The Christmas season often leaves us feeling scattered and stretched thin. But what if the best preparation isn’t about doing more, but about coming home? John the Baptist’s birth was announced as part of God’s plan to turn people’s hearts back to him. This Advent begins with God inviting us home—to forgiveness, peace, and a fresh start.

We come to the part of the story we have all been waiting for! It’s wedding bells for Boaz and Ruth. She is finally a bride and he is her redeemer. A redeemer is someone who does for us what we could not do ourselves. Pays a price we could not pay. So we could be redeemed. The marriage in this story gives us a beautiful picture of the relationship we have with our Redeemer… what He did for us to make us his Bride. It also shows how God worked this whole story out for that very purpose… so He could be our Redeemer.

How often have you been willing to use others for your advantage? How often have you tried to manipulate events and situations to benefit yourself? Without caring how it will impact others? It can be too easy to do this. The real test of faithfulness is doing something that might not be desirable or easy to do because it’s the thing God wants you to do. Like Jesus did for us. Our character is tested when we do the right thing even when no one is looking. The faithfulness and character we display will point people to how beautiful our God is. Today’s message will give us much to think about concerning faithfulness and character.

Today’s installment of our story is the heart-warming meeting of a girl and boy, Ruth and Boaz. God is bringing them together for a very important purpose. God has been bringing men and women together since the beginning of time… for very important purposes. God has a purpose for your marriage. For Ruth, not everything had been going very well. She had been through difficult circumstances. But would she let those circumstances define her? Or would she define her circumstances as obstacles and opportunities she would get through with God’s help? We can learn a lot from Boaz and Ruth in today’s message!

It’s a classic opening to a tragic short story… “It was a dark and stormy night.” That opening line usually leads to all the challenges and hardships that are making things “dark and stormy.” In the beginning of this story, death separates three marriages, all in one family. The widows have no place to live. No way to make a living. It’s a time of bitterness. Why did this happen? How does God see his people through situations this dark and stormy? Why does He allow it? This story will offer us an enormous amount of life lessons and faith lessons. Lessons about how following God is worth more than anything else.

We all crave happiness—but what kind? The kind that fades the moment life gets hard? Or the kind that endures even in pain? This week, God challenges the popular belief that his highest goal is our short-term comfort. In Hebrews 11, we see an example of someone who could have chosen comfort, ease, and status—but instead chose something better. Through this, God shows us that true happiness isn’t found in chasing pleasure, but in walking with him toward something eternal.

We’re told from every angle—school, work, even church—that our worth depends on how we perform. But this Reformation Sunday, we remember the truth that set the Church free: you are saved not by performance, but by grace. As we celebrate 175 years of God’s grace in the WELS, we’re not bragging on ourselves—we’re boasting in Christ alone.

In a society that has almost tried to get the word “sin” out of circulation, it’s fascinating that self-loathing over unresolved guilt, anger over unexpressed forgiveness is still one of the largest drivers of behavior. This week, we look at the most famous fail of processing guilt in history, the story of Judas Iscariot, to see the necessity of finding forgiveness, including self-forgiveness.