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Friday!
Proverbs!

A murderer's tormented conscience will drive him into the grave. 
Don't protect him
Proverbs 28:17 NLT

Wow, could Proverbs have thrown up a more inappropriate message at Christmas?
Maybe Proverbs is just keeping it real. 
There's still war in Ukraine, Gaza, and many other places around the world.
The news is full of tragic stories.
Christmas doesn't stop violence and abuse in our homes, for some it makes it worse.
Christmas doesn't stop our memories of harm, of loss, of grief. 
Let's not tinsel over the reality of today, nor that first Christmas. We romanticise a young couple unable to find a place to stay and a baby being born in what may have been a stable. 
Reality is that's a really difficult situation. 
This proverb is about facing reality, not tinseling over it, the reality we sometimes find in our own hearts, and in the hearts of others. 
And Christmas reminds us that Hope entered the story in a whole new way.
Love entered the story in a whole new way. 
This proverb is bleak because there is no alternative, yet Christmas says that there is, we're not left alone, Emmanuel, God is with us. 
In the reality of this world, Hope is alive, Love has, and is, and will make a way, in us, and through us. 
#Proverbs
#wisdom
#something to chewing
#hope
#christmas2023
#lovewins

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