[NO AUDIO]

“It is not enough just for you to be my light to Israel,” God tells his servant. “I am making you a light to all the nations.” Today we strive to rekindle the earnest, heartfelt, but also pessimistic yearning God’s people had for a coming Messiah. They hoped for God’s promise to come true. Like a young couple, pregnant with their first child, are excited, fearful, and clueless at the same time. The future is wide open. And, as Mary was told by the angel Gabriel, “Nothing is impossible with God.”