Oh. What an interesting, glorious, necessary and timely thing to do: WAIT.

Wait. We wait for Christmas, but do we actually actively participate or just wait. We wait for Christmas goodies, or do we make them? We wait for Christmas glut to pass too – way too much!!!.

With Christmas maybe we should hope that we can savor small bits of gratefulness without as much of the glitz. As sometimes we wait for the glitz to get us into the mood of Christmas, maybe we should refocus on Christmas meaning. Where is our Christmas spirit? Are we always waiting for more? Do we not stop to know already? Jesus at Christmas came to be God With Us,  IMMANUEL.  Solved our Salvation Situation. And Jesus will come back.

There IS more. There is MORE. More Jesus Evermore.

I’m not there in a Christmas glitz spirit, won’t be for a while, but I’m ready for the Spirit of Christ in Christmas and everyday for sure. An awe with angels overhead. I am ready for JOY. And yet am I letting myself inti His Joy? Do I even know the fraction of JOY that He brings? Well, I wait, I wait upon myself to absorb if just the crumbs of Jesus’s Whole Loaf, and piecemeal myself to rest in Him, to focus, to know. I need to whole loaf rest in Jesus and remember that Hope. Jesus came to me in a Christmas Flood – how dare I not lift my head in Praise and WOW… I never want to grow cold to His Fire. And He won’t let me be frozen out. He always holds us close. He is our MORE.

I do know that the Lord wants us to set aside the world for a time to focus on Him, learn in His Word, then lean on Him for ventures back out and through the world. Jesus doesn’t just stay in a box, wrapped under the tree, Jesus is out in the world with us. May we only hear His voice, feel His Spirit, be in His Arms. He is OUR MORE.

I love these chapters 63 and especially 64, of Isaiah, prophet of the ending portion of old testament times when the Israelites have seen so much from God, and yet wait for more. They won’t yet see the 1st coming of Christ, but their prophets foretell of Him, of His Hope and Salvation, the Arm that saves because God Himself Whom corrects is also Mighty to Save. Chapter 63 reminds of the price of judgment and when God hardens hearts. But God also said “Surely they are My people”...  and is sending of Himself a Savior: So He became their Savior. In all their affliction He was afflicted, And the Angel of His Presence saved them; In His love and in His pity He redeemed them. Chapter 64 brings a remembrance of our need and the nation of Israel’s need (and all gentiles need) for a Savior.

You meet him who rejoices. How often does God ask for our sacrificial Praise even in adversity? ALL THE TIME!  The Israelites of Isaiah’s time were looking at ruins from the temple and the people God set aside and Isaiah on behalf of the nation acknowledged their sinfulness. He begs but saw the salvation Arm of God in the midst of the fury. We EXPERIENCE what he FORETOLD, SALVATION of Jesus forgiveness and a bride to His Bridegroom, a healing for ever after. 

Isaiah says that amazing truth: “O Lord, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You our potter; And all we are the work of Your hand.”

If we take time for Christmas, let’s not neglect the time we take for (and spend with) Christ. Let’s not judge the world, lest we be judged. Not demand but encourage Christ in Christmas. Especially we ourselves could fully open the gift of thoughtfulness, sacrifice, holiness, wholeness, wholesomeness, and Praise. Let us remember what angered God of those generations turning backs on Him, from those left behind after Noah’s Ark to generations spoken of by Isaiah, and NOT do that. Let us remember our clay is molded after Him and our lives are moldable by His HANDS and Jesus’s Hydration – and we are directed to turn towards Him. Let us hear our Shephard’s assuring Voice.

If God waits patiently for us, let’s not make Him wait and more for us to turn towards Him. Piety is pursuing our Prince of PEACE. Praise Him.

Amen 

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Isaiah 63-64 NKJV 

The Lord in Judgment and Salvation

Who is this who comes from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah, this One who is glorious in His apparel, Traveling in the greatness of His strength?—

“I who speak in righteousness, mighty to save.”

Why is Your apparel red, And Your garments like one who treads in the winepress? “I have trodden the winepress alone, and from the peoples no one was with Me. For I have trodden them in My anger, And trampled them in My fury; Their blood is sprinkled upon My garments, And I have stained all My robes. For the day of vengeance is in My heart, And the year of My redeemed has come. I looked, but there was no one to help, And I wondered that there was no one to uphold; Therefore My own arm brought salvation for Me; And My own fury, it sustained Me. I have trodden down the peoples in My anger, Made them drunk in My fury, And brought down their strength to the earth.”

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God’s Mercy Remembered

I will mention the lovingkindnesses of the Lord And the praises of the Lord, According to all that the Lord has bestowed on us, And the great goodness toward the house of Israel, Which He has bestowed on them according to His mercies, according to the multitude of His lovingkindnesses. For He said, “Surely they are My people, children who will not lie.” So He became their Savior. In all their affliction He was afflicted, And the Angel of His Presence saved them; In His love and in His pity He redeemed them; And He bore them and carried them all the days of old. But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit; So He turned Himself against them as an enemy, and He fought against them.

Then he remembered the days of old, Moses and his people, saying: “Where is He who brought them up out of the sea With the shepherd of His flock? Where is He who put His Holy Spirit within them, Who led them by the right hand of Moses, With His glorious arm, Dividing the water before them to make for Himself an everlasting name, Who led them through the deep, As a horse in the wilderness, that they might not stumble?” As a beast goes down into the valley, And the Spirit of the Lord causes him to rest, So You lead Your people, To make Yourself a glorious name.

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A Prayer of Penitence

Look down from heaven, and see from Your habitation, holy and glorious. Where are Your zeal and Your strength, The yearning of Your heart and Your mercies toward me? Are they restrained? Doubtless You are our Father, Though Abraham was ignorant of us, And Israel does not acknowledge us. You, O Lord, are our Father; Our Redeemer from Everlasting is Your name. O Lord, why have You made us stray from Your ways, and hardened our heart from Your fear? Return for Your servants’ sake, the tribes of Your inheritance. Your holy people have possessed it but a little while; Our adversaries have trodden down Your sanctuary. We have become like those of old, over whom You never ruled, Those who were never called by Your name.

Chapter 64

A Prayer for Help

Oh, that You would rend the heavens! That You would come down! That the mountains might shake at Your presence – As fire burns brushwood, as fire causes water to boil – to make Your name known to Your adversaries, that the nations may tremble at Your presence! When You did awesome things for which we did not look, You came down, The mountains shook at Your presence. For since the beginning of the world Men have not heard nor perceived by the ear, Nor has the eye seen any God besides You, Who acts for the one who waits for Him. You meet him who rejoices and does righteousness, Who remembers You in Your ways. You are indeed angry, for we have sinned – In these ways we continue; And we need to be saved.

But we are all like an unclean thing, And all our righteousnesses are like Filthy rags; We all fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. And there is no one who calls on Your name, Who stirs himself up to take hold of You; For You have hidden Your face from us, And have consumed us because of our iniquities.

But now, O Lord, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You our potter;

And all we are the work of Your hand. Do not be furious, O Lord,

Nor remember iniquity forever; Indeed, please look—we all are Your people! Your holy cities are a wilderness, Zion is a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation. Our holy and beautiful temple, Where our fathers praised You, is burned up with fire; and all our pleasant things are laid waste. Will You restrain Yourself because of these things, O Lord? Will You hold Your peace, and afflict us very severely?