Spiritual Family

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Spiritual Family - Daily Devotional by Max Lucado

Is your fantasy that your family will be like the Waltons? An expectation that your dearest friends will be your next of kin? Jesus didn’t have that expectation. Look how Jesus defined his family in Mark 3:35: “My true brother and sister and mother are those who do what God wants.” He recognized that his spiritual family could provide what his physical family did not.

If Jesus himself couldn’t force his family to share his convictions, what makes you think you can force yours? We can’t control the way our family responds to us. We have to move beyond the naïve expectation that if we do good, our family will treat us right. I can’t assure you that your family will ever give you the blessing you seek, but I know this much: God will. Accept God as your Father, and let God give you what your family does not.

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Devotion by Max Lucado | The Almighty Jehovah | https://thealmightyJehovah.com

What Gabriel Never Expected

Prior to Bethlehem God gave us his messengers, his teachers, his words. But in the manger God gave us himself. Extraordinary, don’t you think? I imagine even Gabriel scratched his head at the idea of “God with us.” Gabriel surely was not one to question his God-given missions. When God sent, Gabriel went.

And when word got out that God was to become a human, Gabriel was no doubt enthused. He could envision the moment: The Messiah in a blazing chariot. The King descending on a fiery cloud. An explosion of light from which the Messiah would emerge. What he never expected, however, was a slip of paper with a Nazarene address. “God will become a baby,” it read. “Tell the mother to name the child Jesus. And tell her not to be afraid.”

Gods With Us Promise

Jesus understands you. He’s faced hunger, sorrow, and death and wants to face them with you. The Bible says Jesus “understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin” (Hebrews 4:15).

If Jesus understands our weaknesses, then so does God. Jesus was God in human form. He was God with us. That’s why Jesus is called Immanuel. Immanu means “with us.” El refers to Elohim, or God. So Immanuel is not an “above-us God” or a “somewhere-in-the-neighborhood God.” He came as the “with-us God.” All of us.

“I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). Search for restrictions on the promise, and you’ll find none. There’s no withholding tax on God’s “with us” promise. God is with us. What great news!

Spiritual Family