You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me… John 5:39

"For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse." Romans 1:20

A few weeks ago in Sunday School we had a brief chat about using nature and the world around us to try to explain the mysteries of God to us humans who are bound in a physical reality and unfamiliar with the spiritual realm. It all started with God and burning bushes, earthquakes and whispers and continued with Jesus and seeds, vines and sheep. Our church fathers continued the tradition in order to reach gentiles and illiterate populations. What would Ireland be without it’s shamrock trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit?

The truth is that from the very beginning, God’s world and God’s Word were pointing to the Messiah, Jesus. From the first prophecy in the Garden of Eden, to Noah’s salvation by water, to the sacrifice of Abraham’s son, to Noah’s three days in a whale and much, much more, God was pointing us to eternal truths about His plan of salvation. But concepts like eternal life, sin and agape love are just hard to comprehend.

Christmas, in particular, is full of symbols that attempt to bring the reality of Christ into our hearts and minds. Every year at our Hanging of the Greens service, we read about many of these symbols as we decorate the Sanctuary. I picked a few of my favorites when I put together my Christmas Quilt illustration.

THE CANDY CANE – The newest of the symbols is the candy cane, created in the shape of a ‘J’ for Jesus, or a shepherd’s crook to remind us of the first witnesses to Jesus’ birth. The red and white remind us of Jesus’ purity and the shedding of His blood. The peppermint symbolizes the sting of sin, while the sugar symbolizes the sweetness of forgiveness.

HOLLY – An evergreen, holly symbolizes eternal life in Christ. The thorns remind us of Christ’s suffering and the red berries remind us of His blood shed for us. Romans used holly extensively during the Saturnalia festival, offering holly wreaths to honor the god Saturn during the winter solstice, and so it was easy to adopt these traditions to celebrate the True King and God, Jesus.

GIFTS – It’s a bit strange to receive gifts on someone else’s birthday, but Jesus himself is the greatest gift humankind could ever have. The gifts the Magi brought to Him show us just what He means to us: gold for a King of Kings, Frankincense for a Great High Priest and Myrrh for a sacrificial Savior who would die so that we can live.

SNOW – Although we are born stained with sin, Jesus washes us white as snow. Snow is also used as a metaphor in describing the hair and clothing of heavenly beings. Because snow is crystals, it bounces the light around at different angles so that all colors of light are bounced back out. All colors of light mixed together appear bright white.

LIGHTS – What would Christmas be without candles and twinkling lights? These remind us that Jesus is the light of the world. In a bigger sense, light symbolizes good, and darkness symbolizes evil. One tiny candle can illuminate a room and chase the darkness away, just as Jesus brought hope to the world. This symbolism is evident in the date chosen for Christmas. Christmas falls close to the Winter Solstice when the days are the shortest and the dark nights the longest causing the death of plants and cold temperatures. It’s easy to associate this time with our spiritual death without Christ. When Jesus comes at Christmas, light comes to humanity and the days become longer and brighter culminating in the coming of Springtime and new life at the Vernal Equinox when Easter is traditionally placed. Light is also still very much a mystery to us. Coming as both a wave and a particle, it gives heat and illumination. Its speed seems to be the universe’s speed limit, and its concentrated beam (laser) can cut through diamonds. Without it, all life on earth would end. It’s easy to see why Jesus is Light!

This Advent Season, as you move through your shopping, decorating and preparations for the arrival of our Savior, look for the signs and symbols of Jesus and His Kingdom. It’s easy to feel that Christmas has become too secularized but note the symbols all around you! Take a moment to share them with others. It doesn’t have to be hard to keep Christ in Christmas – He’s already there!

Advent blessings,

Jen

The busyness of the Holiday season is underway and about to ramp up to epic proportions. But right now, in this moment, there is time to breathe and give thanks.

In Sunday School we performed a skit where ‘Future Hailey’ came back to tell Hailey about a really, truly, horrible, awful day coming up in a few months. It was a day like Job’s worst day ever. We considered how we can be thankful on a day like that. The answer is, we give thanks “in” everything, during the good times and the horrible, for a good, good God who will never leave us or forsake us, who walks through the fire alongside us, and has promised to work all things together for our ultimate good. He loved us enough to give His only Son a truly worst day ever, all for our benefit – eternal salvation.

The previous week we learned about Martha and Mary. This is the ultimate Thanksgiving Day story – one woman is in the kitchen rushing around cooking, cleaning and preparing, all the while feeling resentment brewing toward her sister who is sitting with the guests, listening. “She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

 “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” Luke 10:40-42

Take the time today to rest – rest with your family or friends, rest watching football, but most importantly, rest in the Lord. He is our source of peace, He is where our souls are refreshed. Intentionally refuse to let yourself get so busy that you miss the blessings of rest and peace that God wants us to be thankful for.

Psalm 62:1: "Truly my soul finds rest in God; my salvation comes from him"

Psalm 62:5: "Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him"

Matthew 11:28-30: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls"

Hebrews 4:9-11: "So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his"

Psalm 23:1-3: "The Lord is my shepherd; I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul"

Have a truly blessed Thanksgiving

Thankful, grateful, blessed,

Jen

The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God. Leviticus 19:34

Strangers, foreigners, others…throughout the history of mankind, these have brought fear and suspicion. And rightly so. Strangers brought war, disease, more mouths to feed, new ideas, and change. But strangers also brought knowledge, skills, new foods, more hands to work, new ideas, and change. Those last two are not always bad, but they are usually scary.

And so, in most cultures, since ancient times, strangers were not treated very well. Perhaps they would be let in, but only at the lowest levels of society without many rights or privileges and usually without the ability to ever become a full member of ‘the tribe.’

However, God Almighty, changed all that when He handed down the Law to Moses. God commanded that His followers treat foreigners with all the love and respect of native-born Israelites, remembering how they, themselves, were treated in Egypt. At this point in the United States, every one of us can trace our ancestry back to foreign lands. Like the ancient Hebrews, we came to a land that was not ours and made it our own. And like Father Abraham and Moses, we established it as a land of freedom, blessed by God and under His Law. We have been a city on a hill attracting foreigners to our melting pot ever since.

War, poverty, injustice, and oppression have caused many millions of people to escape their homelands and head for the ‘land of liberty.’ The cost is great – they leave behind land, inheritances, ancestors, family, language, culture and skills to start over at square one in a new land. Some come for economic gain, some come to do evil, some come unwillingly by force, but the vast majority come for the hope of a better life for themselves and their families. Many have been lied to about the journey and its costs, deceived by their own countrymen.

Illegal immigration has become a huge political issue for us, but our calling is to follow God, not men. And what does the Lord ask us to do?

“This is what the Lord Almighty said: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. Do not plot evil against each other.’” Zechariah 7:9-10

As we work our way through this issue and think and talk about it, remember God’s command. True justice should be shown to those who perpetrate evil. Mercy and compassion shown to the poor and oppressed. Our Pilgrim ancestors, escaping persecution and oppression, found compassion and aid among the Native Americans in the New Land. That is what we still celebrate 403 years later.

As we prepare to celebrate a feast with our friends and families with gratitude in our hearts for God’s many manifold blessings on ourselves and our country, let us remember the strangers in our land, for we were once strangers in a strange land. Let our compassion and mercy overflow like our gravy boats. And if you are moved to get involved, check out some of the organizations that work with the State of Maryland to assist immigrants, several of which are faith-based groups: https://goci.maryland.gov/community-partners/

HAVE A BLESSED THANKSGIVING!🙏🦃

Blessed to be a blessing,

Jen

So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.

~Genesis 1:27-31

The struggle over the environment continues. When the Pope said that we must care for the Earth and protect it for future generations, quite a few feathers got ruffled. But this was literally God's first command to us. He gave us everything and only asked us to care for it all.

In this month of giving thanks, this is a perfect place to start in your gratitude practice. You can list natural things you are grateful for or go out and experience them - on a trail, up to the mountains or in your own yard. The natural world is full of wonders and evidence of God as Creator and Merciful Father. Just ponder our sense of sight for starters.

Thinking about all He has given us led me to remember my favorite Hymn, "For the Beauty of the Earth" by Folliot Pierpoint, 1864. From the glory of creation to the joy of family and friends, to the wonder of our senses and faculties, to the mystery of salvation and reconciliation with God, this hymn really says it all. And I am especially fond of the last line of each verse, "Lord of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise." After a little research I found that this hymn was originally a poem, and my favorite last line was originally "Lord of all, to thee we raise this our sacrifice of praise." I like it either way. I am profoundly grateful for everything mentioned in the hymn, the earth, the universe, our senses, family, the church and especially Christ Jesus, and it doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice to praise God for all of these blessings. I heard this verse once, though, and it put a new twist on it for me:

But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel. -Psalm 22:3 (KJV)

God inhabits, or is enthroned in, the praises of His people. Our praise is valuable to Him, and He considers it to be a valuable sacrifice. And it is easy to find things to praise Him for, starting with the beauty of the earth, especially in Autumn when the leaves begin to turn.

I'll leave you with the words of the hymn to meditate on and hopefully you will start to feel that gratitude and hope welling up from within you and pouring over into praise of our great and glorious God!

For the beauty of the earth,
for the glory of the skies,
for the love which from our birth
over and around us lies;
Lord of all, to thee we raise
this our hymn of grateful praise.

For the beauty of each hour
of the day and of the night,
hill and vale, and tree and flower,
sun and moon, and stars of light;
Lord of all, to thee we raise
this our hymn of grateful praise.

For the joy of ear and eye,
for the heart and mind's delight,
for the mystic harmony,
linking sense to sound and sight;
Lord of all, to thee we raise
this our hymn of grateful praise.

For the joy of human love,
brother, sister, parent, child,
friends on earth and friends above,
for all gentle thoughts and mild;
Lord of all, to thee we raise
this our hymn of grateful praise.

For thy church, that evermore
lifteth holy hands above,
offering up on every shore
her pure sacrifice of love;
Lord of all, to thee we raise
this our hymn of grateful praise.

For thyself, best Gift Divine,
to the world so freely given,
for that great, great love of thine,
peace on earth, and joy in heaven:
Lord of all, to thee we raise
this our hymn of grateful praise.

Blessings of gratitude,

Jen 

The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. John 10:10 NKJ

bounty

noun

boun·​ty ˈbau̇n-tē 

1: something that is given generously

2: liberality in giving : generosity

3: yield especially of a crop

Abundance, bounty, overflowing…these Biblical concepts must have sounded nearly magical to an agrarian society scratching out its existence year to year subject to the whims of weather, pestilence and war. Those growing up during the Great Depression craved this kind of assurance of the future.  But these days abundance is more of a problem than a promise for most Americans.

The United States discards more food than any other country in the world: nearly 60 million tons — 120 billion pounds — every year. That’s estimated to be almost 40 percent of the entire US food supply.* And for most of us, our closets and drawers are overflowing with clothes, shoes, and linens. Our kids’ closets are filled with toys, games and little doodads and prizes from who knows where. Garages, attics and basements are stuffed to the gills. In fact, we have so much stuff that a new industry of Storage Facilities has grown up and keeps growing, filling suburban commercial areas. And new stuff arrives daily by Amazon, UPS, and more.

This is despite the fact that most Americans will tell you that money is tight, things are too expensive and it’s harder to maintain a household. Perhaps we are not quite the good stewards we think we are. And perhaps we are not as generous as we ought to be. I’m preaching to myself here, but maybe you can empathize.

This Sunday our church will be collecting shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child, a ministry of Samaritan’s Purse run by Franklin Graham. I have been participating in this ministry for decades now, and it was a real favorite of my own kids. We would fill a shoebox with hygiene items, cozy socks or gloves, school and art supplies and a “wow item” like a doll, toy truck, ball or a plushie. We included a sheet with information about the kids’ likes and lives and our address so the recipient could write to us (and they did!). We also tracked our shoeboxes to see where in the world they ended up. Our boxes have gone to Togo, Ukraine, South Africa, The Dominican Republic, and a mysterious “hard to reach area”! We enjoyed finding those places on a map and imagining life there. If you have participated, try tracking your own boxes at https://www.samaritanspurse.org/operation-christmas-child/label-options/#fyb.

These days, the ministry has expanded so much that there are many ways to participate and increase your involvement. You can fill a shoebox online at https://build-a-shoebox.samaritanspurse.org/goal/view/0856c565-fe20-4a73-a914-58abea414da4. You can work at their distribution centers. You can bring in your packed boxes to church on Sunday (or the following week at Chick-fil-A). And there are many, many videos you can watch that show how the boxes are delivered and share the testimonies of children who have received them.

And here’s the point – America is a land of abundance. Even our poorest have most of their needs met for shelter, food, clothing, schooling, healthcare, etc. With Dollar Stores on every other block, most can have what they need, if not what they want. However, this is not so in much of the rest of the world. There, the poor and orphaned are not taken care of by the government, and are mostly forgotten if not ignored. But Operation Christmas Child goes to extraordinary lengths to bring Christmas gifts to children in the most remote places of the world. By foot, by mule, by boat, by bicycle, boxes of hope are delivered to children that have never heard of Christmas, never heard of Jesus. Each of our boxes will include a ‘Greatest Journey’ booklet in their language that tells the Gospel story in an engaging way. And the local churches and missions follow up the shoeboxes with Bible study for the kids, AND Bible study for adults. In this way, entire communities are transformed. Watch a few of the short videos – you will be blessed by them! Operation Christmas Child Videos

This weekend, our Sunday School kids packed boxes as part of the lesson. We also watched some of the videos. They voted for this one and it made me cry (not much of a challenge) so I’m attaching it here for you. If you’ve had parents, a church, and a toy at Christmas, you are more blessed than you can ever realize.

Blessings of Generosity,

Jen

*https://www.rts.com/resources/guides/food-waste-america/