Delightsome Land

King Herod We like to talk about what it looks like when people have courage. But what happens when people decide to not be courageous?  The Christmas story shows us an example of someone who was not courageous. His name was Herod, and he was king over the Jews when Jesus was born. We often think of a king as a courageous person, don’t we? King David in the Old Testament certainly showed courage. He knew that his courage came from God, and that courage helped him fight a giant named Goliath! But, sometimes kings are not courageous. Instead, they are afraid. King Herod was like that. What do you think he was afraid of? Stop for a minute and share some ideas with your family.  Did you guess that King Herod might have been afraid of someone taking his power away? If so, then you guessed right! Instead of being a courageous king who ruled well and protected his people, he was an evil king who did hateful things to anyone who he thought might take away his power. ...

  This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit. Joseph, to whom she was engaged, was a righteous man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement quietly. As he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. “Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit. And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All of this occurred to fulfill the Lord’s message through his prophet: “Look! The virgin will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, which means ‘God is with us.’” When Joseph woke up, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife. -Matthew 1:18...

In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a village in Galilee, to a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of King David. Gabriel appeared to her and said, “Greetings, favored woman! The Lord is with you! ” Confused and disturbed, Mary tried to think what the angel could mean. “Don’t be afraid, Mary,” the angel told her, “for you have found favor with God! You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David. And he will reign over Israel forever; his Kingdom will never end!” Mary asked the angel, “But how can this happen? I am a virgin.” The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the baby to be born will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God. What’s more, your relative Elizabet...

Luke 1:5‭-‬7 https://bible.com/bible/116/luk.1.5-7.NLT Luke 1:23‭-‬25 https://bible.com/bible/116/luk.1.23-25.NLT Elizabeth and Zechariah Close your eyes for a minute and think about something you want really badly. Maybe you want to go somewhere special with your family. Perhaps there is a very special Christmas present you have in mind. Maybe you have a test coming up that you want to do well on. As you grow older, you will want different things like a car or a college scholarship or just the right job.  It is not a bad thing to want something very badly. But, sometimes we get so focused on what we want that we start to become afraid or mad about not getting it. What can we do to keep ourselves from becoming afraid or mad?  In the book of Luke in the Bible, the first characters we read about in the Christmas story are two people named Zechariah and Elizabeth. Zechariah and Elizabeth were married, but they did not have any children. They wanted children to hel...

I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord. They will be My people, and I will be their God, for they will return to Me with all their heart.  — Jeremiah 24:7 Lauren stared at the photo on her phone, barely comprehending what she saw. It was a picture of her son, William, lying in a hospital bed, his head wrapped in a bloody bandage. He had been assaulted in what he said was a random robbery, and Lauren wanted to believe him. Given what they knew about their son’s current lifestyle, she didn’t know what to think. Lauren and her husband, Mike, had been lukewarm about William’s plan to move to Chicago when he graduated from college. They understood why a guy from a small town in Alabama would want to spread his wings, but his idea — to launch a neighborhood-based classified-ad service to sell things like used furniture, cars, and household goods — sounded iffy. William had majored in business, but he knew very little about technology and even less about Chicago’s div...

Deflect Despair [God] gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.  — 1 Corinthians 15:57 NIV There is a story about Martin Luther going through a period of discouragement and depression. For days his long face graced the family table and dampened the family’s home life. One day his wife came to the breakfast table all dressed in black, as if she were going to a funeral service. When Martin asked her who had died, she replied, “Martin, the way you’ve been behaving lately, I thought God had died, so I came prepared to attend His funeral.” Her gentle but effective rebuke drove straight to Luther’s heart, and as a result the great Reformer resolved never again to allow worldly care, resentment, depression, discouragement, or frustration to defeat him. By God’s grace, he vowed, he would submit his life to the Savior and reflect His grace in a spirit of rejoicing, whatever came. When was the last time you praised God in the midst of despair? Don’t wait until you “feel like it,”...

Christians  should  be the happiest people we know.  Agree? Yet, I have felt for a while now that doesn’t seem to be the general consensus…and maybe you’ve felt it, too.  Why is that?  Why is it that the people who claim to have found true joy and abundant life in the person of Jesus Christ don’t reflect it in their faces, attitudes, thoughts, business dealings or home environments?  Listen, I get it.  I really do.  It’s hard, y’all. Like the famous quote from the movie,  Forest Gump : Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get. Have you ever woken up in a great mood, ready to take on the day, and then after one unexpected let down, disappointment, or choice, you find yourself becoming a yelling “mommy monster” to your kids, and a “negative Nancy” to everyone else?  Life derails our positivity and joy like nothing else.  And, more than often, we cave to whatever circumstances are thrown our way. Now, jus...