A series preparing hearts for Easter… (Day 6)
We pause to listen to His Word,
linger,
lift up voice in prayer…
then go live the Word.
Listen to His Word (read):
Matthew 2:13-18 from NLT
After the wise men were gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up! Flee to Egypt with the child and his mother,” the angel said. “Stay there until I tell you to return, because Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”
That night Joseph left for Egypt with the child and Mary, his mother, and they stayed there until Herod’s death. This fulfilled what the Lord had spoken through the prophet: “I called my Son out of Egypt.”
Herod was furious when he realized that the wise men had outwitted him. He sent soldiers to kill all the boys in and around Bethlehem who were two years old and under, based on the wise men’s report of the star’s first appearance. Herod’s brutal action fulfilled what God had spoken through the prophet Jeremiah:
“A cry was heard in Ramah—
weeping and great mourning.
Rachel weeps for her children,
refusing to be comforted,
for they are dead.”
Linger…silently meditate on His Word:
That night Joseph left for Egypt with the child and Mary, his mother, and they stayed there until Herod’s death. This fulfilled what the Lord had spoken through the prophet: “I called my Son out of Egypt.”
(Join children in closing eyes and envisioning the passage, re-read again… again…linger.)
Lift up voice in prayer, responding to His Word:
Father, we marvel how You tranformed Egypt, the place where the babe Moses once floated down the Nile to escape the blade meant for all male infants, and used that same land as a place where the holy Child Jesus might find refuge.
At Your fingertips, places of death are made into places of life.
Mary and Joseph trusted You to deliver them even through the means of Egypt. Lead us into the same firm faith, Father. That in places that once meant death, we’d trust that You will bring forth life.
Places like the Cross.
Live the Word (contemplate it so long that it settles down into heart, hands, feet):
Today, have faith that places that seem to be dying places… God means to bring forth life.
Spend time today with someone who has hurt you. Show them Christ’s love. Have faith that God will to meet you there.
Watch for signs of new life.
Print, mount, cut, hang art symbol on Easter Tree
Artist: Dürer, Albrecht
