Ken Winter
Advent – We Three Kings (Balthazar’s Story)

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

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Introduction to this post:

This is the fourth of this year’s weekly Advent posts. Those of you who have followed the blog for more than a year know that it is my annual practice to post a weekly story for the season of Advent about the incarnational birth of Jesus. My hope is that the stories have become a part of your Advent tradition as you remember and celebrate the Good News of the advent of our Lord and Savior.

This year’s posts are as follows:

Week #1 - November 27th: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel (Joseph’s Story)

Week #2 - December 4th: Away in a Manger (Achim’s Story)

Week #3 – December 11th: Silent Night (Moshe’s Story)

This week - December 18th: We Three Kings (Balthazar’s Story)

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My name is Balthazar and I am a lifelong student of the science of the stars….

Advent – We Three Kings (Balthazar’s Story)
Ken Winter
Advent – Silent Night (Moshe’s Story)

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

Introduction to this post:

This is the third of this year’s weekly Advent posts. Those of you who have followed the blog for more than a year know that it is my annual practice to post a weekly story for the season of Advent about the incarnational birth of Jesus. My hope is that the stories have become a part of your Advent tradition as you remember and celebrate the Good News of the advent of our Lord and Savior.

This year’s posts are as follows:

Week #1 - November 27th: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel (Joseph’s Story)

Week #2 - December 4th: Away in a Manger (Achim’s Story)

This week – December 11th: Silent Night (Moshe’s Story)

December 18th: We Three Kings (Balthazar’s Story)

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I am a shepherd named Moshe.

Advent – Silent Night (Moshe’s Story)
Ken Winter
Advent – Away in a Manger (Achim’s Story)

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

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Introduction to this post:

This is the second of this year’s weekly Advent posts. Those of you who have followed the blog for more than a year know that it is my annual practice to post a weekly story for the season of Advent about the incarnational birth of Jesus. My hope is that the stories have become a part of your Advent tradition as you remember and celebrate the Good News of the advent of our Lord and Savior.

This year’s posts are as follows:

Last week - November 27th: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel (Joseph’s Story)

This week - December 4th: Away in a Manger (Achim’s Story)

December 11th: Silent Night (Moshe’s Story)

December 18th: We Three Kings (Balthazar’s Story)

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My name is Achim. My family and I live here in Bethlehem, the town of our ancestor David, the shepherd king….

Advent – Away in a Manger (Achim’s Story)
Ken Winter
Advent - O Come, O Come, Emmanuel (Joseph’s ...

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

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A preface to this post:

Dear family, friends and faithful readers of this blog,

This week is my 321st weekly blog post—not a huge number for many, but for me it has been a sharing of my heart with you. Those of you who have followed the blog for more than a year know that it is my annual practice to post a weekly stories for the season of Advent about the incarnational birth of Jesus. My hope is that the stories have become a part of your Advent tradition as you remember and celebrate the Good News of the advent of our Lord and Savior.

This year, i am repeating four of the weekly Advent posts from 2019 for two reasons. First, i have made changes to the posts, and have a higher quality audio recording of the posts in the event you would like to listen to them on audio—feel free to click the link above to do so.

The second reason is that i will be bringing my season of posting to an end as of the end of December. As many of you know, i have been diagnosed with metastatic (stage 4) lung cancer and am now being placed on home hospice care. Thus, it has become more difficult for me to produce these post. I hope and pray you receive these as my gift and expression of love to you.

The remaining five posts are as follows:

November 27th: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel (Joseph’s Story)

December 4th: Away in a Manger (Achim’s Story)

December 11th: Silent Night (Moshe’s Story)

December 18th: We Three Kings (Balthazar’s Story)

December 25th: A Christmas Celebration (My Story)

Advent - O Come, O Come, Emmanuel (Joseph’s Story)
Ken Winter
His Dwelling Place

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

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What does it mean to live in the shelter of the Most High and to find rest in His shadow? This is how Psalm 91 begins—a psalm many attribute to Moses. i believe that attribution is fitting. Moses is the one who carried Jehovah God’s instructions to His people for constructing the Tabernacle in the wilderness. He witnessed the fabrication of each part and completed the last of the work.

The Tabernacle was completed exactly as the Lord specified and was erected on the first anniversary of Israel’s departure from Egypt. That day, the Lord’s glorious presence descended upon it, covering and filling it with His awesome glory. His presence, previously seen in the guiding pillar of cloud, now took residence within His dwelling place among the people. From that day on, as His Spirit led, the people moved forward; when His Spirit remained in the Tabernacle, the people encamped.

His Dwelling Place

Thanksgiving

Don’t Forget to Be Thankful

Don’t Forget to Be Thankful

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

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Thursday, November 23rd, is Thanksgiving Day here in the U.S. Our Canadian friends celebrated Thanksgiving on October 9th, and our friends in the U.K. celebrated Harvest Festival on October 1st. Regardless of the date on the calendar, we all typically celebrate the day with good food, good fun, and a special time with family and friends. Hopefully in the midst of all the festivities, we make time to be thankful.

Because we all have much for which to be thankful—even in the midst of challenging days. But i fear we tend to forget. We lose sight of all the reasons from days past, and we become distracted by the urgency surrounding days present. As a result, the thanksgiving which should influence our thoughts, attitudes and actions each and every day gets lost in the shuffle.

That was the message Joshua was giving to the Israelites from his deathbed….

Only One Gave Thanks

Only One Gave Thanks

If you would prefer to listen to this post as a podcast, CLICK HERE.

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This week in the U.S., we celebrate Thanksgiving Day. It’s the one day set apart on our calendars to give thanks to God for the many blessings He has given to us. But as we busily prepare for a good meal, and/or time together with friends and/or family, are we truly stopping to give thanks? Have we become so distracted by all that is going on around us, and so consumed with what is taking place in our lives, that we now fail to turn to the One to whom all thanksgiving is due?

Allow me to hastily acknowledge that our thanksgiving to God should never be limited to one day on our calendar, it should be a daily acknowledgement of Him and to Him. But is it? Do we truly stop to give Him thanks? i wonder if i have stopped short of being thankful. i’m grateful for what i have – family, friends, health, strength, possessions and provision (no matter how much or little it might be), and so forth. But am i truly thankful to the One who has provided it all? Or, have i settled for being grateful instead of being thankful?

Thankful

Thankful

My journey as a novelist began less than a year ago. The idea for my first novel began to take root in my heart and mind at the end of 2018. It was the beginning of what continues to be a great adventure and a tremendous learning experience.

One of the elements i have enjoyed the most is learning how to create “fictional” characters within a novel – to visualize their appearance, to bring their personality and history to life, and then to begin to empathize with them. One of my mentors encouraged me to identify a muse for every character i write about. As i write, i picture that person in my mind’s eye, and his or her appearance and personality begin to help shape that of my story’s character. Through that process, the characters become as real to me as the “real” characters that i place alongside of them….

Thanksgiving or Gratitude?

Thanksgiving or Gratitude?

It has only been since Virginia became our adopted home that we have learned that the first English Thanksgiving celebration in America occurred on December 4, 1619 at Berkeley Hundred along the James River here in Virginia. The men had just completed a two and a half months’ voyage across the Atlantic from Bristol, England. It was a diverse group of sailors, soldiers, craftsmen – even a priest – that had come together for a single purpose. Clifford Dowdey wrote in his book “The Great Plantation”: “The men placed their personal luggage on the hard ground, gazed at the woods enclosing them and listened in complete silence. Then at a command from Captain John Woodlief, the men kneeled and said a prayer of Thanksgiving to Almighty God for their safe voyage.”Captain Woodlief’s descendant, Graham Woodlief writes: “They did this in accordance with the proclamation they received from the Berkeley Company in England, instructing them, upon arrival, to give thanks and to do so annually and perpetually. The first English Thanksgiving in America had just occurred.” In recent years, my family and i have on several occasions attended and participated in that annual reenactment and remembrance of thanksgiving that continues to this day.

As we come upon this annual time on our calendars to give thanks, i am mindful of another thanksgiving account that occurred 1600 years prior to that remembrance along the James River….

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