“Let your daily actions witness: Christ will come again” - Day 7

Colossians 3:17

 17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

 In another place Paul writes: “Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.” (Romans 12:1, The Message)

 We live our everyday lives in God, the God who is revealed to us in Jesus Christ. In Advent we remember that Jesus came and that he is coming again. We hold these two facts in balance – remembering and looking forward. Jesus came and lived ordinary human life – sleeping, eating, walking-around life. As he lived that life, his life became an example of how we can live our lives towards the coming reign of God. No heroic measures needed, no grand expeditions, just where we are living a life built on the practices and values of the coming kingdom – giving and forgiving – loving and seeking justice. We live our ordinary lives with the promise that Christ is coming again, and as we orient our lives to the pattern of that coming kingdom our lives declare by our actions that we are loyal to Jesus Christ and to Christ alone. That our lives are lived to his honour and glory.

 In joy and thanksgiving, we celebrate Jesus Christ has come, and that he has shown us the way to live into his kingdom. In joy and thanksgiving, we look ahead to his coming again when the kingdom will be fully revealed. In the present moment there are moments of doubt, moments of not knowing, but we live by the promised coming kingdom. We declare our loyalty and hope by living each day by the pattern of that kingdom.

 PRAYER:

O Lord, we want all that we say and do to bring honour to your name. It is what we desire more than anything else. Shape our everyday lives to witness to your promise that Jesus Christ will come again. In Jesus’ name. Amen.