Christ is Coming
Christ is coming! That, after all, is the theme of Advent (from Latin adventus, arrival). Today, the 1st Sunday in Advent, marks the beginning of a special penitential season. This time is set apart, hallowed, to prepare ourselves for the coming and arrival of Jesus. And we’re not simply preparing for Christmas. We’re also anticipating both his second coming at the end of time, and his coming for each one of us individually at the end of our life here on Earth.
And the sea gave up the dead in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead in them, and all were judged by what they had done. (Revelation 20:13)
You might be afraid, by the way, that I’m one of those people who rants about keeping Advent and Christmas in their own appropriate seasons. You know the type. The sort who gnashes his teeth about celebrating Christmas too early. Well, you’d be right. I am. But, for better or for worse, I’m not going to do it today. There will be plenty more opportunities for that over the next four weeks.
Even the Hairs of Your Head
Today I’m thinking more about that third advent of Jesus, the meeting each one of us will have with Christ at the end of our own lives. And truth be told, I’m thinking in particular of the meeting that I will have with Him at the end of my life.
It may seem that the Creator of so immensely vast a universe would have little time for me or you. Jesus tells us otherwise:
Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground without your Father’s will. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. (Matthew 10:29-31)
This is a theme that runs all through scripture, and is intrinsic to the Christian Faith. The details matter, the particulars matter. God chose a particular people to preserve his Word and to nurture the Word made Flesh. That Word came forth as a real individual person, as a tiny baby, in a specific town, at a definite time, not in some indefinite mythological past. It’s for this reason the Evangelist Luke makes sure that we know that Augustus was the emperor and Quirinus the governor. This is real history. For the same reason the Nicene Creed likewise named Pontius Pilate as the Roman procurator who crucified Jesus.
Time and Attention
And because people matter, not just collectively but as individuals, we relate to the Church through the lives of individual Christian men and women. We call those men and women saints, and we call upon them by name so that they might speak for us, by name, before the throne of God.
The Season of Advent, then, is a reminder to us that the infinite God has enough time and attention for each and every one of us. Christ is coming, and each one of us will meet him, face to face. There will be no hiding in the crowd, no slipping past unnoticed. We are given a reminder, and the opportunity to prepare ourselves: let’s not pass it up.