Christmas Colors - Black
Devotional for November 26-December 2,
2007
Day One Wrong Person
“How is Joey enjoying middle school?”
I asked his mom at the school recently.
“Now, let me think,” she replied, “I am think I know who Joey is, but I am not
sure how middle school is going for him.”
I looked up at Andrea who stood
behind the woman. Andrea had her “you
are not talking to who you think you are talking to” look. I know this look well,
it is big eyes, a shaking head, and a subtle, but obvious, look of
disgust. I have seen this look often as
I frequently mistake people for someone else.
This time it was a very excusable mistake, the woman had been speaking
of her second grade daughter Maggie; Joey has a second grade sister named
Maggie. Plus, this woman looked exactly
like Maggie and Joey’s mom, only she was not her. Now this was one time that Andrea actually
agreed that there was a huge similarity in the looks of this woman compared to
the non-Joey, Maggie’s mom. While I am
often far off, this time even Andrea admitted to thinking this was Joey’s mom
as well, she won’t admit it but I think she had made the same mistake
earlier. Nevertheless, this was not
Joey’s mom. No matter how much she
looked like her or even that she also had a second grade daughter named Maggie,
it still was not Joey’s mom. There was
no way to make her be Joey’s mom, no matter how much I tried. I had the wrong person.
I am not the only one who frequently
makes the mistake of picking the wrong person.
It is a mistake that goes all the way back to the old
testament. Let’s begin by looking
at a major “wrong person” mistake made by Abraham. To understand his “wrong person” mistake we
must first look at who he was looking for.
What does God tell Abraham in Genesis 12:1-4?
Who is this promise to?
Who is the giver of the promise?
Who is the person of the promise (the
receiver)?
Now, let’s look at Abraham’s “wrong
person” mistake. Who does Abraham
choose as the “wrong person” in Genesis 16:1-4?
Why did he make this “wrong person”
mistake?
Abraham’s “wrong person” mistake was
a combination of many factors but it probably all boils down to the fact that
God’s promise was not coming fast enough or in the way he expected it to
come. It was probably a
issue of doubt in God and in himself.
Whatever the reason, he made a huge “wrong person” mistake. Continue reading the story in Genesis 16:4-5
and see what the consequences of his “wrong person” mistake were.
What would it have taken for Abraham
to have made a “right person” choice?
How can you avoid “wrong person”
mistakes?
Day Two The Right Person
I have a boy on my 7-8 year olds basketball
team who has been a challenge since our first practice. He is easily distracted
and is often causing fights with the other boys. I regret to say that he has spent a
substantial amount of time sitting on the side during practices due to bad
behavior. Recently, however, we were
losing a game (we are pretty experienced at losing games) when I realized
something about this boy. When he is on
the court he is everywhere, except for his designated position, he cannot keep
still. When he is near to the person
with the ball he is waving his arms attempting to slap the ball away from the
offensive player. During this particular
game, as I gave up getting him to his actual position and gave up telling him
not to slap at the ball, it occurred to me that I could use all these seemingly
frustrated traits. At a timeout I called
him over and told him that he was now in charge of being in the face of the
offensive player whenever they were throwing the ball back into play. I told him to stand as close to the line at
the ref would permit and to wave his arms and to jump around as much as
possible trying to distract the offensive player. As it turned out he was the exact “right
person” for this job! We still did not
win, but we gave the other team a great deal of grief when they were attempting
to pass the ball into play.
Often times it takes a lot of work
but it is worth it when we find the “right person.”
Prior to Christ the people had been
looking for the “right person”. They had
been looking for the Messiah, the chosen, anointed one. Throughout time, there had been many who had
been the “chosen” ones, such as prophets and priests. The Messiah, however, that they were looking
for, was “THE” chosen one. What does
Andrew say about Christ in John 1:40-41?
How do you think that Andrew knew
that Christ was “THE” chosen one?
Why do you think so many people did
not make this identification?
How did you discover that Christ was
and is “The Chosen One”?
How do you recognized
that now?
Day Three A Proper Picture
Anyone who has lived in Oklahoma over
the past two decade has heard of the place called Tar Creek. Tar Creek is the area around Picher,
Oklahoma, located in Northeast Oklahoma famous for the fact that it has been designated
as the number one worst location in the United States for hazardous
environmental conditions. This area was
a major mining area in the first part of the 20th century. Even though the mines are no longer active,
the waste left behind in the Chat piles and other consequences of the mining,
has exposed the population to lead and zinc poisons. I have heard of this area since the 1980s and
had a very clear picture of what it would look like in my mind. I have never been to this area but had an
idea what it would look like from the stories I had heard. I was wrong.
I recently watched a documentary called “The River Runs Red” which not
only showed the mining areas and the remaining Chat piles but it also had many
examples of the town and people who continue to live there. It looked nothing like what I expected. Except for the Chat piles in the background
it was a very green and nice looking town.
I was amazed at how this town, which has toxic chat piles located on the
outskirts of the town and frequently has to deal with sinkholes within the town,
is a town that looks picturesque and quaint.
It in no way was the toxic mess that I had imagined all these years.
We frequently get a picture in our
mind of something we have heard about and are often very surprised when we find
the true, proper picture, to be very different from our expectations.
In John 4:1-26 we see Jesus’
encounter with the Samaritan woman. From
reading this story, what do you think the woman’s picture in her mind was of
God and the coming Messiah?
How did Christ confirm and confound
her expectations?
What was the result, the impact on
her life?
What pictures do you have of Christ
and how He will work in your life?
How has your own experience with
Christ confirmed or confounded your expectations?
How do your expectations often keep
you from seeing the work of Christ?
Day Four Missing the Obvious
Recently I was looking for my
belt. I went to get my belt and it was
not in the proper location. I had placed
it on the back of the chair that sits in our bedroom, which I always do, and
the next morning it was not there. I
looked everywhere and it was not anywhere to be found. The belt bandit had
obviously entered our house during the night and taken my belt, nothing else
just my belt. As I stood in the closet
after conducting an exhausting search for the belt I asked Andrea if she had
seen the belt. It was at this point that
I saw the look on her face that made me realize that it was not the belt bandit
afterall,
I now knew that this conspiracy was actually the work of one Andrea A. Anthony.
“Just look in front of you,” she said
as she rolled her eyes.
Looking straight ahead I still saw
nothing that resembled the missing belt.
She then walked over to the closet,
this is when I began to know that my belt theory was incorrect and that I was
about to look rather foolish. She
reached in front of me, at my eye lever, and pulled the belt from the hanger.
“Here it is,” she said walking away,
still with eyes rolling.
For some reason she had found fault
with my “keep the belt on the back of the chair” system and had decided that it
needed to be stored in the closet. It
was not what I expected and therefore was very easily missed by me. It may have been right in front of my eyes
but it still was not where I was expecting so is was
easily missed.
I often miss things that are right in
front of me because they are not where I expect them to be. I actually think most people are this
way. I am sure this is especially true in
relation to God. We have God figured out
and miss Him when He is not where we expect to discover Him.
Read in John 1:1-11 and see what God
did to help us see the coming Christ.
Even though God sent a messenger to
prepare people to see Christ, many still failed to see Him. Why do you think so many failed to see
Christ?
Many did not see Christ because He
did not come in the manner they expected.
He was not who and where they had decided they would be so they missed
Him. What does John 1:12-13 say about
those who did see Christ?
How do people miss Christ even today?
How can you make sure that you do not
miss Him?
Day Five Seeing Clearly
In the summer of 1984 I served on as
a youth camp staffer as part of a team that would travel the western United
States conducting camps. Each week we
would play a game where all of the camp staff would hide in different places
and all the campers would attempt to find us.
One of the weeks were at a camp near Mt. Baker
in the northern part of the state of Washington. This camp was located deep in the forest that
led up to Mt Baker, it was a beautiful area.
On the day that we played the staff find game I
came up with the bright idea of hiding under one of the camp buildings which
had a small crawl space. I crawled up in
the far corner under the building sure that no one would ever find me. I was right, as it layed
there in the dirt under this building no one came looking for me. There I laid, in total darkness, for a long
time. It was a long enough time to hear
crawling noises of other creatures that were under the building with me. Creature I could not see or identify. I could only imagine what they were, to this day I imagine what creature I was laying there
with. I eventually crawled out of my
hiding space because the darkness of my great location soon became too much to
handle. Darkness is that way, it can
cause you to imagine the worst and not be able to identify anything.
Yesterday we saw Christ identified as
“the light of the world.” We saw that
John came as a forerunner to Christ to prepare the people for the light. We saw in John 1:7 that John came to testify
of the light that was to come; the light that was and is Jesus Christ. How did John prepare the people to see the
light (see Matthew 3:1-12)?
How is this preparation still
applicable to us today?
How do you prepare for Christ?