[Dailydevo] Daily Dvotion Tuesday Deember 6, 2005

[Barry Ludwig]

Daily Devotion Tuesday December 6, 2005

The Devotions this week are written by Erin Anderson, interim director of
Young Discipleship at Zion. Her theme is Preparing for Narnia, Preparing for
Jesus.        

 

Always Winter, Never Christmas

In the story The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, the White Witch has cast
a spell over the land of Narnia making it always winter, but never
Christmas.  She also has a firm grip on the creatures of the land.  She will
entice, demand and lure to get what she wants, and turn to stone all those
who oppose her. 

 

Can you imagine, year after year of perpetual snow?  It would be quite
trying to live without the hope of warmth returning in the months of April
and May, but to top it off no Christmas!  I could do without the presents,
the commercials, the kitschy glitzy decorations and the red nosed reindeer,
but take away the birth of Jesus?  No way!! (Understandably this visual
doesn't work for those residing in the Southern Hemisphere, but bear with me
here.)  Without Christmas, we might focus our attention on the negative
aspects of winter; power outages, icy roads, cancelled events, high energy
bills, cold toes and shoveling, shoveling, and more shoveling!  Yuk!  We
might be lured by the fantasies of the tropics, of throwing caution to the
wind and going without a coat, of buying excesses of hats and mittens, or
scrunching down into bed and not coming out until the Groundhog does.

 

"Always winter, never Christmas", what does this mean??  Could this idea be
like our lives and our world in some way?  We live in a world that is not as
it should be.  We live in a world fallen because of sin.  This is not how
God intended it, but our White Witch (sinfulness) holds reign on us and on
our world, enslaves us, enchants us, or even turns us to stone.  Our world
is filled with those who have fallen into dark times, captive to the wrong
things and minds and hearts that are turned to stone because of hurt,
despair, loneliness, greed and pride.  What a cold world, but we can't
escape it; we are sinful.  

 

But there is hope, and there is a place, a world that will be Christmas all
the time.  There is One who heals our hearts of stone, brings us out of
darkness and bondage.  One who melts our winter chills and turns this world
around.  There is hope in the Savior, who has defeated our White Witches,
and has come back victorious.  Who has made our winters bearable by His
coming into this world, and promising us a new world, His eternal home.  

 

So we celebrate Christmas now because we have seen a glimpse of this new
world and salvation from the old.  We have witnessed the lamp-post in our
dark, the frayed ropes within our prisons, the water washing over our
hardened statues of hearts and minds, and the hope in our Savior, the birth,
death and resurrection of Christ.  God has, is and will turn this world into
Christmas again!  And we will have winter cold no more.  Come Jesus, Come!

 

Isaiah 9:6-7 & Romans 8:18-25

God, of this world and the world to come.  Show us your light, your justice,
your peace, your comfort, and your grace upon this fallen world.  May we
work to show light in the darkness, break the shackles of the oppressed,
heal the wounds of the sick and soften the harshness of greed and pride by
spreading Your love to all peoples we meet today.  May you spring in us the
enthusiasm to show others the Christmas that is coming in the midst of this
winter cold.     Amen.

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://zlc-aa.org/pipermail/dailydevo_zlc-aa.org/attachments/20051206/658d552c/attachment.htm