Celebrating the True Meaning of Advent
Focus on the Family with Jim Daly
Focus on the Family
4.7 • 4.5K Ratings
🗓️ 8 December 2023
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Gary Thomas explains the meaning of Advent, “God with us,” by using a true story about a visit to a ranch where he saw a great word picture: a lone horse and a lone sheep who wouldn’t leave each other’s sides. The rancher explained that there used to be an entire flock of sheep, but they were all picked off by coyote. This one sheep figured out that as long as he stayed near that big horse, he was safe. And he remains there to this day. And we, like that sheep, are safe because of Advent – “God with us.”
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Alyssa suffered through 11 years of her husband's addiction, and she feared the worst. |
| 0:05.6 | After we had called focus on the family, that was really the journey where we started to see God moving and working. I know that focus on |
| 0:16.4 | the family was just an answered prayer. I'm Jim Daly. This season help us |
| 0:21.0 | give families hope and when you give today your donation will be doubled. |
| 0:26.0 | Donate at focus on the family.com slash gift. The message of Advent is that God is with us and there is no problem in your life bigger than God. |
| 0:48.0 | Well as we enter a really busy holiday season we have a message of reflection and encouragement for you from |
| 0:54.1 | pastor Gary Thomas. Thanks for joining us this is focus on the family with your |
| 0:58.1 | host focus president and author Jim Daly and I'm John Fuller. As many of you know, Advent began on Sunday and it is a wonderful practice of focusing on the biblical aspect of Christmas. |
| 1:10.0 | Advent is when we remember God's promises to send a Messiah and we see how Jesus |
| 1:15.9 | fulfilled every prophecy that had been written about him. We can rejoice in |
| 1:20.8 | knowing that Jesus's birth, life, death, and resurrection made it possible |
| 1:25.8 | for us to have a relationship with God and to one day spend eternity with Him. |
| 1:31.3 | And today we're featuring a message from Gary Thomas that will bring you |
| 1:35.2 | a vivid picture of how we can live out the principles of the Advent season. |
| 1:40.5 | And if you can't stay with us be sure to visit our website where we have a special |
| 1:44.6 | Advent 2023 resource page with devotionals and videos and even craft projects. |
| 1:50.0 | That'll help you make the weeks leading up to Christmas a lot more meaningful. |
| 1:55.6 | You can find that special Advent page. |
| 1:58.0 | We're going to have the link in the show notes. |
| 2:00.9 | Here now is Gary Thomas speaking at Cherry Hills Community Church in Highlands Ranch, Colorado on today's episode of Focus on the Family. |
| 2:11.0 | When our children were young, we lived in a small college town in northwest Washington |
| 2:16.6 | just below the Canadian border. Not a lot happened there, but there's one season |
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