This chapter puts an awful note of
realism into Advent.
Why interrupt the joyful season with
this?
Because hope is no hope which cannot
face reality. Hope is no hope which cannot rise through the horrific world war
that ended 100 years ago in Belgium’s muddy, rat-ridden, blood-stained fields,
or through the sophisticated barbarity of the next when God's chosen people
were systematically dehumanized by a popular dictator.
And should the world sink to even
deeper depths than these, may the Church recall that the reality of a
coming universal "delusion" (v.11) headed up by a “man of sin”
(v.3) was impressed upon her from the start. The images in
Luke 21 and at the end of Revelation 13 were shown to her long
before the advent of world wars and modern dictators.
But the true Advent hope is not
lessened a bit by any of this. Integendeel,
au contraire, it is only strengthened and made all the more
vital. Look to the “coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to
him” (v.1). That is the message. Don’t let anyone persuade you otherwise (v.2).
The darkest darkness will be overthrown “by the splendour of his coming”
(v.8)!
So drink in deeply the hope shining
from those Advent candles and Christmas lights.
And
« levez la tête et prenez courage, car alors votre
délivrance sera proche ! » (BDS)
“Kijk dan omhoog en hef uw hoofd op, omdat uw verlossing
nabij is!” (HSV)
“When these things begin to take place,
stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near!”
(Luke 21:28, NIV)
James
Pitts
Attribution:
Langdon, Fe. "Aging Grace", from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. http://diglib.library.
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