This week's Advent devotional from Practicing the Way reflects on the love we have been given in Jesus.
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Pastor Tracy
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Read
"Prepare the way for the LORD, make straight paths for him." Isaiah 40:3
"This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us." 1 John 4:10
"All who heard it were amazed." Luke 2:18
"No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known." John 1:18
From the filling of Elizabeth and Mary’s wombs, to the messages of peace and proclamation that came with them, Advent is about one crucial thing: God pursuing us. We are, every one of us, Elizabeth’s empty womb. Burdened by our tiny love, in the darkness, desperate for divine infilling. The gospel isn’t that an empty womb can bring itself into life, but that Life indeed brings itself to it. Or as the Apostle John eloquently puts it, “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us.” (1 John 4v10)
God promises himself, gives himself, and finishes what he started. All he asks for in return is our yes. That’s what all our feeling, anticipating, listening, and pondering this month has been about, the preparation of our hearts for the magnificent inbreaking of Christ who is always moving toward us in deeper and deeper waves.
It’s in that spirit that Advent is as alive today as it was then. Because God’s love is continually being born in us as we learn day by day to receive him now in our souls just as humanity did then. We are now ourselves the inn, singing to our deepest places with carolers of history past, “Prepare him room!” as Christ himself stands knocking on the door, longing to come and be with us (Rev 3:19-20). This is the beginning of all communion, simply taking time to receive this kind of love into our minds, hearts, and bodies. It doesn’t happen by accident, but by intentionally turning toward this God, the one who goes to any length to have us and who thinks good thoughts about us long before we think about him.
Advent is about living that into our lives, then turning it toward the world, as God did. We discover this Advent love when we un-noise our lives, enter into the stillness of God’s peace, and practice the joy of living into a reality bigger than we can feel or understand. Then, this revolution of love and peace bursts out of us with nuclear light amidst the barrenness of our own communities and spaces of living.
In Christ, God’s pursuing love sows pursuing love in us. It’s because of this letting-in of Love into our darkness, and our hoping and trusting in his desire to finish what he started, that we can obliterate divine insecurity and truly receive and respond with the angels, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” (Luke 2:14) Hallelujah!
Reflect
Receiving God’s love isn’t ultimately an intellectual exercise, but an experiential one. This week, as we live into Christmas, consider taking five minutes a day to simply receive God’s love for you. The best time for this is in the morning, before you pick up your phone or begin your day. You might like to sit in a comfortable place with your palms facing up, and pray a simple prayer like ‘Father, I receive your love for me into my mind, my heart, and my body.’ Then, as your mind drifts here and there, repeat the prayer and allow it to soak you through. Remember that God says he is loving, patient, kind, gentle, and protecting; allow yourself to just receive that into your deepest place. You may feel something or you may not, that’s okay. The most important thing is making yourself available to receive. Allow God to do the rest.
THIS SUNDAY
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 24 @ 10am
WAITING FOR JESUS
Waiting for Love
Tracy Dunham
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