The Incarnation of Jesus Christ - #597 - JCSM's Weekly Devotions

Dear Subscribers,

I hope you're well today.

I've decided to concentrate on 25 different character qualities in next year's devotions. I'll spend two weeks on each one, plus we'll have a special devotional message for Easter and Christmas. If you'd like to see this list of essential virtues, please click here! We will have an RSS/podcast feed, beginning on January 1, 2009, so you can easily subscribe and download the weekly devotions.

Welcome to the new readers of this message! Here is your Devotion, A Moment of Introspection, JCSM's Challenge, the Word of the Week, a faith-builder from "The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained," and the Quotes of the Week. Have a fantastic week and God bless you!

Love in Christ,

JCSM

JCSM's Weekly Devotions

"The Incarnation of Jesus Christ"

John 1:1-14 "1The Word was first, the Word present to God, God present to the Word. The Word was God, in readiness for God from day one. Everything was created through him; nothing—not one thing!—came into being without him. What came into existence was Life, and the Life was Light to live by. The Life-Light blazed out of the darkness; the darkness couldn’t put it out. There once was a man, his name John, sent by God to point out the way to the Life-Light. He came to show everyone where to look, who to believe in. John was not himself the Light; he was there to show the way to the Light. The Life-Light was the real thing: Every person entering Life he brings into Light. He was in the world, the world was there through him, and yet the world didn’t even notice. He came to his own people, but they didn’t want him. But whoever did want him, who believed he was who he claimed and would do what he said, He made to be their true selves, their child-of-God selves. These are the God-begotten, not blood-begotten, not flesh-begotten,
not sex-begotten. The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one-of-a-kind glory, like Father, like Son, Generous inside and out, true from start to finish.

Insight: The incarnation of Jesus Christ was one of the most amazing events in human history. God came to Earth, showed us how to live, died for our sins, and rose from the grave. Discover the person of Jesus today!

Prayer: "Dear Lord, thank you for what You have given to us. Help us to grasp it all. Thank you for your grace and mercy, things we do not deserve. Forgive our sins and purify us. Help us to do good and not evil. Thank you for loving us so much. Help us to love You and others more. Let us consider You this Christmas and how You came to Earth to do a mighty, powerful work. In Jesus' name, Amen."

A Moment of Introspection

When you can always do something, but never undo it, give it a little thought before doing it. - Me

JCSM's Challenge

Create a list of New Year's Resolutions. Decide which ones are the most important, then decide to do them at all costs in 2009. You have the opportunity to make some positive changes that could benefit you and others for a long time.

God bless you as you meet this week's challenge!

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained

"The Skeptic's Annotated Bible" claims:

Matthew 5:17 - Jesus strongly approves of the law and the prophets. He hasn't the slightest objection to the cruelties of the Old Testament.

"The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained" responds:

God's laws were given to protect people and make them righteous. The prophets were the mouthpieces of God. The so-called cruelties were God's judgments on wicked, unrepentant sinners; after being warned and generally after receiving several warnings and much time to repent.

(This explanation came from "The Skeptic's Annotated Bible: Corrected and Explained". This book is on CD and gives over 4,000 answers to alleged Bible errors, regarding the entire Bible at http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.org. There is also a 300 question workbook that accompanies the CD-ROM.)

Quotes of the Week

"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." - Ferris Bueller

If you'd like to read more wise quotes, you can either visit our Quotations Archive or get a copy of "10,000 Wise Quotes and Spiritual Sayings"! It's the largest collection of Bible-based quotations in the world.

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