A Holy Anticipation

Read Malachi 3:1-4

Advent.  That word likely stirs up a variety of images and memories in your mind.  For me it includes candles being lit in church each Sunday in December, traditional Christmas hymns being sung with joy and excitement as the blare of the organ shook the stained-glass windows of our small rural church, and, of course, fighting with my sisters over who had rights to the stale pieces of chocolate in the cheap advent calendar we purchased each year.

The word “Advent” implies, “The arrival of a notable person, thing, or event.”  Advent is about anticipation—a holy anticipation.  The closure of the Old Testament features a stark warning from the prophet Malachi about the consequences of half-hearted worship, even concluding with the threat of a curse.  Yet woven in the prophetic text is the promise of the future coming of the Lord to his temple as a messenger of the covenant.

And then, silence. 

Four hundred years of silence to be precise.  Generation after generation of God’s people passed without hearing from their heavenly Father.  But then with a word to the priest Zechariah, God emerges from the silence to foretell of His imminent arrival.  Advent indeed marks the arrival of the most notable person in human history.  The person is Jesus Christ, God himself in human flesh.  The God who “sits enthroned above the circle of the earth” declared that he would break through the chasm that separated his unique holiness from our feeble humanity, and become like us.  In Eden, Adam and Eve brought sin and death to all people by trying to be like God.  In Christ, God responds with the offering of salvation to all people by becoming a man.

Let your anticipation build as you contemplate the arrival of the King.

Starter Prayer:

Father,

In the midst of the distractions of the season, please turn my trivial longings into a holy anticipation of something—no, someone— greater.  Use this time to draw me into a deeper enthrallment with your incarnation; the kind that would result in a deeper embrace of the gospel and a greater appreciation for your passionate pursuit of your people.

Amen.