Monday, December 30, 2013

Vessels & Treasures

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness, made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.  But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. - 2 Cor 4:6-7

 
As I looked at the Christmas tree this year I noticed the lights strung neatly on the branches, the little ornaments that adorned the tree, some holding messages of hope, joy, peace, and love.  And I noticed the presents wrapped under the tree, each a temporary container treated carefully because it would be the little vessel by which a treasure would be revealed on Christmas morning.  My son was especially excited about unwrapping a set of old steel strings because it conveyed the promise of a 5-string acoustic bass hidden in the other room.  After gifts are unwrapped in my husband's family the kids head outside and form a bonfire out of all the wrappings...in a weird way, it has become a family tradition.  I mean really, keeping the wrappings would seem silly, right?  After all, they've served their purpose of conveying a treasure to someone.
 
A treasure and it's vessel....hmm... I'm challenged as I considered what I hold
sacred? Things are sacred because something special has come from them.  Like a present wrapped under the tree, "sacred" things are the little vessels by which we encounter certain treasures.  So I may hold a date night with my husband “sacred” because it allows me to spend meaningful time with him.  The same would be true with regard to my kids.  When they were young, tucking them into bed felt sacred because it brought the treasure of being with them during that time.  My kids are much older now and tucking them in at bedtime would just be strange!  To encounter the treasure of time spent with them now, has required the vessel to change.
The same can hold true for our spiritual life.  Vessels are good because they lead us to the treasure, which is a living encounter with Christ.  However, vessels are not the treasure themselves.  They are only as good as their ability to lead us TO the treasure. 
 
I find it easy to invert these two things.  I’ve done it plenty of times and I bet you have too.  It may be a particular style of music in church, a certain family/faith tradition, or even a church program.  All of which are meant to lead us to the treasure of personally encountering God and they do!  For the Israelites it was the tabernacle, for Moses it was a burning bush, a pillar of fire and a hovering cloud, for Paul it was a walk to Damascus, during the 1960’s and 70’s in the United States it was The Jesus Movement, for me it was summer camp, and a particular song. All have been vessels by which someone has encountered the living God.  In the right season these things seem sacred because of the treasure they carry.   But vessels change as God brings a new treasure of himself into our midst and if I am not open to the new ways in which I may encounter Him, I will miss Him altogether.  when I hold the vessel too tightly I will end up majoring on minors and minoring on the major because I’m compelled to preserve the wrong thing – the vessel.  Without the treasure the vessel is useless and empty.
When we major on the minors we do things like get angry, even mean, as we try to protect something we've grown attached to.  We may become demanding, insisting things happen a certain way – a way that puts our vessel front and center.  The problem is that when our sacred vessel is front and center, Christ is not.  Vessels and our responses to them, can become great distractions from the real thing.  Perhaps there is a certain Sunday School program through which many came to find Christ and thinking back on that season seems like the "glory days" of church to you.   What was sacred was the Christ encounter, but it would be easy to make the Sunday school program "sacred" and want to keep it preserved just the way it was; when in reality it was merely the vessel God chose at the time to bring His presence.

Vessels play a vital role in in our ongoing relationship with God, but those vessels may change over time. If we hold them too tightly we will lose the treasure of being with God.  That treasure will evade us because our ability to find Him becomes limited to the deteriorating walls of an old vessel.
For those of us who are methodical plodders, we may keep dusting off the same vessel, time after time, and wonder why God is being so distant or why our experience of him has become so blah and dry.  Perhaps the vessel we are using has run its course and it’s time for something new.  This by no means negates the old.  It was good and wonderful because for a time it helped us orient around the One True Treasure - Christ...



"Neither do people pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved."...Jesus' words in Matt 9

Christ was preparing the people to encounter Him and His kingdom in a new way.


How have you encountered Christ in the past?  What made it meaningful? 

Are there vessels you've held onto that are no longer serving their purpose?
How have you worked to maintain or protect them (perhaps holding on too tight :))?

How is God inviting you to a new "wineskin" vessel so He can pour His new wine presence in you?

 

 
 

 

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

The Great Light

This morning my parents came over to share in some Christmas with us.  As we sat down to eat my father read an editorial he had found from the Wall Street Journal. It may surprise you, as it did me,  that it was not about economics or politics.  The following is a copy of the article.  It has been published in the WSJ every Christmas Eve since 1949 (which will explain some of its vernacular). I’ve thought many times about what I would post for Christmas on this blog.  I’ve had many creative ideas about it.  But none compare to the words of the late Vermont Royster penned so long ago.
"When Saul of Tarsus set out on his journey to Damascus the whole of the known world lay in bondage. There was one state, and it was Rome. There was one master for it all, and he was Tiberius Caesar.
Everywhere there was civil order, for the arm of the Roman law was long. Everywhere there was stability, in government and in society, for the centurions saw that it was so.
 
But everywhere there was something else, too. There was oppression—for those who were not the friends of Tiberius Caesar. There was the tax gatherer to take the grain from the fields and the flax from the spindle to feed the legions or to fill the hungry treasury from which divine Caesar gave largess to the people. There was the impressor to find recruits for the circuses. There were executioners to quiet those whom the Emperor proscribed. What was a man for but to serve Caesar?
 
There was the persecution of men who dared think differently, who heard strange voices or read strange manuscripts. There was enslavement of men whose tribes came not from Rome, disdain for those who did not have the familiar visage. And most of all, there was everywhere a contempt for human life. What, to the strong, was one man more or less in a crowded world?
 
Then, of a sudden, there was a light in the world, and a man from Galilee saying, Render unto Caesar the
things which are Caesar's and unto God the things that are God's.
And the voice from Galilee, which would defy Caesar, offered a new Kingdom in which each man could walk upright and bow to none but his God. Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. And he sent this gospel of the Kingdom of Man into the uttermost ends of the earth.
 
So the light came into the world and the men who lived in darkness were afraid, and they tried to lower a curtain so that man would still believe salvation lay with the leaders.
But it came to pass for a while in divers places that the truth did set man free, although the men of darkness were offended and they tried to put out the light. The voice said, Haste ye. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness come upon you, for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth.
 
Along the road to Damascus the light shone brightly. But afterward Paul of Tarsus, too, was sore afraid. He feared that other Caesars, other prophets, might one day persuade men that man was nothing save a servant unto them, that men might yield up their birthright from God for pottage and walk no more in freedom.
Then might it come to pass that darkness would settle again over the lands and there would be a burning of books and men would think only of what they should eat and what they should wear, and would give heed only to new Caesars and to false prophets. Then might it come to pass that men would not look upward to see even a winter's star in the East, and once more, there would be no light at all in the darkness.
And so Paul, the apostle of the Son of Man, spoke to his brethren, the Galatians, the words he would have us remember afterward in each of the years of his Lord:
Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage."
 
This editorial was written in 1949 by the late Vermont Royster and has been published annually since
 
Merry Christmas!

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Joy-Strength

Joy…what’s it all about?


Joy is much different than a state of profound happiness or excitement.  Joy is
deeper than that.  In fact neurologists have discovered that there is actually a “joy center” in the brain.  It’s there from the moment a person is born.  It’s developed through exchanges of delight; such as when a baby first meets its mother’s eyes and finds her smile, or when a parent returns home and the child runs into their open, waiting arms.  These are exchanges of joy through which we learn we are someone’s beloved and have a place in this world.

So joy is relational.  Contagiously, it is stirred up in a person when someone is glad to see them and they return joy back.  Studies show that Joy can grow between individuals at a rate of 6 cycles per second in a non-verbal face to face exchange.  In fact, in the absence of this joy exchange, a person can refer back to it and return to a state of joy.  That is the strength of joy.
Joy is actually one of the most powerful forces a person can experience. It can produce images of glad belonging and consolation that anchor the executive center of us (our heart, will, mind, and emotions)  Interestingly, one of the ways joy-strength is built happens as we learn to move through difficult circumstances and find joy on the other side of them.  Like the moment a climber crests the top of a steep mountain after a long and arduous hike, or when a parent embraces their child upon their return.  Moments like these produce in us the ability to say, “I know this is hard but we’ve done this before and we can do this again.”  Or “This is difficult, but the reward is worth it.”


“So why are you saying all of this?” You might ask.  Because all of us long to be the apple in someone’s eye, or experience moments of consolation after long desolate journeys. We were actually made to crave it and be nourished by it - by JOY.  That is what gives us the strength to journey on and live the life we were made to live.  It’s what helps life make sense.  And, while joy is built through relationship with others, it is ultimately built through our relationship with God.  Joy grows between us and God through shared moments.  It happens as we set our eyes on him and find his smile.  Over time we develop an ongoing sense of well-being learned through the goodness of God.

The One who came as a baby, came by way of a mother whom God strengthened through a "delight-exchange" between her and her cousin, Elizabeth (Luke 1:14); so at 8 months pregnant , Mary journeyed on the back of a donkey to share a stable and birth JOY – Emanuel, God with us.  Jesus, who "for the JOY set before him, endured the cross, despising its shame", now sits at the right hand of God (Heb. 12:2).  He is the Good King over all, forever waiting with open arms for us. He desires to be with us and anticipates our companionship.  He is the one who is mighty to save and rejoices over us with singing (Zeph. 3:17).  He, “makes our feet like hinds feet” (Ps 18:33) as we scale the craggy mountain paths of our life journey with Him. He tells his children that as they live under the banner of His love they will “Go out with Joy and be led forth with peace” (Isa 55:12). “The Joy of the Lord is our strength!” (Neh. 8:10) - Joy-Strength.   
Some Ideas on how to build Joy:

1.       Greet others with a smile.


2.       Invite others to tell you truthfully how they are doing, and what they are thinking.  Listen without interrupting.


3.       Take a sincere interest in really knowing the other person.  Work hard to understand the other’s fears, joys, passions, talents and pain.


4.       Treat each other with dignity and respect.

5.       Use touch when it’s appropriate.  Hold hands, link arms, give hugs, etc…

6.       Discover what brings someone joy and custom fit your time with them.

7.       Give little surprises that causes someone’s eye’s to light up…and let your eyes light up to!  Remember, Joy builds as the glances go back and forth.

8.       Cherish babies and children by establishing through words and actions that you are authentically “glad to be with them.”
 
9. ...and know that God does the same with us
 
 
 
Material taken from Living from the Heart Jesus Gave You, by James Friesen, Ph.D; E. James Wilder, Ph. D; Anne M Bierling, M.A.; and Maribeth Poole, M.A.

Monday, December 16, 2013

Journey to Joy


Joy: Joy is not pleasure, a mere sensation, but a pervasive and constant sense of wellbeing. Hope in the goodness of God is joy's indispensable support.- Dallas Willard

As I looked through our nativity sets recently, I noticed that we don't have a single one that shows Mary...pregnant... on a donkey.  That's when it struck me how uncharacteristic it must be.  It's funny how we often want to remember just the end of the story where all was calm and bright.  But "joy comes",  that phrase implies it was not first there.  We journey to joy.   

This week as we enter the JOY theme of Advent, I don’t necessarily feel joyful.  Over the last few weeks life has been a bit tangled.  Its uncanny how difficulties can bring rise to our otherwise buried pain.   I find myself wanting to manage it much like I'd shore up the discomfort of a headache with an aspirin. However, while there may be over-the-counter remedies for headaches, there are none for heart-disruption.  So we are left with a choice to either see it through or bury it.   One brings life, the other takes it.

It’s tempting and quite normal to bury pain, especially at Christmas.  Who has time to deal with trouble when there’s so much to be done? This is the season of peace, joy and love; not conflict, sorrow, and pain – right?  Every time we bury hurt it is like sowing a little seed of death.  It germinates in dark soil spaces, nourished by images of pain, and takes root. Over time, given the right environment, it will sprout; making its appearance above the soil in unexpected places.  With remarkably protective posture, this stubborn shoot yields cynicism, contempt, fear and isolation...joy-stealers! (By the way, I can always tell when I’ve encounter a bitter-root sapling because my response seems out of proportion to the circumstance.)

But there is another choice. We can invite God into the pain and let him bring healing.  That’s what happens when we “see it through”.  We stay in it, feel it, let it be messy and seek God in it...we gaze into his face to find him present.  Answers are tempting distractions, but rarely salve the wound the way the ministry and fellowship of God will.  As the song says, “He is the balm in Gilead that makes the wounded whole”. 

So this Advent-Joy time has been a reminder for me to journey to the manger, in the everyday-ordinary, to stare at what arises once again and hold joy close. 

Romans 12:1-2 says this, “So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him.….. fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out.”

That’s what difficulty does.  It affords the opportunity to adjust our focus and recount God's activity…

“Once again I’ll go over what God has done,
    lay out on the table the ancient wonders;
I’ll ponder all the things you've accomplished,
    and give a long, loving look at your acts.” – Ps 77:11-12

This is the anchor on which we tether our heart as it sways in the wind between the outcries of our soul and the whispers of God. (I wonder if Mary's heart swayed as she traveled over rough terrain on the back of a donkey journeying to Bethlehem?)  It’s worth every wave that comes because when it’s over, joy shows up.  Life is new and less hindered; allowing us to remember that while sorrow may be lent our way for a season, Joy is given to us for a lifetime. 


 As you consider the good things God has done, what come to mind?

What are the places of discomfort and pain that you are tempted to bury for the sake of the Holidays?

How can you invite God into it and let him bring healing and joy?

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Waiting...Maidservant Mishaps


Waiting….                                                                    Waiting is hard.                               Much like trying not to stare at      the gaps in these      phrases.  We see the gap                                     and want to bring         the words                back into position or fill the space with                   something else - something useful and productive.  You know, tidy it up a bit.  It’s hard to just LEAVE it there, unfinished and discombobulated.  And why would we?  Allowing the "gap" seems almost irresponsible– doesn’t it?          

Waiting for the Promise by Elspeth Young
Abraham’s wife, Sarah, saw many gaps like these in her life.  For a long time her life appeared unfinished and discombobulated.  After being uprooted from her community, she waited for a home, after years of bareness she longed for a child, after assuming God has smited her, she waited on a blessing, just to name a few things.   At times she grew cynical in the wait (see Genesis 18:11-15).  After all, she spent many years disappointed and barren.  At nearly eighty year old, the best years were behind her by the time God brought His promise to her .  Waiting seemed ridiculous, almost irresponsible. She figured a maidservant was her only hope for such a child-blessing, her preoccupation with the promise kept her from yielding to God in it...her plan did not work out very well. God’s plan is often much different than ours. So after her plans failed there she was, back to square one waiting.  Doubtful, but waiting.  She probably wondered how God would ever tidy up her unfinished story.

2000 years ago, the Jewish people waited on an unfinished story too. After a much discombobulated history, and a few wilderness moments, there they were, "barren" and displaced, awaiting a promise of deliverance hundreds of years before it would ever come to pass...they waited for centuries!  There were long gaps in the sentence structure of God's story for them.  Like Sarah’s story, the plan for a Messiah to bring all the pieces together looked different than most expected. Also like Sarah, Israel grew weary of waiting and took matters into their own hands to get the job done.  (After all, that would be the responsible thing to do - right?) While a few chose to stay alert and watch for God, many went about inaugurating “maidservant” plans of their own in the form of various leader and kings.  Their plan didn’t work any better for them than Sarah's did for her.  Running ahead of God never works.   I know.  I’ve tried many times and it has never, not one time, turned out well. 
When hope and vision come from God, it is a fierce undertaking to stay yielded to his stride in it.  It's often hard to believe our maidservant-plan is not the best.  Sometimes we'd rather give the promise up altogether than wait for it....too much pain and disappointment.  How does one just leave the story unfin   ished and                discon   nec   ted?  In fact, if I'm to be entirely honest, I know when I am preoccupied with the promise more than I am with God, that's when waiting makes me crawl out of my skin!  However, in our frantic effort to fill in the “waiting-space” and bring the story together, we slowly realize we can’t and only God can.    I suppose that’s part of the reason God brings the wait, because the discomfort of unfinished business has the potential of moving us towards Him.  "Demoting" the promise and letting the gaps remain helps us stay surrendered and alert in the story, we can hold freely the promise and exchange our plan for His. We move from wanting to run our own kingdom to embracing His, which is far better than ours. 

It took Sarah many years to reconcile her plan with God’s.   The bigger the dream, the harder it is to surrender!  It’s easy to become cynical and doubtful when things don’t go as we planned. We may wonder if the situation is too barren to even birth a promise or if too much time has past, leaving our best years are behind us, but God is not bound by time, nor his eternal plan lost on the barren wilderness journey or maidservant-mistakes.   He will bring His purpose to completion (Phil 1:6).  God’s Kingdom  WILL come to pass in you, in me, and in this world we call home- He actually cares more about it than we do!  Our job is to        pause,          wait,         stay surrendered and alert, letting Him do it His way, in His time.
 
What are the Barren places in your life in which you desire God's deliverance?

Where are you tempted to take matters into your own hands and use "maidservant" ways to get the job done?


What would it look like to surrender your plan for His?

Romans 8:22-28 is a long scripture passage to end with but it says it so well that I couldn’t leave any of it out!

All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it’s not only around us; it’s within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We’re also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our [waiting] condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.



Friday, December 6, 2013

In the Bleak Midwinter - HOPE!

(this is a re-post...for some reason the original was changed)

In the bleak midwinter frosty wind made moan
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone
Snow had fallen, snow, on snow, on snow
in the bleak midwinter, long ago
Our God, heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain
Heaven and earth shall flee away when he comes to reign
In the bleak midwinter, a stable place suffice
The Lord God, Jesus Christ
 
- Christina G. Rossetti, 1830-1894 

 
 
 I remember taking these photos the day before Thanksgiving 2010.  That was the year we huddled up in a cold cabin hoping power would be restored within the next 48 hours.  We were grateful for the heat provided by the fireplace and the little generator in the garage allowing a small lamp to stay lit during the night.  It was a storm of fierce magnitude!  As my husband, Ken, and son, Ben, made their way up the mountain the day before us, cascading waterfalls jeweled in the frozen hills greeted them in silent protest.  Occasionally  they'd pull over to clear the window of snow.  Ken is accustomed to driving in those conditions and I feel confident when he is at the wheel that we will arrive home safe.  We have many friends that make the same trip every year for Thanksgiving and stay in nearby cabins.  Most did not come that year or left early to avoid weathering the storm.  We stayed; there was something commanding and austere about walking the quiet paths burdened with white...God is big.

I remember one other time I was in a snow storm like that.  It was early January. Ken and I were traveling from the St. Paul/ Minneapolis Airport to a small town in northern Minnesota.  We had 6 month old Ben with us and no idea how bad the storm would get.  The snow drifts were high enough to keep us from distinguishing the road from a front yard or a store parking lot.  We were looking for a tiny little street in a tiny little town.  Every few yards I would hop out of the car and clear off a mail box to try and get a gauge as to our whereabouts.  We were running out of food for Ben and the gas was low in the car…we soon realized is was going to take an act of God to get us to the right place and out of this storm. 

These storms came during a time when I was facing significant “life storms” too.  I can’t help but wonder if God did that to remind me that He is at the wheel and I could rest confident that He would bring me home safe.  Ken and I quipped while we were at the cabin in 2010 that we could not wait  to bid farewell to the past 12 ferocious months and ring in the new year because 2011 had to be better….2011 wasn’t better it was actually worse.  So was 2012.  But somewhere in it God kept an inner lamp lit.  The night was indeed cold and dark. At times it required us to "pull over" for a bit and clear the window of our thoughts to see the path a little better.  But staying present with Him in the storm, much like we huddled around the fire place that year for warmth, helped us. Things like prayer, fasting, conversations with others, honest expressions of our emotions and thoughts, etc. were things God used to help us let go of lesser "loves" that were competing with the love He had to offer.   In recent posts I’ve talked a lot about storms and I don’t need to repeat it all, except to say, 2013 has been different.  I guess that's why I picked this post and Rossini's poem for this advent day.  After such a season of storms, little green shoots have begun to pop up from the dormant, snow-laden ground.  Christ is being born anew in my heart and in the hearts of those who have weathered a similar journey and it has brought …HOPE.

Remember the blizzard car ride in Minnesota?  Just about the time I was really getting worried, I happened to glance over to a snow-covered house.  It drew my attention because the lights were on inside and there was a fire in the fireplace – It looked like it belonged on a Burle & Ives Christmas card.  And in one short glance I saw a little girl pop up into the window and back down  as she bounced on the couch inside.  It was as quick as a wink but I knew it was our friend’s little girl, Jenneke!  OH what relief that sight brought! 

“I can’t believe you made it!  Oh my goodness!  How did you ever get here?!”  They said. 

To which a replied, “God turned my head and I saw Janneke in your window!"…HOPE

Sometimes there’s a bleak mid-winter that rests itself upon us. Where snow falls, “snow, on snow, on snow” But there’s also a God that “heaven cannot hold nor earth sustain” .  He is the one who brings the warmth, keeps the lamp-light lit, and in just the right time turns our head so we may see… HOPE

The link  below is a beautiful arrangement of the song, In the Bleak Midwinter http://youtu.be/4zAgEt6sCMA

Monday, December 2, 2013

Drums and Perfume...HOPE!


“She did what she could…” Mark 14:8



“She did what she could…”

I don’t know about you but when I hear those words they don’t have a positive ring to them.  They often sound defeated, resigned and hopeless.  Like “well, I tried but it just couldn’t happen – I did all I could but it wasn’t enough.”  Or when a doctor comes in to give disappointing news to the family members of a patient, “I’m sorry, we did all that we could….”  That phrase over time has taken on meaning but not a good one.
However, I’ve recently been struck by the way Jesus uses this phrase in Mark 14:8.  Because it takes on a different meaning than what I've been used to.  A woman consumed with the HOPE that Jesus was the promised Messiah, did what she could to bring herself sacrificially and open-handed to Jesus.  She didn’t have much to offer in the eyes of everyone around her (In fact, some thought her offering of perfume was pretty wasteful and stupid.) but to Jesus, her offering was profound. (but that's for a later blog J)

In the song, The Little Drummer Boy (Albeit a song, it holds a great message), the young boy gave in a similar manner as the woman did.  There he was, a little boy, amidst Kings and “kingly offerings”, with nothing of any worldly value to give.  Hope allowed for creative, on the spot, thinking!

“Little baby.  I am a poor boy too, I have no gift to bring.  That’s fit to give the King.  Shall I play for you?  Mary nodded,…I played my drum for him.  I played my best for him. Then he smiled at me – me and my drum.”

What beautiful expressions of expectation mingled with poured out offering!  I wonder if we  complicate things by seeking to make our life of worship to God pristine and impressive? Then, when it can't be, we think we have nothing of value to offer and begin to wonder if He can make anything good out of what we DO have.  It's easy to forget that what He’s really looking for is a life that's drawing near to him, one that's ready to step onto the hay, into the messy, smelly barn and kneel, bringing what we can and laying it at his feet.  He smiles when we do that - whether it's pristine or tattered.  God is overjoyed as we draw near; and the offering we bring with anticipation and love, is His delight. 
This week during Advent as we celebrate HOPE, let’s set aside the voices that cause us to dismiss the offering we bring to Christ.  Let’s pause instead to hear the distance drums of a poor boy in Bethlehem, and take in the aroma of poured out love like the woman in Bethany. Both did what they could and it was …positively …enough!

What "song" or "fragrance" is God inviting you to bring before Him this season?

And...since I am a musician, I can't help but add the link of The Little Drummer Boy sung by the Pentatonix.  Enjoy! http://youtu.be/qJ_MGWio-vc