Advent II - Wednesday

“God travels wonderful ways with human beings, but he does not comply with the views and opinions of people. God does not go the way that people want to prescribe for him; rather, his way is beyond all comprehension, free and self-determined beyond all proof. Where reason is indignant, where our nature rebels, where our piety anxiously keeps us away: that is precisely where God loves to be. There he confounds the reason of the reasonable; there he aggravates our nature, our piety—that is where he wants to be, and no one can keep him from it. Only the humble believe him and rejoice that God is so free and so marvelous that he does wonders where people despair, that he takes what is little and lowly and makes it marvelous. And that is the wonder of all wonders, that God loves the lowly…. God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs his wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; he loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas

Questions to ponder:

Think about a time where you were lost. What did that feel like? Did your feelings change once you were found? Describe those emotions.

Now, equate those feelings with God who “loves the lost” and is eager to be in relationship with you. Do you believe that God loves you that much?

Have you ever imagined that God has chosen you as an “instrument to perform wonders where one would least expect them”? Why or why not?

Devotional Reading - Luke 11