Tis The Season for Remembrance

 

 

”When the time comes for you to die, you need not be afraid, because death cannot separate you from God’s love.”

 ~ Charles H. Spurgeon

There is no greater time of family involvement and fellowship then there is during the holidays. I absolutely love all those special times we get to share with the ones we love! I mean who doesn’t love having their husband home while getting paid for it?! :p However, this year I can’t help but also be grieved as we have lost so many that are so dear to us and others who are so dear to the ones we love.

Sometimes it is overwhelming to know how hard this time of year is for some people. While many of us are going about the holiday season with such giddiness and joy, there are others who are hurting and grieving.

I did a sermon recently on adversity and someone came up to me after service and said, “I am really glad you gave this message. A lot of people struggle with the holiday season.” At that moment I got thinking….when did I even mention the holidays?!!! His words went straight to my heart and how profoundly true it was. We get so busy with our day to day lives and the holidays have their added stress, that we can so easily forget that BillyBob Jo is spending his first year as a widower, that Jane Doe is spending her first year without her best friend, Jack and Joanne are grieving the loss of their baby boy or that Nemo is spending his first year without his mother. Oii. How heartbreaking!!

We need to take inventory of our lives and priorities this Christmas season. Are we focused more on how many “gifts” our children have/need or perhaps concerned about having the biggest and best party! Let’s take a moment and think about our friends and family who are spending this season with a gap in their heart and find a way to lift their spirits. Scripture says we are to mourn with those who mourn and grieve with those who grieve. It could be as simple as sending a personalized card just letting them know how loved they are or that you are always there to lend a listening ear. So what if the cookies haven’t been baked yet! Life is so much more than that.

This year let’s focus more on the reason for the season. Lend a helping hand and most of all your heart and time J because that’s what Jesus would do!!

 

 

For those who need a little more encouraging and comfort this Christmas, I hope you will find that comfort in the best hands out there our Abba Daddy (God).

John 14:1-4 “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”

Romans 8:16-17 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

2 Corinthians 5:6-8 So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-18 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.

1 Thessalonians 5:9-11 For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.

2 Samuel 12:23 But now he is dead. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.” (King David speaking of his infant son who died)

John 11:23-26 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

1 Corinthians 15:54-57 When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Philippians 3:20-21 But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.

1 Corinthians 15:20-23 But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.

Philippians 1:23-24 I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account.

1 Peter 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

1 John 3:1-2 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.

Revelation 21:1-4 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

Psalm 23:4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil,

Psalm 116:15 Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.

John 10:27-29 “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.” (Jesus speaking)

Romans 8:38-39 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 14:8 For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.

Revelation 14:13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying, “Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Blessed indeed,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them!”