Today is December 25.

Today is a day that this world likes to exchange gifts🎁.

There is nothing wrong with giving🫴 a person a gift🎁.

Those gifts🎁 that we give are called offerings🫴.

People like to give🫴 and receive🫱🫲.

Giving🫴 and receiving🫱🫲 gifts brings great joy 😁, and who receives the greater joy is the giver🫴 according to Acts 20:35.

GOD’S Word encourages giving, and tells us that we are to do so cheerfully and with a willing heart. (2 Corinthians 9:6-7; Exodus 35:4-9)

This “season” where people are thinking of King Jesus, is the best time to incorporate the two greatest commandments.

1.The first of the greatest commandments is to love the Lord our God with our whole heart, soul, and mind.

On December 25th, many think they are doing this because they claim that they are celebrating the birth of King Jesus, and this is why they exchange gifts 🎁. 

2. King Jesus said that the second of the commandments is to love❤️ our neighbors as we love ourselves. (Matthew 22:37-4)

This command is simplified in Matthew 7:12 where we are told to “Do unto others as you would have done to you.”

So, let’s consider this as it relates to the giving done today:

There is nothing wrong with giving.

We really don’t need a reason, or specific date, to give. 

We should, and can, give as much, or little, as our heart leads us to, simply because we love the person we are giving to.

With that being the case, consider this…

🧐

On a birthday, who expects to receive gifts?

The one whose birthday it is, right?

On your birthday, what would you like to do?🥳

🥳Would you like to hear from someone that is family or that you consider to be your friend?

🥳Would you like to receive a gift🎁?

🥳Would you like to go out to dinner?🍽🥘🥂🥗🍰🍨

If neither your family,  nor your friends called you, would that hurt your feelings? 🥹

If you have read this far,

THANK YOU 💕

Please allow me a couple more minutes of your precious time…

On this date, December 25th, the world claims to celebrate the birth of 👑Jesus Christ.

👑Jesus Christ lives.

HE is our resurrected King 👑.

Have you spent time with 👑HIM on this day that you believe to be HIS date of birth?

Have you cheerfully and willingly brought 👑HIM your gifts🎁?

Have you planned to dine🍽 with 👑HIM today?

I restate that 👑King Jesus lives.

GOD is NOT dead. HE is surely alive.

I mention that for these two reasons.

1. There are those whom we love that are no longer with us, but are buried (sleeping per John 11:11-15) in the grave.

On their birthdays, or any special day associated with them, we remember them, but we don’t gift them because they are no longer alive.

We might even go out to eat, and think of them as we share meals with other family members.

We can’t share a meal with them because they are dead.

But GOD is NOT dead.

👑KING JESUS arose from the grave on the third day, after 👑HE paid our debts for us, giving us the greatest gift of freeing us from the debt of sin.

👑HE got up on the 3rd day, and showed 👑Himself to be alive.

Then, 40 days later 👑He ascended to heaven where 👑He sits at the right hand of our Heavenly 👑👑Father Yahweh (Eng.  Jehovah).

We await 👑His return from heaven because we know 👑He is alive.

2. Because our 👑Redeemer lives, we can call upon 👑HIM, not because we need something, but simply to say “I love You. I thank You for waking me today. Im grateful for the mercy You have shown me and for Your loving kindness towards me. I just wanted to take some time and say, Thank You so much for loving me. I love You.”

Because our 👑Redeemer lives, and because of the huge price 👑He paid for us, to bring us back into relationship with our Heavenly 👑👑Father, the greatest gift that we can give is to keep the relationship going through giving our time.

That’s right, time.

The value of a relationship is seen in the time spent in the presence of the one you desire the relationship with.

We do a lot of fellowshipping with others, and that’s fine.

But we must not forget the one on one time spent in relationship with the recipient of our time, attention, and love. That is important also, and moreso.

We must not forget the alone time that needs to be spent because this is where the intimacy of connection happens.

It’s where our attention is not divided, but instead, it is given to the one we claim to love.

Finally, let’s not forget to dine.

Communion, the eating of bread 🍞 and drinking of wine 🍷, is how we dine with 👑King Jesus.

Now, eating a wafer and drinking a cup of  wine or juice is symbolic.

It’s like getting a card in the mail, on your birthday, from those who are “thinking of you”, and can’t be with you on your special day. It’s simply symbollic, a representation of what is real.

For those who desire to spend “real” time with 👑King Jesus, we are told exactly where 👑King Jesus is (Hebrews 9:24 – in the true [real] tabernacle in heaven), and that we can enter in boldly (Hebrews 4:6).

Luke 14:15-24 shows us that 👑King Jesus wants to dine🍽 with us.

In Luke 22:29-30, 👑King Jesus speaks of our eating and drinking with 👑Him at 👑His table.

And here is the one that I really like:

In Revelation 3:20, 👑King Jesus says that 👑He will come to us and dine with us.

👑He says 👑He is standing at the door knocking, and that IF we open the door to 👑Him that 👑He will come in and dine with us, and us with 👑Him.

👑King Jesus is at your door knocking now.

Will you open the door to 👑Him?

How?

This is done by opening your Bible, the Word of God, and sitting quietly with it and reading it.

Reading God’s Word is the true way in which we eat the bread 🍞 , AND drinking the wine 🍷 is our digging deep into God’s Word (symbollically squeezing the grapes🍇 of the verses we are reading) for understanding and practical application. 

The oil🫗 poured upon our heads as we delve deep into reading God’s Word is the presence of the Holy Spirit giving us a deeper revelation (understanding) of what we have read so that it is embedded into the good ground of our heart.

This happens in the intimate times we share with the Lord, sitting in His Presence.

And what is so amazing is that even as we give 🫴 of our time 🕑 to the Lord our King 👑, in our giving, He gives back even greater, because there is nothing like the reward of being lost in reading God’s Word and experiencing the Holy Spirit open God’s Word up to us so that we can understand it on levels we never experienced  before.

Now imagine having a birthday celebration where there is a true exchange of gifts🎁.

As you are giving your gifts to others…

Dont forget to give your gift to the One whom you are claiming to celebrate.

I would hate to have a birthday party where a guest at my party talked to everyone, but didn’t even acknowledge me, and the party was for me.

I promise you I would respond just like 👑King Jesus described in Matthew 22:11-13, regarding what happened at one such dinner event. (The nerve of that guy 🙄😬.)

Anyway, don’t forget about giving your gift to 👑King Jesus:

The gift of your time spent alone in 👑His Presence. Not just in prayer because that’s in your talking, but also in reading God’s Word because it is then that you are listening as God speaks.

I hope you enjoyed this.

I got to go now.

👑King Jesus is knocking at my door and I want to spend time with 👑HIM too.

Bye y’all  👋

👑🍽🍞🍷💕👑🍽🍞🍷💕