1. The need to be in control becomes a terrible burden when we’re forced to realize how little we can control.
2. Control becomes a burden when we work for it without God or try to control that which belongs only to God.
3. This is a key sign of pride – trusting we can control things better than God can.
4. When our human control proves weak, our self-confidence turns into heavy anxiety.
5. God invites us to humbly relinquish our need for control so we can joyfully rest in Him.
6. A calm lightness came over his soul after he chose to trust that His Father is good and walk the path of humility with Him.
7. Pride darkens our hearts with its restless promises of freedom, but Christ freely followed the road of humility.
8. There are moments and seasons when Jesus will allow that burden of control to feel so heavy that it takes us low.                                           
9. From that place of humility, we learn to trust God for what we cannot control, diligently seek His wisdom for what we can, and treat all of life as a gift from Him.
10. How could we learn to calm and quiet our souls with God?
11. Identify what people or things you are trying to control on your own.
12. Write out a list of what you can control and what you cannot control.
13. Turn your list into a daily prayer for wisdom and trust.
14. As I control what I can with God and trust Him for what I cannot, life becomes a joy.
15. The road from anxious control to joyful rest winds through the valley of humility.

1. Shame afflicts us with the burden that we will never be good enough.
2. Shame mercilessly burdens us with a standard we cannot hold.
3. Once we can’t live up to its standard, shame condemns us and isolates us from God.
4. Shame cannot give us rest. It can only lay more burdens upon us.
5. While fully knowing your shortcomings and guilt, Jesus invites you to come to Him.
6. Jesus doesn’t invite the self-sufficient, but the weary and the burdened to come.
7. The accuser yells, ‘you’re never good enough’, but Jesus invites, “Come to Me.”
8. As we learn to come to Jesus, He teaches us to quiet the accuser and rest in His grace.
9. Even before you feel worthy, come to Jesus.
10. Ask Jesus to teach you what’s His voice and the voice of the accuser.
11. Honestly offload your sin to Christ and ask for His way.

What have you been trying to fix on your own that Jesus wants you bring to Him instead?

1. The peace of God isn’t just the absence of fear or war, but it’s the presence of a King.
2. God has promised ever increasing peace through His everlasting King.
3. God’s King did not just come to remove conflict but make us and all things whole.
4. The Prince of Peace has to be God’s King because only God has created us and only He knows what it looks like to make us whole again.
5. Instead of leaving us searching for a façade of peace in our human power, Christ came in humble love to be our everlasting peace.
6. Caesar Augustus claimed to bring about an absence of hostility in the world, but it was by dominating power from on high.
7. Heaven’s King came as a baby to bring His peace to the whole world through the means of humble love.
8. With the life of our King in us, we are His representatives of His peace among one other and within our communities.
9. Christmas morning was the inauguration, unto us a child was born, but God promises His shalom will cover every corner of creation.
10. As we realize that Christ’s life is at work through us restoring all things to Himself, we start seeing all aspects of our lives as His work.
11. The eternal King has come to be our peace, and the increase of His peace will not end until every corner of His creation is made whole.

Text: Luke 1:46-55

Title: A Song of Hope

Series: Advent: Heaven Come Down

Date: November 28, 2021

1. As we humbly learn to take God at His word, we find hope even when life looks hopeless.
2. When the circumstances threatened to overwhelm her, Mary chose to magnify the glory of her God.
3. Optimism looks for the best in our circumstances, but hope looks to who God is even in the darkest of circumstances.
4. Hope is the direct result of a humble faith in who God says He is.
5. What was the source of Mary’s hope?
6. Our God sees you and comes to you with mercy not judgment.
7. We serve a mighty God who promised to establish His justice and peace on the earth.

1. If the Spirit of Christ is within us, we, too, have a song of hope to sing.
2. When we take God at His Word, our faith becomes hope, our hope becomes a song, and the song becomes an invitation to others to believe, too.
3. This Christmas, as we remember that our God has come and His salvation has dawned, we sing our song of hope again.