Chosen to Be a Miracle! Advent Plan Based on “The Chosen"预览

Day 18: Come and see

I have to admit that I have many skills, but diplomacy is not one of them. Many people have told me throughout my life that I am very direct when I speak, and I don't like half-truths. 

This has created many problems and enemies for me throughout my life. It was also one of the reasons I lost my job as an architect...I didn't have a good relationship with my boss. 

I had fought so hard to become the first Jewish architect in Caesarea Philippi! I couldn't believe that my career had ended in such an unexpected way. So great was my disappointment that I took all the plans I had drawn up and went to the countryside where I could be completely alone. I sat under a fig tree and opened my heart to God. I was broken, and I didn't feel Him near me at all. In my sadness, I began to burn the plans while I almost shouted, "Do not hide Your face from me! Do You see me? Do You see me?" 

A few days later, even in my anguish, I had an unexpected visit from my good friend Philip that cheered me up. He had been a disciple of John the Baptist for years, but he had recently begun to follow another teacher named Jesus, from Nazareth. It didn't make sense to me: could anything good come out of Nazareth? Philip, his eyes fixed on me, said with a conviction I'd never seen in him before, "He's the One. The One who Moses foretold and the prophets said would come. The One. Jesus of Nazareth, son of Joseph."

Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't have bothered to go, but Philip's conviction really caught my attention. And that's how I met Him. At that first meeting, Jesus spoke to me as if He knew me, and to my bewilderment, looking me straight in the eye, He said, "'I have known you long before Philip called you to come and see...When you were in your lowest moment and you were alone, I did not turn My face from you. I saw you under the fig tree.'" (adapted from John 1:43-51, NKJV)

I was speechless. No one but the Messiah could have known these things. His answer deeply touched my heart. I knew I had found the One I'd sought all my life, and I was ready to follow Him from that very moment forward.

My name is Nathanael, and I have been chosen by Jesus.

P.S. Dear friend, you may sometimes feel that you're alone and that God doesn't hear your cry. But that's not true: He always listens to you. He is attentive to you at every moment, and He desires to turn your most complicated situations around. God wants to work miracles in your life, even at Christmas! :-) Today, cling to Him more than ever by faith. It's in His faith that you have the victory!                                                                                                                                                              

You are Chosen to be a Miracle!
Christian Misch