Thursday, December 22, 2022

Prepare The Way For The Lord, Week 4 Video Edition

Trusting God at All Times – Prepare the Way for the Lord 4 To be posted Thursday, December 22, 2022 Have four advent candles lit. Grace and peace to you, and welcome to Trusting God at all times, a daily devotion. I’m Rev. Joe Cailles, the pastor of Peakland United Methodist Church here in Lynchburg Virginia. During this season of Advent, Peakland people have been discussing this book written by Rev. Adam Hamilton: Prepare the Way for the Lord, an advent study focusing on John the Baptist. . In chapter 1, we read about Zechariah and Elizabeth, John’s parents, and their prayer for a child. Sometimes God answers our prayers with a miracle: with healing, with new life, with a much-wanted child. Sometimes God doesn’t answer our prayers, and that can also be a blessing particularly when our prayers run toward self-centered and destructive desires. Most times, God uses us to answer each other’s prayers. God uses us to provide comfort and healing and hope to those around us. In chapter 2, we read that Zechariah had to be silent for the entire time Elizabeth was pregnant. We sat in silence for a minute and looked for silent spaces this advent so that we could better listen to God. I hope you’ll find silent spaces beyond advent and Christmas so that you can better listen to God. Last week, in chapter 3, we considered baptism where God washes us clean from sin and leads us to live worthy lives filled with generosity and kindness and compassion for others. This season and beyond embrace generosity and kindness and compassion in your words and deeds. Today as we conclude our study, we consider the relationship, the friendship between Jesus and John the Baptist. Scripture doesn’t tell us much about their lives growing up, but in the book Adam Hamilton imagines that if they grew up together, they would have had wonderful conversations about scripture and theology and ethics. John and Jesus both offered baptisms. They both spoke truth to power, confronting hypocrisy and deceit. But John recognizes that Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Jesus and Jesus alone offers salvation from sin and offers us new life today fill with joy, hope, peace and love. This Christmas I hope you find the peace of Christ in your heart. I hope your life becomes more and more filled with joy and peace and love. I hope Peakland will be more and more part of your life in the new year and in the years to come. These Trusting God daily devotions will take a Christmas break and will return in the new year on Mondays and Wednesdays. Linwood will keep offering our wonderful music Mondays beginning January 9, and I’ll offer a devotion each Wednesday in the new year beginning Wednesday January 11. If you can’t join us here at Peakland in person for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, I hope you’ll join us online. We are livestreaming our 7:00 p.m. Christmas Eve worship this Saturday. You can worship with us online through Facebook and YouTube. For Christmas Day, we’re going to post the Christmas Worship Concert we enjoyed at Peakland last Sunday. Let’s close this with a prayer. I’ll read the regular print, you read the bold. As we celebrate your Word made flesh in Jesus Christ, O God, we pray that your Word becomes real in our lives. MAKE US MORE AND MORE INTO PEOPLE WHO WITNESS TO YOUR LIGHT BY ALL WE SAY AND DO. GIVE US GRACE AND BOLDNESS TO LOVE ONE ANOTHER. LIKE JOHN, LET OUR LIVES PROCLAIM “BEHOLD THE LAMB OF GOD.” Thanks be to God. Amen.