Servanthood: Playing S.D. Kluger and Seeking to Honor Jesus – Purity 1834
Purity 1834 12/08/2025 Puriyt 1834 Audio Podcast
Purity 1834 on YouTube:
Good morning,
Today’s photo of an angel adorning the top of a brightly lighted and colorfully decorated Christmas tree comes to us from yours truly as I captured this scene of Yuletide splendor back on Christmas Day 2017.
Well, it’s Monday and although today’s photo seeks to stir up the ghost of Christmas past as it begs to summon bittersweet memories of my former life circa 2017, I am not looking back with regret, anger, or depression but can appreciate the things gone by with joy, and look forward to making new Christmas memories in the weeks ahead, as in 2 weeks, 3 days as Christmas Day is coming very and I am giving us all a heads up to get it together before its too late!
While preparing for Christmas always has its stressors, this year is particularly crazy me because I anticipate working 6 day work weeks right up until Christmas day as my sudden loss of a job in November has me working as a seasonal delivery driver this year. Yup, this year I am helping the Christmas effort in a way that I never have before. Channeling Fred Astaire’s Special Delivery Kluger from the 1970 Rankin/Bass holiday classic Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town, I am “assisting Santa” in delivering all those “packages, boxes, & bags” that will soon be wrapped up and placed beneath Christmas’ trees all across the Hudson Valley of upstate New York.
As happy as I am to have a job at all and to be assisting others with their Christmas plans, I am struggling to adjust to my new schedule and to figure out all of my Christmas plans. My precarious financial situation has me planning to give less this year and to be creative with the resources I do have which causes me to worry about whether or not the Christmas gifts I give will be appreciated.
But to be honest, I’m not much of “gift giver” anyway. If people don’t tell me specifically what they want, I give out gift cards or “token” gifts. You know what those are right? Token gifts are those holiday marketing creations that fill the seasonal section of retail stores that are general enough to be given to almost anyone and are basically guaranteed to disappoint just about everyone. Hey here’ your gift, like it or not! Merry Christmas.
But seriously, I will do my best to figure out what I give to who in the next two weeks, and probably disappoint my fair share of family and friends, but it is always my hope that the Lord will do His work in people’s hearts this year to bring them closer to Him and to appreciate the gift they could have in Jesus.
Speaking of the reason for the season, Jesus Christ, the In Touch with Dr. Charles Stanley devotion for today honors our Lord and Savior and I am sharing it on the blog today to encourage us all to remember what Christ did for us in the midst of our holiday stress. Dr. Charles Stanley writes:
“The Pattern for Servanthood
Jesus performed the ultimate act of service by sacrificing His life for us.
Matthew 20:25-28
We often think of great people as the ones with authority, prominence, and power. Though Jesus had all that, He laid it aside to become a servant (Isaiah 42:1).
Jesus gave Himself completely to fulfill the Father’s plan of redemption, even though the beneficiaries—each of us—were undeserving. God, who is holy and righteous, has “eyes … too pure to approve evil, and [He] can not look on wickedness with favor” (Habakkuk 1:13). Yet all of humanity is marked by wrongdoing (Romans 3:23).
Jesus’ ultimate act of service was to give His life to rescue us (Matt. 20:28). He made it possible for all of us to be free and to experience the joy that comes with being united to God in love, which was the Father’s intention from the moment we were created by His loving hands.
Because of Jesus’ sacrifice, we receive the gift of grace. We are now sons and daughters of the Almighty! He served the Father’s purpose faithfully. He gave up His righteousness to carry the weight of all our failures and endured pain and disgrace to bring us salvation. To meet our needs, the Savior held nothing of Himself back and thereby set a powerful example of servanthood for us to follow.” – Charles Stanley
Amen. It’s Christmas time and as we deal with the stress of getting everything ready for our Christmas celebrations, let’s not lose sight of who we are celebrating and seek to follow His example by choosing to serve others in some small way to give God glory.
As amazing as God’s grace is ,that He would send His only begotten to save us, the fact that He did it to those who really don’t deserve it makes it even more mind blowing.
Jesus didn’t just come to save those “good people” who make the occasional mistake. First of all, the word tells us that all sin and fall short of the glory of God, so there are NO “good people” – sure some are better than others but, all of us deserve judgement and death!
To me this just makes God’s love and Jesus’ servanthood that much more amazing and makes me think that Jesus didn’t die for what we did, He died for who we would become – children of God who would represent God’s kingdom and love by showing and sharing God’s love through the good works we will do in His name.
Jesus’ sacrifice and servanthood should inspire us to sacrifice and to serve others. From the love we received, we should give love to others.
Yesterday my growth group, spent time at a nursing home entertaining the residents with Christmas carols. Here people took time from their weekend to do something nice for others. The reason? To glorify God by sharing songs that exalted Jesus’ name and lordship.
Jesus’ servanthood compels us to serve others and when we do, the work of glorifying God and honoring the life of Jesus is done. So remember that Christmas is not about Santa, reindeer, elves, or presents – Christmas is about honoring Jesus and the gift of grace that we receive and can give to others.
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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple encouragements provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/.
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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling” By John G. Kruis.
(While Bible verses on various topics of Counseling can be found with a quick Google search, we encourage you to purchase this resource to support the late author’s work. (The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling By John G. Kruis on Amazon )
This morning’s meditation verses come from the section on Prayer – Waiting On the Lord.
Matthew 6:9 (ESV) Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven.”
Today’s verses fall under the second point of our counseling reference guide resource section on Prayer.
2. Pray “Our Father.”
Today’s Bible verse highlights the relationship that we have with God. While some faith streams honor the Almighty by calling Him “Lord our God, King of the Universe”, Jesus taught His disciples to refer to God as “Father”.
Jesus represents God’s love for us – that He lowered Himself to become man and to dwell among us and paid the ultimate sacrifice on the cross so we could live – and Jesus taught us to pray to God as our Father. Jesus changed everything.
Because of Jesus we don’t have to fear God as some wrathful judge or king who is looking to lop off our heads. Because of Jesus, we understand that God is love and through faith in Jesus we become His children. So treat God as He wants to be treated and pray to Him as “our Father”.
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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.com where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.
Today we continue sharing from “Day by Day Along the Way” By Jay E. Adams.
As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage you all to purchase Adams’ books for your own private study and to support the late author’s work. This resource is available online for less than $20 at many sites.
Day 333
I have many people in this city. – Acts 18:10
The Lord knows who are His. Before they ever came to Him in faith, He chose His elect people. In a genuine sense, what the apostles—and anyone who wins others to faith in Christ—are doing is gathering the elect “from the four winds,” as Jesus said they would (Matthew 24:31). There the word “angels” should be translated “messengers,” as the name means. Corinth, located on an isthmus that connected Greece proper to the Peloponnesus, boasted a seaport on each side of the city. It was full of sailors and many unsavory characters—a city filled with vice. In its temple were 1,000 prostitutes plying their trade as part of the religion. What a city for ministry! Yet perhaps it is in such dark places that the elect are still to be found today. And in some cases, with the church’s flight to the suburbs, we may be heading for the few, rather than for the “many” in the city to whom the Lord would have us speak.[1]
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[1] Jay E. Adams, Day by Day along the Way (Cordova, TN: Institute for Nouthetic Studies, 2020), 341.
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