Most people seem to me to have a tendency to think about the needy at Christmas time.  That’s good.  Unfortunately, it also seems that many have a tendency to think about the needy only at Christmas time.  As Christians, our concern for those in need should be apparent every day of the year.   The biblical commands to care for the poor are numerous and clear and certainly not limited to once a year.

I don’t say any of that, of course, to discourage anyone from remembering the needy at Christmas.  Rather, I hope to encourage you to remember the needy all year long.  Since Christmas is quickly approaching, though, I want to point out a few simple and rather painless things you could do this holiday season to help those in need.

Buy Coffee

Freshly roasted coffee makes a nice, fairly inexpensive gift for the beloved coffee addicts in your life.  If you’d like to buy coffee and help the poor at the same time, you have a couple of options.

Gobena Coffee

The events surrounding the adoption of their daughter inspired the Lehmans, in their words, to…

start this ministry where 100% of the net profits are reinvested in the lives of orphan children throughout the world. Each time you purchase a bag of coffee, you are providing hope and life to children who do not have parents caring for them.  (Find out more here)

Bolaven Farms

Inspired in part by the ministry of John Piper, Bolaven Farms is a coffee grower with a heart for the poor.

What the poor want is not aid, but jobs – real jobs, not subsidized ones. This is the dignity and self-reliance we are equally created for. Embracing this revealed desire of the poor, Bolaven Farms is committed to labor with our Resident Farmers, to put an end to poverty, one family at a time.  (Website here)

Buy Homemade Earring Holders

Whose wife doesn’t have lots of earrings?

Blog team member Isaac Johnson’s wife has a friend who is trying to help a refugee family from Iraq pay for much needed dental work by selling home made earring holders.

If you or anyone you know is interested in purchasing an earring holder for a suggested donation of $20 (plus shipping if needed), one hundred percent of the proceeds will fund the dental work needed by this family. (If you do know of others who might be interested in your area, it might save on shipping to send a couple together.) The earring holders are beautifully crafted, hand-made, and they make great Christmas gifts!  (Read more here)

If you’re not interested in purchasing coffee or earring holders (or even if you are) there are also a lot of other ways to help the needy.

Fill a shoebox for Operation Christmas Child (but you’ll have to hurry!)

Get involved with Prison Fellowship’s Angel Tree ministry.

Or do something else creative.  But please, do something.  And whatever you do, don’t stop when Christmas is over.

My Sunday School lesson last week concluded with some questions about the Incarnation:

Consider the remarkable truth that God becomes a human being in Jesus Christ. How do you respond to that fact? Does it still have power to amaze you? Is it so familiar to you that it has little impact?

It is a sad fact of our human nature that our hearts often grow dull.  We don’t feel the force of truth as we should.  In order to combat that tendency we need to meditate deeply on the stunning realities of Scripture.  The incarnation is exactly that sort of reality.  The new The ESV Study Bible, commenting on John 1:14, says,

This is the most amazing event in all of history: the eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent, infinitely holy Son of God took on a human nature and lived among humanity as one who was both God and man at the same time, in one person.

“The most amazing event in all of history”–that’s quite a statement, but I believe it’s true.  In the words of John Stott, “The paradox is amazing.  The Creator assumes the human frailty of his creatures.  The Eternal One enters time.  The all-powerful makes himself vulnerable.  The all-holy exposes himself to temptation.  And in the end the immortal dies.”

What would happen if we truly grasped the profound significance of the Incarnation?

We must both read and meditate upon the Nativity.  If the meditation does not reach the heart, we shall sense no sweetness, nor shall we know what solace for humankind lies in this contemplation.  The heart will not laugh nor be merry.  As spray does not touch the deep, so mere meditation will not quiet the heart.  There is such richness and goodness in this Nativity that if we should see and deeply understand, we should be dissolved in perpetual joy…

This is the word of the prophet: “Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given” (Isaiah 9:6).  This is for us the hardest point, not so much to believe that He is the son of the Virgin and God himself, as to believe that this Son of God is ours.  That is where we wilt, but he who does feel it has become another man (from Martin Luther’s Christmas Book).

Merry Christmas.  My hope is that all who read these words would find in Christ, this very day, a Savior from the terrible power and penalty of their own sin; and so find themselves “dissolved in perpetual joy.”

A couple of weeks ago I posted an Advent poll (which you can still participate in, if you’d like).  Based on some of the comments on that post, as well as other conversations I’ve had, I think there are a lot of people who are interested in Advent, but simply inexperienced or uninformed about it.  I understand that, because I was in exactly the same boat until about three years ago.

There are two questions in the title of this post.  I want to try, with your help, to answer both.

In answer to the first part of the question (What is Advent?), I would say from my limited experience that Advent provides a structured way to spend an extended period of time meditating on both the Incarnation (the first coming) and the return (the second coming) of Christ.  Here’s a brief but helpful history of the development of Advent, from the Encyclopedia Britannica:

(from Latin adventus, “coming”), in the Christian church calendar, the period of preparation for the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ at Christmas and also of preparation for the Second Coming of Christ. It begins on the Sunday nearest to November 30 (St. Andrew’s Day) and is the beginning of the new church year. The date when the season was first observed is uncertain. Bishop Perpetuus of Tours (461–490) established a fast before Christmas that began on November 11 (St. Martin’s Day), and the Council of Tours (567) mentioned an Advent season. Its liturgical meaning referred to the dual “coming” of Jesus—his incarnation in Bethlehem and his second coming as judge at the end of time. Together with Lent it was observed as a penitential season, though not with the same rigour as Lent. Consequently, Advent developed increasingly into the joyful anticipation of Jesus’ birth.

If you’re looking for a more detailed description of Advent traditions, you might want to browse through Dennis Bratcher’s site.

The themes and elements of Advent celebrations can vary widely, especially if a formal church liturgy isn’t followed.  We’ve created our own unique Advent celebrations at home and at church, incorporating some of the traditional elements of Advent (a wreath, a Jesse tree, etc.) with some customs and ideas of our own.  So Advent can be celebrated in a variety of traditional and non-traditional ways.  The key is not the form Advent celebrations may take; the key is spending a sustained period of time focusing on Christ, and meditating deeply on the profound significance of his (once and future) coming.

Now I want to hand off the second part of the question to you–how do you celebrate Advent, and what impact has it had on you and your family? Be as detailed as you’d like.

Martin Luther was adept at articulating timeless truths in creative and memorable and sometimes even jarring ways.  Don’t take that as an endorsement of everything Luther said, though.  His creativity and enthusiasm would have been better kept in check at times, but–that’s just part of what made him such a colorful character, and so much fun to read.

And reading is what this post is about.  I’m always on the lookout for good books to read during Advent.  I want to tell you about one I bought a couple of years ago.

Roland Bainton, who’s best know as the author of Here I Stand – A Life Of Martin Luther, is also the editor of a collection of Christmas meditations entitled Martin Luther’s Christmas Book.  It contains excerpts from his sermons, “reconstructed by way of condensation, transposition, and paraphrase,” and organized around eight different themes: Annunciation, Visitation, Nativity, Shepherds, Herod, Wise Men, Presentation, and From Heaven High.

Luther never ceased marvelling at the staggering implications of the Incarnation.  If I have time next week (don’t hold your breath), I’ll post a few quotes from this Christmas Book.  In the mean time, here’s an excerpt from Bainton’s Introduction:

The condescension of God was the great wonder.  This it is that reason cannot fathom.  What man, if guided by his natural promptings, would do so much for another?  Why should God humble himself to lie in the feedbox of a donkey and to hang upon a cross?  The manger and the cross are never far apart for Luther.  The birth was more than a lovely idyl.  It took place in squalor and under the shadow of terror.  Bethlehem presaged Calvary.  Confronted by the self-emptying of God, modern man stands on no other ground than that of Luther.  For neither can faith be easy.  For neither need it be impossible.  That Luther, feeling as acutely as we all the difficulties, could yet believe–that may help our unbelief.

Spend Advent reflecting on the Incarnation with Martin Luther.

The staggering fact that God one day wrapped Himself in flesh and lived among us is explored in this compelling video.  Post continued below the video…

(HT – Tony Brott)

What if God was one of us? Joan Osborne wistfully asked that question in a popular song several years ago.  Don’t be misled by the title of the song, though.  It was by no stretch of the imagination a Christian song, although it did raise a provocative question.

What if God was one of us?  Well, he was.  Christmas is, in fact, about God becoming one of us, being “made flesh” (John 1:14) in his incarnation, and doing so with a specific purpose–to reconcile us to God.

Do you celebrate Advent?  I never had–at least, not until 2005.  Our new pastor arrived in the summer of that year, and one of the things he wanted to do was begin a new tradition at our church–celebrating Advent together.  From that first year until now, my family and I have thoroughly enjoyed observing the season, both at church and at home.

So now I’m curious how many of you celebrate Advent.  I’d like for you to take the poll below, and then perhaps elaborate in the comments on how you or your church observe Advent, and how long you’ve been doing it.  Thanks!

I love Advent, and I love music. So does my whole family.  So, you probably won’t be surprised when I tell you that we have a lot of Christmas CDs.

My friend Tony recently recommended the new Christmas CD by Ten Out Of Tenn. I haven’t heard it yet, but I’m sure I’ll like it.  Tony and I have similar tastes in music and doctrine (I’ve never met anyone else who was Reformed and liked Larry Norman).  Anyway, I thought I’d take time to list some of the Christmas music we like to listen to not just at Christmas, but all year round.

My favorites:

Noel – Various Artists

A Medieval Christmas – Kemper Crabb

Behold the Lamb of God – Andrew Peterson

Advent Songs – Sojourn Music

The Birth of Jesus:Celebration – John Michael Talbot

A Broken Christmas – Various Artists

Yonder Shines the Infant Light – Bill Mallonee

The Spirit of Christmas Past: A Charles Dickens Christmas – Ed Sweeney

Here are a few others that my wife and kids enjoy:

Christmas – Michael W. Smith

Christmas Songs – Jars of Clay

Let It Snow Baby… Let It Reindeer – Relient K

Mannheim Steamroller Christmas Celebration – Mannheim Steamroller

Christmas Portrait – Carpenters

White Christmas: A Christmas Festival – Boston Pops / Arthur Fiedler

Christmas with the Chipmunks – Alvin and the Chipmunks

Advent begins tomorrow.  We celebrate it both at home and at our church.  It’s a special time for our family, and I pray that it would be for yours as well.  I sincerely wish you all a blessed Advent and Christmas season.