Tidings of Comfort and Joy: 25 Advent Devotionals Leading to Christmas

By Mark M. Yarbrough and Chip Ingram

Remember Christ our Savior was born on Christmas Day.

The Christmas season easily overwhelms, and meaning can be lost in the busyness. In Tidings of Comfort and Joy, Mark M. Yarbrough reminds us why we celebrate. These twenty--five short devotions focus December on Jesus through a combination of Scripture reflections, winsome stories, advent applications, and guided prayers. This is a book that you and your family will turn to annually, as you prepare your heart for the wonder and meaning of Christmas.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kirkdale Press
• Release date: Oct 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781683595663

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SERPENT STOMPER

DECEMBER 1

So the LORD God said to the serpent, Because you have done this, Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.

—Genesis 3:14–15

For a five-year span during my teenage years I worked on and off at the Double N Ranch in Menard County, Texas. It was fabulous. I learned the joys of hard work and simple pleasures. But I also learned about the ranch enemy—diamondback rattlesnakes. Unfortunately, we had plenty of them, and they disrupted the thought of every step.

On one occasion, I was riding in the back of a pickup truck. As it slowed down near a pasture entrance, I foolishly jumped off into an unassuming patch of tall Johnsongrass, ready to open the gate. Upon landing, I heard an all-too-familiar sound: Tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic. Pause. Tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic, tic. I froze. I could hear the snake but could not see it. Then I felt it move underneath my boots. I had inadvertently pinned the snake as I landed in the grass.

I had two choices: (A) I could try to jump out of the waist-high grass and risk falling or sliding back over the snake, or (B) I could start stomping the snake to death. I chose B. That snake paid the price! After one solid minute of the serpent death-dance, I had detached the snake’s head, pulverizing him into ground meat.

Pause that story for a moment.

Long before my encounter on the ranch, another more crafty serpent engaged our ancestors in the garden of Eden with the intent to deceive and kill. Prior to that moment all was right with the world. Man and woman had been placed as stewards in the garden and charged to rule over God’s creation. But there was a serpent. He was cunning and deceptive, with an agenda to destroy. This moment (Gen 3:1–5) is shocking because the serpent spoke and he challenged the caretakers, Adam and Eve, to trust his words as opposed to the words of God.

The text is clear that after assessing the tempter’s words (they will be like God, knowing good and evil), man and woman broke the command previously given (2:16–17) forbidding them to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Both Adam and Eve ate (3:6–7), subsequently choosing to follow up that moment with their own brand of deception and lies.

After speaking to the man and woman about this atrocity (3:8–13), the creator God spoke to the serpent with forceful certainty. In that garden moment the serpent was banished to crawl on the ground—like snakes do today. Was that particular serpent previously upright? We don’t know. But in that moment the Creator displayed his power over the deceiver. More importantly, an even greater proclamation was made: one would come from the ancestry of woman, whom the serpent had deceived, who would resolve the conflict between the deceiver and humanity by a blow to the serpent’s head.

Don’t lose the garden imagery and the reality behind it. One from the line of woman (an upright man) will one day crush the head of a serpent (a ground-crawling snake). The original hearers of this text understood the conflict and the picture it represented. In that time-bound garden moment, God made an eternal promise that he would send someone through the lineage of humanity to deal with the evil serpent once and for all. That one would come and do the serpent death-dance and eradicate the evil stranglehold that imprisoned humanity.

However, don’t miss the powerful twist. Remember my snake encounter? After pulverizing that snake in the grass, I sat down to catch my breath. That’s when I felt it. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. A pulsating pain in my right heel captured my undivided attention. No, I had not been bitten by the snake, but I had beaten that snake so hard I had torn a small tendon in my heel. I couldn’t walk for several weeks because of the pain I brought to bear upon myself in order to eradicate that evil!

Do you see it? The biblical picture and promise are powerful.

God sent his Son, one born of woman (Gal 4:4), through a virgin named Mary (Matt 1:18), to deal with the penalty of sin and to offer reconciliation with God (John 3:16). How did this happen? We see the shrouded promise of the Christ in Genesis 3:15, and we frequently focus on what seems to be a trading of blows (heel versus head) between that ancient serpent (Rev 20:2) and God’s redeemer (Matt 1:21). God said to the serpent, He [the one of woman] will crush your head, and you [the serpent] will strike his heel.

While Satan certainly did his evil work and surely thought himself victorious when the Babe of Bethlehem hung on the cross, we dare not forget that our Savior went there willingly. In crushing the head of the serpent, the Son of God, a pure and perfect man, freely brought exceedingly great pain and suffering upon himself in order to eradicate evil. That’s love personified!

He is the great Serpent Stomper.

ADVENT APPLICATION

Remember that his pain was our gain.

It may seem strange to start this Advent season with the cross as opposed to the cradle, but I think there is a great benefit in doing so. After all, the infant in the manger came to take our debt upon himself in order to reconcile us to God. As someone once said, the Son of God became the Son of Man, so that the sons and daughters of mankind could become the sons and daughters of God. Dear friend, let’s remember where this is going. Let’s frame the nativity by not forgetting that, in his first lap, the Messiah came to pull us out of this mess. He came down to our level to deliver us up to his. And his path was the way of the cross. Read Matthew 27:11–66. It makes our appreciation of the gentle manger scene all the more relevant and purposeful at Christmas.

PRAYER

Dear Lord, as I start this December, please help me to see the purpose of the nativity. Our Savior came to die and pay my debt. Because he loves us, he took on flesh at Bethlehem in order to present himself to the world as our atoning sacrifice. Help me to remember where this Advent story is ultimately going and to appreciate it more fully. In the precious name of Jesus, Amen.

A WORLDWIDE BLESSING

DECEMBER 2

The LORD had said to Abram, Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

—Genesis 12:1–3

Need a daily pick-me-up? You might want to think about avoiding chapters 3–11 of Genesis. Call it what it is. When the curtain pulls back and we watch act 1 of the Bible outside of chapters 1 and 2, it is generally depressing. Here’s what I mean. Think of the large-scale, big-picture narrative of Genesis 1–11. It covers the creation (Gen 1–2), the fall and promise of death (Gen 3), a demonstration of death in Cain and Abel (Gen 4), a genealogy of death (Gen 5), and the death of the entire world, barring one family (Gen 6–9). When there is a chance of a redo after the flood, we see the same results of sin in humanity (Gen 10–11). Did you hear a death theme? It is not the feel-good part of the biblical story, but it is certainly necessary in understanding the rest of it.

However, I have good news. Hang with the biblical narrative a bit longer and Genesis 12:1–3 shows up on the scene—act 2, if you will. It brings a presence of life to the text—one for which we should rejoice. Moreover, it has great bearing upon Christmas. In this passage, God intervenes by making promises to a man named Abram in these three powerful verses. While death had been the result of sin, God’s promises speak of life not just to the lineage of Abram, but to the whole world.

Specifically, three promises are given: (1) a people, (2) a land, and (3) a blessing.

First, God promised Abram (later changed to Abraham) a people. As the story unfolds, God blesses Abraham and his barren wife Sarai by giving them a son of promise named Isaac. His birth was a miracle because

Reviews for Tidings of Comfort and Joy

[Tristan Kirn · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Brilliantly done, fantastic book to prepare your heart, faith & spirit for Christmas!