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I was playing with my 3-year-old grandson Blake last week, and I heard him say, “Papaw, you can’t find me!” Oddly enough, we were both in the kitchen. I turned around, and he was standing by the cabinets not five feet away with his hands over his eyes!

Often, we find ourselves in a situation of despair that is so dark that we can’t see anyway out. The problem is that we try to do it ourselves, and the results can be devastating. Proverbs 14:12 warns us, “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.” Yet, God promises us a way: His way. Psalm 119:105 says, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.” We must allow God’s Word to show us the way through and out of those circumstances.

There will also be times when the “Master of Disaster”, Satan, will tempt us, relentlessly, especially where we are most vulnerable. Hebrews 12:1 says, “…let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,” However, I’m so thankful that when the evil one tries to disrupt our faithfulness in walking with the Lord, we have a divine defense. I Corinthians 10:13 promises us, “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” Praise the Lord!!!

*Zach Williams and Dolly Parton sing a song titled, “There was Jesus!” The third stanza reads,

In the waiting, in the searching
In the healing and the hurting
Like a blessing buried in the broken pieces
Every minute, every moment
Where I've been and where I'm going
Even when I didn't know it or couldn't see it
There was Jesus

On the first Christmas, this glorious announcement came in Luke 2:11, “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. Regardless of what we may go through, we, too, can say, there was Jesus. Hebrews 13:5 promises, “Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.” I pray we won’t let PRESENTS keep us from seeing the very PRESENCE of Christ. Only then can we have a very Merry Christmas!  

From My Heart,

Bro. John