Being Generous in Every Way | Advent

December 20, 2019Leave a comment

We have a Christmas card delivery box at our church, a central station for Merry Christmas wishes and Happy New Year greetings.

Instead of us all buying stamps and mailing cards to one another, our church’s missions group sets out their own church post office hub. We leave our cards for each other in the boxes and give the money we would have spent on postage to a missions offering instead.

My kids love checking our “mailbox,” the slot that holds all of the cards in it for people in our church with last names beginning with J or K. I usually only have to check the box once a season. They stay on top of card delivery.

Years ago, someone spoke a few gentle words of truth to me about those cards and the boxes, about the giving and the receiving.

She brought to my attention a name, one person in our little congregation who loved checking the box, but didn’t often find a card addressed to him. He so eagerly checked that Christmas card box every single Sunday. Always with hope. Never showing disappointment or sorrow over the cards he didn’t receive. He rarely walked away with a card, though.

It is because of my friend’s loving reminder to truly show love that I address his card first every year when I write the names on the envelopes. I do not want to forget or neglect to give and love someone whom God so loves.

And this has been on my heart this year at Christmas.

Most of us as moms seek out ways to teach our children that Christmas is more about giving than getting. I’m in the thick of it. With four kids ages 6 to 15, I’m right in the middle of this training season, to keep Christmas about Jesus and His love.

For years, I’ve had my kids hunt through the gift catalogs from World Vision, Compassion International, and Samaritan’s Purse, choosing what they felt passionate about giving that year: Soccer balls, malaria nets, goats, chickens and ducks, blankets, Bibles, school kits, and more. They had to do extra chores through the fall months in order to raise the money they would give to their chosen cause.

We pack boxes with Operation Christmas Child.

We send our sponsored children a Christmas gift.

Two years ago, we started a reverse Advent box, adopting an idea I had seen online. We start with an empty box and we pick a local charity to give to. Every day in December, we put an item in the box to donate to our chosen charity. Last year, we collected hygiene items. This year, we’re collecting wipes, onesies and other baby items for moms in need.

The ideas online are endless. Random Acts of Kindness Calendars. Volunteering at homeless shelters. Ringing bells for the Salvation Army. Toys for Tots. Caroling at nursing homes. And many more. We have so many ways to engage, so many opportunities to focus our hearts and minds on giving during the Christmas season.

But this year, I feel the challenge more than ever to make it personal.

I tell the Christmas story to preschoolers most years and as I do, I remember the simplicity and the beauty of the nativity. I see how God chose an ordinary young woman and a poor carpenter. How He announced the news to lowly shepherds. How He drew in wise men from afar.

The poor. The outcast. The foreigner.

This is who God chose to use at Christmas. This is who God invited to worship. This is who God drew in to be His witnesses, to see what He was doing.

Others missed it, sleeping silently, crammed into every possible accommodation in Bethlehem, totally unaware that “today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord” (Luke 2:11).

So, our family keeps up the giving traditions. We fill our reverse advent box for moms and babies we do not know. We pack shoeboxes for kids we will not meet on this side of heaven. We send gifts and pack gifts and gather and give for people in need who remain nameless to us.

But there are also people I personally know who could use a Christmas card with their name on it this year.

There are people I personally know who could use some homemade cookies because no one else will be baking for them this Christmas.

Kindness from a distance and giving from afar can be so much “easier” and more “comfortable” than the vulnerable act of loving the neighbor we know.

May we find ways to do both.

“You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God” (2 Corinthians 9:11 ESV).

Raise Your Hand if You’re So Excited

January 4, 2019January 3, 20192 Comments

“Raise your hand if you’re so excited about Christmas!”

That was my five-year-old son on repeat in the weeks before Christmas day. He asked us often and he expected a response every time. Everyone in the vicinity had to raise a hand quickly and high enough to be seen. Either that, or the offending non-responder would be quizzed stringently.

Aren’t you excited for Christmas? Why didn’t you raise hand? Are you not really excited?

During our Christmas Eve service, he started to fall asleep a bit ( so much excitement can wear a fellow out), so I picked him up and cradled him in my lap during the pastor’s message. We made it almost to the end when my son sat straight up, no longer tired, and said in not quite a whisper: “Raise your hand if you’re so excited about Christmas!”

Every one of us in the pew raised our hands just a teeny bit, not high enough for anyone else in the church to see, but enough so he wouldn’t launch into the full-scale interrogation.

After Christmas, he kept the excitement going. He enjoyed every bit of Christmas break. Then I explained our New Year’s Eve plans and how our family usually has family game night, eats special snacks and watches funny videos on TV.

The first thing he asked as he rubbed sleep out of his eyes at 7:30 a.m. on December 31st was if it was time yet for the game playing and the snack eating and the funny video watching.

He was ready. Ready all day. He quizzed me at 10 a.m. and again at noon and then afternoon right up until we (finally) started celebrating.

During the Christmas season, I felt a continual nudging as I read each part of the story: am I living with expectation?

The wise men were searching the night sky. They were actively looking, digging deep into ancient Scriptures, studying promises, watching for their fulfillment. Then, at the first sign of God on the move, they chose active obedience and pursuit. They left behind the familiar, they traveled far from home, because they wanted to see what God was doing.

Simeon and Anna both knew the Messiah was coming. They had been promised and assured of his imminence. With profound expectation, they lingered in the temple courts, hoping for the day they would see the Savior with their own eyes. And they did. God did what He said He would do.

Am I this excited? Am I expectant?

I’m not really. Not as excited as my son, and not as expectant as the wise men, or Simeon, or Anna. I’m not watchful or hopeful of seeing the goodness God is doing.

Maybe you’ve started this new year with just that high level of expectation and excitement. Or, maybe you’re more like me, limping in slowly, timidly, a little worn out from the hard season you’ve just walked through–hoping (but not certain) that the most difficult steps are finally in the past.

Maybe you’ve been waiting and there’s more waiting to be done.

I read this today:

Now the people were waiting expectantly, and all of them were questioning in their hearts whether John might be the Messiah (Luke 3:6 CSB).

Can we all be expectant?

It wasn’t just the Christmas characters who lived with anticipation of the Messiah; it was a general buzz of anticipation. Crowds lined the riverfront to see John the Baptist because they “were waiting expectantly,” on the lookout for a Savior.

And one day, they stood along that riverbank and watched as Jesus Himself stepped out of the crowd and into the water to be baptized.

They were seeking and because they were seeking, they found the Lord Himself.

So, what am I seeking?

I’m not seeking answers or direction. I’m not seeking next steps or a Promised Land or a bright future.

This is what Scripture says:

You will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:13)

and

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you (Matthew 6:33).

I can raise my hand because I’m so excited to see Jesus. Even the worn-out me who is tempted to hide away can instead be stirred up with eager expectation because I want to see the Lord and to see God’s kingdom at work in the here and now. I’m so excited to catch glimpses of His glory this year, knowing that He is present and He is powerful.

He is a Good God. And He is doing Good things.

The amazing, astonishing, startling, unexpected grace of Christmas

December 22, 20172 Comments

I pieced the shepherd back together yesterday.

One night while I was out this past week, apparently there was a crash, the kind that happens when child meets breakable object. The shepherd in our nativity took a tumble and was left in pieces. His lamb was missing wool. He was missing a hand and a foot and a corner of his robe.

So, I puzzled it out piece by piece with a bottle of super glue until he looked presentable again.

This isn’t the first brokenness in our nativity.

There’s a wise men who has had some patching up, as well. A few years ago, he crashed and lost his head and a foot. Super glue saved the day then, too.

I bought the set years and years ago for $6 at a church yard sale, and I love it. Truly love it. It’s not porcelain white with gold trim. It’s not handcrafted wood. It’s not expensive or fancy. It was a bargain, well-loved, used, and slightly the worst for wear.

It’s been a little broken even from the beginning for me. Our donkey came to us with one ear missing. So, this little set has some history.

But I love it. There’s something about these figures that draws me, their individual expressions and personality, the colorfulness of it all, maybe.

Maybe the beauty is simply this: Jesus didn’t come all pristine and showy. He didn’t come gilded or gorgeous, lofty and high.

He came so low. He came to the humblest and the small. He came to the broken.

He came to us.

I see this heart in Mary when she sang with astonishment at the angel’s message. She would be the mother of the Savior! Her! Not some princess or queen, not a woman of position and power, not a matriarch of a rich family,

Young. Single. Poor.

Mary sang:

“My soul magnifies the Lord,
    and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
    For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
    and holy is his name (Luke 1:36-49).

Her song rings with astonishment. Not just that God would do this miraculous work, but that He would do these great things “for me.”

In his book, Hidden Christmas, Timothy Keller writes:

We should be just as shocked that God would give us—with all our smallness and flaws—such a mighty gift.

God does this. He chooses the humble. Scripture reminds us of God’s heart:

Though the Lord is great, he cares for the humble, but he keeps his distance from the proud
(Psalm 138:6 NLT)

The Lord supports the humble, but he brings the wicked down into the dust.
(Psalm 147:6 NLT)

For the Lord delights in his people; he crowns the humble with victory.
(Psalm 149:4 NLT)

So he chooses this girl Mary, and when He does she marvels at the way this is so topsy-turvy, so against the world’s expectations and plans:

He has shown strength with his arm;
    he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
⁵²he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
    and exalted those of humble estate;
⁵³he has filled the hungry with good things,
    and the rich he has sent away empty (Luke 1:51-53).

He has blessed not the mighty, but the humble, not the rich, but the hungry.

How startling that God would choose her.

And he chooses simple shepherds. He chooses foreigners, Gentiles, from a far off nation to carry the gold and the frankincense and the myrrh to worship this new King. He chooses the tiny town of Bethlehem; He chooses a stable, not a palace in the capital city.

How startling that God would choose them.

It’s an astonishment we need ourselves: How startling that God would choose us: love us, save us, call us, use us.

Us! Yes, us, the broken ones gathered around the nativity, held together by super glue with our cracks still evident upon up-close inspection.

Timothy Keller continues in his book this way:

“no Christian should ever be far from this astonishment that ‘I, I of all people, should be loved and embraced by his grace!” (Hidden Christmas)

It’s a surprise that shakes us out of complacency and into awe-filled worship. Our God, so mighty, so worthy of praise, He “has done great things for me!” Yes, He has done this even for me, even when I was lost, even when I’m imperfect, even when I mess up, even when I’m broken, even when I don’t have it all together.

Such grace. Such amazing grace.

Losing, Looking, Seeking and Finding Christ this Christmas

December 8, 2017December 8, 20173 Comments

Who knew at least 25% of my life as a mom would be looking for other people’s stuff?

One day you hold a beautiful infant in your arms and 12 years later, you’re answering an endless stream of the same-old, same-old questions.

“Mom, have you seen….?”

“Mom, where did YOU put….” (Because obviously you must have moved it.)

“Mom,where’s my….?”

Today alone, I have already found a costume piece, a missing outfit, and a pair of shoes. Plus, I am engaged in an ongoing hunt for a dress that apparently walked out of a closet.

Earlier this week, I sat at the kitchen table helping one daughter with schoolwork while another daughter frantically huffed around the house.

She shuffled papers on the piano. She tossed books around in the book bin. She slammed desk drawers and closet doors.

I prodded her with a few standard investigative questions. “Where did you last have it? When was the last time you saw it?”

She just knew she put it on the piano, 100% absolutely sure . Someone must have moved it.

I let her search while I doggedly continued the study session with my other kid. Finally, though, I looked up at this increasingly stressed child and said, “I feel like I saw you fold that paper up into a square as we headed out the door somewhere. Maybe in your coat pocket? Maybe in your Bible?

Ding ding ding!

I carried that victory around as a moment of superior Mom-ness. Finding something without even getting up to look, that is worth serious parental points right there.

Hunting and finding. Searching and seeking. Looking and tracking.

This Mom-life has made me watchful and aware, and maybe that’s more than just a good Mom-skill. Maybe that’s a heart-skill we need, especially at Christmas.

Because, right there in the busiest of seasons, if we stop being watchful and aware, we can miss out on Christ right in the middle of Christmas.

The shepherds looked up on that holy night. As the angels crowded into the night sky, the shepherds could have run in fear, cowered into rock crevices, hid their faces, and waited for life to return to normal so they could get back to watching those good-old sheep.

Instead, they looked up. They listened. They watched their flocks by night and they watched the angels worship, and they pursued the Savior. They had to leave those Bethlehem hills and follow the instructions they’d been given. A manger. Swaddling clothes. This baby. Christ the Lord.

The wise men looked up, too. They watched the night sky, they studied the stars. They dug deep into ancient texts and lived in awareness.

Then, instead of shrugging off an anomaly among the stars, they packed up belongings, kissed loved ones goodbye, and set off on a journey to who knows where to find really who knows what.

They were searchers, seekers, treasure hunters, and they were finders.

Then there’s Simeon, who waited in the temple to see the Messiah. He watched as people filed in and out, families coming for festivals, couples carrying babies to be dedicated.

He saw the One he’d been waiting for all because he kept his eyes open. He looked and kept looking and never gave up looking until a poor carpenter walked in with a young bride who carried in her arms a baby named Jesus.

Shepherds. Wise Men. Simeon.

They all lived watchfully.

Others missed out. When those wise men arrived in Jerusalem and asked King Herod about this one who was born “King of the Jews,” he called for religious scholars to fill in the blanks. They knew the prophecy. The Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

But they didn’t go. They shrugged off the visit from these foreign seekers and stayed right where they were, pursuing their own religious agendas, doing all of the holy things, and yet MISSING it, MISSING Him.

Max Lucado writes,
“They reported to Herod that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. Did they not read the prophecy? Yes, but they did not respond to it. You’d think at a minimum they would have accompanied the magi to Bethlehem. The village was near enough. The risk was small enough. At worst they would be out the effort. At best they would see the fulfillment of prophecy. But the priests showed no interest” (Because of Bethlehem p. 78).

During this holy season, how can we choose the better thing, to be aware of God on the move?

How can we wake each day with watchful anticipation, asking God to let us see Him? To not miss Him? To go where He is and to worship Him right there?

Let’s look and let’s listen and live watchfully, so we can see Jesus and we can worship.

This is the invitation to go together and not alone

November 29, 2017November 29, 20172 Comments

“I want to come!”

This is my son. He lives in a constant state of high-alert awareness, making sure no one in the family goes out for an adventure or for some fun without bringing him along.

We plan a movie day, just me and my girls to see a film that isn’t animated and isn’t going to hold the interest of my active four-year-old boy.

Somehow, though, without us talking to him or even talking near him so he’ll overhear us, he manages to catch the word “movies” and pipes up with his current catchphrase, “I want to come!”

This is so hard.

I am an oldest child in a family of 5 kids. Until I had a youngest child of my own, I had no idea how hard it can be sometimes to be the baby of the family.

He is the one who wants to play, but the others are too old to play.

He is the one who always wants to come even if we’re going somewhere he can’t go. That means feeling left behind and that breaks his momma’s heart.

So, we try our best. We draw him in. We take him whenever we can. That’s not everywhere and that’s not always, but we do our best.

Right in the middle of decorating our Christmas tree, last weekend, I ran out of working Christmas lights. It had been a long and busy day full of projects, but unfinished projects are like fingernails on a chalkboard for me. I cannot do, “let it wait until tomorrow.”

So, off I went, grabbing my bag and prepping for an emergency dash to the Wal-Mart.

My son saw my bag and sure enough said, “I want to come!”

He didn’t even know where I was going. He just didn’t want to be left out.

Of course, making quick runs into a store is much easier without children along for the ride, but I grabbed his coat and shoes and took him with me because I could.

We drove out of our neighborhood slowly, marveling at all the Christmas lights. We bought our supplies at the store and as we walked back out, Andrew shouted to a group of unknown bystanders, “Hey, they have a lot of Christmas stuff in there!” Then we drove back home a slightly different way so we could see the decorations on a whole new set of houses.

The best part of our unexpected adventure was his presence. He was there. He didn’t miss it. I had drawn him in to the journey and pulled him alongside as a companion and he brought all the joy when wrestling with the lights on that tree had left me joy-depleted.

This is one of the gifts of the Christmas season: Jesus draws us in and He draws us together with others.

This is what He did for Mary, as she was commissioned to be the mother of the Messiah, right when the calling was at its most overwhelming and she could have felt both overwhelmed and all alone. That’s when the angel said:

And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren (Luke 1:36 ESV).

You’re not in this by yourself. Come. Share this experience and this calling with another.

That was the invitation.

It was an invitation to do the hard thing with another rather than all alone.

And the angels made other announcements. The heavens displayed other signs. They shared the good news of great joy with a group of shepherds co-laboring in the fields, and a group of wise men studying the skies and ancient texts together.

These men had been working together and searching together. Now, they became fellow-travelers and fellow-witnesses, bringing their community to Jesus and bringing Jesus to their community.

So much of me wants to hide away and hibernate by the time we hit December. The calendar has “no more room at the inn” and my depleted resources leave me with little left to give.

But Jesus.

Jesus draws others in.

He brought His very presence right into the middle of the everyday, ordinary, needy lives of people and then invited them to come and not just to come alone, but to come together .

Maybe this Christmas can be a Christmas of invitation for us. Maybe instead of doing alone and going alone, we can ask another, “Do you want to come?” It can be last minute, it can be messy, it can be casual, it can be crazy. It can be formal and planned or it can be made up as we go along.

It can be a prayer as we begin the Advent season, “Lord, draw me to you….and draw me to others.”

Why we’re not done celebrating yet

January 6, 2017January 4, 20177 Comments

jeremiah-29-13

I’m slipping ornaments and lights into Rubbermaid containers and packing the Christmas village into Styrofoam and cardboard this week.

On the kitchen table, though, I place the three wise men from our nativity scene.

Tonight, the wise men take center stage.

My middle daughter announced a few years ago that we should celebrate Three Kings’ Day on January 6th.

This was important. Necessary even.

She instructed us:

We must leave our Christmas decorations up until then.
We must have a special dinner with a kingly treat.

I tried to ignore the pleading at first and then made futile attempts to explain that since by January 6th we are already immersed in the insane schedule we call everyday life, perhaps we could skip Three Kings’ Day.

But no.

So, knowing how this girl-of-mine treasures traditions and because I love her, I Googled it and Pinterest-searched and asked on Facebook how to make this happen.

I read about traditional dishes like “pickled cabbage leaves stuffed with grouts drizzled with water and sauerkraut juice, ” “broccoli accompanied by crostini with chicken liver pate” and “stuffed ravioli with rich duck or rabbit ragu.”

I’m not loving this holiday.

But a friend speaks truth to me. It’s not about the menu. It’s about the family time and the celebration.

So, I let my daughter plan the feast and she chooses what is simple and fun and a family favorite.

I see the simplicity of this. It’s a family dinner with a special dessert and three wise men finally arriving in Bethlehem to worship the new King. Nothing difficult or fancy.

It’s not about effort; its about celebrating those who abandoned everything to seek truth–to seek Christ.

I read in my Internet research that it’s not just the celebration of “three kings,” but the rejoicing in the Epiphany, the humanity of Christ, God in flesh. It’s the reminder that He’s not a cold and impersonal deity too far out of reach to care about the passions of my day-to-day heart.

He is God come near.

God bent low.

God of compassion, who knows what it’s like to be hungry, tired, hurt, broken, sad, joyful, loved, and hated.

And I marvel at the magnitude of this, that when God’s infant Son cried out in a hay-filled manger, right there at the beginning of the salvation story, God sent the birth announcements to the whole world.

Not just to the Bethlehem natives. Not to the religious elite or the most righteous among them. Not even just to Jewish shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night.

For God so loved the world….

The whole world.

He sent a Messiah to the Jewish nation, but then announced redemption for us all with a star that Gentile sages could see and follow to find their Savior, as well.

These men, these watchers-of-the-sky, not so much kings as bookworms, as astronomers, as students and sages, they remind me to pursue the presence of Christ.

How hard it must have been to explain to wives, to family, to employers, to friends, to the people in their hometown that they needed to journey far in pursuit of a newborn King.

Sometimes I’ve imagined them following a star without really knowing why, without knowing what it could mean or where it would take them. Yet, when they arrived in Jerusalem, they pestered Herod with questions:

“Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him” (Matthew 2:2).

Everyone else continued on with life as usual, but they were willing to rock their entire lives in radical pursuit of the Messiah. It was so clear to them. So simple.

See the star.
Follow it.
Find the Savior.
Worship Him.

Reality so often complicates the simple. Life gets busy. Radical seems too hard. Maybe the journey will cost too much. Perhaps I forget along the way whatever it was I was seeking to begin with.

Or maybe I’m too busy and distracted to seek at all.

But I’m reminded today that God comes near and the wise seek Him.

Tonight I celebrate these magi who pursued the presence of Christ with wild abandon and focused determination, and I celebrate the God who promised this:

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:13 NIV).

Originally posted January 6, 2014

#AnywhereFaith and Christmas

December 14, 2016December 13, 20163 Comments

christmas15

Today, I plunked down $0.88 for a new address book.

Then, I laid its 13-year-old, well-worn predecessor to rest.

It was time.

In that old address book, I have crossed out. I have drawn arrows. I have swirled over old addresses and entered in new. I have stuffed envelopes with corrected info into the pages.

This year during ‘Operation Christmas Cards,’ I flipped through that edited mess. Seven more family members moved this year to new homes in new places.

Most of these are happy moves: The new-job, new-marriage, new-baby kind of celebration.

Others are moves of in-between, of change, of loss and sadness and finding new hope for the future.

Since I have an intense dislike, maybe even horror, of writing in pencil, though, I can’t just erase and start afresh at each new life event.

That’s when I realized the truth. It wasn’t time for more corrections. It was time for a completely fresh shart.

It was time to move on.

And it strikes me right at that moment as I fill in the blank pages A-Z, surrounded by Christmas decorations and Christmas cards, that Christmas itself is about moving.

God began that progress, journeying to us:

God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent His One and Only Son into the world so that we might live through Him (1 John 4:9 HCSB).

He makes the first move. He steps into the void we can’t breach, the abyss of sin we can’t possibly cross, and He leaves the glory of heaven for our sake.

Jesus isn’t the only One who moved that first Christmas, though.

“The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth” (Luke 1:26).

Mary and Joseph loaded up the donkey and trekked slowly “from the town of Nazareth in Galilee, to Judea, to the City of David, which is called Bethlehem” (Luke 2:4 HCSB).

The angels arrived on the hillside to announce the Savior’s birth to shepherds and then “left them and returned to heaven” (Luke 2:15 HCSB).

Then, those shepherds in their excitement said, “Let’s go straight to Bethlehem and see what has happened” (Luke 2:15 HCSB).

Days later, a man named Simeon was guided by the Spirit and went straight to a GOd-appointed place: “he entered the temple complex” (Luke 2:27 HCSB).

Wise men from the east searched the night sky and could no longer remain at home, complacent, apathetic, mildly interested but not engaged when they saw the mysterious star.

NO, THEY MOVED.

They committed to the journey, packing camels, loading supplies, asking questions.

They must have left so much behind: Family, possessions, homes, a culture they knew and friends they loved. Maybe they left position and power in the dust in order to arrive in a foreign land as strangers and outsiders searching for a King they couldn’t describe whose name they didn’t know.

Where were they going? They did not know. When would their journey end? They could not say.

Just like Abram long before, the Magi left their homes to travel to an unknown destination for an uncertain amount of time.

Friends must have called them crazy. Family might have questioned their sanity.

Yet, they kept moving because a star “led them until it came and stopped above the place where the child was ” (Matthew 2:9 HCSB).

CHRISTMAS IS ABOUT THE FAITH OF MOVEMENT, ABOUT FAITH IN ACTION.

It’s going anywhere god calls you to go.

NO STANDING STILL. NO REMAINING THE SAME. NO STUBBORNLY REFUSING TO LEAVE THE OLD IN PURSUIT OF GOD’S WORK ANEW.

In a season steeped in tradition, God shows us that He can do the surprising and unexpected. He is at work. He is in motion.

Christmas is angels and shepherds, sages and a teenage girl, the righteous and the ordinary, all abandoning their plans, agendas, comfort, and homes, leaving it all behind so they would not miss what God was doing.

ARE WE SO WILLING TO MOVE?

When God calls, when He is active, when He is at work and He comes to us, will we also go to Him?

I’ve finished filling this new address book now and for a while at least everything is settled and set.

Yet, I’m hushed with expectancy. I’m at the feet of Christ with anticipation. I’m asking the question and I’m silent, breathlessly waiting for the answer He gives:

“God, what are you doing and how can I be there? I don’t want to miss it by refusing to move when you move. Lead me this Christmas.”

Originally published 12/11/2015

Would you consider sharing the message of Anywhere Faith with others this Christmas? Click here to visit the book page on Amazon. Thanks!

Christmas means God on the move

December 11, 2015November 23, 20162 Comments