WHEN THE TIME WAS FULFILLED

When the Time Was Fulfilled

Luke 2:6–7 (ASV) — 6 And it came to pass, while they were there, the days were fulfilled that she should be delivered. 7 And she brought forth her firstborn son; and she wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

When the time was fulfilled…” These words have such redeeming power!

When the time was right, something happened

Luke 2:6 (NKJV) — 6 So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered.

Luke 2:6 (KJV) — 6 And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.

When the time was fulfilled, when the time for the accomplishment had been reached, the Messiah was born

Mary had up to this time been living at the wrong place (Nazareth instead of Bethlehem) for Messiah’s birth.

A little longer stay at Nazareth, and the prophecy would have failed.

The difficult three-day journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem may have taken longer because of Mary’s condition.

But lo! with no intention certainly on her part, much less of Caesar Augustus, to fulfil the prophecy, she is brought from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and at that nick of time her "her days were completed” and her Babe is born

“Could anything good come out of Nazareth”, as the saying goes but God had a plan in the fullness of time, He would engineer that Elizabeth and Joseph would have to travel to Bethlehem

That Jesus would be born in Bethlehem was ordained by God long before Caesar Augustus made his decree

Micah 5:2 (KJV) — 2 But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.

Acts 15:18 (KJV) — 18 Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.

Could anything good come out of our lives, our children, our Ministry, our careers, our Church etc etc

Oh YES. In the fullness of time

Psalm 118:23 (KJV) — 23 This is the LORD’S doing; it is marvellous in our eyes.

The Lords doing are always marvellous, and that is something we all need to come to terms with

Marvellous in the sense that with all the twists and turns, God is able to bring as it were something out of nothing

He is able to bring about the right circumstances at the right time to bring into being His perfect plan for humanity

At the fall, we see the plan of redemption initiated from Adam to the birth of the Messiah as scholars put the 4000 years between Adam and the Messiah

In the fullness of time His own arm brought salvation for Himself

Isaiah 63:5 (NKJV) — 5 I looked, but there was no one to help, And I wondered That there was no one to uphold; Therefore My own arm brought salvation for Me; And My own fury, it sustained Me.

Isaiah 59:16 (NKJV) — 16 He saw that there was no man, And wondered that there was no intercessor; Therefore His own arm brought salvation for Him; And His own righteousness, it sustained Him.

In the midst of our daily life we often preoccupy ourselves with those things we think serve God and his cause.

We work until we are weary to the bone and so often yet see so little fruit.

Without Him we can do nothing, yet through Him we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us

What do all our efforts amount to in the face of all the forces of misery and evil in the world?

Oh, the futility of human effort without the intervention of God

Our attempt to save ourselves through our own effort, leaves us with such agonising questions

The first Christmas did not come after a great crowd of people had completed something good, or because of the successful result of any human effort.

No, it came as a miracle, as the child that comes when his time is fulfilled, as a gift of the Father which he lays into those arms that are stretched out in longing.

We all need a miracle, in the fulfilment of time, when the days were completed , when the days were accomplished

Perhaps you have waited for years to be freed from some need or sin. For a long, long time you have looked out from the darkness in search of the light.

Maybe you have a difficult problem that hasn’t been solved, in spite of great efforts. But then, when the time is fulfilled and God’s hour arrives, a solution, light, and deliverance will come quite unexpectedly.

Perhaps quite differently than you might think?

Hasn’t this happened to you before, just as a baby comes at his own time, and no impatience or hurrying can compel it – but then it comes with its blessing and full of the wonder of God?

Hasn’t God’s help come to you sometimes in this way?

As God takes us through the process because He has inside information that we don't

When we are discouraged by the apparently slow progress of all our honest efforts, by the failure of this or that person, and by the ever new reappearance of enemy powers and their apparent victories, then we should know: the time shall be fulfilled.

Because of the noise and activity of the struggle and the work, we often do not hear the hidden gentle sound and movement of the life that is coming into being through the hand of God

But here and there, at hours that are blessed, God lets us feel how he is everywhere at work and how his cause is growing and moving forward.

The time is being fulfilled and the light shall shine, perhaps just when it seems that the darkness is impenetrable.

Is it true that God only laughs at our efforts and that all our strivings cannot avail – that we are to receive everything only as a gift?

And just as every life comes into being through a working together of God and humanity

But our efforts always belong to God’s work, even when it is only to keep the manger prepared in which the Child wants to lie.

As we consider the birth or incarnation of our Lord and saviour Jesus Christ, can we come to the place where our faith and trust is firm, that in the fullness of time we all shall bring to birth Gods promises for our lives

#Eberhard Arnold