For seven days celebrate the Feast to the LORD your God
at the place the LORD will choose.
For the LORD your God will bless you
in all your harvest and
in all the work of your hands, and
your joy will be complete.
Deuteronomy 16:15
The fruit of our labor – whether we harvest literally or figuratively – is a result of God’s blessing and provision. The farmer’s toil is rewarded with a literal harvest, while the tradesman celebrates a completed project, and the author, a published book. A mother may rejoice that potty training has been successfully navigated, a student delights in the completion of finals week, and homeowners celebrate when the flower beds are weeded and mulched.
Work brings satisfaction, and the completion of work brings joy. The resources to do the job coupled with our personal capacity to lift, walk, labor, think and produce – all are the blessings of the One who gave us life and endowed us with resources.
All we are and all we have are a gift from Him.
As we are wrapping up the Thanksgiving season, we can recall certain words that point to this annual season: harvest, gratitude, thankfulness. And, as we prepare to replace the pumpkins and cornucopias with Christmas trees and holly wreaths, and as orange and yellow give way to red and green, we are poised to usher in a new set of seasonal words: peace, joy, merry, noel.
But as we re-read the verse above – one we might label as a “Thanksgiving” verse because of the harvest theme – we note it concludes with JOY.
We need not relegate JOY to celebrating Christmas only (any more than we need to assign thankfulness only to Thanksgiving). Life is a rhythm … an ebb and flow of seasons, work, and satisfaction that prompt thankfulness, joy,and grateful praise to the God who provided all of it!
Let’s make JOY the end result of every season!
Our Write the WORD bookmark for the month of December was conceived to help us focus on JOY, a word that appears in each daily verse. As you read, write, ponder, and pray God’s WORD this month, it is my fervent hope that you will then be prompted to speak it, tell it, and live it. May your joy be complete!
Be sure to visit our ‘Downloads’ page for your own copy of this month’s Write The WORD: JOY bookmark and S.O.A.P. Bible study pages.
In this week’s devotional video, Laura issues a challenge to add thanking and praising “bookends” to the beginning and end of each day. Inspired by both I Chronicles 23:30 (duties for the Levites) and the life of Brother Andrew (The Practice of the Presence of God), we pray this challenge will be accepted – and change up our “why” for all we do during the holiday season and into the new year.
You can order your copy of The Practice of the Presence of God here (and Cross My Heart Ministry might even receive a few pennies from Amazon when you do). And don’t forget to visit our Downloads page for the December Write the WORD bookmark, S.O.A.P. study pages, and more.
