To Bring Him Joy

  “ But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.” (Matthew 1:20-21, 24-25 ESV) So the other morning when I was reading the story of the birth of Jesus, aka the Christmas story, and the warning in the dream to the wise men stood out to me, I decided I would go back and see just how many times this happened in this story. It happened quite often to Joseph. This passage caught my attention and caused me to not only thank God for Joseph but for my husband, who is much like Joseph. Maybe you have a Joseph that you need to give much more

  "And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way." Matthew 2:12 ESV As I told you in my previous post, I've been trying to read the story of the birth of Jesus around Christmas time for over thirty years now, asking God to show me something new.  I'm hoping to share some of those things with you over the next few weeks.  I'm so excited as I have been reading and remembering different things that the Holy Spirit has spoken to me about through His word and this particular story over the years.  I want to say that just because I call it a story does not mean that it didn't happen. It is not a fairy tale. It is a biography, the story of the living God that He has chosen to reveal to us in written form. Wow, what a blessing that He would want to share His story with us and even more that He would want to share Himself with us. Of course, this is why He wrote this history. The whole Bible has been written

“Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. ” Philippians 2:5-8 ESV   Every year I struggle with just exactly how to celebrate Christmas. In fact, I probably struggle with how to celebrate every holiday, even birthdays! My husband says that holidays will never be the way that I want them until I'm in heaven! I so badly want them all to be about Jesus and I struggle with how to create that atmosphere for each member of my family. I remember when I was a freshman in college deciding that I kind of hated Christmas and holidays because I had the misconception that they were supposed to be about family and my family was broken with no hope of being whole. Don

     " Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving."   Colossians 2:6-7 ESV How often do we "abound in thanksgiving"?  It actually means: to overflow, to excel still more, to increase in excellence. I don't think that I can claim to excel in thanksgiving much less excel still more or increase in excellence. I am way behind when it comes to thanksgiving. It should be my daily attitude and practice but to often it is not. This is telling of a couple of major things: that I don't really know God, who He is and what He has done and I don't know myself, how sinful I am and what great need I have. Or I have lost focus, forgotten these most important things, it is the Gospel, after all. Throughout the Old Testament this phrase is repeated in some form over and over again: “Oh give thanks to the LORD for He is good, H