No one ever said that the Christian life wasn't a challenge. Or at least, Jesus never suggested it. In fact, just the opposite. He was continually laying out with His followers the costs of discipleship. Nowhere is this challenge more highlighted than in the struggle between truth (the content of our faith) on the one hand and practice (living out the faith in our daily lives, especially through our love for others) on the other hand. It is this struggle that is foremost in today's meditation.

Today's meditation remembers one of the lesser known 'saints' commemorations, and one of the uglier episodes of Biblical history, the state ordered murder of the innocent children of the town of Bethlehem. Almost since the earliest years of the Christian church, these youngsters were remembered as unintentional martyrs in the 'cause' of Christ, martyrs because they were seen as threats to the secular order, people who were simply 'in the way.'

I remember, so very vividly, my first realization that no one is expendable, no one left out or excluded from the grasp or reach of God's love as found in Christ Jesus. I was visiting a woman in Trochu Hospital who was paralyzed from the neck down. In sitting there beside her, holding her unresponsive hand, and looking into her very responsive eyes, I said something that was unintentionally quite profound. I said "Lena [not her real name], Jesus, while on the Cross, was paralyzed even as you are, but for other reasons. His hands and feet were fastened by nails and so He too was unable to move. And so He understands fully, from His own experience, what it is like for you. He suffered that agony, and even died, just for you. In fact, if there had been no other person on earth, He would have done that, just for you. Yes, just if you had been the only one." I could tell from the look in her eyes that this was something that deeply moved her, and it became something of a touchstone each time I visited her.

But, isn't that the reality of Jesus in every world and every life. "If you had been the only one." Isn't that what the 'Every child matters' movement is trying to tell us? Yes, if you or I, or anyone else, had been the only one. You see, in God's love, God's economy, there are NO expendable ones.

I hope that all of you are staying safe and warm, as it is incredibly cold here on the Prairies--not 'fit for man nor beast' as some would say.

Our meditation for today deals with the strange and unpleasant dichotomy of life, namely that good and evil coexist and that evil sometimes seems to flourish, as the psalm says, 'like a bad weed.' However, we need to realize that this is NOT the final word. We need to remember that God is in control and that He will ultimately even out everything and see that justice, real justice, is eventually done. So, we just need to hang on, remain faithful, and simply trust, trust in God no matter what.

today's meditation (on Matthew 23) reminds us of the peril, and ever present danger, of rejecting God's loving rule for our lives.

Galatians 3 reminds that God has never left Himself without a witness, but has been present in every age and culture

meditation on Isaiah 9 talks about the hope, hope in even desperate and uncertain times, that we have in our Messiah, Jesus;

Psalm 46 emphasizes the importance even of small things, small actions on our part;

It touches on the idea of God as the author of the 'unexpected', which most surely is one of the themes not only of Christmas, but also of the entire Bible. My conviction is that God is always 'pulling off' the unexpected, if only we could see it. May you and I always be open to this.

Today, inspired by something that the apostle Paul said to his fellow worker Titus, you will find a completely different 'take' on Christmas, one that runs afoul of much of what has been told to children over the years as part of the whole Santa Claus narrative. Sadly, however, it hasn't always been just children, but adults as well, who have bought into this 'I'm not good enough' narrative. God loves all of us, each of us, regardless of how good we are or aren't. God just loves us, period, end of story.

One of my favourite Biblical stories is that of John Mark, the man generally reputed to be the author of Mark's Gospel. Eusebius tells us that he was a close associate of Simon Peter, which would account for the many seemingly first-hand details he includes in that gospel. The Scriptures themselves tell us relatively little about him, but what it does say is most telling. He was the travelling partner and sometime helper to Paul and Barnabas, but then, for some unknown reason, decided to leave the expedition and return home. (We can always speculate on the reason, but we will never know for sure). Anyway, on a subsequent journey, Barnabas proposes to bring him along, and to that suggestion Paul gets quite puffy and worked up and refuses to do so. In fact, Acts 15:36-41 tells us that Paul and Barnabas practically came to blows over the matter, which had the result that the two apostles parted ways, never to work together again. Nevertheless, Barnabas took John Mark under his wing, and later on, we hear something most strange and surprising come from the mouth of brother Paul. He says, in 2 Timothy 4:11 "Mark can be very useful to me, so please find him and bring him with you". Obviously, Barnabas had given him a second chance, and here is what happened. Thanks be to God, that He does the very same thing with each of us.