Preparation For Celebration

On this third Lord’s Day Sunday in February, we pause to give our Heavenly Father unending, High and Holy praise and thanks for Jesus His Beloved Son our Loving Saviour. Indeed, we are eternally grateful for the privilege we all have been given on this one Lord’s Day Sunday, to remember and celebrate so much of our Lord’s life, while He was in flesh. Will you let your minds of faith take you to that precious, solemn and accepted moment of the Presentation of Jesus in the temple? God entrusted Himself, as a Man, to ordinary, frail, carnal human beings to present Him in the Temple. God entrusts Himself, in His Living Word, to frail, weak, ordinary human beings like you and me, to present Him to others. That’s beyond human comprehension!

O how the Holy Spirit has been merciful to us, has done and is doing in us and for us what we cannot do for ourselves. It is He who brings us to worship, fits us for worship, joins us in worship and helps us in worship, for who can enter the presence of God? Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD?  Or who may stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, nor sworn deceitfully. Psalm 24: 3 - 4. We can claim nothing of those attributes, but we claim the Sovereign Grace of our Lord, as God the Holy Spirit, humbles sinners and makes us fit for this time of worship. It is He and He alone who leads us on this day to celebrate in this most divinely special Trilogy of Worship.

I refer to it as a trilogy, as we are giving much praise to God with the melodies of our hearts. The three come from the fact that we are celebrating three huge events all pertaining to God Incarnate, God who became Man and lived among us in flesh as we are.

In the Christian Liturgical Calendar, today is the Last Sunday, after the Epiphany. We must pause with reverence and privilege, as we have been brought through that most thrilling and exposing time, when we remembered how Christ Jesus, as a little Child, was presented to Gentiles. They were the wise men from the East, who diligently, excitedly and resolutely followed God’s guiding star, which took them to where the Child Jesus was. And behold, the star which they had seen in the East went before them, till it came and stood over where the young Child was. Matthew 2: 9b. We praise God that it is through Him, by faith, we too are able to see Jesus and worship and adore Him. 

Today is also being celebrated by many Christians as The Transfiguration of our Lord Jesus Christ. Whether or not you specially celebrate this occasion, I invite you to accept all that is being brought before you, thankful and full of praise to God for reminding us of this, another thrilling and exposing time in Jesus’ life. It is the time when He was transfigured before three of His disciples where, in a ray of dazzlingly, unimaginable splendour, their Jesus was presented to them, in what had them in awful fear. They saw and heard what mortals do not see and hear, but God made it possible for them to see and hear, as Jesus, Elijah and Moses were in conversation. We are told that Peter opened his carnal mouth and spoke, because he did not know what to say, for they were greatly afraid. Mark 9: 6. We praise God that it is through Him, by grace that we too may be presented with supernatural experiences, to witness fellowship that is all in the realm of the Spirit.

Additionally, today is the final Lord’s Day Sunday before the First Sunday in Lent.  Yes, just listening to these words brings a sort of anxious hush and ripples of anxiety to some of us, as we begin to wonder and ponder. Are we prepared for this Passion Time? Are we ready to take this pilgrimage of forty days and forty nights, this most focused, disciplined and apart time, when we move with Jesus along the most difficult road to the Cross? Am I even prepared to face Ash Wednesday, as the Lord gives life?

Receiving all that we have been given thus far, we cling to the Holy Spirit who alone can prepare us to receive this time before us.

For the next two days we shall receive preparation for celebration.