Monday, December 8, 2008

Blessed Hope

When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. In a loud voice she exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished!" Luke 1:41-45 NIV

After the angel announced to Mary she would conceive the Messiah, she traveled to see her cousin, Elizabeth. As soon as she heard Mary’s voice, she was filled with the Holy Spirit as the presence of the Lord came near her. The Holy Spirit revealed to her that Mary carried the promised Messiah.

This must have been such an exciting moment for both these women who were chosen to be used by God to fulfill His prophecies. Being good Jewish women, they’ve heard the writing of the prophets read aloud. After Jewish people had not heard from God for approximately 400 years, the fulfillment of the long awaited promise was great news to their ears.

For years the people put their hope in the promises of God. They may have wondered if it would come to pass. Now the One God promised was conceived. God keeps all His promises. Not one has failed to come to pass.

Sometimes it seems as though we wait and wait for a promise, wondering if it will ever come to pass. But God is faithful to keep all His promises. Jesus Christ was born as promised in the writings of the Prophets. He will return again as written in the Prophets. We have that glorious hope. We have Jesus Christ. We have the Scriptures. We have the Holy Spirit.

For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. ~~Romans 15:4 NIV

All the trials we go through create endurance in us. We have the Scriptures to read for encouragement so we have hope. When I faced a problem, one of my first instincts was to complain about it with whoever would listen whether it was my husband or an available friend. I’ve had to learn over time and retrain myself to have a new first instinct—to run to the Lord in prayer and read His Word. He provides the answer.

When we receive the answer, then we can run to our loved ones and friends as Mary went to Elizabeth. They celebrated the great news. Let’s spread the good news instead of our frustrations. We have the blessed hope in the Messiah.

Engrafted by His Grace--

5 gracious comments:

Leah Adams said...

This was the passage that my pastor and I taught from on 11/16/08 in our evening service. (www.fbcvision.com) I so enjoyed digging into it. Our focus was on Elizabeth but we also talked about Mary and even Zechariah. It was such an honor to be able to teach with him.

Leah

Michelle V said...

Shonda, I love this post! I too have struggled with the tendency to run to people when I face a problem. I love what you said about running to the Lord with the problem and then running to our friends when we get an answer!

Blessings
Michelle

Starla said...

I'll usually go to someone and ask them to pray for me. I may not unload the whole story upon them, I'll just ask them to pray.

Mrs.Naz@BecomingMe said...

What a beautiful message here...there indeed is so much to celebrate---Hope abounds

marine's words said...

Shonda, He will accomplish and complete his work. The Lord longs to give us a full life with an array of emotions that enchance our faith, He will rake our rubber-band buddle and make sense of it. He will give us definition ,he will guide us toward resolution,& he provides us the hope of diven destination.It's a process,so don't be discouraged Its a EMMAUS ROAD !!" patsy clirmont" love, marina