Dear Friends,
It's here. Christmas. A couple of weeks ago as I walked into our local Wal-Mart, I was greeted by a fully decorated Christmas Tree. This was 3 weeks before Thanksgiving. Television and the newspapers have been flooded with ads for Black Friday Sales, although some retailers have felt a return of the spirit of the season, and are giving their employees Thanksgiving Day off, This is all part of the world's view of Christmas; sales, Santa, snowmen, and every child with more toys than they know what to do with. "Merry Christmas" has, all too often, been removed and replaced with the generic "Happy Holidays". However, even as the world turns the entire Christmas season into one great big shopping event, with Santas greeting us everywhere we go, Christians instead hold dear the knowledge that Christmas is when we celebrate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ, when God sent His Son into the world to save all mankind from our sins. Christmas is love, joy, peace, and hope all wrapped up in the form of one small child, born in a manger, under the stars, and surrounded by shepherds and angels. This year lets all remember to keep Christ in Christmas, and wish everyone we see a "Merry Christmas", as it is Christmas, the celebration of the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Merry Christmas to all!
Pastor Doug
Discovery:
They were overjoyed at seeing the star, and on entering the house they saw the child with His mother Mary. Matthew 2:10-11
How domestic. How ordinary!
The Magi followed a wondrous star until it stops over "the place where the Child was born", and what is that place? A house. That's all, Not a castle, not a mansion, but just a house. The Magi discover the Messiah, the Son of God, in an ordinary house. The find Him in ordinary circumstances, with an ordinary looking mother.
How often do we go looking for Jesus in all kinds of extraordinary places; on a mountaintop, at the seashore, or in any kind of spectacular location? It is always wonderful to see the magnificence of God's creation, but let's not forget that the best location for finding Christ is all around us, in incredibly ordinary circumstances. We find Him in our homes, in our workplaces, and in gatherings of our families and friends.
In other words, the Holy is in the ordinary. That is one of the most basic teachings of the Christmas season. The Son of God arrived not with the kind of pomp and circumstance most people might expect, but rather entered history in the most ordinary of circumstances, and that is where we are still most likely to find Him.
Lord Jesus, Thank you for being present, always, in every ordinary time and place in my life.
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