“”Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”“
Luke 2:14 ESV
Merry Christmas everyone! These last two weeks for me have been a mixture of Christmas camps, recovering from sickness, and rest. As you can imagine, it has been tough not being with family and friends for the holidays, but God is continuing to focus me on himself, especially in this special time. One thing God has specifically placed in my heart is a gratitude for God’s love in the gospel.
However the past few days spiritually have felt tiring and mundane, leaving me wondering where me and God where at. Small doubts crept into my head as I felt a lacking of peace and presence in my life. My mind began to wander into worldly things and my soul was calling out, where are you God! Then, on Christmas Eve, God came and presented his love for me anew through the preaching of Gods word. The pastor went through a passage on John, focusing on a theme of love come down. And as I prayed for focus, and for my wandering thoughts to settle in on this message of love, my mind snapped back to me and the words of scripture and application flooded my vision as I completely zoned in on what was being said. The message reminded me of my sin, my imperfect humanness, and then the undeserving, unfailing, unshackling love of God. That he loved me to the point that he humbled himself so low to come to earth. Giving up all he had in heaven to experience absolute vulnerability at the hands of a teenage girl and her carpenter husband in Bethlehem. He put himself in flesh, in pain, in separation from his father so that we might never be separated from him again. One thing that stuck out was the phrase before Moses all that existed was the law and God’s justice, after Jesus we got to experience what true love was and actually live it out through Jesus’ entrance into our lives. We have been given so much, as he has given up much for us, and it just continues to shake me that this is the unfathomable love of my God.
Some ways I got to experience this love in the past two weeks and display it to others was;
-1 month debrief with the team
-student Christmas camp and missions mobilization
-doing mud games at the camp and getting to mess around with some music with the band
-Christmas shopping
-Christmas eve service
-white elephant, watching “the shepherd”, and praising God for his love
-late night Christmas movie night
Though this season can be hard away from everything it also is reminding me that I have everything in the love of Christ. Some things y’all could be lifting up in prayer for the next few weeks are:
- general health to improve
- for renewed joy in the gospel daily
- for team unity and peace
- for the love of God to be my whole focus and for me to live that out in my life
As I prepare for today’s Christmas festivities and dive into God’s love once again I just want to encourage y’all will the love God has for us. Don’t take it for granted, don’t lose sight of what he’s done for you, this is why we celebrate. He loved us so much that he came down for us. He came to save us. He came to bring us his joy and peace. Love has come down, this is why we celebrate. Merry Christmas y’all and have a wonderful Christmas Day!!
