Merry Christmas everyone! It sure doesn't seem like it's time to say that but it is. Rejoicing about the birth of our Lord and Savior should be a year=round response to God's most perfect gift from Heaven. Saying Merry Christmas applies to every circumstance and day of the year much like Thanksgiving does. In fact, God says we are to do both all the time.

Rejoice in the Lord always: and again, I say , Rejoice. Phillippians 4:4

In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. 1 Thessalonians 5:18

     This is surely the most beautiful season of the year. This fall has been the most glorious! Even in South Georgia the leaves have seemed beautiful displaying their fall foliage and falling softly and silently. It would be great for each of us, as we grow older in years by His grace to show off our true colors of faithfulness, patience, and godly love. Then we die silently and softly like a leaf floating from a tree in the fall season. One of the beauties of the leaf fall is that we can see more of the sky, sun, moon, and stars when the leaves are off the trees. That's how it should be with us as we die daily to our selfish desires, as well as when it comes our time to die physically. That others may see through our witness who and what is above us all, the Lord of Glory!

     Christmas time is a merry time because it's the time of the year we celebrate the greatest gift ever given, the humanity of God, namely the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. Christmas is about God sending His love from above. Everything that God sends to us is needful and right, and this includes our trials, troubles, but most especially His beloved only begotten Son.

Every good gift and every perfect gift are from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with who is no variablesness, neither shadow of turning. James 1:17

     Thanksgiving should turn our hearts to praise God. Christmas ought to strengthen our hearts to trust God. After all, the very fact that God sent His Son to this sinful earth is sure evidence that He cares for and has not given up on His earthly project. The birth of the Lord Jesus Christ is proof that God is trustworthy. Since God has given us this most wonderful gift, it would be good for us to give God something to acknowledge our appreciation for all He has done, is doing, and promises to do for us through Christ Jesus our Lord. This Christmas let's give God the gift that keeps on giving, let's trust Him as never before.

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. Proverbs 3:5

     Trust in the dictionary is defined as firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something. Trust in the Christian is defined as a sufficient assurance that God is God and knowing that in the end everything is going to be just right. Every time I think about trusting God, I think about what God thinks about it. God thinks so much of trust that He wrote about it in the very center and middle verse in the Bible.

It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. Psalms 118:8

     Trusting God is the next best thing to being saved. Actually, God saves us so we can trust Him. Because He has saved us, we ought to trust Him. There is nothing we can do about our salvation but there is a lot we can do about our trust in God. Nothing pleases God more than trusting Him. The reason God likes and wants us to trust Him is because trusting Him must be done by faith, not sight nor feelings . Jesus Christ's birth is why we celebrate Christmas but the reason for the season is to verify and validate our trust in God. Every day brings circumstances and situations which could scatter and shake us were it not for the fact that we are tied to God by trust. Trust in God is the chain that will not break the rock that we can stand on and the victory over evil which seemed impossible. If you want to get in the Christmas spirit, try trusting God as never before.

Trust God when you don't understand what He is doing,

And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her. Luke 1:38

     When theAngel told Mary she was going to have a baby she did not understand what God was doing, but because she was highly favored by the Lord, she believed what she did not nor your not understand. God does not require us to understand what He is doing in our lives. He does expect us to trust Him no matter the circumstances though. Every genuine Christian is also highly favored of the Lord. We should all deck the halls and our hearts with God's grace and mercy. Our holy boughs of holly, spiritually speaking, are what makes us holy. The red berries of holly remind us of the redeeming blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and the evergreens remind us that we have eternal life and that nothing can separate us from God's love. All of us as believers have been chosen by God to bring His beloved Son into the world so to speak. The gift of the Holy Spirit is given to us so that we know, and others will know that God has done something miraculous for us and to us. The best way to bring Jesus into the world is to trust His world and submit to His ways. Even though His ways and our ways may differ, His ways are always right. When we can't see His hand we can always trust His promise. God is always doing something!

He will not suffer thy foot to be moved; he that keepeth thee will not slumber.  Psalm 121:3

     And whatever God does, it's always for His glory and our good. This Christmas we can trust God by making every effort to glorify Him. The truth is we can never outlive God. When we give Him glory, He gives us His goodness. Really if we can't trust God who can we trust? God, by sending His beloved only begotten Son into this sinful world, proved that He is trustworthy. Let's open His git this Christmas and find so much trust that we know without a shadow of a doubt that what He says is true. 

     Truth makes us free because we can trust the truth. The Lord has given us such a wonderful gift let's acknowledge to Him how much we appreciate it by trusting what we cannot understand or comprehend. If someone we love and who loved us gave us a special coat or jacket and we never wore it but kept it in the closet, what would they think?

Trust God when you don't want to do what God wants you to do.

But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife; for that which is conceived in here is of the Holy Ghost.  Matthew 1:20

     The virgin birth of the Lord Jesus Christ is the foundational fact of the Christian faith. If Jesus is not God, then His sacrifice could not have redeemed us from sin. The very fact that Jesus was born of the the Virgin Mary, conceived by the Holy Spirit, is reason enough to trust Him even when we don't feel like trusting Him. Trusting God and prayer have a lot in common and that the best time to do both is when we don't feel like doing either. Sorriness hatches out in our lives when only we do things we fee like doing. The devil may be a feeling being, but God is not. When you can't trust your feelings, you can always trust God. One of the consequences of my knee replacement surgery is I have to endure pain at night when I'm in bed trying to sleep. The fact that my knee hurst does not diminish the strength nor softness of my bed. I do not think for one second that my bed will fall when I lay down. Just because we hurt doesn't mean we shouldn't trust God. Sometimes the pain of this life reveals who we can truly trust.

God is pleased when we trust Him even when we are afraid.

What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. In God I will praise His word, in God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me. Psalms 56:3-4

     When my daughters were learning to swim, I could stand a few feet away from the pool's edge on which they stood. With my arms wide open I would tell them to jump to me. Most of the time there was a moment of hesitation but then they submitted to my command and fell into my arms. Not only did they feel better and were more confident in the water, I also was honored that they trusted me enough to put their very lives in my hands.

     I believe we miss a lot of blessing in this life just because we let our feelings overrule our faith. Think about what Joseph would have missed had not the Angel directed him to trust God. This Christmas may the Lord direct us and give us a special holiday unction to trust Him when our feelings are pulling us towards selfishness which leads to sorriness even rebellion. It is true that most of the time God wants us to be where He wants us to be, more than we want to be where He wants us to be. The best holiday will be a holy day and that will be the day we are where God wants us to be which will happen every day as we trust and obey.

Trust God when others want you to go their way and you know it's not God's way.

And being warned f God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way. Matthew 2:12

     One of the devil's greatest lies is "everybody's doing it so it's OK for us to do it too". Peer pressure is powerful and will often pull us in the wrong direction no matter our age or religion. The path of the greatest resistance is going to be the right path for us if we want to please God and have any peace and make any positive progress. Most likely, if everybody's doing it, it's not God's way.

Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because stait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth u to life, and few there be that find it. Matthew 7:13-14

     What made the wise men wise was not them searching for the Christ child nor was it their education or wealth. What made the wise men wise was their fear of God. the Bible says that the beginning wisdom is the fear of the Lord. So, these wise men feared God more than they feared Herod who had told them to come his way when they found Jesus so he could know where he was and worship him also.

     We can be sure that the devil and a lot of other people want us to go their way. For the Christian there is only one way, God's way! Sometimes we get discouraged because the way is hard and sometimes the road seems lonely. We must remember the Lord is with us and we can trust Him and His map.

     Sometimes a well-worn or used path is the right one but sometimes it's not. I always depended on my compass to keep me going in the right direction when I was walking and working in the woods. There were times the thickets and creeks seemed to be in the wrong place, and I even felt like I was going in the wrong direction, even lots. The compass would always get me out of the woods and keep me going in the right direction. God has given us a compass in our hearts to direct us, guide us, and keep us going the right way. The Holy Spirit dwells in every believer and His strong touch manifest a magnetic true north attention of His amazing, unconditional love. We can never trust the devil for anything, but trouble and we can't trust others all the time. However, we trust God, especially during our trials.

But he knoweth the way that I take; when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. Job 23:10

     Trust God this Christmas! Even when you can't understand what He is doing, like Mary. Trust Him when you don't feel like it, like Joseph. Trust Him when you are at odds with what people want you to do and what God wants you to do, like the wisemen.

Merry Christmas,

Brother Randy