ADVENTure: The Loud, Noisy, Roaring, Life Changing, Not So Silent NightShembull

The Adventure:

One of the greatest adventures that leads us to the birth of Jesus is the story of Abraham who went by the name Abram before. Imagine this, you go on such a big adventure that God says you’re no longer the same person- you need a different name. That is the kind of adventure Abraham went on.

I don’t know about you but whenever I go places, I need directions. Maybe you ask where the bathroom is and someone says, “Oh, uh it’s just over there.” No, no, no walk me over there because I get lost between my toothbrush and my mouth. But we see here God speaks to Abram and he says go. He doesn’t say go to a specific place or go in a specific direction: God just says go and I will show you. That takes faith.

Faith is believing in what you cannot see and hoping in things that you don’t have yet. No one has faith in the things they already have. You already have it so why would you need to believe you’ll get it? But Abraham is being called to have faith in things he does not see, and that can be extremely scary. When you are trusting in God when you don’t see Him, the world gets even louder. It becomes so easy to listen to the voices that doubt God or even listen to the voice in your head that says God is going to fail.

As followers of Jesus, we have to live lives like Abraham. He didn’t stop following God even when the voices got loud and the world got messy. We can go on the adventure of following Jesus together but we need faith. We don’t see Jesus but we can still trust Him. We don’t see Jesus but we can celebrate Him.

The Destination:

When we really think about the Christmas story, there can be parts that sound bizarre. Jesus was always around, He was then born in a barn, hundreds of angels appeared, and that’s only the beginning. And unless you are keeping a secret, I don’t think you were there. Believing in Jesus’ birth takes faith but we can be confident that God’s Word is 100% true and God can be trusted with everything He says. It would be hard to celebrate someone’s birthday if you don’t believe they exist. Christmas takes faith and this Christmas season we can believe together that the savior of the world was born.

Songs For The Journey:

O Come Let Us Adore Him by Hillsong Worship