Mary was not the only one to get a pre-birth announcement from an angel. Matthew recorded the dream given to Joseph.
behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:
“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). (Matthew 1:20–23 ESV)
Joseph also was told about the miraculous conception, less to answer his questions about the biological possibility and more about the legality and the propriety. The angel affirmed that Mary had not been unfaithful.
The angel also told Joseph the child’s name: Jesus. It meant something: “for he will save his people from their sins.” Savior was His name, part of His identity.
The angel also quoted Isaiah, not only to connect Jesus’ origin with the prophecy about a virgin birth, but also as a further part of His identity. He is named Jesus, and Immanuel, meaning “God with us.”
Beloved, the bread and wine before us are signs of the cost of our salvation and signs of the Son’s flesh and blood. We eat and drink in remembrance of Jesus, Immanuel, our Lord.
Most of us who are parents grew up in families that focused our seasonal celebration on Christmas day, while many of your families now think about Christmas day as the cap to your celebration of Advent, the four Sundays and/or the all days between now and December 25th.
Whether or not you are a big Advent and/or big Christmas person/family, do rejoice in the Incarnation of God’s Son and love Jesus Christ? If yes, how do you show it?
I first remember learning these categories about six years ago from a book titled The Things of Earth. These two approaches will help you answer the question.
Consider your love for God and His Son by way of comparison and by way of integration. Usually we hear more about the comparative side; that’s where the Christmas guilt usually gets applied, while the integrated aspects may be happening, even if not so obviously pursued or passed on to our kids.
By comparison “there is nothing on earth that I desire besides You” (Psalm 73:25). Love God with all your heart. If you had to choose, Christ or Christmas, there must be no contest. If you chose Christmas (and any of your favored traditions), you would have chosen an idol no matter how good the name. You shouldn’t love the gift more than the giver, you shouldn’t love any giver more than God. At the least, when we assemble to worship, we test the hierarchy of affections in our heart. God first.
And that same God who commands our love to Him above all, is the same God who gives us gifts. This God says “all are yours” (1 Corinthians 3:22). Is this a cruel temptation? Why all the work (and parties) and extras during a season in which we’re supposed to focus on the Incarnation? It’s because most of the time He wants our love for Him integrated in what we do. Love Christ more than Christmas, and then your heart will be free to love Christ as you do all the cookie baking and gift wrapping and calendar crunching.
Do not let your heart off the hook in either direction.
Holidays are hard. This is because sin is grabby and humans are sinners. One other way we sin is by believing lies about how holidays can save us. This is a Hallmark gospel, the not-even-so subtle story we’re sold during this season. Just get the food offering prepared and the gifts secured and the table cleaned off and all brokenness can be healed!
Even Christians can tend to see these times through Precious Moments tinsel. I like to remind you that you know better, that these feasting times are spiritual war, and that the same behavior that blesses some will antagonize others.
Paul used a parade picture to encourage the Corinthians. “Thanks be to God who always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere” (2 Corinthians 2:14). The triumph was a Roman victory spectacle, with music and dancing and food and prisoners of war and the conquering general. Paul puts believers in such a festival, celebrating the victory of Christ.
But “we are the aroma of Christ to God…to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life” (2 Corinthians 2:16). When you live from faith to faith, some will join in thanking God, others will blame you and criticize you for not feeling more guilty about all the people you’ve hurt as you thoughtlessly celebrate this “triumph.”
The communion feast shows us the way. It demands that we recognize Christ’s sacrifice as the only gospel, a gospel that heals, that reconciles, that humbles, and that lifts up our faces.
Gird up the loins of your mind, and your gravy bowls. Be full of thanks. Be a blessing. Be a joyful sacrifice spreading the knowledge of God everywhere.
It is godly to be thankful, though God Himself is not said to be thankful.
There is no description of God giving thanks or of the Lord giving thanks in Scripture. Jesus gave thanks to His Father for a few things (Matthew 11:25; John 6:11; John 11:41; Matthew 26:26-28), but this was the Son of God in flesh on earth.
For what it’s worth, I could not find any example of angels giving thanks either.
God is always the object, never the subject, of giving thanks. He is always the sun, never the moon, always the engine, never the wheels.
So gratitude is not an attribute of God. But gratitude was created by God as a uniquely human way to honor God. We become like who or what we worship, and in many ways we, as those who bear God’s image, take on His likeness as we see what He is like. We are transformed from one degree of glory to another as we behold Him (2 Corinthians 3:18), but in this case, as we behold Him we have more reasons to be thankful for His independent and good nature.
Paul wrote to Timothy that in the last days men would be, among other things, ungrateful (2 Timothy 3:2). Some would even have the appearance of godliness but be denying its power (3:5). Let the people of God be godly, not only in appearance, but in strong appreciation for the riches of His kindness to us.
Jonathan made a foundational connection last Sunday night in his message from 1 Peter 2 about living stones. He said that we seek our identity where we seek our righteousness. That’ll preach.
We’re religious beings. What makes our identity unique from other warm-blooded, breathing animals is our responsibility to worship God and our relationship with Him, and others. We can’t worship God in unholiness/unrighteousness, and we can’t truly fellowship with others in darkness/unrighteousness (1 John 1:6-7).
God the Father chose us, and sent His Son, who “suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18). We are a “people for his own possession,” and in that identity we “proclaim the excellences of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).
“He is the source of [our] life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and sanctification and redemption. Therefore, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord’” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31). Jesus Christ is the cornerstone, chosen and precious.
Jesus is our righteousness, and our baptism proclaims our identity as those who have died and rose again in Him. Jesus is our righteousness, and the bread and the wine are the tokens of the cost. Jesus is our righteousness, and there will be glory and honor and peace for all those who do good, from faith to faith. The righteous shall live–and eat and drink–by faith.
This will likely be the final installment of exhortations about the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23). That said, it obviously won’t be the last time we’re concerned about spiritual fruit.
Because love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control are the Spirit’s fruit in and through us, what are we supposed to do? These nine attributes of fruit are supernatural products, but how does that relate to the Christian’s pursuit?
In the immediate context in Galatians 5 there are four different angles on our activity. Paul says Christian brothers are 1) to walk by the Spirit (verse 16), 2) to be led by the Spirit (verse 18), 3) to live by the Spirit (verse 25) and 4) to keep in step with the Spirit (verse 25).
They relate to the apostle’s exhortation to the Ephesians, an epistle he wrote around four years after Galatians, giving him editing time to boil it down: in contrast to wine-drinking, “be (being) filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18). That is also in a context of walking carefully (Ephesians 5:15).
Again: walk by, be led by, live by, keep in step with, be filled by, the Spirit.
Walking is a regular metaphor for daily movements; think about each step. Being led is an easily understood illustration; look where the Spirit is going and go there too. Living by is a question of strength and standard, which leads to the keeping in step, tracking with a direction and a pace. Being filled is concerned with the controlling influence.
For good measure, a fifth verb comes in the next chapter; “the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life” (Galatians 6:8).
You cannot cause the water in the river to flow, but that’s no excuse for laying down on the shore. Get in. Don’t grow weary of keeping in line with the Spirit.
I’m here for your grammatical-meditation-edification again with a block diagram in English as well as a line-diagram in Greek for Romans 2:5-11. This is another one of those not whether but which issues, and the storehouses are eternal.
I’ve been thinking again about starting a newspaper (or a newsapp) for Marysville.
It’s an idea and conversation I’ve had before, but at that time there was the “Marysville Globe.” According to Wikipedia the paper was established in 1891. That was even before the internet. For the two decades I’ve lived in Marysville it was the only local paper I knew about. It’s also the local paper I rarely read due to the less than scintillating copy. It might have been bad, but at least it was ours.
Sometime in the last year or so it disappeared. The url – www.MarysvilleGlobe.com – redirects to the Everett Herald. Bleh. There’s just an archive of the Globe available now.
Which means we’ve got a real opportunity and zero current competition.
There’s a fantastic book called, Rules for Reformers. It focuses on place rather than media, but one of the principles is finding a city that is both strategic and feasible. It is a place that matters and is also a place that can be taken. A “paper,” so-called,” isn’t a city, but it is a source of information and perspective that could really start a fire.
So what if we started a paper that was Local first, State second, Nation next?
What if we loved our city in a way that brought out more of its loveliness?
What if we provided a biblical perspective on what’s happening among and around us, re-presented our Constitutional liberties to our fellow citizens, and pushed our local magistrates to remember their authority and responsibilities to protect us against so much tyrannical overreach coming from the “power” cities of our State?
What if we celebrated our local businesses – where you could enjoy coffee and beer and more – and promoted entrepreneurial opportunities?
What if we highlighted the ridiculousness of some of the official positions in our public schools, and also highlighted some of the other educational movements that are actually awake to the deadly dreams of the woke?
What if we connected churches, not to be under the same roof, but to build a better culture on behalf of the same Lord?
What if we acknowledged that Jesus is the Lord (Romans 10:9), that He is before all things and in Him all things hold together (Colossians 17), that in Him we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28), and that we will give an account for everything to Him (Hebrews 4:13)?
So what if we called this venture The Marysville Standard? A friend of mine started working with this name a couple years ago. That name might remind us that we are under a (transcendent, eternal) standard, it could urge us to set a new standard for local news and editorials, and it respectfully recalls the name of the paper Abraham Kuyper started in Holland, De Standaard, the same guy who said that Jesus claims lordship over every thumb’s-width in the domain of human existence. That includes Marysville.
Let me know what you think, if the juice would be worth the squeeze, how you could help.
Once David had been king for a while, having established his name through military victories and appointed a political cabinet, he appears to have enough time for some proactive kindness. “And David said, ‘Is there still anyone left of the house of Saul, that I may show him kindness for Jonathan’s sake?’” (2 Samuel 9:1). David had promised that he wouldn’t cut off all Saul’s offspring (1 Samuel 24:21-22), and this goes further. It turned out, there was a surviving, though crippled, son of Jonathan named Mephibosheth. David sent and had Mephibosheth carried over 100 miles back to his palace.
“David said to him, ‘Do not fear, for I will show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan, and I will restore to you all the land of Saul your father, and you shall eat at my table always.” (2 Samuel 9:8). “So Mephibosheth ate at David’s table, like one of the king’s sons” (2 Samuel 9:11).
This story does not have a fourth-layer allegorical meaning. It does, though, illustrate a principle, and gives us some parallels to consider.
When the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:4-7)
God purposed to show us kindness for His name’s sake. We share with Him as sons and daughters of the King. He has promised us an inheritance of His everlasting kindness. He has brought us near, and we commune “around the table of the King.”
Is it more important to be correct or to be kind? That is not a false dilemma; the premise of the question isn’t about exclusion but about priority. If you were thinking about a man who was complete in Christ, which of the two characteristics would be more memorable?
Before I say more, I am touchy-feely…at least about my Bible covers. I once shipped my Hebrew-Greek combo Bible to Mexico for six months in order to get a calf-skin cover on it. When you open the Bible, the Bible says it is profitable for rebuke and correction (2 Timothy 3:16). The Word is a gift for our understanding. God is love, and God is light, and we ought to want the light on bright.
But, you’ve been hearing me repeat the fruit of the Spirit for a few weeks now. Interesting, isn’t it, that the same Spirit who breathed-out the Word does more (not less) than make us accurate. He didn’t say anywhere among the nine attributes that the fruit is knowledge, understanding, or wisdom; nowhere is being correct, or having a critical Spirit.
The list does talk about fruit including kindness (χρηστότης, Galatians 5:22), and that is more than just a covering.
God Himself is kind. Taste and see that the Lord is kind (χρηστὸς, 1 Peter 2:3; though the ESV translates it as “good,” it’s the same Greek cognate). His kindness leads to repentance (χρηστὸν, Romans 2:4).
What does it mean to be kind? What does it feel like when someone isn’t kind to you?
It is spiritual and godly and wise to be kind. “A man who is kind benefits himself, but a cruel man hurts himself.” (Proverbs 11:17, see also Proverbs 21:21).
