Use this devo as you are able, in whole or in part. Don’t feel compelled to read it all. Simply read and meditate upon whatever catches your attention. The goal is enjoying time with God through His Word and in prayer. Questions about the devotional elements?
Advent Begins TOMORROW!
So this email is to help us prepare our hearts to “make him room” during this coming season. Advent begins in the dark. Literally. It is the darkest time of the year. Advent, which begins our church calendar, begins facing this darkness. Advent comes to us as a gift of darkness, emptiness, and says – will you enter this period of waiting with me?
Entering into waiting is serious business. We often ask our children to model this mindset of waiting: “Wait for dessert.” “You’ll just have to wait until Christmas morning to see if Saint Nicholas brings you that toy.” Yet how often are we mindful of our own impatience for God to show up? How often do we enter into this season of darkness determined to light our own way forward? Christ has come for this very reason: to rescue us from our sinful self-sufficiency, to bring us into the fullness of joy he has promised, but we too must wait.
Our daily devotional over the next month will reflect this focus, and we hope that you will enter in with glad and expectant hearts for how God will reveal himself in Christ to you this Advent.
In Christ,
Pastor Micah
Call to Prayer
“Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.” (Ps. 46:10)
Scripture Reading
Readings: Psalm 149 + Micah 6:1-8
Read the passages above.
Then spend a moment in quiet stillness before God.
(Click on the link to read each of the passages, or turn there in your Bible)
Prayer
Father, I expend so much energy wondering what your will is for my life. Could you make it any clearer? Give me a gospel-motivated resolve to carry out your clear and good purposes—living justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with you. In Jesus’ name, amen. (prayer based on the Heidelberg Catechism, Question 124).
*Prayer borrowed from Philip Reinders’ Seeking God’s Face: Praying with the Bible through the Year
Wonder
Advent begins in the dark. Literally. It is the darkest time of the year. Advent, which begins our church calendar, begins facing this darkness. Advent comes to us as a gift of darkness, emptiness, and says – will you enter this period of waiting with me?
Will you pause to remember and recognize your own emptiness and darkness – and practice longing for the light? These works of art invite us to enter into the wonder and waiting for the Light of the World to dawn on Christmas morn.
MUSIC
(if accessing via email, CLICK these links: Advent Playlist 1 + Advent Playlist 2)
Benediction
“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his people and redeemed them.” (Luke 1:68)