A message from Pastor Matthias –
The season of Advent, in the liturgical year, encompasses the four Sundays leading up to Christmas. It is a time of expectant hope as we journey towards Bethlehem and the birth of Jesus, the incarnation of God’s love. This expectant hope, however, also finds a parallel meaning in our faith as we yearn for the fulfillment of God’s kin-dom upon Christ’s return, the making new of all creation that scriptures promise will one day come.
We are not of mind, usually, to spend much time talking about the “second coming.” It is a narrative that has been co – opted by the Left Behind series and turned into religious horror stories that declare salvation for some and damnation for others. Hard pass. No thank you.
But in linking the hope we experience in Advent awaiting Jesus’ birth to the ultimate hope of Christ making all things new, there is a key insight for progressive Christians which helps us reclaim this idea of a second coming. Christmas is decidedly incarnational. It wouldn’t happen without a young woman giving birth to a child. This is God breaking into our world. So too, by parallel, any understanding of what the fulfillment of God’s kin-dom looks like or Jesus’ return in the fullness of time cannot be detached from human embodied living. This then must include the full dignity of Black lives. This must then include reproductive rights of women. This must then include the personal autonomy of trans and enby (non – binary) folx to live their God – blessed truth. This must include full justice for the incarnate needs of all people — food, clean water, home, dignity, and room to grow and thrive.
The very coming of the Holy to dwell with us brings into harmony body and spirit, and the fulfillment of justice with the coming of the Prince of Peace. Let us journey with embodied hope and a holistic sense of the justice Jesus’ coming brings.
Yours on the journey,
Pastor Matthias