Christmas carols | Stray Thoughts

I don’t want to “laud” my own link. But I did want to share a post I’ve shared many times before. My mom passed away 17 years ago today. It seems like every holiday season, someone else I know has lost a loved one that year. So I have shared Christmas Grief, Christmas Hope, Christmas Joy at intervals as an encouragement to those whose loved ones have passed on and who especially miss them this time of year.

I’m once again behind on some blog reading during this busy time, but here are a few posts I enjoyed this week:

What Does It Mean to Enter Into Temptation? HT to Challies. “Jesus doesn’t say, ‘Watch and pray, so you won’t be tempted.’ There is no way you can get into a place in the Christian life where you are no longer tempted. He says, ‘Watch and pray, so that you will not fall into temptation.’ Literally it says, ‘so that you will not enter into temptation.'”

Do You Hear the Bells of Christmas? HT to The Story Warren. “Henry Longfellow was one of the most widely known American poets in the 19th century. What’s not as well-known is a poem he wrote called, I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day which was eventually put to music and has since become a cherished Christmas hymn. What’s beautiful about this Christmas melody is the incredible story that led him to put his pen to paper on Christmas morning, 1863”

Grammar Crash Course: Clauses. “Distinguishing dependent clauses from independent clauses may seem like an obscure and academic thing to do. Not the most thrilling way to occupy one’s morning. But this is perhaps the most important grammatical skill to master for your Bible study.”

Three Biblical Ways to Pray for Your Adult Children. “Prayers for strong marriages, safety on the job, or wisdom in college selection are all good requests from the heart of a Christian mum, but Paul’s three-verse, single-sentence outpouring to God challenges me to lift my sights to motivation and to pray about the drive behind my adult children’s following lives — and to take a careful look at my own.”

African Christianity Thrived Long Before White Men Arrived, HT to Challies. “Crudely put, Christianity is the white man’s religion and has no place amongst true Africans. In an era where forming an African identity aside from Colonialism is high on people’s agenda, it’s a compelling argument to some. Except that it’s not true. For Christianity was present in Africa 1000 years before the first European Colonialists arrived on African shores.”

Christmas lights are my favorite holiday decorations. Just when the landscape becomes bare and dreary and the nights are longest, cheery lights go up inside and outside. I miss them when we take them down at the end of the month.

I don’t know if I did a good job teaching my children the symbolism behind many of our Christmas customs. But the symbolism behind Christmas lights is a favorite.

God began creation by saying “Let there be light”. But He soon saw His world engulfed in darkness when sin came in. Nevertheless, He promised light would shine again.

“I am the LORD; I have called you in righteousness; I will take you by the hand and keep you; I will give you as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness (Isaiah 42:6-7).

“But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall” (Malachi 4:2).

The Isaiah passage that foretells of the child born, the son given who will take David’s throne, rule in righteousness, whose “name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” begins with “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” (Isaiah 9:2).

Scripture points repeatedly to Jesus as the light.

Jesus said, “ “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12).

In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it (John 1:4-5).

When we believe on the Lord, His light shines through us:

At one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light (Ephesians 5:8-14a).

The NKJV renders that last phrase “But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light.”

This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin (1 John 1: 5-7).

Someday, for God’s children, “night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 22:5). How desperately we need to choose light now, because those who don’t will be “thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12).

For now, though we have the light, we live in a dark world.

Who among you fears the Lord and obeys the voice of his servant? Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God (Isaiah 50:10).

Keep looking to the light!