First of all - Merry Christmas everybody!! Hope you have a wonderful day celebrating the birth of Jesus with your family and friends.
Wow, there's a lot going on in today's readings! Maybe I'll start with Nehemiah and then go back to the Christmas stories.
One thing that is so evident in Nehemiah is how much he relied on prayer.
When he received the bad news about the state of Jerusalem's walls, his reaction was to pray. In his prayer he praised God, he thanked God, he confessed sin and asked for specific help. In doing so, he included God in his plans and concerns, prepared his own heart and gave room for God to work, and committed to doing his part.
Even during his conversation with the king he prayed (2:4), putting the results in God's hands.
As we get further into Nehemiah we will find that this is a consistent pattern.
Oh, how I need to work on this! I want my immediate reaction to bad news to be prayer. I want my first instinct when going into a stressful situation to be prayer. I want to pray without ceasing, to be in constant search of aligning my will with His. That He may be glorified.
On to our Christmas passages....
I love the genealogy portion of the Matthew passage. It lists 46 people, all ancestors of Jesus, but with huge differences between them. Some were heroes of faith (Abraham, Isaac, Ruth, David), some had shady reputations (Rahab, Tamar), some were ordinary (Ram, Akim), some were downright evil (Manessah, Abijah). God's plans and purposes are not limited by human failure or sins, and He can work through everyone from the ordinary to the extraordinary to accomplish His will. We will allow ourselves to benefit from willingly participating in His plan, or will His plan unfold despite us?
In Luke 2 what jumped out at me was Anna's situation. She was only married for 7 yrs before she was widowed, and she remained a widow until she was 84 (at which point, I assume she died). Assuming she married young - maybe around 13 or 14 years old, that would mean she was likely widowed at age 20 or 21 yrs of age. What a long long time! But she devoted her life to God, and was rewarded in an extraordinary way when she was chosen to be one of the first to bear witness to the Messiah. God always rewards our faithfulness, sometimes quickly, sometimes not for 60+ years, sometimes not until eternity - but it will be rewarded!
Blessings to you and your family as you celebrate the birth of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ! Merry Christmas!
Tomorrow's passage: Nehemiah 4-6, Revelation 17
1 comment:
I noticed the widow Anna when I read as well! I don't remember ever really noticing that before, but what an example of devotion. And about what you said about prayer... definitely something I plan to work on this coming year!
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