Ephesians 2:4-5  "But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved.

You've heard the question, "What's in a name?" Today I ask, "What's in a home?" Is it just the basics - the rooms, the furniture, the appliances, the food in the fridge? Or is it all that and more? Let's look beyond the basics.

Our desire is to place God at the center of our home. Yet, how do we - and others - know he is present? God the Father has bestowed upon us his mercy, grace and forgiveness through Christ. In response, we show mercy, grace and forgiveness within our home and to those who consider us their home.

Even as we prepare to come face-to-face with God's gift of grace, expectations of the "perfect Christmas" create pressure. When patience snaps and frustrations flare, may grace, mercy and forgiveness be in your home this Christmas.

-- Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

 

Psalm 90:1  Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.

When asking someone to define home, you might ask, "Is it a person, place or thing?" The answer could be "yes" because home can be any of these or all three. After all, home is an essence unique to everyone.

Emily Dickinson wrote, "Where thou art - that - is home." She was conveying that the very presence of one you love creates a  sense of home. Psalm 90 is a prayer of Moses who, even as he wandered the desert for 40 years, considered God his refuge, his home.

Is God your refuge? Through him, are you a refuge for others? This season is a hectic continuum of people, places and things. Perhaps it's time to slow the pace and focus on God, the Father who loves us so much he sent his Son. Then the other people, places and things will all fall into place.

Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

 

Numbers 21:4-9

The Israelites are in the middle of their years wandering in the desert, looking for the Promised Land, and they're getting impatient. They complain about the lack of good food and water, and they wish they'd never left Egypt in the first place. God, hearing their complaints, sends poisonous snakes among them, and many of the Israelites get bitten and die.

Ah, the joys of the Old Testament. Complain about how God's treating you? Here are some poisonous snakes! So the people come back to Moses and they say:

“We sinned when we spoke against the Lord and against you. Pray that the Lord will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. The Lord said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived.

There are a lot of foreshadowing elements in this story. Jesus references it in John 3 when He says that He, too, must be lifted up. In the same way that the elevation of the snake on a pole is the avenue for the Israelites' salvation, Jesus' hanging on a cross is the way in which eternal salvation comes to the world.

A particularly fascinating thing about this story is that God chooses the serpent to be the image lifted up on the pole - the very thing that is killing the people. Again, He is foreshadowing the final act of His plan of salvation. Jesus, who knew no sin, became sin on the cross so that we might become the righteousness of God. The very thing that is killing us - sin - is laid on Jesus and lifted up on the cross. The bringer of death - the serpents and the cross - becomes the way of life.

Today, know that Jesus took your sin unto Himself and gave you His righteousness, so that you might live, and live forever.

-- Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

 

Matthew 13:45-46

On an episode of the TV show The Big Bang Theory, Sheldon discovers that Penny has gotten him a Christmas present. Angered, he reminds Penny that the "foundation of gift giving is reciprocity" and that she hasn't given him a purchase for her "a gift of commensurate value and representing the same perceived level of friendship" as that represented by the gift she's given him.

His solution is to purchase three gift baskets (of various sizes) of bath products. His plan is to see what her gift to him is, excuse himself from the room, give her the appropriate gift basket, and return the other two baskets to the store. What happens, though, is that Penny has gotten Sheldon a napkin that Leonard Nimoy has used and autographed. Sheldon notes that he now not only has Nimoy's signature, he has his DNA.

After excusing himself, Sheldon returns with all three gift baskets, barely able to carry the weight. "I know, I know," he wails. "It's not enough!"

And that's the problem, isn't it? We don;t know how to react when we get really good gifts. When the gift is that good, no response is good enough. Certainly a plain "thank you" won't cut it. There is no bath product cornucopia that can balance the scales when Leonard Nimoy's DNA is on the other side, and there doesn't seem to be an adequate response when Jesus' death for our sins holds that place.

Many of us spend our lives trying to reciprocate for Jesus' gift to adequately say thank you. But if we turn a big enough gift into an obligation, we are crushed by it.

Let's acknowledge from the beginning, then, that this is a gift that tips the scale forever. Let's treat the gift like a child would, with excitement and joy, and go play, remembering that even our most heartfelt gratitude is not commensurate with His life-giving gift - liberating us from the impossible burden of repayment.

-- Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

 

Psalm 40 was made popular by King David long before it was made popular by U2. "I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry?" This is the first step in a beautiful, poetic, and short description of the story of God's action in human life. This is the trademark of human life - waiting and crying. That might sound dark to some, but to those who have lived through it, who are familiar with grief, struggle, and tribulation, the poet has connected to our very core with his first lines.

"I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry." The psalmist suggests a God who hears our cries and then springs into action. It's much more than a sympathetic ear: He stoops to us.

As is so the case, however, God goes above and beyond. He doesn't merely stoop to hear our cries; He rescues us from despair.

"He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure, he put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God."  Here, the psalmist is describing the profound result of the human interaction with God. As always, just as it is God who stoops to those of us who cry, God is again the actor here. He drew me up...He set my feet...He made my steps...He put a new song in my mouth. Our action is to wait and to cry. God's action is to stoop down and rescue. We go from existing in the pit of destruction and the mud of the swamp, to having our feet set on a rock, our footsteps firm, and with a new song on our lips.

-- 

Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,


 

In his Commentary on Galatians, Martin Luther makes a beautiful observation in response to Paul's letter-opening prayer, "Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ" (v. 3). Luther says that Paul chose those words carefully, and that those "two words, grace and peace, contain all that belongs to Christianity." He says that "grace forgives sin, and peace makes the conscience quiet."

Despite our efforts to achieve peace through a host of other methods - sound financial planning, righteous behavior, whatever - Luther contends that Paul's claim is that true peace can only come through grace. He says elsewhere that our "quest for glory can never be satisfied. It must be extinguished." In other words, there is no plane to which you could ascend at which you couldn't imagine being more peaceful. The grass is always greener, and all that.

The fact is that, because of Christ's saving work, we actually have been given peace through grace. Luther goes on to say that although the words are simple, "during temptation, to be convinced in our hearts that we have forgiveness of sins and peace with God by grace alone is the hardest thing." And this is true to human Christian experience, right? When faced with a situation, to accept that our standing with God is secure even if we make the wrong choice is next to impossible. This is why our consciences are so often troubled. We just flat out can't really believe that God will be graceful to us, and we therefore cannot have peace.

This is why it is important for Paul to begin his letter by wishing the Galatians grace and peace through God and Jesus Christ. This is why it's important for all of us to hear it every week, every day, every minute.

Today, let us begin with grace and peace. Peace is the thing that, left to our own devices, we would spend all of today seeking. Instead, let us remember that, in Christ, true peace is already ours, through grace.

-- 

Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

 

Eternal Death

In sharp contrast to the joys and glory of heaven are the sorrows and disgrace of those who suffer eternal death. Scripture describes eternal death in symbolic language as well, with analogies related to experiences in this earthly life. It is compared to fire, but it is the eternal fire that God prepared for the devil and his angels (Matthew 25:41,46; Mark 9:43-44; Isaiah 66:15-16, 24). Those who reject the only Savior from sin will be put "with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matthew 24:51). The lost "shall be an abhorrence to all flesh" (Isaiah 66:24); they will be seen as objects of "shame and everlasting contempt" (Daniel 12:2). The Lutheran Confessions, therfore, reject the doctrine that "the devils and condemned human beings will not suffer eternal torture and torment".

In reality, eternal death is beyond human description, for it is being forsaken by God, "away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might" (2 Thessalonians 1:9). It is being cut off from the very source and preserver of life. At the same time, Scripture is clear in stating that eternal death is not annihilation. It is the destruction of both the body and the soul in hell (Matthew 10:28).

Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,