The greatest obstacle to friendship in middle age isn't that nobody wants friends. It's that everyone is waiting for someone else to go first. But here's the good news: Christ has already gone first for you. And because He has, you are free to go first for someone else.
Ecclesiastes tells us that there is a time for everything under heaven. But God has also placed eternity in our hearts, and that makes us strange creatures: able to rejoice in this life yet always aching for a life that only Christ can give.
What does it take to draw near to God? It takes a perfect priest, a finished work, and a broken body to open the way. In short, it takes everything, which is exactly what Christ has given for you.

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Matthew makes it abundantly clear that Joseph lacked one thing: Control. He may have been the titular head of his emerging household, but he was clearly not in charge. God was, as God always is.
Therefore, on the cusp of Christmas the message of the fourth week in Advent heightens our anticipation and joy, but also the unvarnished truth about the challenge of following the crucified King.
By his first Advent in the flesh, through his second Advent with bread and wine and water and Word, we await his third Advent at the end.
We will not become hopeless because the Lord is with us.
The waiting of Advent isn’t just for Christmas; it’s for God’s reversal of all sin and evil and his renewal of all things.
Let us rejoice, then, in this grace so that our glory may be the testimony of our conscience wherein we glory not in ourselves but in the Lord (2 Cor. 1:12).
More than that, as children of the One who is the Resurrection and the eternal Life, as children who have themselves been both justified and regenerated, live as if Christ has already reappeared, as if the parousia has happened.
John the Baptist’s question in our text offers you an opportunity to help your congregation take seriously the doubts experienced by those who live by faith.
It is terribly easy to set up our theology as a buffer against the real coming of the Lord and its consequences.
When and how did the church start this season of anticipation?
The Lord is coming, that much is certain. He is coming to reign, not only over the heavens, but also over the members of your congregation.
We of all people, because of Christ, can build securely on the future because the truth of Christ runs from the past to the present, establishing a most certain future.