December 19, 2023  

Today's Reading: 1 Thessalonians 5.16-24

Daily Lectionary: Isaiah 40:1-17; Revelations 7:1-17

Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Thessalonians 5:23)

In the Name + of Jesus. Amen. That’s right, Paul is talking about Advent, the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Although he’s referring to the second Advent the whole church prayerfully waits for. Yes that’s right, just as God’s people of old sought the first Advent of God’s Messiah, His anointed one, who God has long promised would come and redeem His people. This was not just a redemption, and return from an earthly exile. Although God would certainly deliver Israel home in time. This was a redemption with eternal consequences.

But we know that story. The Advent of the Messiah who was born in Bethlehem, not as a king in a palace, but the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who came to redeem you. To end your exile of wandering in slavery to sin, and death, and to know God’s love for you in the wounds of His crucified Messiah, Jesus. Only these wounds are not found in the arms of a dead man, but the wounds of your crucified, dead, and risen Savior. Who came for you, died for you, and conquered death for you. 

In Jesus, the God of peace sanctifies you completely. It’s all His gift, given to you through faith by the simple means of the water of your Baptism, and nourishing you weak after weak with His life giving body and blood that He gives you to eat and to drink. He does this without any merit or worthiness in you, purely out of His fatherly divine mercy, that just as His people of old wait for Him, you too may wait for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, assured of the promises of the God of Israel, the God of the church, and the God who will come and bring you out of the great tribulation, and into the life to come. In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.

“Comfort, Comfort ye My people, Speak ye peace,” thus saith our God; “Comfort those who sit in darkness, Mourning ‘neath their sorrows’ load. Speak ye to Jerusalem Of the peace that waits for them; Tell her that her sins I cover And her warfare now is over.” (LSB 347:1) 

-Vicar Justin Chester is vicar at Shepherd of the City in Fort Wayne, IN.

Audio Reflections Speaker: Pastor Jonathan Lackey is the pastor at Grace Lutheran Church, Vine Grove, Ky.

Study Christ's words on the cross to see how you can show more Christlike grace in your life. Perfect for group or individual study, each chapter has a Q&A at the end, and the back of the book includes a leader guide. Available now from Concordia Publishing House.