The End and the Beginning

Most of us are familiar with the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas".  It's an old English carol, published sometime around 1780.  When sung it repetitively and progressively recounts the gifts given on each day from day 1 to day 12.  These twelve days are traditionally a part of the celebration of church from Christmas day to the celebration of the Epiphany - which means the first appearance of the Lord Jesus, when as a baby his parents presented him to be circumcised.  

No one knows for certain the meaning of the song.  It has been suggested it was used as a memory device for the church to remain faithful when persecution forced teachings underground.  It is also suggested it was merely part of a game in which each person is tested to see if they can repeat the first, all the way to the end without missing a point.  It simply is not known.

What is known is that this week is both the end and the beginning of the year.  We have a week to sort through all that 2012 has been, and a week to prepare as we enter into a new year.  So what shall we do with it?

To begin with let us recall our year as a movie...play it forward and recall all that has occurred.  

Is there someplace in that year that we have lost step with God, with fellowship, worship, prayer, and his word?  It's important that we begin again.

Psalm 111:10 (NIV)
¹⁰  The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding. To him belongs eternal praise. 

Is there a need to establish a time to meet with God in a disciplined way...in other words, not haphazardly, but consistently?  It does not mean we have to spend a certain quantity of time to make our fellowship real.  It is merely important that we have some time.  Even taking five minutes a day to open God's word, read a chapter or a number of verses, and keep reading from the end spot the next day will yield a gathering sense of what God is saying to each of us day by day - and we're taking in God's word as food for our soul.

John 1:1 (ESV)
¹  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Jesus is our Savior, but he is also the object of our living.  As Christ's followers, his disciples, we live in  such a way that our lives are a pursuit of all that He is and what we can become in him.

In the END, that is where we are, and where we are going...we are the people of God, and have been given the gifts of God for a life of fellowship with God that we might know the fullness of God that leads us towards  eternal life in Christ.

Colossians 1:15-23 (ESV)
¹⁵  He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
¹⁶  For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.
¹⁷  And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
¹⁸  And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.
¹⁹  For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell,
²⁰  and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
²¹  And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds,
²²  he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him,
²³  if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.