12.23.2005 | Gatherings

The coming of the Lord is at hand, and our time of celebration about to begin. Of course, in the secular world, it's been little else but noise and tinsel. Not that I've anything against Christmas carols; I love them. Just that they come too early, and listening to "Jingle Bells" in early November is jarring.

Advent should be a time of watchfulness, of waiting for Him. It is also a time to gather one's thoughts about God, to know that God's purpose for sending Jesus to us through the vessel of Mary was to put paid to our sins.

God caused this to be known. Mary was told, directly, that she, too, would suffer as the Mother of God when Jesus was pierced and put on the tree. From Luke 2

34And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, "Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed 35(and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed."

"A sword will pierce through you." As it should for all who proclaim Christ as Lord. William Penn wrote, in 1669, a pamphlet entitled,"No Cross, No Crown."

We go Friend Penn one step further, and know that the wood of Jesus' cradle presages the wood of His cross.

| technorati tag | Christianity|