Month: December 2024

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Eager Patience

Waiting for God to act. It’s not exactly our strong suit, is it? Yet so much of our time is spent doing exactly that — waiting for relief, waiting for answers, waiting for direction, waiting, waiting, waiting. So how do we wait? Sometimes like David we wait anxiously for God: “How long O Lord . . . How long . . . How long . . . ?”1 Perhaps in better times, we, like Abraham, have “waited patiently”2 for Him. And then there is the patience of Simeon. “He was righteous and devout and was eagerly waiting for the Messiah to come and rescue Israel. The Holy Spirit was upon him and had revealed to him that he would not die until he had seen the Lord’s Messiah.”3 How inspiring, this eager patience of Simeon. And how awesome, the faithfulness of his God.

I find it fascinating that both God and Simeon longed for the same thing, the sending of the Messiah. For what Simeon yearned to receive, God desired to give. In fact, God himself waited for a very specific time of fulfillment, a time of His own eager expectation. For “when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.”4 The promised moment is forever fulfilled: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.”5 In His timing, God has done what God has promised. Merry Christmas!

Then in the confidence of our promise-keeping God we wait again, for our Messiah will return to us just as assuredly as He came two millennia ago. For “Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.”6 Did you catch it? We are called to wait for the Messiah as Simeon awaited Him— eagerly. To me this means aligning my will with God’s purposes, joining Him in His work as He calls me today, speaking truth in love, extending grace to others from the grace I have received. It means conversing with Him who calls me “friend”7 and humbling myself before Him who is both Lord and King.8

What about you? What might “eagerly waiting” for Jesus mean to you?

But you, dear friends, by building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. — Jude 20-21 NIV

Father, You are the promise-keeping God. Thank You for giving us Your Spirit to guide us in eager expectation of Your presence, both now and forever. Grace us to submit ourselves to Him. In Christ we pray. Amen.

1 Psalm 13:1-2 ESV
2 Hebrews 6:15 NLT
3 Luke 2:25-26 NLT
4 Galatians 4:4-5 NIV
5 Isaiah 9:2 ESV
6 Hebrews 9:28 ESV
7 John 15:15
8 Revelation 19:16 ESV

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The Gift that Grows

December 18 2024 — The Gift that Grows

To each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. — Ephesians 4:7 NIV

It’s Christmastime again, and you know what that means! The annual “white elephant” gift exchange. Each person has the option of choosing a wrapped present or seizing one already selected and unwrapped by someone else. As more packages are opened, stealing increasingly becomes the go-to option. “I’ll take your gift, thank you very much.” It’s a zero-sum game: one person’s gain is another person’s loss. So anticipation mounts — who will finish with the more coveted gifts, and who will be stuck with . . . let’s just say the “more memorable” ones? The two I remember most? A bullwhip and a porcelain bedpan. (I tried to market the latter as an antique, but there were no takers.)

Not all gift exchanges are “winner take all,” fortunately, and one that immediately comes to mind is grace. Grace is not “I win; you lose”; it is quite the opposite — liberated by God’s grace to me, I gratefully share the same with you. As Jesus said, “Freely you have received; freely give.”1 Then, grace multiplies, it spreads, it bears fruit, it “keeps giving.” For grace itself “teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.”2 What a relief! May we live as we ought.

Ironically, for some of us giving grace is especially difficult during the holidays. For we gather with those who know us the best and who “punch our buttons” the most, sometimes knowingly and perhaps more often not. As a bumper sticker reads: “I’ll be home for Christmas and in therapy by New Year.” So, why not live this season in grace? Why not pause to consider God’s patience with us and His forbearance toward us, and in humility and thankfulness, share the gift of grace with those who struggle against sin as much as we do. Paul exhorts us, “Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.”3

Grace can be difficult to give, for it calls us to expel our pride and become vulnerable again. But gifts await us in exchange. Maybe even the gift of joy.

Live grace. Give grace.

Father, from [Jesus’] fullness we have all received grace upon grace.4 Fill us with Your Spirit, that we would extend this grace to others, especially those who punch our buttons. In Christ we pray. Amen.

1 Matthew 10:8 NIV
2 Titus 2:12 NIV
3 Colossians 3:13 NLT
4 John 1:16 ESV

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No Turning Back

Let’s dig a little deeper. In last week’s post, we approached the matter of “euphoric recall” — our tendency to remember past experiences more positively than they actually were, and not to recall the negative things associated with those events — for instance, the insecurities, disappointments, or pains, both those we suffered and those we inflicted. As we observed, such selective memory embellishes our past, deflates our present, and sets an unreasonable standard for tomorrow. Moreover, it coaxes us back to a life we thought we left behind.

Consider the addict who has been sober for some time. Seeing some friends drinking and laughing together, she thinks, “Maybe one drink wouldn’t hurt,” or “I’m not sure sobriety is worth missing all the fun I used to have.” Forgetting the frustrations and failures of a life formerly spinning out of control, she lets the feelings of the moment distort the lessons from her past. Here is another example: Recalling a former “flame” through the foggy mist of time, the man “follows” her a little too closely — and “likes” her a little too wrongly — on social media, remembering the warmth of companionship, but forgetting all the reasons each is now an “ex” of the other. Or what about all the times we compromise godly gain to regain worldly approval? In these moments, we can recognize and resist the deception of revisionist recollection, or emulate the puppy of Proverbs, instead: “Like a dog that returns to his vomit is a fool who repeats his folly.”1

So Peter charges us to detect these and other deceptions, and to own our response to temptations: “As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct . . .”2 Through the wonder of God’s favor, we are liberated and empowered for exactly this. Paul writes, “For the grace of God . . . teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.”3 Peter likewise reminds us of God’s provision: “His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.”4

The psalmist Asaph wrote, “I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before you.”5 With this honest look-back, he entrusted his present and future to God: “Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory.”6 May we so live today.

I will hear what God the Lord will say; For He will speak peace to His people, to His godly ones; And may they not turn back to foolishness. — Psalm 85:8 NASB

Our Father, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.7 In Christ we pray. Amen.

1 Proverbs 26:11 ESV
2 1 Peter 1:14-15 ESV
3 Titus 2:11-12 ESV
4 2 Peter 1:3 NIV
5 Psalm 73:21-22 NIV
6 Psalm 73:23-24 NIV
7 Matthew 6:9, 13 ESV