READING:
One-year plan: Micah 4-7, Nahum 1-3, Revelation 13:11-14:20
Two-year plan: 2 Chronicles 7:1-9:12, Acts 4:13-22
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It is appropriate that we are reading Micah 4-7 today, Christmas Eve, 2024. There, the Word prophesied that the One who would rule over Israel would be born in Bethlehem. That village was small, especially compared to the significant city of Jerusalem—but from that place would come One with ancient origins (indeed, the New Testament would reveal Him as eternal) whose kingdom was yet to come. Only Jesus the Messiah would meet those qualifications.
His earthly origins, though, would be as a baby in a borrowed stable in an unremarkable village. God would step into the world He created in a most unimpressive way. In an unexpected village, in fact, God would lower Himself to be born among the shepherds so you and I might become His sheep. That baby would later die on a borrowed cross and be buried in somebody else’s tomb, but He was the Redeemer come to have compassion on us, forgive our iniquity, and “cast all our sins into the depths of the sea” (Mic 7:19). The baby king would change the world.
This story reminds us that our God specializes in the small, the unknown, the insignificant, and the least. That’s a good thing, since all of us fit into those categories.
PERSONAL REFLECTION: Do you realize how gracious God has been in coming to us?
DAILY PRAYER: “God, I’m so grateful You choose to love people like me.”
TOMORROW’S READINGS:
One-year plan: Habakkuk 1-3, Revelation 15-16
Two-year plan: 2 Chronicles 9:13-11:23, Acts 4:23-37
*portions first published in 2018