Daily Advent Reading

This is our Digital Advent Calendar for 2023. We would hope you could join in daily during the season of Advent. Every day’s Advent Gift box will have a new Scripture to read and reflect on. Every Thursday there will be a Children’s Ministry Activity for you and your children. Every Tuesday there will be a question for adults to enjoy and engage on our Facebook page.

Isaiah 11:1-5

1 A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.

2 The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord

3 and he will delight in the fear of the Lord. He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears;

4 but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.

5 Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist.

Devotional

The words are summoned from the midst of a deep tragedy. Isaiah speaks the sweetest words of hope the people could hear. Though the family line of King David, son of Jesse, had been cut down to a stump, out of the deep, thick morass of human faith and suffering a tender new shoot would grow. The little green sprig would be a sign of something new springing from the old.           

We, too, long for deliverance from oppression in our slavery to sin. So even as we anticipate the birth of Jesus the Branch, the new shoot from the stump of Jesse, we also anticipate, in hope, a second coming of Christ. We await the completion of God’s promises of salvation—when God will free from sin’s grip his well-loved creation and come to live with us forever.

Are you longing for that day?

  •  Prayer: O come, Emmanuel, and ransom your people, who mourn in lonely exile. We long for the day when You will come and set us free from sin and death forever. In Your name, Amen.