I am a Christian, a retired teacher, a mother and a grandmother. I love to read and I love the Lord Jesus Christ! Unless otherwise specified ,all visual illustrations are from the YOU VERSION APP of the Bible.
If you are Biblically literate, then I am sure you know the story of Joseph and how he ended up as a slave in Egypt after his jealous brothers sold him. The finality of the story is Joseph forgiving them and saying this to them:
I did not make a mistake. I put Joseph’s words with a cross background because Jesus could have said the same thing and it would have been true. The people who crucified Him (all of us, because we would have most likely been in that mob and because we are ALL sinners), meant Him harm. Harm being a euphemism for death. They wanted to kill him and get Him off the earth and out of the way of their plans to keep on sinning.
But God and Jesus had other plans. When He was resurrected, He showed everyone that they had actually helped God carry out His plan of redemption through their evil obsession with killing Him.
How many times have others offended me or harmed me? How many times has God turned it around for me for good? Too many times to count, but I am sorry to say that, unlike Jesus and Joseph, I did not recognize what they did as something that God could use for my good. Today’s devotional opened my eyes to a new perspective about people who are against me. What do you think? Is this true for you, too? No matter what, God’s plans will not be thwarted. He works for our good and continues to work out His purpose for our lives.
From the YouVersion Bible App Devotional, “Advent, Day 23”
What Does Love Look Like?
At the beginning of the week, we asked these questions:
What do you think of when you read the word “love”?
How would you describe love to someone else?
How would they know you were being loving through your words and actions?
How would you answer these questions after spending time reading about Jesus’ examples of love, and looking at Old Testament stories?
Often, we think of love as a happy, warm feeling that makes us feel good. We might consider a time when someone showed us kindness or made us feel seen. But love is so much more than a feeling.
Love is following Jesus’ example of loving everyone as valuable and worthy of sacrificial care, and we have many examples of people practicing God-honoring love throughout the Bible.
Today, let’s take another look at Jesus’ parents, Mary and Joseph. Mary was chosen by God to have His Son. But Mary and Joseph weren’t married, so everyone had their thoughts about what had really happened. Mary and Joseph had a decision to make about how they chose to respond to God, and they made the choice to love Him.
Mary served and loved God by joyfully responding to God’s call with faithful trust. She could have been bitter, angry, or frustrated. Instead, she embraced God’s purpose for her life because she knew the character and nature of God. She wasn’t trying to earn His love by having Jesus, but knew she was already fully loved by her heavenly Father.
Joseph chose to stay with Mary and raise the Son of God together. This decision took courage and trust. He could have turned his back on her. Instead, he cared for her throughout her pregnancy, maybe even bringing her soup and crackers to help with morning sickness. His love translated to outward actions and loving care.
Together, they would end up making a 90-mile journey when Mary was nine months pregnant, ultimately ending with baby Jesus being born in a barn.
Through Mary and Joseph’s story, we learn that we don’t love others by accident, but instead make the choice to care for them the same way God does. It’s looking beyond the mistakes or shortcomings to see the unique character God has placed in everyone. When we do, we gain an even greater understanding of the love He has for us.
Pause and Pray:
Gracious Father, thank You for sending Your Son through Mary and Joseph. Thank You for the unique ways they chose to trust and love You. I believe everyone is valuable and worthy of sacrificial care. Please help me to love You and the people around me with the same steady faithfulness. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Joseph was an obedient servant of the Lord who looked beyond the circumstances and chose to believe and obey God. How often do I only look skin deep and choose to go my own way? Too many times to count! I pray to be more like Joseph, open to hearing God’s directions and following them no matter how it inconveniences or embarrasses me.
I know for certain that I am not nor will I ever be like Mary, the Lord’s mother, who was a teen when an angel appeared to her and gave her the news that she would give birth to the Messiah. God looks on the heart and knew that Mary would be a willing servant. I hope that I am getting more like Mary, but some days I look at myself honestly and know for a fact that I would have scoffed at the news from the angel and wanted some kind of proof about what was going to be happening to me. I am not there yet, but I am still on the road of faith and that’s a big deal for me. I like to think that God is pleased with the progress that I am making, but sometimes I know He is disappointed when I take a step back instead of forward. May we all learn to look at God through the eyes of faith of a young, unmarried virgin whose reply to the angel is to be emulated.
In the middle of the valley of waiting, we all get tired and wonder if the promise we wait for is ever coming. The story of Joseph offers us hope. Think of all that Joseph went through and all of the years he waited, for it all to culminate in God’s saving an entire nation through him. We never know what God is doing on the other side of the tapestry of our lives, but we can be sure of one thing…if it is from God, it will be the right thing, at the right time and for the right reasons.
The devotional today is one that encouraged me and made me think, too. Where is God in my current circumstances? But, God… Fill in the blank with a praise for what you are going through and what God has done in the middle of your challenge. For example, we had planned to go to PA just as we do every summer. But my health has made it so that living in a place that is not air conditioned is not feasible right now. I really dreaded telling my daughter that we couldn’t come. She said that she would talk to her husband and they would come up with something. When she called back with her plans to do a staycation at our house, I was overwhelmed with praise for God that He was working things out for me to see my PA family! But God worked things out in an unexpected way. I thought the answer would be that we could meet them at a beach or somewhere (which we don’t have the funds for). Or maybe that the visit could wait until the weather was cooler and I was feeling better, but that would mean not seeing the kids in college. But God had a different plan and has worked things out so that we see our daughter’s entire family and get to spend time playing games and doing all of the things I love best about visiting PA, only without the long trip and the lack of AC. I confess that I didn’t see things from God’s perspective, but I did trust Him to work things out so that all are content with the plan. And bonus! Aaron is going to work on repairing our steps. I love my husband dearly, but he cannot fix anything…not cars, household maintenance, nothing. Things were easier when we were both working and could pay for repairs, but since we are both retired, our steps are sadly lacking in safety. Another but God…He knows what we need and supplies it in unexpected ways.
Oh, my! The story of Joseph has a happy ending but not before he goes through some really rough times. I can identify with Joseph because of events in my family when I first got married. I won’t bore you with the whole story but suffice it to say that my dad was in trouble and dragged my mom and younger siblings along with him to escape justice (at least for a while). I felt alone and adrift, pregnant with my first baby and not knowing where my family was for over two years. I was a new Christian, too, and I think the Lord is who saved my sanity during these hard times. My siblings were 19, 11 and 5 and I didn’t even know that they were okay. My mom wrote me a letter after two years were over and we visited them in FL, introduced them to their new granddaughter and tried to pretend that all was okay. But my trust for my father was gone…poof! I kept waiting for a second shoe to drop and more revelations about his past. It took many years but I finally came to forgive him and helped most of my siblings to forgive him, too. My dad fell off his pedestal and the harsh reality of drug addiction and all of the evil that comes along with it changed my life for many years after that.
I think that we all have skeletons in our closet that we don’t really like to talk about or remember. But reading the story of Joseph and how God used his hard times to make him stronger and use him for a greater purpose reminded me of all I had gone through and how God carried me most of the way.
www.bible.com/reading-plans/26293/day/18
www.bible.com/reading-plans/26293/day/17
www.bible.com/reading-plans/26293/day/3
Vickie's Book Nook and Meditation Corner 