http://www.edow.org/spirituality/readings.html#1201
"December 4
Perhaps best understood through the metaphor of pregnancy, Advent offers us a word of hope, the possibility of birthing new life, a rekindled vision to which we might give our lives. It is not so much a penitential season focused on our unfaithfulness as it is a season of paradoxes: longing anticipation and patient watching; transforming the way we envision life and yet living prepared; waiting for what never seems to come and continuing in hopeful trust; desiring to give up control and opening ourselves to few possibilities for life. All of these are responses to God's unmerited and gracious love for us, God's implanting of life in us at the very moment in our lives when we have grown weary, and have lost hope.
Perhaps if we really took seriously these stories of Advent, life in the church would be somewhat different from what most of us know it to be. For many of us, Advent is preparation for a secular Christmas through frantic, exhausting escapist behavior. We eat too much, party too much, stay up too late. And when Christmas comes, we fall apart. We frantically decorate and clean our homes. We buy presents. By the end of Advent some have experienced what they call “Christmas joy,” but it is short-lived and lacking in depth. It is a season when the lonely tend to experience greater loneliness, the broken have their wounds opened again, the weary end up more tired, and everyone is poorer. Few experience a second coming, a rebirth of new life, and the presence of that peace, hope, healing, love, joy promised to those who need them most. If the church is to be a gift to those whose lives cry out for good news, it will need to rethink how it integrates the stories of people with its story during the Advent season. This in turn will mean reflecting more deeply on the stories of Advent and more honestly on the stories of our lives.
From “Recapturing Lost Visions: Advent” in A Pilgrim People: Learning Through the Church Year by John H. Westerhoff III. A Seabury Classic from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2005. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York , NY . www.churchpublishing.org"
4 comments:
Excellent post for me to reflect on. Thank you.
--Alicia
How wonderful it is to come together under the name and power of our sovereign God through the blood of Yeshua. During this time of season I want to challenge you to consider the forgiveness of sins. There are undoubtedly many messages during this time of year focusing on the birth and message of Jesus. Yes Jesus was born in a manager and had a human family it's the Bible message that should be taught in every church this time of year. Rather than go into a message you may have heard today I want to challenge you to forgive those who have hurt you. Today we are going to talk about the forgiveness of sins. What is the forgiveness of sins? Who alone can offer forgiveness? These questions of course are important for our consideration, but even up and above that what is important is Jesus Christ, and His message to us, Hallejiuah to the Lamb of God!
1st Peter 2: 24He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. 25For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls
The Book of 1st Peter was written to teach believers how to live victoriously in the midst of the hostility of persecution without losing hope, without becoming bitter, while trusting in their Lord, and while looking for His second coming. Peter wished to impress on his readers that by living an obedient victorious life under duress, a Christian can actually evangelize his hostile world. With this in mind then we turn into the book of 1st Peter chapter 2 verses 24 and 25. He Himself bore ours sins in his body on the tree points to the fact that Christ suffered not simply as the Christians' pattern but far more importantly as the Christian's substitute. To bear sins was to be punished for them (Numbers 14:33; Ezek 18:20). Christ bore the punishment and the penalty for believers, thus satisfying a holy God (3:18 Gal 3:13). This great doctrine of the substitionary atonement is the heat of the gospel. Actual atonement, sufficient for the sins of the whole world was made for all who would ever believe, namely the elect (Lev 16:17; 23:27-30: John 3:16; 2 Cor 5:1; 1 Tim 2:6; 2 Tim 4:10; Titus 2:11; Heb 2:; 1 John 2:2; 4:9-10). We have died to sins points out that this is true by the miracle of being in Christ. We died to sin in the sense that we paid its penalty, death by being in Christ when he died as our substitute (See Romans 6:1-11). Lived for righteousness points out that Not only have we been declared just the penalty for our sins paid by His death but have risen to walk in new life, empowered by the Holy Spirit (See Romans 6:12-22) By whose stripes you were healed (see Isaiah 53:5). Through the wounds of Christ at the Cross, believers are healed spiritually from the deadly disease of sin. Returned means to turn toward and and refers to the repentant faith a person has at salvation. Shepherd and Overseer: Christ is not only the Christian's standard (vv.21-23) and substitute (v.24) but He is also the Christian's shepherd (5:4; Is. 53:6; John 10:11). In the OT, the title of shepherd for the Lord was often messianic (Ezek 34:23-24; 37:24; John 10:1-18. Beyond that, "Shepherd and Overseer" were the most appropriate descriptions of Christ for Peter to use in order to comfort Christians who were being persecuted and slandered (v.12). These two terms are also used for human spiritual leaders.
Who is Fernando d impang, jr?
He commented on my "The Advent Season" when I think he meant to leave a blog on his own spot.
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