It Christmas!  Stores are busy decorating, luring buyers into the store hoping that this year’s bottom line will be better than last.  Churches are busy practicing plays, cantatas and other events, seeking to get the message of Christ to an increasingly secular world.

We too are busy planning parties, developing schedules, buying presents and cooking holiday goodies.  And we really don’t mind.  We are used to the hustle and bustle of life.  As a matter of fact we are trained to be busy to achieve, to produce to use every waking moment in the industry of making things or getting results.

But how about the ordinary, the back page events, those things that are not out front, in the headlines or making the news scroll on the bottom of our television screens?  We often look for God, or inspiration in the big things in life.  We fail to see Him working in the small things.  We fail to understand that all of life walking, talking, eating, reading, etc. is a part of the training process of God to produce in us the very character of Christ.

For instance, we pass a flower bed.  It is colorful, and its beauty causes us to pause and gaze in wonder at it.  We revel in it color and declare how it brightens our day  Yet we forget that before the flowers there was dirt; every day dirt. And there was weeds and grass and often times dirt that needed to be conditioned to bring for flowers. We forget the drudgery of turning the soil, pulling the weeds, defining the boundaries of the flower bed.

And yet, all of this is necessary to produce a beautiful array of flowers.  In the same manner, all of life is necessary for God to produce in us the Christian character that He so desires.  The little things, the ordinary, every day things of life work together to produce in us the character that honor our Creator and lifts the spirits of those around us.

This makes all of life exciting.  It produces in us an expectation of knowing that every day things, routine things are not outside the purview of God and are being used of Him to develop us into the creation that will bring forth praise to His holy name.

In a recent interview with Neil Cole the question, “What is a Missional community?” was asked. Neil responded in the following manner.

Being on a mission is not what the church is doing for God, but what it is allowing God to do through it.  It is not us doing stuff for God, but allowing Him to do stuff through us.  It is not meetings, campaigns, etc. but it is a life-style, so that, all of life is missional.  We cannot have the God of the scriptures and not have His mission.

So what is His mission?  It is the discipling of the nations.  It is Christ living on the inside of believers and those believers infiltrating every community.  A missional community does not exist for a task or one another, but for Jesus. Three ingredients are necessary in its DNA:

1. Divine Truth – the presence of the Spirit of God and His Word.

2. Nurturing Relationships – helping each other grow in the grace of God.

3. Apostolic Mission – living as “sent” one, individually and as a   community.

This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, (Hebrews 6:19 NKJV)

Hope a universal need is often swallowed up in the details of life.  Someone we know is diagnosed with cancer.  A relationship falls apart and someone we know allows the lure of this world to draw them away from the Lord.  Our heart is broken and we are saddened by the loss of loved ones.  We don’t understand how someone could make decisions that bring hurt and destruction to their lives.  It seems our world is falling apart and there is nothing we can do.

Oddly enough there is something we can do.  We can choose.  We can choose to believe in the hope that is in Christ or we can choose to allow our circumstances to destroy our hope, happiness and steal away our joy.

The Bible says the hope that we have in Christ is an anchor.  An anchor is designed to keep a ship in place.  It is designed to keep the ship from being carried away by the tide or the waves of the ocean or lake. The hope we have in Christ is our anchor.  It is both sure and steadfast. In the preceding verse we read “that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.” (Hebrews 6:18 NKJV)

God has set a hope before us.  It is the hope of being set free from our sins, liberated from the power of sin and eventually to be distanced from the very presence of sin itself.  This hope is not just “pie in the sky” hope; but a present reality and possession.  Our hope is in the “immutability” of God’s word.  That is God is incapable of lying or deceiving.  He does not give false hope but a sure and steadfast hope.

Today I am thinking of my sister Patsy who died of cancer last June.  I miss her terribly.  I miss her hugs, her smile, her calling me “Bud”.  However, I have great consolation that she is not at all missing me; but in heaven she is having the time of her life.  She is happy, joyous, healthy and whole.  She has discovered that her hope in Christ has become a living reality.

And because of Christ, I have hope of seeing her again.  That hope sustains me, gives me peace and helps me cope with the loss of someone I love.  And this hope is based upon two things that God promised and two promises He fulfilled.  One is that Jesus would come.  The Old Testament is full of prophecies that foretold the coming of Christ. He came as was promised.  The second is the resurrection of Christ.  He said He would die and live again and He did!  These two promises give me hope of another promise.  He will come back for me and you. He will!  I believe it! Do you?