trust

Opening Prayer: O God, sometimes you ask us to do the impossible; you ask us to trust you even when things are beyond our understanding or comprehension.  Help us to have the courage and the faith to do so, to trust you even in the midst of the most chaotic and trying and difficult circumstances of our lives.  Amen. (Watch and Wait by Jim Branch)

Scripture: Matthew 1:18-25

Journal: How would you have felt if you were Joseph?  What would you have been tempted to do?  What circumstances in your life right now are requiring you to trust God completely?

Reflection: I wonder how long you made Joseph wait in that agonizing tension before you told him your plan.  And what was it you were trying to accomplish within him in the midst of his struggling and wrestling?  Were you trying to teach him to pray?  Were you building his character? Were you testing his faith?  Were you trying to see if he would say yes to you regardless of the situation or circumstances?  Were you increasing his groaning, because you knew it would make the soil of his soul fertile and receptive to your coming?  Was the time of struggle designed to increase the depths of his gratitude once you finally told him the truth?  Was it to test his love for Mary, the mother of your Son?  Was it to test his love for you?  What was that awful, struggle-filled waiting meant to do in him?  And what is it meant to do in me?  How am I, like Joseph, looking at a seemingly no-win situation and having to trust you to somehow show up in the middle of it?  Where am I watching and waiting and trusting you to help me begin to make sense of it all? Where am I waiting desperately for you to arrive?  Come, Lord Jesus! (Watch and Wait by Jim Branch)

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Lord God, help us to trust you even in the midst of our waiting and uncertainty, that through it all we may remain certain of one thing—you!  Amen. (Watch and Wait by Jim Branch)