Category: Advent
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How Long Must We Wait?
Sometimes life can feel very much like this picture. We carry a burden, and slowly the long years take their toll on us, until the weight seems normal. This is how we were meant to live. And it is. For a time. One day the burden will be lifted. One day we will walk free…
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The Prophecies of Angels and Aunts
As we begin December and the Advent season, I think about Mary and the amazing revelation she received. Perhaps I’ll look back on this post with regret, but I really don’t believe Mary came away from her conversation with Gabriel substantially changed. She was given new information, to be sure. Gabriel called her favored, but…
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The Wisdom of the Magi
I don’t claim to be a scholar on ancient history, but here are some thoughts I had surrounding the Magi and their visit to Jesus as described in Matthew: Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where…
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Squalid Majesty
When you really start digging, a lot of Christmas tradition falls apart. We celebrate the birth of Christ on December 25th, but historically this is almost certainly not the day He was born. Because the early church didn’t celebrate the birth of Jesus, the actual date has been lost to history. An existing celebration, the…
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Holy Seasons
I finished up reading The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer, and he ended on a thought about the relationship between the secular and the sacred. His point, and I believe it to be valid, is that the distinction is purely artificial. There is no such divide. One such distinction that he calls into question is…
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Beautiful Darkness
I’m not a patient man. Waiting is painful for me. Growing up Gen X has probably compounded any naturally occurring unwillingness to simply be in the moment. But that sense of dissatisfaction is increased exponentially in the darkness. There is so much darkness in the world. Really, when you think about it, the Universe is…
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So Near, Yet So Far
How long, O Lord? Will You forget me forever? How long will You hide Your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, Having sorrow in my heart all the day? How long will my enemy be exalted over me? Psalm 13:1-2 (NASB) I wonder sometimes why it seems that the…
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Wonder-full
I often lose my sense of wonder. As adults, sometimes we have a hard time capturing the emotion that dominated our childhoods. I can remember my daughter’s sense of wonder when she was four. Everything was amazing. The world was full of new things that captured her imagination and produced physical responses, from gasping in…
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Love
Could we with ink the ocean fill, And were the skies of parchment made, Were every stalk on earth a quill, And every man a scribe by trade; To write the love of God above Would drain the ocean dry; Nor could the scroll contain the whole, Though stretched from sky to sky. This verse,…
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Joy
In the same region there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them; and they were terribly frightened. But the angel said to them, “Do not be…