He delivers and rescues, he works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth; for he has saved Daniel from the power of the lions.
Hebrews 13:8
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever.
Words of Grace For Today
Lions are not common in Alberta.
Alligators and wolves and elephants of the 2 legged variety abound, but no lions. It’s more difficult to be saved from the 2 legged variety than even from lions.
God steps in to save Daniel, and God works to save us, too. God delivers and rescues, works signs and wonders. The greatest wonder is the love God demonstrates for all people in becoming one us, to save us all. Grace comes
Jesus changes not a bit, not at all. Always gracious, forgiving, healing, and renewing. For all people.
The work of God never ends, never changes, and always gives us life and breath. Against those that would do us harm, God has no end of work and signs to make clear to us, that is God’s never ending wonder.
Signs and wonders fill the days and the nights of all our lives, for us all to see, and for us to give God thanks.
Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.
John 1:14
And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.
Words of Grace For Today
The Word became flesh and lived among us.
It is quite the image. God creates with a word: Let there be ….
That Word is a reality that creates out of void reality, out of chaos order, out of nothing breath and life.
Then that Word becomes flesh, becomes a human, born as any other with no shortcuts like becoming a fully formed human ready to preach hell fire and brimstone, or heal all that ails creation in an instant, or overthrow corrupt and cruel rulers and religious leaders, replacing them with righteous people.
No, the Word becomes flesh, grows in Mary’s womb like every other baby, and is born into poverty in an animal barn, like most of humanity (except maybe the animal barn. Perhaps more humans have been born in a dwelling of some sort than in an animal barn. Though generations ago we were all born in less comfortable circumstances than an animal barn.) Then this infant must be nursed, protected (on the run for this life as a refugee into Egypt), and study and learn about life as a human. There is no knowledge dump into the Word-become-flesh’s brain or consciousness.
The one difference that sets this human, Jesus, from the rest of humanity (besides that he is the Word, God, who created the universe) is that he is without sin. The accurate description is full of grace and truth. God’s identifiable qualities in this human are primarily grace and truth.
It would be easier in life if more people could be even somewhat full of grace and truth. I suppose it would be easier if the first person for each of us were the one with whom that started to be so!
I have a long list of people I wish that were true, starting with judges, RCMP, church people, and supposedly ‘honourable’ people. I suppose we all have such lists or so.
Hanging on to them is impossible, if one really wants to live. That is where GRACE comes in to play, with each of us in the first person. Grace is not only smooth and marvellous movement, like in a dance. It is the dance we do that carries us through each day as we encounter sin and evil, some of it so destructive that it is hard to contemplate. Best not to, but to continue to bless everyone, and those that are out to destroy us, with the blessing of the czar: may God bless the czar, and from us keep him very far!
Grace and Truth.
These are what we celebrate is born in poverty in an animal barn; now creation can see God’s Grace and Truth in the life of a human.
God’s works are full of mystery and wonder. This Christmas, with Covid 19, we can take Advent to prepare our hearts as we must rethink what Christmas really is all about, since lots of the trappings we’ve leaned on in the past are not possible.
What is essential for Christmas? That we wait, alert, preparing to meet again the Word, the Word that created the universe, the Word that lived among us, the Word the so loved the world that God came as one of us to save us all.
Christ is come – generations ago,
Christ is here – through every generation as the Holy Spirit, God walking with us,
Christ will come again – for every generation, to bring the perfection of ‘heaven’ to earth.
How are you going to celebrate the mass of Christ? The Christmas, which took over the pagan rights of light in the darkness, a yule log lit, of evergreen trees decorated with symbols of life and lit with candles, and the tradition of St. Nicholas, the Saint of Giving?
May it be more blessed this year. Thanks to Covid 19 challenging us to re-evaluate our lives and return to the roots of our celebrations.
This year more than ever we need a purposeful Advent to prepare … for something different and hopefully better.
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with flowing streams, with springs and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills,
Romans 8:32
He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else?
Words of Grace For Today
A land flowing with streams, springs and underground waters welling up.
In this part of the world this is the way of the earth. Fresh water is abundant in Canada, more so than in any other place in the world. Swamps are common, the earth’s water recycling systems. Streams flow full. Lakes dot the land.
But in most of the world, and in the desert lands of Abraham and Sarah with the dry wind pulling water right out of your skin, a land with water was a dream of heaven on earth.
As God provided water for God’s people, so God has provided all that God’s people ever needed, not as we might have wished or dreamed, but as God chose.
Today, for us, God still provides.
So we wait, patiently, for the coming of the Christ, bringing a new earth and new heaven, with homes for everyone.
Why rush past the waiting?
It does us no good. Christ does not come sooner, or better. Christmas does not come sooner or better.
Shopping does not contribute to Christmas much at all. It more detracts from it, as we bury ourselves from Christ’ call in consuming more and more and more and giving more and more and more to wrap and tag with a name and watch to see if the recipient really wants that THING.
God sends God’s son, Jesus. No wrapping, no name tag.
Jesus is not to hide or reveal. He comes to make obvious what is already been given through the Law and the Prophets: God loves all creation and all people.
God desires that we live abundantly, not self destructively.
Jesus requires no name tag to identify for whom he comes; he comes for ALL people, all creation, to give all people life abundant.
Wait. Stay alert. Remember. Hope. Hold the precious blue of advent hope in view. Christ is coming, Christ is near, Christ is here, as God has been since before time.
Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming, it is near.
2 Peter 3:13
But, in accordance with his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.
Words of Grace For Today
They said go west young man.
So I went …
…
north instead.
And
Decades later I’m still going, and waiting,
for a home with the righteous.
If only I could find one of them,
Everyone here is a sinner,
Then I hear the trumpet blow
and see the Lord is coming
bringing
a new heaven and earth and a new home for all these wretched sinners made saints by Grace
Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever.
2 Corinthians 5:20
So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
Words of Grace For Today
The pied piper led many though they knew not why or whereto.
Lemmings like sheep follow a leader who is blind to the path taken, even when it’s over a cliff to their death.
If we are ambassadors for Christ and God makes God’s appeal through us to people to be reconciled to God, and the wise shine like the daytime brightness of the sky, and those who lead others to righteousness shine forever like the stars in the dark night, then to what are we to lead people.
We confess that we cannot do anything to make ourselves righteous before God. We confess that we cannot do anything to reconcile ourselves to God.
Can we then lead other people to make themselves righteous before God? Can we lead other people to reconcile themselves to God? No, not all all.
When we try, we are as stupid as dumb sheep and lemmings leading people over a cliff of self over-importance, self-righteousness, and arrogance before God that is an attempt to be godlets, when in fact we are no more than beggars for God’s mercy and grace.
Fortunately God supplies us with both mercy and grace, along with renewed life and the old, old story of Jesus and God’s love.
This is what we can bring to people. And through us the Holy Spirit may indeed reconcile many people to God, and God may bring us to be among the saints, the people who reflect Christ’s Light to all people.
Can we do nothing, then, in relation to being reconciled to God? Yes, though we can do plenty to resist and destroy and tear down and separate ourselves from God. We do have free choice, and we each of us exercises it plenty in trying to turn away from God, to try to take over what only God can do, to try to become godlets unto ourselves, as if we created the universe and could ever control it.
Since God reconciles us to God by Grace alone, and since God shines Christ’s Light through us to the world, and since God sends us and equips us to be God’s ambassadors to Christ’s Grace, then through us the Holy Spirit can and does make wondrous things happen, signs for all to see God’s glory in Grace and Love.
10:00 am as I write this. The sunshine finally finds the snow on the lake, though not a drop has found the snow on the meadow between the trees. We likewise find ourselves in the escalating numbers of the second wave of Covid 19, as it spreads like wildfire across Alberta, the government responding with ideological priorities, so as not to offend those who hold their individual rights and freedoms must not be infringed on. The light seems to be that a vaccine will be available in a month. The reality is it will be available to only a few at first. It will likely be a half year at the earliest that everyone who wants a vaccine will receive it. The number who will refuse is likely to be so high that there will be little ‘herd vaccine protection’ and the virus will take a few years to subside … perhaps just in time for the next mutation of a coronavirus to sweep across the too densely populated earth.
In this mess and chaotic, deadly non-response to the virus, we are sent as ambassadors of Christ’ Light and Grace. Reach out to all those in need, especially the ineffective leaders, and the masses of skewed-thinking people who think it’s all a hoax, or that their individual rights and freedoms cannot be limited so as to save everyone.
And pray, for this is just one chaotic mess made by humans that only God’s Grace can set right. Carry on each day, trusting the God’s Grace is sufficient for our days.
Saint Nicholas Day, Remembering the Bringer of Gifts
Like Tracks in the Snow Disappearing Toward the Light,
The Signs and Wonders of God’s Work for Us All
Are All Around Us.
Daniel 4:2
The signs and wonders that the Most High God has worked for me I am pleased to recount.
1 John 1:2
This life [the word of life that Jesus brings to us] was revealed, and we have seen it and testify to it, and declare to you the eternal life that was with the Father and was revealed to us.
Words of Grace For Today
Signs and wonders … the word of life revealed, eternal life even today for us.
These are everywhere to be encountered, seen, heard, touched, inwardly experienced.
The sun rises in the cold morning, light spreading and pushing back the darkness until a clear burst of light is visible through the trees near the horizon. The Light of the world is here, as a blessed sign that God is with us.
The periodic drone of fisher’s ice augers rumbles like bumble bees across the snow covered lake and through the trees. There are fish in this lake, stocked as it is, which provide food for many, except in the shoulder seasons when the ice forms or melts and is not safe enough to support a fisher. When the water is open boats bring fishers to all corners and bays of this lake. Then the ice is solid, on foot, by quad and side-by-side and snowmobile, or by truck, fishers spread across the lake to harvest for their families sustenance, signs of God’s blessings unceasingly flowing for us all.
After more than seven years with various people seeking my destruction, death and/or exile based on lies and greed, and a mental illness perverted view of life, fuelled by misandry and hate-based, perverted faith, I wake each morning, here, alive, accepting my life as blessed, though I am financially so far in debt I will likely never emerge, though my reputation among corrupt people of power will likely never be restored, though I work desperately hard to survive the challenges of living rough: cold requires lots of work but it is constant and properly conquered with care; moisture, heat, and bugs are the most difficult, fickle, and most dangerous. Each day I still breath is a gift from God, a sign of the wonders God works sustaining my life though it is under constant attack by so many, and so powerful.
This is eternal life, for today. (Yes, eternal life has already begun. We do not wait until after death!) For the Word of life, Jesus Christ, has come, is here, and will return.
Advent, these precious few days of blue hope, suspending us in waiting, holding us alert in watching, guiding us with Light into the darkness of winter … Advent is filled with signs and wonders of God working for us. We only need take a breath, pause, reflect, … and notice all that God does for us each day.
This day there are millions of people who through terrible injustice and cruelty do not have clean air, clean water, nourishing food, adequate clothing, sufficient shelter. Many, many people will die this day across the face of the earth … and it need not be so.
So many more millions have those basics of life, but lack the other two that keep us give us resilience to face the challenges and evil that would rob us of our hearts, minds and strength: meaningful labour and love (both being able to love others and to be loved by others).
Facing Covid 19 and our feeble efforts to slow it’s progress through the populations, if we do not have an ever-renewing reserve of resilience, we can lose our hearts, minds and strength to face each day. We can instead forego all precautions and put others at great risk, we can gather as if we thought that would help (participating in a super-spreader event, killing and maiming many downstream), or we can join the insane protests with no masks or physical distance (also participating in a super-spreader event, killing and maiming many downstream).
What will we do this day, if seemingly small, to reach out with the Word of life, to all? What will we do reaching out to others, for therein we build our own resilience?
The Word of Life works signs and wonders for us all.
Stay alert, lest we do not notice, or hear, or see Christ in our midst, calling us to be Christ’s signs and wonders for us all.
God gives the desolate a home to live in; he leads out the prisoners to prosperity, but the rebellious live in a parched land. O God, when you went out before your people, when you marched through the wilderness, Selah
Mark 1:32-34
That evening, at sunset, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. And the whole city was gathered around the door. And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.
Words of Grace For Today
Stories contain our identity. We ignore and lose our ancestors’ stories at our own peril, for then we not only find ourselves foreigners in our own land, we separate ourselves from reality: we think and behave as if we could separate ourselves from God.
… O God, when you went out before your people, when you marched through the wilderness, Selah.
These simple words remind us of God’s rescue of God’s people, out of slavery in Egypt, through the wilderness, into the Promised Land.
… the whole city was gathered around the door. [Jesus] cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons….
These simple words remind us of Jesus’ ministry on earth, teaching, healing illnesses, casting out demons, and of the people’s flocking to listen to and be healed by Jesus.
Our God has claimed us as people, rescued us from slavery and brought us, as God had promised, into a land flowing with milk and honey. God’s Son Jesus came, taught and healed us, and cast out demons.
We understand disease, and healing. Casting out demons is not part of our worldview today, not part of our science based ordering of chaos into an understandable, ordered view of the world that can be manipulated with technology to give us ‘control’ and ‘comforts’ and ‘advancements’. Nothing is wrong with a scientific view of the universe. On the contrary science is possible (and was possible as the historical record shows) only because we believe God created an order to the universe. Science is not able to encompass all of the universe. ‘Casting out demons’ is an example. It could be clearly exemplified by what possesses Donald Trump, who with a constant flow of lies tries, unfortunately successfully in the minds of some likewise possessed people, to create a fiction about life that is not based at all in reality, just so that he can ‘succeed’.
That kind of possession is all too common: lie, lie, and lie again until one believes one’s own lies, others believe your lies, and they add more lies to confirm the resulting fiction as if it were based in any reality.
Remembering the stories of our ancestors we need not disconnect ourselves from reality. We need not hide in a bubble of like-thinking, skewed-thinking people. We can encounter all ideas and thoughts, evaluate all with our ancestors’ stories as a guide to what is real and what is fantasy or diseased or ‘demon’. Our present and future are anchored in the real past: this is God’s creation and we are God’s creatures, God’s people.
Engaging with all people, we can remain true to God’s wish for us: that we love all people unconditionally. Surrounded by, restricted by, and endangered by everything Covid 19 brings upon us, we need not panic, go bananas, or rebel with protests demanding that it is all a hoax, no matter how much we wish it were. Anchored in our ancestors’ stories of their journeys with God at their side, we can trust that God is at our side. Our hearts need not be troubled. We know that God gives the desolate a home to live in; God leads out the prisoners to prosperity, but the rebellious live in a parched land.
God gives us a calm assurance that God’s blessing still flow unceasingly over us.
With the Psalmist we can sigh with the precious blue hope of Advent: Selah!
It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives sleep to his beloved.
Matthew 6:8
Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
Words of Grace For Today
From our ancestors’ instincts to rise up early and go late to rest in order to be ready to catch the prey and ensure one did not become prey, we still have an instinctual drive to ‘give it our all’ and then some, to ensure our survival.
Examples abound of humans who have worked and worked and worked themselves ‘to the bone’ at the cost of any real life. The majority of humans who have ever lived were oppressed and enslaved in poverty by the rich and the powerful; they have ‘given their all’ out of necessity to provide the mere basics of life for those for whom they are responsible.
Many others through history and especially today, as the gap between rich and poor grows ever greater, and still the ‘middle class’ is larger than ever in all of history, throw themselves into perpetual work at the expense of living life, all in order to have just one more comfort, one more luxury, to possess one more thing, to pay for just one more purchase that fails to fulfill it’s promise to give life meaning.
A third category of people are those who are rich, and give everything they are and have in order to protect and grow their wealth, as if it could ever provide them life or any real security.
This second and third group are those to whom this passage is addressed.
God did not create us to continually work. God created us to work hard, and then to rest. God created us to wake each day and work hard, but then to relax and enjoy the company of other people, and to sleep content with the blessings provided to us. God created us to work hard for six days, and to rest on the seventh.
All the sciences about humans confirm sleep, companionship, and regular rest are requirements for a human to maintain long-term health. It is no surprise at all that religious wisdom is confirmed by scientific research.
The first group is addressed less by this passage than by God’s repeated promises to bring judgment and justice to earth, for all people, living and dead. To them, to us, to all people, Matthew addresses Jesus’ words about how to pray, not heaping up empty phrases, but asking for what one needs. God listens. God walks with us. God promises justice for all in the end. And God knows already what we each need … and God ensures we receive it. We need God’s blessings, no matter our circumstance. The danger to life is not the lack of necessities or the inevitable arrival of death. The real danger to live is the corruption of our hearts, minds and strength by the work of the Devil.
Pray constantly that God would deliver us from this, and that God would bless the czar (all who exercise corrupt power) and keep him from us, very far.
As we wait, prepare, and remain alert, we pray with thanks for all God gives us, every blessing. We can work hard and rest easy. Covid 19 restrictions, infections, long-haul symptoms, and even death cannot separate us from God’s unconditional love, nor our ability to exercise that unconditional love for all whom God created.
which makes us think we need to strive to be better, more, something else.
God focuses us on what we have
to share.
Deuteronomy 16:17
All shall give as they are able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you.
2 Corinthians 8:12
For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has – not according to what one does not have.
Words of Grace For Today
The world, with simplistic lessons, teaches us that IF we want to survive or IF we want to maintain our standard of living or IF we want to protect our riches, power or fame … or IF we want in any way to guarantee our own lives to be as we want them,
THEN we must take care of ourselves, hang on to whatever we have or can get by any means, and protect ourselves from others who will always try to get (by whatever means) from us what we have.
This is not how God created us to live. It is not how humans survive. It is not how civilizations provide protection from barbarism. This is how the devil works to steal life from us. This is what kills humans. This is how the thin veneer of civilized society is shredded by barbarism from within.
God created us in God’s likeness, not just our faces, or bodies, or anything else external about us. God created us like God, in that we live well when we graciously and generously share all we have with everyone we can.
Giving, not taking, is how we live abundantly. It is how we live as Christ’s voice, hands, and feet on this earth. It is how we live blessed.
Eventually 100% of us humans die. It’s not a matter of if, but of when, and how. Death is not the goal of life, nor (since God promises us eternal life through Jesus Christ’ record in place of ours on our judgment day) is it the end or terminus of life.
God gives us our lives, so that we can imitate Christ: giving to all, all we have to give; seeking justice for all, until we have nothing more with which to seek; loving unconditionally all, until we have nothing left, no breathe of life, with which to love.
Whether giving leaves us more vulnerable to death, whether pressing for justice leaves us more vulnerable to death, whether forgiving our enemies and loving everyone unconditionally leaves us more vulnerable to death – all this is simply not significant, ultimately. Our actions of giving, seeking justice, and loving unconditionally are exactly what God has done for us, given us, blessed us with.
Giving is not an exercise in trying to not hit a tree as we ski down the hills of life. Focusing on the trees we are surely going to crash into one or more. Giving is not an exercise measured by what we cannot give or do not want to give up. Giving is an exercise measured by what God has given us … until we have given away every last drop of life, breathe, hope, and love that God has given us.
While we may think, having learned the simplistic lessons of life from the world around us, that it is foolish to give everything away, to seek true justice at all costs, and to love (especially our enemies) unconditionally though it robs us of hope, this is simply, truthfully all wrong. God did not create humans to live in a zero-summed life. Much of creation around us appears to be zero-summed, that is there is a limit to the resources available and we must strive to get our portion … or more!
Doch, God created humans to live as the loaf of bread, and jar of oil, which Elijah shared with the widow and her son: they never diminished but were continually restored to fullness, in order to provide sustenance for all three people, saving their lives through the famine.
God’s blessing pour over us all our lives, overfilling us and everything around us … if we would only see God’s blessings.
Our measure of giving then is not to miss the trees, and try (in vain) to ensure our survival. Our measure of giving is God’s prodigal blessings that never end.
God walks with us, even when we suffer greatly, no matter what we do not have, no matter what injustices are aimed at us, no matter what hate is focused on us.
Giving from a never failing supply of goodness, love and blessings is a great way to live.
Advent is our time to take time to reflect on God’s blessings and promises that we have forgotten or become blind to. Wake up, Be alert. Wait for Christ. Rest assured. Do not be afraid or troubled. Christ is already here, and will come again. Christmas celebrations can wait, until Christmas. We have more than enough to do, to give, to seek, to love, while we wait.
In the Lord I take refuge; how can you say to me, ‘Flee like a bird to the mountains.’
John 14:27
Jesus spoke: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.
Words of Grace For Today
When I am most drained, I head to the mountains. I do not flee. I head there to hike, to camp, to ski, to take photos, to write. The mountains are a place of renewal.
Mountains have long since also been a place where we humans have fled from danger to our lives, for in the mountains we are harder to find, though life there is much more challenging. The world can easily give us more than we can take, where even the renewal of the mountains or the refuge of the mountains is not enough.
I do not give to you as the world gives.
The world, filled with sinful people, gives in lots of horrendous ways.
The world gives Covid 19, generously, killing and maiming millions.
The world gives false security with power, fame, and money, but all of that can evaporate in an instant and become more of a burden than a security for the future or a freedom for one’s todays.
The world gives promises of equality, justice, and opportunity; and then oppresses the masses, knowingly judges and falsely convicts, incarcerates and ruins honest people based on falsehoods and cruelty … The world promises opportunity but offers only opportunity to be enslaved so others can exercise corrupt power.
The world provides the blessings God created it to contain: air, water, food and opportunity to produce and utilize clothing and shelter; but the people in the world ensure they have their own excessive ‘comforts’ and luxuries at the expense of others being robbed of clean air, clean water, nourishing food, adequate clothing and sufficient shelter.
The world invites the masses to work to make a living possible, and then enslaves the masses at a standard of living that is impossible to call humane.
The world comes at us when we speak out and encourage change, equity, and justice. The world comes at us, condemns us for threatening the powerful people’s privileges in order to bring justice to the masses. The world comes at us to kill us with lies and Gaslighting or drive us into exile.
This is nothing new. It’s been humanity’s inhumane manner of executing injustice from the beginning of time.
God gives in many and various ways, all of which are marvellous.
God created and creates a universe that provides enough to support each and every person’s needs to live, and to live abundantly.
God gives us free choice to love, along with the other option, to choose evil.
God frees us from our inevitable choices that are evil, forgiving us, redeeming us, and renewing us so that we can live free from the sins of our past, present and future.
God gives us abundant life, and inspires, equips and calls us to give life abundant to all those around us.
God promises to walk with us no matter what we encounter in life. God’s Word is absolutely trustworthy. God keeps promises, always.
God sends Jesus, God’s own son, to live as an example of how to live life fully, abundantly; sacrificing oneself to provide life to others, forgiving even our enemies, and fearing and loving God, loving oneself and all other people, especially one’s enemies.
Jesus gives us peace, a peace that no one and nothing can take from us.
Therefore we have no cause to be afraid and our hearts need not be troubled … by any of the chaos that churns the world around us.
We get to be the people at peace, sharing life and peace – graciously – with all.
What a life.
It is the life of living renewed, each day, as if we were in the mountains.
It is a life living as refugees, in God’s arms, protected from all the threats of this world.
