Monday, November 30, 2009

Will You Occupy Burdens or Joy This Christmas Season?

Prayer Blog Message for Tuesday - December 1, 2009

What will occupy you most this Christmas season? Burdens or joy?

The shepherds that first Christmas night were probably burdened with the usual culprits: straying lambs, wool ticks, cut hooves, and nighttime cold. Suddenly they were exposed to angels, international news, and glory --- brilliant, radiant, Shekinah Glory! They never could be the same again. They returned “glorifying and praising God for all they had seen and heard.”

Luke 2:20 (New International Version)
20The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
Surely they returned to wool ticks and cut hooves, but forever after they would see all their annoyances through new eyes.
“Are you burned with the “usual”?

We to too have been exposed to the splendor, all the joy, all the majesty of God’s eternal plans, set in motion by the birth of Jesus Christ.

Let’s not be absorbed by burdens! Our mission this Christmas season should be to glorify and praise God for all we have seen and heard.

Oh, ring Noel, each Christmas bell;
God’s good news is great news all over the earth!
And Christians – all sing it, as bells ring and ring it;
Applaud it and laud it, this wonderful birth!
Yes, ring it out, fling it out, chiming and clanging:
On this joyous morn, Our Redeemer is born!

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