I hope you’re having a wonderful preparations for Christmas time! I’m very grateful to be with you on this special weekend before Christmas. I pray you are blessed and amazed in the best way for Christmas and beyond. And I’m excited to share this very thoughtful and insightful message, carefully researched and carefully supported by scripture, concerning Mary, the mother of our Lord Jesus. She was a special young woman, chosen by God, highly favored and blessed. Her prayer, called the Magnificat, was deeply rooted in scripture and demonstrated she had a depth of knowledge that not many, even religious leaders, experienced at that time, and sometimes not now though we have multitudes of resources to help our understanding. I hadn’t thought about this, I learned this from today’s Weekly encouragement! message, that all the young Jewish women of that time were hoping, praying, to be the one through whom the Messiah would come. This is incredible to me, that Jewish young women had such a good grasp of scripture to know that the Messiah would come as a baby. To sense this prayer could be theirs. The conception and birth of Jesus was miraculous, and also everything surrounding His coming into this world. Mary has been controversial, however, something not fitting for the mother of Jesus. Such that some have even prayed to Mary, which is addressed by Jesus, did you know? In Luke chapter 11, there is a story where Jesus is teaching and a woman in the crowd shouted out, “blessed is the woman that gave You birth and nursed You.” Jesus replied, “Blessed, rather, are those who hear the Word of God and obey it.” This was the first attempt to worship Mary and Jesus did not allow this burden to be on Mary. It’s a bit amazing, in a difficult way, to me, that worship of Mary has gone on, in the Catholic Church, primarily, for centuries, when this is a burden being placed on Mary, not a blessing. Mary proclaimed that she needed a Savior, not that she was a Savior. She points to Jesus and this is important to us, today. It’s sort of like what we do with Christmas in modern society, we make it about commercialism and our traditions, some good traditions and others not as redemptive, rather than pointing others to Jesus, which is what Mary did. Maybe we can let her rest in our newfound Christmas joy and let our worship be of God, which is what Mary did. She worshipped God and gave her burdens to Him, recognizing herself and her need of a Savior. This is a global renewal in removing the burden from the mother of Jesus. An important and necessary Word. You will find greater joy with the removal of all blinders to Jesus. He is the One who is accessible. Please remember I’m praying for you because I love you! Please see my Christmas Letter included in this mailing!​​

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​Julie's Christmas Letter