Gò0dNews for Everyone
Remember When? o you ever pull off the shoes of your imagination and let it run barefoot through your mind? I think the modern term for that is reminiscing. Well, a little reminiscing this time of the year is not a bad thing. It will bring us back to our roots, good or bad. Then, we must stop and remember. Speaking of remembering, I can talk to you better about my childhood than I can about what my sermon was last Sunday. Christmas was more laid back and filled with more excitement when I was a boy than it is today. In early December, my mother and grandmother would find a cedar tree, cut it, and nail boards on the bottom to stabilize it. Then came the exciting part. We had strands and strands of big bulb lights with which they adorned the tree from top to bottom. There was not a branch that did not have multiple lights attached. After the lights, we popped popcorn and strung it together with sewing thread and a needle. Silver and gold tinsel would be draped across the limbs. The final touch was some white concoction, and blobs of it would adorn the tips of the tree to look like snow. The presents would eventually find their way under the tree. Then it would be Christmas, and my grandfather would come home from working on the railroad. I remember my grandmother telling me the true meaning of Christmas. The arrival of the Christ child. I remember all that as the “good old days.” What about you? What are some of your Christmas memories? How long has it been since you just sat and let your childhood memories race through your mind? Some will be good memories, and some will be not so good. But it will do you good to spend a little time reminiscing. However, as you reminisce about your childhood, don’t forget the reason for the season. Had it not been for God’s unmerited favor, everlasting love, and enduring faithfulness, there would be no reason for an evergreen Christmas tree, big bulbs, popcorn, tinsel, and snow-capped branches. God, in His great love, sent His only Son into this world. His Son, the baby of Bethlehem, came into this world
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knowing what He faced. Yet Jesus came anyway and lived, loved, suffered, and died to redeem us from our sin. Then, three days later, He arose bodily from the grave and walked the face of this earth 40 more days. He then went back to His rightful place in heaven to prepare a place for us and now sits at God’s right hand, making intercession for us, waiting to return.
Hebrews 9:11-14: “But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”
About The Author
D
by Jimmy Bryant
Following his 80th birthday and almost 59 years in the ministry, Bryant retired, again. He and his wife of almost 60 years have two sons, three grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. They make their home in Summerville, Georgia. He is the author of “Confessions of a Baptist Minister.”
