Are You Maturing In God’s Incarnate Light?
Good Morning Friends,
Light and Water are both pretty important for growing anything. But sometimes life’s tragedies and loss, sorrow and pain may obscure God’s radiant face. Sometimes we kind of dry up for lack of water. But God’s provision is never completely absent. In His birth, life, death and resurrection He is in this life always coming to us, always preparing us to welcome in a new season of Advent. He is a God that has at His command the hosts of Heaven ready to do His will at any moment of any hour of any day. Still He is binding our wounds with swaddling clothes, mending our hearts outside the gates… covering our sins with a cloth designed to be used for death’s journey and yet it is here in His new life that He gives us a strength with power over death through a light of love and prepares us for a wedding. Are you Maturing In God’s Incarnate Light?
Scripture: The God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” . . . has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians 4:6 (NRSV)
May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers–all things have been created through him and for him.
Colossians 1:11-16 (NRSV)
After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow.
Matthew 28:1-3 (NRSV)
he says, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”
Isaiah 49:6 (NRSV)
Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty thunder peals, crying out, “Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready; to her it has been granted to be clothed with fine linen, bright and pure”— for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints. And the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” And he said to me, “These are true words of God.”
Revelation 19:6-9 (NRSV)
As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.
Colossians 3:12 (NRSV)
Message: There is a disease running rampant in the world today. Instead of calling people to faith, repentance and submission to the supremacy of Christ it is telling us that Jesus just wants us to be happy and have a stress free life. That message keeps us and the baby Jesus forever in the manger. The minimizing of Jesus as prominent but not preeminent is a great darkness. We are to believe in the supremacy of Jesus over what has been created and over what Jesus is bringing into creation. Jesus is paramount over everything….the cosmos and the church… the light and the dark….everything He has made. Here we see that Jesus is God with us… the unique Son of God… the firstborn…the creator of all things….and He and only He holds all things together…He binds us together in His swaddling clothes and death shroud and prepares us for a wedding feast. Here His light exposes the darkness in us. And here if we confess and repent our stained clothing is made clean. Here the beginning and ruler of Holy History heals us in His light. Here in the radiance of Christ we connect the birth, life, death and resurrection of Christ. Here we prepare for the wedding feast and Christ’s return in a cloud of light. Perhaps this Season we need to experience another kind of White Christmas that shimmers in our growth with God.
Pray that we grow in the formation of light manifested in our lives. Pray we not fall into the chaos of darkness. Pray we seek and find Jesus in this life. Pray that the fullness of Jesus…the Spirit of God dwell in us.
Pray that we realize that Jesus is not just an image of God but God incarnate. Pray we realize that some will not believe and some will bring false teachings but that where God’s truth is so too is His light. Pray that this Christmas we receive anew the gift of the life giving Incarnate Light of Christ. Pray we let God’s light shine through us. Pray the light of truth and love shine in and through us to the glory of God for His purpose in us. Pray that the truth of the light of Christ heals us and transforms us. Pray we become all that God wants us to be. Pray we keep growing. Pray
that we celebrate a wedding of our intellect with a heart that is as warm and kind as a mother’s love for a child. Pray we celebrate at the wedding feast in a light that never ends.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 