Posts Tagged ‘Luke 1’
Posted on December 13, 2009 - by Tim L
Living Christmas,….in the Lounge
Living Christmas,…. in the Lounge.
What’s the lounge like in your house?
Is it a place of relaxing, maybe a place of TV, watching? Do you have real fire?
Does it have your favourite chair or sofa to sit in?
Is it a place of welcome and hospitality? Do you sit with friends and family and talk? Do you read a book in the stillness of an empty house?
Is it cosy? Is it warm enough to kick off your shoes and curl up on the sofa. Do you know what it is to be loved in the lounge? Someone brings you a glass of wine or cup of tea?
Maybe it is a place of arguments over who has the remote,…who has the power and control in your lounge.
Maybe it is place of arguments over the TV and who gets to watch what, Strictly or X Factor, Sports personality or X factor final,..
Are there toys all over the floor and you have to mind where you step?
Over the Christmas period, your lounge might take on a different character, …It might become very busy, messy and full of bodies. People asleep after a large lunch, children arguing over the latest toy,…families thrust together for a longer period of time than usual leads to some strained relationships.
How can you live Christmas in the lounge this year rather than just survive?
Maybe you will need a little help from your friends.
The Bridge group sang - With a little help from my friends,...
9Mary didn’t waste a minute. She got up and traveled to a town in Judah in the hill country, 40straight to Zachariah’s house, and greeted Elizabeth. 41When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby in her womb leaped. She was filled with the Holy Spirit, 42and sang out exuberantly,
You’re so blessed among women,
and the babe in your womb, also blessed!
43And why am I so blessed that
the mother of my Lord visits me?
44The moment the sound of your
greeting entered my ears,
The babe in my womb
skipped like a lamb for sheer joy.
45Blessed woman, who believed what God said,
believed every word would come true!Luke 1: 39 - 45 (The Message)
We watched a film clip. to view it go to or go to and click on Father’s Day on the menu.
It just want to pick up on a couple of things;
One from the reading and songs we heard and the other from the clip we saw.
In the bible passage we read;
Blessed…….who believed what God said, believed every word would come true! (Luke 1;45)
Kathryn Jenkins news album is called Believe.
Sony’s adverts over Christmas have the tag line on the bottom, Make. Believe. It is the first time Sony have ever had a global tag line beneath their name.. And to quote their general manager of Marketing “The brand revealed make.believe in September and it is the first time the brand has had a single message for all its divisions spanning electronics, games, movies, music, mobile phones and network services”
It is suddenly trendy to make.believe. Christians have been saying it for 2000 years!
My question comes down to who you will believe? What do you think is true? Will you be blessed by God or Sony this Christmas?
And my second point comes from that modern re-telling of the Joseph story. Joseph says that the name Jesus means rescuer. When you cry out this Christmas in pain or anger who will you be crying out to. Who will be your rescuer this Christmas?
There will come a point when the lounge is bomb site, when the arguments have become heated, when your tired and want to just fall asleep, or you just want to get away from it all because it is all too much.
Who will be your rescuer this Christmas?
Will you be blessed by God or Sony this Christmas?
Who will be your rescuer this Christmas?
When the world was dark
and the city was quiet,
you came.You crept in beside us.
And no-one knew.
Only the few
who dared to believe
that God might do something different.Will you do the same this Christmas, Lord?
Will you come into the darkness of today’s world;
not the friendly darkness
as when sleep rescues us from tiredness,
but the fearful darkness,
in which people have stopped believing
that war will end
or that food will come
or that a government will change
or that the Church cares?Will you come into that darkness
and do something different
to save your people from death and despair?Will you come into the quietness of this town/village
not the friendly quietness
as when lovers hold hands,
but the fearful silence
when the phone has not rung,
the letter has not come
the friendly voice no longer speaks,
the doctor’s face says it all?Will you come into that darkness,
and do something different,
not to distract, but to embrace your people?And will you come into the dark corners
and the quiet places of our lives?We ask this not because we are guilt-ridden
or want to be,
but because the fullness our lives long for
depends on us being as open and vulnerable to you
as you were to us, when you came,
wearing no more than nappies,
and trusting human hands
to hold their maker.Will you come into our lives,
if we open them to you
and do something different?When the world was dark
and the city was quiet
you came.You crept in beside us.
Do the same this Christmas, Lord.
Do the same this Christmas.
AMEN.Taken from Cloth for the Cradle by the Wild Goose Worship Group, Wild Goose Publications 1997
Please take some time to reflect.
Posted on December 6, 2009 - by Tim L
Living Christmas,….in the bedroom
The Bridge group sang “Love is all around us,…..” by Wet, wet, wet
We all watched a clip from Love actually
Well, this week we are Living Christmas in the bedroom. As I was preparing for this evening earlier in the week, I was thinking about the words or themes that people might associate bedrooms with: private places, retreats, intimacy, loneliness,
Primarily they can be places of communication. A way of escaping from the children, a place to go and be quiet or still, a place to talk to a loved one without interruptions. Some might dread going there because they represent too many memories of happier times in the past.
The clip we have just seen was taken from the film Love Actually. Colin Firth and Lúcia Moniz have problems communicating with each other. On the one hand they can’t understand a word the other says, one speaks in English and the other in Portuguese. And yet on the other hand they seem to communicate very well. Their bodies and eyes speak another whole language above and beyond the language of speech. You don’t have to be a mind reader to realise what is going on, it is obvious how these two people feel about each other.
We all speak love but we often speak love in different languages. Do you know your own native language so that you will know if you are being loved?
I have a questionnaire for you to complete. There are 30 questions and you will be pleased to know complete with answers. All you need to do is circle the one of the two options that you prefer.
When you get to the end tot up the scores under A, B, C, D and E and see what love language is your own. If you then turn over the page that will give you some ideas of what each language is.
A couple of tips;
- Don’t have a look over the page first.
- Don’t think too hard about what you would like the answers to be.
- Try using a gut reaction.
When you have finished turn with some one close by and share with them what you have come up with. For a copy of the questionnaire five_love_languages_quiz
Now it is great that you might know your own love language. It will be one of the five languages of love;
- Words of affirmation - This is verbal appreciation or encouragement. Such as “You look great in that dress”
- Quality time - Is about focusing all of your energy on your partner.
- Receiving gifts - Some of us respond well to visual symbols of love such as flowers, tickets to a game,
- Acts of service - Doing chores around the house can be an undeniable expression of love. Finding the rubbish dealt when we get home can be a real expression of love.
- Physical touch - Is exactly what it suggests. Being held by someone in complete silence can be a very powerful expression of love.
I know for me my love language are quality time and physical touch.
When we enter into relationships with others we need to learn the language of love for another person. It might be different from our own language of love. It means you have to give up your own language of love to tell another person how much you love them. They need to hear that you love them in their own native tongue rather then your love language. You have to learn another whole language to be able to communicate with the other person and tell them that you love them. If you like it would be a Portuguese person learning English and English culture to tell and show an English person that they are loved.
Love is not about the language you want to speak but about the language and culture you need to speak so that the other person can understand that they are truly loved.
It is about putting the needs of the other person first and learning their language of love. Love will not be shared, heard, understood or received if that does not happen.
And we come to our reading this evening and you won’t be surprised to hear that the Father knows the languages of love.
26In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to the Galilean village of Nazareth 27to a virgin engaged to be married to a man descended from David. His name was Joseph, and the virgin’s name, Mary.
28Upon entering, Gabriel greeted her:
Good morning!
You’re beautiful with God’s beauty,
Beautiful inside and out!
God be with you.
29She was thoroughly shaken, wondering what was behind a greeting like that. 30But the angel assured her, “Mary, you have nothing to fear. God has a surprise for you: 31You will become pregnant and give birth to a son and call his name Jesus.
32He will be great,
be called ‘Son of the Highest.’
The Lord God will give him
the throne of his father David;
33He will rule Jacob’s house forever-
no end, ever, to his kingdom.”Luke 1: 26 - 33 (The Message)
It was no good God standing up there in heaven shouting from a distance his love for us. He choose to come and learn the language, he choose to come and walk amongst us, to communicate love to us a language that we would all understand.
We all watched a second clip from Love Actually
Will you learn another’s language of love this advent time?
For more information on this subject please try one of the following;