abandoned to Christ.

ADVENT ~ Day 26 December 24, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ 1 John 3:11-18 Abundance n. - an extremely plentiful or oversufficient quantity or supply; overflowing fullness "I will recount the steadfast love of the LORD, the praises of the LORD, according to all that the LORD has granted us, and the great goodness to the house of Israel that He has granted them according to His compassion, according to the abundance of His steadfast love . For He said, 'Surely they are my people, children who will not deal falsely.' And He became their Savior. In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the angel of His presence saved them; in His love and in His pity He redeemed them; He lifted them up and carried them all the days of old." Today is our the last day of our Advent - that is, preparing our hearts, minds and souls for the day we celebrate the first coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Tomorrow, many will come to give honor, glory and thanksgiving to our ...

ADVENT ~ Day 25 December 23, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Galatians 4:1-31 Today, I'm combining my Word-Filled Wednesdays post with the Advent devotional, as the Key Verse for today's devotional has really impressed upon my heart who we really are - without Christ. As I read our Scripture Passage today, my heart rejoiced in the fact that I am a child of The Promise. An adopted child, born of God, through faith in Jesus Christ's first coming, His virgin birth, His perfect sinless life, His atonement for my sins, His death, His resurrection and His second coming. And then my eyes and heart stopped and rested on two verses: "But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons." (Galatians 4:4-5) I'm still trying to wrap my mind around the fact that Jesus, the Son of God, left Heaven. In Heaven, Jesus was rightly worshipe...

ADVENT ~ Day 23 December 21, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Isaiah 60:1-5 I've mentioned before that I am not the sharpest pencil in the pack, therefore I don't understand many things as other people do. Often it takes me quite some time to really perceive what someone is saying, as the meaning often seems to escape me. Knowing this, when I was in high school, I used to carry a dictionary in my backpack, to have with me at all times. And back in the days when dinosaurs still roamed the earth (just kidding), pocket-dictionaries were not invented yet; well, not very good ones. So, the dictionary I carried around in my backpack was - you guessed it, the large, Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. Sure it was heavy, but I didn't mind because I pulled it out often to look up the words that people were using during conversations, as well as reading it during lunch and anytime I had available. I always had it with me when I read the Bible because it seemed that I would of...

ADVENT ~ Day 19 December 17, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10 What an incredibly uplifting passage! The Apostle Paul opens his first letter to the church in Thessaloniki with a greeting of mutual love, hope, grace and peace found only in God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Then Paul shares how he is so encouraged by the faith of the Thessalonian believers, that he is moved to give thanks to God for their work of faith, labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord, Christ Jesus. What was it about these 3 things that caused the Apostle Paul to continually give thanks to God? Let's take a closer look. work of faith: The way the Apostle Paul worded this is very significant. Notice here that Paul specifically writes, "work of faith", not "work to have faith". As we know it is clear in Scripture that we are saved by grace through faith in Jesus, it is a gift of God, NOT by works, so that no man can boast (Ephesians 2:8-9)....

ADVENT ~ Day 11 December 10, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Genesis 22:1-18 As we continue to fix our hearts, minds, souls and bodies on the Reason why we celebrate Christmas, I'd like to recap something we touched on yesterday. We talked about how we all need to “go tell it on the mountain” like God told Abraham when he went to sacrifice Isaac on Mount Moriah. According to the ESV, which is the “word-for-word” translation of the Bible, the first time God uses the word “love” is in our Scripture reading today (specifically, Genesis 22:2). I’ve often wondered if the writer of the song, “Go Tell It On The Mountain”, wrote this because God told it on the mountain first; Mount Moriah: “And the angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven and said, ‘By myself I have sworn, declares the LORD, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven...

ADVENT ~ Day 10 December 8, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Psalm 25:6-15 Who can know the secret of God? Who is worthy or who does God trust with His secret? What kinds of people are chosen as God’s friends? The word secret is synonymous with the word mystery. A mystery is something that is hidden, something that is not revealed to everyone. Often when someone has a secret, they only tell those whom they trust; their friends. Secrets are only shared with people who have proven their faithfulness and love to the one holding the secret. Some people want to know a secret only for the sake of knowing, or for the sake of feeling important, being entertained, or even to use the secret to mock or torment someone else. Obviously, none of these reasons are good reason to want to know or share a secret. Sadly, I must admit that I’ve often wanted to know a secret for some of these reasons. I’ve wanted to know a secret because it made me feel like I was “in the loop”, which made me feel...

ADVENT ~ Day 9 December 7, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Psalm 25:1-5 The Hebrew words for "ways" ( derek ) and "paths" ( 'orach ), have virtually the same meaning: direction, road, way of living, manner . In today's reading passage, King David is crying out to God in the midst of his distress. While it is obvious that David is under attack, he makes a strong proclamation of faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And then he humbly, yet boldly makes fervent requests for God to teach him the road, the way, and the manner of the Lord God Almighty. As we know, our Lord Jesus is The Way of God, revealed to us in the birth, death and resurrection of our Savior. David even goes as far as stating his confidence in God's righteous judgment of those who reject His gift of salvation - whether witnessed here on earth, or ultimately, when Jesus will make a distinction between those who truly knew Him vs. those who only claimed it with their mouths,...

ADVENT ~ Day 6 December 4, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Psalm 24:7-10 From the time of Adam and Eve's sin, our Father God has been proclaiming the mystery of His gift of salvation, that is found only through faith in His one and only Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (Genesis 3:14-15) The LORD of hosts, then repeated this mystery of salvation to Abraham, Elijah, Moses, King David, Isaiah, Daniel, Jeremiah, along with many other prophets and faithful servants of the LORD God Most High. By faith, they all believed God's message of salvation to all people, whether Jew or Gentile. Because they believed God, and put their trust in the One whom they would never see on this side of Heaven, God credited Christ's righteousness to them, so that they too may enter into the fullness of His glorious presence for all eternity in Heaven. The righteousness of Christ was not credited to them because of mere words, but their lives proved that their trust was in the coming Messiah of ...

ADVENT ~ Day 3 December 2, 2009 Scripture Passage: READ Psalm 24:1-6 Who is worthy to approach the LORD? He is Sovereign. He is good. By His might, He created the heavens, the earth and all that it is within it. Time cannot encompass Him. There is nothing in all creation that can overpower Him. He is self-sustaining. He is majestic. He is holy. He is glorious. He is perfect. He is righteous. He is just. God is so awesome, so brilliant, so holy; and the magnitude of His righteousness is so pure and powerful, that the Bible says no man can see God’s face and live (Exodus 33:20)! In our Scripture reading today, we find King David, perfectly assessing the level of righteousness a person must possess, in order to approach God, and not die. “He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully.” ~ Psalm 24:4 Well, that leaves me out! And not just me, but everyone I’ve ever known or heard of! There is not one...

Introduction to Advent by Rev. Dr. Mark D. Roberts Copyright © 2009 by Mark D. Roberts When is Advent? Advent is a Christian season that lasts for about four weeks. It begins four Sundays before Christmas and ends on Christmas Eve, thus there is some variation in its length. (If you're unfamiliar with the idea of Christian seasons, you might find helpful a few pieces I've written: "Overview of the Christian Year," "The Colors of the Christian Year," and "The Christian Year and the Textures of Worship." I should mention that Eastern Orthodox Christians do not recognize Advent per se, but have a longer season that is rather like Advent. Their Nativity Fast begins in the middle of November and is a season for repentance and abstinence. In our secular American celebration of Christmas, the Christmas season (or Holiday season, ugh) begins in the weeks prior to Christmas Day. Generally, this season starts in early December, though retail...

ADVENT ~ Day 14 December 13, 2008 Scripture Passage: READ 1 John 3:11-18 Extravagant adj. - excessively high; exceeding the bounds of reason; going beyond what is deserved or justifiable I'll make a list of God's gracious dealings, all the things God has done that need praising, All the generous bounties of God, his great goodness to the family of Israel— Compassion lavished, love extravagant . He said, "Without question these are my people, children who would never betray me." So he became their Savior. In all their troubles, he was troubled, too. He didn't send someone else to help them. He did it himself, in person. Out of his own love and pity he redeemed them. He rescued them and carried them along for a long, long time. ~ Isaiah 63:7-9 (The Message) Our Father God's love for us is extravagant: excessively high, exceeding the bounds of reason and goes beyond what any of us could ever deserve. He didn't pay for us with the fleeting, ...

ADVENT ~ Day 10 December 9, 2008 Scripture Passage: READ Matthew 2:1-12 Our Advent devotional will be a little different today. As we draw nearer and nearer to Christmas, I've been praying and asking God to guide me to be more mindful of the celebration of our Lord Jesus' first coming. In an answer to my prayer, our sovereign Father led me to an article at CWO (Christian Women Online) . This article provides wise counsel on how to refrain from spending like the heathens! :-) Just kidding. Seriously, Marybeth shares how to keep from losing focus on why we celebrate, rather Who we celebrate and how we can keep our spending to a minimum by honoring God. She also gives us some great practical insight on how we can train our children to have a different mindset on the blessing of giving gifts rather than receiving them. After I read this wonderful article, I asked my Favorite to read it and suggested we implement these ideas, but maybe next year (since we're already s...

Today is the 8 th day of Advent Why Advent? by Rev. Dr. Mark D. Roberts Copyright © 2008 by Mark D. Roberts In my last post, I told the story of my Advent beginnings. When I started out as pastor of Irvine Presbyterian Church in 1991, for the first time in my life, I began to see Advent as a distinct season of the year and to experience its richness. In the years following my Advent beginnings, my appreciation of Advent grew slowly and steadily. At some point I became aware of the purple and pink Advent color scheme, something we had not emphasized at Irvine Presbyterian Church. I remember when, sometime in the 1990s, we started using three purple and one pink candle in the church Advent wreath. It was a change for church members, who had been used to all white candles. But soon they appreciated the connotations of the colors. (Photo: The Advent wreath on the chancel of the sanctuary at Irvine Presbyterian Church) I decided to go “whole hog” with Advent colors one year....

ADVENT ~ Day 7 December 6, 2008 Scripture Passage: READ Mark 5:25-34 On Saturdays, I will post videos that help us to remember why we worship Jesus alone and why we celebrate His birth, while we look forward to our Homegoing. On Sundays, I will post articles from Rev. Mark D. Roberts regarding the Advent; what it means and why it's important for all of us to stay in a continual state of awe and wonder of CHRISTmas. I can never watch this music video without crying...and I'm not a cryer. So girls, if you're cryers, or not, you better go get your Bibles and some tissues. Be sure to read the Scripture passage for today so you can gain the full effect of this music video. I think all of us can relate to someone or many someone's on this video. I've been the first girl, full of shame due to sexual immorality; looking for acceptance and control of my life. I've also been the little boy and girl who had rejected and unloved on their shirts. I think...