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JESUS’ CHRISTMAS
WISH LIST
6 great gift ideas for the man
who has everything
CHRISTMAS RUSH OR
CHRISTMAS REASON?
“Please let me stop and look at
Jesus!”
Activated Ministries
PO Box 462805
Escondido, CA 92046–2805
USA “Joy to the world!” When sung full throttle by anyone who has
Toll-free: (1–877) 862–3228 experienced that joy firsthand, those four words from the old
E-mail: info@actmin.org familiar Christmas carol really pack a wallop! Why? Because
they carry the Spirit of God and a powerful message from God.
Activated Europe It is, of course, an echo of the angel’s proclamation to a few
Bramingham Pk. Business Ctr. startled shepherds on a hillside near Bethlehem on the first
Enterprise Way Christmas Eve: “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy
Luton, Beds. LU3 4BU which will be to all people” (Luke 2:10).
United Kingdom That just might be the most powerful and far-reaching
+44 (0) 845 838 1384 proclamation since God said, “Let there be light” (Genesis 1:3).
E-mail: activatedEurope@activated.org I believe it is, for two reasons.
First, those “good tidings” are actually the best possible
Activated Africa news: In sending Jesus, God threw open a door for us to make
P.O. Box 2150 our way back to Him.
Westville 3630 Second, it’s a universal proclamation from the only One with
South Africa
truly universal authority. God is the Father of us all, so when He
+27 (83) 556 8213
sent an angel with a message to “all people,” He didn’t mean
E-mail: activatedAfrica@activated.org
“all Christians” or “all good people” or all of any other selective
group. He meant all people. You can never be too bad. You can
Activated India
never be too young or too old. You can never be too distant. You
P.O. Box 5215
G.P.O.
can never be too different. All people.
Bangalore – 560 001 Whoever you are and wherever you are, that includes you! He
India reaches out every day and He will keep reaching out after this
E-mail: activatedIndia@activated.org Christmas is past, but there’s no better time to open your heart
and experience His love and joy than right now. I pray you will.
Activated Philippines From all of us at Activated, may you and your loved ones have
P.O. Box 1147 a very blessed merry Christmas!
Antipolo City P.O.
1870 Antipolo City Keith Phillips
Philippines
E-mail: activatedPI@activated.org For the Activated family
Cel: (0922) 8125326
C
By
we spent together. More and temperance
specifically, I was thinking (Galatians 5:22–23 KJV).
about the Christmases when Then there was the
I was small. The thing that Christmas when I was
made each memory special smaller still. We strung
wasn’t the number or value popcorn and hung it on the
of the gifts we received or tree. There was hardly any
the Christmas parties we left by the end of December,
attended. Rather, it was the for a little mouse, cleverly
simple things. disguised as a three-year-old
First there was the in pigtails, nibbled away
Christmas when we made whenever she thought no one
an extra effort to do things was looking. look back on. That’s when
together as a family, when There was also the I realized what it was that
we made a nativity scene in Christmas when I was nine, made those moments so
our living room out of an old when we six girls awoke to a special: It was my parents’
board topped with miniature surprise—a line of white shoe love and the time they gave
pine trees and figurines boxes, each clearly marked us, which demonstrated that
that we’d made and dressed with one of our names and love. It was also our parents’
ourselves. each containing something faith in Jesus and God’s
The cold little house we special that we needed or Word that gave us what
lived in another year was could play with—skipping we needed—His love and
warmed by a cassette tape ropes, jacks, a hairbrush salvation and a purpose in
of Christmas carols—a first or hairclips, small clothing life—reaching and winning
for us children—and the joy items, etc. What treats those others with God’s love.
of finding oranges in the were for us children of full- No, we didn’t have a lot,
stockings we had hung out, time volunteers! but we had the Lord and one
along with nuts and raisins Thinking about those another—and that’s what
wrapped in foil. That year special occasions caused made those such happy and
we also had a Christmas tree me to want to give my own special Christmases. /
with homemade ornaments children that same love,
depicting the gifts of the excitement, and warmth Cari Harrop is a
Holy Spirit—love, joy, peace, this Christmas. I want them volunteer with the Family
longsuffering, gentleness, to have happy memories to International in India.
CHRISTMAS RUSH
CHRISTMAS REASON?
OR
our Christmas with so many unnecessary my heart in a new way this year. Let me
things. And should we not stop to enjoy learn more about the gifts He gave me so
anything of life until after Christmas, the long ago on Christmas. Let me be a part of
fury with which we proceed will send us Christmas itself by being more like Him.
reeling into the New Year sighing, “I just Let me stop and look at Jesus.
survived Christmas!”
Jesus came to bless our lives. That is Dear Jesus, I want each day that comes
why we have Christmas. He said He came To share some part with You,
to bring us life, and that we might have Where I can sit, receive Your peace,
it more abundantly (John 10:10). And And hear You speak to me.
the apostle Paul tells us, “We have peace
with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” A place where I can turn aside
(Romans 5:1). Peace and life in all their And leave the cares of life,
fullness need not elude us. They are ours Where I can get the strength I need
to enjoy this Christmas if we’ll give Jesus To banish storm and strife.
a chance in our lives and a place in our
hearts. A quiet, serene, and trusting place
Let me take a minute with Jesus. The Where You alone can give
true presence of Christmas is found with The very blessing that I need—
Him. Let the celebration of His birth touch Here would I rest and live. /
light
months earlier Joseph’s life had taken
a sudden change—for the worse, it
seemed at the time—yet there had
been a glimmer of hope: He had been
promised in a dream that all would be
right. He held on to that promise; he
hoped and prayed and patiently waited.
That first Christmas night all fears were
washed away. As the tiny Babe lay in the
The manger, peace flooded Joseph’s worried
everlasting soul.
On the hills outside Bethlehem a
lowly shepherd watched sheep all night.
Life was hard for him. He had taxes to
By Ariana Keating pay and a large family to feed. His coun-
try was occupied by a foreign army, and
he longed for the day when he would be
free. That night of the first Christmas,
T
he Christmas when I was six as he sat under the starlit sky, he prayed
years old, our teacher taught my like he had every other night for as long
class a poem titled “Where Jesus as he could remember for an answer to
Was Born.” The poem tells the story of his problems. That night his prayers
three boys who went to see Jesus. One were answered, and as he watched the
was blind, another was mute, and the Babe sleeping in the manger he knew
third was lame. Despite their infirmi- that God was going to work everything
ties, they helped one another make out in the end. Light came into his life
their way to the manger where Jesus that Christmas night.
was born. Because of their love for one There was a wise man in the East
another and their eagerness to see who, in his quest for truth and mean-
‘Christmas’ at school or
with people you don’t
know,” I remember being
told when I turned school
age. We only used the word
at home because some
Chris
there was a state ban on
religion, so “finding Christ-
mas” wasn’t easy.
“Don’t use the word
Finding Christmas
through the branches of
the Christmas tree and
wondering if there was any
connection between the
two. Who is that pictured
there? Why do we keep a
picture of someone we don’t
know?
I also remember the first
Christmas I celebrated in
the countryside with other
members of my family. The
By Priscila Lipciuc
FEEDING READING
S
olange was one of great personal love for each of us. To give His life for us:
several dozen patients I also prayed for her healing and Matthew 20:28
I met while caroling promised to visit her again. John 6:51
with friends in a hospital one “Joanna,” she said, “my heart John 10:11
Christmas Eve. Each patient was is touched because you are here, John 15:13
suffering and hoped for a little because you are concerned for me, Romans 5:6
love and comfort, but young a total stranger, and because you
Solange—in bandages and would spend your Christmas Eve To reconcile us to
casts from head to toe—was with me.” God, so we can have
special. As we sang for her, she Solange remained in the eternal life:
began to cry. Soon she was hospital for three more months, Luke 19:10
sobbing almost uncontrollably. and I visited her as often as I John 1:29
“Jesus loves and cares for you,” could. Each time I took her one of John 3:16
I reassured her. the Family’s inspirational cassette 1 Timothy 1:15
Then Solange explained that tapes such as Fear Not or How to 1 John 3:5
she and her family had been in a Win, or read to her from the Bible 1 John 4:14
car accident. Her father, mother, to encourage her and strengthen
and sister were all killed. She had her faith. By the time Solange was To destroy the works
lost her family. Solange had been released from the hospital, the of the Devil:
in a coma for three days, but had miracle that began in her life on Acts 10:38
survived against all odds. Christmas Eve was complete; she Hebrews 2:14
I prayed with her to receive was happy, whole, and recovering 1 John 3:8
Jesus as her Savior, and gave her from her emotional trauma.
two Christmas posters I’d brought To better our lives:
with me—one with a text on the Joanna Adino is a member of the Luke 4:18–19
back about Heaven, and the other Family International in Brazil./ John 10:10b
“ G lory to God in
the highest,”
angels proclaimed
to shepherds on the first
Christmas Eve, “and on
HE ARMS
S A F E IN T earth peace, goodwill
O F J E S U S s of Jesus, toward men” (Luke 2:14).
a rm
S a fe in the st ; Although peace has been
H is gentle brea the goal of mankind for
S a fe on h a de d ,
is love o’ers
T here by H st . thousands of years—and
soul sha ll re
Sweetly my (1820–191
5) the desire for peace is
J. Crosby never so great as it is
—Frances
at Christmas—it seems
that our ability to find or
establish peace continues
to elude us.
Today bloody hostilities
continue. As Pete Seeger’s
well-known folk song from
the 1960s asked, “Where
have all the flowers gone?
… When will they ever
learn? When will they ever
learn? ”
True peace on every
level, from international
conflicts to our personal
lives, has become more dif-
ficult than ever to achieve.
In the Bible, the word
“peace” means much more
than the absence of con-
flict. It carries with it the
connotation of health and
well-being. In the Old
Testament, two Hebrew
words, shalom (peace) and