This advent devotional is about living with joy on a personal basis. There is truly only one way of living with joy all the time and that is with a personal relationship with Jesus.
Will it be easy? Absolutely not! Will it take a lot of work to keep the joy when things are falling apart? Absolutely! Will it be worth it in the end and for eternity? SO MUCH SO! And I'm looking forward to it.
God Bless and Merry Christmas.
How Do We Live Out Joy Personally?
When Jesus was born into this world, it had huge implications. Not only did He come to set the captives free (Luke 4:18), He also came to give His followers a brand new identity (2 Corinthians 5:17). Have you decided to put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ? If so, your entire identity has changed!
The love of Christ now compels us to live for Him and seek to glorify God in everything we do instead of trying to glorify ourselves. It’s a lifelong process, continuing to learn how to live for Jesus instead of living for ourselves.
Personally, we live out joy in our lives by spending time with God through prayer, reading the Bible, and trusting that the Holy Spirit will lead us to repentance, out of our old ways and into the newness of life in Christ. God will direct us on what it means to have a new identity and to be joyful in the process.
The Gospel drives our identity. As we progress and continue to see more and more just how sinful we are, we see how holy God really is. What Jesus did on the cross becomes that much more important for us and the cross gets bigger for us each day. The more we realize there is nothing we can do for our salvation and that everything has been done for us through Jesus, the more we can live out joy in our new identity as a follower of Christ.
Families with Young Children
KIDS, How do you think we can live out our joy? Read Psalm 16:11 and Psalm 126:3. KIDS, What does this verse tell us about our joy? When we spend time with God through prayer, or by reading our Bibles, He shows us the way to live and He fills us with joy. What does Psalm 126:3 remind us of? (that God has done great things for us) When we live our lives reminded of this and we tell others of all the great things that God has done in our lives, we are living out the joy that comes from the Lord.
Read Luke 2: 8-19. KIDS, What did the angel of the Lord say to the shepherds in the field? (good news of great joy for all people, a Savior, who is Christ the Lord is born) What happened after the angel spoke to the shepherds? (a multitude of heavenly hosts began praising God) What was the shepherd’s response? (they went to see for themselves the news the Lord had made known to them) How did the shepherds respond when they found Jesus? (they were glorifying and praising God for all they had seen and heard)
- KIDS, We’ve been waiting and waiting for Christmas to get here—just like God’s people had been waiting for a Savior. Except they’d been waiting for hundreds of years! So, when the shepherds got the good news that the Savior had come at last, there was no way they were going to keep that news to themselves. The Savior is here, and He’s here to rescue all people! They were full of joy because they had found the angels words to be true and they broke out in praise because God had sent Jesus, the Savior! And, just like the shepherds, we can have joy because we know that God’s Word is true. We can celebrate that He sent us Jesus and we can live out our joy by praising and glorifying God!
-Author Unknown
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