First, If you’re in the Dig, take note: The Digging Deep Podcast is tomorrow night (Tuesday) at 7 p.m. Central Time. Join in if you can. We may be short on participation since some will be with family, so, if you are in between celebrations, be sure to be a part of this conversation! Digging Deep Nugget Night Link. Be sure to register, so you can phone in your comments. If you are not a part of the study, now is a great time to join. Next weekend we begin a new study called “Women of Troubled Times.” In my judgment, it’s extremely relevant to the American culture of 2012. I believe it’s a study that can challenge us to be better for Him in 2012.
And now, the best to you this holiday season:
Chances are really good that you will not be reading this on the day it’s posted. I am certainly not writing it on the day after Christmas. But as you are reading, I hope you’ve added some sweet family memories to your mental treasury. I hope you gathered somewhere around a tree with Mannheim Steamroller or at least Gene Autry or Bing Crosby playing in the background and I hope you made a huge mess in the living room! But, most importantly, I hope you gathered yesterday with your family in the Lord. I hope you sang praises to the Holy Father and I hope you offered worship that was a sweet savor to Him. I hope you gathered around His table and remembered the death and resurrection of the Lord with extreme gratitude in your spirit. I hope that assembly was the most important thing on your agenda for Christmas day and every Sunday of the past year. If everyone around your family Christmas tree has the Lord as the heart’s foremost priority, you are in a very tiny minority of the world’s wealthiest people. If your family has never had or has lost that focus, your time together was not nearly as happy as it could have been and I am so sorry for that loss. I pray that I will never know a day when my family attempts to enjoy fellowship with one another without Him in the center.
May your family’s holiday memories include this baker’s dozen:
1. Prayers for the safety of the travelers in your crew.
2. Excitement in your conversations about the works of your various congregations of His people.
3. Family devotionals with singing and prayer and discussions of scripture before bedtime.
4. Gifts, cards and wishes to and from your family in the Lord.
5. Funny, happy, sad and wonderful stories about great servants in the kingdom that your family has known.
6. Dinner table discussions about passages of scripture and their applications.
7. Gifts of commentaries, lectureship books, children’s Bible story books and recordings of hymns.
8. Delicious dishes prepared from recipes shared by sisters in Christ.
9. Hospitality extended to brothers and sisters in the Lord.
10. Filling up a pew or more at the worship service of the local church.
11. Kids working on projects for Bible class, Bible Bowl, Lads to Leaders or service projects with the youth group.
12. Messages, handwritten or verbal, telling your loved ones the spiritual character traits you admire about them and encouraging them to grow in faith and service.
13. Goodbyes when you part that everyone knows are not final, even if an accident or an illness steals a life before the next earthly reunion.
This is my wish list for you this holiday season. Blessings!
Here’s a quick valentine idea for your sweetheart. My daughter did this for her husband and sneaked it into our family valentine box.