Bear with me. I know that title was bizarre, but as I lay quietly in bed last night meditating on God’s goodness, I had this amazing visual illustration. It went something like this.
Imagine you’re sitting down for a quiet lunch. It’s just you. You’re sitting at a large, round, oak dining room table. In front of you sits a tall glass of skim milk and a small white plate holding a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on wheat bread and a half dozen of those little, bite-sized raw carrots.
Maybe you’ve heard the analogies about Jesus in your life like He’s in a house — like do you keep Him on the porch, or in a closet or maybe He’s allowed into the formal living room … Or do you invite him in to the kitchen where you really live?
Well, I’m kinda a foodie — No, I’m seriously a foodie and God spoke to me through this FOOD-related spiritual picture. Let’s see if any of you can track with me.
So, is God my nice, healthy, good-looking tall glass of clean, white skim milk? Kept at arm’s length, and good for washing down anything distasteful in my life?
Or is He my side of carrots? Good for me, full of vitamins and crunchy to the teeth? He’s made it on the plate, but not because I want Him there — more because He’s supposed to be there. You know, like a necessary but not desirable part of my life. I don’t hunger for Him, but I know that I need Him.
Or is He the crust on that PB&J sandwich? All around the outside. Visible to the onlooking world. But in my real, every day activities when no one’s watching, I peel Him off and cast Him off on the plate. Maybe when I’m really hungry and I’ve finished off everything else, I pick Him up as a last resort.
Or is He the peanut butter and jelly of my life? Sweet? Appetizing? Spread thick from edge to edge, filling every empty space and oozing out with every bite I take? Is He my “go-to” favorite? What I run to at every point of need, knowing that He will satisfy both my needs and my desires?
I pray that Jesus would fill my life with all that is good and beautiful to overflowing, that He would ooze out of me with joy and gratitude and that He would be my go-to-first response to whatever my day brings.
Every year this time of year people think about their New Year resolutions.
I’m not real sure about that myself because I seem to have a hard time following through on the promises I want to make, but I do start every year with some reflection on the past year and prayer for the coming year.
With that in mind, these are my prayers for this year.
Father, teach me to number my days. May I make the most of every moment.
Every moment with my rapidly growing children. Every moment with my husband. Every moment out in the world where my life is on display. Every moment You give me to proclaim Your truths in word and in deed.
Father, please guide me in how to spend my free time. Show me by Your wisdom and grace in how to spend those extra little moments and minutes and hours when nothing is pressing for my attention.
Father, I pray that I would remember that I have been chosen, been made a royal priest, been made holy, made your very own possession, that I would PROCLAIM the excellencies of Him (that’s YOU) who called me out of darkness into His marvelous light. Once I was not part of God’s family, God’s people, Your people, but now I am. Once I had not received mercy but now I have received mercy. Now, as a sojourner and exile, I pray that I would abstain from the passions of the flesh which wage war against my soul. I pray that I would keep my conduct among the world honorable so that when they seek to speak evil against me, they would see my GOOD deeds and glorify GOD. (1 Peter 2:9-12)
May I live my life as Yours. Your servant. Your slave. Your chosen, adopted child. Your daughter.
May I remember that my life is not my own, that I have been BOUGHT with a price. The blood of Jesus has ransomed me from my slavery to sin. I have become Your bond servant. I have sold myself willingly into Your service.
But, no, it’s more than that. I am MORE than a mere bond servant. I have been made a daughter of the King of kings, Lord of lords, ruler supreme of the universe.
Father, please give me the strength, passion and wisdom to live boldly in the grace and power which that gives me. May I be about my Your business, my Father’s business, today and every day.
Not by my might, nor by my power, but by Your Spirit,
I don’t know if our earthly birthdays are still celebrated in Heaven, but if they are,
Happy Birthday, Brady.
My first of many nephews.
You are still loved, missed and remembered.
When we wake up in the morning, we may not know what grief that day might hold.
And for that, I am thankful.
Yet, in the same way, we don’t know what JOY awaits us either.
May we choose joy. May we choose hope. May we choose faith and love and life. May we live every day giving thanks, trusting that God is good. May we wake up each morning and live each moment with grateful hearts to God from whom all BLESSINGS flow.
Brady’s life was a blessing.
We thank the Lord for each day he had. 486 days of life after birth.
We give thanks for his big smile, his contagious laugh, his sparkling blue eyes.
And we give thanks for the blessed hope that we will see him again one day in the glory of Heaven that awaits us.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 (ESV)
13 But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. 14 For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. 15 For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.
(a) of natural relationship, e.g., Mat 19:29; (“and everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life”), of the “sisters” of Christ, the children of Joseph and Mary after the virgin birth of Christ, e.g., Mat 13:56;
(b) of “spiritual kinship” with Christ, an affinity marked by the fulfillment of the will of the Father, Matthew 12:50 (Jesus says: “For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother”); Mark 3:35 (Jesus says, “For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother”); of spiritual relationship based upon faith in Christ, Romans 16:1 (“I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a servant of the church at Cenchreae”); 1Corinthians 7:15 (“But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace.); 1 Corinthians 9:5 (“Do we not have the right to take along a believing (adelphe) wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?”) …
Lord Jesus, thank You for the blessing of sisters. Thank You for my sisters in the body of Christ. Truly, they are sisters in blood – Your blood. They are sisters in my family – the family of Christ. Thank You for the kinship of believers. Thank You for the fellowship that is only made possible by the grace and forgiveness that is ours in Christ.
I praise Your name for the gift it is to have my dearest sister not only a part of my earthly family, but of my heavenly one as well. I praise You for the gift it is to have married into a family where I have sisters in the faith. I praise You for the gift of sisters both close by and across the nation, sisters who lift me up before Your throne of grace, sisters who see all my faults and imperfections and issues and love me anyway.
Frozen statues in the cold, washed in moonlight blue and gold.
Mary’s babe in plastic cape, quiet wonder on her face.
Mary, you look so serene, far too pretty, much too clean.
We might think we know you well, but what stories would you tell?
Of all the dirt and dust and shame, every burning labor pain,
And as I turn to walk away, I hear you say…
I am real.
Don’t turn me into memory or myth.
Let me be real. Real.
And I’ll show you what it means to love like this.
To be real.
Shepherds bending to the ground, Bethlehem is safe and sound.
Joseph, you look brave and true, but do we know what it was like to be you?
How many sleepless nights awake found you desperate and afraid?
And as I turn to walk away, I hear you say…
I am real.
Don’t turn me into memory or myth.
Let me be real.
And I’ll show you what it means to love like this.
To love like you don’t even care about the hurry and the hussle,
Like you are unaware December comes with so much trouble
Cause you believe a baby came not in paintings or in plains
But every minute, every hour, every day.
To be real,
Real
You are real, real
Show us what it means to love like this.
To be real To be real
More than a memory,
More than a story.
Someone on an online forum I belong to recently asked this question: “How do we keep Jesus Christ and His birth at the center of our Christmas celebration?” This really got me thinking and I pray that my response will bless you, too.
Growing up our family never went to church apart from going with my grandparents. I wasn’t raised to pray or read the Bible and yet, my family celebrated Christmas. We put up stockings and a Christmas tree and exchanged gifts and my parents played Santa just like everyone else.
By the time I was a teenager, I was an outspoken atheist that found pleasure in ridiculing and arguing with Christians. So when I was in college, I questioned my parents about our Christmas festivities, asking them why we celebrated Christmas if we weren’t Christians. I still wanted to exchange gifts (come on, who wouldn’t?), but I wished we would do it for New Years so that it wasn’t a religious event. I don’t actually remember how this played out, but the point is that I knew that whatever we were doing wasn’t right.
Sadly, despite being a hard-hearted atheist, I really had no idea what Christianity was all about. I did not understand that Christians believed that Jesus Christ was God in the flesh and that Christmas was celebrated to remember the day He was born on earth to live as a man. I also did not realize that Easter was the celebration of His resurrection from the dead after He had shed His blood on the cross to pay the penalty for man’s sin.
It was not until many heated debates with a Christian young man (who later became my husband) that I heard the good news of the gospel – that I could be forgiven and set free from my slavery to sin by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His sacrifice on my behalf.
So, with that background, let me encourage everyone how IMPORTANT it is to keep CHRIST at the focus of your Christmas celebrations. That is certainly a good question to ask, but, at the same time, I fear that the question that’s being asked is actually the wrong question. I think the real question, the better question, is this: HOW DO WE KEEP CHRIST AT THE CENTER OF OUR EVERY SINGLE DAY OF THE YEAR LIFE? This is really the heart of the matter because I think that as we keep our heart focused on Him, when we live and move and have our being in Him, then He will be guiding us away from the crazy busy commercialization of this holiday that has actually become more of a deterrent to our devotion to Jesus than an asset.
In response to the question – “How do we keep Christ at the center of Christmas,” the answer is to walk by faith and not by sight, to set our minds on things that are above where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father. Every advent activity needs to be evaluated by whether it is drawing your family closer to Jesus or pushing you farther away.
Yes, we festively decorate our home and Christmas tree. Yes, we buy gifts for our children and other members of our family. Yes, we drive around town and look at the pretty Christmas lights.
But, no, we don’t spend days and weeks putting up and taking down decorations. We refuse to go into debt feeding our kids’ appetites for stuff and our own appetite to impress others with our earthly possessions. And, no, we do not attend a dozen holiday plays, cookie exchanges and Santa Claus festivals because truthfully they take our family’s eyes off the true GIFT of Jesus and just add busy-ness to our already full lives.
But, once again, these are not decisions that are made just for the Christmas advent season, these are decisions that we have to make each and every day. Every day we have to choose for ourselves who we will serve and as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. This means walking daily deciding what God wants us to do that particular day and that particular week, rather than just saying, “Yes” to every fun opportunity that comes our way.
Truthfully, in my almost 20 years now of being a follower of Jesus Christ, I have learned that the Christian life is so much more than a list of do’s and don’ts, shoulds and shouldn’ts. It really is a living relationship with the great Creator, the Ruler of the Universe and the Lord of my soul. If the Lord is calling you to spend a month putting on a Christmas play for your neighbors, if the Lord is calling you to organize the cookie exchange to end all cookie exchanges, if the Lord is calling you to decorate your home in a thousand lights, then DO IT! But, don’t do it to “keep up with the Joneses.” Don’t do it because “everybody’s doing it.”
Truly, when you seek the Lord with all your heart, you will find Him. Trust Him. His Word is a light to Your feet. Jesus is our Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
As for our family, here are some things we do that help us not lose Jesus in the midst of our Christmas celebration –
We limit ourselves to three gifts per child. This limits not only the money, but also the time and energy, we spend on Christmas gifts.
Each of our four children choose a gift for each of their siblings and parents. They use their own money that they have earned doing chores throughout the year to buy them. This helps them focus on the giving, rather than just the receiving, of gifts.
My husband and I and our children give our gifts to the recipients, rather than taking our gifts. This, too, helps to keep the focus on giving rather than receiving.
My husband and I try to have most of our gifts bought before December 1, so my mind is not being consumed by shopping. The stress of finding “just the right gifts” was frequently enough to make me anxious and angry, not good for the Christmas spirit.
I have to commit myself to going to bed on time every night. If it’s not done by 10:30, then it doesn’t need to be done. Tomorrow is another day. A tired mommy is a cranky mommy.
We enjoy sending Christmas letters – now via email – but try to keep the focus on the goodness of God and His sustaining grace.
We spread out opening gifts over several days or even weeks. With two sets of out-of-town grandparents, plus aunts and uncles, plus our own family’s gifts, we wanted everyone’s gifts to receive the attention they deserved. This means our kids might receive their gifts from us a week before Christmas, so that they can enjoy them and still appreciate the gifts from their grandparents they’ll receive on Christmas Eve. Does this make sense?
We taught our kids from a young age that playing pretend is fun, but it’s just pretend. God is real. Santa is pretend. We used to “play Santa” and do stockings and leave Santa cookies, but our kids knew the truth. I know this is a big can of worms I’m opening here, but I believe God wants us to be truth bearers and I wanted my kids to know that Mommy always speaks the truth. I want them to trust me, to know that I will not deceive them. That does not mean that we can’t play pretend – but they know we are pretending. Does this make sense?
Christmas morning we have family breakfast and worship before any gifts are opened.
And, yes, we do try to have daily prayer and scripture reading and discussion as a family. But, this is not just for the advent season. Why would we only read the Bible for the couple weeks before Christmas? Jesus is not just the King of Christmas, He is the King every day of the year!
I love you guys and I pray that this is an encouragement to you. I am in no way writing this to make you feel guilty about what you’re not doing. No! I am writing this because I’ve had to make it up as I go along for the last twenty years and I am grateful that the Lord has impressed this on me.
“Again and again we will see places where we must yield up our rights,
as Jesus yielded up His for us. We shall have to see that the thing in
us that reacts so sharply to another’s selfishness and pride is simply
our own selfishness and pride, which we are unwilling to sacrifice. We
shall have to accept another’s ways and doings as God’s will for us
and meekly bend the neck to all God’s providences. That does not mean
that we must accept another’s selfishness as God’s will for him — far
from it — but only as God’s will for us.”
The Calvary Road
By Roy Hession
copyright 1990
page 74
“Do not let your adorning be external – the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear – but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious. For this is how the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves, by submitting to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening.” 1 Peter 3:3-6
Today let’s dig into those two words – gentle and quiet (ESV). (KJV translates them as meek and quiet.)
That first word translated gentle or meek comes from the Greeks word “prays,” meaning mildness of disposition, gentleness of spirit, meekness. On the Blue Letter Bible website’s Outline of Biblical Usage, it is described thus:
Meekness toward God is that disposition of spirit in which we accept His dealings with us as good, and therefore without disputing or resisting. In the OT, the meek are those wholly relying on God rather than their own strength to defend against injustice. Thus, meekness toward evil people means knowing God is permitting the injuries they inflict, that He is using them to purify His elect, and that He will deliver His elect in His time (Isa 41:17, Luk 18:1-8). Gentleness or meekness is the opposite to self-assertiveness and self-interest. It stems from trust in God’s goodness and control over the situation. The gentle person is not occupied with self at all. This is a work of the Holy Spirit, not of the human will (Gal 5:23).
When I read this, it leaped off the page because of its context. Read it again with me. I am being subject to my own husband even when he is not obeying God’s word because my spirit is meek before God. I am humble before God. I trust GOD more than my own sense of what “seems right” to me.
This same word – Strong’s Number G4239 appears 3 other times in the New Testament, twice referring to Jesus Christ, our gentle and humble king.
“”Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” – Matthew 5:5 ESV
“Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” – Matthew 11:29 ESV
“”Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.'”” – Matthew 21:5 ESV
That second word, translated quiet, is “hesychios” which in the Greek means quiet, tranquil or peaceable.
The only other time it is used in the New Testament is in 1 Timothy 2:2 where Paul is urging that prayers be made “for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.”
For any of you that know me, being “quiet” is not high on my list of character traits. I talk rather loudly and I talk rather a lot. But, that doesn’t mean that my spirit cannot be gentle and quiet.
On occasion I’ve worried that I must speak in whispers or sit in silence in order to have the quiet spirit to which 1 Peter 3:4 is referring. With further study, though, I am convinced that this gentle, meek, quiet, peaceable spirit is not so much based on volume or even quantity, as it is on the quality and nature of my speech and the hidden person of my heart.
Am I anxious? Am I quarrelsome? Am I irritable?
-or-
Am I joyful? Am I humble? Am I meek?
So, then, how exactly am I to adorn myself with this imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious?
Specifically, I display my gentle, quiet spirit by submitting (hypotasso = “appointed under” – see previous entry) myself to my own husband, even as Sarah obeyed (hypakouo = “hear under,” to listen, to harken to a command) Abraham, calling him lord.
Imagine my dismay when I discovered that this Greek word hypakouo is the very same word for obey found in Ephesians 6:1 and Colossians 3:20, “Children, obey your parents…” This is also the same Greek word describing that the winds and the sea (Matthew 8:27) and even unclean spirits (Mark 1:27) obey Jesus.
We are being called to harken to our husband, to hear and obey him. Yes, my children do have the freedom to discuss things with me and yes, I am called to be a good helpmate to my husband, but ultimately, I am being asked to submit myself under his authority over me and to obey his spoken word. Is this easy? No. Will things sometimes not go as I would like? Yes. Is God sovereign? Indeed. Yes.
Lord, help me. In my weakness, may Your strength be magnified and made manifest. May Your kingdom come and Your will be done here on earth as it is in Heaven. May You be glorified in my home, in my household, in my family as we submit ourselves to You and to one another and to those in authority over us.
In my November 15 blog entry regarding Ephesians 5:24 “Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.” I’d said I’d share more on my study of 1 Peter 3. I apologize that it has taken me this long to type it out. Please pray for me, I’m planning to have surgery on my right elbow on December 19 which will hopefully help with all the pain and difficulty I’ve been having with writing and typing.
So, when I was reading Ephesians 5:24 and saw that word “submits,” I wondered if it was the same (in the Greek) in 1 Peter 3. Sure enough. It was.
1 Peter 3:1 (ESV) – “Likewise, wives, be subject (hypotasso) to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey (apeitheo) the word, they may be won (kerdaino) without a word by the conduct of their wives.”
Apeitheo – not to allow one’s self to be persuaded, to refuse or withhold belief, to refuse belief and obedience, not to comply with.
Kerdaino – to gain, acquire. To gain one to faith in Christ.
Listen, these wives are being told to submit to their own husbands – even (or especially) the ones who do not believe, comply with, obey God’s Word.
Let me tell it like it is. You know, for me, when my husband is being a godly, humble, patient, loving, servant leader, it is a joy for me to submit to him … but what about the times when he isn’t. The times when he’s being selfish? Childish? Careless?
Yep. Even then. I am told to submit to him even in those times. In fact, those are the times when I need to be praying fervently for strength and wisdom. Those are the times when I must walk by the spirit and not by the lusts of my flesh. Those are the times when I need to display as the following verse references my “respectful and pure conduct.”
One more thing – in the King James Version, 1 Peter 3:1 is translated like this:
“Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation (this word means conduct, not speech) of the wives.”
Did you catch it? In the KJV both times the Greek word is translated to phrase is “the word” while in the ESV it is “the word” the first time and “a word” the second time. As I understand it, there is no indefinite article (“a”) in Greek. In the original Greek, both of these are simply written as “logos” so we cannot be certain whether it is “a word” or “the word.” And, do you know what? They BOTH make sense. Our husbands might be won without THE word, but they may also be won without A word from our mouths. But it both ways, it is our respectful & pure (chaste) conduct which wins them.
This brings us to 1 Peter 3:2 “when they see your respectful and pure conduct.“
This verse was unremarkable until I looked it up in the Greek. Any guess what the Greek word translated “respectful” is? PHOBOS. Yes. Phobos – fear, dread, terror … revererence. Look back at my previous entry on Ephesians 5 on this word “phobos.” Wow – another agreement between these two passages of 1 Peter 3 and Ephesians 5.
And how about that word “pure?” This is “hagnos” in Greek, meaning “exciting reverence, venerable, sacred, pure, chaste, immaculate, clean.”
When I read this it reminds me of my teenage years, before I had come to know Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. I would look around and see my friends leading sin-filled lives and yet calling themselves Christians and I was confused. Their conduct was certainly not winning me to the Lord, in fact it led me to “blaspheme the word of God” (Titus 2:5).
My life as a wife and a follower of Jesus Christ must be characterized by purity and respect, by reverence and chastity, that I would draw my husband – whether a follower of Christ or not – into a closer walk with Jesus. When I find myself getting caught up in petty, selfish quarrels, I need to ask myself, “Is this really that important? Is this really a battle God wants ME to fight? Am I trying to be God to my husband?”
May we all remember Proverbs 3:5-7, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and He will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and turn away from evil.”
If you have not yet read my last two posts on Ephesians 5, I would encourage you to read them before digging into this tough verse.
Ephesians 5:33 “However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.”
My dear husband with our four kiddos on his 39th birthday
When you see the word “phobeo” what do you think of? Phobia? Me, too. What does that mean to you? Fear? Me, too.
In my trusty Blue Letter Bible app, it defines PHOBEO (G5399) as:
* to put to flight by terrifying (to scare away)
* to put to flight, to flee
* to fear, be afraid
* to be struck with fear, to be seized with alarm
* of those startled by strange sights or occurrences
* of those struck with amazement
* to fear, be afraid of one
* to fear (i.e. hesitate) to do something (for fear of harm)
* to reverence, venerate, to treat with deference or reverential obedience
The KJV translates Strongs G5399 in the following manner: fear (62x), be afraid (23x), be afraid of (5x), reverence (1x), misc (2x).
Phobeo occurs 97 times in 91 verses in the Greek concordance of the NASB.
In looking through the concordance for this Greek word, many of the times this word is used is when Jesus says “FEAR NOT” or “DO NOT BE AFRAID.” It is also used three times in Revelation – Rev. 14:7, 15:4 and 19:5 – encouraging man to fear God and give Him glory.
But in THIS verse? “Phobeo?”
“However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.”
We are told to RESPECT our husband, to PHOBEO, to FEAR?? our husband. WHAT????
I can get fearing God, reverencing Him as HOLY, being struck with amazement at the GLORY of the Lord. But, my husband???? How can this be?
The Lord brought 1 Peter 3 to mind, to see if that same word was used there …. and YES, it is.
But, that’ll have to wait until another time. My household and familial responsibilities call.
Maybe you could read 1 Peter 3 for yourself while you’re waiting. Try out Blue Letter Bible for yourself.
Heavenly Father, please speak to us. Open our eyes to Your truth. Teach us Your ways. Show us how to reverence and honor and fear our own husbands in a way which brings You honor and glory. You alone are worthy. Amen.
Teach What is Good 
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