Saturday within the Octave of the Feast of the Nativity of our Lord
Posted on December 31, 2022 by under
Scripture: Ephesians 1:3-6 (NKJV)
1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, 5 having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, 6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.
Devotion
“He made us accepted in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.”
Even though we sinful human beings were unacceptable in God’s sight and deserved only the eternal torments of hell, God’s Word tells us that we have been made “accepted in the Beloved,” in the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ kept God’s commandments perfectly in our stead and atoned for all our sins. He redeemed us sinners with His holy and precious blood, shed for us on the cross. Through faith in Jesus Christ, we have God’s pardon and forgiveness for all our sins and eternal life with Him. Through faith in Christ Jesus, we are justified and acceptable in God’s sight!
It is as St. Paul wrote in Colossians 1:19–23: “For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight—if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel…”
Prayer: Almighty and everlasting God, direct our actions according to Thy good pleasure, that in the name of Thy beloved Son we may be made to abound in good works; through the same Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
Collect for the Feast of the Nativity of our Lord
Grant, we beseech Thee, Almighty God, that the new Birth of Thine Only-Begotten Son in the flesh may set us free who are held in the old bondage under the yoke of sin; through the same Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
