Advent

WEEKLY MEDITATION 26 DECEMBER – 1 JANUARY 2023

Father, as this year comes to an end, we ask for your continued blessing, guidance, health, protection, and love as we enter a new year. We ask that Your will be done here on Earth. We ask for your peace…in our lives and the world. We ask that you help us understand your word through the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and open our hearts and minds so that we may understand and incorporate your word and will into our lives for your glory. Please give us peace and comfort in these difficult times and help us cling to you through your word and the presence of the Holy Spirit. Please help us to see your blessings in our lives and give us a spirit of gratitude to you and for you. We know you are in control and will use these challenging times for your good. Forgive us if we interpret your silence as a lack of your love. We know you will answer if we only stay faithful. In Jesus name, we pray.

– Amen

“As it is written: “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9-10)

“For I know the plans I have for you” Declares the Lord, “Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11)

“Our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body” (Philippians 3:20-21)

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WEEKLY MEDITATION 5-11 DECEMBER 2016

As you begin this week we ask that you meditate on the following scriptures and how they apply to your life and your growing relationship with the Lord.

Father, we ask that you help us understand your word through guidance of the Holy Spirit, and open our hearts and minds so that we may incorporate your guidance and will into our lives for your glory.

– Amen

Worship is the “thank you” that refuses to be silenced…..

“God love the world so much that he gave his one and only Son so that whoever believes in him may not be lost, but have eternal life. God did not send his Son into the world to judge the world guilty, but to save the world through him” (John 3:16-17)

“If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord”, and if you believe in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9)

“We have seen and can testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14)

 

 

He Came Near. Christmas Message

John 3:16 …For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

As Christmas dawns across the world, we wish you and your family a very blessed and peaceful Christmas and New Year.  We also ask that you keep those less fortunate then yourselves, those who are persecuted for their Christian faith, those that are lonely and suffering, those in need and all those who need prayer in their lives, in your prayers.

“We have troubles all around us, but we are not defeated. We do not know what to do, but we do not give up the hope of living. We are persecuted, but God does not leave us. We are hurt sometimes, but we are not destroyed…So we do not give up. Our physical body is becoming older and weaker, but our spirit inside us is made  new every day. We have small troubles for a while now, but they are helping us fain an eternal glory that is much greater than the troubles. We set our eyes not on what we see but on what we cannot see..” 1 Corinthians 4:8-9, 16-18

“Then suddenly there appeared with the angel an army of the troops of heaven (a heavenly knighthood), praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest [heaven], and on earth peace among men with whom He is well pleased [men of goodwill, of His favor]. Luke 2:13-14 AMP

We would like to leave you with this last Christmas Story from Max Lucado’s book Grace For the Moment. “In Bethlehem, the human being who best understood who God was and what he was doing, was a teenage girl in a smelly stable. As Mary looked into the face of the baby, she saw her son, her Lord, His majesty.  She couldn’t take her eyes off him!  Somehow Mary knew she was holding God.  So this is he, she thought. She remembered the words of the angel. “His kingdom will never end!”

He looks like anything but a king. His cry, though strong and healthy, was still the helpless and piercing cry of a baby. Majesty in the midst of mundane. Holiness in the filth of sheep manure and sweat. Divinity entering the world on the floor of a stable, through the womb of a teenager and in the presence of a carpenter. God came near! And Luke 1:33 says, “His kingdom will never end!”

Merry Christmas and God’s blessings be upon you.

– Sola Fide Ministries

Remember Our Persecuted Family This Christmas

Sponsor Christmas Care Packs and Village Outreach Kits through our brothers and sisters at Voice of the Martyrs.

Send a gift to persecuted Christians in one of the nations where VOM serves. Bless a child with a Christmas Care Pack full of items to use at school and home, including Christian literature such as a children’s Bible. Provide Christian workers with a Village Outreach Kit that includes tools to help them effectively reach others with the gospel. This year, packs will be distributed among the more than 60 nations where VOM works.

Please click here to learn more or sponsor a care pack.

The Voice of the Martyrs is a non-profit,inter-denominational Christian organization dedicated to assisting our persecuted family worldwide. VOM was founded in 1967 by Pastor Richard Wurmbrand, who was imprisoned 14 years in Communist Romania for his faith in Christ. His wife, Sabina, was imprisoned for three years. In the 1960s, Richard, Sabina, and their son, Mihai, were ransomed out of Romania and came to the United States. Through their travels, the Wurmbrands spread the message of the atrocities that Christians face in restricted nations, while establishing a network of offices dedicated to assisting the persecuted church. The Voice of the Martyrs continues in this mission around the world today through the following main purposes:

WEEKLY MEDITATION 30 NOVEMBER – 6 DECEMBER

As you begin this week we ask that you meditate on the following scriptures and how they apply to your life and your growing relationship with the Lord.

Father, we ask that you help us understand your word through guidance of the Holy Spirit, and open our hearts and minds so that we may incorporate your guidance and will into our lives for your glory.

– Amen

Worship is the “thank you” that refuses to be silenced…..

“I urge you now to live the life to which God called you. Always be humble, gentle, and patient, accepting each other in love. You are joined together with peace through the Spirit, so make every effort to continue together in the this way” (Ephesians 4:1-3)

“Love each other deeply, because love will cause many sins to be forgiven. Open your homes to each other, without complaining. Each of you has received a gift to use to serve others. Be good servants of God’s various gifts of grace” (1 Peter 4:  8-10)

“Be sure that no one pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to do what is good for each other and for all people” (1 Thessalonians 5:15)

Bring a Torch, Jeannette, Isabella

During this season of Advent, we would like to share some short stories, scripture, poems and essays with you over the coming weeks regarding Jesus’s birth and the indescribable gift we have been blessed with should we chose to accept it. Today we are presenting “Bring a Torch, Jeannette, Isabella”.

Bring a torch, Jeannette, Isabella;

Bring a torch, come swiftly and run.

Christ is born, tell the folk of the village;

Jesus is sleeping in His cradle.

Ah, ah, beautiful is the Mother;

Ah, ah, beautiful is her Son.

Hasten now, good folk of the village;

Hasten now, the Christ-Child to see.

You will fin Him asleep in the manger;

Quietly come and whisper softly,

Hush, hush, peacefully now He slumbers;

Hush, hush peacefully now He sleeps.

The Birth of Jesus

During this season of Advent, we would like to share some short stories, scripture, poems and essays with you over the coming weeks regarding Jesus’s birth and the indescribable gift we have been blessed with should we chose to accept it. Today we are presenting “The Birth of Jesus” by Henry Van Dyke.

The birth of Jesus is the sunrise of the Bible. Towards this point the aspirations of the prophets and the poems of the psalmists were directed as the heads of flowers are turned toward the dawn. From this point a new day began to flow very silently over the world-a day of faith and freedom, a day of home and love. When we remember the high meaning that has come into human life and the clear light that has flooded softly down from the manger-cradle in Bethlehem of Judea, we do not wonder that mankind has learned to reckon history from the birthday of Jesus, and to date all events by the years before or after the Nativity of Christ.

In The Bleak Mid-Winter

During this season of Advent, we would like to share some short stories, scripture, poems and essays with you over the coming weeks regarding Jesus’s birth and the indescribable gift we have been blessed with should we chose to accept it. Today we are presenting “In The Bleak Mid-Winter by Christina Rossetti.

What can I give Him,

Poor as I am?

If I were a shepherd,

I would bring a lamb,

If I were a Wise Man,

I would do my part,-

Yet what can I give Him?

Give my heart.

“December 25…Or Thereabout”

During this season of Advent, we would like to share some short stories, scripture, poems and essays with you over the coming weeks regarding Jesus’s birth and the indescribable gift we have been blessed with should we chose to accept it. Today we are presenting “December 25…Or Thereabout” by Alfred Edersheim.

It was, then, on that “wintery night” of the 25th of December, that shepherds watched the flocks destined for sacrificial service, in the very place consecrated by tradition as that were the Messiah was to be first revealed. Of a sudden came the long-delayed, unthought-of announcement. Heaven and earth seemed to mingle, as suddenly an Angel stood before their dazzled eyes, while the out streaming glory of the Lord seemed to enwrap them, as in a mantle of light. Surprise, awe, fear would be hushed into calm and expectancy, as from the Angel they  heard, that what they saw boded not judgement, but ushered in to waiting Israel the great joy of those good tidings which he brought: that the long-promised Savior, Messiah, Lord, was born in the City of David, and that they themselves might go and see, and recognize Him by the humbleness of circumstances surrounding His Nativity.