Advent and the Coming of God

Advent means ‘arrival,’ coming. It’s a season in the Christian calendar, traditionally focused on Jesus coming into the world, the beginning of the great event, the turning point of history. No one knows Jesus’ birthday. A date was chosen. Traditions of all kinds grew up around it.

The Gospels tell of his ‘Advent’ because of its core: ‘incarnation.’ Human nature is united to God’s reality in Jesus. Jesus is both us and God. The event continues through Jesus’ growth, ministry, teaching, crucifixion, resurrection and beyond! In Jesus, the God beyond all imagination seeks us human creatures and creates a way for us to be united to God’s own life – the ongoing climax to all of scripture. Advent continues till God renews creation.

God’s Purpose to Bless Humanity

The idea of incarnation seems radically new, unexpected. But the Gospels, and Jesus himself, show its deep roots in the whole, complex story of scripture. God’s relation with humanity unfolds, interacting with human brokenness, through law, kings, prophets, poets, temple, priests, national destruction, exile, renewal, etc. Jesus himself weaves together scripture with new images to help us see where God had been going through that circuitous story.

Humans are created in God’s image; God comes in that image. Human exile. Abraham: God’s promise of Grace for all. Paths of covenant in Law, Wisdom, Poetry, Worship. Promise to David of an Anointed King. National failure, exile. God is coming! God is King! His Arm, his presence, a Suffering Servant. Against little human gods, God comes as “Son of the human.”

People thought the gulf between God & human could not be crossed. Death ended human hope. Human effort always ends in failure. But in Jesus, God does the impossible. God the creator become a creature sharing human suffering and death to create new life.

Jesus and the Father – Embodying God’s Love.

The unity of Jesus’ story from birth to death is crucial. Some popular forms of talking about Jesus’ crucifixion & atonement seem almost to set Jesus over against God: God’s righteous wrath requires that all people as sinners be punished. Jesus intervenes to stop God’s wrath by taking it on himself. No! Jesus on the cross is the very embodiment of God’s Love! 

In Jesus, God comes seeking us. Jesus dies for us by taking into God’s self all our sin, brokenness, & death, so that we can realize God’s love and live as God’s beloved children. 

Jesus’ Advent is God’s Advent and Our Advent, new hope, truly the turning of the Ages!