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Eight maids a-milking (the Eight Beatitudes - Matthew 5)

Monday, January 1, 2001

Luke 2:16-21
...glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

On this first day of the new millennium, we get our last look at the Christmas story, the story most of us have heard all our lives and know by heart. The story of the stable and baby born, the angels and the shepherds, Mary's acceptance and Joseph's strength, the beginning of all things new.

Last night, late night, we found our way to the U of Illinois Assembly Hall, where 20,000 students and missionaries from around the world were closing the Urbana 2000 conference, held every three years by InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. The conference puts a huge exclamation point behind the words of Jesus in Matthew 28..."Go and make disciples of all nations..."

We participated in the communion service, which climaxed five days of teaching and sharing and prayer and music and worship and commitment. Singing songs in several languages, crying out to God to "open up the gates" and hearing ourselves sing, "Got deliverance? Get up and tell somebody!" I remembered late on December 31 how grateful I am for the "missionaries" in my life who touched my hand and said, "Let me tell you my story."

Inevitably the stories of men and women being found by Jesus become the story of Jesus. After all, as Becky Pippert says in Out of the Saltshaker, he is God and we are not. God touching me, making me new, is the story of us.

So the words "...just as they had been told" ring with power today for me. What is truth? Pilate and Jesus got nowhere in their conversation. Jesus said, "I am the truth." To know his story is to be knocking on the doors of truth, of value and meaning, contentment and joy. And to tell his story (and mine) is to share all of that with those He loves.

Lord, you know me and you teach me. You show me who I am. You write your story on the days of my life. Day by day, let me demonstrate your love, and tell the story of Jesus and me.



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