Romans 12:2  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

"Friendship with the world is enmity with God," James says (4:4). As disciples of Christ and citizens of the kingdom of heaven, we commit treason when we conform to the world and adopt its ungodly ways. Such sinning will not increase God's grace but invite his rebuke and discipline. We have died and risen to new life in Christ. We walk in the liberated light of the Spirit, not the chains of death's darkness.

Having made us alive in Jesus, the Spirit is constantly renewing our minds, that we might think, speak and live, even now, as spiritually resurrected people who await a physical resurrection. His mercy daily transforms us. His love regenerates us. Jesus is emptying us of ourselves to fill us with more and more of himself, that we might be constantly renewed into the image of the children of God.
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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Psalm 27:11 Teach me your way, O Lord, and lead me on a level path because of my enemies.

Long before Christianity was called Christianity, it was referred to as The Way. For instance, if Saul "found any belonging to The Way, men or women," he would arrest them (Acts 9:2). This name is deeply rooted in the Old Testament, where the "way of the Lord" is frequently mentioned. A "way" is literally a road or path. To go the way of the Lord is to walk with Him, be led by Him. Faith, in this sense, is never static but always moving forward, alongside God, to a destination.

The Advent way is the way in which we walk with Him who, by His own confession, is "the way, and the truth, and the life" (John 14:6). He is in us, to our left, to our right, above us, beneath us, behind us, before us, as the Breastplate of St. Patrick puts it. Christ is our way. He is our beginning, our journey and our destination.
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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Exodus 15:13  You have led in your steadfast love the people whom you have redeemed; you have guided them by your strength to your holy abode.

Israel sang these words after they crossed the Red Sea on dry ground. Their former Egyptians overlords had just been unwillingly buried at sea behind them. The vista of a new future lay open before them. They didn't know at the time what we do now, namely, that forty years of wandering would pass before the nation would cross into the Promised Land. Even so, during that time, the Lord would lead them in "steadfast love." This love, chesed in Hebrew, is his one-way love - faithful, giving, loyal, unwavering commitment to Israel.

That chesed, that love, took on flesh and blood as Jesus the Messiah. He guides us through our own Red Sea of baptism into new life. He leads us through the wilderness of this world. And he will guide us finally into the promised land of the resurrection. His advent among us is everlasting testimony to his love.
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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Luke 2:12 And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” 
 

Mangers are animal feeding troughs but in ancient Israel they were made of stone - not what you would see in a modern day nativity scene. Not comfortable, but great for protection. That's why those who were experts in this matter, the priests, would put their newborn lambs in them for protection. But not just any lamb, the unblemished perfect lambs that were used in the sacrifice for sins. And Bethlehem, where Jesus was born was famous for their unblemished lambs and used for the sacrifice. These lambs had to be perfect so they would wrap them tightly in cloth and lie them in the manger to keep them safe. This is exactly why the only time mangers are mentioned in Jesus' birth story it is being told to shepherds. The shepherds would have understood this powerful parallel! They knew what the cloth and the manger meant. This baby would be the perfect Lamb of God. The Messiah who would sacrifice His life for the sins of the whole world. He wasn't just a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger, He was God; perfect, sinless, and Holy, humbling Himself to become the perfect sacrifice to reconcile us back to Himself! That perfect Lamb is why we celebrate Christmas!

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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Romans 12:2  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Friendship with the world is enmity with God," James says (4:4). As disciples of Christ and citizens of the kingdom of heaven, we commit treason when we conform to the world and ape its ungodly ways.  Such sinning will not increase God's grace but invite his rebuke and discipline. We have died and risen to new life in Christ. We walk in the liberated light of the Spirit, not the chains of death's darkness.

Having made us alive in Jesus, the Spirit is constantly renewing our minds, that we might think, speak and live, even now, as spiritually resurrected people who await a physical resurrection. His mercy daily transforms us. His love regenerates us. Jesus is emptying us of ourselves to fill us with more and more of himself, that we might be constantly renewed into the image of the children of God.
--
 

Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Lamentations 5:20-21  Why do you forget us forever, why do you forsake us for so many days? Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored! Renew our days as of old.

While nostalgia for the "good old days" is frequently misguided, for Israel the "days of old" for which they yearned were usually the days of the Exodus. Those truly were good days when the Lord, in His mercy, rescued his people from slavery. In Lamentations, they cry out to God following the destruction of Jerusalem and exile to Babylon. Remember us! Restore us! Renew us!

We don't always need to be happy. There is room for lament in the believer's life. We cry out to God in tears, with shattered hearts. We beat on heaven's door. In his own time and way, our Father will answer. His immediate answer, however, will always be Christ with us, for us, in us. Bit by bit, Jesus will renew our darkened hopes with the light of his healing love.
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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,

Psalm 104:30  When you send forth your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground.

If we put the opening chapter of the Bible to music, it would sound like Psalm 104. In this song, the poet praises God for everything from winged angels to wild donkeys. He also reminds us of something we often forget: creation is not independent. Were God to cease speaking everything into ongoing existence, it would vanish into non-existence. Creation is wholly dependent upon the Creator. Rain falls because God sends it. The sun shines because God makes it. We breathe and walk and talk because the Word of God makes us so. Every tiny aspect of creation hinges on God's Spirit creating and renewing.

At Christmas, we celebrate God taking into himself. God with eyes and ears and tiny toes. You see, it wasn't enough for the Lord to be Creator; to save us, he needed to become a creature, too. So he did, gladly and graciously, to renew us as his own.
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Helping people live life with Jesus everyday,