Signs of Christmas are everywhere. Christmas decorations glow from public buildings and private homes. Christmas music greets shoppers in grocery stores and department stores alike. The sparkling lights of Christmas trees glimmer through the windows of countless homes.
Christmas ties and Christmas sweaters are proudly sported by young and old as Christmas cards are addressed and Christmas presents wrapped.
It is Christmas, or Advent as the season has been called by Christians of many different theological stripes for centuries. Advent is a Latin word meaning “coming.” And that is what happened on that first Advent. In Jesus, a baby born to the Virgin Mary, God “became flesh and dwelt among us,” as the Apostle John wrote (John 1:14). God came to us in human form because “God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
Journey to Bethlehem
That is the event Christians celebrate this season of the year. We look back to a journey to Bethlehem by Joseph and Mary. We rejoice at the sound of the angels singing “Glory to God in the highest” after appearing to lowly shepherds gathered around a campfire. We marvel at the wise men led by a star across hundreds of miles and weeks of travel.
We picture the holy couple sheltered in a stable, probably a small cave, and Mary giving birth to the Christ child, wrapping Him in clothes brought for the occasion and placing baby Jesus in a feeding trough meant for farm animals.
That is the story about which choirs sing, which is recounted in plays and books and retold in innumerable Christian homes on Christmas mornings. It is Advent past, the Advent of history. And the Advent of history is the primary attention of most people during the Christmas season.
But there is another Advent to celebrate as well. That is the Advent of Jesus coming into the life of a believer through personal saving faith. That is Advent present. Again the words of the Apostle John, “For God did not send His Son into the world that He might condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him” (John 3:17).
In the unexplainable economy of God, His love expressed through Jesus reached down to where humanity was perishing and offered rescue. In Romans 3 the Apostle Paul quotes Psalm 14 when he declares, “There is none righteous, not even one” (v. 10). In verse 23 the Apostle Paul adds, “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”
In Romans 10:13 the Apostle declares, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
To those who are perishing, the love of God reaches down to transport them to the heights of eternal life. Hear the words again: God so loved; He gave; should not perish; everlasting life; through Him (Jesus); whoever believes.
The key to that transformation is belief — a personal commitment to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. It is a belief that opens one to a present Advent of Christ — the coming of Christ into a believer’s life.
Present, personal Advent
Ironically it is only those who experience a present day Advent who can truly celebrate the first Advent. Without the understanding provided by a present coming of Christ into one’s life, the first Advent remains only history. To the unbeliever it may seem like some kind of magical tale filled with fantasy.
But with the understanding of a present, personal Advent, one can see the glory of the “Word made flesh.” One can see His glory “as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). One sees the “Word was with God and the Word was God” (John 1:1).
In the same way, the historical Advent empowers a present Advent. Without the first “coming” there would be no opportunity for a present Advent for anyone. So the historical Advent is inexorably linked to every person’s present Advent and every person’s present Advent is inexorably linked to the historical Advent.
But there is still more.
Both Advent past and Advent present look forward to a future Advent — the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ in power.
The return of the Lord Jesus has been a key teaching of the Christian faith since its beginnings. In Acts 1:11 angels promised, “This Jesus … will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.” The angels’ words only confirmed what Jesus Himself earlier told the disciples. After alerting them to His departure, Jesus promised, “I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am there you may be also” (John 14:3).
This future Advent will not be as a “suffering servant” but as a “conquering king.” And those who have experienced a present Advent and who have believed the historical Advent, will rejoice in this final Advent as they are invited into the presence of the creator God for ever and ever because of faith in the Lord Jesus.
‘Christ in you’
Perhaps the Apostle Paul summed up that whole idea when he wrote in Colossians 1:27 that “Christ in you” is “the hope of glory.” No longer is that truth hidden, writes the Apostle. Now it is clear to all. Hope for glory in eternity is a present Advent for the believer — a coming of Christ into one’s life. “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
And that involves the first Advent when “God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son,” when the “Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”
Advent past. Advent present. Advent future. Which of these do you celebrate this Christmas season?
Hopefully you understand the love God poured out to all in the first Advent. Hopefully you have “believed” and invited Jesus into your life. Hopefully you know the reality of a present Advent. If so, then you can join in the hope that reigns in all believers as we look toward a future Advent and say, “Come Lord Jesus.”
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