Sunday,
December 1, began the Advent Season. While
the retail world has been preparing their store displays for Christmas for
several weeks now, pretty much since before Halloween, and they saw it begin
with earnest on Black Friday, we see the Christmas Season as officially
beginning Sunday, December 1, the first Sunday in Advent. And as they see it as a chance to
dramatically increase sales before the year-end, we see it as a chance to
prepare ourselves again for the second coming of our Messiah.
I love
Advent. It is a holy time of year for
me. A chance to reflect on God Himself
becoming human, being born in the most unholy of circumstances. Truly becoming one of us, even one of the
least of us. Yet inside, He was still fully
God. Living on the outside just as you
or I might have, yet, pure and holy. Our
divine Lord.
But not only
do have the promise that He was coming, we have the promise that He is coming
again. And Advent reminds us of
that. And it gives us an opportunity to
make ourselves ready. Three quick ways
to do this: first, we identify with
Christ by getting baptized and becoming a member of his church. This shows that we are a part of His body,
the church family. We need to commit to
him, and to his family.
Second, we
live by the qualities Jesus lived by while he was here on earth; these are
love, humility, truth, and service to others.
In other words, we sort of role-play what Jesus would do if He were in
our situation. We try to become
imitators of Christ, regularly asking ourselves, “What Would Jesus Do?”
And thirdly,
we watch ourselves carefully, so we don’t fall into any sin. We work on our discipline, we become more self-controlled,
we stand up to sin – we don’t give in. We
need to monitor this carefully, because sin starts with a tiny temptation. We need to make sure we avoid any little thing
that might open the door to sin. When we
work on these three things, we will be ready for his return.
William Coffin once said, “We have learned to soar through the air like birds, to swim through the
seas like fish, to soar through space like comets. Now it is high time we
learned to walk the earth as the children of our God.” This advent season, make sure you’re ready
for his return. Make sure you’re walking
as one of his children.
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