No Asterisks | Advent Devotional Day 20

Advent 2025 DevotionalCore | Peace
December 19, 2025
Written by Megan Hall

Title: No Asterisks

Scripture:

7 How beautiful upon the mountains
    are the feet of a messenger
    who proclaims peace,
    who brings good news,
    who proclaims salvation,
    who says to Zion, “Your God rules!”
8  Listen! Your lookouts lift their voice;
    they sing out together!
    Right before their eyes they see the Lord returning to Zion.
9  Break into song together, you ruins of Jerusalem!
The Lord has comforted his people and has redeemed Jerusalem.
(Isaiah 52:7-9)

Reflection:

I’ve been in some form of ministry or church leadership for most of my life. I’ve spoken the Gospel message of salvation over decades and across several countries.
But let’s be honest: I’ve often evangelized the “Good News” because I wanted someone else to change—or because I felt like it was something I was supposed to check off God’s list.
And yet it never really felt like good news to me. It was awkward, something to defend or explain away. A statement about my own beliefs that sometimes carried a hint of shame.
It wasn’t Good News because it always came with an asterisk.

“Meet Jesus!*
*He’ll save you from the eternal torment he’ll send you to if you don’t believe.”

“Meet Jesus!*
*Then make sure you do your devotions every day, join a small group, never miss church, and stop every behavior we’ve deemed sinful.”

“Meet Jesus!*
*And by the way, telling people about him is more important than feeding a hungry child or freeing a captive—those things are only temporary.”

Ugh.
How upside down we’ve understood what it means to be a messenger of Good News.

In Isaiah 52, the messenger is celebrated for bringing good news—not of a faraway heaven, but of justice here. Wholeness to the broken, now.Deliverance to the oppressed, now. Help to the hurting, now.

The Gospel of the coming Savior has no asterisks. It’s freedom, justice, shalom, and joy—for the whole world. It’s peace that restores neighborhoods, reconciles enemies, heals creation itself. And maybe that’s the point: Good News isn’t something we preach at people. It’s something we become.

 We carry it in our words, our hands, our choices, our presence.

 We become the feet that cross mountains, the voices that announce hope, the communities that sing redemption into the ruins.  That’s the kind of Good News I want to spend the rest of my life proclaiming.

My Prayer:
 

• What would it look like for me to live as a messenger of peace—so that my presence, not just my words, becomes Good News?

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