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Extra Content for the Gospel Spice Christmas Plan

Extra Devotional 1 – Tracing the chronicles of God’s glory

On a cold winter’s night that was so deep, the Jewish people in Roman-occupied Judea had been enduring a year of disappointments and hardships. Had God abandoned them? Was He punishing them? Did He even care? Was He even there? How would they make it through? Hum. Does it sound familiar?

It was time to ponder the past and catalogue the loss. To the Jews, the essence of God’s favor had always been encapsulated in the presence of His glory and favor among them. The glory of God had always been the visible manifestation of His predilection for them, their North Star, firmly established in Jerusalem. And it was gone. So, they reminisced. As do we.

The sweet fragrance of God’s glory lingered in distant memory. It had appeared to Moses in the burning bush, over 1,400 years earlier (Exodus 3:1-4). The “Shekinah” glory of God had become the Israelites’ guide through the wilderness—a pillar of fire by night, and a cloud by day. The glory had provided them with tasty, spicy manna daily (Exodus 16:31). When the glory moved, the people packed up camp and followed; when it rested, so did they (Exodus 13:21). A Tent among tents, the Tabernacle had been God’s dwelling place among His people (Exodus 40:34). The glory had guided the Israelites in war and in peace through the conquest of the Promised Land, and had eventually rested, alongside them, in the Temple in Jerusalem under King Solomon (2 Chronicles 7:2), inaugurated around 950BC. These were the golden days of the Jewish Kingdom.

That little ragtag nation, huddled under the shadow of Solomon’s Temple, was destined for great things—on one condition. God had made it clear: His blessing was conditional to His people’s faithfulness. Their adultery would lead to His departure (Exodus 19:3-6, 23:22; Deuteronomy 28:1-2,15-16; Jeremiah 11:10). Yet, time and again they chose other gods for themselves. Time and again, God forgave (Exodus 34:6-7). The Old Testament is the story of God’s compassion and forgiveness towards His wayward children. Eventually, the story of the prodigal (Luke 15:11-12) became reality as the prodigal nation tasted the bitter, rotten fruit born of their choice.

And so, God’s glory departed, reluctantly. So reluctantly, in fact, that you can trace its hesitant steps away from the Temple in the book of Ezekiel (8:4, 9:3, 10:4, 10:18-19, 11:22;23). The Jews call this event “ichabod” (1Samuel 4:21). The glory of God didn’t stomp out in a fit; but depart, it did.

God is the spice, or essence, of love, life, beauty, wisdom, hope, joy, light, and protection. When His people chose away from Him, they departed from all He is. They embraced the bitter bland existence of hate, indifference, selfishness, death, foolishness, despair, sadness, darkness, and danger. And like them, we too have chosen away from the Source of all good (Romans 3:23).

Once the glory departed, Jerusalem found herself under God’s protection no more. Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar promptly rsvp’d this open invitation for invasion: between 595 and 586BC, three waves of attacks systematically destroyed the city of David, and the Jews were taken into exile—Daniel the most famous of them. Seventy years later, Ezra and Nehemiah led a small remnant of Israel back to Jerusalem, as prophesied by Jeremiah and Isaiah (2 Chronicles 36:22-23; Jeremiah 25:11-12; Isaiah 44:28), but the glory of God did not return.

That had been over 400 years earlier. And so it was, on that cold winter’s night that was so deep, that the people of Israel remained bereft of hope. Darkness, and silence, and ichabod.

But God had not given up on His prodigals. Christmas was coming.

Has this year has brought bitter darkness to you? If so, take courage: the glory of God shines brightest against the dark backdrop of deepest night.

Just ask certain poor shepherds.

Extra Devotional 2 – Culture, spices and personal experiences of Christmas.

Spices are not in the Christmas story, yet they are very much a part of our personal experience of the celebration of Christmas. Did you know that most of the spices we instinctively associate with Christmas were initially used in the early Middle Ages to fight infections and diseases? Their powerful anti-bacterial properties made them winter staples in meats, hot drinks and ales. A spicy French legend describes a band of robbers who would inhale then rub spices on their skin before raiding valuables from the corpses of black plague victims. Spices’ prohibitive cost placed them on top of everyone’s Christmas wish list and were almost exclusively used by the wealthy. The Spice Route merchants brought these treasures from the Orient to the great cities of Europe. A pouch of cinnamon sticks, a jar of dried ginger or a rind of orange peel were worth their weight in gold.

Each culture has its own preferred spices. I am French and have lived the last two decades on three continents, four countries and five cities in six professional roles. In Middle Eastern-inspired North Africa, where I lived for almost a decade, I learned to favor cumin and cilantro. In the UK, I embraced curry, celebrated in the Indian-forward British culinary scene. Here in the US, I have more recently begun a love affair with pumpkin spice. And my homeland, France, has of course inspired me with countless spice combinations, some as complex as Pain d’Epices—literally, “spice bread,” a sweet honey cake made of up to twenty-one spices and flavors, favored in the winter with a strong cup of black tea. Its forward notes are what you’d expect in the winter, maybe inspired by our French thieves’ legend: cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, cardamom, star of anise, all-spice, and ginger.

None of these spices would have evoked Christmas in the days of the early church. Though they are not mentioned in the gospels, who can deny that spices hold as dear a place in our Christmases, as do our beloved nativity scenes and carols? So much so, I suspect God enjoys our culturally-steeped renditions of the birth of His Son—when executed in the appropriate spirit of worship and rejoicing. I think Jesus would have enjoyed a cup of cinnamon-cloves black tea with a drop of honey! God invites us to flavor our experience of Christmas with our own cultural preferences.

The entire incarnated life of Jesus displays God’s invitation to weave the human into the divine. Jesus, fully God and fully Man, blends in perfect unity the natures of God and man as man was created to be, in complete surrender and love to his Creator. In Christ, we are invited to weave our creativity into our Christmas experience, and to flavor His incarnation in our lives with our favorite spices.

This invitation is not limited to temporal celebrations of Christmas this side of heaven. God beckons us to adorn eternity with our own creativity, too. Have you noticed that the Book of Revelation describes the New Heaven and the New Earth not only as a garden (Revelation 22:1-2), but also as a city (Revelation 21:1-2)? A city is the epitome of human creativity, displaying our Imago-Dei powers in architecture, design, engineering and artistic beauty (Revelation 21:15-27). God values human cultures across time and space as part of His plan and, as such, He opens the door for our human, God-given creative spirit to shape heaven. We are created in God’s image, thus created to create. Unfathomably, God values our additions to His story—that is, the ones that honor Him and lead us, creatures, to worship our Creator in awe and reverence. In the context of the coming of Messiah, and ultimately in the New Jerusalem, Zephaniah 3:17 tells us that God takes great delight over us when we honor Him. His proud Father’s heart sings at the sight of His children honoring Him through their boundless creativity.

Each child uniquely creates, to the glory and delight of the Father. How do you do so?

Extra Devotional 3 – What about your own Christmas experience?

Insert yesterday’s insight back to your Christmas experience: God delight in watching you personalize your experience of Christmas with your very own spices and flavors. So, how do you cultivate spice in ways that honor God? How do you know that He delights over the unique flavors you bring into this life?

First, don’t be content to be just any old spice mix, and don’t settle for imitation flavors. A truly pleasing spice mix blends creativity with depth of flavor. It boasts its own identity. Be ambitious and demanding in your own standards. Don’t try to be someone else. God is too creative to create two identical people or lives: be who God created you to be. Exude the fragrant aroma of the spices He uniquely mixed to create you. Be as bold and over-the-top as you wish, or as subtle and understated as you prefer—under His guidance. Be you—to His glory, and your delight. When you err and go stale or too pungent, go back to Him. Ask Him to recalibrate you—and you will enjoy, again, the precise spice mix He made you to be.

Second, any chef will tell you: you need to taste your dish every step of the way. It takes active participation. In spiritual terms, every Christmas is an opportunity for you to step into the Incarnation story, to dare to go deeper in your intimacy with God. Don’t be content with last year’s batch of Christmas spices. This year is a new crop—treat it as such. Don’t microwave last year’s leftovers. Dig into the Christmas story with fresh perspective and anticipate a revolution for your spiritual taste buds. Expect God to bring you flavors you didn’t know were there.

Finally, once you have discovered a truly amazing spice, you can’t help but share it. Like the shepherds, you will not be able to contain yourself. You will want to tell others. To paraphrase C.S. Lewis, praise isn’t complete until it is shared. That is why we snap a photo of a stunning sunset and message it to our loved ones. That is why we encourage them to take a bite of that incredible chocolate tart. And that is why we sing to the Lord in corporate worship—so that the experience of praise is made complete through community. And when you do so, you spread that spice of the gospel to others. You have tasted the spice, and now you become that spice to others.

When you experience God’s glory in your life as the all-encompassing spice that transforms everything, when His glory truly becomes your delight, you can’t help but beckon others to taste the spice of the gospel for themselves, so that they in turn become enthralled by it.

Just ask the shepherds, and all who heard their story—from Luke to you.

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