Begin with this interesting story from Thursday of this week: TRINITY, N.C., Dec. 18 (UPI) -- A mother in Trinity, N.C., says her family home has 61 Christmas trees, each of which is decorated with a different theme. Bren Knox said her home's Christmas trees began to multiply 11 years ago when her daughter requested a tree in her bedroom to help her sleep while Knox was out of town.
During the ensuing years, Knox said she added tree after tree to the home and began creating themes for each of the holiday items. Among the themes featured in the Knox home are chef and fruit-themed trees. "When people hear how many trees I have in my home, they think I'm crazy," the mother of two said. "But once they come in, they say it is the most magnificent, beautiful thing they've ever seen." Knox, who occasionally holds open houses to showcase her tree collection, told WFMY-TV her favorite tree contains items her children personally made.
For most people Christmas is a time to get more than before. Look around at see where this is true. You can look in the newspaper ads, decorations, your schedule, your possessions, etc. You in your life and in others.
Read Hebrews 12.1-2. We are encouraged to obviously get rid of sin so that we can run a good race. But we are also to get rid of something else. What is mentioned before the sin?
Anything that hinders is pretty broad, but it is in opposition to sin. It refers not to bad things in our lives, but good things which although they are good still hinder them. Our other readings give us some examples of good things God asks people to throw off so they can run the race that He marks out for us.
Read about Mary in Luke 1.26-28. Verse 34 is key. Amazingly it is Mary’s only question. But is speaks volumes about what God is asking her to have less of for Christmas. Having a child out of wedlock is the end of her girlhood dreams of an engagement and festive wedding, then the joy of bearing children. Mary rightly realizes that Christmas is about less and without a hesitation she throws off her dreams which hindered her from running with perseverance the race marked out for her.
Read about Paul in 2 Corinthians 12.7-10. Fast and furious, Paul lists the good things he has thrown off in order to run the race. What do you see that he has freely given up?
Three that jump out for me are physical health and comfort (12.7), strength (12.10), and an easy way (12.10 mentions both hardships and difficulties.) These are all good things, but they got in the way of the race.
Why?
“Hold on. I am not Paul or Mary. I am pretty confident that I can handle the race and comfort, ease, strength, and my dreams.”
Hang on to that thought. Can you think of anyone in the Bible who ran the race well with all of those things?
Joseph? Moses? Sampson? Saul? David? Solomon? Jonah? Jesus? Peter? Paul?
You can keep going with less prominent people. Universally they either throw off good to run the race, or they fail to finish well.
Why?
For me it helps to define what the race is. An athletic race is slightly appealing as I think about a prize or an award. But trophies seem to fade over time. Then I looked at verse 2 of Hebrews 12 and realized that the race isn’t for a prize. It is a race to someone. We aren’t running from these good things, we are running to Someone, better than those things. I think of coming home form work and having my daughters drop their crayons, throw aside their toys, lose their place in their book, so they can run to me. I think Mary and Paul understood this image. They threw off what hinders so they could get to Him as fast as possible.
Application:
As usual I am preaching to me. This speaks to me. I invite you to listen to what God is saying to me, then consider how He is speaking to you in these areas.
- My Dreams: I love to travel. I have my personal list of everywhere I want to go and it only grows. It is worth it to me to cut costs and save so I can travel. It is good. But I lay that dream at the feet of Jesus. I will only pick it up as He leads me to.
- My Health: I hate my allergies. Sometimes my head is so full that I feel like I am in a daze and I get so tired. I’d love to be done with them. That will be good. But I throw off my demand to be comfortable and without pain. My desire for health I lay at the feet of Jesus.
- Strength: I want to be the pastor of a growing healthy church. God also desires growing healthy churches. But I lay that desire for obvious strength before Him. I am content to be weak and frail in the eyes of the world.
- Easy way: For some reason I assume life ought to flow my way. Tire chains for instance. I want to be able to buy the cheap ones and have them easily slip on my tires. I get ticked when my hands strain to reach around my filthy tires and I struggle to tighten the chain without being able to see what I am doing. The numb wet fingers only add to the pleasure. I throw off my desire for a life without hardship or difficulty. I look past those things because I want to run to Him.
Pretty obviously I am still figuring out what all this means. I want a Christmas of less, so that I am free to run to the human/divine Beautiful Savior.