A Merry Christmas to everyone. How wonderful it is to get together with family and friends and celebrate the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. It is a shame that so many places and countries are forbidding gatherings, and I hope and pray that the longer this goes on, the more people wake up to it being not only a shame, but a sham as well. We have a God-given immune system and we do not need to fear giving it a work out. The message of the angels of God to both Mary and Joseph was firstly, Do Not Fear. We really don’t need to be afraid, especially if we have faith, and God does not want us to live in fear. Sure, there’s a lot of things to be afraid of and a lot of things that could kill us, but still, over and over in Scripture it tells us to not live in fear, that we can live boldly in Christ, confident in our salvation. I think this can apply to a cold virus as well as anything else. Certainly it applies to snow and ice. Here in Minnesota we just had a blizzard and even with icy, snowy roads where any number of us could lose our lives in an instant if the car would slip, thousands, perhaps more, were still out on the roads, because being with our loved ones at this time is more important than the fear of a car crash.

That’s the big contemplation for me with 2021 coming up: What’s more important? Fearing the threat of illness? Fearing the threat of violence from the authorities? Or living life to the fullest and placing community and people of higher importance than all that? As Christians, the one thing from this world that we can take with us to heaven is other people, and it’s hard to witness to them if we never see them or are around them. It saddens me greatly that the worst thing to come out of this is that the Church has allowed itself to be silenced to some degree. In a world so blessed by God, this should not be! We are to thank and praise, serve and obey God rather than men, daily! However, there is hope, and I do think in many places the tide is turning. The battle for freedom is something absolutely worth being fought, for if we are free, so can we freely proclaim God’s wonderful promises of salvation and the fulfillment of them in Jesus.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!