In Scripture, laments are raw expressions of grief, but they always point to hope. What if our culture’s obsession with holiday lights is an unconscious way of crying out, “We need good news, and we need it now”?

If I were to stand in the pulpit and tell my pew-sitters to take the tenth leper as their model and be thankful, it would ignore how such thanks truly comes about.

As we celebrate Advent and Christmas, we flex the muscles of a new season, a new year, a new life which His resurrection and our baptisms have bestowed upon us.

C.S. Lewis, Grief, and the Holiday Season

Today on the show, we look a bit into the practice of Lent and tell a story about a popular Japanese dish.

Today on the show, we tell the story behind the story of Valentine’s Day.

For with God we look not for the order of nature, but rest our faith in the power of him who works.

Our children are not our own, but even more, our children are born in need. They are sinful, from conception and from birth.

Christ has received the mark of law that we might be marked with the gospel, with the sign of his holy cross on our heads and hearts as redeemed children of God.

While the world and other religions might be fine with considering him everything but, the foremost thing our Jesus came to be and still remains is Jesus, Savior.

Buried deep in our human psyche, there seems to be more than a need—almost a necessity—to celebrate the arrival of a new year. It’s like an unspoken, unlegislated cultural demand, as instinctual as moving to music or smiling at a newborn. Why? What deep human need is at work here?

Is it possible to celebrate Thanksgiving every time we come together as God’s people as well?