Advent 2022 – Day 21

Do you find that sometimes time passes slowly (like for children waiting for school vacation), but other times the days fly by (like parents trying to prepare for Christmas visitors)? Thank you for returning here each day to join us as we learn about “God’s Love Story.”

My father and mother were engaged for over a year. It must have seemed that time crawled by, but many busy months intervened between the second half of 1941 and the start of 1942. During this time, my father was completing his final year of seminary in New York. He gained experience by preaching at small churches. Meanwhile, my mother taught at a small private school and completed her semester courses at Harvard in New England. In the Spring of 1942, they were at last busy making plans for their June 19th wedding and investigating sites for the honeymoon. Dad’s letters to his parents were full of these daily activities. Still their love remained as an undercurrent.

Jesus too faced all the demands of daily life. He had to eat and sleep, to bathe and walk from place to place. He had only three years to teach his disciples but they were constantly interrupted by people who asked to be healed and other people who wanted to argue. Did those years fly by or were there some slow times also? In Matt. 12:15, Jesus withdrew from the area where people wanted to kill Him, but other people followed him. In Luke 5:15,16, we read, “despite Jesus’s instructions, the report of his power spread even faster, and vast crowds came to hear him preach and to be healed of their diseases. But Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer.” He never complained about the intrusions. After all, these were the people He came to save.

Our love of Jesus does not remove us from the obligations of daily life. We still have to eat, sleep and work. But His love is always there as an undercurrent sustaining us through toil and stress. If you find time is rushing you today and your plans are interrupted, thank God for stepping into your day.

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