Two things stood out to me as I read Luke 2.
First . . . “And this is how you will recognize him . . . “
The angels who appeared to the shepherds had to describe how to recognize Jesus when the shepherds went to find him, indicating that Jesus looked like an ordinary baby. There was no halo of light around his head to indicate that He was God’s Son (or around Mary's head). Jesus was the extraordinary in ordinary form . . . human flesh.
If Jesus is our Lord and Savior and the Holy Spirit lives in us, we are the extraordinary in ordinary form, called flesh. Contrary to what you may think, there is no halo of light around my head or glow about me . . . well, my “personal summers” used to give me a glow . . . wrong glow! :-)
Seriously, if the angels were telling shepherds how to recognize us as a child of God, what would they say? How would they describe us? We’ll be recognized because we go to Lincoln City Church? No! How then? By our love for one another.
Second . . . It says when the angels found Mary and Joseph and baby Jesus, “The Shepherd told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child. All who heard the shepherd’s story were astonished. But Mary quietly treasured these things in her heart and thought about them often.” (Vs. 16-19)
We need to quietly treasure God’s Word in our hearts and think about His Word often, allowing the Word of God to filter from our mind to our heart, bringing change in our lives!
Mary was both a “hand servant” and a “heart servant” of the Lord. I want to be, too! But both come with a cost . . . giving my life, my will, my time to God without reservation.
“I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back.” (Philippians 3:12-14)
3 comments:
That is great! I always get a Holy Spirit nudge when i read about the shepherds' excitement, immediate action to find and worship Jesus and then to tell EVERYone! Youch to me!
What spoke to me today was from Joshua. Even amid the listings and descriptions of landmarks and cities that i sometimes sorta skim through, something jumped out and yanked on the parenting sleeve of my heart.
What struck me was the fact that in all the "border of the inheritance" of the tribes, the inheritance was:
-Marked very clearly
-Known by each forthcoming generation
-To be passed on to generations
I continued to be struck by the examples of Laziness & Complacency versus Heroic Advancement:
-Ephraim & Manasseh didn't drive out the Canaanites - even though they were very large, very powerful tribes with amazing weaponry (and God)
-The 7 tribes remaining without an inheritance by 18:2
-Machir, on the other hand, in 17:1, was a heroic man of war and therefore received an incredible inheritance
-The daughters of Manasseh pursued an inheritance even though they were women
All this spoke to me as a parent, passing on a spiritual inheritance and a physical inheritance to my children.
Spiritually, do they know the boundaries of our inheritance? Many of the boundaries and places of remembrance in the OT were places where God had done something great. He's done great things in our family -- do my kids know it?
Am i in the Camp of Laziness'n'Complacency or the Camp of Heroic Advancement? Am I actively protecting the inheritance and making it richer?
Please, Lord, help me to guard the inheritance, build it up and pass it on.
Love your post, Heather. In the OT, they verbally passed on to the next generation all that God did in their lives. It's so important to do that today, too. It probably would even be good if we kept a journal of all that God has done in our lives, which could be passed from generation to generation.
"I want to leave a legacy, how will they remember me . . . "
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