Advent

The full message of Advent could not be more unlike the watered down message of our popular culture regarding the Christmas season, because the Advent of Christ, is not about, gross materialism or superficial sentimentality. Advent celebrates three separate occasions, when the Lord in His great goodness breaks into our human reality. The first of these manifestations was his birth in Bethlehem when Jesus came in poverty and meekness and for our sake was born as a child, in all the weakness of our human flesh. His second birth can take place at any moment of our own choosing, when Christ may be born in our hearts. Perhaps right now we may come to greater faith in Him, and more than ever before accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior. And His third Birth will be at the end of time, when the Lord will come again, not in poverty and weakness, but in great power and majesty, to judge the living and the dead. We may ignore the First Coming. We may chose to resist a Second Coming into our hearts and lives, but all the universe and each one of us, must submit to His Final Coming when He appears again in glory.