Jeremiah 31:16-17

Find space to reckon with your grief during the most joyous time of the year. With prayer and spiritual practices from Stephanie Duncan Smith, author of Even After Everything and creator of Slant Letter, this devotional invites you to openly acknowledge your loss, reckon with the dissonance of the season, and encounter God’s empathy in the fullness of your honest emotions.

This Christmas devotional traces the "whispers" of the Old Testament prophets about the miraculous birth of Jesus centuries in advance. From the Davidic lineage to the specific birthplace of Bethlehem, God's plan for the Messiah's arrival echoes subtly throughout the Scriptures. This study considers these prophetic hints and the profound ways they were fulfilled in the Christmas story.

Expectation. Longing. Yearning. These emotions fill our hearts during the season of Advent. Drawn from the Latin word adventus, which means "coming," Advent is a time of anticipation for the celebration of Christ's Nativity. It is also a period of preparation for our Lord's Second Coming. Paradoxically, this holy season focuses our attention on the historical fact of Christ's birth as well as on the promise of his anticipated return.

The Bible is written by different authors and contains different genres of literature. The Basic Training Challenge takes you through books written by prophets and poets to learn more about God’s mission here on earth. Similar to your basic training, this plan will challenge you to get spiritually fit in God’s Word.