Seasonal Reflections

My journal entry for February 6, 2022 reads in part: “It’s hard to imagine life without Sunday worship with our family at Incarnation—and all too easy to imagine dreariness and loneliness in its absence.” It seemed so certain a prediction the year before we moved to Kazakhstan—and yet! Sunday services here, both with our Kazakh church and the English service we do in our home using your order of service, have been life-giving, just as they were (and are! And will be!) for us at Incarnation. 
 
In his book The Two Towers Tolkien describes waybread made by elves and given to the party of hobbits and others as they continued on their way to destroy the evil Ring of Power. Their waybread, the elves explained, would sustain them more and more fully as their other food supplies ran low and they were required to rely on the waybread more fully. That picture has come to mind often as I join with my family and the few others the Lord has brought to our English services. Especially in that first winter when we had been stripped of so much and could not yet see how the Lord would renew any of it, I anticipated and yearned for those times of Sabbath worship “as in a dry and weary land, where there is no water” (Psalm 63:1). And the water our Father provided us within those services—even himself!—was truly life-giving: water turned into celebratory wine, wine made for us into the life-giving blood of our Savior.
 
In this season of Epiphany, we remember how Jesus grew “in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man” (Luke 2:52). What would it look like for us to grow as Jesus did, to be so fully dependent on the Father that we are able to receive fully, unmixed with any food of our own making, the nourishment He offers? In her book Sacred Seasons Danielle Hitchen urges: “If we want to be conformed to the image of Christ, then we must spend time doing the things that Jesus did: He practiced prayer, solitude, and silence, routinely desiring time away to be with his Father. He prayed with and for others. He fasted (forty days in the wilderness). He served others. He went regularly to the temple and synagogue for communal worship and to learn the Scriptures (Luke 2:41-52). He kept sacred time, remembering the Sabbath as well as the Jewish calendar of feasts. These are the spiritual disciplines. If you want to be like Jesus, do these things. These habits formed the rich inner life of Christ that shaped his visibly abundant outer life.”
 
As we consider our resolutions for this coming year, we do well to consider how our Lord lived his life. Resolving to attend Sunday worship and to prayerfully attend to the Scriptures might seem too little, as unassuming as the little wafers of the elves’ waybread. But in so doing, we will be following the example of our Lord Jesus, as well as our brothers and sisters in the faith whose story we heard read from Nehemiah 8:1-12 this past Sunday. As they listened to Ezra and the other priests and Levites read and explain the Scriptures, those men and women (and children!) worshipped and wept—and then feasted with joy as they were commanded to. There will be times for all of us when that command, “do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10) will seem harsh and out of reach. And yet! “This God—his way is perfect; the word of the LORD proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him” (2 Samuel 22:31).
 
In her explanation of Epiphany, Hitchins says: “As image bearers of God who take up Christ’s specific call to be the light of the world (Matthew 5:14-16), we are transformed into walking epiphanies, mini-manifestations of God shining forth in the dark world.” What a beautiful vision! Would you shine more brightly, reflect more faithfully the light of your Savior? Take these children’s songs to heart: “[Go to church!], read your Bible, and pray every day, and you will grow,” for, “Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so.” 
 
Give us grace, O Lord, to answer readily the call of our Savior Jesus Christ and proclaim to all people the Good News of his salvation, that we and the whole world may perceive the glory of his marvelous works; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
 
Hannah