The Promise Of The Spirit.1

"It is the Spirit
 that has the power
 to give life."

                      -Jesus

Another Christmas season is upon us.  Do you suppose Jesus gets annoyed at all the people who won't celebrate the season properly?  Wait, what is the proper way to celebrate, it is His birthday after all?  
-Purge the urge to get caught up in the commercialism? (saw a young Amish-man at Walmart picking out a Nerf-gun, presumably for a child...are there no sanctuaries of simplicity left in this world?!). 
-Feel indignant at the insufferable secular infiltration into His important incursion? (Believe in Santa/Don't believe in Santa...)  
-Pout at the potency of pitiful popular sentiment? ("The Dog Who Saved Christmas"...seriously?)
-Antagonize atheists who attack our sacred symbols?  (Stop making me say "Happy Holidays!"...darn you!)

Or maybe its to quietly and thankfully remember that this season represents all that Jesus is about: attracting to himself all that makes life troublesome - our lack or want magnified by our inability to satisfy it!

My Christmas wish for you, follower of Jesus, is to be reminded of these wonderful truths, from friend George Mac:

• that the soul [filled with] harmony has more life, a larger being, than the soul consumed of cares;

• that the sage is a larger life than the clown;

• that the poet is more alive than the man whose life flows out that money may come in;

• that the man who loves his fellow is infinitely more alive than he whose chief effort is to exalt himself above him;

• that the man who strives to be better, is better, than he who longs for the praise of the many;

• And, best of all, that the man to whom God is all in all, who feels his life-roots hid with Christ in God, who knows himself the inheritor of all wealth and worlds and ages, yea, of power essential and in itself, that man has begun to be alive indeed.

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"Let us in all the troubles of life remember—that our one lack is life—that what we need is more life—more of the life-making presence in us making us more, and more largely, alive." 

--George MacDonald, Life, Unspoken Sermons II

May you, by the Power of the Spirit, experience more and more of the Life He came into this world to let us taste, and in our tasting create a greater longing for, the love that satisfies as it ever expands its own life-giving presence -- in us and through us! 

Faith That Moves Mountains.4

"These signs will follow those who believe: In my name they will cast out devils. They will speak with new tongues. Serpents, or deadly things, will not harm them. They will lay hands on the sick and the sick will be made whole. Possessing faith the size of a mustard seed, they shall say to the mountains: 'Be removed and cast into the sea.'"

--Jesus

Walking through a Walmart one day I saw a man with a "withered hand" (actually it was his whole arm, but I digress). I went through this thought process:

"What if I had the courage, like Jesus, to boldly approach this guy and ask if he wants his arm made well. What if after conquering my own fear and unbelief and getting excited about the possibility of a real miracle occurring right in the middle of Walmart, just like a modern day Jesus, what if he responded: 'Actually I was just looking for the butter.' Not sure what I would have said after that...probably best just to not trouble the man. Yeah, best not to trouble him..."
The point of that little scenario is that I am confessing that I've struggled with the whole 'laying hands on the sick and the sick will be made well' thing. If I believed I could do that, does that mean that the person needing wellness would recieve it? Whose faith is being tested? The one who believes God can use them to bless others in wonder-filled ways or the one who has lost hope in ever changing their miserable circumstances?

Just watched the movie "John Q" again, depicting a desperate father, trying to get a new heart transplant for his dying son, taking on the evil medical/insurance complex and emerging the hero for both his wife & son as well as the financially disadvantaged. 
 Heroes come in a variety of shapes and sizes and the One who spoke from "Himalayas that we can only view from our sand heaps" sought to inspire in those who "will follow" the possibility of being like Him and His Father. Like God, we love and help and save. And with the powers of the Godhead at our disposal the possibilities of loving, helping and saving are infinite!

Dressing up in a superhero costume doesn't make one a superhero; but it does remind us that reality often intrudes on fantasy! For the follower of Jesus, however, we live daily with the possibility of the supernatural intruding on the strife-filled, weary natural leaving a life, a family, a community, a nation, a world a better place to live!