Ah, Christmas is almost upon us. If one more person asks me, "Bought all your gifts?" or "Done all your shopping?" I do believe I will scream! I am all for Christmas. I enjoy the excitment it brings children, I enjoy the Christmas specials, the church musicals, and the like. But just what are we doing, folks?

Once as I was putting my young daughter to bed, she asked a very profound question: "Dad, if Christmas is Jesus' Birthday, why do we give each other presents?" Hmm...Just what are we doing? Who is giving what, to whom?

Jesus is OUR gift from the Father, and through faith in Jesus we are given the gift of salvation. Even the faith which enables us to believe, is a gift from God.

Luke 2:11 (NIV) Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.

Ephesians 2:8 (NIV) For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.

Now you can say "okay David, what's the point?" Well, what does Jesus receive on His birthday (besides the gifts of gold, incense and myrrh given at His birth)? What can we give Jesus? Talk about not knowing what to give to someone Who has everything! Jesus has it all, except our hearts. Have you fully surrendered yourself to Him?

John 17:24 (NIV) Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

Believers in Jesus Christ are gifts to Jesus from the Father. We are Christ's presents. Thinking about this makes me want to pour out love to Christ.

John 14:3 (NIV) And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

Colossians 3:4 (NIV) When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Our hope and faith lie in the above verses; they hinge upon being with Jesus forever. Jesus is preparing a place for us in Heaven, but only if we believe in Him and accept Him as our Lord and Savior.

My prayer for my fellow believers this Christmas is that we will take seriously our role as gifts to Jesus from the Father, and that we will take seriously the awesome gift of eternal life with Jesus. He takes very good care of His gifts. During this Advent season, churches will be filled with non-believers. I pray that they will see Christ in us and want to investigate Christianity further. For those of you who are not quite sure about all this "accepting Jesus" stuff, or about Jesus being a gift and us being a gift to Him, my prayers are for you to keep hanging around the church, keep seeking Jesus, and keep looking at and investigating Christ.

So who is giving what, to whom? God gave us Jesus, Who through our faith and belief gives us eternal life -- which in turn gives us to Jesus. Sounds like Christmas to me! It sounds like exchanging gifts... but these gifts never die, rot, fade, go out of style or burn up; they last forever!

David Massey 12/15/1997

The Christmas season is fully upon us. Just what was God's plan in bringing about Christmas? Why did He decide to manifest Himself as a human being? Why did He provide this wonderful plan of mercy, grace and love that I often cannot begin to comprehend?

Jesus came to reconcile man to God.

Hebrews 2:17 (LB) And it was necessary for Jesus to be like us, his brothers, so that he could be our merciful and faithful High Priest before God, a Priest who would be both merciful to us and faithful to God in dealing with the sins of the people.

He came also to reconcile us with each other. Throughout the Bible, we find examples set by Jesus and others, of reconciliation between individuals. Jesus must have thought that reconciliation should be a high priority in our lives. Nowhere else in the Bible can I find an instance where a teacher instructs someone to leave the church and make up with someone before giving an offering.

Matthew 5:23-24 (LB) So if you are standing before the altar in the Temple, offering a sacrifice to God, and suddenly remember that a friend has something against you, leave your sacrifice there beside the altar and go and apologize and be reconciled to him, and then come and offer your sacrifice to God.

Esau and his brother Jacob were reconciled:

Genesis 33:4,11 (LB) And then Esau ran to meet him and embraced him affectionately and kissed him; and both of them were in tears! 11 Please accept the present that was brought to you, for God has been gracious to me and I have all I need." And because Jacob insisted, Esau accepted it.

Luke tells about the reconciliation of Herod and Pilate:

Luke 23:12 (LB) That day Herod and Pilate became friends-before this they had been enemies.

This is hard stuff. It is difficult to do. But it is Biblical and I have seen it work in both my own life and other people's lives. So let's just go through this next passage and see the steps Jesus lays out for us to take, when trying to restore a relationship.

Matthew 18:15-17 (NIV) If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that 'every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.' If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

Step One is the most difficult one. Jesus is saying for us to go to the person with whom we have a problem, share our feelings and do it in private. Our natural inclination is to go tell everyone we know, except the person that we feel has wronged us. Before long, the situation has been stirred and changed into something even worse than the original version. And more harmfully, the telling of others can turn into gossip.

I am not a very confrontational person. Therefore this first step is very difficult for me. I have written short notes to people, and at other times called them on the phone. I once came out and asked for a private meeting face-to-face. But in the few times that I have invoked the Matthew 18 principle, the dispute was settled after Step One. The dispute never went any farther. Please don't think that all this happened very quickly. One reconciliation took me ten years to complete. Often we become paralyzed with anger and can never take this initial step, but if we really want to live as fully-devoted followers of Christ, we must try.

The second step, if necessary, is to take one or two people along with you to serve as witnesses to the process. I am assuming that this other person or two would help mediate the matter and provide unbiased opinions of the situation, in order to help start a process of healing and understanding.

The conflicts that I have seen, have been resolved with Step One, so hopefully the third step in this plan will not be necessary. When needed, its purpose is to shed light on the dispute. It serves as a way to reprimand the guilty party while hopefully setting up a means to restore him back to fellowship with others and with Christ. I recently witnessed a successful example of this step in action. The situation was somewhat different as it involved a church member and a pastor. The pastor had committed a sin. Another pastor confronted the pastor, who denied the charge. The pastor and an elder of the church then confronted him. Though the evidence against the pastor was overwhelming, he was still unrepentant. However, he did resign. The church was told of the reason for the Pastors' resignation and the healing has begun.

So there you have it -- a simple yet profound, three-step Biblical plan of reconciliation, given to us by none other than the great Reconciler himself, Jesus Christ. Now the question is: Are you ready to take the first step? Try it; it works. What better time than now, to start on a path of reconciliation with someone in your life?

David Massey 12/13/2003

Magnification of Emotions

Originally Published 1996-12-18

Matt 25:35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in. 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me. I was in prison, and you came to visit me. (NIV)

I have made an interesting discovery during the holiday season this year. One of those "defining moments" in my life. Have you noticed, during the Christmas Season, how the lonely are lonelier, the hurting hurt more, the down and out, more down, the poor are poorer, and even the joyful, seem more joyous?

What are we as Christ followers to do?

John 13:34 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." (NIV)

I challenge each of you in the next few days to take being a Christ Follower to another level. Take HIS words from your head, move them to your heart, and then to your feet. Let's do something. Let's show the world what being a Christ follower is all about. Jesus' command to us is very simple. All He is saying is just love one another; just love. That's it.

Let's visit that person that is alone, let's feed the hungry, let's share with the poor, let's help the sick, let's just love one another. Smile at that person sitting alone on the bench; sit down and visit with them for a minute. I know one man that recently bought some flowers, went to a nursing home and gave them to a complete stranger who was all alone. He really touched that woman with the love of Christ. Just love one another.

Matt 25:40 "The King will reply, `I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.' (NIV)

What an awesome thought.... "Whatever I do for others.... I do for Christ"

Forgiveness 

Try this daily. Let someone off the hook. Start with little wrong, a forgotten returned phone call, a missed appointment, and so forth. 

Give the person a "do over." In golf it's called a Mulligan. They are free to try again. 

Respond with, "hey no problem, I forget things at times." Or, "Oh, I understand."

Meekness does not equal weakness. We can be strong and forgiving at the same time. 

These small acts of quick forgiveness lead to an easier time at being quicker to forgive others, including ourselves. 

Life is too short to be locked inside a room of resentments. A room created by an unforgiving heart. 

Negative attitudes are self-fulfilling prophecies. They can also be contagious. If we have a negative attitude, it will not only keep us down; it will also bring down the people around us.

Think negatively and the world around us seems negative. I call negative people drainers, because they drain the life out of others.  

Conversely a positive, cheerful and grateful attitude will make everything seem right.  They fill us up.  

We all walk around life with two imaginary buckets. One is filled with fuel, the other with water. 

We have a choice when we are ambushed by a negative conversation. We can either throw our bucket of fuel on it, igniting the negativism, or we can douse it with our water bucket. 

Most negative people do not realize how negative their demeanors have become. But simply saying, "Gee Joe, you are so negative. You drain the life out of me", is not going to work. That will only throw the bucket of fuel on the situation. 

When a negative attitude is displayed, try to take what is said, and make a positive statement back to the person. 

Watch these examples. Negative person says, "That customer is such a pain. He drives me crazy with his demands." We could answer, "Yes he is very demanding, but that is why we have our jobs, to satisfy customers' demands." The negative person says, "This is not how we have always done this." A good response: "Glad you noticed we are making changes around here to improve our services."

One encounter like this will not change a negative person's attitude overnight. It takes time and patience, but after a while, it may  click in their mind, "Hmm, no use in complaining around them or others. " 

Ideally, they will start coming to you thinking, "Help me see the good in this." 

Do you want to throw your bucket of fuel on the fire, or your bucket of water? The choice is ours.