Teaching | Love | Advent E04
Practicing the Way with John Mark Comer
Practicing the Way
4.9 • 1.9K Ratings
🗓️ 22 December 2025
⏱️ 43 minutes
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Summary
How do we love well? Bethany Allen explores the final theme of Advent: love. She shows us that receiving love requires surrender, vulnerability, and trust, and challenges us to intentionally receive God's love as an active, life-changing invitation to become the people we were always meant to be.
Key Scripture Passages: Micah 5v2-5a; 1 John 4v10
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to the John Mark Horma Teachings podcast. |
| 0:06.0 | My name is Yinka Darsen and I'm your host. |
| 0:09.0 | Each week we feature teachings by John Mark or other voices in the formation space. |
| 0:13.0 | It's wonderful to have you with us. |
| 0:16.0 | Today we come to the final week in Advent with the theme of love. |
| 0:25.2 | This teaching is from our friend Bethany Allen, associate pastor at Bridgetown Church. |
| 0:30.2 | She explores both the importance and the challenge of receiving God's love for us. |
| 0:31.7 | Here's Bethany. |
| 0:48.7 | But you, Bethlehem Ephritha, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me, one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times. |
| 0:55.0 | Therefore, Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor bears a son, |
| 0:58.6 | and the rest of his brothers return to join the Israelites. |
| 1:02.6 | He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, |
| 1:05.8 | in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God, |
| 1:11.9 | and they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth. |
| 1:19.6 | And he will be our peace when the Assyrians invade our land and march through our fortresses. |
| 1:22.0 | This is the word of the Lord. |
| 1:39.9 | Thank you, God. Let love find you. These are the words that have echoed in both my heart and my mind since last week when I finally took a quiet moment to reflect on the last 12 months. |
| 1:46.4 | It's definitely not normal that I sit so early in the Christmas season to take stock of what |
| 1:51.1 | has been, but this year has felt different. There's been a sort of restlessness in me, a growing |
| 1:57.6 | desire to pack it all up and close the last chapter of the year with some |
| 2:02.1 | kind of neat summary so that I can magically start again when the clock strikes midnight in |
| 2:07.2 | just a few weeks. Let love find you. As I sat coffee in my hands in the same spot I sit every |
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