Sunday Soak: More Than Wrong
Gazing upon the glory of the Lord to discern ourselves in the light of His mercy and love.
Happy Sunday, my friends!
Talk about derailed. I feel like I keep telling you guys the same things about my life, but with escalating intensity. So yes, again, I was struck with another bout of awful illness, and again, I was inundated with a major event - this time a 550-student, all-day bocce tournament that ended in an all-school final match. T-shirts were tossed. Walk-up music abounded. Small plastic trophies emblazoned with the most important details of the day were awarded to a gang of freshman boys who had never played bocce before today, and whose team name was inappropriately-acronymed until a more to-the-wise teacher stormed in to threaten the newly-famous offenders with a trip to a principal following their win. It was entertaining and exhausting in all possible directions for being the last day before break.
Amidst spending a couple of days re-sampling everything I had eaten and planning to run myself into the ground before the holidays, we had also had a couple of great weekends, because our local ski resorts in PA are opening quickly, and so Zeb and I spent the last two Saturdays on the slopes and got to catch up with a ski-coach friend of ours. Since Zeb and I met at one of the local ski resorts at a birthday party for someone we had each worked with at different times, both the places and the people are special to us.
It was much needed after a particularly long work week. Normal schools run by sane people typically like to take it easy the last couple of weeks leading into Christmas break. They do silly activities in class, show movies, hold review sessions, and limit activities to some disorganized, decentralized nonsense sprinkled throughout the school. They do not, for example, begin planning an all-school lip-synced video, take registrations for a three-county-wide student council conference, fulfill 200 spirit wear orders, or hold a bocce tournament so big that you have to have after-school elimination rounds after school through the week leading into the Friday when an additional 500 students will participate. And they certainly do not host a serious lesson and discussion about civil discourse with students who are hearing for the first time that not every conversation is a debate. But we’re not a normal school, and I am apparently not a very sane person, because that’s where I am this December.
The work is important, though, especially that civil discourse lesson. We’re trying to get students to grasp that they can dialogue with others in a way that they can walk away with a deeper understanding and empathy for one another without being so enraged. They struggle to get beyond the mindset that if they’re expressing their own views, it is for the purpose of convincing someone else that they’re right and that they need to change their beliefs.
So the lesson started out with giving some definitions and explanations of dialogue, discourse, debate, high conflict, and active listening. After discussing these for a while, I gave a common scenario to analyze in which a topic comes up in class, and one student pops off with a controversial statement that gets everyone riled up. I asked them, “What could you do to turn this ugly moment into a civil discourse?” The students began sharing a list of things they wouldn’t do. “Like, don’t disrespect that person,” one shared. “I wouldn’t tell them they’re just wrong or that their statement is stupid.”
Not a single kid could tell me an action that was right, only what was wrong. And it had me both worried and sad.
I started to think about a lesson I learned when I was getting certified with the United States Ski and Snowboard Association to be a ski coach. We were in an on-snow clinic, and the instructor told us, “Don’t teach your athletes what not to do. You’ll just end up keeping them focused on what they’re doing wrong, because it’s all they’ll hear. Instead, tell them what to do so that they can focus on correct technique. If you have to correct something, make sure you teach the correct technique and not just point out the flaw.”
It’s a really basic, common piece of advice to teachers and coaches. It seems obvious, even, when a parent is teaching their child to tie their shoes or or sweep the kitchen, they don’t start with the incorrect techniques. They start with the correct process and result, and the child strives to achieve it. This is the best way we teach just about everything - how to cast a fly rod, kick a soccer ball, strike a drum with a stick, drive a car, write sentences, put on pants.
When I was learning how to euronymph, the guide teaching me constantly demonstrated proper technique in different conditions and scenarios. Because I knew what was correct, it was easy to discern what was incorrect.
For example, I learned how important it was to get a proper drift. Remember, the drift is the way the fly glides through the water at the end of your line, and a good drift makes that bug look as natural as the real thing, or at least that’s the goal. Once I learned what a good drift should look like, it was easy to discern when I had a bad drift.
I don’t think the same could have been said in reverse, though. Knowing that my drift was bad would not have automatically helped me discern what a good drift looked like. I know from experience that you can get it wrong in 100 different ways in 100 casts, but they’ll never reveal to you what is right, and there are far fewer ways to do it right than to do it wrong. If my guide had focused the majority of his teaching on demonstrating bad techniques and telling me not to do them, I would never have learned what was right or how to do it.
It’s a pretty simple concept, yeah?
Knowing what is right, then, has the power to illuminate what is wrong. But I think we’ve been teaching it backwards as a culture for too long. So long that a lot of our society is currently conflicted by both what is right and what is wrong, because again, from the vantage point of what is wrong, it’s hard to be able to tell what is right. And we don’t know what is right, then we struggle to discern what is wrong.
That was a mouthful, but Proverbs 22:6 helps us out by saying, “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” This means we are charged with raising the next generation to know what is right, and that this teaching is incredibly important for how we live our lives year-after-year.
At the same time, we observe a balance in the Bible. Let’s take the Ten Commandments, for example. They are a mix of shalls and shall-nots:
“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me.
“You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
“You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
“Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
“You shall not murder.
“You shall not commit adultery.
“You shall not steal.
“You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
Jesus, however, boiled the entire Law down to just two affirmative commandments in Matthew 22:34-40:
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
“On these two commandments,” He said, “hang all the law and the prophets.” Thus, Jesus illuminated every “shall not” with two distinct “shall” commandments, because if you love your neighbor as yourself, you will see him as a man made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), whom Jesus died to save (John 3:16), and whom you have no right to judge nor condemn (Luke 6:37), and so you will not kill, steal from, lie about, or be jealous of him.
Part of the reason Jesus boiled it down this way is that the Pharisees, who were the most influential and powerful religious sect of Judaism in His day, believed in both the Law of Moses and oral traditions passed down. They had many rules, so many that they became caught up in them far more than they were caught up in God’s holiness and glory. Mark 7 demonstrates an interaction with Jesus and the Pharisees where He points this out:
1 The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus 2 and saw some of his disciples eating food with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. 3 (The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. 4 When they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions, such as the washing of cups, pitchers and kettles.)
5 So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with defiled hands?”
6 He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:
“‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
7 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’
8 You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.”
9 And he continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ 11 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)— 12 then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. 13 Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.”
14 Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. 15 Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.”
17 After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable. 18 “Are you so dull?” he asked. “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? 19 For it doesn’t go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.)
20 He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. 21 For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, 22 adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. 23 All these evils come from inside and defile a person.”
The Pharisees had so many rules that they were consumed by things that did not matter, and that focus actually gave them an incorrect view of the things God cares about. Matthew 9 demonstrates another important interaction between them and Jesus:
1 Jesus stepped into a boat, crossed over and came to his own town. 2 Some men brought to him a paralyzed man, lying on a mat. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the man, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.”
3 At this, some of the teachers of the law said to themselves, “This fellow is blaspheming!”
4 Knowing their thoughts, Jesus said, “Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts? 5 Which is easier: to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up and walk’? 6 But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the paralyzed man, “Get up, take your mat and go home.” 7 Then the man got up and went home. 8 When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe; and they praised God, who had given such authority to man.
9 As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.
10 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
12 On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 13 But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
In this interaction, the Pharisees continually criticize Jesus for things He is doing wrong, and His response is that they have missed the point entirely. They have missed the love and grace and heart of the Lord. They missed what is right.
We were never meant to look at the Law and obsess over all the details. We were meant to gaze upon His holiness, as the Psalmists did so many times - to magnify Him (Psalm 34), to behold His power and glory (Psalm 63), to praise Him because His mercy is eternal (Psalm 136), and to wonder why, in His great power and wisdom to create all things, He would even bother with us (Psalm 8).
The practice of beholding the Lord is my favorite Christmas tradition. That may sound a little odd amidst the holiday lights, gift giving, gatherings, and a million other ways we observe this month, but as a kid (and adult), I found a lot of the season a bit overstimulating. Our house, normally quite light and orderly, became seasonally darker and filled with many decorations, presents, and trees. We listened to more music and had more plans in the evenings, particularly involving band concerts and shopping trips. Although I delighted in the season at the start when we watched “Christmas Vacation” as a family after dinner on Thanksgiving, I became increasingly overwhelmed by the excess in my eyes, ears, and schedule.
As a child, I stayed up late in my bedroom, quiet as a mouse, listening for Santa and his reindeer on our rooftop. I remember the thrill of every little wisp of wind blowing through the trees and wondering if the distant car I could barely hear was actually his sleigh. As I got older and grew out of those beliefs, I never really let go of that tradition, but it has transformed over the years and has increasingly shaped the way I observe this season.
As an adult, I enjoy some festive decorations in our living room and getting carried away with exterior illumination, but have left the majority of the house alone to avoid being overwhelmed by change. Too, I’ve carefully turned down extra plans, parties, and travel, not for some obsessive form of self-care, but because for so many years, I found myself so exhausted, discouraged, angry, and feeling far from God because the man-made traditions, rituals, and expectations took up so much of my time that I felt desperately far from Him in a season we were called to do 10,000 more things to observe His Birth.
It’s really not too far off from the overcrowded rituals of the Pharisees. Different circumstances, but same result - losing focus on the real reason we celebrate this season. As I’ve realized that, I have opted out of the majority of the holiday fever that makes me feel so separated from God. Instead, I’ve said no to sending cards and baking cookies so that I can spend more time in the quiet and stillness of the season, meditating on the significance of what transpired in Bethlehem.
As a child, I was always tucked underneath warm layers of blankets, but air in my room was so cold and thin while I was listening for Santa. As an adult, that same feeling of warmth vs. thin air can immediately transport me back to our Northern Michigan farmhouse.
Only, as time went by and I grew out of Santa, I began to listen for the angels singing, bringing tidings to lowly shepherds. Instead of imagining his sleigh, I imagine a young man leading a young and very pregnant young woman to the town of Bethlehem and wonder what the ground felt like beneath their feet. Would he offer her his cloak if she were chilled? I think about the sound of the straw in the manger, rustling against the Christ Child’s swaddling clothes as Mary lays Him down. I listen for the labored breathing of camels as they carry the Magi to see the Messiah.
I think about the mysteries surrounding our salvation - how God could become Man. Isaiah 6:1-5 recounts the prophet’s vision of the Lord:
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. 3 And they were calling to one another:
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty;
the whole earth is full of his glory.”
4 At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.
5 “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”
When we behold the Lord, Isaiah’s response is sure to be ours. “I have seen what is right, perfect, holy, and glorious, and therefore I have seen myself for who I am - a sinner, surrounded by sinners.” And yet, when we behold the Christmas story, we see something unfathomable:
“An angel of the Lord appeared to [Joseph] in a dream and said, ‘Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.’
“All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 ‘The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’ (which means ‘God with us’)” (Matthew 1:20b-23).
The Lord - the Holy One of Israel, God Almighty, Creator and Ruler and Sustainer of all, whose angels cry “Holy Holy Holy is the Lord Almighty” in perpetuity - sent His Son to save us from our sins, from ourselves. He came to die so that we could have the free gift of grace and eternal life with Him, and would then send us the Holy Spirit so that He could dwell with man and man with Him eternally.
We are meant to dwell on these things. The word “behold” is used in the Bible roughly 1300 times. The translations of this word go far beyond looking at or seeing something. The Old Testament Hebrew word “nabat” means to look, regard, consider, pay attention to, or carefully contemplate. The New Testament Greek word “eido” means to perceive, discern, discover, turn both eyes and mind toward, inspect or examine, and to know, regard, and cherish.
With 1300 verses to choose from, we could go a lot of directions with this. Here is a small sampling of 47 such verses. It is clear from these, and from the many others available, that when we are told to behold something in the Bible, it is something good, beautiful, incredible, worthy of our wonder and curiosity, worthy of our attention and time and devotion.
I haven’t combed through all 1300 verses, but the pattern I have picked out is that we are to spend a significant portion of our time and attention gazing upon what was right, rather than observing rituals and wrongs. We are to not only know what is right, but to behold it and to know it deeply in ourselves. Paul even advises us to spend our time considering what is pure, noble, holy, right, lovely, admirable, and praiseworthy in Philippians 4:8.
While it is important to know what is wrong, that alone is not something we can stand on. We do not declare who Jesus is by denying who He is not. When a friend of mine believes a lie and recites it to me, it is not enough for me to say, “That didn’t come from Jesus.” That gap leaves room for other lies and frustrations. I also have to be prepared to tell her what is true, and that comes from a place of knowing both what Jesus says and that what He says is the complete and perfect truth.
I have to practice this with myself. Objectively, I have followed God along a strange and difficult path in life. There have been times that I have asked Him - or maybe accused is the more accurate word - if He only made me to struggle and suffer, and why He seemed to love me less than others. But the closer I draw to His Word and His Identity - that is, what is true about Him, and therefore about us - the more I can see what is untrue in those old narratives. I stand on who He is, and that’s solid ground.
Likewise, knowing what is wrong and avoiding it doesn’t save us. It seems to be a popular trend right now to point out nothing but flaws. I’ve heard it said about this fierce Gen-Z that they know how to tear everything down, but they have no idea how to build. They can say, “That’s wrong, that’s wrong, that’s wrong. That’s canceled, that’s on blast,” but I honestly think they’re just more confused than anything. What is right to them are things we can all agree on - life matters, people matter, how you treat people matters, hard work counts for something, etc. But there’s a lot of ambiguity in there, too.
I had a conversation with some other kids the other day in which they told me they understood what disrespect was, but they hadn’t really been given a good idea of what respect actually is. So they’re constantly on the lookout for what’s wrong, not what they can do right. Isn’t that such a sad and scary way to live? It seems like a recipe for pinballing through life and relationships.
So when we have this trend cross over to the Church, we’ve got a lot of people saying, “That’s wrong. That’s wrong. That’s a sinner. That’s heresy. That’s blasphemy.” But telling the world it’s doing the wrong thing is not the same thing as offering the salvation of Jesus Christ.
Let me show you what I mean. Let’s take the lifelong seedy celebrity figure, for example. He’s cheated on his wife and ended up divorced, been caught with prostitutes in a massage parlor, gotten caught up in illegal gambling rings, and arrested for driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol. One day, he decides he wants to run for office and hires a publicist, who advises him that his lifestyle isn't really good for his public image. So he cleans himself up. He vows never to revisit his past ways again. He marries a new wife and is faithful to her, stops drinking, carousing, doing drugs, gambling, and otherwise engaging in debauchery. He has all new friends who are upstanding figures. He gives to charity, serves the poor, and even begins a new foundation to help troubled youths out of poverty through education.
But he’s not saved. Because knowing what was wrong and doing the opposite of that in the world is not what brings salvation. Otherwise, the Pharisees would have been onto something with all of their added rituals and traditions. The man may have become a good man by worldly standards, but he’s not a saved man by Heavenly standards, because God is the standard by which we all fall short (Romans 3:23), not the world’s, and it is only by the Blood of Christ that we are saved from death and freed from condemnation (Romans 8:1).
I remember one night I was out training with my ski team. A lot of the guys on the team had become very arrogant and believed they didn’t need to train as hard anymore, because they were better than some of us not-so-talented racers. In response, one of our coaches flew his son home from Colorado, where he was training on the bottom rung of the U.S. Ski Team. The coach had us meeting him at the base of our race hill, and his son approached the start gate, which at that time was just a couple of poles stuck 16 inches apart in the middle of the hill.
To even see him in the start was to look at an entirely different species of skier. Everything about his demeanor, stature, and physique screamed that he was a higher-caliber athlete. And then he took off. He crushed our course, flying through it at a speed none of us would ever achieve, breaking a couple of gates from the sheer power of his turns, and then nodded to us as he sped to the chairlift to take another lap.
We stared dumb-founded. We all knew who he was and what had happened. “You have been humbled,” our coach said, quite unnecessarily. We had beheld something far greater than ourselves, and we were able to see ourselves - including our shortcomings - far clearer as a result.
A mediocre racer patting himself on the back for being faster than a beginner is similar to the habit we have of declaring ourselves more righteous than other sinners. None of us is good on our own. None of us is holy on our own.
When it comes to our lives, the only true measure of what is right is the holiness of God, and we have all fallen short of His glory. The gloriousness of Jesus is that He came to become sin so that He could take on the punishment we could not withstand, but which we deserved, so that He could free us from sin, curse, and death and have eternal life with Him. As we gaze at His glory from this side of salvation, we live in a sort of beautiful tension. On the one hand, we see that we continue to fall short of it. And on the other hand, that shortfall allows us to see how merciful and wonderful He is, and what a miraculous and most perfect love He has for us that He would make such a sacrifice to save us.
To look at Jesus is to see ourselves purely and honestly. It is to have all our sin, shame, and pride exposed by the holiest light. It is to know we are unclean and pathetic, and that all of our talents, money, and achievements are pitiful fodder for this world, unless He comes to transform them for His Kingdom.
The last Christmas tradition I’ll share with you is one I very much miss from my childhood. On Christmas Eve, we would come home from the church service and prepare for the morning. Dad would build a fire, while us kids would set out cookies and a vodka martini on the rocks for Santa - he had left us a very detailed note about his preferences one year - and we would make sure we had a game plan for getting up several hours before our parents would let us even think about coming downstairs. And once we had our preparations complete, we would all settle in the living room by the now-blazing fire around my dad, who would read The Littlest Angel by Charles Tazewell.
The book recounts the story of a very miserable and bored child-angel, who often found himself in a lot of trouble in Heaven, where was quite the misfit among the many glorious adult angels who always seemed to do everything right. Eventually, it is noted that he is very sad and miserable, and he is shown compassion by the heavenly order and granted a request to help him cheer up. He requests a box from under his bed at home, which makes him the happiest angel in heaven. At the climax of the book, Heaven is preparing for the birth of the Christ Child on earth, and the angels are to bring gifts to the Newborn King. The littlest angel is delighted to bring his greatest earthly treasure - that box - to the Lord’s feet, but as he approaches the throne and beholds all of the beautiful gifts from the other angels, he becomes ashamed and embarrassed by his gift. But before he can find it, God selects and opens it to find that it contained a butterfly he had caught, a sky-blue egg he had found, a couple of stones from a stream where he had played with his earthly friends, and a chewed up old collar from his loyal dog. The little boy’s most precious treasures - his only request that would make him happy - which he sacrificed to make the Christ Child happy. Rather than get himself into greater trouble, as he expects, the Lord takes his gift and glorifies it, turning it into the Star of Bethlehem.
Knowing what is wrong is important, and rituals are even important. But they will never be as important as cutting through all the noise of the age and beholding what is eternally right. The story of this littlest angel demonstrates the posture of a humble heart before the Holy One, and God’s response to us in our humility. Mary, mother of Jesus, told us:
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation (Luke 1:47-50).
And of course, her Son taught us, “The last will be first, and the first last” (Matthew 20:16) and told the Pharisees, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you” (Matthew 21:31).
I’m going to leave us with the lyrics and link to one of my favorite songs, “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus”, which I think so perfectly tells us where to fix our gaze when we’re too inundated with stimuli to see straight It goes:
1 - O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s light for a look at the Savior,
And life more abundant and free.
Chorus - Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.
2 - Through death into life everlasting
He passed, and we follow Him there;
O’er us sin no more hath dominion
For more than conqu’rors we are!
3 - His Word shall not fail you, He promised;
Believe Him and all will be well;
Then go to a world that is dying,
His perfect salvation to tell!
Friends, what things have stolen your gaze and confused you this season? This year? This life? Is it a man-made list of “shoulds”? Is it all the things that everyone is doing wrong in the world? Is it the weight of your own sin? Is it the stress of a world of striving?
I pray, sincerely, that you can find some time to get away from the noise and busyness of the season, the rituals and traditions that can become a little noxious, and the nonsense of our times to simply sit in a quiet place with Jesus. I hope you’re able to contemplate, consider, and behold the mystery that He made Himself like us, lived the life we could not, paid the penalty we could not, and died to save us. And for what? So that we could be with Him forever. And I pray that as the things of this world grow dim that you are filled to the brim with childlike wonder and peace.
The angels declared, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests” (Luke 2:14), and friends, His favor rests on those who declare that He is the Lord and has come to save us.
The very merriest Christmas to all of you and your loved ones!
Until next time, may all that God created testify to His power and divine nature, that you may be encouraged by His love all around you.