“… It had been revealed to him [Simeon] by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ” (Luke 2:26).

How much time passed from the giving of the promise to its fulfillment? Decades? Years? Months? Or was it far less? There is not one clue as to how long this godly man waited and no statement confirming that he was an old man, only that he was a hopeful man who knew he would not die until he personally saw the one who would destroy the sting of death. That’s what Simeon was waiting for. And isn’t that what we are waiting for? The central mission of Messiah was to remove the threat of death for all who would trust Him as the Life-Giver (1 Corinthians 15:55).

How would we live if we knew we were indestructible? Did Simeon become a bit less careful when crossing streets, or eating deep-fried food at the “Judea County Fair?” I doubt he took the guarantee as a license to make foolish decisions with his safety or health, but he DID know he was abiding under the personal protection of God. This man was not waiting to die. He was waiting to live. Christmas is a celebration of life. Not just the beginning of the earthly life of Jesus the Son of God, but the celebration of the end of the fear of death, because the ultimate “abolitionist” had finally arrived.

One of the sweetest and most faith-filled aspects of Advent is found in the way we choose to rejoice through the days of anticipation, knowing that hope is on the horizon as the star is moving across the night sky, though we have no idea HOW God will pull this off. God is in the business of “getting our hopes up,” and Simeon would live the rest of his days with this outrageous, stabilizing hope that he would cheat death every day, until he saw His Savior.

Let’s choose to live more fully every day, free of the fear of death, knowing that God is able to fulfill all He declares. Don’t worry about how He’ll get it done, or when He will get it done. Enjoy each moment living on the rock of His promises. “Being fully convinced that God is able to do whatever He promised” (Romans 4:21).

Let hope rise…But look both ways crossing the street.

“And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was with him. And it had been revealed to Him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ” (Luke 2:25-26).

His name was Simeon. We don’t know his occupation, but at heart, he was a “waiter.” He was waiting for the “consolation of Israel” aka the Messiah. He was living with a personal promise. We don’t know how or when or where the promise was made known to him. We don’t know how long he had been living with a sense of indestructibility, but Simeon had been told with certainty that he would live to see the Messiah.

I can imagine him waking up early every day, maybe even having trouble sleeping at times, wondering if the next day would be THE day he would “see the Lord’s Christ.”

Perhaps he heard about the Christmas plan before the priest Zechariah & his wife Elizabeth, or Mary & her carpenter fiancé, Joseph. Maybe this news had been entrusted to him for years rather than just days, weeks or months. But that ancient hope, voiced by the long line of prophets, was now his own soul-strengthening secret as angels of heaven practiced their lines for the big event. God’s promises have a way of doing that, don’t they? Hold tightly to the ones you’ve discovered.

Let’s leave Simeon in his season of anticipation for a few weeks, and try to grasp his perspective and imagine what this would have been like to wonder if every baby, boy or full grown man, might have been “the One you’ve been waiting for.”

Life truly begins as we die to ourselves and trust in Christ.

Once we receive Jesus into our lives, His Spirit joins with our human spirit, and we become born again as new creations in Christ. Our sinful life is exchanged with the righteous life of Christ. Our lives take on new meaning and true purpose, but this does not mean we are always living according to this newness of life. This is why Paul says, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25, NKJV).

The Apostle Paul understood that we still have a natural selfish bent in life that gives us the potential to act according to our fallen nature, which can affect both our personal walk with God and the kind of fellowship we will have with other believers. Our family upbringing, fallen nature and personal choices have predisposed us to act and react in certain ways based on our previous conditioning. Sometimes, we try to excuse our behavior and bad habits by telling others, “This is just who I am.” Our insecurities and personal hang-ups still need to pass through the cross, so that we don’t let our past identity affect our new identity in Christ.

Of all the battles being fought in our world, the believer’s battle between the flesh and the Spirit is the most critical. Our personal holiness and influence on others depend on our victory in this area. Therefore, we must learn to appropriate Christ’s finished work on the cross and learn to walk in the newness of the Spirit.

Paul the Apostle said,

“I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law” (Galatians 5:16-18, NKJV).

To be led by or to walk in the Spirit means to be governed and guided by His Spirit. This has to do with right belief more than right behavior. It is having a Gospel-centered way of thinking where we rely on God more than trying harder.

In our daily practice, it means choosing God’s will over our own will, so that we “do not do the things that [we] wish.” Only then can we overcome evil with good and be “the salt and light” we are called to be.

The Gospel takes us directly to the cross where both sin and the sinner were judged, forgiven and graciously exchanged for an entirely different way of life based on what Christ has done and continues to do through us!

Here are three essential ways to explain and maintain our daily walk in the Spirit:

1. Acknowledge God’s Presence in your life and your absolute need for His grace.

This begins by thanking God for His abiding presence and realizing that we always need God. Jesus said in John 15:5, “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.” (emphasis mine)

Since we all gravitate toward the appetites and confidence of our flesh, whether rebellious or religious in nature, our natural inclination can still be to solve our own problems and fulfill our own desires. But victory comes as we look to Christ for our sufficiency and satisfaction. David wrote in his famous shepherd’s psalm, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want” (Psalm 23:1). It is only as we are communing with God and aware of His presence that we will no longer need to rely on ourselves or look elsewhere for fulfillment.

The Apostle Paul makes a very important distinction in Galatians 5:19-21 when he calls our former sinful practices “the works of the flesh,” emphasizing what we naturally do apart from God, but when speaking of the life of the Spirit, he changes his verbiage and uses the term “the fruit of the Spirit.” Notice that it is no longer our works but His work in us that makes all the difference for us to become more like Christ. We are called to work out what God has already worked within, even as Paul reminds us, “for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13, NKJV).

Paul further explains that the fruit of the Spirit is LOVE – expressed in joy, peace, longsuffering, etc. Thus, walking in the Spirit will result in abiding in Christ’s love. This is possible only as we are rooted and connected to the life of Christ – since there can be no real FRUIT without the right ROOT.

2. Believe in God’s Promises and look past your own perspective.

Regardless of what we are going through, we must know what God reveals to us in His living Word. The Word of God declares who we are, how we are to live, and what we shall become.

With Christ living in us, we can heed God’s wisdom in Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.”

Although it is natural for us to lean on our own understanding in order to explain a situation or solve a problem, we are called to trust in God by learning and leaning on what He says to us. He will direct our paths as we acknowledge Him in all of our ways.

We must remember that there are no ties when it comes to the flesh battling against the Spirit. We are either under the influence of the Spirit or being governed by the flesh. Jesus said, “the spirit gives life and the flesh profits nothing (John 6:63). We are either carnally minded which leads to death or spiritually minded which leads to “life and peace” (Romans 8:6).

Thus, God’s promises are the right starting point for every situation we find ourselves in. His promise should be the premise of every process. Rather than always needing an explanation for our present circumstances, we should learn to live with an expectation of God’s promised conclusions.

Therefore, it is wise for us to learn and memorize the promises revealed in God’s treasure chest of Scripture and to unlearn what it means to be wise in our own opinions (Romans 12:16).

3. Rely on God’s Power and His sufficiency for our lives.

Even with a right spiritual mindset, we must not try to do the right thing in our own strength. Since we live in a fallen world that is constantly working against us and wearing us down, we must come to Him to find His rest for our souls. In order to walk in the Spirit, we must STOP TRYING and START DYING to be regularly RELYING on God!

We must believe that Christ has already given us the means and the motive to do all that He asks of us. With His every command comes the necessary grace to fulfill what He asks of us. It is His strength and power that matters. We are no longer living our own life but His. “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.” (2 Corinthians 4:7)

Our victory lies in believing the Gospel and living in the present reality of who Christ is in us!

Paul puts it this way to Timothy, “be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 2:1). This means that we are to be strong in the strength that we do not have. Walking in the Spirit requires us to turn to God in the Spirit, surrender our will to His, and receive by faith what He alone is able to provide.

The human spirit fails unless the Holy Spirit fills!

God is eager to surprise us with his wonders when we pray radically to love radically. We need to pray with great anticipation, radical expectation and unwavering confidence in the finished redemptive work of Christ Jesus. Then God will surprise us saying, “Here my son; here my daughter. This is what you really need!” God expects us to be one hundred percent strong, real, set apart, consistent, resilient, obedient, humble, teachable and dedicated. This leads to a readiness to arise, go and be prepared to engage and lead others into any battle He sends for the greater hallowing of His name.

Joshua 3:5 does not leave any room for negotiation with God. It eliminates any excuse for bringing shame to our Father’s name or for hurting the people we say we love. It presents a very critical, urgent and super important message for today because the church is being defiled, the gospel misinterpreted; and America is in spiritual ruins.

The key is consecration to God.

The definition of consecration is to be set apart for a holy use, to dedicate to God our Father and to Him alone. It involves being sanctified and purified, to devote ourselves one hundred percent to our Holy Good Father alone!

Joshua told the people, “Consecrate yourselves, because the LORD will do wonders among you tomorrow.” This also is a personal invitation from Yahweh Himself to Christians today, and we must obey without delay. Yahweh means the God who delivers.

Yahweh is making you an amazing irresistible promise today. He wants to deliver you and free you from whatever handicap, slavery, addiction, oppression, falsehood, misconceptions or imprisonment you are experiencing.

He is offering to heal you from mental, emotional or physical handicaps by transforming the disposition of your heart, which is the central station or the control room for a Christian.

Yahweh delivers one time without any type of recovery program. Jesus came to make us brand new. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ (one hundred percent consecrated), he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. (2 Corinthians 5:17)

It is sad to see a great number of Christians allow their emotions to control them and paralyze them with fear.

In Ephesians 1:17-20 God tells us that He will open our eyes of understanding, so we will know that His power that raised Jesus from the dead is available for us. We have no excuse to live in spiritual paralysis.

We find the account of Moses leading the children of Israel out of Egypt in Exodus 14. Moses told the Israelites to stand still and see the salvation of the LORD (Yahweh.) When they crossed the Red Sea and saw the dead Egyptians on the seashore they believed in Yahweh and in Moses. How sad that their belief lasted only three days. Then they went back to their complaining.

For God our Father to bless us and to surprise us with His wonders time after time, we must consecrate ourselves to Him and to Him alone. He will not share us with the world or with the things of the prince of the world. It is either all or nothing: one hundred percent in or one hundred percent out!

Since God has offered us the help we need to live consecrated lives, why do we continue to live in the danger and misery of uncertainty and insecurity? We must stop bringing shame to our Good Father and stop being a double minded agent. We need to consecrate ourselves to Yahweh immediately, so we can enjoy His transforming powerful wonders. Ask Him to make you hungrier and thirstier for His righteousness. You do not need to keep faking it or continue to live in the dumpster. Take your mask off, surrender now to our Good Father, repent with godly sorrow and become real because Jesus is the real deal.

It is encouraging to know that He will always fight for us and make us victorious.

If we are prepared, God oftentimes uses these battles to build us up with His strong and mighty, credible character to equip us for fulfilling His great commission. One of our ministry goals should be to pitch our tent to tabernacle and get dirty with any neighbor our Father chooses to send our way.

Joshua chapter one gives the account of God’s commands and promises as Joshua prepared the Israelites to cross the river Jordan to enter the Promised Land. God gave Joshua the same promises He had given Moses regarding Israel’s inheritance. God continued to move Israel toward the Promised Land during Joshua’s leadership just as He had with throughout Moses’ time. By following God’s command not to turn to the right or to the left from the Law, the people were to keep their eyes fixed on our Father. They were to be consumed with the Word by meditating on it day and night. Then came God’s promise that He would be with them wherever they went. On the other hand, we also see that God requires complete obedience and those in the camp who did not obey were to be put to death. Disobedience is not acceptable. They were not only to profess but also possess the Word of God.

The book of Joshua is about conquering the land that God promised to His chosen people who kept rejecting Him.

God is a very persistent loving, merciful and gracious Father, who suffers deeply and long. He never gives up pursuing His children with His radical, irresistible love! Jesus realized how much the Father loves Him, and therefore, became our substitute to perish on the cross. God loved Moses so much that He forgave his sin of disobedience of smiting the rock instead of speaking to it. He did not give Moses a do-over opportunity, and Moses still had to suffer the penalty of his sin; he was not allowed to enter the Promised Land. We need to take a radical time out to heed this clear and urgent warning for us to run to our Father NOW in genuine repentance to plead with urgency for the heart of Jesus Christ with a new beginning.

Unlike Moses, Jesus finished the work and completed the radical and impossible mission God the Father gave to Him, John 17:4 and 19:3. We need to follow Christ’s example rather than Moses’ who took God’s Word, mercy and grace for granted like many of us do every single day. We need to be like Joshua and be willing to pay the price of real and effective leadership to arise, go, and prepare that will please Yahweh to lead His people into the Promised Land. God expects His disciples to lead at a moment’s notice. Radical prayer is essential in meeting this expectation. In verse two God’s first command to Joshua was to arise and go over this Jordan. God the deliverer wants to deliver you and me just like He delivered Joshua and the Israelites. Our battles are the Lord’s just as Joshua’s were. Let us commit to stop reacting and rebelling out of fear and anger. Rather, respond out of love to empower us by GRACE with radical courage, and not hide or run away from reality like prodigals do. Our Father does not want to hire us but love on us radically and lavishly.

Joshua followed God’s command to prepare the Israelites to cross the Jordan. Joshua told the people to prepare provisions for themselves because in three days they would cross over into the land that was promised to them. Faith by all participants was necessary because, at that time of year, the waters of the Jordan were overflowing, making it impossible for them to cross.

To arise, go, and prepare like Joshua did with his hope alive requires a relationship of trust and intimacy with our Father through radical, Biblical prayer.

By being prepared in this way, we can expect our Father to surprise us at any moment, even when the situation seems impossible. Our Father will make a way out of situations that seem impossible. He will open new doors, making what appears impossible to become very possible. When this occurs, we become by faith radical partakers of our Father’s unlimited grace that produces radical courage to empower us to obey radically. Biblical courage is doing what is right in the eyes of God our Father, regardless of the consequences. We must be willing to live out our Biblical courage.

True, effective and lasting leadership is driven and sustained by Biblical (Truth of the Word) radical prayer.

Much more is accomplished on our knees than on our feet! Radical prayer defines who we are as Christians and hence establishes our current and eternal legacy as Christians. In conclusion, consider the following questions: Is Jesus the full and exclusive object of your affection and satisfaction? If not, why not? Are you ready to arise, go, and prepare? If not, why not?

Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians is such an amazing bit of real estate in the Bible! In it, we discover that Paul, the great apostle, church planter and New Testament author experienced the same kind of deep, personal pain we experience when our motives, our message and our mission come under attack. It can be argued that 2 Corinthians contains the most spiritually and emotionally intense portions in all of his writings. In it, Paul bared his soul, and he revealed how he was so deeply wounded by the fickle hearts of men and women he had loved and served for over a year and a half.

“I will gladly spend myself and all I have for you, even though it seems that the more I love you, the less you love me” (2 Corinthians 12:15 NLT).

In this letter, the Holy Spirit reveals to us so much of Paul: his sufferings, his values and his motives. In it, we gain invaluable insight into Spirit-led leadership, and how a man with legitimate authority should exercise that authority when it was being challenged! THAT is no easy bit of road to navigate! The Holy Spirit shows us how Paul could love (11: 11) — but also rebuke (12: 11). He shows how Paul was legitimately angry with the Corinthian believers — yet he constantly grieved over them and continued to love them.

But here’s another really big reason why 2 Corinthians is so important for us that the Holy Spirit inspired it and preserved it for us: It’s in the context of Paul’s heart crushing dealings with the Corinthians that we find some of the MOST precious promises and powerful doctrinal teaching in the New Testament. In 2 Peter, we’re told that God has “granted to us His precious and very great promises.” On this side of heaven, we have read and held fast to many of those promises found in 2 Corinthians. But they become even greater — even more precious — when we understand the pit from which they were mined.

It was in the context of wading through the muck and mire of a messy church and all the personal pain and spiritual challenges that arose from it that Paul wrote: “For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory” (2 Corinthians 1:20).

That truth was the solid ground that Paul held to in the maelstrom of spiritual and emotional chaos involving the church in Corinth. When the lives and ministry he had invested in there at Corinth were like shifting sand, Paul was able to hold his ground because he knew that God’s promises were unchanging and unfailing. We learn from Paul that the only solid thing in the universe is the Word of God (Matthew 7:24-25). When our emotions cause us to question the Word of God, we need to cling to the Word of God not our emotions.

Here’s another great promise that is even more precious when we think of the situation Paul was in when he wrote it: “Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:4-6).

Ministry is not simply a matter of man doing God’s work.

Ministry is God doing His work through human agency. The men and women in the church in Corinth had pretty much decided that Paul wasn’t competent to minister because he had no credentials — no letters of recommendation. Paul stood on this great truth: NO credentials or training are sufficient to make one a minister. Gospel work is simply beyond the scope of human man capacity. It is the gifts and power of the Spirit ALONE that make a man or woman able ministers of the Gospel. All that Paul had done for Jesus was being assaulted! The men and women he loved so deeply, served so well and suffered so long with agreed with those who attacked Paul’s motives and message. Yet, Paul held fast to the truth that it is God who qualifies us and enables us to live on mission with Jesus and for Jesus. When the spiritual warfare is intense and we’re being bombarded with the thought, Who do you think you are to think you can do anything for Jesus — remember everything Paul was going through when he wrote 2 Corinthians 3:4-6.

Here’s another great and precious promise that becomes even greater and more precious to me in light of all that Paul was dealing with when he wrote it:

“But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:9-10).

This is perhaps the key verse for the entire book. The tense of the verb in 2 Corinthians 12:9 is important: “And He [God] has once-for-all said to me.” This was serious stuff that God wanted settled once and for all in Paul’s heart. The problem is that we HATE those circumstances that show us our weakness! Paul Tripp calls those circumstances uncomfortable grace. As Paul prayed about his problem, his thorn in the flesh, God gave Paul a promise and a truth. Both the promise and the truth are totally counterintuitive — totally against every natural inclination and desire.

“My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Paul was desperate in his desire to find relief from his thorn in the flesh. There are two ways of relief: Remove the load or strengthen the shoulder that bears the load. Instead of taking away the thorn, God strengthened Paul under it and showed His strength through Paul’s apparent weakness.

We really don’t believe God’s grace is sufficient until we believe we are insufficient. For many of us, especially in the American culture, this is a huge obstacle. We are the people who idolize the “self-made man” and want to rely on ourselves. We also idolize comfort. But we can’t receive God’s strength until we know our weakness. We can’t receive the sufficiency of God’s grace until we know our own insufficiency.

“My grace is sufficient for you.” We can read this with emphasis in several places

“My grace is sufficient for you.” Grace is the unmerited favor and love of God in action. Can you hear it from God? ”The love and favor that you don’t deserve from Me is enough for you.”

“My grace is sufficient for you.” Whose grace is it? It is the grace of Jesus. What will Jesus fail at? Remember too that Jesus suffered thorns, so He cares; and He knows.

“My grace is sufficient for you.” It is right now. Not that it will be some day but right now, at this moment, His grace is sufficient.

“My grace is sufficient for you.” I’m so glad God didn’t say, “My grace is sufficient for Paul the Apostle.” YOU can be the “you” in for you. God’s grace is sufficient for you! Are you beyond it? Are you so different? Is your thorn worse than Paul’s or worse than many others who have known the triumph of Jesus? Of course not, this sufficient grace is for you.

Paul’s personal suffering at that time was the very thing by which God’s power would have it’s most perfect manifestation. CHRISTIANS — We treasure the very thing that will mute — obscure — diminish or distort the display of God’s strength! We do not live on explanations; we live on promises. Our feelings change, but God’s promises never change. Promises generate faith, and faith strengthens hope. I’ll close with this one

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).

J. Sidlow Baxter said this about 2 Corinthians: “It was written with a quill dipped in tears, from the apostle’s anguish of heart, and contains more of human pathos than any other of his letters. Yet there is a lovely rainbow shining through it all, for in his dire distress and deep disappointment he is discovering more than ever before that ‘the Father of mercies is the God of all comfort.’”

“The Father of Mercies” — The New English Bible reads it as “the all—merciful Father”

“The God of all comfort,” Please remember the real life context in which Paul wrote these words!

This is theology experienced in real time! Paul experienced it. The Holy Spirit inspired Paul to state it. All comfort comes from God. When we are uncomfortable, we should come to Him because He calls us, invites us, urges us and appeals to us in all our affliction. God comforts us no matter what the problem is.

I love this fourth verse in 1 Corinthians 1 because it tells how the economy of the divine comforts works: We are troubled. We receive comfort from the Lord. We look for others who are struggling and seek to provide the same comfort we have received from Christ.

Don’t miss this. Paul knew this as reality from out of his total experience as a Christian. But he shared his experience of God’s comfort with the very people whose actions and attitudes towards him were soul crushing!