Do Not Be Afraid

“Do not be afraid.” For any student of the bible who has wandered through the pages of Scripture, the words, Do not be afraid should create an unsettled feeling deep in our gut. Our exegetical red flags should signal something is about to happen. God is about to act in a decisive way. God is about to do something that will leave the person or persons receiving the message totally changed. There will be no going back to the old way of life. A new course is about to be plotted out. God is about to turn everything upside down. Do not be afraid, God said and then Moses found himself leading the Israelites through the desert for forty years. Do not be afraid, said the prophet Elijah and then he asked the widow of Zerepath to give up her last morsel of food. Do not be afraid Jesus said and then he invited Peter to step out onto the water. Do not be afraid, said Gabriel, and then an unmarried girl became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Do not be afraid, God said to me years ago when God called me into the ministry. Do not be afraid, God told a couple when God lead them into a foreign land. Do not be afraid, God said when God closed one door and opened up another for you. Do not be afraid, God said when God asked you to serve in the church. Do not be afraid, was the words you heard when you found yourself in an uncomfortable position for the sake of the gospel. Do not be afraid, was shouted deep in your soul when you were challenged to step out of your comfort zone to share the love of Christ.

If you have never heard those words or its been a while since you have, then don’t be surprised if they come to you at unexpected moments. Don’t be surprised if you wake up in the middle of the night with the urge to do something different. Don’t be surprised if you are sitting in church one Sunday morning trying not to fall asleep when all of a sudden God knocks you out of your pew. Don’t be surprised if you find your self in a situation and something tells you that is what you were made for. Don’t be surprised if you hear the words, “Do not be afraid!” And find your world turned upside down. Don’t be surprised because God is a God of surprises. God loves to surprise ordinary common folk with impossible tasks. Do not be afraid, is a signal that you are about to be taken on a wild ride with the One for whom nothing is impossible!

It was the message given to Mary by the Angel and it is the Good News given to us. “Do not be afraid, for you have found favor with God,” is our invitation to act courageously for the sake of the Gospel. It is the invitation to believe the incredible, to accept the inconceivable, and to embrace the impossible. It is a call to begin a journey that demands all our courage, all our strength, all our faith. It is a summons to plunge headlong into the unknown. It is the call to travel unfamiliar territory. The request to love neighbor, love enemy, and to live for the Kingdom of God. It is an enticement to use our talents, treasure, and time for the purpose of God’s Kingdom. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Be a neighbor to someone in need! Do not be afraid, God is with you! Find time to minister to the hundreds of teenagers in our community who are searching for role models. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Invest in God’s kingdom. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Be a peacemaker instead of violence. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Answer the call into the ministry. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Respond to the voice that calls forth overseas to missions. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Pray for a friend. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Offer forgiveness to an enemy. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Keep promises, speak the truth. Do not be afraid, God is with you! Visit a new neighbor, invite them to church, build a relationship. Do not be afraid, God is with you!

Not So Silent

Silent night, holy night. All is calm, all is bright round yon virgin mother and child. Holy infant, so tender and mild, sleep in heavenly peace…

One of the reasons this hymn is so popular is because it paints an image of a “perfect” Christmas. It is the kind of Christmas we all say we want but often never get.

We all know the reality of Christmas is far from perfect. Children who get up at the crack of dawn are cranky by 10 a.m. In receiving guests you quickly realize you forgot a gift and go rushing to the bedroom looking for something that looks new and can be disguised behind wrapping paper. After all those guests are gone, the sink is piled high with dirty dishes. And the worst, the toy does not fit together the way explained in the instructions. Silent night, holy night, all is calm, all is bright . . .

The good news is that Christmas does not need to be perfect to be Christmas. God does not wait around until our lives are perfect to give us the gift of Christmas. The gift of Christmas comes regardless of and in the very midst of our imperfect, incomplete, and disordered life. Casseroles burn. A not so friendly game of family feud erupts. Perfectly decorated and cleaned homes look like war zones after all the presents are unwrapped. A baby is still born.

On that first Christmas morning, it is anything but calm. Bethlehem is overcrowded. Israel is being occupied by an outside force whose version of peace was ushered in through military oppression. The city is in an uproar. The people are anxious and fearful. A baby will be born regardless of the housing conditions. Shepherds leave their flocks and search through the chaos for a newborn.

We seek God through the special, the peaceful, and the calmly prepared moments. Instead God comes to us in the ordinary distractions of life. God comes to us in the busyness. God comes in the midst of our struggles. God comes in the midst of our mistakes. Life is not perfect. Christmas is not perfect. But peace is announced and a baby is born. This Christmas may not be silent, but it can still be holy.


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Live with Hope in the Heart

In a couple of days the madness will be over. The stores will be back to their normal hours. The Christmas lights – well most of them – will be coming down. Parties over. Wrapping paper in trash. Fudge eaten. The important thing for us is what we do after we have seen Jesus. After the angels left and heaven was silent, the shepherds went to see Jesus. After the angels visit, Mary said “let it be.” Joseph chose to marry Mary. Gideon led an ill-equipped army. Moses marched with the Jews through the desert. Fishermen dropped their nets and followed the Master. What have you done with the grace you have been given? When I was going to Candler I always saw this car with a bumper sticker that read, “Safe women don’t change the world.” A group of psychologists got together to study regret. They asked the question, “As people reflect on their lives what do they most regret?” The surprising answer is that most people regret the things they left undone more than the mistakes they’ve made. The shepherds had heard from heaven and they acted. They would never have to look back on their lives and say I wish I would have done something with the message that the angels had shared with us. Never would they have to say, “I wish I would’ve ….” How many times will we say that? On December 26th and the days following what are you going to do with your encounter with the Christmas miracle. Do something. Live the life that God has given. Empower others. No regrets! Howard Thurman has a poem entitled “The Work of Christmas.” He says, “When the song of the angels is stilled, When the star in the sky is gone, When the kings and princes are home, When the shepherds are back with their flock, The work of Christmas begins: To find the lost, To heal the broken, To feed the hungry, To release the prisoner, To rebuild the nations, To bring peace among the brothers, To make music in the heart.” Go ahead live life like the shepherds. Live with hope in the heart.

Incarnational Living

Faye Yu lives in Freetown, Sierra Leone, in the postwar horror of a punishing ten-year conflict. She has been sent by God to this region of the world in order to incarnate the good news of Christ among the children who were enslaved by this horrible war. Ten thousand children in this small country were forced into the war, some as young as five years old. If they refused to kill on behalf of the rebel army their limbs were cut off. They witnessed the killing of parents, forced to participate in the killings of family members, brainwashed, and drugged. Many of the girls were uses as sex toys for the older soldiers. In the wake of this childhood robbery, Faye is called to embody Jesus Christ. She has been sent to “flesh out” her belief in Jesus Christ. Her call as she sees it is to give children permission to be children again.
Faye understands a concept of the gospel that many of us have failed to capture. We cannot live out the gospel from a distance. We cannot be Christ from a distance. We cannot be unattached when it comes to fleshing out the good news. Jesus Christ didn’t stay in the heavens to save us. He entered our world. He became as us, a particular person, in a particular place, at a particular time. God calls us to the same. Incarnational living places Christ at the center of our life and our life at the center of what God is doing in the world. Living incarnationally gives perspective. It helps us see others, God and ourselves in new ways. To each one of us God has called us to incarnate the Gospel in a particular way at a particular time and a particular place. Each day incarnation is a choice. We are always tempted with finding easier ways out, compromising the message, or refusing to live out the gospel. Our journey with Jesus and movement closer to God is lived out when we make a conscious decision each day to live incarnate. It’s the little choices to live simply and give our lives for the sake of others that defines incarnational living.
John writes, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it” (John 1:5). God enters the darkness. God refuses to remain in heaven and allow the world to be consumed by darkness. Instead, God climbs down into the darkest places of our lives to be with us. The message of Christmas is that darkness does not overcome. In Jesus, the light has come. We are not alone. The hope of Christmas is that God is present, God has given company. God has moved into the neighborhood.
This Christmas I challenge you to carry that light into someone’s dark world. Be the light in someone’s darkness. Make this Christmas the time for you to start living the life of Jesus, incarnational living.

A Christmas More Meaningful

This is an article I wrote for The Paper (Braselton) last year.

Have you ever seen the construction of a Wal-Mart Supercenter? What a sight! A mammoth structure that houses everything from a grocery store to a place to get new tires. You can purchase your blue jeans along with your office supplies. You can buy a lamp shade and get a loaf of bread. And we flock there because it’s one-stop shopping, famous low prices, and a quick get in and get out affair. Don’t forget about the official smiley face mascot that greets you on every sign. It just makes you feel all warm and fuzzy as you spend your money.
This Christmas I have struggled. I had a friend give my wife and I some toy catalogs to look through because we were struggling with what to get our children for Christmas. So one evening we sat our oldest son down on the couch and said we are going to look through some toy catalogs. He jumped up in between us on the couch and for the next hour we combed through a wonderland of consumption. The next night we said we were going to read the Christmas story from the Bible and you would have thought that we said we were going to force him to drink soured milk – at least from the look on his face. To his credit he has changed and now has been retelling the Christmas story to us. We made a decision this year that we were not going to let Toys R Us tell us what our children need for Christmas.
Imagine yourself a shepherd. You have finished registering with the census. You are back caring for your sheep. Being away from the lights of the city you are able to catch a glimpse of the stars. You sit staring into the heavens with thoughts of family in mind. You imagine that back home your wife is snuggling your children into bed. As she lays down to sleep she whispers a prayer for “peace on earth.” In the stillness of the night you worry about your family. “What kind of world will your children find themselves in?” What kind of life will they live?” Who will they grow up to be?” “Have you raised them right?” Have you taught them the importance of life?” “Have you given them enough?” “Do they trust in God?” “Do they long for Shalom?” At that moment the silence is broken and your heart is beating out of your chest. The voice assures you “do not be afraid, I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” What do you do with such a message? Do you get up at 4 a.m. to rush to Kohl’s because they are having an after Thanksgiving sale? Do you borrow credit off of your sheep and spend all that on gifts to bring to your children? And spend the rest of the year working overtime to pay off the debt that is owed! Or do you go on a search for the Christmas child. You don’t look in malls or advertisements. You don’t search for the Christ child on the internet or in magazines. Instead you go to the simplest of places. You find him wrapped in cloth not from Gap or Abercrombie and Fitch but handmade cloth. You find him in a manger and not in a decorated mansion. The beauty of the Christmas story is found in its simplicity. We are attracted by its simplicity. I believe one of the reasons we come back to it every year is because we long for that type of wonder and beauty. Remember the line from How the Grinch Stole Christmas: “And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before! “Maybe Christmas, “he thought, “doesn’t come from a store. Maybe Christmas perhaps means a little bit more!”