“For the Lord your God is the God of gods and Lord of lords. He is the great God, the mighty and awesome God, who shows no partiality and cannot be bribed. He ensures that orphans and widows receive justice. He shows love to the foreigners living among you and gives them food and clothing. So you, too, must show love to foreigners, for you yourselves were once foreigners in the land of Egypt.” -Deuteronomy 10:17-19

Je t’aime
Te amo
Aishiteru
Ani ohevet othka, I love you

The sounds are all as different
As the lands from which they came
And though our words are all unique
Our hearts are still the same

Love in any language, straight from the heart
Pulls us all together, never apart
And once we learn to speak it, all the world will hear
Love in any language, fluently spoken here.

I love this song. I honestly do.

Aside from the fact that I’m fascinated with the different languages, it’s the message of the song that really captivates me. Yes, we are all different just like the languages spoken in the different parts of the world but one thing is common: we are all created by a Creator who has designed our hearts to understand the language of love.

In John 3:16 it says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

The coming of Jesus was not just for a chosen few.

It was not only for the educated, nor for the rich, nor for the famous and celebrated. It was for everyone who is in the world. It doesn’t matter what language you speak, what color you are, or what nation you live in.

The Savior’s advent is for all, for everyone.

The Lord shows no bias or prejudice. He loves you and me the same way He loves those living in the other parts of the world. He doesn’t play favorites.

In Deuteronomy 10:17-18, Moses reminded the Israelites that the God whom they serve is “God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widos, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing.” In verse 19, Moses then commanded them “to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.” These verses once again showed that God’s love is for everyone. And as God loved the “foreigners”, the Israelites are instructed to do the same.

I believe these verses also apply to us today. We who have tasted God’s love and goodness should likewise show the same love and compassion we have received. We who already belong to God’s family, no longer considered “foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household” (Ephesians 2:19), should reach out to those who are not yet His people to let them know about His love that it is not solely for us but is being made available for everyone. Jesus’ coming on that first Christmas Day was His way of saying He came for you, for me and for them; He loves you, He loves me and He loves them.

As we celebrate this time of year, may we never forget the reason for the season. The Son of God came because of love.

May we all speak fluently of His love.

“Yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.  God, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places.”
Habakkuk 3:18-19

To rejoice means to feel or show great joy or delight in something or someone. Isn’t that just the perfect way to describe how we should feel about God? After all, great joy and great delight are a natural byproduct of being close to Him, which is precisely where He wants us to be so that He can be our strength and our hope.

But what about when we’re afraid?

Or when things aren’t going all that well and it seems like everything around us is working against us? Or what about when things just feel totally out of control? It can be a lot harder to rejoice in those places. But those are exactly the times when we must lay down our worries and our fears, and choose to trust Him anyway.

In our abandoned trust, there is real joy waiting to be found.

There is a fantastic book called Hinds’ Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard, which is an allegory about the yearning of God’s children to be led to new heights. In it, the reader follows the main character Much-Afraid on her spiritual journey as she faces dangers and reaches new, high places. One quote from the book that stood out to me was this:

“The look the Shepherd turned on her was very beautiful. “Nothing my Father and I have made is ever wasted,” he said quietly, “and the little wild flowers have a wonderful lesson to teach. They offer themselves so sweetly and confidently and willingly, even if it seems that there is no one to appreciate them. Just as though they sang a joyous little song to themselves, that it is so happy to love…”

Rejoicing always, especially when it’s hard or when things don’t make sense; that is what it looks like to live out of faith. No situation, circumstance, or season is ever wasted when God is at the helm.

In Habakkuk 3:19, it says that He “makes my feet like the deer’s; He makes me tread on my high places.” I just love that in many versions of the Bible the high places described are unique to each person. They are not the high places, but my high places. And my high places are probably a little — or maybe even a lot — different than yours.  Isn’t that beautiful?

To think that our God created each of us for a different journey with unique heights to reach kind of blows my mind, and truly brings some serious joy to my heart.

I can have joy because I know that He made each of us for and wants to lead us to our high places.

Here is the thing: true, perfect, and everlasting joy came on a night when no one could have expected it: the night that Jesus was born.

As fully man and fully God, He came into a world that was desperate for what Him, even though they may not have known it at the time. He came to bring hope, joy, and life abundant for those who would choose to follow Him. So as you and I remember that special day when our sweet Savior was born, may we slow down to adore and delight in His presence, and may we remember that the greatest gift we would ever receive came that quiet night in Bethlehem.

 Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

Philippians 4:4

I was preparing to go and speak to someone about feeling miserable all the time. I was thinking something along the lines of “I don’t want to be told to choose to be grateful.” I’d seen several Instagram posts about the need to choose gratitude and, even though I knew it was true, it seemed like an annoying answer. I didn’t want to have choose gratitude.

I just wanted things to be fixed.

In a similar vein, I caught this post from Jordan Lee of SoulScripts the other day:

“I’m aware of the fact that lots of you wrestle with anxiety, depression, eating disorders, shame, and more. And I know that “choosing joy” is a cute thing to put on a coffee mug or on Pinterest but not all that simple to put into action in real life. When I walked through heartbreaks, grieved loss, hated my body and starved it in an effort to control SOMETHING in my life, I never once felt like I could simply choose joy. So I’m not going to challenge you to choose joy. I’m going to challenge you to choose Jesus. That doesn’t mean you’re going to become a perfect person in three easy steps. That doesn’t mean you’ll never feel icky or stuck or sad or frustrated. But it does mean your joy isn’t something you have to manufacture but something you are given. So if that’s the only choice we can really control, I think we oughtta make it in the middle of our mess.”

After talking through everything, this person set me the task of practicing gratitude and, coming from her, it felt like real advice (not just a cookie cutter answer).

Here’s the rub: it does change things.

It’s not about putting on a big smile and pretending everything’s fine. It can be about picking out the little slivers of light that you can in the moment and then saying thank-you.

Those little reminders of God’s goodness, and the way gratitude re-focuses on Him, bring breaths of joy.

Because while it is not easy to choose joy, it is possible to choose moments of rejoicing – whether those moments come out as a whimper or as a shout of joy! And it is possible to turn your eyes to Jesus.

Wherever you’re at, consider this your kick in the butt from a fellow struggler to do what you can in choosing gratitude.

Take a moment today to choose Jesus.

Choose to acknowledge the ways in which he is already blessing us. Cry out to him and surrender the parts of your life which feel joyless. Air your heart, take the dust-sheets off things you’ve been forgetting to enjoy, re-examine what you have and appreciate it once more, celebrating our good and generous God.