A summary of our Christmas Experience (video style)

Here's a video that my totally awesome wife made for our family and friends to recap the Guaranteed White Christmas event hosted by The Weather Channel at our house on Christmas day.

Year-End, New Year Inventory

1. Am I submitting to, and finding joy in God's sovereignty over all things?
2. What are the recent evidences of God's grace in my life?
3. Do I have an accurate view of God?
4. Do I have any temptations or sins that are sinking deep roots into me?
5. How are my closest relationships?  With Ginny?  Our kids?  The Church Staff?
6. How am I doing with "temple care"?  Health?  Sleep?  Diet?  Exercise?  Energy level?
7. What am I "feeding" to my mind?
8. How is my dominion over technology?
9. How is my stewardship of what God has entrusted to me?
10. Who has sinned against me and how am I responding?
11. Who or what is "filling" me?
12. Who or what is "draining" me?
13. What am I doing to advance the kingdom of God on earth?
14. How is my flesh getting in the way of being an effective witness of God's grace?
15. Do I love people?
16. Is there a spiritual discipline I need to employ or focus on more this coming year?
17. What was the most significant thing I read this year?
18. What was the most significant thing said to me this year?
19. What was my most significant answered prayer this year?
20. What is one thing I'd like to say about 2011 next December?

The first 15 questions were posed by my friend Chuck Thomas.  I added the last 5 because those are good questions for me.  Hope it's all helpful.

Sermon Notes from 12.26.10

We did an abbreviated service this Sunday and here are the notes from the sermon.  You can find the notes and audio at sermons.heritagepark.org.  I like to end each year with some teaching on prayer and an exhortation to it.  I hope, before God, that this stirred people to it.

Prayer 2010

Ephesians 6.17-18

The imperative:  take up the sword of the Spirit.

·       

Take it up personally

• Ask questions of the text that will help you live it out.

Take it up prayerfully

• The Scriptures are inherently relational because they reveal God to us.
• Fueling our prayers with Scriptures puts our eyes on God.
• The promises in the Bible incite our prayers and affections.

Take it up missionally

• Pray with a sense of the warfare around you.
• Push your prayers outward – begin with you but end with something global.

But He HAD to...

This is probably the last post before the awesome insanity of the Guaranteed White Christmas from The Weather Channel starts around here.  So, Merry Christmas everyone!

A question:  is there something God has to do?

If you're an aspiring theologian, you can probably name a few:  He has to be truthful, He has to be pure, etc.  If you're consumed by American idiocy clothed in religious clothes, you might say He has to bless you or He owes you a good life (you might not say it that way, but you might say it nonetheless).

Here's one that's probably not on your list:  He had to be made like His brothers in every way (Heb. 2.17).  That is, Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity and God the Son, had to become like us - a human.  It's a beautiful little Christmas truth smack in the middle of Hebrews.

But why?  Why does God the Son have to become like us in every way?  The rest of the verse answers that question:  so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.


Jesus had to take on humanity, becoming incarnate (literally "putting on flesh"), in order to be a high priest and make propitiation for our sin.  If He were not human, He would not be a merciful and faithful high priest.  He would be unable to sympathize with us in our temptations, struggles, pressings, tribulations, and even our tears.  But clearly He can (Heb. 4.15).  If He were only God, hovering above us, He couldn't identify with us.

But also He, as a human, can make propitiation for us.  That is, He can become the sacrifice that takes away God's wrath and gives us righteousness.  Gregory of Naziansus (c. 329-390) said it this way:  "What is not assumed cannot be saved."  In other words, if Jesus didn't become a human He wouldn't be able to save humans.  If He didn't have a human body, a human mind, a human will, a human heart, a human ____________, He couldn't save humans who have those same things.

So Christmas is about God's saving work.  Don't forget that.

But that's just me thinking thoughts...

Why Church is Family (or it ought to be)

I said this before I started the sermon this past Sunday, but I couldn't be prouder and more grateful for our church family at Heritage Park.  During the past week, they have done exactly what Romans 12.15 says to do:  rejoice with those who rejoice.

We have received emails, notes, calls, Facebook posts, and shouts down the hall of congratulations for winning the Guaranteed White Christmas from The Weather Channel.  Their excitement for us has blessed us tremendously and ratcheted up our excitement even more.  And for all those not a part of the Heritage Park family who have done the same, our gratitude to God for you too.

And that brings me to this brief reflection:  church is family or it should be.  Yes, we have a Kingdom to advance like an army - but we don't shoot our wounded because they slow us down.  Yes, we're parts of the body and function differently - but adding body parts doesn't really compute (and yes, I know it's a scriptural analogy).  I like and advocate for the idea of church as family because...

God is our Father
Families are committed to one another
Families welcome new members with celebration
Families advocate responsibility and chores
Families laugh...hopefully a lot
Families cry when appropriate
Families do hard times together
Families party together
Families have...unique...personalities in them (which makes them fun or at least memorable)
Families gather regularly

Can you add to the list?

Sermon Notes from 12.19.10

Here are the sermon notes from Sunday, December 19th.  I wrapped up the Christmas series from Romans 5.6-8 with some thoughts on God's love for us in Christ.  I didn't finish the sermon via the notes, going off the outline in the third portion, explaining the difference between what you hear and what's on the page.  As always, you can find these notes and the sermon audio at sermons.heritagepark.org.  May the Spirit shed abroad God's love in all our hearts.

Christmas 2010

Love – Romans 5.6-8

The reason why this is Xmas:  God’s love doesn’t come to us apart from Jesus Christ.

Sacrificial love

• At the right time, Jesus Christ gave Himself for us. 
• In light of who we are apart from Him, it was the right time.

Unique Love

• Part of what makes His love unique is its prior nature.
• Part of what makes His love unique is its affect – it frees us to love Him. 
• We have never been loved like this.

Demonstrated Love

• His love justifies – saving us from wrath.
• His love reconciles – creating relationship with Him.
• My perception of His love determines my perception of His pursuit.
• My perception of His pursuit determines my perception of His love.
• God leaves nothing to chance by demonstrating His love in Jesus and pursuing our hearts.

What a day...

First, it was announced this morning that we won the Guaranteed White Christmas from The Weather Channel.  Then, we got a call at about 11am or so that our local NBC affiliate, KPRC, that the weather man, Frank Billingsley wanted to show Jack around and do a piece for the 5pm news.  Well, this is what happened...


http://www.click2houston.com/video/26177576/index.html

HOLY COW - WE WON

Unbelievable news.  We won the Guaranteed White Christmas event with The Weather Channel.  They're going to bring a snow blower, a portable ice rink, and a bunch of other stuff to our house on Christmas.  They'll also broadcast their morning shows from our house.

Crazy stuff!

Here's the winning video created by my amazing wife...

What kind of love?

So this week, at least at Heritage Park, is the 4th week of Advent which is the week we focus on Love.  As I said in an earlier post, I'm not sure we do it in the order everyone else does, but it makes sense to us and so we stick with it.

Here is an insight I'm working on for Sunday.  There appears to be a pretty consistent cycle in my life and in the lives of many I know.  The two-pieces of the cycle are (1) whatever I think a person is after determines my perception of the kind of love that person has for me and (2) whatever kind of love a person has for me determines what I think that person is pursuing.

You easily see #2 on reality TV.  Which bachelor or bachelorette has taken the kind one over the hot one?  And to my knowledge, only one of those couples is still together.  And #1?  Look at any relationship (good or bad) between a teenager and parent.  If teens succeed in keeping in mind that parents want the best for them, their sense of love and acceptance makes them pick up the phone and call when they run the new car into the pole at the gas station.  If teens think parents want me not to be a screw up and embarrassment, they hide and hide everything:  blemishes, grades, sexual struggles, hurtful conversations, etc.

And here's the beautiful thing about God's love - He demonstrates it and it reveals what He's after.  His love shows up in the death and resurrection of His Son.  It's free, unconditional, unique and transformational.  And it shows that He's after the hearts of men and women everywhere, capturing their allegiance and affection.

Can't wait for Sunday to preach this.

I simply cannot improve on this...

FBC Dallas has a Grinch website set up for those companies who do not say, "Merry Christmas," but opt for the more PC, "Happy Holidays."  I'm sure this makes Jesus, who has something to do with Christmas, look great to those watching.  And I'm confident it reflects well upon the people who claim to follow Him.

Okay, enough sarcasm.  My friend Tommy Kidd has a great article on the founding fathers and Christmas.  He's excellent on historical perspectives on Christianity in the public sphere.  I can't improve on it so I'm putting it here (from www.patheos.com, posted in its entirety)...

Christmas in 1776           

By Thomas S. Kidd

‘Tis the season to argue about religion. Or more specifically, to feud about whether to say Merry Christmas or Seasons Greetings . . . to call it a Christmas Village or a Holiday Village . . . or to allow a crèche or menorah to stand on public property.

What would Americans at the time of the founding think about all this?

They would have been perplexed. Perplexed, first, at the ways that we fuss about the public role of religion. The Revolutionary era was shot through with public expressions of faith, from the days of prayer and fasting declared by presidents, to the chaplains employed by the Continental Congress and Washington's army, to the faith principles undergirding the Revolution itself, especially the notion that all men are created equal. The concept of a public square stripped of religion would have been deeply unfamiliar to Americans in 1776.

But they would also find our kind of Christmas strange, and probably unpleasant. We are constantly warned by the prophets of our age -- Charlie Brown and Snoopy chief among them -- that we should not become obsessed with commercialism at Christmas. Yet this is like warning fish about the pollution in water -- a world of consumption is what we Americans live and breathe in.

Christmas in 1776 was very different. One difference, of course, is that America was engaged in a terrible war with Britain. That is why George Washington and his army spent Christmas night of 1776 crossing the Delaware River through a blizzard of sleet -- to attack the Hessians at Trenton, New Jersey.

Wartime or not, Christmas was not a big public spectacle at the time of the Founding. One searches in vain through the newspapers and almanacs of the Revolutionary War period to find references to Christmas. It was almost never mentioned, even on December 25th itself. When it was, the holiday was usually only cited as a reference point. ("General Washington hopes that the war will be over by Christmas," and such.)

But let's not be romantic about their simple, subdued Christmas, either. One reason that Christmas was downplayed in the New England states is because the Puritan fathers had banned Christmas for much of the 17th century. This was not because they were killjoys, but because they did not see how the Bible taught a December Christmas. They believed that the festival of Christmas was invented by medieval Catholics -- and this, if you were a Puritan, was never a good thing.

You did see occasional evidence of commercialism in Revolutionary America, too, especially after the war was over. In the Christmas Eve edition of Rivington's New York Gazette for 1783, there was a screaming advertisement -- almost reminiscent of our "Black Friday" ads -- for "CHRISTMAS and NEW YEAR'S PRESENTS," which included gold and silver watches; goblets fit for drinking "Porter, Ales, Punch, Sangree" and other holiday beverages; and assortments of stockings that the merchant pronounced "Monstrous Cheap."

Christmas at the time of the founding -- for those who embraced it -- was mostly a family and church affair. Lauren Winner's delightful new book A Cheerful and Comfortable Faith shows how Christmas occurred naturally as a part of the household devotion of 18th-century Anglicans in Virginia. Wealthy families there often had sumptuous feasts. At one Christmas dinner, the menu of the Fairfax family included "six mince pies, seven custards, twelve tarts, one chicken pie, and four puddings." Twelfth Night, the evening signaling the end of the Christmas season, saw even bigger bashes, which could sometimes turn into drunken brawls. Devout Anglicans also made their way to church for the Sunday of Christmas week, where they would hear a special sermon on the incarnation and receive communion.

In modern America, outdoor nativity scenes and other Christmas displays became common after World War I, encouraged by the advent of electricity to light displays at night. Some of these displays ended up on government property, a circumstance that predictably elicited lawsuits by secularists. The first major lawsuit on this topic sought to remove a nativity scene from the White House Ellipse in 1969. A number of contradictory court decisions have followed, fostering annual feuding and court cases regarding Christmas or Hanukkah displays.

Americans of 1776 had no particular need for public manger scenes. Christmas, when observed, fit easily in the traditional rhythms of home and church life. Obviously, they had no secularists screeching for the removal of Baby Jesus from the public park, either. His image was not there in the first place, nor did it need to be. Their society was already pervasively religious, even though not every American was a saint. They lived in a serenely religious milieu that we can only approximate today. We certainly can't recreate it on today's fractious courthouse square.

Thankfully, believers can still foster an indisputably Christian Christmas in our homes and churches. I guess that is where Christmas is the most edifying anyway.

Thomas S. Kidd teaches history and is a Senior Fellow at Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion, and is the author of God of Liberty: A Religious History of the American Revolution (Basic Books, 2010). Follow his writings viaFacebook.