Day 6 - God

I hope that it is not hard to see in this story of Christmas that the greatest kindness of all is the incredible kindness of God bending to us. 

Text: Read Philippians 2:5-8. (MSG)

He was in very nature God and yet He gave that up for us. He left forever and entered time. He left glory and came to earth. He left omnipresence and took on a body.

Why?

Because as Isaiah prophesied centuries before, “He longs to be gracious to you

He waits on high to have compassion on you.” (Is. 30:18) 

The word gracious in Hebrew means “to bend or stoop in kindness to an inferior; causatively to implore.”  

Hosea shared a similar prophetic message. 

“I led them with cords of human kindness,

with ties of love.

To them, I was like one who lifts

a little child to the cheek,

and I bent down to feed them.” (Hosea 11:4)

Let that sink in. Let the kindness of Almighty God tenderly stoop to us, pick us up, imploring us with cords of love and kindness.

That is beautiful and, almost, unbelievable.

It is my hope and prayer that this week you have been captured (and maybe disrupted like I was) by the kindness of God. What a simple but powerful and catalytic word.

There is a Harvard study that shows that kindness begets kindness. We become kind by experiencing kindness.

No real surprise.  

That was the divine intent and Jesus leads the way by example. 

Father, could we enter each day the same way - in kindness.

Reflection

Morning Pause: Enter the day with the image in your head and heart of God stooping to you, bringing you to his cheek and then setting you back down to return the favor.

Afternoon Pause: Who can I “stoop to” today, to love and implore with the kindness of Christ through me? 

Evening Pause: Close your day with a prayer of thanksgiving for the cords of lovingkindness that have bound and led you this far and will lead you to the end.