Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Luke 2 before reading the devotional below.
Even if you only go to church on Christmas and Easter, you’ve heard Luke 2. Jesus is born. You hear the songs about it every December in the mall. Manger, shepherds, angels, all that. Keep reading and Jesus’ entire early childhood is glossed over until his parents lose him at age 12. (That’s reassuring for all us parents whose children wander from time to time… Can you imagine you’ve been entrusted with the Son of God and you LOSE HIM??!! My parenting is suddenly looking so together…)
But if you look past the stories that we have heard a thousand times and place yourself in the era of Jesus’ coming and early life, there is a deep sense of awe and mystery. Imagine that God has revealed to you that there is a time coming when some pretty amazing things will happen. You can envision this future, but it’s fuzzy and part of you wonders if you have just made the whole thing up. But God keeps nudging and nudging and you keep praying and praying. And imagine that after a season of waiting things that God told you about begin to slowly unfold. Not all at once of course… Just one prophecy and one prayer at a time. And you start to realize that everything he’s told you up until this point is true… That is the sense of wonder and amazement that captures the emotional experiences of Mary, Joseph, Simeon and Anna.
Perhaps you are in a place where you used to have some hope, but now you wonder if it was all just wishful thinking. Maybe everything looks bad right now and God doesn’t seem to be opening any doors. That can be a tremendous place of discouragement and even depression and hopelessness. Here’s your freedom for today: God finishes what he starts. His timeline may be pretty different from yours, but he’s working. If he planted a dream in your heart, he will carry it through to completion because it was his plan to begin with. If there are pieces that you need to let go of, he’ll let you know along the way. But hold tight to any place of faith in your heart that is telling you to wait and then expect God to show up. He’s at work. Just wait and watch the unfolding with awe.