The Gift of Love

Today, I’m late finishing the Christmas Conversation series I started for the advent season of 2020.

The week before Christmas my husband and I were diagnosed with Covid-19, and with the phone call that relayed the positive test result, our celebration of Christmas and the end of the year took a turn down an unexpected path.

While we were thankful to have mild cases, I found the anxiety that comes with the presence of the virus and the fatigue which accompanies it was enough to keep me from finishing what I had started.

I also struggled with the impact that Covid-19 had on our Christmas plans. We missed it- entirely. All of our adult kids who were planning to be home had to redirect and celebrate elsewhere. Our loss of smell and taste kept us from enjoying even the simple pleasure of food and goodies thoughtfully left at the door. The headaches and congestion made it hard to concentrate on the basic disciplines of quiet time and prayer.

It was a time to rest in the grace of the greatest gift ever given-

The Gift of Love, the incarnate Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh- who came to dwell among us and for us!

And a time to know that nothing in this world has the power to cancel Christmas!

The Gift of Love has come, and Romans 8:35-39 was still true- nothing can separate me from the great and powerful love of Jesus Christ!

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

A week into 2021, I’m grateful to be safe and secure in the great love of Jesus Christ!

The troubles of 2020 have not disappeared with the calendar change, so I’ll close today with two PICs that I’m praying often.

I pray that in whatever you are facing, you will know that God is for you-

And I pray you’ll join me in loving others well this year by intentionally praying for their health and well-being.

Thank you Lord Jesus for loving me enough to come so that I could know how much God loves me and is for me. In 2021, root me securely in your great Gift of Love– in Jesus. Be alive in me as you dwell in me this year. Help me to face these times with courage and confidence in you. I want to love others well, showing that I am yours.