CHRISTMAS 2019

Selections from 2012

"This is my Son in whom I am well pleased."

Sons:  I realize I say, "Good boy!" mostly to my dog and "No!" to my sons.  I need to work on that.  I need to be like God and remember to tell them I am well pleased.  

Mary had His Son.  There were threats against her life and thus that of her unborn+ son.  Since she was pregnant out of wedlock, Jewish law said she could be stoned to death.  Herod the evil leader sought to kill Him as an infant, but an angel warned Joseph to escape to Egypt.  Her Son was finally killed at age thirty while she watched him suffer.  She had pondered these things in her heart for years.

We have an enemy of our soul who is out to steal, kill and destroy.  First he wans to steal our life in Christ by lies, then kill us for eternity.  Like the Israelites in Egypt, where Joseph sought refuge, the blood over the doorpost was necessary or the angel of death passing over would not spare the first born son.  I pray the blood over the doorpost for my sons knowing Jesus came as a vulnerable baby to destroy the works of Satan.

The Saviour's Work

1847

"The babe in Bethlehem's manger laid in humble form so low;

By wond'ring angels is surveyed

Through all his scenes of woe:

Nowell Nowell, now sing a Saviour's birth,

All hail his coming down to earth

Who raises us to heav'n!

A Saviour!  sinners all around 

Sing, shout the wondrous word;

Let ev'ry bosom hail the sound,

A Saviour!  Christ the Lord:

(Nowell chorus)

For not to sit on David's throne

With wordly pomp and joy,

He came on earth for sin to atone,

And Satan to destroy:

(Nowell chorus)

To preach the word of life divine,

And feed with living bread,

To heal the sick with hand benign,

And raise to life the dead:

(Nowell chorus)

He preached, he suffered, bled and died,

Uplift 'twixt earth and skies;

In sinners' stead was crucified,

For sin a sacrifice:

(Nowell chorus)

Well may we sing a Saviour's birth,

Who need the grace so given,

And hail his coming down to earth,

Who raises us to heaven:

(Nowell chorus)