The advent story does not begin with the birth of Jesus. The advent story really begins with the foretelling of the birth of Jesus. In Luke 1:26-38 we see the angel Gabriel come to Mary and announce that she will be the mother of Jesus. It is a story that we are all very familiar with. Did you know that this is not even where the story begins?
"Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel." Isaiah 7:14
This is a verse that is written around 700 years before the birth of Jesus. We can see that the divine providence of God was working even well before Jesus was born in a manger.
There are many other verse that foretell events that occur during the Advent season. Here is a list of some of them:
Isaiah 7:14 is fulfilled in Matthew 1:22-23 (Jesus would be born of a virgin)
Micah 5:2 is fulfilled in Matthew 2:5-6 (Jesus would be born in Bethlehem)
Jeremiah 31:15 is fulfilled in Matthew 2:14-15 (Jesus born under Pharaoh's threat)
Hosea 11:1 is fulfilled in Matthew 2:14-15 (Mary and Joseph take Jesus to Egypt)
These are just a few. This is really cool that the Advent story was written long before it ever occurred.
Here is a video to help us work through some of the prophecy in the Old Testament that points us to the Birth of Jesus.
Service Opportunities
We have some opportunities to serve our community in the coming weeks.
This coming Saturday sign up to ring the bells for the Salvation Army at the Pick N Save in cedar creek. We are ringing with a group. The group code is CCPC. Here is the link that you can sign up at:
The second opportunity we have is with Hearts of Hope. This year we will be doing curbside delivery for Hearts of Hope. Families will be coming for pick up between 9-12 on Saturday December 19. We volunteers to help deliver gifts to the cars as the pull into the parking lot. Please let me know if you can help us out with this. Email me at dan@covenatncommunitypc.org.
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