This is the day that the Lord has made, and it is a day on which the Lord has called us to remember His goodness and to count on His continued blessing.
God has picked me out to be His own and to enjoy all the benefits of liberation from Satan’s domination and all the blessings of the peace of His presence.
Not only is “the Hidden God” marked by the “no trespassing” sign, God Hidden also points us to the God revealed in Jesus the Messiah and the Scriptures which bear witness to Him.
No Bible passage is so clear that we cannot twist it to conform our own presuppositions and prejudices. We do this because we fear the implications of what the text says.
A life of repentance embraces the ashes placed on our own foreheads and the coals we feel heaped upon our heads, for these ashes and coals bid us to join in the refreshment and restoration that comes on the road of repentance.
Faith in the Risen One gives us a degree of certainty, even in the face of the trials of those around us, in our core understanding of self and world, for this faith relies on a person.
Any other foundation than the Gospel of Jesus Christ for shaping a reliable character will be inadequate, for all other foundations focus our lives on ourselves or some creature of God.
More easily than we think, our failure to respect and fear, love and trust in God above all things, can eat away at our peace, our joy, our life itself.
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.
Reconciliation with God affirms the worth of our persons, and it banishes the inhibitions and fears, as well as the resentments and desire for revenge, which create gulches between us and those around us.