Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 12: Love

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 12: Love

“But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.” Titus 3:4-7

For our last word of the Advent Words challenge, I had to return to the passage in Titus 3 that we used the other day. God’s greatest gift of love is seen in His Son, Jesus Christ. God’s greatest act of love was in His sacrifice of His Son for the sake of the world.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16

God so easily expresses love because God himself is love.

“God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” I John 4:8-10

God’s love is not a feeling, it’s an action. It is because of His love for us that He did not give sinful man what they deserved but, rather, He acted out of love and mercy and gave sinful man salvation and eternal life through Jesus Christ. Love is an action, and we are called throughout the New Testament to imitate God’s love in our daily life. Motivated by love God seeks us, but He doesn’t force us into a relationship with Him. He bids us to respond to His love. When we love each other and act in love, motivated by God’s love, we help the world see who God is. God is love.

“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:35

“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.” 1 John 3:16

“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.” 1 John 4:7

Advent is a celebration of waiting and preparing for the event of Christmas when God sent His love into the world in the birth of His Son, our Savior.

Merry Christmas!

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 11: Emmanuel

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 11: Emmanuel

“All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Emmanuel” (which means “God with us”).” Matthew 1:22-23

 Advent is a season that reminds us that what we long for down deep is God’s presence with us. We wait and we long and we look for it. Matthew tells us in his gospel that what we long for became a reality when Jesus was born. In Matthew 1:20-21 we are told that an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph and told him that the child Mary carried “is from the Holy Spirit…you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” Jesus is Greek for Hebrew Yeshua, or Joshua, which means “God saves”. His name describes who he is.

The angel goes on to tell him “they will call him Emmanuel.” Emmanuel is not to be his name but a title of who he is. We see a similar thing in Isaiah 9:6, “and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Emmanuel is a title for Jesus because God came down to us. God was in the flesh and was among us.

From the beginning of Matthew's Gospel through the New Testament until we reach its end in Revelation, the Incarnation - God came down to us - is the fulfillment of God's promise of His presence with us. 

In fact, the story of the whole Bible is about God's desire to dwell with His people. From the beginning God created a place where He could be present with His people. In Genesis 3:8, it says that God would walk in the Garden of Eden among Adam and Eve. But then sin separated them, and us, from God. From that point on God's presence was found in His holy temple or tabernacle (Exodus 25:8 Deuteronomy 12:4-14). Later in history the Jewish Rabbi's would refer to the temple or tabernacle as the "Shikinah Glory". Shikinah coming from the Hebrew word for dwelling.

 Ultimately though, God had a still greater plan to dwell with and be present with His people. He promised one who would be born and called Emmanuel - God with us.

 “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14

 (Side note: Immanuel is the Hebrew spelling, Emmanuel is the Greek spelling. You may see both used in the Bible depending on the translation.)

 Matthew tells us that the one promised is Jesus (Matthew 1:23). John goes even deeper saying that God through Jesus "became flesh and made his dwelling among us" (John 1:14). The Greek word John used for dwelling is skenoo which means tabernacle or dwelling.  So, John literally says that God "tabernacled" among us through the incarnation of His Son.

 Through faith in Jesus Christ and the sacrifice He made for us on the cross, we have the promise of God's presence with us forever.

 “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ...In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” Ephesians 2:13, 21-22

 Through Jesus Christ God not only dwells with us, but He dwells in us through His Spirit.

“And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth.”  John 14:16-17

 “On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.” John 14:20

 “You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.” Romans 8:9-11

 God's people, collectively as the church and individually, are now the dwelling place of God, His tabernacle!

“Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst?” 1 Corinthians 3:16

 “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?” 1 Corinthians 6:19

 We are yet promised an even greater presence with God in the New Jerusalem. John paints a picture of that heavenly dwelling with God.

“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.” Revelation 21:3

 “I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.” Revelation 21:22-23

Glory to God in the highest ~ Emmanuel has come! God is with us!

 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 10: Salvation

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 10: Salvation

“But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.” Titus 3:4-7

This passage in Titus has one of the best descriptions of the incarnation and the first Advent of Christ: “The kindness and love of God, our Savior, appeared." This is the goodness of God. In the previous verse, Titus 3:3, Paul reminded his readers that we once were enslaved by sin, but now, because the kindness and love of God have appeared, we are saved. We were once lost; now we are found and saved by God.

This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from The Chosen series. Mary Magdalene says, “I was one way, and now I’m completely different. And the thing that happened in between…was Him.”

It is because of God’s kindness toward us that he offers us the opportunity for repentance (Romans 2:4). Because of His great love for us, he offers us the gift of salvation through His Son. He reminds us in verse 5 that we are not saved because of the righteous things we have done, “but because of His mercy.”.

Take note also that all three persons of the Trinity are involved in our salvation! God the Father, through His kindness and love, sent God the Son to be our Savior, and God the Son poured out God the Holy Spirit into our lives. And, as if all of this were not enough, Paul adds that now that we have been justified by His grace, we are also heirs, having the hope of eternal life. Through Christ, we have new life and the hope of eternal life. This is the gift of salvation!

Notice the bookends surrounding this passage:

“Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and always to be gentle toward everyone.” Titus 3:1-2

“This is a trustworthy saying. And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone.” Titus 3:8

Paul shows us how renewed people will live out their salvation. Our passage today, positioned between Titus 3:1-2 and verse 8, shows us that the gift of salvation given to us through the kindness and love of God is our motivation to respond to him by living changed lives sharing His goodness and love with others. 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 9: Glory

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 9: Glory

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3:17-18

When we looked at the word ‘grace’ the other day we looked at John 1:14, which showed us that when Jesus Christ took on flesh he made God’s glory visible to us. The writer of Hebrews says something similar,

“The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being…” Hebrews 1:3

God’s glory expresses everything that God is – His character, His being, His attributes, His works. Jesus reflects all that God is, all His glory. Our passage today in 2 Corinthians 3 shows some of how God’s glory works in our lives as well.

We, who are in Christ, have received the gift of His Spirit which resides in us enabling us to live for Christ. Paul says in this passage that wherever the Spirit of the Lord is there also resides freedom. Part of our freedom means we have unveiled faces. This comes from the story of Moses when he would go before the Lord his face would shine with the radiance of God’s glory. But as he left God’s presence and returned to the people, he would put a veil over his face so the people would not see that the radiance from speaking to God was fading (See Exodus 34:33). We are freed from putting a veil over our faces because the Lord’s radiance does not fade because His Spirit is in us. Paul says that we also reflect the Lord’s glory.

Older translations of this passage use the word ‘behold’ instead of reflect, thus, we are “beholding the glory of the Lord”. Commentators point out that to behold something can mean both to gaze intently upon it and to reflect it. God’s Word gives us the ability to gaze intently on Christ and enables us, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to be transformed (changed) into Christ’s likeness. Paul says this process takes place with ever-increasing glory, or from one degree of glory to another. Christ in us enables us to be transformed – to change from the inside out!

As I was studying for this passage the words of a song came to mind.

“Turn your eyes upon Jesus.

Look full in his wonderful face.

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim

In the light of His glory and grace."

We become what we behold. The more clearly we see (behold) Christ, the more we will become like Him and reflect Him to the world around us. And we, like Christ, reveal God’s glory with our lives. Keep your gaze intently focused on Christ.

Advent and Christmas give us so many opportunities to show God’s glory to those we interact with daily. His glory is expressed repeatedly in the hymns and carols of the season. There is a renewed spirit at this time of year for gift-giving and serving others in Christ’s love. Spend time beholding the glory of the Lord in His Word during this season and looking for ways to bless and serve others, reflecting His glory.

 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 8: Joy

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 8: Joy

“Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.” 1 Peter 1:8-9

Here is the promise of Advent: On the night of Jesus’ birth, an angel appeared to the shepherds and told them, “I bring you good news that will be great joy for all people. Today in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:10–11).This news of the arrival of Christ brought joy because the people knew the Savior would bring them salvation. During Advent, we celebrate Christ’s first coming with joy. Joy is our response to God’s gracious gift of salvation through His Son, Jesus Christ.

Joy is also a result of faith. Like the first readers of Peter’s letter, we are among those who have not seen Jesus. Yet, as Peter points out, we do not need to see him to love him. This is faith. Believing gives us eyes to see and ears to hear. Spiritual eyesight enables us to see God’s love for us through the gift of His Son. We love Him, we trust Him, and the result is inexpressible and glorious joy!

New Testament scholar Wayne Grudem says this joy Peter speaks of is “joy so profound as to be beyond the power of words." We have joy now because we have confidence that we are receiving the goal of our faith, the salvation of our souls. Peter stated earlier in this passage that we have an inheritance kept for us in heaven that can never perish, spoil, or fade (1 Peter 1:4). Our joy is rooted in the salvation we have received through Christ and in our hope of everlasting life with him. We have joy now because we are in His presence and have the hope of everlasting life—the joy of being in His presence forever.

 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 7: Grace

 

Advents Words 2023
Word 7: Grace

“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:14

This verse in John’s Gospel describes the advent of Christ that we look back on.  John tells us the Word, Jesus Christ, became flesh. God the Father sent God the Son into the world, and He became a man, and he dwelled among us. God with us. Not only did he live among us, but he made God and his glory visible to us in the flesh. When we see Jesus, we see God; we see glory.

Then John gives us good news, God the Son came from God the Father full of grace and truth. God’s grace through Christ means freedom for sinful mankind.

“But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.” Romans 3:21-26

It’s not that grace was not present before the appearing of Christ, but rather that God's grace was fully realized in Christ. The nature of God's grace was made manifest, it became visible, in Jesus Christ.

 

Grace, in its shortest definition, means the unmerited favor of God. It is an act of His loving kindness given to those who do not deserve it and who have not earned it. Paul reminds us of this in the book of Ephesians:

 

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast." Ephesians 2:8-9

 

In the incarnation, the Word becoming flesh, Jesus made God visible to us. In Jesus, God made grace available to us. Jesus, the Word, came from the Father, full of, and abounding in, grace and truth. This is the Good News! 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 6: Between

 

Advent Words 2023
Day 6: Between

“For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.” Titus 2:11-14

As we saw with the word “epiphany” on day 2, we live in this present age between the two comings of Christ. His first coming brought the promise of salvation to all people (Titus 2:11); his second coming will bring our hope of glory (Titus 2:14). For now, we live in between what God has done and what God will do.

In this in-between time, we are called to a specific way of life. Right now, those who are in Christ already have every spiritual blessing in Christ (Ephesians 1:3). It’s a done deal. In Christ we possess these spiritual blessings which enable us to live for Christ. We just need to discover and accept that we already possess them and allow them to enable us to live the fullness of life God intends for us. This is the role of indicatives, or statements of fact, in the New Testament. Indicatives point out what is already true of you in Christ. Some of those indicatives are spelled out in the rest of Ephesians 1:3-14: In Christ you are chosen, holy, blameless, adopted as a child of God, you have redemption, forgiveness, the Holy Spirit, and an inheritance.

One might say then, “since we already possess every spiritual blessing in Christ, all we have to do now is to be happy and wait for Christ to return”. Like I said before, it is true that we possess every spiritual blessing in Christ now, but Paul points out in Titus 2:11-14, that while we possess those blessings, the grace of God, it is intended that God’s people will live in this current age in a manner that expresses to the world around us that we are His very own people. In this present age God’s people “live self-controlled, upright and godly lives… eager to do what is good”.

How we live in between Christ’s two epiphanies matters. We live for Christ and as Christ’s representatives, His ambassadors.

“For the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died. And he died for all, that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once regarded Christ from a human point of view, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” 2 Corinthians 5:14-21 (RSV)

In this time between Christ’s two comings we are called to live by the grace God has given us, living upright and holy lives, eager to do good, while we wait with our eyes focused on the blessed hope – the appearing of the glory of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.

 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 5: Peace

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 5: Peace

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13

In the second week of Advent, the theme is peace. As we look ahead to Christmas and celebrate that the Prince of Peace has arrived, we rejoice that, through Jesus Christ, we now have peace with God. Paul makes this very clear earlier in the book of Romans.

“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.” Romans 5:1-2

We are justified (made right) with God through faith in Jesus Christ, and the result is peace with God—not a feeling of peace, although that is true as well, but peace as in we are no longer separated or alienated from God because of our sin. Jesus has paid the price for our sin. Through him, we are reconciled to God. Jesus made “peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:20).

In Paul’s prayer in Romans 15:13, his desire is that the God of hope – the source, the giver, and the object of our hope – would fill us with all joy and peace. Peace in the New Testament is equivalent to shalom in the Old Testament. Shalom is not only absence of violence or wickedness, but it is also the fullness of life, the wholeness of life, harmony, and goodness.

Did you notice the word “as” in this verse? God is the great giver, but in this case, he expects something of us as well. God fills us with all joy and peace as we trust in Him. Joy and peace are God’s byproduct for those who walk in faith, who live in dependence on God’s power and his promise to provide what we need. We are His children, and we are secure in His Love and His mercy. So, walking by faith and trusting in God means we are living life firmly believing in God’s ability to do all that he says he will do. And the result of living in this trust is that God will fill you with all joy and peace.

Here is just one example of how this is lived out. Philippians 4:6-7 says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Anxiety is the opposite of peace. As we continually turn our anxieties and fears over to God through prayer, Paul says that we will then have God’s peace guarding our heart and mind. Prayer is one of the ways we trust in God and one of the ways he fills us with his peace.

The end result of God filling us with all joy and peace is that, through the power of the Holy Spirit, our lives will overflow with hope. I get the picture here that when one is overflowing with hope, it is visible in their life, possibly even contagious to those around them. When one is overflowing with hope, their gaze is continually focused on Jesus and on His promises. This is the result of being filled with the peace that only God can give.

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 4: Prepare

 

Advent Words 2023
Day 4: Prepare

“In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah:

“A voice of one calling in the wilderness,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord,
    make straight paths for him.’”

Matthew 3:1-3

 

The Advent season is a time of preparation for the coming of Christ. We don’t often think of the Advent season as a time for repentance. We associate that more with the Lent season. But at the heart of preparing for the coming of Christ is coming face-to-face with our own hearts. And that preparation involves repentance, for repentance prepares us to receive grace.

 

In Matthew’s gospel, right before Jesus will begin his ministry, we are introduced to John the Baptist. Matthew tells us that John came preaching. John was the prophet that was promised in Malachi 3:1 and Isaiah 40:1-5, the prophet that would prepare the way for the Messiah. Isaiah tells us in 40:1-5 that the Messiah’s arrival will indicate that sin has been paid for and that the Lord’s glory will be revealed.

 

John the Baptist’s message of preparation was to call the people to repent. Repentance in the Bible means to change one’s mind or perspective and then to act on it. To turn from one way to another. Repentance involves action so that not just the mind is changed, but one’s lifestyle changes as a result.

 

Paul gave a picture of what this repentance looks like when he was on trial before King Agippa. He describes to them what Jesus spoke to him on the road to Damascus:

The Lord said, “I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’ …So then…  to the Gentiles, I preached that they should repent and turn to God and demonstrate their repentance by their deeds.” Acts 26:17-18, 20.

 

Our changed life is an outward expression of the repentance and salvation that is ours through faith in Jesus Christ. When we turn in the baptismal pool, it represents our repentance and our acceptance of faith in Christ, as we turn from our old way of life to new life.

 

John preached repentance because, “The kingdom of heaven is near”. The King is coming. The way to prepare for his arrival is to prepare our hearts. Sin separates us from God and all he has for us. Repentance opens our hearts to God and to His grace and enables us to accept and receive His gift of grace, His Son Jesus Christ. 

John’s command to repent in Matthew 3:2 in Greek is a present tense imperative. Greek present tense calls for a continual, habitual action. Repentance, therefore, is not a one-time action but it becomes a lifestyle. It becomes a way of life where one continually looks at one’s heart and lifestyle and goes before the Lord, turning to Him and repenting of our sins, looking to the Spirit of God to bring about in us the character of Christ. Advent’s time of preparation helps us connect with our need to repent and to prepare our hearts for the coming King.

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 3: Wait

 

Advent Words 2023
Day 3: Wait

“…while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.” Titus 2:13

“Advent is a season for waiting; we wait for the coming of God. We need him to come. Our world is messed up and we are messed up. We lament our condition and long for God to set things right, to make us better…we wait in hope…God is coming!” Bobby Gross, The Christian Year

The Advent season reminds us to look back and see God’s promises fulfilled in Christ while we wait for those promises to be fully fulfilled. There is still a reign that is yet to come, and a day of salvation that is still in the future, and a promise from Jesus that he will return one day on the clouds.

Paul implies in this letter to Titus that waiting it is a normal part of the Christian life. “In this present age” (Titus 2:12) we are called to wait, and we are called to a specific kind of waiting – we wait in hope. Because Hope is future oriented, it naturally involves waiting. Yet hope is also the very thing that sustains us while we wait. As we saw the other day, God has given us “new birth into a living hope” (1 Peter 1:3). Our hope is active, and our waiting, while focused on the future appearing of the glory of the Lord, is not passive waiting. While we wait, we live for Christ - imitating His sacrificial love and his way of life as His people.

The Greek word used for waiting has a sense of expectant or eager waiting. This word is a verb in Greek that is present tense. In Greek, present tense describes an action that is continuing or habitual and often describes a lifestyle. (As a Bible study nerdy side note, always pause and take note when you find out the verb in a Bible verse is present tense because you are being called to make something a lifestyle, to live out the command continually.)

So, we live with a continual expectation of Christ's return. We are continually waiting; we have a lifestyle of waiting. The only way it is possible to live a life of continually waiting in expectation of Christ's return, is that we live with an eternal perspective.

In Philippians Paul reminds us that "our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ". (Philippians 3:20) We wait because our ultimate hope is beyond this world. If we stay focused only on what this world holds, only on the things we can see, then we will give up in despair. We will lose heart and fail to live as we are called to.

 Again, Paul calls us to live with an eternal perspective in his second letter to the Corinthians:

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Expectant waiting means we do so with our eyes fixed on eternity. We keep our eyes on God without losing sight of the fact that we live here on earth, in this present age. Our waiting is not to be passive, but active. While we wait with our eyes and our hearts set on eternity, we live with our hands active in the lives of those around us. We live in dependence upon God and obedience to Him.  Paul's challenge to us in Titus 2:11-14 is to live in obedience now, while anticipating Christ's promised return.

“I wait for the LORD, my whole being waits, and in his Word I put my hope.” Psalm 130:5

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 2: Epiphany

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 2: Epiphany

“For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.” Titus 2:11-13

If you saw this word on the calendar for Advent Words and thought I may have mixed up my holidays, don’t worry, I know it’s the Advent season! The word “epiphany” has many uses. When we suddenly have a burst of understanding about something, we call it an epiphany.  And there is also the holiday that some churches celebrate on January 6 to commemorate the wise men, or Magi, visiting the Christ child. Epiphany also appears in today’s passage, but it’s not quite so obvious.

In the New Testament the Greek words epipaneia (noun) and epiphaino (verb) mean manifestation or appearing and refer to the first and second coming of Christ. In Titus 2:11, he has appeared (epiphaino) refers to Jesus’ birth and life. Jesus Christ appeared as the grace of God bringing to all the salvation God promised. The angel proclaimed to the shepherds at the birth of Jesus,

“I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you: he is Christ the Lord.” Luke 2:10-11

John declares, “From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” John 1:16-17

The grace of God has appeared in the person of Jesus Christ. This is the first epiphany!

But Paul goes on in his letter to Titus that we are still waiting for another epiphany; “the blessed hope – the appearing (epiphaneia) of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13). Jesus will appear again when he comes to judge the living and the dead (2 Timothy 4:1) and establishes God’s kingdom in its fullest expression.

Charles Spurgeon once said, “We stand between two epiphanies. Behind us is our trust; before us is our hope. Behind us is the Son of God in humiliation; before us is the great God our Savior in his glory. “

We live in this present age between two epiphanies: trusting in the grace of God's salvation through the life and death of Jesus Christ on our behalf and focusing on the hope of glory that will come to those who believe in and wait for His promised return. Grace to glory!

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Words 2023 ~ Word 1: Hope

 

Advent Words 2023
Word 1: Hope

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.”  1 Peter 1:3-5

The first theme of the Advent season is hope. In our culture, hope has become a word that is often associated with wishful thinking. “I hope it’s sunny today or I hope I get the job I interviewed for, or I hope our family has a happy Christmas.”

This, however, is not how hope is defined in the Bible, and it is not the type of hope we are called to live out as Christ’s followers.  Biblical hope is a confident expectation or solid assurance of what God has promised. A firm trust that God always keeps his promises. Mounce’s Expository Dictionary says hope is “a firm conviction that because of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, we can have confidence as we face the future”.  

Our passage today in 1 Peter gives us the basis, the present reality, and the future focus of our hope.

Peter says that God has given us new birth through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Jesus described this new birth to Nicodemus in John 3:3-8 as being “born again”, saying that “no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again” and that “no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit”. Through faith in Jesus Christ and his resurrection from the dead, we are born anew – born spiritually - and we become children of God. (See John 1:12-13)

Our new life is a gift from God. Peter says that God gave us this new birth “in His great mercy”.  Paul further describes this act of mercy in his letter to Titus.

“But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.” Titus 3:4-7

Our hope is based on what God did for us through the resurrection of his Son – the gift of new birth, and, as Paul adds, renewal by the Holy Spirit. Peter goes on to show us what that hope looks like in this present age, it is a “living hope”. We experience hope now, because our new birth through faith in Christ has brought us into a new life, which is characterized by a living hope. Living hope is hope that is real and active. It is hope in action. F.B. Meyer says, “Living hope is our link between our present and future.” 

What is the future we are to set our hope on? Peter points out that we have been promised an inheritance. An inheritance that Peter says that can never perish,spoil or fade and it is kept in heaven for you until Christ appears again. Paul, in the Titus 3 passage, points out that our inheritance as heirs is the hope of eternal life. So, we can live by hope in this age because we have been promised something much more glorious in the age to come. What Paul calls in Titus 2:13, “The blessed hope – the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ”.

Pastor and teacher Bob Utley calls us to “make a decisive choice to trust completely in Christ’s return." Our faith in God’s promise of eternal life with Him enables us to live by hope now. We must choose to fix our eyes on Jesus and His promises and live by hope. 

Share how you respond to today's word in the Words Facebook Group or on Instagram using #adventwords2023.

Advent Is Coming!

 

The Advent season is here! Advent 2023 begins tomorrow, Sunday, December 3, and we begin our seventh Advent Words challenge. Each year I wonder if I can come up with any new words, or if I can create new Bible study devotions. But God always leads and He always provides. Yet some words remain the same - they just fit with the rhythm and the story of Advent.

If you would like to participate in Advent Words this year, I encourage you to follow this blog to receive the Bible study devotions every other day. There is a subscription form located at the bottom of the column on the right. Then on the days when there is not a devotion, I encourage you to dig deeper into the Scriture passages and to respond creatively in whatever manner you choose. You can share your insights and art in the private Words Challenge Facebook group and join in conversation with others. Or you can share your creative response on Instagram using the #adventwords2023.

Finally, here is a calendar with the words and main Scriture passage. If you click on the photo it will provide you with a PDF to download and print.