December 4, 2015
“But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. (Luke 2:19)
The holidays are the most family-oriented weeks of the year. Yet for many – those who have no family, singles, widows and widowers, the divorced among us, and those with painful and negative family experiences – the holidays can be the most difficult time of the year. As a pastor, every year I had parishioners who asked me in early November to pray for them to make it through the holidays. The hard reality is that lonely, depressed, and anxious people are lonelier, more depressed, and more anxious during the “season to be jolly” than at any other time of the year.
At the same time, the last four weeks of the year are filled with joy and happiness for millions of people and their families. Whether the holiday season is your favorite time or your most difficult time of the year, I want to share a Christmas prescription that can bring the true meaning of Christmas to your holidays and to every day of your new year.
Try to block out the advertising blitz of the commercial Christmas we have today. Carefully read the Christmas scriptures in the first two chapters of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, and then read the first 18 verses of the Gospel of John.
God told a devout peasant girl what He was going to do. Mary believed God, but she asked Him questions and pondered these things in her heart.
Dick Woodward, A Christmas Prescription
Editor’s Note: During December, the blog posting elf would like to share one of Papa’s booklets, A Christmas Prescription, bit by bit with you. Be blessed this month as we ‘ponder’ the Christmas that was, the Christmas that shall be, and the Christmas that is…
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 23, 2014
“I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.” (Luke 2:10)
When the angels appeared to those frightened shepherds, they gave them a wonderful Christmas greeting. They announced that they were bringing good tidings of great joy to all people.
These good tidings were not just for Jewish people or for good people. They were to bring great joy to ALL people! That means all kinds of people – and all kinds of people everywhere!
Before He ascended, the last words of Jesus were: “… go be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere… to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8 NLT).
Some enjoy their faith as if the last words of Jesus were: “Now don’t let it get around!” They live out their faith as if the Gospel is a secret to be kept.
Never forget these two beautiful Christmas words, “All people!”
The spiritual community of those who believe and follow Jesus is not to be a secret organization. It is a community of people who exist for the benefit of their non-members.
Jesus Christ came to bring good news and great joy to people who are not good. The Bible tells us that all of us have gone astray and turned every one of us to his or her own way. That’s the bad news. But the good news is that God laid the penalty for all of our sins on His Son (Isaiah 53:6).
Two more great Christmas words are “mercy” and “grace.” The mercy of God withholds from us what we deserve and His grace lavishes on us all kinds of marvelous things we do not deserve. His mercy and grace give us more blessings than we can count if we have the faith to receive them.
Dick Woodward, 23 December 2011
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 19, 2014
“So the Word became human and made his home among us…And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son.” (John 1:14 NLT)
God became human and made His home among us so we could see and not just read what He wrote in the 39 books of the Old Testament. We should find a Christmas challenge in the words of the Apostle Paul which tell us “… that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh” (2Corinthians 4:11).
One of the reasons God did Christmas was because He felt that a written Word was not enough. He wanted us to see as well as read His Word to us. Everything Jesus was, said, and did was one great spoken Word from God to you and me (John 1: 1, 14, 18).
It is the plan of God that unbelievers in this world today should see as well as read His Word through your mortal flesh and mine. That truth, which is clearly articulated by the Apostle Paul, moved me to make an important decision in my ministry as a Bible pastor/teacher. In the early sixties I was praying about accepting an opportunity presented to me to be a radio Bible teacher. Those words of Paul were used by God to direct me to be the pastor of a church where people could see as well as hear the Word of God in my mortal flesh.
“We’re writing a Gospel a chapter each day by things that we do and things that we say. Men read what we write whether faithless or true. Say, what is the Gospel according to you?”
That should be our Christmas challenge all year long.
Dick Woodward, 16 December 2011
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 16, 2014
“And now abides faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (I Corinthians 13:13)
Do you know, or do you remember what it is like to live your life, day in and day out, without hope? In the great love chapter of the Bible, the Apostle Paul tells us the three lasting, eternal values in life are faith, hope and love. Love is the greatest of these eternal values because God is love. Faith is an eternal value because faith brings us to God. Hope is also one of the three great eternal values because hope brings us to the faith that brings us to God. In the heart of every human being, God plants hope, the conviction that something good exists in this life and someday that good will intersect our lives. That is what the author of the Book of Hebrews means when he tells us that faith gives substance to the things for which we have been hoping. (Hebrews 11:1).
As followers of Jesus Christ, we must realize that we have Good News that can give hope to the hopeless, and we must not let unbelief silence us. If we never share the Good News of the Christmas that was and the Christmas that shall be, we should ask ourselves if we really believe the essence of the Gospel of Christmas. Because we really believe in the Christmas that was, we should share that Good News with the people Jesus told us He came to seek and to save (Luke 19:10). We show that we really do believe in the Christmas that shall be, when we tell hopeless people that God is going to give us another Christmas.
Like the wise men, we should ask the question, “Where is He?,” seek Him until we find Him, and then worship Him and give the gift of our lives to Him. Then, like those shepherds, we should tell everybody the Good News that Christmas has come and Christmas is coming again to this otherwise hopeless world.
Dick Woodward, from A Christmas Prescription
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 12, 2014
“…whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:26)
Has the joyful happy holiday season found you with a heavy heart because you have lost a loved one? I have suggested that if you want to find the happiness and comfort Jesus promised in His second beatitude to those who mourn, you should ask the right questions and listen to God’s answers to the right questions. My third suggestion was implied by Jesus as He gave an excellent right answer to Martha when he asked her, “Do you believe this?”
My third suggestion is that you believe God’s answers to the right questions. When we ask, listen, and believe, the death of someone we love is like an investment in the world to come. We have simply bought shares in heaven and we have increased our motivation to be there in the eternal dimension with Christ and with them.
A devout surgeon I know says that the word we use most in this life is “Why?” However, the word we are going to use most in the next world is going to be “Oh!” An old hymn I don’t hear much anymore proclaims: “Friends will be there I have known long ago. Joy like a river around me will flow. Yet just a smile from my Savior I know, that will be glory be glory for me!”
The whole Bible is filled with God’s answers to the right questions. When we believe those answers we will discover that the happy state Jesus promised those who mourn in one word is salvation. Salvation and the comfort He promised can begin right now and last forever if you will ask, listen, and believe! Will you do that now?
Dick Woodward, 17 December 2010
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 24, 2013
“There are three things that will last — faith, hope, and love…” (1Corinthians 13:13)
When Paul tells us there are three things that will endure, have you ever wondered why one of them is hope? The other two are love and faith: love will last because God is love, and faith is the way we know God. But why is hope one of the three?
Hope is the conviction that something good exists in this world and we are going to experience it. God plants hope in the hearts of people and it keeps them going. While studying psychology in college we analyzed the 25,000 suicides in 1952. Psychiatrists, clinical psychologists and sociologists determined that those people committed suicide because they lost hope. That same year a man committed suicide by jumping off the top of my dormitory which was located where Hope Street ended in front of the Los Angeles Public Library. The newspaper reported that he jumped to his death at the end of Hope Street. That accentuated what we learned in the classroom, big time!
Tonight is Christmas Eve. Millions of people will gather in families and extended families to celebrate, but many millions more will be alone. Pastors and those who work with people know that life is unspeakably sad and millions are hope-challenged because they have experienced nothing good.
In his famous carol Philips Brooks wrote that the hopes and fears of all the years were met in Bethlehem when Christ was born. God intersected human history that night but what the Bible calls the blessed hope of the church and the only hope for the world is that God is going to do that again when Christ returns.
Are you guilty of criminal negligence because you are not sharing that hope with hope-challenged people?
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 20, 2013
“I bring you good news of great joy which will be for all people!” (Luke 2:10)
A great man named Tim Hansel lived every day with excruciating pain. He wrote in his book, You Gotta Keep Dancing, that pain and suffering are inevitable but misery is optional. That is true for a Spirit controlled disciple of Jesus. Tim also wrote “I can choose to be joyful.”
Joy is one of the nine fruits of the Spirit the Apostle Paul wrote about in his letter to the Galatians (5: 22, 23). As evidence of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives joy could be paraphrased “happiness that does not make good sense.” The derivation of the word “happiness” has to do with what happens to us. But this joy, which is the fruit of the Spirit living in us, is not controlled by what happens to us. That is why we say it does not make good sense, especially to secular non-spiritual people. In the very short letter the Apostle Paul wrote from prison to his favorite church, the Philippians, he used the word joy 17 times!
While appearing to the shepherds the angels explained why their declaration would bring great joy to all people: “For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11).
Great joy came because the One born is the Savior. He is the Christ, which is the Greek way of saying the Messiah. And He is to be our Lord. Joy came because He gives the Holy Spirit to those who follow Him. This joy is intended for all people, including you.
Are you choosing to be joyful, anyway?
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 17, 2013
“You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a candlestick, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:14-16)
I love Christmas lights! Where I live in Williamsburg, Virginia, one of the signature features of Christmas decorating is using white lights. We put our Christmas tree up for all of December because we enjoy the white lights so very much.
A very significant Christmas gift I received is a book I wrote this year that was delivered from the printer on the third of December. It is called Marketplace Disciples. The thrust of this book’s message highlights the mandate Jesus gave His disciples to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth. A missionary statesman said that if the disciples of Jesus stick together with a fortress mentality, we are like manure. We stink! But if we get spread around we do a lot of good.
The risen living Christ uses the fact that we need to make a living to get the salt out of the salt shaker and the candles He has lighted on candlesticks of His choosing. We should impact the marketplace because we are authentic disciples of Jesus Christ. The values of Christ should revolutionize our ethics and the way we do business. That is why today most evangelism takes place in the marketplace.
When you see the beautiful Christmas lights this year remember that Jesus said His light flowing through us cannot be hidden.
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 25, 2012
“For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.” (Titus 2: 11-14).
One of my very favorite Christmas Scriptures is here where the Apostle Paul wrote to Titus that the grace of God appeared on that first Christmas Eve when Christ was born. His Church should always be looking forward to what he calls “the blessed hope” which is the appearing of Christ in His Second Coming.
In these Christmas verses Paul writes that between these two appearances of Jesus Christ God wants to appear to this world through His special people by the way they adorn their doctrine with good works and godly living. The word “special” is sometimes translated “peculiar” or “unique.”
Great paintings are valuable because they are peculiar. If there is another painting exactly like a particular painting it loses its value. Paul counseled Titus that it is critical to have spiritual people in his church who will adorn their doctrine with good works and be peculiar people through whom God appears to this present age.
There is a Christmas that was when God first appeared to us. There is a Christmas that shall be when God appears through the return of Christ. And there is the Christmas that is as God appears through believers like you and me.
Are you willing to be the Christmas that is for those who know you today?
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Posted by Dick Woodward
December 25, 2011
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6)
This verse begins and ends with one of the most beautiful Christmas words in the Bible: the word “all.” The first time the word is used in this great verse it gives us the bad news. It tells us that all of us have gone astray and turned–every one of us–to our own way. The great prophet Isaiah repeats himself for emphasis when he tells us that every one of us has turned to his or her own way. Do you believe you are included in the first “all” of this verse?
I don’t know about you but I don’t need a verse of Scripture to convince me that I’m included in the first “all” of this verse. Only Santa Claus brings good things to good people on Christmas Day. According to Isaiah, Christmas was when good things happened to bad people.
The good news of this Christmas word is the way Isaiah concludes his verse. We are not ready for the good news until we are convinced of the bad news. He tells us the good news that God has laid on His Son the iniquity or sins of us all! Do you believe you are included in the last “all” of this great verse?
If you will meet yourself in the two “alls” of Isaiah you can receive, by faith, your greatest Christmas gift. Paul described it this way:
“For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.” (2Corinthians 5:21).
Merry Christmas to ALL!!
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Posted by Dick Woodward
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