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The calendar year runs from January to December. The school year begins anew each September. The fiscal year often turns over in April. But the Church Year, which is the true reflection of heavenly time, begins today. Advent marks the beginning of the new Church year.
It is the universal experience of humanity, children as we are of a fallen race, to find this world disappointing and ultimately unsatisfying. Not that it isn't filled with goodness, with beauty and interest and hope. But we know it is somehow not what it should be. When we are young, we often want to change it, to start afresh, to do things differently from those who preceded us, which is a way of saying that we see it as not what it should be. As the long years pass, and the intractable and stubborn nature of this world becomes clear to us through hard experience, and our own hearts show themselves so unready to change, we grow weary, and some of us grow cynical and bitter. So much promise of life and goodness! So much suffering and difficulty as life rolls itself out before us! And those who put their hope in this life tend to get depressed; of course they do, because they are beating their heads against a wall; we have not the power to really change this world. The disease runs too deep. Only God can provide the cure.
The wonderful news is that he has. He has come, he has invaded our darkened earth and sin-saddened lives, he has confronted our enemies and defeated them through his death and rising. He has poured out his Spirit upon us, and we who were living in darkness have seen a great light. This was the first invasion, two thousand years ago, the most extraordinary event that has ever occurred, when God the Almighty and All-Powerful stooped to join himself with human flesh. We call this unbelievable event the Incarnation, the "Enfleshment" of God. It has forever ennobled our race, raised us to heights we could not imagine.
And still he comes, day by day, invading our darkness with his light, feeding us with his body and blood, speaking within our hearts, encouraging, consoling, warning, loving, his promises new every morning.
And soon, maybe today, maybe tomorrow, maybe a thousand years from now, we don't know the day or the hour, the same God who came among us humbly and known only to the eyes of faith will invade yet again. He will come then with the armies of heaven, and every eye will see him as he truly is, Lord of heaven and earth, mighty warrior against darkness, a dread and holy and unimaginably beautiful King. He will then re-establish the earth in perfection and beauty, and all of our deepest desires will be fulfilled and all our dreams for justice and truth will be realized, and we will reign with him in the kingdom of light.
Be on guard lest your spirits become bloated
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