What can be said that hasn’t been said already about Christmas?

Maybe that’s the wrong question. Maybe we should just review ALL that’s been said and try to get it deep into our own spirits, and ask why we have such a hard time living it!???

Was Jesus Christ really born in Bethlehem? Did wise men really come and meet him? Did Jesus grow and become the Sacrifice for our sins and rise from the dead and go to his Father and send us the Holy Spirit and call US to follow him too and empower us and comfort us and provide for us and lead us and BE the subject matter for the entire New Testament, not to mention YOUR testament!?

Oh my, there are so many things we can remember, and SHOULD remember, to encourage us and strengthen us for daily stuff.

You need it, don’t you? Encouragement. Strength. Guidance. Forgiveness.

Add your own, customized list of needs, and see if Jesus Christ speaks to them, answers them, and offers a way to resolve each and every one.

What a gift!

God. Himself. For us.

Christ-mass.

Be Merry.

It’s Christmas time, which means we’re all busy with the gift-giving thing. This can be really cool or really horrible. Carol and I have a large family, which means we are really very Blessed, but it also means we have to, uh …, think about gifts in a financial way we don’t like. It causes me to wonder:
What is Value?
What is it to be Valuable?
Are we losing the understanding?

We usually determine value by what something costs. Whether it costs money or time and energy, the more we have to put into a thing the more value we probably ascribe to it. The less it costs us the more apt we are to disregard it or abuse it, even discard it.

In business they talk about the ‘cost/benefit analysis’ to decide what to invest in or what project to take on. We all do this, I think, in our daily lives of going here and there and making decisions on the fly, as we must. We have this instant analysis going on inside us, cost vs benefit, with ‘me’ at the center. We can’t help it. Our ‘selves’ demand that we take care of them and get the best outcome we can.

We get really irritated when someone abuses our stuff. That’s why we don’t like to loan out things, right? When someone treats as ‘low value’ what another thinks is ‘high value’ we have relationship problems. People just value things differently. Some folks take great care of their car, for example, while others just drive ‘em and don’t pay much attention to maintenance. Some folks keep their houses clean and tidy, and others just live in ‘em and have no concern about order or vacuuming.

This is all very well on an individual basis, but not so good when involving others, because others have different opinions, and here is where the relationship issues happen.

So, what is YOUR value to God? Does He value you? Does He care about you? Did you cost Him anything? Is He trying to maintain you in any way? Are you taking care of His child … you? Are you nurturing His desire for relationship? Are you listening when He whispers His love for you?

And, what is your value of others?

Good things to ponder this Christmas, as we think about the VALUE of GIFTS given, to us … this day … a child was born … to save the world!

Here are 10 things I took away from Amanda’s message on September 4th:

1. God has proved faithful when I said “yes” to Him.
2. Fear keeps you from doing things.
3. If you don’t say “yes” to Him, He will go to someone else.
4. From the Voice: Looking for a Lion, John saw the Lamb!
5. So? So worship!
6. Worry? Choose worship!
   Fear? Choose faith!
   Remember who your God is! (communion)
7. Worship releases faith in the soul.
8. God will spare you from the pain, or, He will bring you through the pain!
9. We’re not here just to live and then die. We’re here to live and see Jesus, and then see Him again.
10. The struggle will be worth it!

-Skip

On a walk today Carol and I were having a good chat, talking about ‘why do we like to walk?,’ Skip says “It gives us time. Time to talk things thru. Time to think. Time to be together.”

“In fact, it gives a person time to live.” Hearing his own words, Skip thinks he’s just landed on a great sermon topic, until Carol takes it higher:

Carol says “Most people are too busy looking at how other people live.”

Think about it. We watch sports, and how athletes live, perhaps longing ourselves to do what they do. We watch movies, and live vicariously through the actors and the great places they take us to. In magazines we read about the lives of others, often going deeper into their lives than we do our own. We go to concerts and watch others make music. The entire industry of celebrities is about other people’s lives. You get it? Sure you do.

Why not begin to live yourself? Why not take the time to … live? Why not go where they go, or at least go somewhere!? Why not make your own music? Why not take on the impossible and see what happens? All that can happen is what some call failure; but then again something wonderful may happen, something miraculous, something God may cause, making some impossible thing … possible.

Walking does give one a time to think things thru. And it doesn’t cost anything, except the forfeiture of all the busy-ness you replaced by taking the walk! It’s great for a marriage. It’s a fantastic thing to take the time to be together, talking about realities in life, but also about dreams. In fact, we often DISCOVER one another’s dreams during a walk. It can give a husband a profound and new understanding of what he could provide his wife, and it can give a wife a profound and new understanding of how she can support and respect her husband.

See? The sermons just keep rolling …

I found myself encouraging someone the other day. I like to do that. I like to help others who seem a bit down- to lift their spirit if I can. It’s not that I don’t realize life can be hard, or cruel, or painful in so many ways, but I don’t like to “live there,” and I like to try to help others get out of that place.

What happens when someone DOES go there, and tells you some sad tale of life and experience? We do much more than just say “I’m sorry.” We try to comfort. We try to encourage. We try to help in some way. Don’t we? Of course we do. We’ve been there and we know what it feels like and we want to help. This is our “good” side at work.

What happens, though, when someone DOESN’T go negative, but goes positive? What happens when they smile and their soul shines, and they tell you some fantastic tale of GOOD? Yes! The rising water lifts ALL boats, and we do that for one another every time we share the joys of life, no matter how small.

Resist the urge here to dismiss this as simply looking at the cup as half full, because in that worn out cliché it is also half empty, right? This is much more than elementary psychology. This is about how you look at life. This is about your personal world-view. This is about your foundation for facing each and every day. A healthy soul seems to bring possibilities to reality; to see good and beauty; to experience wonder and joy and amazement! A healthy soul is able to overcome, endure, be humble, and wait for God to show up. A healthy soul is a soul with a living faith, a growing faith, right in the middle of a tried faith, an attacked faith, and especially a faith challenged with so much ‘world’ that it dims the Kingdom of God which, we believe, is right in our midst!

You don’t need a Thesaurus to give you all the synonyms for “bad, sad, hard, failed, hurt, etc.” We’re experts in this area and can spiral downward quickly. Negative upon negative, almost self-generating, or should I say degenerating? So here is an exercise to add to your daily fitness pursuit: start looking up positive words. Study them. Know what they mean. Know what they say is happening. Let them confront you, challenge you, and begin to lift you. Let the knowledge of GOOD begin to triumph, even in regular life. Let them move you to prayer, asking God to transform your own negatives into something good and positive.

It’s not “wishful thinking” when you ask God! It’s not just the “think system” from The Music Man when you seek the Lord God Almighty to CHANGE you! It’s not “mind over matter” when you go to the One Who created both, loves both, and Who wants you to experience both to the full!

The Bible is the Word of God and can be more than just read. It can be trusted. It can be a handbook for life and living. It can feed you and it can heal you and it can lift the veil and reveal the Kingdom to you. Let the Glorious Word of God take you into Heavenly places in your soul, as your spirit joins His Spirit in the journey we are all on. Rebuke the negative and grasp the positive, as you allow Jesus to become more than some historical figure subject to debate. End the debate. Accept what He has for you. Life. Good. Beauty. Promise. Trust. Help. Strength. Victory!