"from the royal throne, leapt your all-powerful Word."

When peaceful silence lay over all, and night had run the half of her swift course, down from the heavens, from the royal throne, leapt your all-powerful Word. Wisdom 18:14,15

Absolutely amazing! Sounds to good to be true. Absolutely true because God is Good!

The One through whom all things were created humbled himself entering history, entering humanity. The Creator God humbly born as a baby for his creatures’ sake.

God is for us! God is with us! Emmanuel!

Jesus the Savior of all humanity, of all creation, has been born to live, die and rise for each and every person. You, me, everyone.

How can we keep from praising Him and telling everyone this incredible news!

God is for us! God is with us! Emmanuel! Jesus, Son of God, Savior of the world.

We love You, Lord Jesus!

Thank you for coming to save us! We invite you into our hearts and lives, into our families, friends, country and world. We love you and welcome your coming as a child for our sake.
Be Lord of our lives. Come Lord Jesus! Praise and glory to You. Amen!

May each of you, encounter even more deeply the love of God during this season. May you be filled with great joy to tell everyone this good news of God’s love and mercy!

Your brothers,
Dave, Leo, & Pete
ChristLife Staff

PS – If you know or are a college student or recent graduate and interested in interning for ChristLife this Spring, check us out!

PPS – Pete and his wife Ally hosted an excellent podcast on Christmas, including young adult testimonies from Discovering Christ

Proposition 49

You may be familiar with the word “proposition,” considering the recent controversy in the political sphere over “Proposition 8” in California.  Well, this proposition is one of a whole bunch of recommendations the bishops attending the recent Synod in Rome have made to Pope Benedict.  They will likely be pastorally digested by the Pope and based on this he will write an Apostolic Exhortation to the whole Church on the theme of “The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church.”  

So far lots of excellent propositions have come forth.  The 49th is particularly applicable to ChristLife and our evangelizing mission...  In the face of what the Pope calls “the dictatorship of relativism” (present within and outside of the Church), the mission of proclaiming Jesus as the Way for all peoples is often neglected or implicitly dismissed. The teaching Church (magisterium) guided by the Holy Spirit continues in fidelity to Jesus’ command and calls all to a renewed proclamation of the Gospel to all:

Proposition 49: Mission "ad gentes"

The Word of God is a good for all men, which the Church must not keep to herself but share with joy and generosity with all peoples and cultures, so that they also can find in Jesus Christ the Way, the Truth and the Life (cf. John 14:6).

Looking at the example of St. Paul, of the Apostles and of so many missionaries that, in the course of history, took the Gospel to peoples, this Synod reaffirms the urgency of the mission "ad gentes" [to all nations] also in our time -- a proclamation that must be explicit, made not only within our churches but everywhere and must be accompanied by a coherent testimony of life, which makes the content evident and reinforces it.

Bishops, priests, deacons, persons of consecrated life and laymen must also be close to persons who do not participate in the liturgy and do not frequent our communities. The Church must go out to all with the strength of the Spirit (cf. 2 Corinthians 2:5) and continue to defend prophetically the right and liberty of persons to listen to the Word of God, seeking the most effective means to proclaim it, not excluding the risk of persecution.

Whoa!  Yeah, read it again, very good!  What strikes you about this Proposition?

The italics above are the parts that strike me:  the urgency of mission is reaffirmed, explicit proclamation of Jesus is called for based on our own testimonies not just doctrine or apologetics, clergy and laity alike are called to have friendships with non-Christians to bring them Jesus, and we need the power of the Spirit.

And, interestingly, if I may point out, the person who put this document together for the bishops got the Scripture verse wrong above :)  Funny, that the document is all about knowing the Word of God.  :)  The proper reference here is first Corinthians 2:5.  This is a powerful Scripture that is better in the context of the preceding few verses:

“For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.
And I was with you in weakness and much fear and trembling;
And my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom,
But in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,
That your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God”
1 Corinthians 2:2-5

Our Lady of Guadalupe

This morning we were sharing about the Mass readings and Leo, who works with me at ChristLife shared a great connection between today's feast and our evangelization efforts in bringing Jesus Christ to others:

Today, December 12, the Catholic Church celebrates the feast of Mary under the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe. In Mary we have a model for evangelization.

She appeared to a simple Mexican peasant, Juan Diego, to share God’s love with him and to ask him to go to the bishop of Mexico and request him to build a church in her honor on Tepeyac hill. The bishop asked for a sign. Mary sent Juan Diego to the top of the hill in the middle of winter to pick flowers for the bishop. The flowers were Castilian roses, flowers from his native country, Spain. Juan took the roses to the bishop wrapped in his tilma. When he opened it, the roses fell out and the bishop dropped to his knees. There imprinted on his tilma was an image of Mary. The bishop built the church and within 6 years, 6 million Aztec Indians converted to Catholicism. Prior to Mary’s appearance, missionaries had labored for years among the Aztecs with very little success.

Mary appeared to Juan as an Aztec princess clothed in native garb. She did not appear as a Jewish maiden from the Middle East. Around her waist she wore a sash or belt that indicated that she was pregnant. She spoke to Juan in his native dialect. She met him where he was in his culture and brought Jesus to him. The lesson for us as we go out to share God’s love with others is to meet them where they are, recognize their culture and adapt our words and actions to them in their culture.

How have you adopted the language or culture of others to bring Jesus Christ to them?

I personally think we are called to do this all the time. Several months ago I was at a local evangelization course and we were eating dinner with the guests and the election came up and we were all sharing our views... Now, I currently vote Republican - and it was clear a few others were not - but as we all were sharing - I "seasoned" my words not wanting to get into an argument with the guests (since I was about to give the talk on why we need Jesus as our Savior). I could have "pressed into" the argument, but I tried to meet them where they were and develop a relational connection - hoping that my words in the talk would bring conversion to Jesus.

Now, some would say I relatized my political view - and they would be somewhat correct... It was relatized in light of a much greater opportunity and command - to bring Jesus to this person. In an entirely different situation, I may have engaged the political discussion fully... But this was one opportunity where I adapted a bit in hopes to bring Jesus to this person.

Advent!

A hearty "happy Advent!" to you. I hope it's treating you well so far... I have an excellent video I want to share with this blog. It's 2-3 minutes long and is a video called Advent Conspiracy which overviews a movement of churches and individuals trying to make a difference this Christmas for those less fortunate AND gives a great perspective on gift-giving - a must see before YOUR shopping spree :)

The Advent Conspiracy Promo Video from Vimeo.

Can't play the above video? Watch it on GodTube.

Well, what did you think of the video? I think the idea is great... to "give Presence" this Christmas. Please share your thoughts on the comments below :)

-snip-

Finally, a word from Pope Benedict on Advent that connects to the above video (he gave this address yesterday in Rome):

Brothers and sisters, it is the time of Advent. In the language of the Church the word Advent has two meanings: presence and expectation.

Presence: The light is present, Christ is the new Adam, he is with us and in our midst. The light already shines and we must open the eyes of the heart to see the light and to enter the river of light. Above all to be grateful for the fact that God himself has entered history as new source of goodness.

But Advent also means expectation: The dark night of evil is still strong. And that is why we pray in Advent with the ancient people of God: "Rorate caeli desuper." And we pray with insistence: Come Jesus; come, give force to light and goodness; come where falsehood, ignorance of God, violence and injustice dominate; come, Lord Jesus, give force to the good of the world and help us to be bearers of your light, agents of peace, witnesses of truth. Come Lord Jesus!

How will you carry His Presence into your environments this advent and Christmas?

the latest

Hello everyone!  I hope you had a great thanksgiving!  And, wow, Advent is already here- Come, Lord Jesus!  

As the “web guru” here at ChristLife, I’m letting you know, we have a new Web site at http://www.christlife.org  BUT, we’re having some problems.  So, say a prayer that our server’s tech support steps up to the plate and fixes the issue going on.  Jesus...

We have lots of great resources to post on this blog and on our new Web site – but I can’t post right now.  I’m posting this present blog via email (hoping it actually works:)

Finally, I will post this video soon, but I can’t wait to share with you a really great resource, called Advent Conspiracy.  Its a movement of Christians creatively helping the Church evangelize this Christmas.  Checkout their 2 minute video at http://www.adventconspiracy.org

Blessings in Jesus to you and your family!