Thursday Devotion: Colossians 1:11-20

Stand strong my brothers and sisters.

Be bold in your faith friends and neighbors.

These may be hard times for our country, for our loved ones or even ourselves. The holiday season is quickly approaching, and this is generally the time of the year when people start having a hard time: remembering loved ones who have past, seeing loved ones for the firs time, reliving old drams and reopening old scars. However, there is hope. Just you wait.

Along with the holiday season, the church is entering the time of Advent, which is the time of waiting, of anticipation, of joyous proclamation of the times to come. What am I talking about? The birth of the savior. Advent is the time where the world prepares for the arrival of the messiah, which is the beginning of the good news.

The rest of the good news is that the messiah grew up, died and rose again for us! With this came the many gifts: strength, compassion, a community, and above all else a love that surpasses all understanding. No matter what we're going through, are looking down, or feel like God is with us and is always showing up for us.

Let this passage be a reminder of the bigness of God. Let it be a reminder of how much God cares for us and all that God is willing to do for us, with us and through us. God has us in his hands, which means nothing can overcome us--no wind, sea or storm shall pull us under. God shows up and protects us through it all.

Stand strong.
Be bold.
Pray hard.
Know that God is with you, for you and by you!

Colossians 1:11-20 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

11 May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. 13 He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. 15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; 16 for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him. 17 He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.