Rejoice in the Birth of Jesus!

            Have you had your Joy Juice today?  During this Christmas season, please don’t forget to put “Joy” at the top of your Christmas list. 

            Joy truly is a gift.  God gave us His Son Jesus and no better gift will there ever be! Philippians 4:4 reminds us to “rejoice in the Lord always”.   No, we won’t always be in joyful situations; we will not always be happy. But if we’ll keep Jesus as our focus and depend on joy in our relationship with Him…then we will be “rejoicing in the Lord”.

          Christmas is rapidly approaching. There will be many fun activities….like parades & parties, shopping & baking.  But let’s not take our eyes off the real reason that we are celebrating. If we do, we will be in danger of missing the JOY of Christmas.

            So what can we do to assure that we are keeping the main thing the main thing?  Here are a few suggestions:

• Let’s start the day with a prayer of gratitude, thanking God for the birth of His Son, Jesus.
• Read the Christmas story from the Bible.  Why not let that be our daily devotionals during this entire month?  We can find the story of Jesus’ birth in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
• When we decorate our homes, let a nativity set be the focal point so that we’ll have a visual reminder of the birth of Jesus.
• And let’s choose to worship faithfully in the church of our choice.  To gather with fellow Christians during any time of year is special, but at Christmas it’s extra JOYful!

 Rejoice in the birth of Jesus and have a joyfully blessed Christmas season.