Celebrating the Christmas Miracle!

Christmas is almost here! The excitement is building and it is less than a week away when we will gather to share Communion, light candles, and sing Silent Night, Holy Night! In Christmas Eve worship, we will commemorate the day GOD broke into our human history to tell us that His place is with us on earth (Immanuel!) and we will know Him as Jesus, because He will save us from our sins. (Matthew 1.18-25) Throughout this season of preparation for Christmas, which we know as Advent, we have explored various aspects of how we can prepare for, and experience anew, the miracle of Christmas!

Our December message series, Be Part of the CHRISTMAS Miracle, has sought to explain the miracle as (1) GOD giving us His presence, even though we do not deserve it; (2) GOD’s saving and changing us through His presence; and (3) GOD inviting us to share the miracle with others so they may know of His love and desire for transformation through salvation! In addition, we have explored the miracle of generosity: GOD is generous and wants us to be made into the likeness of Jesus and be generous, too. We understand generosity as doing something for someone without any expectation of reciprocity, and giving to someone who could never repay you. It was during this message that we unveiled our Miracle in Missions offering, where we are hoping to collect $10,000 to be used in mission and ministry across the world. So far we have only collected $1,745, less than 20% of our goal, but you still have time to bring your offering to the church either in worship this Sunday, Christmas Eve, or in our combined worship celebration on December 30^th at 10:55am.

This past Sunday, we explored the Miracle of Celebration. Celebrations are important! They are times when we rally together to celebrate something significant that happens in life. The miracle of celebration is it forces us to shift our focus off of self, where we are prone to want it to be, and refocus where it needs to be…GOD! Christmastime is perfect for this, because we tend to focus too much on our own wishes and dreams and not enough on the fact that this life-changing event is all about GOD saving us and providing the hope we need when life causes us to be discouraged. Then, when we come together to celebrate, we find a synergy is developed with others with whom we are celebrating. This is the essence of Christian community, and is an exclamation point on the need to gather in worship for such high and holy times.

I don’t know about you, but the recent events at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT dampened my celebrating spirit. I wept as I watched the news coverage about the evil and hateful atrocities just a week-and-a-half or so from Christmas. As I was praying, though, GOD reminded me that our current understanding of Christmas as sleeping in heavenly peace, is really all about hope, because the peace we seek is not our reality. It wasn’t the reality in the world some 2,000 years ago, and it is not reality today. GOD didn’t look at earth and realize that we had finally learned how to get along with each other and decided it was time to come hang out. The world was dark, dirty, and messy, yet in love, GOD decided to come anyway. We tend to think that we deserve Christmas, making it all about us, but the reality is we did not then, and do not today; still, GOD came to bring the light and show us the way! This being the case, the beauty of Christmas arrives when we realize that the very night the star pierced the darkness to declare that GOD’s home was now with His people on earth was the moment when hope was truly born! This forces us to shift our focus off of self and onto GOD so that we know we can celebrate – even when life seems so scary – the fact that GOD truly is with us!

I want to leave you with a beautiful passage from Scripture that reminds us how important it is to celebrate GOD, even when life does not make much sense in the here-and-now. May these words challenge and comfort you as you put the finishing touches on your Christmas preparations so you may celebrate anew next Tuesday!

“Celebrate God all day, every day. I mean, revel in him! Make it as clear as you can to all you meet that you’re on their side, working with them and not against them. Help them see that the Master is about to arrive. He could show up any minute! Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.” (Philippians 4.4-7, The Message, emphases mine)

 Merry Christmas!

Taking the Miracle to the World!

I hope you are experiencing an awakening as to the miracles that GOD is already at work in bringing to you and your family during this Advent season, the Christmas season, and beyond! We are fully engaged in our Be Part of the Christmas Miracle message series that Pastor John and I have led this month. As a reminder, this is the three-step approach that we are using to describe the miracle of Christmas: (1) GOD gives us His presence even when we do not deserve it; (2) GOD’s presence changes and transforms us; (3) GOD invites us to be part of the miracle by sharing the message of salvation for the transformation of the world.

This past Sunday, we discussed the Miracle of Generosity by exploring Acts 20:35. Luke records Paul saying, “In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’” Paul admits that bearing the message of salvation can be hard and sacrificial work, but it is necessary for those who are capable to help others in need; then Paul mentioned the oft heard and used words of Jesus, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” Considering generosity from a biblical point of view, we must recognize that it is doing something for another without expecting anything in return, as well as doing something for another who could never repay that act of generosity. We see that GOD in Christ did both of these simultaneously for each of us that we might be changed and enjoy the eternal blessings of heaven as part of GOD’s holy family. So when we view generosity this way, just like Ebenezer Scrooge learned in A Christmas Carol, we come to experience the fact that we are changed when we are generous…a total reorientation of life!

As I wrote last week, we are giving each individual and family an opportunity to Be Part of the Christmas Miracle by flexing our generosity muscles. We have set an ambitious goal of collecting $10,000 that will be given directly to missionaries and mission agencies to be part of GOD’s miracle of transformation by utilizing the global reach of the United Methodist Church. During worship on each Sunday remaining in 2012, as well as on Christmas Eve, we are collecting a special missions offering to help bring the miracle of GOD’s transforming love to people in places across the world that you and I would likely never be able to reach. We hope that you will strive to be part of the miracle of generosity and be generous to people all across the world without any expectation of reciprocity from those who could never repay your sacrificial act. We also encourage this to be something you do as a family, so everyone – young and old – has an opportunity to know that your sacrifice has helped to bring love and relief to someone in need. I guarantee that it will make a difference in the way you experience Christmas this year. In the spirit of Christmas, this is truly something to celebrate!

Speaking of celebration, this coming Sunday, Pastor John and I will explore the miracle of celebration as part of our Advent message series. GOD calls His people to times of celebration to help us move the focus off of self and onto others at times we might be inclined to be too self-centered. I hope you will make every effort to be in worship this Sunday as we strive to Be Part of the Christmas Miracle and share the glory of GOD’s transforming presence in our own lives as we dedicate our lives to joining GOD in the task of transforming the world! I pray you will come and celebrate with us!

The Miracle of Generosity

This past Sunday Pastor John and I debuted our Advent message series, "Be Part of the Christmas Miracle." Advent is the season of preparation for Christmas where we commemorate God coming to earth in Jesus, as well as looking forward to the return of Jesus (see Revelation 21:1-7). During this special season, we also think critically about how we are to live lives of Christian hope, peace, love, and joy to share the miracle of God with the world, beginning in our own backyard. 

As we began talking about the miracle of God, we explained it this way: (1) the miracle comes first in God's presence with us, in spite of the fact that we do not deserve it; (2) the miracle of God's presence transforms our lives as we begin to live for Him; and (3) God invites us to participate in the miracle by serving, sharing, and shining the light and love of God for others. Understanding the nature of God's miracle, and how we are invited to participate and share in it, can help us garner a whole new appreciation for Christmas and our need to prepare adequately for it during Advent! 

This coming Sunday, we will continue our "Be Part of the Christmas Miracle" message series as we explore the miracle of generosity. This is perhaps the one time of year when we all palpably know that it is better to give than to receive. The fact of the matter is that God gave us all the love, grace, and mercy, and hope of eternity, and that changes the way we live in the here-and-now! God's generosity greets us in the midst of our own existence, changes the way we see the world, and challenges us to live lives of generosity for the transformation of the world. Let's face it, God is a giver and we are to be givers, too! So as we live generous lives, we not only change the world, but find ourselves changed, too!!!

As part of our Advent series, we will each have the opportunity to flex our generosity muscles, so to speak. We are challenging each individual and family to commit to being generous for the world -- please consider making a special gift (over and above your regular commitment to giving to the church) that will be used in mission and ministry to the world! We have set an ambitious goal of $10,000, but imagine the miracles that can be done in the name of Jesus Christ as we seriously consider our call to share in the miracle of generosity! Every penny will be used to share the love of God with people all across the globe. 

This is indeed a special and blessed season as we consider the amazing gift of God and the implications it has for our lives. I join the Apostle Paul and share his prayer from Ephesians 3: I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (Eph.3:16-19, NIV) This is the essence of God's generosity and our call to be difference makers in the lives of others as a difference is made in the world for God!