2016-12-07 ILC Chapel — Prepare for the coming of…
Isaiah 40:3 (Listen)
3 A voice cries:1
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Footnotes
[1] 40:3
(ESV)
Isaiah 7:14 (Listen)
14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.1
Footnotes
[1] 7:14
(ESV)
Isaiah 9:6–7 (Listen)
6 For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be upon1 his shoulder,
and his name shall be called2
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 Of the increase of his government and of peace
there will be no end,
on the throne of David and over his kingdom,
to establish it and to uphold it
with justice and with righteousness
from this time forth and forevermore.
The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.
(ESV)
2 Chronicles 29:1–9 (Listen)
Hezekiah Reigns in Judah
29:1 Hezekiah began to reign when he was twenty-five years old, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Abijah1 the daughter of Zechariah. 2 And he did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, according to all that David his father had done.
Hezekiah Cleanses the Temple
3 In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the LORD and repaired them. 4 He brought in the priests and the Levites and assembled them in the square on the east 5 and said to them, “Hear me, Levites! Now consecrate yourselves, and consecrate the house of the LORD, the God of your fathers, and carry out the filth2 from the Holy Place. 6 For our fathers have been unfaithful and have done what was evil in the sight of the LORD our God. They have forsaken him and have turned away their faces from the habitation of the LORD and turned their backs. 7 They also shut the doors of the vestibule and put out the lamps and have not burned incense or offered burnt offerings in the Holy Place to the God of Israel. 8 Therefore the wrath of the LORD came on Judah and Jerusalem, and he has made them an object of horror, of astonishment, and of hissing, as you see with your own eyes. 9 For behold, our fathers have fallen by the sword, and our sons and our daughters and our wives are in captivity for this.
(ESV)
Hymn: LSB 354, st. 2-3 :
Arise, O Christian People
2. Prepare the way before Him;
Prepare for Him the best.
Cast out what would offend Him,
This great, this heav’nly guest.
Make straight, make plain the way:
The lowly valleys raising,
The heights of pride abasing,
His path, all even lay.
3. The humble heart and lowly
God raises up on high;
Beneath His feet in terror
The haughty soul shall lie.
The heart sincere and right,
That heeds God’s invitation
And makes true preparation–
It is the Lord’s delight.