Advent Devotional 2024

Isaiah 7:14 14Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. KJV

The Lord spoke to Isaiah the prophet centuries before He sent His Son to earth for the redemption of all. He told the king that the name of the son would be Immanuel. Take a moment to look up what Immanuel means.

It means “God with us.” God living among us. God walking among us. Could you imagine God walking among us today? What kind of peace would you have, walking right next to Jesus, the Son of God? Knowing that at just His word, the winds and seas calm?

And did you know that you can walk hand in hand with Him every day? He waits for us to invite Him in, and once we do, we can walk with Him every day, casting our cares upon Him and living with the peace that passes all understanding. (Philippians 4:7)

Revelation 3:20 “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup [eat] with him, and he with me.”

How can you open the door of your heart for Immanuel to come in today?

Mark 1:1-3; Isaiah 40:3
1The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, 2as it is written in Isaiah the prophet:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way” –
3a voice of one calling in the wilderness,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord,
Make straight paths for him.’” 

Isaiah 40:3
3A voice of one calling in the wilderness
prepare the way for the Lord;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.

Who are these verses talking about? What do you think it means to “prepare the way for the Lord”? To make straight paths for Him? How did John the Baptist prepare the way? After 500 years of waiting for prophecy to be fulfilled, do you think people were actively looking for the Messiah? How would you make a way for someone special that had promised to come, but everyone had forgotten about? What would you say? Who would you tell and how would you tell them?

Read Malachi 3:1. If you knew the Lord was coming TO YOU, how would you prepare? What paths would you “make straight”?

Lord, open our eyes and our hearts to prepare for You to come in. Make us willing vessels to accomplish Your purpose in our lives. Show us where our paths may have become crooked and help us to straighten them in alignment with Your will. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

Luke 1:11-17
11 Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense.
12 When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear.
13 But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John.
14 He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth,
15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born.
16 He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God.
17 And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”

Gabriel told Zechariah that John would “make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” What did that mean back then? What would it mean in 2024? In the US, we have been blessed with the freedom to think, worship, and speak freely without persecution. As a result, each of us has causes and ideas we are willing to defend, and they have ended up dividing us. Do you know God’s stance on what you fight for? Hold that thought! Before you answer quickly- have you asked Him? Have you looked in His Word for what breaks His heart? Whether the time and energy you spend on that cause is how His Son spent His time on earth?

Read Jesus’ prayer in John 17:20-23. He prayed for you before you ever came into this world. And that His Church would be one so that the world would know that God sent Him. When we operate in division, the world misses the truth that God sent Him from heaven. Oof.

Lord, forgive us for any time we’ve not carried Your love in our hearts, not shown Your love when we had opportunity, and for every time we may have misrepresented Your love and Your Son. Open our eyes to see who we may need to forgive, or of whom we may need to ask forgiveness. Prepare our hearts for You alone, and bring us into complete unity as Jesus prayed over each of us, Your children, for Your glory. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

Luke 1:18-24
18 Zechariah asked the angel, “How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.”
19 The angel said to him, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news.
20 And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time.”
21 Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple.
22 When he came out, he could not speak to them. They realized he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them but remained unable to speak.
23 When his time of service was completed, he returned home.
24 After this his wife Elizabeth became pregnant and for five months remained in seclusion. “The Lord has done this for me,” she said. “In these days he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people.”

How did Zechariah respond to Gabriel? What happened when he responded that way? Have you ever heard God speak something to you that didn’t make sense? Spoiler alert: It usually doesn’t make sense. Because if we can come up with the idea and how to accomplish it, it’s usually not God-sized nor God-imagined. If you have an idea or dream in your heart that is so big, you can’t understand how it could possibly be accomplished, or it scares you to even think about taking the first step, there is a good chance it’s from God. Except! Do a good deep dive into your heart and make sure it is for His glory, and not for your own personal gain. If the driving force in your dream involves earning millions of dollars and having your name be a household one, likely not from Him. But if He you hear a still, small voice in your heart calling you to do something uncomfortable for Him, how are you going to respond?

Dear God, thank You for Your Word speaking to us. Thank You for trusting us with Your will and plans. Open our hearts to be willing to follow after You to accomplish Your purpose in our lives. Open our ears to hear You clearly, drown out every other noise, and give us the strength and boldness to trust You with every detail as we step out in faith, even when it doesn’t make sense. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

Luke 1:26-30
26 In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee,
27 to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary.
28 The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
29 Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.
30 But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God."

Mary was greatly troubled when the angel came to her. I’ve never experienced it, but I can imagine an angel showing up in your room can seem scary. But as Gabriel said, she found favor with God. What does it mean to find favor with God? Would you expect a child who repetitively disobeys their parent to find favor with them, for example in the form of gifts, rewards, or blessings?

How can we find favor with God? Before you answer, are there any things that you can think of in your life that may be preventing God from bestowing His favor? Yes, His Word says it rains on the just and the unjust (Matthew 5:45), and following Him is not always rainbows and butterflies, it takes work, commitment, and daily sacrifice of ourselves. But the favor of God is visible in the lives of His children who are obedient – sometimes in tangible blessings, and sometimes just in peace, strength, joy in the midst of trouble, or in building a family or friendships. If you are not seeing these blessings, what may be preventing them? A mindset? Something or someone you may need to let go of? What kind of things can we do or change to find favor with God?

Father, thank You for Your favor. Help us to be obedient to You to find Your favor.  We love you for the good Father that You are, not for what You can give us. But we simply thank You for loving us enough to show Your favor. Amen.