Bono & Christmas

oh by the way.... Baby, Please Come Home from Very Special Christmas 1 is classic....

This reflection on Christmas occurred after Bono had just returned home, to Dublin, from a long tour with U2. On Christmas Eve Bono went to the famous St. Patrick’s Cathedral, where Jonathan Swift was once dean. Apparently he was given a really poor seat, one obstructed by a pillar, making it even more difficult for him to keep his eyes open…but it was there that the Christmas story struck him like never before.

He writes:

“The idea that God, if there is a force of Logic and Love in the universe, that it would seek to explain itself is amazing enough. That it would seek to explain itself and describe itself by becoming a child born in straw poverty, in shit and straw . . . a child . . . I just thought: “Wow!” Just the poetry . . . Unknowable love, unknowable power, describes itself as the most vulnerable. There it was. I was sitting there, and it’s not that it hadn’t struck me before, but tears came streaming down my face, and I saw the genius of this, utter genius of picking a particular point in time and deciding to turn on this.”

Isn’t it compelling? The logic and love of a personal God revealing himself, accounting for our personality, our propensity to love. And oh, the mercy of God, born in shit and straw, to rescue us from ourselves, our godless gift-giving, and our arrogant disregard for God and for others so that we might know and enjoy him and his new creation forever. And that he, the infinite God, would do it in Christ, in time, in space, in confounding condescension to pivot the course of the entire creation project from despair, destruction, and dereliction to a hopeful, whole, and happy future.

Will you ponder the poetry of Christmas this year, the genius of the incarnation?

Some Amazing Cookies

I'm gonna try THIS recipe.... with Olivia's help

Marty Freese, a member of Christ Community Church, is in basic training for the Navy.


Hey Everyone, Its Marty. I’m writing to you from boot camp which surprisingly isn’t as bad as everyone says it is. The only thing that is bad is the snow, (which I now dislike with an extreme passion). And the fact that your family and friends are like a world away. The food here is O.K. Its just like cheap cafeteria food from Williston High School which means it is better than Bronson’s cafeteria food. Big Red, Trooper, Peach, Mello, Bama, and Georgia say hi, they are some close shipmates of mine. If there are any who want to join the Navy come here in the warm months. Just saying. But I want you all to know that I miss all of you even if you haven’t written me yet*.

Signed, your favorite sailor since Popeye,

Marty Freese


*Marty's Address:

SR Freese, Martin
Ship 11, Division 059
Recruit Training Command
3505 Sailor Drive
Chicago, IL 60088-3505

Any words of encouragement would mean a lot in this challenging time.

Rembrandt's Return of the Prodigal

The Incarnation... illustrated

Great article by Philip Yancey on the life of Henri Nouwen... and how Nouwen helped him see the profundity of Jesus' coming to us

excerpt:

Unable to talk, walk, or dress himself, profoundly retarded, Adam gave no sign of comprehension. He seemed to recognize, at least, that his family had come. He drooled throughout the ceremony and grunted loudly a few times.

Later Nouwen told me it took him nearly two hours to prepare Adam each day. Bathing and shaving him, brushing his teeth, combing his hair, guiding his hand as he tried to eat breakfast-these simple, repetitive acts had become for him almost like an hour of meditation.

I must admit I had a fleeting doubt as to whether this was the best use of the busy priest's time. Could not someone else take over the manual chores? When I cautiously broached the subject with Nouwen himself, he informed me that I had completely misinterpreted him. "I am not giving up anything," he insisted. "It is I, not Adam, who gets the main benefit from our friendship."

All day Nouwen kept circling back to my question, bringing up various ways he had benefitted from his relationship with Adam. It had been difficult for him at first, he said. Physical touch, affection, and the messiness of caring for an uncoordinated person did not come easily. But he had learned to love Adam, truly to love him. In the process he had learned what it must be like for God to love us--spiritually uncoordinated, retarded, able to respond with what must seem to God like inarticulate grunts and groans.

-- whole article by Yancey

excerpts from article on Handel's Messiah

Philip Yancey (who i once met in an airport restroom... it was totally legit, i promise) wrote a classic article of how God met him through Handel's Messiah... along the way he gives a great overview of the tremendous piece

Part 1: Bethlehem
As I ... listened to the familiar beginning of Messiah, it was easy to understand how the oratorio came to be associated with the Advent season. Handel begins with a collection of lilting prophecies from Isaiah about a coming king who will bring peace and comfort to a disturbed and violent world. The music builds, swelling from a solo tenor ("Comfort ye my people ... ") to a full chorus joyously celebrating the day when "the glory of the Lord shall be revealed."

Part 2: Calvary

Part 1 ends with a scriptural invitation ("Come unto him") based on a paradox; Part 2 explains the paradox of how his yoke can indeed be easy, and his burden light. It is because of a transfer of suffering. At the cross, the pain and sorrow of humanity became the pain and sorrow of God. The chorus early on states it well: "Surely, he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows ... and with his stripes we are healed."

Furthermore, in that act death itself died. What happened next, on the day of resurrection, was a miracle deserving of all praise, deserving of the "Hallelujah!" chorus.

Part 3: Eternity
Handel's Messiah could not rightly end with the "Hallelujah!" chorus. The Messiah has come in "glory" (Part 1); the Messiah has died and been resurrected (Part 2). Why, then, does the world remain in such a sorry state? Part 3 attempts an answer. Beyond the images from Bethlehem and Calvary, one more messianic image is needed: the Messiah as Sovereign Lord. The Incarnation did not usher in the end of history—only the beginning of the end. Much work remains before creation is restored to God's original intent.


Read the whole (it is long) article here
fyi... Messiah can be enjoyed this Sunday evening at Holy Trinity downtown

Mary's Song

Mary's Song

Blue homespun and the bend of my breast
keep warm this small hot naked star
fallen to my arms. (Rest …
you who have had so far to come.)
Now nearness satisfies
the body of God sweetly. Quiet he lies
whose vigor hurled a universe. He sleeps
whose eyelids have not closed before.
His breath (so slight it seems
no breath at all) once ruffled the dark deeps
to sprout a world. Charmed by doves' voices,
the whisper of straw, he dreams,
hearing no music from his other spheres.
Breath, mouth, ears, eyes
he is curtailed who overflowed all skies,
all years. Older than eternity, now he
is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed
to my poor planet, caught
that I might be free, blind in my womb
to know my darkness ended,
brought to this birth for me to be new-born,
and for him to see me mended
I must see him torn.

Luci Shaw

Joy Has Dawned.... Help us see

By Keith Getty & Stuart Townend:

Joy has dawned upon the world,
Promised from creation--
God's salvation now unfurled,
Hope for ev'ry nation


Oh, give us that hope!

fyi

Messiah Sing-Along

Sunday, December 21, 2008, 7:00 p.m.

Holy Trinity Episcopal Church
100 NE 1st St, Gainesville, FL
$5 donation requested

Continuing a tradition that has become part of the holiday season in Gainesville, the Gainesville Civic Chorus once again invites everyone to join us in singing many of the beloved choruses from George Frederick Handel's magnificent Messiah. Over the past twenty years, hundreds have participated in this opportunity to sing this wonderful music, which will be accompanied this year by pipe organ. Please bring your own score if you have one.

Put down your torches...

This week we are going to be looking at what it means that
Jesus Comes to us as: The Light

One thing it means is that only he can bring health & wholeness to our lives... we are so tempted to think that we know what would bring meaning and joy to our lives... and we go after it... or we are constantly fighting against going after it... Isaiah wrote to some folks like us:

Who among you fears the Lord
and obeys the voice of his servant?
Let him who walks in darkness
and has no light
trust in the name of the Lord
and rely on his God.
Behold, all you who kindle a fire,
who equip yourselves with burning torches!
Walk by the light of your fire,
and by the torches that you have kindled!
This you have from my hand:
you shall lie down in torment.

Is there anything harder than trusting God when you are in the dark? When you can't make sense of what is going on and you think you can live another day if only you light this little torch... that will bring peace to my soul. I can always wait for His light tomorrow, right? Ahh, friend ...

wait.... rely.... trust... HOPE!

Oh Jesus, give us grace to stomp out the little torches we--in our idolatry--try to walk by... convince us you are with us in the darkness.

happy bday johnny M

no less than four times this morning i've been reminded that Today is the 400th birthday of John Milton, the Puritan literary giant who wrote Paradise Lost.

i have the audio on my ipod and have listened (months ago) to the first 10 seconds... and i was lost

So maybe during commute today i'll turn off what has been happening:
sports talk am 1230
cell phone
carols of the nativity by cambridge singers, cond.John Rutter

and listen to the of what most critics would agree is the greatest poem in the English language

(Also... this is one great thing about promise of new heavens and new earth... the BEST of our art will be there and be enjoyed! )

The person of Jesus is the quiet resting-place of his people, and when we
draw near to him in the breaking of the bread, in the hearing of the word,
the searching of the Scriptures, prayer, or praise, we find any form of
approach to him to be the return of peace to our spirits.

10am Sunday

Do You Hear What I Hear?

Join us on Sunday, December 14 for a special worship service celebrating the divine person of Christ. This is a chance to share the true meaning of Christmas! A light brunch will follow. We are asking families to bring low maintenance breakfast items like fruit, bagels, cinnamon rolls or danishes. Items can be delivered to the fellowship hall before the service.

A reminder...

This is a reminder for you of the powerful touch that a follow-up to prayer can be.

This morning at 7:15 I emailed (from my fabulous Curve) 3 friends to ask them to pray for my 2nd grader who was experiencing extreme--i'm talking paralyzing--fear about doing his part as the Wolf in his school play this morning.

I got a hit back from my brother-in-law saying he was on it. Just now he emails me asking "How'd it go?"
Stupid play at school that will be forgotten in a week... but i can't express what it means that he cares for me and my son.
So... remember how powerful a follow-up can be.

O my soul, knock hard!

Spurgeon y'day morning...
Go to Christ and find: forgiveness, clothing, weapons... all your needs supplied!

If all these things are to be had by merely knocking at mercy's door, O my
soul, knock hard this morning, and ask large things of thy generous Lord.
Leave not the throne of grace till all thy wants have been spread before
the Lord, and until by faith thou hast a comfortable prospect that they
shall be all supplied. No bashfulness need retard when Jesus invites.
No unbelief should hinder when Jesus promises.
No cold-heartedness should restrain when such blessings are to be
obtained.

Please God, make me like Jesse Jackson

Dare I link to a Jesse Jackson youtube?
As Palin might say, "You betcha!"

In meditating on Isaiah 11 this week and the world we all want that Jesus has inaugurated...
I've thought about an image from the recent US Presidential election night. Jesse Jackson was in Chicago at the celebration of Obama's victory. An African-American had been elected to the highest office in the land. The land that has degraded them for so long. Jackson seems to be soaking in the experience in a way that the white folks around him just can't experience... for they haven't known Jackson's longing. JJ was on the balcony when Dr. King was shot in Memphis. There have been times when hoping for "the coming of this day" had to seem ludicrous. Yet here it is.



In order for me to enjoy the consummation of the Kingdom of God (the vision of Isaiah 11)...
I must yearn for it. And that kind of yearning, my friends, is Spirit-wrought. Ask!

Reminder... Communion is not tomorrow Dec 7 but next week Dec.14

i need something like morphine only better
i need something like a kiss that lasts forever
i need something like money that will not burn
i need something and i need more than i can earn -
i need something what can i do i need something i need you -
i need something like a cure for my soul
i need something like amnesia for things i know
i need something like a mother cause i'm just a child
i need something like an asylum cause i go wild -
i need something i need you -
i need something like dynamite for the mess i'm in
i need something like a tattoo underneath my skin
i need somebody more than a lover in my bed
i need somebody here with me in my head
i need something bad and i need it now
i got something wrong with me you better fix it cause i don't know how -
i need You

--(Julie Miller “I Need You” from her album “Broken Things”)

Jesus, King of Angels

I have long-loved a song by Fernando Ortega called "Jesus, King of Angels". Y'day i heard an interview with him and he was asked why this song is on his new Christmas album.

"Because I got the title from a Christmas song! You know:
O come, all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant,
O come ye, O come ye, to Bethlehem.
Come and behold Him, born the King of angels;"

anyway, here are some lyrics that help me remember that this One we await is Glorious and Near:

Jesus, King of angels, heaven's light,
Shine Your face upon this house tonight.
Let no evil come into my dreams;
Light of heaven, keep me in Your peace.

Remind me how You made dark spirits flee, And spoke Your power to the raging sea.
And spoke Your mercy to a sinful man;
Remind me, Jesus, for this is what I am.

CHORUS:
The universe is vast beyond the stars,
But You are mindful when the sparrow falls, And mindful of the anxious thoughts That find me, surround me, and bind me . . . .

With all my heart I love You, Sovereign Lord.
Tomorrow, let me love You even more.
And rise to speak the goodness of Your name Until I close my eyes and sleep again.

Jesus, King of angels, heaven's light,
Hold my hand and keep me through this night.

The Inconsolable Secret

In speaking of this desire for our own faroff country, which we find in ourselves even now, I feel a certain shyness. I am almost committing an indecency. I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence; the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves; the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both. We cannot tell it because it is a desire for something that has never actually appeared in our experience. We cannot hide it because our experience is constantly suggesting it, and we betray ourselves like lovers at the mention of a name. Our commonest expedient is to call it beauty and behave as if that had settled the matter. Wordsworth’s expedient was to identify it with certain moments in his own past. But all this is a cheat. If Wordsworth had gone back to those moments in the past, he would not have found the thing itself, but only the reminder of it; what he remembered would turn out to be itself a remembering. The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited. --C.S. Lewis

In verse 1, Messiah was a shoot of Jesse. Here in verse 10, he is the root of Jesse.
Verse 1 affirms his humanity. Verse 10 affirms his deity. Its why his resting place, his
dwelling among us here in this world, will bring us nothing less than the glory of God. --Ortlund

Christ is creating a world without hurt, without destruction. When the earth is full of the
knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea, the scars of our ugly utopias will
disappear forever under the overflowing healing of Christ. The very environment will
breathe with the peace of God, and we will never hurt one another again. Jesus Christ, he
will lead us into everything safe and pleasant, with no dark side, no forced laughter, no
guilty conscience, no unhealed wounds.

This is what Isaiah wants us all to see. The triumph of Jesus will not put us up in
the clouds, playing harps and singing in massed choirs forever. The victory of Jesus will
be the awakening and purifying and restoring and gladdening of all things human.
--Ray Ortlund

Jesus knows every human heart. The apostle John saw him as having eyes “like a
flame of fire” (Revelation 1:14). Jesus begins each of his seven letters to the early
churches with the words “I know” (Revelation 2-3). Jesus knows you. He knows what
you’re going through. He knows what you need. He knows how to defend you. You can
trust him. --Ray Ortlund

This Sunday we are looking at Jesus Comes To Us As:
A Stem from a Stump... a tremendous picture in Isaiah 11 where Jesus is from the stump of Jesse:


Who was Jesse? Jesse was the father of King David, and David prefigured the
Messiah. But isn’t it interesting that I have to explain to you who Jesse was? Messiah
didn’t come from the Caesars or the Romanovs or the Hapsburgs or the Dale Earnhardt
dynasty. The Savior of the world came into history through an unknown family and
inherited a defeated throne. But from those origins, unimpressive by any standard, God
gave us a new David. God wants us to know where we can find our only hope. And it’s
not in the laboratories of science or the lecture halls of philosophy or the corridors of
human power. The only hope of the world was born in a stable in a remote corner of the
Roman Empire 2000 years ago. He was a nobody. How was that little boy qualified to
rule the world? That’s where Isaiah goes next. --Ray Ortlund

This is a very helpful document by Sinclair Ferguson on the Christ as the center of the Old Testament (Hebrew Scriptures).

"God's reckless grace is our greatest hope, a life-changing experience, and the subject of this book."

--Tim Keller, The Prodigal God

8:30 in Wal-Mart Parking Lot this Saturday

be there... If you would like to help decorate the Arbor House for Christmas... great way for all ages to serve

Good Article on Santa

In our worship (family or congregational) at Christmas we may varnish the staggering truth of the incarnation with what is visually, audibly, and aesthetically pleasing. We confuse emotional pleasure -- or worse, sentiment -- with true adoration.

--Sinclair Ferguson in Santa Christ?

Let this be another plug for you guys to take advantage of the Advent Scripture Reading Guide!
It is on the website if you don't have it already.

Information Meeting for...

parents interested in helping their children prepare for church membership

9am Sunday morning in the education wing

Spurgeon on Refiner's Fire

The Lord Jesus Christ, by his Spirit, is carrying on in believers daily a purifying work; for he sits as a refiner and he purifies the sons of Levi. He is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap. Let us pray that, however trying it may be to us, and whatever rough providences it may involve, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ may be with us all in this respect. May our prayer be, "Refining fire, go through my heart!" Let the winnowing fan be used; let our chaff be driven away, there is not a particle of it we would wish to retain. We desire to be sanctified—spirit, soul, and body—through him who leads his people ... May we walk in the light as he is in the light, and so have fellowship one with another, and may the blood of Jesus Christ, God's dear Son, cleanse us from all sin. --CHS

You are His!

God wants his children to be sure that they belong to him, and does not want us to remain in doubt and uncertainty. So much so, that each of the three persons of the Trinity contributes to our assurance. The witness of God the Holy Spirit confirms the word of God the Father concerning the work of God the Son. The three strong legs of this tripod make it very steady indeed.
--John Stott

I'm praying today for you CCC... for your confident sense that you are His.

Today's Advent Scripture Reading is Genesis 22:1-18

Thoughts:

1.) What is said to Abraham in verse 12:
'...now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.”

Does this mean that we will know when we are fearing the name of the Lord (Malachi 4 from y'day) when we are--like abraham--offering up to God that which is most precious to us? Oh God, give us grace and courage to "not withhold" any relationship, treasure, etc. from You.

2.) Abraham told his son that God would provide a lamb.
God provided a ram.

Does this mean that God will always provide (as Abraham wonderfully trusts) but that the WAY God provides for us is not what we anticipate?