff up my already considerable ego. I am sure that even when I am being used by God, there is some of me mixed in and I cannot always tell the difference. I can't always sort out, which bit is divine and which is an expression of my mixed bag of emotions.

This weekend I believe I was used by God. I say this with some trepidation, but I believe it to be true, not because I feel a particular way, but because of the reactions of others. I was given the opportunity to preach on Sunday at a church. The pastor was traveling and they invited me to fill the pulpit. To be honest, I'm in the middle of a bunch of stuff right now, and I didn't really want to do it, but they asked and I felt compelled to say "yes". So, over the last few weeks I have been praying, studying, and preparing. Then, on Sunday I got to preach.

After the service and even into this week people have been contacting me to let me know how God spoke to them particularly through the sermon. It is not uncommon to get the occasional, "Good sermon pastor!" kind of comments from people, but these are different. One man called me and told me how his heart was touched and his life will forever be different in some very practical ways because of decisions he made in response the sermon. I have been preaching for a long time and rarely, if ever, have I seen this kind of response.

I don't think it is because I was better prepared, had a snappier outline, or better alliterations. I don't think it had to do with me much at all. As I have been reflecting on this, I think my role is like a cup. When you are drinking something, you rarely think about the cup. The size, shape, color, or design of the cup make little if any difference. The cup is not the point, the beverage is the point. The cup is not insignificant, it is useful and necessary to the process, but it is a means and not the end. Imagine going to a fine restaurant and ordering a really nice glass of wine. As you enjoy the wine, you won't really be thinking about the glass. The wine is what you enjoy, the cup is merely the utensil to get the wine into your mouth.

For whatever reason, God chose to use this vessel, this cup, to get the wine of communion into the mouths of His people on Sunday. What a an awesome privilege and tremendous joy to be a cup in God's hand and for His purposes. I am humbled and thrilled that He would use me. When I preach I feel His pleasure. It was also so sweet and kind of Him to allow me to see some of the fruit. I feel like that was a personal touch, a little side gift, to me in this. He is so good.