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Hope Springs Forth
Throughout the year, we have continued to celebrate the 90th anniversary of The Upper Room daily Read More
Mindy McGarrah Sharp | Read Isaiah 7:10-16
In the search for deep knowledge, you’ll notice signs and wonders if you know how to look. Look closer! In this expectant season, we are called to linger in noticing, to welcome depth. Signs of world-mending healing are already being born here now. Instead of waiting for signs to bubble...
God, bring to mind losses to be grieved and births to notice. When we reach into the soil, help us learn to lament and to join in the liberating possibilities of new creation. Amen.
This week’s texts invite reflecting about depth as a practice not a product, a process not a destination. What does going deeper feel like? What does it require in a fast-paced world of split-second discernment about where and whom to engage? Isaiah goes to the king of Judah to prophesy about the boy called “Immanuel.” The psalmist cries out to God for restoration. Paul’s words root Jesus in the line of David. And Matthew tells of the angel’s visit to Joseph. These texts seek signs in depths, yearn for deep relief from ravages of war, recall deep generational and geographical connections, and stir deep stories of messy births in a messy world.
• Read Isaiah 7:10-16. When have you asked for a sign from God? How do you recognize signs from God?
• Read Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19. When have you been consumed by your own fuming grief and rage? How has this been acknowledged? In the presence of bitter tears, how do you start to imagine and pray for a different future?
• Read Romans 1:1-7. How do you hold together deep joy and deep trauma at Advent? How many generations and in what land(s) can you trace joys and aches backward and forward in time and place?
• Read Matthew 1:18-25. Who holds and tells origin stories in your community and in your family? Does your community tell stories about births? Where do they begin? What details about the risks, vulnerabilities, and wrestling around birth are included or left out?
Respond by posting a prayer.
