Christmas Blog!!!

It's Christmas in one day...... stop, yes.... ONE DAY! How crazy it that? 2008 has gone by so fast. I want to share a devo/excerpt from my journal after China. I shared this with my youth group on my day to lead a short devotion and prayer time on our mission trip. Yes, it does have something to do with Christmas.

I learned a lot about pride through going to China, something I never, ever thought I would have to learn about. But I found that I had a lot of self to get rid of before I was even close to becoming more like Christ.

the devo
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. -Philippians 2:5-7
When we focus on ourselves, we lose sight of Christ' love, faithfulness and glory etc. If we don't surrender this flesh from the inside out, it will block out our Savior and his love, it will never be real to us and how can we give what we have refused ourselves? When we don't die to this flesh, or sin nature, whatever you call it, our lives will never be what they were meant to be. This flesh causes sin, and sin keeps us from God. The challenge is this; can we let go of this life, and the temptations of it, and live after the life of Christ?

It's not easy to deny ourselves and chase after a life that's often beyond our understanding , but if we are going to follow after Christ one of the first steps in definitely humility.

Therefore since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off every thing that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning it's shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
-Hebrews 12:1-2

This Christmas, my prayer is to remember what this time of year really represents, our Savior and King humbling himself to come and live as a man, and die for our sins. If the perfect Son of God could humble himself that much out of love for a sinful and fallen people, is it so much for us to lay aside our desires and focus on his desires, to 'fix our eyes on Jesus'? As we close out this year and begin a new one, let's pray and open our hearts to Love, focus our eyes on Jesus and be his hands and feet. We give out so many material gifts this time of the year, but don't forget to give the lasting ones that money could never buy, return all those stressed out angry comments with kindness, skip over the gossip, toss that change in the Salvation Army bucket, pray and comfort those who will spend Christmas with one less loved one this year, and remember with thankfulness and humility how much joy and hope we have to share. God bless you and Merry Christmas!