Hanging Onto His Promises (No pun intended)

Sometimes I start my own traditions.
Part of it is that I'm getting older and I want something new to carry with me.
Part of it is that I'm getting older and I want these memories with my best friend to keep when I go.
Part of it is that this time is hard and my heart is hurting and I need to passionately remind myself that God is still who He says He is.

That's why I made my own advent calendar.

(I got the scriptures from this website.)

Each cone, each day, has two scriptures. One is a prophecy about Christ in the Old testament. The second is the fulfillment of  that prophecy in Scripture.
25 days, 25 promises fulfilled.
Not only little slips of grace for every day of advent, but I'm so excited about day 25. Christmas day leaves us hope for all the other days, because the scripture is promise of His second coming.

Hope can be hard to find. We search and we scrounge, never realizing that hope's always been there but we're living with eyes closed. 

Maybe something new is springing out of something I've been looking at but never really seeing. 

Gifts. The hope is in the gifts. And not because the gifts are good or plentiful but because the Giver is good and plentiful. He gives us gifts so we can see Him. He begs us to just open our eyes because "No matter how we're hurting-it's only when we lose hope that the real horror happens." All we need is to turn our eyes upon Jesus and if we really see Him, everything else will follow. 

James says that when we see Him we will be like Him. I dare to suggest that while, yes, when we see Him at the second coming or our transition to Heaven we will be transformed to look like Him, He gives us little glimpses of Him, little glimpses of hope, so that we can be like Him now, even if just a microscopic portion of us. We are being transformed as we are being renewed every day. We may be plagued and poisoned by sin, but He is every day redeeming us, pulling away the filth and making something new.  

"Behold, I am doing a new thing;
now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness
and rivers in the desert." Isaiah 43:19

He will take our desert souls, our wild lives, and from them new life will spring. 

So this, friends, is our hope for the season, for our lives (cause why shouldn't our whole lives be lived in Advent anticipation?). He will show us more of Him so we can be more like Him. More of Him is always the answer.He has fulfilled His promises before and our God never change so He will do it again.

We are promised to become like Him.
We are promised to see Him. 
We are promised to never walk alone.
We are promised that our Bridegroom is coming back for us and we will finally be home. 

Hold on to a hope that will not disappoint. He's coming.
He's coming.