the dance of advent

Opening Prayer: O Lord, during this season of Advent, help me be aware of and attentive to the ways you want to come to me and the new birth you want to conceive in me.  Come, Lord Jesus!

Scripture: Luke 1:26-38

Journal: What new and beautiful thing do you long for God to do within you?  How do you expect that to take place?  How do you think Mary felt when the Holy Spirit came upon her and the Most High overshadowed her?  What do you think that was like for her?  Where and how have you experienced communion with God lately?  What fruit did it produce in you?

Reflection: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the Most High will overshadow you.  So that the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35) Communion, conception, incarnation, it has been the pattern of life with God from the very beginning of the Scriptures.  From the opening verses of Genesis, we see God in communion: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Three persons, one God, living in unspeakable love, unity, and intimacy.  It is communion of the best and deepest kind.  It is from this communion that creation was conceived and then brought into being (incarnation).  God was so full of love that he simply could not contain himself, so he created.  He spoke and things came to be.  His words became flesh, so to speak, ending in the focal point of all creation—man and woman, who were created in his image.  God breathed his divine breath into human beings and invited them into the life and laughter and love of the Trinity.  The whole reason we were created was so that we could experience what the saints and poets and pilgrims have called, “The Great Round Dance of Love.”  Thus, we were created out of communion, by communion, for communion.  Which means that in life with God, everything starts with communion: deep, intimate, encounter with the God who made us for himself.

This pattern comes to life beautifully during the season of Advent, when God sends the angel Gabriel to a teenage girl in Nazareth of Galilee to tell her of how he is finally, after all the years of waiting, going to come into the world to show us how fully and deeply and passionately we are loved.  In fact, Mary is going to be the very channel through with the Son of God will be born.  She is what scholars have called the theotokos, the God Bearer. 

“How will this be,” responds Mary, “since I am a virgin.”  And the angel’s response is priceless: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the Most High will overshadow you.  So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.”  Did you hear that?  All of this will start with communion.  The Holy Spirit is going to come upon Mary, and the Most High is going to overshadow her.  The word overshadow in the Greek means to envelop.  It is the same word that is used to describe the intimacy and the power and the glory of what happened to the disciples later on at the Mount of Transfiguration, when the cloud of God descended upon them and the voice of God spoke to them.  Mary was going to be enveloped by the Most High.  He was going to come to her and sweep her up in his divine embrace of love and power and glory.  That’s communion!  An encounter so intimate and so passionate that it would conceive new life inside of her.  “See, I am doing a new thing!” is how Isaiah describes it.  “Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 43:19) 

You see, where life with God is concerned, communion always leads to conception.  That’s just the way it’s designed to work.  In fact, it’s what ministry is all about.  God draws us into communion that is so deep and so intimate that it creates new life in us.  Then that new life is born into the world.  It worked that way in the creation story, it worked that way at the Annunciation, and it works that way for me and you.  Thus, the beauty of the Advent season is that God wants to conceive something of himself deep within each of us, so that he might be born anew and afresh into the world through us. 

Which begs the question: What is the new and beautiful thing he is conceiving in you these days?  And how does he want that new and beautiful thing to be born into a lost and broken world in a way that will bring new life and new hope?  So, during this season, make time and space for the Holy Spirit to come upon you and the Most High to envelop you.  Allow that encounter to conceive something new and beautiful within you.  And then ask God to show you how and where and when he wants that new and beautiful thing to be born into the world.  “I am the Lord’s servant.  May it be to me as you have said.”  Come, Lord Jesus!

Pray

Closing Prayer: Thank you, O Lord for the beautiful dance of Advent.  Help me to enter into it so that I may be swept up into your loving embrace, transformed by your presence, awakened by your touch of love, and given to the world in some new and beautiful way.

desolations

Opening Prayer: “Come and see the works of the Lord, the desolations he has brought on the earth.”  Thank you, O Lord, that you even use desolations to make us more into the people you desire us to be.

Scripture: Psalm 46:8

Journal: How has God used desolation in your life to grow you into the person he desires you to be?  How is he doing that now?  What is the fruit?

Reflection: “Come and see the works of the Lord, the desolations he has brought on the earth.” (Psalm 46:8) God not only works through consolation, but also through desolation.  At times, he brings us down into the dust so that he can build us up.  He tears us apart so that he can put us back together.  Sometimes desolation accomplishes things in us that consolation cannot.  For instance, as a wise saint once said, “It takes a ton of humiliation to get one ounce of humility.”  But who wants to be humiliated?  Only someone who really wants to be humble.  The desolation of humiliation leads to the acquisition of true humility.

The fact is that it might be easier to “Come and see the works of the Lord” through desolation than it is through consolation.  Maybe we really are refined by fire.  Maybe trial and error, pain and suffering, sorrow and sadness, flaws and frailties, brokenness and neediness, form us into the image of Christ much more than comfort and ease.  The hard things in life are the ones that either make us or break us, or maybe even break us to make us.  To make us real, to make us vulnerable, to make us open, to make us true.

Maybe the thing God really cares about is making us humble and meek.  Maybe he is helping us become poor in spirit.  Maybe he takes us to the bottom in order to help us let go of our constant need to get to the top.  After all, the least are the greatest in the kingdom.  Maybe he’s trying to take us so low that we become unoffendable, holy fools, a non-anxious presence in this world.  Maybe he just wants us to trust him fully, to see that even in the times of desolation he is at work.  Maybe he just wants us to recognize that he both meets us and makes us through the desolations of our lives.

Pray

Closing Prayer: O Lord, thank you for both meeting us and making us through our times of desolation.

walking through

Opening Prayer: Thank you, Lord God, that you are always with us, even in the valley of the shadow of death.  Thank you that we need not fear evil for your rod and your staff will comfort us.

Scripture: Psalm 23:4

Journal: How has God grown you as a result of making you go through the valley of the shadow of death rather than around it?

Reflection: “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.  Your rod and your staff, they comfort me?” (Ps. 23:4) As much as we all would like to go around the valley of the shadow of death, that is not usually God’s way.  We must go through it, at least at some point in our lives.  Probably repeatedly.  That is because going through the valley of the shadow produces things in us that going around it simply cannot.

We might think that the point of life is success and ease and comfort, and our strategy may be to avoid as much pain and discomfort as we possibly can.  But ease and comfort provide little food in the journey of sanctification—of us becoming all God intended us to be.  In fact, they actually work against growth and formation.  God grows and forms us by allowing us the gift of going through the valley of the shadow of death.  It is in that place where God does some of his very best work.  It is death that produces new life.  It is in the valley where we learn dependence, reliance, obedience, humility, perseverance, and surrender.

So next time you find yourself in the valley of the shadow of death, do not fear.  Do not think that God has abandoned you.  Do not try to immediately get yourself out of it.  Instead, embrace it; there is much to learn there.  For a wise and wonderful saint once said: “There’s no way out, only through.”  

Pray

Closing Prayer: Lord, when I am going through the valley of the shadow of death help me not to fear or doubt or get angry but help me to trust.  Help me to trust in your power, to trust in your care, and to trust in your love.  You are with me in ways that I cannot fully know of explain.

 

why are you so afraid

Opening Prayer: Thank you, Lord Jesus, that perfect love drives out fear.  Drive fear, and all its effects, out of my heart and life today, so that I can love like you love.

Scripture: Mark 4:35-41

Journal: Why are you so afraid?  What impact is fear having on your life?  What problems or dysfunctions in your life are the result of fear?

Reflection: “Why are you so afraid?” (Mark 4:40) What a great question, not only for the disciples but for each of us.  Fear has such a profound impact on all of our lives, whether we realize it or not.  Jesus knew that, and he just wanted us to know it too. 

Fear is at the root of so many of our issues, problems, and dysfunctions.  And it’s even at the root of some things that the culture around us would call good things.  But are they?  Really?  Especially if their origin is fear.

For example, fear is obviously behind our anxiety, insecurity, and doubt, but it is also at the root of our drivenness, competitiveness, and workaholism.  Fear is surely the main source of our judgmentalness and criticalness, but it is also at the core of our inability, or our unwillingness, to stop and rest.

“There is no fear in love.  But perfect love drives out all fear,” says the apostle John.  Thus, fear is actually the enemy of love.  And if we are called to love, which we obviously are, fear will keep us from being able to do that.

So, I guess we all must answer the question, “Why are you so afraid?” with as much honesty and transparency and vulnerability and reflection and courage as we possibly can.  Because it is only when we recognize fear as the source of our behavior that we can ever have any real hope of transforming that fear into love.     

Pray

Closing Prayer: Lord Jesus, help us not to live in the house of fear but to live in the house of love.  For only then can we love like you love.

weak is strong

Opening Prayer: Lord Jesus, when I am weak, you are strong.  Therefore, help me to live out of my weakness, so that your power may be revealed in and through me.

Scripture: 2 Corinthians 12:7-10

Journal: How is God’s strength showing up in your weakness these days?  What does it look like for you to be weak, so that he may be strong?

Reflection: Weak is strong in the kingdom of God.  Never in my life have I felt as weak, as flawed, as fragile, and as vulnerable as I do right now, and yet God continues to work in power.  Never has the phrase “treasure in jars of clay” been a more accurate description of who I am and how I’m operating, and yet God continues to show up in amazing ways.  Maybe it's because I am finally getting out of the way.  Never has “For when I am weak, then I am strong" been more evident in my life and my ministry.  My weakness, my anxiety, and my dysfunctions are the very channels through which God is doing some of his best work.  I’ve tried to overcome them to no avail, and now I think I’m actually supposed to lean into them and embrace them.  That seems to be what Paul is saying.  I’m not supposed to overcome them because his power is made perfect in my weakness.  Weak is strong in the kingdom of God.  His power is best revealed in our powerlessness.  It’s all about him, not about me.  When will I ever learn?

Pray

Closing Prayer: Lord Jesus, we fight so hard against being seen as weak, but we are.  Help us to embrace our weaknesses rather than deny them, hide them, or cover them up so that your power may be made manifest in and through us.  Your grace really is sufficient for us.  Thank you!

desired

Opening Prayer: Lord, it is hard to wrap my mind around the fact that you desire me, because most days I do not feel desirable at all.  In fact, just the opposite.  But you do love and desire me, O Lord, and for that I am eternally grateful.

Scripture: Song of Songs 7:10

Journal: What does it stir up in you to know that you are desired by God?

Reflection: “I belong to my beloved, and his desire is for me.” (Song of Songs 7:10)

“Do you know that you are desirable?  Do you know how deeply I love you and desire you?  You are my beloved, my bride, my lover, my heart’s desire.  You are the apple of my eye.  Don’t let the world around you, or the doubt within you, convince you of anything else.”

My you know the depths of his love and affection today.

Pray

Closing Prayer: May your desire for me, O Lord, stir up in my heart a deep desire for you.  After all, we love because you first loved us.

powerlessness

Opening Prayer: Thank you, Lord Jesus, that when we were utterly powerless in our sin and struggle, you died for the ungodly.  Help us to live in that power today, and not in our own.

Scripture: Romans 5:6-8

Journal: What does God want to say to you through his word today?  How are you experiencing powerlessness and helplessness in your struggle against sin?  What does it look like to surrender and submit to Jesus?

Reflection: “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.  Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die.  But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:6-8)

When will we ever get it through our heads that apart from Jesus we are utterly powerless?  We keep trying to do it on our own, but we just keep “missing the mark” (the definition of the Greek word for sin).  And we will continue to miss the mark until we surrender our attempts to do it ourselves and submit to the power of Jesus to claim the victory for us that we can never achieve for ourselves.  We can’t, but he can.  Lord Jesus, have mercy on us!

Pray

Closing Prayer: Lord Jesus, maybe I keep failing because I keep trying to do it on my own.  I am powerless to do anything but miss the mark apart from you.  Lord Jesus, have mercy on me!