Friends, I found this beautiful song as I was reflecting on what God has done in me and for me in 2023. I hope it blesses you too.
Sarah Kroger
You’ve owned your fear and all your self-loathing You’ve owned the voices inside of your head You’ve owned the shame and reproach of your failure It’s time to own your belovedness
You’ve owned your past and how it’s defined you You’ve owned everything everybody else says It’s time to hear what your Father has spoken It’s time to own your belovedness
He says, “You’re mine, I smiled when I made you I find you beautiful in every way My love for you is fierce and unending I’ll come to find you, whatever it takes My beloved”
You’ve owned the mess you see in the mirror You’ve owned the lies that you’re just not enough You’ve been so blinded by all you’re comparing It’s time to own your belovedness
He says, “You’re mine, I smiled when I made you I find you beautiful in every way My love for you is fierce and unending I’ll come to find you, whatever it takes My beloved”
You are completely loved and fully known Beloved, believe He died to make your heart His home
And He says, “You’re mine, I smiled when I made you I find you beautiful in every way My love for you is fierce and unending I’ll come to find you, whatever it takes”
He says, “You’re mine, I smiled when I made you I find you beautiful in every way My love for you is fierce and unending I’ll come to find you, whatever it takes My beloved”
Almighty, eternal God! forgive us our sin and lead us to eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Ulrich Zwingli
Almighty, eternal God! Forgive us our sin and lead us to eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Ulrich Zwingli
Begin by centering your heart in God’s presence… Give thanks to Him that you do not need to hide anything from him. Affirm that He is faithful and good, and his mercy and grace are “new every morning.” The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness” (Lam. 3:22-23).
Now let Him begin the process of searching your heart. Are there ways you have not honored Christ this week? Where were your thoughts and desires not centered in Him? How have you failed in obedience to Christ?
Then, simply confess in as specific a way you can the sins that trouble you. Don’t rush through this process. Simply rest in God’s presence as He does this.
Now choose to let this go and receive Christ’s forgiveness for you. Remember – “He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9)
Receive His assurance of pardon – 7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, 8 which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight 9 making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ . (Eph 1:7-9 ESV)
And finally commit this confession to the Lord. As you rest in His forgiveness ask Him how to walk this out. Ask for the supernatural power of His Spirit to give you what you need to move forward. Thank Him that you “have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer [you] who live, but Christ lives in [you]” (Gal. 2:20).
Who is like a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love. He will again have compassion on us; he will tread our iniquities underfoot. You will cast all our sins Into the depths of the sea. You will show faithfulness to Jacob and steadfast love to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers From the days of old. Micah 7:18-20
The Lord’s Prayer – The Incarnation
Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed by thy name. Thy kingdom come; thy will be done. On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread, And forgive us our sins, As we forgive those who have sinned against us. And lead us not into temptation. But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, And the glory, forever. Amen.
Abba, Father – You inhabit the whole of heaven, and Your name is forever made holy. In this season of Christmastide, we long for Your kingdom to come now in all its fullness. Rule us by Your word and Your Spirit that we might delight in Your will; which came about through the obedience of Your Son. “It was He who gave His life as a ransom for many.” (Mat 20:28). While we celebrate His birth in this season – we know that the Cross awaits him. He died that we might live. And that is food enough. We are eternally grateful that Christ died for our sins. Make us eager then to forgive others their sins against us. Protect us Lord, from temptation and from evil – because it is your kingdom and your power and your glory forever. Amen.
John 1:9-14 – 9 The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. 14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Step One – Read the passage slowly, attentively. Allow yourself to be taken in by the words – pay attention to any word or phrase that strikes you in the passage. (If you haven’t studied this passage, you may find this first reading will stir observation questions in you – such as who, what when, where, and how).
Step Two – Read it again. Meditate and reflect on the passage. What is it in your life that needs to hear that word or phrase? Sit in silence for a time, attending to the thoughts, images and impressions that begin to come to you. Turn that into prayer.
Step Three – What is God saying to you? What do you begin to feel called to?
Step Four – How does God want you to live this passage out? What are you resolved to do?
Lectio Quote – The Incarnation
When God spoke and brought the world into existence, Christmas was on His heart. Christmas is all about Jesus, the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world! It’s about Jesus, God’s gift of redemption –born to die in my place and your place, for my sins and your sins, because the wages of sin is death. Write it down; post it on the refrigerator or the bathroom mirror: “Jesus–born to die that I might live!” No matter who you are, what you have done, you were pre-loved by God! Kay Arthur
You can go through the same steps that we use for Lectio Divina for Scripture, or simply take some time and read this quote slowly and seek the Spirit’s help to take deep into your soul the way this author captures the deep truth of the Incarnation.
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14).
I wish I knew more about glory – or maybe it’s that I want to see what it must have been like to have been there at his birth and to see His glory. I wish I had seen Moses behind the rock, or the pillar of fire or cloud, or the ark of the covenant. And then to have seen that glory fully concentrated in Christ’s body, his very being. Very God of Very God.
I’m reminded of something Annie Dillard wrote – “On the whole, I do not find Christians, outside of the catacombs, sufficiently sensible of conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offense, or the waking god may draw us out to where we can never return.” (Annie Dillard, Teaching a Stone to Talk)
“The glory has departed from Israel, for the ark of God has been captured.”
1 Samuel 4:22
I don’t have to tell you that we live in a world utterly stripped of glory. We don’t even have words for it. Can you imagine the national grief captured by Phinehas’ wife after hearing the ark of the covenant had been captured? (and her husband and son dead). “…she said, ‘The glory has departed from Israel, for the ark of God has been captured.’” (1Sa 4:22 ESV) Glory, as we see it in the Old Testament is always manifested from a distance, for it is the unabated, unfiltered presence of God. Under the old dispensation, just like Moses, we would not have been able to come near it and live. This was Moses’ experience:
18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he [God] said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. 20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” 21 And the LORD said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, 22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.” (Exo. 33:18-23)
And yet, shepherds and prophets from the east, and Joseph, and even Mary, especially Mary, gazed at the face of this new-born babe and lived. What would it have been like to kneel there, by the cradle, laying down all power, all wealth, all of all, to worship him and to know his glory?
The apostle John captures this poetically in the first chapter of his gospel. ” And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14). This is the incarnation – This is God made man. – C.S. Lewis called this the central miracle of all miracles. But how can we even talk about the fact that while Christ took on flesh, he remained God. It was never a blending of the two, and not an uneasy union of the two. This is how one Pilgrim preacher wrote of it:
“What a wonder that two natures infinitely distant should be more intimately united than anything in the world…That the same person should have both a glory and a grief; an infinite joy in the Deity, and an inexpressible sorrow in the humanity! That a God upon a throne should be an infant in a cradle; the thundering Creator be a weeping babe and a suffering man; the incarnation astonishes men upon earth, and angels in heaven.” (Stephen Charnook).
When we bless God for giving us the best parking space but neglect doing the hard, obedient things He has called us to, where is His glory?
The denial of the incarnation was one way the early church could identify a false prophet. In 1 John 4 John says to test the spirits by this one criterion: “By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God…” (1 John 4:2 ESV).
Paul echoes this thought in 1 Tim. 3:16 – “Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness: He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.”
The shepherds were given a foretaste of that glory – “and in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear” (Luke 2:8-10).
What have we done with that glory? By that I don’t mean that we can ever do anything to diminish the glory that is Christ’s. What I mean is have we banished it? Have we forgotten it? Have we become inured to even the idea of glory? When we reduce our God to be an extension of our desires and not the God we are called to by Holy Scripture to worship, what have we done? When we bless God for giving us the best parking space but neglect doing the hard, obedient things he has called us to, where is his glory?
I think we would all say, after pausing and reflecting on this – that we want the reflection of Christ to be on our faces. We want to turn our faces to Him, unveiled, transparent, (our sins, our secrets settled by the glory of the Cross) so that we can behold the glory of the Lord. And oh, don’t you want to be transformed into the image of Christ – from one degree of glory to another? (2 Cor. 3:18) Let this be the cry of our hearts, and may “light shine out of darkness, the light which has shown in our hearts… to give the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6) Amen.
“The grace of God prepares the way for the confession of sin, is present in the confession, and even before the confession has been made, has already worked the restoration of which the confession is not the cause but the sign”.
Fleming Rutledge
Start by centering your heart in God’s presence… Give thanks to Him that He sent His Son to grant us fullness of life. His love is so deep for us; and for that we now know that God is indeed with us throughout eternity. Are there ways that you don’t live that out? Have the noise and chaos of this broken world crowded His voice out? You do not need to hide anything from him. Affirm that He is faithful and good, and his mercy and grace are “new every morning.” The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness” (Lam. 3:22-23).
Now let Him begin the process of searching your heart. Are there ways you have not honored Christ this week? Where were your thoughts and desires not centered in Him? How have you failed in obedience to Christ?
Then, simply confess specifically what the Holy Spirit is showing you. Don’t rush through this process. Simply rest in God’s presence as He does this.
Now choose to let this go and receive the truth of this passage: “I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste. Let him lead me to the banquet hall and let his banner over me be love”. If you have confessed a stronghold of fear or complacency receive Christ’s forgiveness for you. Remember – “He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
And finally commit this confession to the Lord. As you rest in His grace and mercy ask Him how to walk this out. Ask for the supernatural power of His Spirit to give you what you need to move forward. Thank him that you “have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer [you] who live, but Christ lives in [you]” (Gal. 2:20).
“In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace. Ephesians 1:7
The Lord’s Prayer in Advent, Week Four- Immanuel
The Lord’s Prayer in Advent: Immanuel
Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; thy will be done. On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread, And forgive us our sins, As we forgive those who have sinned against us. And lead us not into temptation. But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, And the glory, forever. Amen.
Abba, Father, we come to this prayer praising You, that You make your home in heaven, the rightful place for you, and for Your Son Jesus. And yet, You sent Him into our broken, sinful world. He is truly “Immanuel, God with us.” Your name is holy, sacred, set apart – and thus is Your Son’s. We pray that Your kingdom would come, that Your will would be done – and we rejoice because Your will was to send Jesus to take the wrath meant for us. This is Your will, here on earth as it is in heaven. Give us Lord, all that we need to walk through our day, and forgive us for all the ways we have not honored this reality – that Christ is truly with us. And help us, Lord to forgive others who have sinned against us. May we live as those who know that our Christ is Immanuel, God with us. We pray that You would keep us from temptation and deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom, and the power and the glory, forever! Amen.
“…heaven is the name of our authentic vocation as human beings; heaven is the final truth about the earth…Heaven is what Christ gives back to us, what we lost through our sin and pride, through our earthly, exclusively earthly sciences and ideologies.
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 9:6 “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Isaiah 7:14
Step One – Read the passage slowly, attentively. Allow yourself to be taken in by the words – pay attention to any word or phrase that strikes you in the passage. (If you have not studied this passage, you may find this first reading will stir observation questions in you – such as who, what when, where, and how).
Step Two – Read it again. Meditate and reflect on the passage. What is it in your life that needs to hear that word or phrase? Sit in silence for a time, attending to the thoughts, images and impressions that begin to come to you. Turn that into prayer.
Step Three – What is God saying to you? What do you begin to feel called to?
Step Four – How does God want you to live this passage out? What are you resolved to do?
Lectio Quote
“This is the message of the Winter Pascha. God is with us on earth. He is in our very midst as the man Jesus, whose name is Immanuel. He has revealed His unknowable, inconceivable, ineffable, invisible nature in the most tangible way as the child who is born for us; as the Son who is given to us. To understand this and to submit to it is man’s greatest glory and joy.”
The Winter Pascha, 116. (Thomas Hopko)
You can go through the same steps that we use for Lectio Divina for Scripture, or simply take some time and read this quote slowly and seek the Holy Spirit’s help to press into the incredible truth of “Immanuel,” God with us.
We have a dilemma today friends! Today marks the fourth week of Advent and yet it is Christmas Eve! I’m starting this week with a fourth theme for Advent – and that is to receive. It might seem a passive action, but we know it is not! I might pop on here later in the week with what would be the first week of Christmastide. Feel free to take part in all or any of it! I love this quote from Robert Webber, which is from the Catholic liturgy for Christmas Eve; “Today you will know the Lord is coming, and in the morning your will see his glory.”
Immanuel – God with us
I think it took me a very long time to see how often Luke talks about joy in his gospel. There are over 20 mentions of joy – far more than any of the other gospels. From the very beginning – when the angel appeared to Zechariah to the very last verse in Luke, when Jesus ascended into heaven, and Luke says – “they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy” (Luk. 24:52). There is joy in the angel’s song over the shepherds; there is joy in the disciples over the effectiveness of their ministry (10:17). Heaven cried out for joy over one sinner who repented! (15:7); and the disciples rejoiced over breakfast after the resurrection (24:41). So much joy.
Immanuel, God with us. This, I believe, is at the heart of every mention of joy by Luke. Even after Jesus returned to heaven, the disciples were left with an assurance that He would never leave them. And their joy can be ours – especially as we acknowledge just how fundamental this need is.
John is a bit more poetic than Luke (in my opinion). In the first 18 verses of chapter one in his gospel – he speaks of glory, and presence and life and light. Such poetry there! Verse 14 is a beautiful hymn of praise: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” Indeed, these first 18 verses are a doxology filled with joy.
One reason I think that the idea of Immanuel resonates so much with us is that it speaks to a longing deep in us for a home. John captures this when he says – “Christ made his dwelling among us.” C.S. Lewis describes this longing as “an inconsolable longing in the heart for we know not what” (where). The name he gives for that longing is joy.
Perhaps this is why Christmas can be so hard on some people. Everything around us speaks to the perfect home, the perfect gift, the perfect gathering. But in our own experiences we often feel lonely; there’s conflict around the family table; and our desires are shattered by expectations not met.
In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.
John 1:4-5
Immanuel, God is with us.
There is (or can be) a legitimacy to our desires and dreams. They’re not the problem. The expectation for the perfect is. There is where our disappointments live – that’s the root of so much of our despair. Yet joy is a gift, a fruit of our abiding in Christ, and it can be present in those dreams, just as it can be present even in the pain those desires draw out from us!
Two of my very favorite people in Luke’s birth narrative are Simeon and Anna. It’s said of Simeon that he was righteous and devout, and that he spent his last years in the temple – waiting for the consolation of the Lord. What an interesting phrase – I suppose another word would have been better – Messiah, Coming, Victory… But Consolation? – That’s a balm on an old wound. It’s a comfort to someone who has suffered. It implies that for Simeon, this was no ordinary Messiah (hmmm.).
Anna as well, was old, and this is what Luke said of her – “she did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.” (Luk 2:37-38). Childless, presumably without family, her life could have been an unfulfilled one- she could have been bitter and resentful. But these two incredible “saints” held their dreams and their desires lightly, offering them to God – acknowledging before Him that life was not what it could have been, but they trusted Him. Joy was theirs. And it was rooted in the kind of peace and confidence and trust that came not after their desired future arrived, but during the waiting for it.
What better consolation, what better joy can we have than when we proclaim that our God is with us!
Dr. Martin Luther King knew this in his very bones. One night in 1965 he got yet another phone call, threatening him and his family. He was warned – “get out of town or we will blow up your house.” He realized that if he were to continue this work he had to know that his religion was real. He had to know God was with him. And so he prayed. This is his prayer:
“I said, ‘Lord, I’m down here trying to do what’s right. I think I’m right. I think the cause that we represent is right. But Lord, I must confess that I’m awake now. I’m faltering. I’m losing my courage. And I can’t let the people see me like this, because if they see me weak and losing my courage, they will begin to get weak.’ Then it happened: And it seemed at that moment that I could hear an inner voice saying to me, ‘Martin Luther, stand up for righteousness. Stand up for justice. Stand up for truth. And lo I will be with you, even until the end of the world.’ . . . I heard the voice of Jesus saying still to fight on. He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone. No never alone. No never alone. He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone.”
Where are you today? Are there sorrows or fears or struggles in you today? Is there grief or pain? Today as I finish this particular reflection I am reminded of our little grandson, Zekey who would be 14 years old today. He’s with Jesus –what joy! But his pain and his death were real. And our grief is there 10 years later. But this I know: there is no greater healing than to know that God is always with us, and that he will never leave us or forsake us. In that we can find joy. In that we know that “all our hopes and fears are met in Thee tonight.”
Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; thy will be done. On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread, And forgive us our sins, As we forgive those who have sinned against us. And lead us not into temptation. But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, And the glory, forever. Amen.
Abba, our Father, who is enthroned in heaven. Your name alone is hallowed. As we approach the end of this worldly kingdom here on earth, we pray that You would usher in the new kingdom, the kingdom described in Revelation 21 – where the new Jerusalem will come down and the city will need no sun or moon because Your glory will be our light and our lamp will be Your Son, the lamb of God. As the day of judgment appears, Lord, would You help us to forgive all those who have sinned against us, so that we might enjoy Your forgiveness and grace for all eternity. On this day, today, as we wait for your blessed appearing, deliver us from all temptation and evil that we might persevere until the very end. For we know and we proclaim that Yours is the kingdom, and all the power and all the glory. Amen.
“No day is named, that every day may be hallowed by the sense of the possibility of its being the day of His Advent. It helps to hallow each day of life, to realize that before its close we may be in the presence of Christ’s glory.” T. R. Glover
You can go through the same steps that we use for Lectio Divina for Scripture, or simply take some time and read this quote slowly and seek The Spirit’s help to discern how this passage might bring new understanding to preparing for His return.
