Waiting on Hope: An Advent Devotional

By Joy Bannen

This devotional will take you through the 25 days of Advent. In this busy time of year, it is important to pause and reflect on the meaning of Christmas, to clear our minds of calendars and to do lists to focus on the reason why we celebrate Christmas and the spiritual importance of this season.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Sep 22, 2022
• ISBN: 9781664273931

Joy Bannen

Joy Bannen was born and raised just outside the majestic smoky mountains of Tennessee. She now lives among the cornfields of Ohio with her husband and 3 girls. Joy lives off of Jesus, family time and coffee. She is passionate about her faith and teaching. When she is not in the classroom teaching students with special needs, she is meeting with local women for Bible study in coffee shops or her living room. Joy earned her bachelor’s degree from Cedarville University. She is currently working on her masters in Theological Studies from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Waiting on Hope is Joy’s first published work.

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WAITING ON

Hope

An Advent Devotional

JOY BANNEN

Copyright © 2022 Joy Bannen.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means,

graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by

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except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher

make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and

in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

WestBow Press

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views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English

Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry

of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-6642-7392-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-7393-1 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022913991

WestBow Press rev. date: 09/21/2022

Contents

Introduction

Week 1     Hope

Week 2     Preparation

Week 3     Joy

Week 4     Love

Week 5     Christ

Final Thoughts

Introduction

A Celebration of Advent

Waiting is hard! That is one universal truth that people from all walks of life can agree on. We spend much of our lives agonizing over waiting. Waiting on a promotion that will better support a growing family. Waiting to hold a long-desired baby. Waiting on a test result to find out if the latest treatments have worked against a devastating disease. Waiting at the airport for a dearly missed loved one. The irony of waiting is that we live in a fast-paced, fast food, fast-talking world. We live in a society where one does not have to wait for a letter to arrive by post to receive an update on a loved one deployed oceans away; we can call or FaceTime them to talk to them instantly. We do not have to spend hours, and even days, prepping for a holiday meal; we can place an order at a restaurant or grocery store ahead of time to have dinner and all the trimmings delivered to our home. We don’t even have to wait in line for the coffee we were too busy to make at home. We can order our three-pump, venti vanilla latte with an extra shot of espresso from our phone on the drive to the coffeehouse, then skip the line, skip the small talk, and go about our day without any wait.

Maybe you grew up celebrating Advent. Maybe you had a family Advent calendar or tradition as a child you still remember. I did not grow up celebrating Christ’s birth with Advent. Having a Christmas Eve birthday, I grew up sharing my red velvet birthday