By Joseph Ametepe
It’s my privilege and pleasure to pronounce God’s blessings upon you for the month of December 2024! May you be abundantly and amazingly blessed by YAHWEH SHALOM (THE LORD IS PEACE) during this festive season of celebrating the Birth of Jesus Christ! May the Holy Spirit freshly assure your heart that “if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1; NASB)! May you always be of good courage – knowing that while you are at home in the body, you are absent from the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:6)! May the Spirit of God work in you to have as your ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:9)! May the love of Christ control you, so that you might no longer live for yourself, but for Christ who died and rose again on your behalf (2 Corinthians 5:14-16)! Also, may the Spirit of God, grant you His amazing grace, to live out your God-ordained life of being an ambassador for Christ (2 Corinthians 5:20)! May you be abundantly encouraged that at the acceptable time, God will listen to you, and on the day of salvation, God will amazingly help you (2 Corinthians 6:2)! May the Spirit grant you the abundance of grace in enduring afflictions, hardships, and distresses in your service for Christ (2 Corinthians 6:4-5)! May the Lord grant you the blessing of speaking of your life: “as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things” (2 Corinthians 6:10; NASB)! May the Lord also grant that you will experience His blessings of being filled with comfort and overflowing with joy in all your affliction (2 Corinthians 7:4)! May the God who comforts the depressed, comfort you (2 Corinthians 7:6)! May you be made sorrowful to the point of repentance, according to the will of God; when you have missed the mark, so that you might not suffer loss in anything (2 Corinthians 7:9)! May the Lord grant that in a severe test of affliction, your abundance of joy and your extreme poverty will overflow in a wealth of generosity on your part, even as it happened among the churches of Macedonia (2 Corinthians 8:1-2)! May the Spirit grant you the joy and blessing of abounding in the gracious work of selflessly and sacrificially sharing in support of the saints (2 Corinthians 8:7)! May the Spirit also make known to you afresh: “the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich” (2 Corinthians 8:9; NASB)! Yes, may You be abundantly and amazingly blessed by YAHWEH SHALOM, who “so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16; NASB)! For Jesus is the Reason for the Season!