What’s on is your Christmas list?

What are you asking for?

What do you hope to unwrap on Christmas day?

What are you longing for?

What are you praying for?

Are you imagining God doing something new and lovely in your life?

Advent means “arrival or coming.” Advent not only anticipates the Christ child laying in a manger, but the possibility that God can come into our lives today.  We live in-between God’s coming into our world. In Bethlehem’s stable, God broke into the world to save humanity rom sin and to show us how to live! At the end of our lives, Christ will come in glory to judge and reign!  Christmas is not just our pondering God’s incarnation in a Bethlehem stable, but our considering that Christ will come again and our experiencing God anew into our lives.

Beyond marking Christian history, Christmas anticipates unwrapping Christ’s presence and power into our daily living.

What are you asking for this Christmas?

What is your Christmas prayer?

What do you hope God unwraps in your soul?

Charles Wesley’s Advent hymn expresses our soul’s deep longing for freedom, release, rest, strength, arrival and joy. May Christ come into our lives this day! May we long for Christ: who has come, who now comes, and who will come again in glory!

Come, thou long expected Jesus, born to set thy people free; from our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in thee. Israel’s strength and consolation, hope of all the earth thou art; dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart.

Let us long for Christ’s coming into our lives.  Even now,  Lord Jesus, come!