So, this is a wee bit late but I’m super stoked on celebration so I figured I’d write anyway. These are basically my notes from post-reading journaling.

-       What are we celebrating?

o   That we are children of God, created by and for him- loved by him.

o   That Jesus came to this Earth to reconcile us to him and that through his death (and more importantly through his resurrection) we enjoy the privileges of being his beloved children.

We can respond in 1 of 2 ways:

1)   Try to repay him for all this and be consumed with guilt over our undeserving selves.

2)   Celebrate (clearly the better option even though I often get trapped in #1)

-       How do we celebrate?

o   Community with fellow believers/serving others

o   Spreading the good news

o   Sabbath (one of my personal faves)

o   Rejoicing in our work

o   Praying together

o   Affirmig each other

o   Gratitude

o   Songs of worship/reading bibles/going to church

o   Forgiving each other

o   Expressing creativity

In reflecting on this question I found that almost all things God invites us to do are forms of celebrating his son and his love for us. I don’t often think of forgiving, praying, or working as moments of celebration but they totally are!

This led me to wonder…What’s the difference between celebration and worship?

Celebrating is worshipful and worship is a way to celebrate. I don’t think they can exist exclusively. Because of our ultimate salvation we can (or at least I can) sometimes diminish the importance of daily duties (work, school, cleaning) because we know that “there are more important things in life.” But what is so awesome is that they actually do have significance, purpose, and value precisely because they are all forms of celebration and worship. What an awesome gift this is!