The Gift of Christmas

It’s December and Christmas is just around the corner!  Most folks are scrambling to get it all together before the big day arrives and praying that they can keep themselves together until torn wrapping paper is thrown out, the leftovers are distributed to guests and sent away, and they can fall peacefully into bed. It is such a wonderful, crazy time of the year.

As a pastor, I’ve been encouraging folks to celebrate Advent (that special time of the year in the church that includes the four Sundays before Christmas).  If we could get Advent right, we might discover a means of keeping “Christ” in Christmas. 

Alas, the Season of Advent is out of date!  It is, after all, a season of anticipation marked by expectant waiting!  Waiting!  Who has time to wait?  Even if one has the time to wait, why wait?

Even with a broken economy, we have at our disposal the means to have what we want NOW!  I have access to over $30,000 in instant money.  Three little plastic cards grant me the privilege to claim ownership immediately of whatever I can buy within those limits.  And that does not count what I might be able to borrow to purchase a new car or a house.  Wait!  Why and for what?

There are, of course, a few people still around who dare to believe and to preach that “all good things come to those who wait.”  But let’s face it.  Such people are really behind the times. 

God is behind the times . . . and for this we should give thanks.  Time moves as it moves.  Things come and things go.  Plants emerge from the soil, bloom, produce fruit, and die.  Babies are born, grow and mature, produce fruit, and die.  Knowledge and wisdom come in small doses over time.  The New Testament even reports that the long-awaited Messiah came only in the “fullness of time” (See Galatians 4:4).  God is behind the times and that is our only source of Hope.

The One who came in the fullness of time promised that he would send his Spirit as our constant companion and that in time (the fullness of God’s time) the day would come when the kingdom would be fulfilled.  For this, the best we can do is wait . . . understanding that this calls for expectant waiting.

There is good news about this waiting.  What is promised—the Spirit and the fulfillment of the kingdom—is prepaid by the Giver of all good gifts.  Our task is to wait expectantly—to live as righteously as we can, to be diligently honest with ourselves, and to face the present knowing that the future includes a kingdom fulfilled.

The season of Advent is not out of date.  It is dateless.  It is for all time.  We’ve been given a promise . . . a promise marked by Hope, Love, Joy, and Peace.  Come!  Gather around the Advent wreath and its candles.  Watch as candles begin to burn and give off their light week by week.  In Jesus there is Hope . . . there is Love . . . there is Joy . . . and there is Peace. All of that is the gift of the Christ to us.  We need only to embrace the promise.

Behold . . . “the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel” (Isaiah 7:14).  The greatest Gift of Christmas will not be under a tree.  It will be found in a cradle and on a cross.  His name is Jesus.