Joy in Emmanuel

 Psalms 16: 5-11; Colossians 1: 9-13

 

This week’s Advent candle is Joy. We now have three flames of light in the darkness. We have gone from Hope in God’s Love and from this we have Joy in our salvation – in the Christ child who will come and bring us salvation.

David in Psalms 16 finds fullness of joy in the presence of the Lord. His heart is glad, and his soul rejoices since he keeps the Lord always before him – God being at his right hand. Due to this he won’t be moved. He will endure and have patience during the hard times of life. He claims that in God’s right hand are pleasures forevermore.

The Lord being always present and before him brings us one of the names of Jesus given at his birth – that of Emmanuel meaning God with us. Jesus fully God incarnated became human to bring salvation to us. So instead of dying and going to Sheol or the Pit God will show David the path of life. This way of life will be shown in the life the baby Jesus will live out. The way of eternal life will also be provided in Jesus’s death on the cross for our sins.

Colossians 1 tells of how God has enabled us to share in the inheritance of the saints of life. Ow Christ’s work on the cross has rescued us from the power of darkness into Christ’s kingdom of light.

Though we have joy in our salvation, our Pleasure was promised to the Psalmist in the afterlife. Christian walk may not be a total pleasure ride. Though we are thankful for the gift of eternal life where we are promised eternal bliss, our life on earth is not always so.

Paul prays for the Colossians that they may walk worthy of the Lord, pleasing God and bearing fruit in good works. He prays for them to be strengthened by God’s power during the hard times so they can endure and have patience always giving thanks to the knowledge of God’s will in understanding so they can have this gratitude – this joy – even in the midst of troubled times knowing that it is well with their soul. They can see then the light of Christ’s power and love to pull them through.

Being in Christ’s kingdom, Christ is at our right hand. Let us be filled with joy being thankful for Emmanuel – God with us – Christ’s presence that gives us the strength and endurance during the rough times. Amen.

 

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Join Me on a Lenten Journey

For those of you not familiar with Lent, it is a season of forty days, which begins on Ash Wednesday and ends on Holy Saturday. Lent comes from the Anglo Saxon word lencten, which means "spring." The forty days represents the time Jesus spent in the wilderness, enduring the temptation of Satan and preparing to begin his ministry. Lent is a time of repentance, fasting and preparation for the coming of Easter. It is a time of self-examination and reflection. Today, Christians focus on their relationship with God, often choosing to give up something or to volunteer and give of themselves for others. Easter comes early this year. Many of us not brought up in this tradition can still embrace its emphasis of focusing on the gifts Christ has brought into your lives and finding ways to share the love of Christ to others. This emphasis of love goes along well with the beginning of Lent this year, Ash Wednesday, falling on all days – Valentine’s Day. So whether or not you plan
Read more

Setting Your Hope in God

 Disclaimer: Paul talks about the Rapture in this passage a concept I still struggle with. I believe that once you die you go direct to the Lord, so bodies awaiting till the rapture to rise is hard for me to grasp. I can see how Paul was comforting the Thessalonians here but was his concept correct? Add any comments you wish to this bafflement of mine. That said, I wrote this per the text. What do you all think? Psalms 78:1-7; I Thessalonians 4:13-18   The psalmist in Psalms 78 is not only telling his current audience to listen to his teaching but to pass it on from one generation to the next. Just like he has heard it from his ancestors, he asks the Israelites to teach them to the coming generations. They are to teach them to the children yet unborn so that these children will teach their children. Why? So, they should set their hope in God, not forgetting God’s works. Fast forward to the New Testament where Paul is passing on this hope to the Thessalonians. The question these bel
Read more

Do What they Teach, Not What they Do

  Matthew 23: 1-12; I Thessalonians 2:9-13   Jesus when he talks about the scribes and the Pharisees in Matthew 23 basically says: “Do what they teach but not what they do.” What he questions most is their motivation. They do what they do to be seen by others. They wear fancy robes and love to have the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues. They love to be greeted with respect. All this Jesus sums up in the word pride or not being humble. He states then that those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted. Years later Paul writes to the Thessalonians telling how he did what Christ had instructed. That he was humble leading a life worthy of God, his motivation being for God’s glory not his own. He tells that not only are the Thessalonians his witnesses of this but God also. They have seen how pure, upright, and blameless his conduct has been. He encourages the Thessalonians to do the same. To live a life worthy of
Read more