In this devotional episode, host M.t. Clark opens with a description of a Tasmanian landscape photo, using the image as a metaphor for seeing life from different perspectives through a covenant relationship with Christ. He emphasizes that true joy at Christmas comes from being rooted in Christ, not material gifts. Clark shares a “Mindful of Christ” message from Lauren Roskillie, based on Romans 11:17‑22, highlighting the olive‑tree grafting metaphor: believers are grafted into Christ’s root, warned not to become prideful, and urged to trust God continually. He then addresses a viewer’s question about being engaged to someone with borderline personality disorder, advising that a solid identity in Christ helps resolve emotional volatility and encourages accountability and transformation. The teaching moves to a biblical meditation on church discipline, quoting Matthew 18:15‑18 and explaining its procedural steps and the current lack of discipline in many churches. Clark continues with a reflection on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Advent writing, “World Judgment and World Redemption,” urging listeners to actively participate in the Christmas story rather than be passive spectators. A poem from Bonhoeffer’s prison is read, followed by an exposition of John 3:16‑21, stressing the light‑and‑darkness dichotomy and the call to live as redeemed disciples. The episode concludes with a prayer asking for God’s guidance to live out the grafted identity, to serve others, and to point people to Jesus.
Chapters
To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of this magical-looking landscape with Bass Strait in the distance comes to us from Dave Bond Photography, who shared the scene 2 days ago as Dave was visiting The Nut, which is a top attraction in Stanley, Tasmania. The Nut is the remains of an ancient volcano plug with a large, mostly flat surface that can be circumnavigated on foot, and you can be— and you can ascend to the 152-meter summit either by foot or chairlift to enjoy the fantastic views there, like this one that Dave captured while looking in a different direction from atop the nut. Well, it's Saturday, and while I won't be in Tasmania anytime soon, I like my— I, like my friend Dave, try to look at life from different directions. To find the beauty that others fail to miss, or others tend to miss, um, fail to see, I guess, was what I was trying to say. Yeah, um, yeah, fail to see I think is a better turn of phrase there. We'll just correct that. Sorry, guys. My different view is, uh, greatly enhanced, of course, by my covenant relationship with God through faith in Jesus and my Christian worldview that recognizes that God is the Creator and sustainer of all things, and that he will determine the direction of history. When we know there is a good, good Father on the other side of eternity that is active and present in the universe, we can let go of fear. We can have peace with him. We can let go of fear, especially when we have peace through him, with him, through faith in Jesus Christ, and see the beauty that surrounds us on all sides. Well, I am in the beautiful confines of my countryside home for another weekend, where I am sure to be out walking later this morning to enjoy the beauty and peace of the country farmlands in my neighborhood, but will also be going to see the beauty of the nativity story being highlighted in the new Christmas with The Chosen Holy Night movie later today. Heads up, next weekend is Christmas Eve on Sunday, so if you haven't reflected on the goodness of God and gotten into the Christmas spirit, I would recommend that you do it soon, if not immediately. Our joy at Christmas should not be dependent on what we find under our Christmas tree. Uh, it should be based on who we are in Christ and how we are rooted in Christ. Speaking of rooted in Christ, it is the weekend, and after answering an email from a YouTube view— viewer who was seeking relationship advice this morning, I've decided to share Mindful of Christ Lauren Roskillie's Word from Wednesday this week to encourage us to be rooted in Christ. Lauren bases her message on the text in Romans 11:1-17-22 and shared verse 11 to introduce her message. So Romans 11:17 from the New Living Translation says, but some of these branches from Abraham's tree, some of the people of Israel, have been broken off, and you Gentiles, who were branches from a wild olive tree, have been grafted in. So now you also receive the blessing as God has promised Abraham and his children, sharing in the rich nourishment from the root of God's special olive tree. And then Lauren writes, rooted in Christ, you have been grafted in to share the richness and power of God. Wow! But you must not brag about being grafted in to replace the branches that were broken off. You are just a branch, not the root. Well, you may say, those branches were broken off to make room for me. Yes, but remember, the Those branches were broken off because they didn't believe in Christ, and you are there because you do believe. So don't think highly of yourself, but fear what could happen. For if God did not spare the original branches, he won't spare you either. Notice how God is both kind and severe. He is severe toward those who disobeyed, but kind to you if you continue to trust in his kindness. But if you stop trusting, you will also— you also will be cut off. And she puts in parentheses verses 18 through 22. In summary, this is an awesome but humbling visual. The tree is a metaphor for our life with Christ. Apart from him, we are and can do nothing at all. But when we are rooted in Christ, we enter into salvation. With this salvation comes power, peace, and strength too. Don't stop trusting him. So check your life. Are there areas that you're not completely trusting God in, or that you haven't given to Christ? If so, give them to him now and let him guide you in your new growth. Blessings from Lauren Ross Killey. And thanks, Lauren. You don't— so don't stop trusting the Lord and rejoice knowing that you have been established in God's kingdom forever, but be humbled and know that the Lord wants you to— wants to work on you to become more and more like Jesus, to become the person that he created you to be. And I share that today as an encouragement to know your identity in Christ and seek your Your freedom in Christ. It addressed the, the issue in the letter I received as someone is engaged to somebody with borderline personality disorder. And borderline personality disorder has a lot to do with identity issues and emotional volatility, shall we say. And if we know who we are in Christ we resolve the identity issues and we resolve— we can have peace to resolve those emotional issues. You know, we can't have anger, live in anger if we're a Christian. We're not supposed to be that way. So I recommend knowing who you are in Christ and accountability to be transformed. You know, we're not just a diagnosis. We are Christians. We're new creations in Christ. But in order to live it, we have to, you know, walk and talk with God until we are transformed and changed. So these comments didn't make the blog, so I apologize to the blog readers who don't listen to the podcast. They'll never hear this, but if you're listening to the podcast, you get these comments additionally. I realized I didn't, you know, I should have put them in the blog now, but It's the weekend and we're going to let it stand. So thanks for listening or watching because you just got a bonus. Anyway, we move along to the Bible verse of the day. Today's Bible verse comes to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John J. Kruse. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on church discipline, and the verses they share are Matthew 18:15-18. Where Jesus said, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Today's verses fall under the 6th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on church discipline, and that 6th point is: Jesus gives us the procedure for church discipline. Today's verses show us the way the church is supposed to operate according to Jesus himself. We are to be accountable to one another to represent the kingdom of God in righteousness, and when we are, are sinned against, we are to challenge and encourage one another to repent. And if we refuse, we are to take the matter to others in the church to attempt reconciliation. If the offender refuses to repent, they're to be loosed from the church fellowship. Concepts like church discipline and excommunication spring from this teaching. It shows us that we are to take our faith and our sanctification seriously, and the, the lack of church discipline in today's churches, uh, show, uh, how far we may have strayed as a society and as a church from what Jesus was pointing to. Deviations from God's Word and distortions of the gospel to allow unrepentant sin is all too common in our modern churches, but God's Word is clear, and we should seek the Lord's wisdom in how to conduct ourselves as Christians in an era where church discipline is seldom seen. We have to govern ourselves as disciples of Jesus and be accountable to God because the local church unfortunately doesn't perform this duty very often these days. As always, I invite all to go to mtforchrist.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from God Is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and today, uh, our, our devotional takes us into week 3 of Advent Redemption Day 5, and Bonhoeffer's message called World Judgment and World Redemption. And Bonhoeffer writes, when God chooses Mary as the means, when God himself wants to come into the world in the manger of Bethlehem, this is not an idyllic family affair. It is instead the beginning of a complete reversal, a new ordering of all things on this earth. If we want to participate in this Advent and Christmas event, we cannot simply sit there like spectators in a theater and enjoy all the friendly pictures. Rather, we must join in the action that is taking place and be drawn into this reversal of all things ourselves. Here we too must act on the stage, for here the spectator is always a person acting in the drama. We cannot remove ourselves from the action. With whom then are we acting? Pious shepherds who are on their knees? Kings who bring their gifts? What is going on here where Mary becomes the Mother of God, where God comes into the world in the lowliness of a manger, of the manger? World judgment and redemption. That is what's happening here, and it is the Christ child in the manger It is God himself who holds world judgment and world redemption. He pushes back the high and mighty. He overturns the thrones of the powerful. He humbles the haughty. His arm exercises power over all the high and mighty. He lifts up what is lowly and makes it great and glorious in his mercy. And our devotional also shares a poem from Bonhoeffer written in Tegel Prison from 1944. And his poem states: Close to you I waken in the dead of night and start with fear. Are you lost to me once more? Is it always vainly that I seek you, you my past? I stretch my hands out and I pray, and a new thing now I hear: the past will come to you once more and be your life's enduring part. Through thanks and repentance, feel in the past God's deliverance and goodness. Pray him to keep you today and tomorrow. And finally, our resource, uh, shares John 3:16-21. And the word of God says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may be not perish but have may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the, send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Those who believe in him are not condemned, but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And that— and this is the judgment, that the light has Light has come into the world, and people love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God. That is it from today's sharing from Bonhoeffer's God is in the Manger for Advent, Week 3, Day 5. And, um, yeah, Jesus coming in the world was something we have to participate in, not be a spectator in. We have to be redeemed and saved and share the message from John 3:16 that those who believe in Jesus will be saved. But those who don't are lost already. So we encourage, uh, we encourage a lifestyle of Christian discipleship here, and that includes sharing the gospel message with others, but it also means applying the word of God to your own life. We can't look at our neighbor and say, wow, you're really messed up, and be messed up ourselves. Um, you know, oh, I believe and I'm forgiven, but we're supposed to repent And when we do that, amazing things happen. You know, the dead come to life, light comes into the darkness, and we discover the new life that we have in Christ is an actual reality that we can live. It's not an ideal, it's, it's what's been given to us, and it's a precious promise from God that we can experience every day, the new abundant life that Jesus came to give us. It's here and now. The kingdom is here and now and yet to come. So we are to live in the kingdom by walking like kingdom members and following the King Jesus. So let's celebrate the King today as we draw closer to Christmas. Remember who you are in Christ and that you're rooted in Christ. But, you know, basically that should make you rejoice, but not prideful. It should humble you to be more and more like Jesus as we seek to follow him and represent him here on the earth. So it is Saturday. I'm gonna have to take that dog for a walk and enjoy the country morning, um, when I'm done here. So let's, let's pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for all that you do for us, Lord. We, uh We're humbled that You decided to graft us in to Your tree, to Your vine, and that we can have eternal life through the vine, Jesus Christ, who without Him we can do nothing. And so we thank You for bringing us into the kingdom. And Lord, we thank You for anyone listening today or reading today's blog, that they would be blessed, that You'd come alongside them and their prayer requests and their walk of faith. Because, Lord, we all need your help. And even though I don't have to work today, I'm going to need your help too. Um, I need you to open my eyes to the things you need me to see, help me to do the things I can do, and to best represent you in your kingdom, Lord. That's all I want to do is point people to Jesus and the life that, that you give to all of us who decide to follow you in spirit and in truth. Lord, so we thank you, we praise you, and we love you. And we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.
