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

Worship

Impeculiar

Impeculiar

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

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Impeculiar! Spell-check just told me the word is incorrect. Google tells me the word does not exist. And yet … it seems to be the perfect word to describe an attitude or action that others consider to be peculiar when, in fact, it should be the norm. i wouldn’t say the action is “ordinary,” because nothing about it is ordinary. I wouldn’t say the action is “unusual,” because it should be our daily response. But conversely, i could not describe it as “usual” or “unremarkable.” So, it must be impeculiar! Please allow me to explain.

Several days before Jesus was crucified, He and His disciples were spending the evening in Bethany at the home of Simon….

Breath

Breath

We are acutely aware in these days that there are many things we permit to divide us. But there is one that should unite us all.

We can live our lives without a lot of the things that hold great importance to us. We can live without the possessions we hold dear. We can live without the positions that bring us self-importance and self-worth. We can even live without the good health and relationships that bring our lives enjoyment and purpose. And, for a period of time, we can even live without the food and water that bring nourishment to our bodies. But take away our breath and we immediately cease to live.

Breath is the one thing that distinguishes the living from the dead. Adam didn’t become a living person until God breathed into his nostrils.(1) Though muscles and flesh formed over the dry bones, they did not come to life until God breathed into them….(2)

King of My Heart

King of My Heart

We live in stormy times. The world in which we live can be a very distressing place. The nightly news is filled with reports of the ravages of disease, the havoc of disasters, and the inhumanity and incivility of man. Within a matter of moments, our lives can be upended into a cascading turmoil by sudden loss, distressing news or tragic circumstances. Where are we to turn?

This past Sunday in worship, as we sang the contemporary psalm entitled King of My Heart (lyrics below), it was a fresh reminder that our Almighty God is the only One to whom we can turn when everything around us is spinning out of control. That simple song makes eight powerful statements about our Almighty God:

He is the mountain… where i run

He is the fountain… from which i drink

He is the shadow… where i hide

He is the ransom… for my life

He is the wind… inside my sails

He is the anchor… in the waves

He is the fire… in my veins

He is the echo… of my days

Be Thou My Vision

Be Thou My Vision

We live in a day when we have become jaded and critical. Our first reaction is most often to distrust and deride. We often call truth a lie and a lie the truth. That with which we disagree is fake and only that with which we agree is real. There are no longer absolutes, only what I label to be true. It is a time heralded by meanness and callous disregard expressed toward one another. Too often we look upon compassion as weakness and bullying as strength. Instead of blessing we curse. Instead of offering respect, we show contempt. Instead of offering forgiveness, we condemn. Instead of choosing to love, we choose to hate.

For a moment last week social media celebrated a few minutes of captured video when Brandt Jean extended Christ-like compassion and forgiveness to Amber Guyger, convicted of fatally shooting his older brother. Though most chose not to mention Christ as the source and the reason for his compassion, few could ignore the heartfelt sincerity of the one who had extended it.

Even Judge Tammy Kemp who adjudicated the trial, after its conclusion was moved to extend a moment of heartfelt personal compassion to the one upon whom she had just pronounced sentence….

The Scandal of Grace

The Scandal of Grace

i don’t know about you, but the phrase “the scandal of grace” sounds contradictory and discordant to me. As regular readers of this blog are aware, i often include the lyrics of contemporary worship songs in my posts. i have oft said that i believe worship songs – whether they be traditional or contemporary – are the outpouring of the deep beliefs we hold in our hearts toward the One who alone is worthy of our worship. 

Like the psalmists, the expressions of our hearts in worship are best conveyed through our “heart songs”. They are a reflection of the gripping truth our Lord God Creator has kneaded into our lives. But sometimes the expressions we use in pouring out our heart songs can be jarring. Another example i wrote about several months ago is the idea that God’s love could ever be considered to be reckless (“Reckless Love”). 

We would readily agree that God’s grace is amazing and that His grace is enough. By its definition, grace is the unmerited favor and love that God freely extends to us. And we must quickly add that though His grace is free to us, it cost Him dearly. It cost Him the shed blood of His Son. His grace is precious. His grace is beyond our comprehension. So how can His grace be scandalous?

A Celebration - Great Are You, Lord!

A Celebration - Great Are You, Lord!

Today is our Baby Girl’s thirtieth birthday. Happy Birthday, Precious Girl! It is hard to believe. In some respects it seems like yesterday. It was an early Monday morning. In what seemed like a moment, we witnessed the birth of a new life. (Remember, i’m the dad; i am certain it seemed much longer than a moment for LaVonne!) i remember her little cry as she took that first breath into her lungs. i remember that somehow the birthing room suddenly seemed brighter. i remember that my wife’s pain and travail in labor were now passed and had now been replaced simultaneously by relief, peace, joy and calm. Immediately our hearts were filled with love for this precious addition to our family. That love was not something that needed to develop over time – it was immediate, just as it had been at the birth of her older brother before her. And our love for one another did not diminish because it now included another; rather, our capacity to love was increased. The birth of a new life is a precious gift from our Creator… an amazing gift… and a gift for a lifetime… and beyond.  

But our God is not only the Giver of physical life, He is the Giver of eternal life….

Which Son Are You?

Which Son Are You?

Since we are in the midst of the forty days of Lent (March 6 – April 18), i thought it would be timely to look at four truths that Jesus taught His disciples and those who crowded around Him during that final week leading up to His crucifixion. i plan to look at one truth each week for the next four weeks, starting with today.

It was Tuesday, the third day of the week leading up to His crucifixion. Jesus had arrived in the temple to teach as was His practice. The religious leaders were irate over Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple the day before. Through that action, He had clearly challenged their authority and they were attempting to dispute His. The problem was that they were ill-equipped for the challenge. They exerted their authority over the people through the pretense of their outward piety. There was not any real substance to their relationship with God. They were just going through the motions – speaking one way and acting in another. So Jesus confronted them with this parable:

Do It Again

Do It Again

Several years ago, my wife LaVonne and i traveled with a team of university students to a country in the Middle East. God had granted us an opportunity to “sow seeds of the gospel” in a place where there were no known churches and very few followers of Jesus. Ironically enough, we were going to one of the places where the gospel was first proclaimed by the Apostle Paul and others two thousand years ago, but, in recent days, the lies of false religion had taken hold and now very few knew the truth.

The “seeds” we were sowing were four-fold. First, we would conversationally share our testimonies and the good news of the gospel whenever we had opportunity with those who could speak some English, since only a few of our team members knew the indigenous language. The second and third seeds were, respectively, videos and CDs in the native language that told the story of Jesus and the truth of the gospel. The fourth seed was a written booklet explaining the gospel in the indigenous language. In enlisting our help, our partner informed us that he had not previously done what he was asking us to do among this group of people. He had no idea how the people would react or respond to us. Since, at the time, we also had never done this before in this particular context, it would be a new experience for all of us – our team, our partner, and the people we would meet.

More Like Jesus

More Like Jesus

He must increase, but I must decrease.(John 3:30 ESV)

Today, as i read that verse, i was reminded of a brother in Christ i met several years ago (this very week) by the name of H. J. Sadhu Dayapara. Brother Dayapara was a 70-year-old pastor faithfully serving his Lord in the City of Bangalore, in the State of Karnataka, India. Several friends and i were in Bangalore to lead a three-day visioning retreat for pastors that were serving throughout the State of Karnataka. To this day, i will never understand why the Lord directed for us to be the presenters at the conference for these brothers. As i stood before them, i knew that it was i who needed to be sitting at their feet, learning from them.

Pastor Dayapara sat there on the very front row all three days, taking in everything that we shared. Though we were separated by a language barrier, we were drawn together by a kinship in Jesus. Throughout our time together, as i watched him and listened to him (through an interpreter), i was drawn to the image of Jesus that radiated through him. i was overwhelmed by the humility and overflow of the fruit of the spirit that was pouring out of this brother. He did not pastor a large church, and probably never would, but he bore all the characteristics of a good and faithful shepherd, who was as much concerned about the one as he was about the ninety-nine. His life bore witness that Jesus was his life and his treasure, his desire and his dream, his purpose and his path. His life evidenced the very truth that John the Baptist spoke – “He must increase, but I must decrease.”

Tremble

Tremble

A few years ago, my wife and i found ourselves in the midst of a gathering of twenty-four worship leaders that God is using, not only to lead their local fellowships in worship, but also the greater body of Christ through the worship songs they are composing. On one particular night, we were all led in the darkness through a wooded area to a room that was away from the main campus where we were meeting. The intent was that we would experience a taste of the daily lives of our persecuted brothers and sisters in many parts of the world who need to gather in secret to worship. The evening was facilitated by good friends – Nik and Ruth Ripken.

As the evening went on, Nik shared the testimonies of men and women that God has permitted him to meet – testimonies of God’s mercy and grace in the midst of persecution. Nik explained that each one of these men and women had a heartsong – a song that God had stamped in their hearts. It was a song of God’s faithfulness, His goodness and His grace….

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