Advent anticipates Jesus’s birth December 25th. Any date will do because shepherds in Israel abide year-round in their fields. Christians didn’t celebrate His birth until 500 years after His death, therefore the date is arbitrary. But anytime is good to Celebrate Jesus’s life.
I’ll always remember the middle-class young woman who answered the door in Saline, Michigan years ago, and in response to my question about her church membership, replied, “We’re doing alright now and don’t need a church.” Those who feel safe and secure don’t feel they need saving. Saving from what—by whom?
Paul writes of hope in heaven and with a heavenly, healthy body. As Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.” (Mark 2:17) That is true now; persons having decent jobs, health, families, and futures don’t feel hopeless and, therefore, aren’t motivated by hope, Now all persons and places face impending disaster. Asymmetric cold war is already in progress among the three global powers. Pandemic is ubiquitous and permanent. Global warming is past the point of no return causing crazy weather, rising sea levels, extinction of coastal cities, warming seas, and acceleration as methane escapes from melting arctic tundra. The ‘institutions” causing our abundance and global supremacy--religion, education, strong democratic, inclusive government--are malfunctioning. These global and national conditions are conflating and spreading hopelessness to “ALL creation” thereby increasing the need for the Hope Jesus brings. Paul couldn’t have anticipated these things except by inspiration.
We should look forward and rejoice in the hope of heaven and eternity through Him. Meanwhile, we should assume our responsibility to be good stewards of the physical universe and messengers of hope provided by Jesus’s birth.
Bob Allison