Making Space – An Advent DevotionalSample

Making Space for Christ - Part 1

"Let every heart prepare Him room."(Or, more precisely, roo-oo-oom). That’s a familiar line from the Christmas hymn, ‘Joy to the World’. It's like Isaac Watts, who wrote the song back in 1719 (Thanks, Wikipedia), knew that almost three centuries down the road, we would face the Crisis of Christ-less Christmas. He probably had an inkling that in the midst our celebrating we would forget the Guest of Honor. Mr. Watts had stumbled on one of the greatest ironies: we get so wrapped up in our gifts that we forget to unwrap the Greatest Gift of all.

I recently heard a pastor mention that the antithesis to fearing God is forgetting God. Not denying Him. Not offending Him. Just omitting Him.

But, Issac Watts reminds us that Advent is a time of anticipating the arrival of the King.

I liken it to preparing your guest room for the arrival of house guests. Hosting another family in your home requires a huge time commitment.  It requires clearing your schedule to make sure they're comfortable, entertained and have clean towels.

Our guest room also works as a home office, a playroom, and the room where one parent crashes when the master bedroom is too full of little people who don't belong in there.

As a result, before house guests arrive, there's always a heap of stuff shuttled off to Goodwill.

This Advent focus on ridding your schedule of the unnecessary. Learn to say “no” to one more commitment. Learn to say “yes” where it counts. De-cluttering Christmas may be just what your soul needs.

Prayer

Father, This Christmas, I echo the words of the Psalmist David: "One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple...” Amen