Monday Prayer
Adapted from Names for the Messiah by Walter Bruggemann...you may also choose to watch Pastor Wes's sermon from Sunday, which discusses the topics in this section.
Sunday's contemporary reading stated: The phrase “Mighty God” from Isaiah does not first of all invite a question about Jesus’s status as “God” or “Man.” Instead, it asks about his power in a world that is organized around many claimants for power, most especially the power of Rome. It is clear that he will not compete with the power of Rome on the terms of Rome. His assertion in the Fourth Gospel at his trial before the Roman governor is, “My kingdom is not from this world.”
1. In what do you think people have misunderstood Jesus's statement, "My kingdom is not from this world?" What do you think he really meant, and what does that say about the way Jesus understood power and authority?
2. Continuing on this week's sermon theme of God's power and might, consider that Jesus gave the disciples the authority to "cure the sick." Have you ever felt or practiced this authority? In whatever ways you understand this kind of authority and power, what do you think this could look like in your life today, this week, and in the coming year?
3. How do you see the church displaying the power of God, as modeled by Jesus, in our world today?
Wednesday Devotional Meditation
Taken from The Journey by Adam Hamilton, which is our 2019 Advent Book Study.
It is not by accident that Matthew tells us that while Gabriel spoke directly to Mary, Joseph's message came in a dream. We can see a connection between this Joseph and the patriarch Joseph, whose story fills nearly thirteen chapters of Genesis. God spoke to that Joseph in dreams (hence the title of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's musical, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat), and in a similar way God spoke to Joseph the carpenter in dreams. Matthew looks for these kinds of parallels between the Old Testament and the story of Jesus.
Has God ever spoken to you in a dream? I hardly remember the dreams I have when I sleep. But I frequently have what could be called day dreams. Some might call these visions. In them I sometimes see what could be; what I believe God wants to be. These are ideas that come to me while I'm reading Scripture, or hearing someone else preach, or meeting with my small group, or conversing with others. Often these are dreams that come when seeing places of great need. I carry a little black book with me to write down these dreams when they occur, because I quickly forget them.
Dreams can also emerge as you hear other people's dreams. Several years ago Karla, one of our staff members at the church, felt compelled to start a worship service for senior adults who had Alzheimer's, dementia, or other forms of memory loss. She announced it to area nursing homes, and they began sending buses of people to the worship service in our chapel.
Karla and her team filled the service with well-known hymns, familiar creeds, the Lord's Prayer, and simple messages that might help people remember who they are. Recently the teachers in our daytime kids program began bringing the little children to sing for the worship service. The three- and four-year-olds sang, "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Little ones to him belong; they are week, but he is strong." As the children sang the chorus, "Yes, Jesus loves me," voices of people who could not remember their own names joined the children: "Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so."
The dream of one woman became the dream of a host of volunteers, and together they did what they felt God was leading them to do. The result was something extraordinary.
God spoke to Joseph in dreams. Joseph's dreams called him to devote the rest of his life to nurturing, mentoring, and protecting Jesus. My dreams from God seldom come at night. They are a sense of calling that wells up inside.
Are you listening for God to speak to you? And if God speaks, are you willing to obey? Listening for God's dreams, and following them, made all the difference in Joseph's life, and it makes all the difference in our lives as well.
Thursday Questions for Reflection
Adapted from The Journey by Adam Hamilton
1. How do you think Joseph first learned of Mary's pregnancy? Did Mary tell him? Did it come in the form of a rumor? Might Elizabeth, Zechariah, or some other member of Mary's family have told him? How do you think Joseph felt as he first received that news?
2. Joseph experience an angel in a dream. How do you think he knew it was an angel? How would you feel if you dreamed of an angel telling you to do something contrary to popular custom and perhaps contrary to what you were feeling?
3. Which of the angel's pronouncements might have surprised Joseph more: that the child was conceived by the Holy Spirit, or that the child would save his people from sin?
4. What do you think the primary lesson is when you look at Joseph's part of this story of the birth of Jesus?
Friday Prayer
From Psalm 51
Create in me a clean heart, oh God,
and put a new and right spirit within me.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
and do not take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and sustain in me a willing spirit...
Oh God, Open my lips
and my mouth will declare your praise.
Amen.