Waiting in Advent #2

Hello everyone!  

I'd like to welcome you to PWOC this morning, as we wrap up our first semester with our final week of studies before the holiday and then next week we will have our wonderful Christmas program,
before we break until January 10.  

I hope you have all enjoyed your studies and your groups, and most of all I pray that you have grown in the Lord and that you feel closer to Him than ever before.  I hope that we are being a support to you in your spiritual life and relationship with Jesus.  Please come talk to me if you have any comments, concerns, questions, or just want to talk.  

I am so thankful that I can be your Spiritual Life VP this year, and I pray that if you have any feedback for me, that you feel comfortable to come tell me.  

I take this position super seriously and I love every minute I spend with you guys.  God is my greatest passion, and I love sharing my desire for a closer walk and love for Him with you.


So last week we read about Zechariah, Elizabeth, and Mary.  We talked about the importance of patient and expectant waiting in this life, and how we want to be "not of this world" by trusting God in our waiting.

In case you missed it, this year's theme here at PWOC is "not of this world", and our theme verse is Romans 12:2 "Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.".  

When we think about what it means to be a Christian, and by that I mean a real Christian, one who knows that she has been saved by Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, one who has decided to forsake all in pursuit of Jesus, those of us who call ourselves Christians, should really be weighing this in all aspects of our lives.  Are we choosing the world’s ways or God’s ways? 

So, if you have your Bible, please get it out and turn to the book of Luke.  We are going to pick up where we left off last week.  Luke is one of the four gospels, and I always remember what order they are in by singing, “Matthew, Mark, Luke & John went to bed with their trousers on”.  I don’t know where I learned that, but it definitely comes in handy. 

So we are picking up in Luke 1, and we are starting today with verse 39.  Please follow along.  Luke 1:39-55

There are a couple things that strike me in these verses.  First, is what Elizabeth says to Mary.  She says, “You are blessed because you believed that the Lord would do what He said.” 

One of the reasons I fell in love with the Bible, and reading and studying God’s word is because when you read God’s word, you see that God always does what He says He is going to do.  God keeps His promises.  I think this is something that is very difficult for us humans to understand because we have been let down by other humans so many times and we have seen so many broken promises that we hardly trust anyone to keep their word anymore.  We have become so used to people breaking their promises, that we start to forget that God NEVER breaks a promise.  We forget that God ALWAYS keeps His word.  When you think about that, like really let it sink in for a moment… God in Heaven, our creator and our father and the one we call Lord and king ALWAYS does what He says He’s going to do.  He NEVER breaks a promise.  He ALWAYS follows through.

God’s word illustrates this point from the very beginning.  From the very first story of creation and the perfect world that God had made for Adam and Eve, God is keeping His word.  What is the first thing God says in Genesis?  “Let there be light”.  And before the sentence is over, there is light.  Literally, Genesis 1:3 says, “Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light”.  He spoke and immediately the word was fulfilled.  It wasn’t like “Let there be light”.  Oh shoot, wrong switch, hold on…”  It was like, “Let there be light”.  Boom.  Word spoken and fulfilled.

This is my most favorite part about God’s word though.  Every single part points to Jesus.  The simple fact of God speaking points to Jesus. 

John 1:1 says, “In the beginning the Word already existed.
    The Word was with God,
    and the Word was God.
² He existed in the beginning with God.
³ God created everything through him,
    and nothing was created except through him.
⁴ The Word gave life to everything that was created,^[a]
    and his life brought light to everyone.
⁵ The light shines in the darkness,
    and the darkness can never extinguish it.^[b]”

This word was Jesus.  When I think about words, they really are a product of what we are thinking, feeling, understanding.  Words are how we communicate who we are and how we relate to everything around us.  When we think about God’s word, and how God relates to us, His word is Jesus.  And God ALWAYS keeps His word.  Even when Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, God told the evil snake Satan in Genesis 3:14-15, “Because you have done this (deceived God’s beloved humans), you are cursed more than all animals, domestic and wild.  You will crawl on your belly, groveling in the dust as long as you live.  And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring.  He will strike your head and you will strike His heel.”  This sounds pretty straightforward.  Obviously there are a lot of people who don’t like snakes, and although the snake may get a bite of the heel, humans will destroy them.  But this is actually a promise God was making to Satan that He would defeat Him through Jesus Christ.  Although Satan tries to defeat Jesus while He was on Earth, it is but a strike on the heel.  But when Jesus rises from the dead, He has struck the snake on the head and defeated evil once and for all.  God keeps His promises.

The book of Isaiah (which is in the Old Testament) speaks of Jesus’ coming many times, but this is one of my favorites Isaiah 9:6-7:

For a child is born to us,
    a son is given to us.
The government will rest on his shoulders.
    And he will be called:
Wonderful Counselor,^[d] Mighty God,
    Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
⁷ His government and its peace
    will never end.
He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor David
    for all eternity.
The passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies
    will make this happen!”  God keeps His promises.

All throughout the Old Testament, you will find imagery such as this.  Example after example of stories that seem so obvious, but when examined closer, reveal promises of Jesus’ miraculous life, death, and resurrection, and the Love that God has always had and will always have for us, His children.  Again and again, God’s word proves God’s truthfulness. 

This is taken from Dawning: “Here is the way Paul put it in Romans 15:8 – “For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews^[a] on behalf of God’s truth, so that the promises made to the patriarchs (Adam, Noah, Moses, Abraham) might be confirmed.”  So there it is, stated crystal clear: Christ came to prove that God tells the truth, that God keeps His promises.  Christmas means that God can be trusted.”

And this is why, as we look back at Luke 1:47-55 and we read Mary’s response to Elizabeth, we see the immense humility and faith that Mary had.  She knew God kept His promises.  She believed Him with all of her heart.  She did not question, or whine – her situation would have been viewed as less than positive at the time – a young unwed girl, pregnant?  She never once doubted the plan God had for her.  Let’s read her response again:

Luke 1:47-55

Lord, bless us.  Help us to be like Mary Lord.  Let her words echo in our hearts.  Help us to remember that your ways are nothing like our ways.  Help us to remember that we are not to look at our circumstances and think that we are doomed.  As followers of Jesus, we are to look at our circumstances and believe that you keep your promises!  Whatever you have said, you WILL do!  Lord, thank you for coming to us in our need.  Thank you for answering our cries.  Thank you that you are good and that you love us perfectly, and that you ALWAYS keep your word and NEVER break your promises.  Thank you for the example we have in Mary, and help us to be humble servants as she was, trusting you for all we need and not relying on what the world has to offer.  Help us to draw nearer to you so you will draw nearer to us.  Help us to hear your still, small voice, and help us to celebrate this Christmas season in authentic faith that your word is being fulfilled.  Lord, help us to fall more and more in love with you and your word, and help us to not conform to the ways of this world, but Lord transform us from the inside out so that we will know your good, pleasing, and perfect will.  Lord, we know that you came Jesus not to be served, but to serve, and we thank you with all that we are.  Help us to serve you and those around us.  Thank you for this wonderful Christmas season.  Amen.

Waiting in Advent

Good morning Ladies!  I hope you all are well!  Welcome to the Advent season!  What a fun time it is, with the Christmas music, lights, and gifts!

If you have your Bible, please open to the book of Luke.

As we enter this season, we can reflect on many things.  We can remember the generosity of God in our lives – the blessings He has given us already and the blessings that are to come.  We can rest in God’s promises – the ones that He has fulfilled and the ones yet to be fulfilled.  We can stand in awe of the mystery of God – how He is omnipresent – everywhere at all times - and omniscient – knows all all the time – and we can be humbled by this.  Humility helps us to be still and rest in God’s sovereignty – His ability to rule over us and this world – and it allows us to trust in His ways, His plans, and His timing.  Because when I realize I am small, then I can truly believe God is big.  When I realize I am weak, then I can truly believe God is strong.

The word advent actually means “coming”.  That is, Jesus is coming.  Somewhere between 6 and 4 B.C. – so four to six years before Christ was born, the Jewish people were waiting.  They were waiting for a Messiah – a promised deliverer.   The Roman government had taken over Israel, and they were oppressed by this powerful government.  They anticipated that a messiah would free them as a people.  They knew their savior was coming, but they didn’t know when.  So they waited in anticipation.

And then, as Galatians 4:4 says, “When the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His son, born of a woman, born under the law”.  When the fullness of time had come.  Other versions says, “When the right time came”, “When the set time had fully come”.  Looking back now, historians and scholars can see that many things had taken place in that time, prophecy had been fulfilled, and the time was perfect for Jesus to arrive.  But for the Jews at the time, they did not know what hour He would come, or how he would a appear.  They just had to wait patiently.  And, maybe even more importantly, they had to wait expectantly.

Read Luke 1:5 – 25

In this reading we meet Zechariah and Elizabeth, who were “righteous in God’s eyes”.  They like their Jewish brethren were waiting for the messiah, but they also had no children.  I’m sure they had waited for a child many times in their lives.  Trying, expecting, waiting, only to be left waiting again.  What strikes me here is that even in their waiting, and surely in their disappointment, they did not stray from God or His ways.  They did not let their impatience and their sadness embitter them toward the Lord – instead they remained steadfast and endured in their righteousness, until they saw a miracle.  How many times in our lives are we set into a season of waiting, and instead of being like Zechariah and Elizabeth, we let our own wants and our impatience get in the way of the path God has laid out for us?  Why do we so easily forget that God is in control and that He has perfect timing?  Why do we instead try to takes matters into our own hands?  We forget that patience is a fruit of the spirit – a product of a life deeply intertwined with faith in Jesus – and instead of letting God come when the time is perfect, we tell God that we are done waiting.

Psalm 27:13 & 14 says, “I would have despaired unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the LORD In the land of the living. 14Wait for the LORD; Be strongand let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the LORD.”

Read Luke 1:26 – 37

And so, like the Israelites, like Zechariah and Elizabeth, and like Mary waited, we now celebrate their waiting in this Advent season, but we also celebrate that their waiting had come to an end, and when God saw that His time was perfect, He brought them (and us) a savior.  Although the Israelites thought this savior would bring them out of bondage in the political sense, we realize that God’s deliverance was much more than that for them, for us, and for all people.  We celebrate that nothing is impossible with God.  That when we trust Him with our lives, when we trust Him enough to wait on Him and not grow impatient and try to take matters into our own hands, His way will prove to be better than ours and we will be blessed because of it.  And, we also celebrate the season of waiting that we are in now, waiting for Jesus to return a second time and take us home to Heaven to live with Him forever.

So as we celebrate Christmas with all its trimmings, don’t let the busyness of the season or any of its shining distractions take your eyes off the prize.  Keep patiently and expectantly waiting for our savior to come.  And remember that what we do while we are waiting is also important.  Part of expectant waiting is to keep moving forward.  Keep being a light, keep spreading the Gospel, keep loving your neighbor.

Remember this:

Ephesians 5:15-16English Standard Version (ESV)

¹⁵ Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, ¹⁶ making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.

And, if you are in a season of personal waiting, let God strengthen you in your faith as you wait.  As James 1:2 says:

² Count it all joy, my brothers,^[b] when you meet trials of various kinds, ³ for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. ⁴ And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

  And remember, that nothing is impossible with God.