Christmas songs, 2020

Put together a few ideas. Our music teacher put some of them to music. A new school carol was born...

We shepherds in the dark, alone,
until the glory of the Lord lit up our world.
Sweet babe, that helpless little lamb
lay in a manger, here from heaven hurled.

We have no words. We gaze in awe and wonder.
Glory glory glory is our song. We sing with angels!
Jesus king is born on earth this night
We shepherds were the first to see the sight.

Sweet babe, you helpless tiny lamb
For our mistakes and failures born this night.
We shepherds celebrate with angels high
And cannot keep but shout out our delight.

Sweet babe, we kings who travelled from afar
Bow down before your regal majesty.
I see the Saviour in your gentle eyes
And know you came to earth for me.

Chorus. Jesus Saviour, come for us
Light our hearts now in the dark. 

Where is the child? Where is the king
We’ve travelled far to worship Him.
Gold, myrrh and frankincense we bring
To honour him.

Where is the child? Where is the king? 
Whose star has made our hearts to sing?
Gold, myrrh and frankincense we bring
To honour him.

Where is the child? We heard the cry
Of angels lighting up the sky.
The shout of gladness brought us joy
We come to find the baby boy.

Come Lord Jesus into our hearts today.
Christmas is come. You are here. To stay.

Advent 2020

In the beginning.... John 1:1

He was there. At the start
of all creation. Making us out of His great love.

He was there.
The lover of us all.

Isaiah 9:1 - 3 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.

Even tonight, as moonlight

floods through the darkness, silvering through the night,

we see only dimly.

How wonderful

to know that His light

will come. 

It will come.

Luke 1:48

In quietness, a candle sings

an eternal melody.

A flickering flame

a gentle reminder

of humble beginnings.

Luke 1:54 - 55

The journey begins.

Reminders of God's faithfulness

throughout the ages.

No matter what twists and turns our lives may take, our lives are part of God's unfolding story as well. 

Advent: the Coming

The media is filled with frenzy.
Imperatives are the new emperor.
Buy this. Plan that. Go here. Do. Do. Do....

Christians, succumb. Or struggle bravely
against the prevailing culture
while still shopping.

Me? Me too. But I
also choose to plunge
deep into the Word.

Daily Bible readings
doubled with Advent studies
and attempts at prayer.

Culture calls.
Holding my course
I hold the things of Christmas lightly.

Only Christmas correspondence
hovers
on the edges of my soul.

This time of year,
this time of reconnection,
where friendship feeds my soul,

bringing joys and sorrows
as I read of change and loss
in dear lives.

Shadows of the Saviour
fully like us.
I dare to think, like me.

Here, on this little page,
this tiny unnoticed corner of a vast world,
I share my thoughts with Him.

Integrity

Joseph's story.
Oh, not our Egyptian hero, but our Nazarene one.
They whispered about him in the village.
Poor Joseph, trustworthy carpenter
having to father
another Man's Son.

Everyone knew
Mary had betrayed him with another.
Unexplainable.
Joseph was a good, steady, hard-working man.
Mary a good, loving, lovely girl.
Oh, he was a good man, he was.

Indeed.
He paid no heed to gossip, wishing only the best
for the girl he adored.
Preferring to protect her in his pain
he, a law-abiding, law-following-in-simple-obedience man
agonized over the Right Thing to Do.

Joseph
descendant of David,
clung to his forefather's psalms
of praise to their God.
Nothing else could matter
but that God, GOD, should be honoured in this mess.

Painfully
he resolved
to quietly separate himself
from his one love
in his disgrace.

Keeping honour
he thought of her first.
Seeking to do what was right and just
and to do it in the right way.
In love and mercy.

But God stepped in.
GOD STEPPED IN!
There was no mistaking the dream.
Joyfully, though he knew
the way would not be easy
Joseph accepted the message.

Joyfully
angst turned to scarcely unbelievable
Good News. He, a man of royal family
yet humble position
would father
the Saviour..

He could not understand it.
Jesus. Yeshua. Jehovah who saves.
Yes. the boy would bear the name
of Joshua, Israel's mighty captain
but saving his people from their sins?

Only God.
Only GOD can save
through men's humble sacrifices
to the Almighty, All-Powerful One.
Joseph knew the Scriptures.
Dared he believe this child would be The One?

He did.
Joseph, carpenter of Nazareth
woke up. He obeyed the Angel of the Lord
willingly he took Mary
to be his wife after all.
Before all that was to come.

And blessing came.
Their marriage
which he thought was lost forever
would be saved.
They would need to be strong
for what lay ahead.

Matthew 1:18 - 25

Advent. Fifth day.

Thoughts turning towards Christmas. Advent 'calendar' up at school - a puzzle of Nativity pieces to put together, one each day, with a 'good deed' to go along with it.

And a little go at a Christmas song...

In King David’s city a Baby was born

As prophets and sages had said (that) He would be

A King in a stable, in Bethlehem’s dawn

The Good News appearing for you and for me.

The shepherds were eager the glad tidings to share

As angels shone o’er them as bright as the day.

Wise men from the east made a journey with care

The signs in the stars shone to show them the way.

We too, now at Christmas, rejoice in His name

And share in the joy with all those who adore/in accord.

We remember the reason the little Babe came

He is our great Saviour, Christ Jesus our Lord.

And then we look up and we say “Thank you Jesus”

For all you have done and for what lies in store

Your presence is with us, you go on before us

We thank you and praise you for Christmas evermore.

We wait and we wonder with Mary and Joseph

A babe is a-coming, and what will he be?

Messiah, Redeemer, a King and a healer

The Saviour God sent to save both you and me.

A stable is home for the King of all Kings

Born into a family of lowly esteem

Rough men hear the report that the angels will bring

A message to bring them the news of their dreams.

So let us now wonder and go to that stable.

Join in with the shepherds, worship and adore.

Remember he’s with us to love and to guide us

Our saviour, King Jesus, now and evermore.

Joyy to the worldd!

Joy.

I have been pondering the word all this last week, and now The Day has come, not of course the actual day but the Day when we remember that Joy has come into the world.

Joy: a way to live:
Jesus.
Other.
You.

And I know it in my mind and I speak it with my lips but sometimes, often, I just don't feel that joy in my heart. I CHOOSE joy, but I don't necessarily feel contentment or happiness or gladness or...
"delight, great pleasure, joyfulness, jubilation, triumph, exultation,rejoicing, happiness, gladness, glee, exhilaration, ebullience,exuberance, elation, euphoria, bliss, ecstasy, transports of delight,
rapture, radiance..."

This comes only occasionally. But it comes when Joy breaks through into our poor hurting world, when prayers are answered, miracles happen and I see the touch of God.

So here I am, Christmas Day, feeling all kinds of emotions which are not just pure joy, but one thing I know and feel: I am thankful.

I am thankful to be here surrounded by my family: Cat, Jonny, my beautiful-inside-and-out daughter-in-law Adele and my solid, grounded, caring, soon-to-be-son-in-law Andy; my lovely borrowed daughter Mags, and her delightful partner Louis; and funny Faith, generous and caring.  

And I am thankful to be in beautiful New Zealand, the surf rolling gently onto the shore beneath our balcony, the sun bright and the air clear...

And I am thankful to God's great gifts, for the gift of life and love and the eternal promises of Jesus, indeed the greatest gift of all.

And in the thankfulness, a tiny seed of joy begins to bubble deep inside me....

Peace in unrest

Peace at Christmas
in a world of unrest
people leaving their homes
travelling far
looking for refuge.

Anxiety
in a world of unrest
Roman invaders ruling
with fear and terror
obedience essential.

Joseph, with Mary,
forces to travel far
in lawful obedience
to Bethlehem,
looking for refuge.

No room to stay
in any hostelry:
homeless, street-wandering,
asking, searching,
grateful for shelter.

In the noise
and bustle of a city
Mary trusts in her loving God
to keep them safe
in a world of unrest.

Peace comes to us
in anxious, trouble times,
as we travel through life
finding refuge
in His loving shelter.

Anna, who lived in the temple...

Anna. A prophetess who lived in the temple. Words of wisdom from Joy at Love God Greatly.

"These verses really get me. I am in awe of Anna. I want her to be my mentor, but since I don’t have a time travel machine just yet, I will have to settle for her life speaking to me via these verses. There isn’t much similar between me and Anna. She was advanced in years, a widow, and had copious amounts of free time to spend fasting and praying in the temple. I, on the other hand, am nearing middle age, still have my husband, a mama to 6, living in Uganda. I have very little free time, and quiet moments are scarce to non-existent. 
So it’s here that I’m tempted to send sweet Anna on her merry way and assume that her life has nothing to do with mine. BUT. She is a woman caught up in the Grand Story of the Redemption. She couldn’t get enough. It flowed out of her life. She spoke of it to all. And this is beautiful to me. I find this irresistible. Oh, how I want this to be true of me!
What if I took her situation, her devotion, her commitment to giving thanks and talking about redemption and translated it into my everyday? What would it look like?
What if I make my home a temple and spend my days worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day? 
Can I take my moments, the ones filled with laundry and trying to convince a teenage boy of the benefits of showers, and turn these mundane moments into acts of worship? Can I? Can I turn my words to thankfulness to God and speak of His redemption to all?
What would this look like? Here are some thoughts on how to start:

• Turn my eyes upon Jesus. Bask in His redemption. Gaze at His glory.There is no substitute and no checklist. The Gospel is where it starts and ends.
• Turn down the noise and to be quiet. {Getting up early, afternoon quiet time for the whole house, turning down TV watching in the evening, turning off the Internet}
• Turn from my idols. Rinse, Repent, Repeat. Daily, hourly, minutely {!}, I find myself running to idols in my heart. Things that tempt me away from gazing. I have to continually return to the Lord and repent and ask the Holy Spirit to help me turn from these things. {Internet, appearance, pride, reputation, to name just a few.}
• Turn up the message I need to hear. {Turning on the worship music, turning my eyes to Scripture, turning to those people in my life that challenge my heart to follow the Lord}
• Turn each mundane moment into an act of worship, no matter how small, from cooking to cleaning, showering to scrubbing.
• Turn my words into words of praise and thankfulness, declaring the redemption to all. 

Let’s take these moments, in our days leading up to Christmas, to turn our homes into temples. Thank you, Anna, for leading us on the road. The Road to Jesus. The Road to Christmas. "

Breakfast in Advent

As I make gingerbread men people, I am reminded of the women whose stories are part of The Big Story. The God Story. The Jesus Story.

I shape hair for the head, and I think of a woman who covered her face so she could not be recognised: Tamar. Tamar, who was Judah's daughter-in-law. Judah, the son of Jacob who had merely sold his brother Joseph into slavery, rather than acquiesce to his killing by the jealous brothers. Tamar, widowed once, rejected by the second brother who should have married her. Tamar, so desperate for children, that she covered her face and disguised herself as a prostitute, enticing her father in law to sleep with her and so ensure that she would not be killed and that her child would be born.
That child was Perez, in Jesus' family tree as a son of Judah.

Are as desperate for God as Tamar was for a child? Are we more desperate for things other than God? How can we do this, when busyness crowds our lives?

The hands of Rahab, letting down a scarlet cord from her window as a sign that she and her household were to be spared by the invading Israelites. Rahab, who risked disgrace, alienation and death to save two foreign men who had visited her brothel. Rahab, who recognised God at work in the Israelites and wanted to be part of that.

How do we recognise God at work? What do we risk, if we 'join in with what God is doing' as Rowan Williams (former Archbishop of Canterbury) has said?

The feet of Boaz, Ruth's husband. Ruth, who risked scorn, humiliation and disgrace to throw herself at a man's feet, tantamount to begging him to marry her. " Boaz had a good time, eating and drinking his fill—he felt great. Then he went off to get some sleep, lying down at the end of a stack of barley. Ruth quietly followed; she lay down to signal her availability for marriage."

The body of Christ. All working together in unison. "The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t. If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.

You are Christ’s body—that’s who you are! You must never forget this. Only as you accept your part of that body does your “part” mean anything."
And I think of the parts of the body to be careful of. The tongue, which can be so divisive. The eyes, which can be haughty. The hands, which should not lie idle. The feet, ready to take the good news of the Gospel to wherever God wants them to go.

Advent. Christmas.

Looking forward, in Advent to studying God's word about the coming of his son. There is an inspirational blog with links to other great devotional studies, including one based on Handel's Messiah, but I am beginning with the Love God Greatly plan: 

Love God Greatly Reading plan

Week One ~ Tamar & Elizabeth: Waiting: Overcoming Shame

Matthew 1:1, 3
Genesis 38:1-30
Genesis 38:13-15, 26-27
Luke 1:5-25, 57-58
Luke 1:6-7, 24-25

Week Two ~ Rahab & Mary - Willing: Social Outcasts

Matthew 1:5a, 16
Joshua 2
Joshua 6:17, 22-23, 25
Luke 1:26-56
Luke 1:34-38

Week Three ~ Ruth Anna - Wanting: to Serve and Glorify

Matthew 1:5b
Ruth 1, 2
Ruth 4:11-13
Ruth 3, 4
Luke 2:36-38
Week Four ~ Bathsheba & the Word - Wishing: to see the Glory of God

Matthew 1:6
2 Samuel 11, 12:24-25
2 Samuel 11:2-5, 26-27
John 1:1-17
John 1:1, 14

Christmas. Twelfth day.

Men came. Foreigners from far off in the East.
Persia, perhaps? Home of the invaders, conquerors over centuries.
What language did they speak? Was Mary frightened
to see these strangers coming to her home?
But look:
"Their joy knew no bounds!Entering the house where the baby and Mary, his mother, were,

they threw themselves down before him, worshiping. Then

they opened their presents and gave him gold, frankincense, and myrrh."

This was surely acts of kindness, banishing fear.

Mary knew her baby was the son of God. 

As those men also realized who Jesus was

may we too have our own epiphany of who He IS.

Christmas. Eleventh day.

 There was a pause in time.
The babe was born. Cleaned up. Pronounced healthy.
The curious visited. Faithful ones declared him special.
But Mary wondered. Waited.
There was much more to come.

Christmas. Tenth day.

After the celebrations come
the quiet days.
the dark days.
the could-be-lonely days.

But we rejoice here with the family
God has so
graciously
given us.

Staying in loving community
we laugh and love
being together
sharing life.

Christmas. Eighth day...

Yes, into the new year but still in these twelve days of Christmastide.

Christmas. He came. HE came! Yet:
so much about this baby was unexpected.
His conception - and the manner of it. Who would have thought it?
His birth - among strangers. No grandmother there to welcome him. Squalid circumstances.
Angelic visions.
Uncouth, rough men visiting.
Surely all those who heard the shepherds story
full of God's praise and glory
must have been amazed.
Surely there must have been a curious mob
thronging the doors of the stable.
Was there a disturbance in those crowded streets?
Did Roman soldiers come with terror?
Or did God surround His newborn son with the promised peace?

Christmas. Seventh day.

I wonder, in these days of dark and Light.
That unexpected sojourning place
of dirt and stench and squalor: did it become
a haven, of sorts?
Did Mary clean up a cosy corner,
nesting quietly with her new born,
treasuring every precious moment?
Was that stable a place
of refuge, away from rough men
and foreign soldiers?
Later, looking back from that road to Egypt,
did she long for that short time
of quiet and stability?

Christmas. Sixth day.

Today is a day of parting.
Sweet son leaving,
resuming his grown-up adult life.
We miss his joy-giving presence.
Now we adjust once more
to long-distance relationship.

I wonder, did shepherds return
to that scene of joy
amidst the squalor? Could they bear
to leave Him behind? Or
did they carry him in their hearts?

Christmas. Fifth day. A word for 2014: joy!

I am wondering if my word for this year should be joy, in the hope that I will experience it more this year. 
Michelle LaChapell had written an interesting post: she says

"all of us long to be the apple in someone’s eye, or experience moments of consolation after long desolate journeys. We were actually made to crave it and be nourished by it - by JOY. That is what gives us the strength to journey on and live the life we were made to live. It’s what helps life make sense. And, while joy is built through relationship with others, it is ultimately built through our relationship with God. Joy grows between us and God through shared moments. It happens as we set our eyes on him and find his smile. Over time we develop an ongoing sense of well-being learned through the goodness of God."

Mary had that Joy. Would

that have been her baby's name

had the child been born a girl?

As Jesus grew, did she gain joy

through every precious shared moment?

Christmas. Fourth day.

Bittersweet are the days after.
Celebration tinged with sadness.
A gift of myrrh is like a portent of death.
Could have been a shroud. Or a coffin.
How did Mary live with that knowledge in her heart?
I too feel this grief in these dark days after.

Christmas. Third day.

On the third day, we turn to faith.

Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see. (Hebrews 11:1)

The Message says: The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It’s our handle on what we can’t see. 

The excitement of Christmas Day has come - but not gone. For this is just the beginning.
We know the earthly end of His Story - but what does our 'faith' mean?

Faith means
I remain confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
14 Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. (Psalm 27:13 - 14)

Philippians explains our confidence so beautifully:
being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:6)

Verse 14 says: the followers of Jesus here have become far more sure of themselves in the faith than ever, speaking out fearlessly about God, about the Messiah...There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears. (NIV, The Message)

This is our faith. God and Jesus. Faithful to us.

Christmas. Second day.

Together. Yet alone.
Mary and Joseph. Together with Jesus.
No relatives to take them in, so they had to find shelter on their own.
A common stable where they had to stay: together with the animals.
We don't hear of relatives visiting: only rough, uncouth shepherds. Lonely, self-sufficient men who spent much time alone, away from society.
And then there were the foreigners. Did Mary and Joseph understand a word they said?
What strength they must have found in being together. A family.