Series of posts for the Advent season

1 Peter 1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, Q: How does Jesus’ resurrection from death shape your hope for both the future and life today? Coming off the heals of a somewhat tense conversation with a good friend yesterday, this verse and question have brought me to a point of thankfulness to Jesus for this… My friend and I are in the middle of a discussion on the interpretive framework that’s appropriate for Genesis 2-11. Yesterday that convo did get a little tense, but it honestly only got there out of the history of our friendship together. And we could only share the disagreement due to the strong foundation of our friendship. AND EVEN BEYOND THAT we only have this friendship because of Jesus… The punchline for me on this reflection question is that Jesus beat death and invites me into new life - an amazing thing about that…

Isaiah 40:31 But those who wait for Yahweh shall renew their strength. They shall go up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not grow weary; they shall walk and not be faint. There is a pretty significant thing going on in my life right now that’s causing me to grow a bit weary and faint. Essentially there are things and people totally outside my control who have some non-trivial power over my life in regards to work and it’s weighing on me. It’s been several months, and I know God provides, and in fact already has… So as far as any needs go, God has fully taken care of me. Nonetheless, the injustices and power dynamics at play in certain environments, like Corporate America, are still a reality that I hardly have a word strong-enough to describe my distaste for… But I’m still breathing, still coding, walking, writing, dad’ing, husband’ing, etc… Faint and weary from the weight of these external factors, that ultimately God is sovereign over, daily life still continues… I saw our…

Psalm 130:7 O Israel, wait for Yahweh. For with Yahweh there is loyal love, and with him there is abundant redemption. He-sed # Yahweh’s is (he-sed)… It comes from Exodus 34 Exodus 34:6-7 6 And Yahweh passed over before him, and he proclaimed, “Yahweh, Yahweh, God, who is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding with loyal love and faithfulness, 7 keeping loyal love to the thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and he does not leave utterly unpunished, punishing the guilt of fathers on sons and on sons of sons on third and fourth generations.” love is undying, unending, enduring, and everlasting. Yahweh’s love for his people isn’t a function of their love or loyalty to him - he is loyal to himself and in that loyalty he is faithful to me God’s abundant redemption, as an artifact of his hesed love for me, is my daily bread. Every morning, with various amount of devotion, do I sit down and reflect on Jesus’s goodness to me… Of course I pray the blessings…

Psalm 39:7 And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is for you. Every Advent I wish I took it more seriously - each year trying to be slightly more diligent about traditions and raising our daughters to understand more than the material-driven “holiday season”. This year has had some ups and downs, ultimately God has been faithful to me in amazing ways. And if he hadn’t blessed me in the ways he has, he’d still be faithful. My hope is for Yahweh to save

Isaiah 8:17 And I will wait for Yahweh, who hides his face from the house of Jacob, and I will await him. -> this isn’t “waiting” like being patient… The first “wait” is, but the second “wait” isn’t the same word. Seems like a few English translations are pick something along the lines of patience rather than expectation here… I’m not an expert, but I do think is a better translation - part of that influence is that it’s the first day’s reflection from this BP Advent Calendar and this first week of Advent is about “Hope”. “Hoping” isn’t just being patient - it’s expecting what you are being patient, it’s longing for that thing to come, it’s excited anticipation. I’m in a short season of stress and waiting - but waiting for things that I don’t really want to happen, to happen… I pray in the Advent season Jesus will keep my thoughts and hopes on him and not on the circumstances that are just as imminent as His coming, albeit probably sooner.

Scripture # Luke 2:14 (ESV): 14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” Edification # There is a word we probably know - Shalom. It’s the Hebrew word we translate often as “peace”. But when I hear “peace” I often think about being calm - and that oversimplifies Shalom… I think a more appropriate understanding is “things are as they are supposed to be”. In the Garden, we see Shalom - the Lord partnering with humanity to steward the earth, to make things as they were supposed to be… You all know we messed that up, Shalom was broken and humanity was exiled. But we have a Great Healer. Jesus is Lord of all, King of Heaven and Earth, Ruler of your lives and mine, and he is the Prince of Peace Things in our lives are probably not often as they are supposed to be… We get sick, worry about bills, experience tragedy, and weather the storms of life. But there is hope - confident expectation - that peace already has been, and will continue to be, res…