December 23rd 2025

Let love and faithfulness never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. Then you will win favor and a good name in the sight of God and man. Proverbs 3:3-4

Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart. What powerful words and visuals for us. I just want us to sit with that for a moment. Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart. Is that what I am currently doing with love and faithfulness in my life? Could I tell someone in my life I wear love and faithfulness around my neck proudly as a garment for all to see and it’s so deep engrained in my life it’s etched on my heart? 

If we really wrestle with and meditate on those words they should challenge us. This isn’t a nice statement to have love in our lives, this is a bold proclamation. The Psalm isn’t just encouraging us to love and let love flow through our lives, no it’s so much greater than that. That’s the beauty of Christ and His word. There’s beauty in the challenge. There’s goodness in the conviction. There’s peace in the wrestling. Because if His word isn’t challenging, convicting and wrestling with what the world is telling us or what our inner dialogue is saying are we truly taking it on? Or do we read a verse like this and think, “wow that’s really cool love and faithfulness I can carry with me always!” Or do we read this and are like, “wow the power of love and faithfulness in my life should be something that people see first and foremost when they look at me (it’s around my neck, it’s visible, it’s outward facing) and then once they get to know me they get to know more of who I am, my character, what I’m about, my integrity, my actions, my words they see that it flows out of me (it’s on the tablet of my heart, it’s my motivation and anchor).” 

Let us be encouraged in the challenge today! True growth only comes in our lives when we are willing to let our muscles stretch a bit, when we are willing to let the tension produce strength and form something in us. So the challenge of what does my life look like to those when they first see me? And what does my life look like to those that know me deeply? Would they describe it as a life of love and faithfulness? Let that settle in your spirit today and in this Advent season allow there to be a little bit more love and faithfulness visible in and through your life. 

- Grace HazelGrove