Do You Hear What I Hear?

Well, our much needed break has begun, Father. As a family, help us to make the most of it. May we take advantage of the time we have and love each other to the fullest. Amen.

********

I come from a musically inclined family, especially my dad’s side. As a matter of fact, when he entered college his father, who had served several years as a pastor, took the whole family on the road as an evangelist. He preached, they all sang and played a variety of instruments.

I love music and I don’t remember exactly when; I took piano lessons early on. At some point, I was pretty decent for someone my age – never really good but decent. At that time, I learned to play one of my favorite Christmas songs – Do You Hear What I Hear? I’m pretty sure that I still have the music in a box up in the attic somewhere, but I haven’t seen or played it in forever.

The song itself is older than I am…but just by a smidge. I existed but wasn’t born until a few months later. Interestingly enough, it was written as a plea for peace during the Cuban Missile Crisis toward the end of 1962, often considered the closest the Cold War came to escalating into a full-scale nuclear war. Pray for peace, people everywhere! is a portion of the last stanza.

I know I wrote of peace in yesterday’s post but, though it was not my original intent, here it is again. I least from my end of things, God must be trying to get through to us. Especially as followers of Christ, it is imperative that we be purveyors of peace.

Paul in his letter to the Romans states,

For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of what we eat or drink, but of living a life of goodness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. If you serve Christ with this attitude, you will please God, and others will approve of you, too. 14:17-18 _NLT (emphasis mine)

Too often, I fear that we do not strive to live righteous lives of goodness, peace, and joy. Quite often the reason we fail is that we don’t take advantage of the Holy Spirit’s presence in our lives.

When someone constantly grates against us, is it a simple task to be a source of peace. No, it’s hard! But…when we call on the Holy Spirit, He is there and he will supply what we cannot. We need but listen to His calling out to us. Do you hear what I hear?

Dec 23^rd, 2020, Wed, 2:39 pm