HARBOR ADVENT 2020

Week 2 Lament

INTRO Advent is the first season in the “church calendar,” derived from the Latin “adventus” which means “coming or arrival.” Through much of the history of Christianity, God’s people have joined together in longing for Jesus to return and celebrating His first coming. We wait, anticipate, lament, hope, and rejoice. This devotional will contain 4 weeks of readings and reflections based on the theme symbolized at each candle lighting: Longing, Lament, Peace, and Joy. Each week will include a selection from the Westminster Shorter Catechism as well a various scriptures.

WEEK 2 LAMENT

DAY #1 NATURE BEFORE NURTURE

In the first few centuries of the early church, its leaders were doing the best they could to try to formulate an expression that would faithfully describe their Savior and Redeemer Jesus Christ. They were aware that Jesus was divine. They were aware that he was also very much a human. While they didn’t finally “nail down” an expression to describe Jesus, the early church could clearly smell a heresy from a mile away. They knew when people said something wrong about Jesus! This catechism q and a captures what the church has known from the beginning to be true, but what became official orthodox Christian doctrine at the council of Nicea in 325 AD.

WSC Q.21. Who is the redeemer of God’s chosen ones? The only redeemer of God’s chosen is the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, Who became man. He was and continues to be God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever.

1.Who is the Redeemer of God’s chosen children? The Redeemer is Jesus Christ. 2.How is Jesus described in this catechism? As the eternal Son of God who became man. He has two distinct natures, but there is one person. “Nature” refers to the “stuff” that makes God, God, or man, man. 3.What does it mean to say that Jesus is the “eternal Son of God” and why do we emphasize this? Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses believe Jesus is divine, but that the he was “made” by God the Father. Jesus has always been around and we worship Him as truly equal in power and glory as with the Father and the Spirit.

4.What does it mean to have “two natures” but one person? Jesus is fully God and fully man. Not a hybrid half-and-half mixture. He didn’t sacrifice any divinity or any humanity when he was born into this world. “One person” means that there was only person who was willing, doing, acting. He wasn’t schizophrenic. 5.Why did Jesus need to have a human nature? He needed to be human in all the ways we are human-with human longings, experiences, feelings, so that he could be our human representative. 6.So then why did he need to be fully God? Since He is fully God his sacrifice is of infinite worth. His blood atoned for all sins of all His people, not just one person-which would have been the case if he were only human. 7. Read John 20:26-27. Jesus still has a body in heaven, and he still bears the scars. What does that say about his love for you and how does that make you feel? He’s not ashamed of you! He bears the scars with pride; can we ever doubt his love for us?

Application: Lament and pray for Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses who lessen Jesus. As a result they have to “make up the difference” with their efforts. Pray for them. Lament your own lack of zeal for seeing new people embrace the real Jesus!

DAY #2 “OH EXCUSE ME, HAVE YOU MET MY REDEEMER?” The catechism question reminds us that Jesus is our redeemer. But the word “redeemer” is not really part of our normal vocabulary. We don’t say, meet so-and-so, he is a or my redeemer. Yet in both the Hebrew and Roman cultures of the New Testament, the concept of a redeemer was very “down to earth.” In fact, according to A Dictionary of Paul and his Letters, it is possible that 80-90 % of Rome’s populations were slaves (many indentured servants). A redeemer purchased someone out of slavery. In the first century, you could go to a party and say, “Have you met Bob, he’s my redeemer. It’s because of this guy, I’m no longer a slave.”

1. Neither you nor I are literal slaves. We may work hard, and have a tough boss, but we are not literal slaves. Or are/were we? Has Jesus ever informed “free” men that they were in some way slaves? Read John 8:31-34

2. Have you ever felt enslaved to sin before? What do you think it means to be enslaved to sin? Being enslaved means we can only choose sin. Even slaves can do nice things, but their motivation is still sinful. Unless we have a redeemer to purchase us out of sin, we’re stuck in slavery.

3. What does our Redeemer Jesus do for us? Read Romans 6:14. Sin isn’t our master anymore. When we were slaves, we could only sin. Jesus has purchased us out of that slavery. Now we can follow Jesus, even though we often fail. We struggle, but we are no longer slaves. We’re under grace!

4. If he declares that Christians are not slaves, how does he describe our new status? Read John 8:35-36. We are now part of God’s family. Have you ever felt on the outside looking in? You need no longer feel that way b/c you’re family!

5. Sometimes the same sins get passed down from generation to generation. According to this passage, are we enslaved and destined to repeat these same sin patterns and pass them on to our children? Nope! We may struggle in similar areas (anger, lust, etc…) as our families/parents, but we’re not enslaved to repeat the cycle (violence, adultery, etc…). Jesus’ redemption stops the cycle. His family trumps our earthly families!

6. Our sins don’t stop God from loving us, but they can prevent us from loving others well. How does seeing Jesus as a Redeemer make you love other people better? Jesus has set you free and your heart becomes so full of gratitude that you want to follow Him wherever He goes, and to the people He calls you.

7. Here’s a sign that we’re growing in love for our Redeemer: we’ll desire to introduce him to others, and say, “This is the god-man who redeemed me! Would you like to meet Him?”

Application: Lament over the many enslaved still today in human trafficking. Pray for those imprisoned in their faith, longing for rescue.

DAY #3 “HE’S ALL GROWN UP NOW” In the movie Talladega Nights, Ricky Bobby (Will Farrell) prays to “little baby Jesus.” His wife wisely corrects him and says, “He’s not a little baby any more, he’s all grown up now.” Even though we would probably not pray to “little baby Jesus” as Ricky Bobby did, his focus on Jesus’ birth to the complete ignorance of his life is more common.

1. Have you ever been excited over the birth of a child, perhaps from a friend/family member? Did you cease to care about the child as though you were only interested in the birth? No, if we cared about the birth, we want to know and see the child grow up. We want to be involve in his/her life.

2. At Christmas time we naturally celebrate Christ’s birth. However we tend to see his birth isolated from the big picture of God’s plan of redemption of which His whole life plays an integral part as well. Why is it important to consider Jesus life and not isolate his life from his birth? We can’t forget WHY Jesus came. He was born to save His people. He could only save them through his perfect life, that he could be a perfect sacrifice in their place.

3. Read Philippians 2:5-11 Even though Jesus our Redeemer was/is a Heavenly King of the highest degree, how could you describe his life while on Earth? He lived a life of obedience and suffering. He loved others well and often suffered for loving them.

4. What can happen when we ignore Jesus’ life? We can get a faulty view of how God sees us and believe He is really angry at us when we sin or screw up.

5. Read Romans 8:1. How then does remembering Jesus’ perfect life affect our view of God and His view of us? God sees His

people through the lens of Jesus’ perfect life. When he sees our sinful lives, he always sees us IN Christ.

6. What does this have to do with self-confidence? Is that really the issue to help us in our fears and insecurities? No, we don’t need more self-confidence but more Christ-confidence. His life is counted as ours. We can then approach God and others confidently.

7. Why could a focus on Jesus’ life help us to love God and others? We are free to fail when we love because we know Jesus did it perfectly. Our motivations may be selfish, but we can still offer our service up to God and others in faith, confident that Jesus already covered up our shortcomings with his perfect love and obedience.

Application: Lament the way we see “baby Jesus” instead of “King Jesus” and forget his life of obedience and suffering. We are called to follow in His footsteps.

DAY # 4 NOT JUST ANOTHER GOOD EXAMPLE The other day I was reading a children’s Christmas book that my son Connar picked out from the public library. The book tried to explain why Christmas was so important to Christians: it was the birth of Jesus. Obviously. But then the author went off the deep end and fell into heresy by saying, “Jesus came to the world to show Christians how to love one another.” Uhhh…..This was actually a heresy the early church had to deal with called Pelagianism. Today we simply call it “moralism” and where folks see Jesus’ purpose in coming was to teach people how to love one another, and all that we really need is a good example. Heresies never really go away, do they?

1. Different people celebrate Christmas for different reasons. Do you think most people understand WHY Christians really celebrate and need Christmas? What would YOU tell them?

2. Would Jesus’ coming to Earth to show us how to love others really be good news? Why or why not? Read Mark 10:45. We got ourselves into this mess, and by virtue of that, we CAN”T get ourselves out of it by a good example-no matter how good of an example! We needed someone to pay the ransom price to God (remember its Him we’ve sinned against) on our behalf.

3. Look at this stanza from T.S. Journey of the Magi “This: were we led all that way for Birth or Death? There was a Birth certainly, We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death, but had thought they were different…” How do the Magi see Jesus birth differently than the children’s book? What difference does it make to believe this way? They see Jesus as coming to die for them. Since we Jesus died for outsiders/enemies, his birth/death make us want to love Him more. We actually follow

Him more, when we consider His life as ransom as opposed to mere example.

4. As Jesus grew up, he lived and displayed to us a life of obedience and suffering. Yet he also told us that the love we show should distinguish us from unbelievers. If Jesus didn’t come as merely an example, how can these two truths be, well, true? Read John 15:13. Jesus is that one. Jesus gave up his life for us. As we see what love He has displayed for us, that He did it perfectly for us, we now WANT to follow Him. We do so imperfectly, but we nevertheless are now motivated to follow Him.

5. How does recognizing Jesus perfect love for us enable us to love those who are unlovely? We don’t look to another person for motivation-that will often never come-but instead to Jesus who has given himself to us.

6. Who has Jesus empowered you to love today? Who is someone “unworthy” of such love? Think about it. As did the Magi in this poem, consider Jesus birth and death FOR YOU, as your motivation. Neither you, nor the other party is a proper motivation, but your Redeemer always is!

Application: Lament how moralism limits our love to others. We limit our love to others based upon whether or not they “deserve” it.

DAY #5 TRUE DEBT RELIEF Have you ever felt overwhelmed with finances before? How about debt? Be thankful you weren’t born into England in the 1800’s. If you couldn’t pay your bills, you could be thrown into “debtor’s” prison until you could pay your bills. But do you see some problems with this? How can someone pay bills when he is in prison or incarcerated for most of his time? Sometimes the prisoner would be allowed some work-release, but it was obviously an unjust system and eventually done away with in 1869.

1. Read Isaiah 61:1. Why are God’s people imprisoned and what hope is there for them? This prophesy gave hope to those in exile, literally prisoners. They were in exile because of their sins. The Messiah would release them from prison, doing that which they couldn’t do themselves.

2. How are all religions outside of Christianity like debtor’s prisons? They tell you that you need to pay your debt down but ignore the fact that you can’t pay your debt down because you’re enslaved to sin. You get stuck and die trying.

3. How is Jesus’ role of Redeemer unique among religious leaders? Being fully God and fully man, he came to Earth to pay the debt we could not pay. The rest of the leaders tell you to do or believe something. Jesus says you can’t, but I can, and I did.

4. Read Matthew 4:16-19. When Jesus began his ministry who did He claim to be, and what did he promise? The Messiah who would bring good news to the poor, heal the sick, give sight to the blind, release prisoners.

5. But what needed to happen before the prisoners and debtors could truly be released? Read Isaiah 53:6, Col 2:13-15. He needed to pay their debt

6. How do we respond to those who look at Jesus’ life simply as an example? Would that really be good news? An example is not what we need. His life and death were a substitute for ours: He gets punishment/death and we get life/forgiveness.

7. How does recognizing Jesus as our Redeemer, as opposed to an example to follow, reveal an even greater love to us? Sometimes we can suffer and obey for a time if we know that someone else will truly and regularly follow our example. Now consider Him who was fully aware that we wouldn’t do a good job following in His footsteps. He couldn’t say, “Well at least they’ll do all that I say and do, just like I did it.” He did it knowing we wouldn’t do a good job, doing that good job FOR us! That’s love.

Application: Lament with those financially struggling this Christmas. Consider giving an offering to the Mercy Fund.

DAY# 6 FROM RICHES TO RAGS Lorena Ochoa was a professional female golfer. She wasn’t just a professional female golfer; she was one of the best, having been number 1 in the world from 2008-2010. Yet at the age of 28, she decided it was time to quit and start a family. She willingly and happily made a sacrifice. She sacrificed fame (someone obviously watches the LPGA, I think…) money, and prosperity that comes from a career in golf. Of course, to her it was well worth it. On the other hand, had she played at the bottom of the pack for 10 years, and then decided to give up her career to start a family, it would not have been much of a sacrifice. She wouldn’t have been giving up very much.

1. Have you ever made a sacrifice for someone you loved? What was it? How did he/she/they respond?

2. Has anyone ever made a great sacrifice for you? What did that do to your love for them?

3. Read Isaiah 6:1-4, Col 1:15-19, and John 13:3. Look what sacrifice Jesus made to come here. What were some specific things he left behind? He left constant praise. He left behind glory, delight, honor.

4. Now compare that glory with the “mean estate” he lay in after birth. Read Luke 2:1-7. From Riches to Rags glory to humility! This is crazy.

5. We aren’t privy to what Joseph and Mary would have thought about their “accommodations.” How do you think they would they have felt? How would you have felt?

6. What they may or may not have realized was that they were giving up far less by being there than Jesus was! Lorena Ochoa married a very wealthy man-so all she really gave up was fame.

Consider all of the ways Christ’s sacrifice is qualitatively different. What does that tell us about Jesus’ love for you? God’s love is always costly, even to Him. And the greater the sacrifice, the greater the love.

7. What does that tell us about the kind of love God produces in us? In response, we love sacrificially, not just when it’s convenient or doesn’t hurt us.

Reflection: “God’s love is a costly love. It never takes the easy path away from relationships. Instead it plots how to how to move toward other people. It thinks creatively of ways to surprise them with love”-Ed Welch, When People are Big, God is Small pg. 178

Application: Think of some creative ways to “surprise” someone with love this Christmas.