Wednesday, December 9

Isaiah 12:2-6
This week’s readings are so full of joy. There’s singing and exulting and praising and shouting and good old-fashioned rejoicing. God’s people are bursting with celebration! And their celebrating comes because of this remarkable fact: God has become their salvation.

What does this salvation look like? This salvation is like water: life-giving, life-sustaining water. This water comes from wells dug deep down to the water table. There’s no risk of them ever drying up.

I’ve never used a well, so I don’t know firsthand the joy of hauling up bucket after bucket of water, feeling more restored as each pail surfaces. But I do know what it’s like to be so parched I can’t concentrate, and then to round the corner and see—a silver beacon before me—a drinking fountain. And I have been a child and whiled away a whole afternoon prancing through a sprinkler whose water sprayed sky-high.

The water in this passage is no ordinary water. This is living water, and this abundant living water makes me burst into laughter. The Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation!

God’s living water is free for the taking. There’s no need to be stingy; I don’t have to store it up for tomorrow as if salvation could be in short supply. There’s no one standing behind me, saying, “Save some for the fishies!” Nope. Salvation is abundant. I can keep returning.

Prayer: Jesus Christ, you are the living water. I am grateful for your salvation, so plentiful it overflows. Thank you for never turning me away, for not limiting the amount of you I can take. I bask in your presence today.

Tuesday, December 8

Zephaniah 3:17-20
When I was in college, I refinished my first piece of furniture. I bought a table at a garage sale—a water-stained, scratched, scuffed table. I brought it home, set it up in the garage, and got to work.

I applied a stripping chemical over the whole thing, then scraped off ribbons of varnish. Some bits of varnish were stubborn and demanded that I really lend the weight of my body to remove them. Once the whole thing had been stripped, I wiped the table down, let it dry, and sanded it smooth. Then I stained it golden and coated every surface with polyurethane to protect it. Here I had to brush carefully so the final coat of gloss would follow the grain of the wood. A few days later, after leaving it to dry, I polished it with linseed oil and powdered pumice. By the end, the table practically glowed.

That’s what I picture when I think of renewal: a complicated process that takes a whole lot of elbow grease and more than a little patience. That kind of renewal is a labor of love.

So it is for God. “He will renew you in his love,” says the prophet Zephaniah. God seeks us out—water-stained, scratched, and scuffed as we are—and imagines what glowing beings we could be. He loves us.

He loves us enough to take the time to peel off our layers of chipping paint, buff out our nicks, seal in our beauty, and polish us till we shine. And yet his arms don’t grow tired, and he doesn’t get antsy waiting for our final glory. The “labor” is hardly laborious for God. To him, it’s simply love.

All that it takes to renew us is God’s love. Yesterday, it was the mere presence of God that had the power to bring us ease and joy. Today, it’s his love that has the power to renew us.

His love is potent. It will make us new.

Prayer: God of love, I am like an old and worn-out piece of furniture, a piece beyond repair or rescue. If it were left up to me, I wouldn’t have the strength to restore me. But for you, all it takes is your love. Work at me with your love. Make me new.

Monday, December 7

Zephaniah 3:14-16
Even as an adult, I find my parents’ presence incredibly reassuring.

Recently, worn down by a season of great life change, I traveled to visit them. Nothing else could console me. When I turned onto their street, there was my dad at the mailbox, looking sharp in his suit and tie. The mere sight of him dispelled my anxiety.

Over the course of that weekend, surrounded by the familiar artifacts of home and kept company by these two wise, capable people, I was set at ease. My muscles could rest, my mind could take in things other than my to-do list, and my heart could dream again. I felt deep joy for the first time in months.

And that was just from being with my parents! They are still flawed, fallible beings. Imagine the kind of ease that comes in the presence of God: “The king of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall fear disaster no more” (Zephaniah 3:15).

This is the Advent promise: that God is with us. The wisest, most capable one is with us. In his presence, there is no reason to fear disaster. Not because the disaster simply feels distant, but because he has actually triumphed over it. In God’s presence, disaster loses its power. We can be at ease. We can rejoice and exult with all our heart.

Prayer: King of Israel, it takes nothing more than your presence to dispel my fears, to give my heart room to rejoice. Today, let me sense your presence. Let me shout for joy.

St Croix Reformed Church members volunteer at the the St Croix Animal and Welfare Center the first Saturday of each month.  Come join the fun!

Friday, December 4

Philippians 1:9-11

My prayers this time of year are usually pleas for sanity in the midst of a chaotic season, for grace toward family members (and their grace toward me!), and for enough soul-peace to greet my Savior well. If I’m feeling especially others-centered, you might hear a prayer for folks in frigid climates who don’t have homes or who can’t afford heat.

But I’ve never prayed for someone’s love to overflow with knowledge and insight. Nor have I asked God to help that person determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ she may be pure and blameless.

But what better thing to pray as we approach Christmas? It’s a season chock-full of opportunities to determine what is “best.” We must decide where to spend money, how to fill our time, and with whom to share that time. This means there are also plenty of opportunities for missteps that put our purity and blamelessness at risk.

We have to discern how a tradition of gift-giving can be practiced in a way that brings glory to God. We must take notice of the stranger and the outcast in a season that’s overwhelmingly family-oriented. We can’t let the Christmas lights blind us to God’s demand that we be righteous in all ways—personally and corporately.

Ultimately, these verses are Paul’s prayer that God’s people would live a gospel life until the day of Christ, including during the Advent season. It’s a prayer that they’d increase in love, in knowledge, and in wisdom, so that they can stand before Christ in righteousness and confidence.

As we anticipate Christ’s return, may our love overflow.

Prayer: Lord, may our love overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help us to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ we may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.

Thursday, December 3

 Philippians 1:3-8

  The Old Testament prophets aren’t the only ones ready for the coming of the Messiah. The apostle Paul is, too.   Paul knows that the Messiah, Jesus Christ, has already come once, and has inaugurated a good work in the lives of God’s people. Now Paul is waiting for that good work to come to completion—something that can only happen on “the day of Jesus Christ,” when Christ comes again.   What is this good work? The good work of the gospel: that in Jesus Christ, God is redeeming his people. God has claimed them, lifted them from the pit of sin and despair, and is shaping them into his likeness. But that likeness won’t be complete until the day of Jesus Christ.   And so Paul prays for the Philippians. He prays for them in joy. He prays for them in confidence.   What if we took a cue from Paul? What if we let the Advent season, with its anticipation of Christ’s coming, prompt us to pray for our sisters and brothers? What if we prayed that God, who has begun a good work in them, would bring it to completion?   Prayer: Faithful God, I remember your people and name them now. I pray that they, with unveiled faces, would see the glory of Christ as though reflected in a mirror, that they would be transformed into his image from one degree of glory to another (2 Corinthians 3:18). Draw them near to you as the day of Christ draws near to us.

Wednesday, December 2

Luke 1:76-79 

What then will this child become?

It’s a good question. These are unusual circumstances: Zechariah and Elizabeth have conceived in their old age after decades of infertility. Zechariah loses his powers of speech throughout the pregnancy and even eight days beyond. And when it comes time to name the child, Zechariah forgoes the family name and instead insists that the child be called John.

So the neighbors can’t be blamed for asking, “What then will this child become?” He will almost certainly be an extraordinary child.

Zechariah answers their question by identifying his son John as “the prophet of the Most High,” the one going ahead to prepare the way of the Lord.

As all the prophets have done, John will call people to God. He will “give knowledge of salvation” to God’s people.

But John’s role as prophet is special because he immediately precedes Jesus. The “dawn from on high” is not centuries away, as it was with the earlier prophets. By the tender mercy of God, that dawn is breaking now. Finally, the light is coming.

Prayer: Light of the world, we await your arrival.