Today is the first Sunday of Advent. This is the day
we bless the advent wreath and light the first candle, the candle of hope.
I hope I get this right, because I am often confused
by what to say at this time of year. It is too early for Merry Christmas and
happy advent or merry advent is just not right. Of course we could always go
with the secular Happy Holidays.
The appropriate greeting is “Have a Blessed Advent.”
That is what it is about, because we are blessed by the anticipation of the coming
of the Lord.
We are blessed; Christ came as the child Jesus born
in Bethlehem. We are blessed; Christ is coming again. We are blessed; Christ
comes every day to our lives. In all these we are blessed with hope.
These are the advents our readings point to today.
The prophet Jeremiah proclaims the first coming from David will come a just shoot that will do what is right and just in
the land.
Of the Second Advent, Jesus proclaims stand
erect and raise our heads because redemption is at hand. It is with these words he prepares us. Beware
that your heart does not become drowsy from the
Anxieties of life. Pray that you have the strength to stand before the Son of Man.
For most Christians prepare for these two Advents. They
celebrate that He has come and He will come again. But many fail to recognize
the everyday advent. They fail to realize the hope of Christ in ever day life.
That is what Paul
is telling the church in Thessalonians.
Brothers and
sisters: “May the Lord make you increase and
abound in love for one another and for all….” And again, “Conduct
yourselves to please God ...., strengthen your hearts, to be blameless in
holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his
holy ones. Amen”
Everyday advent is
seeing the face of Christ in each other. Advent is bring Christ to the world in
all we are and in all we do. It is an everyday advent. It is hope for this
world.
This week I flew to
Kansas City for a business meeting. I had a layover in Dallas. There, I met a
beautiful lady, Mrs. Caldwell. The valet had pushed her wheelchair next to
where I was sitting.
After she finished
her lunch, I offer to throw away her trash and we struck up a conversation. Boarding
the plane, she said to me “I saw Christ in you the moment I laid eyes on you.”
It was not about
me. It was her faith seeing Christ in others. It was her advent.
On the return
flight again in the Dallas airport was another woman. The valet had pushed her
wheelchair to the area I was seated so she could watch the Saints - Cowboys
game.
Immediately, she
was on her phone, obviously upset. Upset the valet had placed her chair too far
from her departing gate. She was at the gate but in front of the television.
She was upset with the
Dallas Cowboys, upset with the New Orleans Saints. She was upset with the
person on the phone, apparently a family member.
And in all this she
showed an extreme talent for colorful language and used it in abundance.
She was clearly
distraught. And as I and another person offered her assistance, I noticed that
around her neck hung a cross.
As we approached
her, she said to the person she had been so upset with on the phone “Got to go
now, love you!”
I thought to
myself, she doesn't sound very Christian.
Friends the problem
was not her. It was me. I was not seeing Christ in this person who was in need
of help. I was not celebrating the coming of Christ in the world today.
My brother and
sisters advent is to prepare ourselves to meet Christ every day. It is seeing
Christ in our brothers and sisters, every person. No matter if they are hungry
or needy or sick or in pain or can talk a blue streak, Christ comes to us in
each and every person.
I met two beautiful
ladies; in one was so easy to see Christ and in the other it was a little
harder. It is that way for all of us.
Remember this
prayer from the psalm: All the paths of
the LORD are kindness and constancy; to you o Lord I lift up my soul.
Have a blessed
advent, be good, be holy and preach the gospel by the way you live and love one
another, Amen.
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