Hope: Welcome to Our World

 

"Tears are falling.

Hearts are breaking.

How we need to hear from God.

You've been promised,

we've been waiting.

Welcome holy child."

The first Sunday of Advent focuses on hope. I don't know about you, but the darkness of this world has been dimming my light for some time the last several months. Reports of so much evil and death take their toll. In my own life I have faced dark moments this year and I am still facing some. I need something to pierce the darkness: Hope.

"Hope that you don't mind our manger.

How I wish we would have known.

But long-awaited holy stranger,

Make yourself at home.

Please make yourself at home."

Where does hope come from? Is it something we can conjure up within us? Perhaps it is more of a yearning, a refusal to see darkness as all there is. Perhaps it has been crafted within us by our maker so we would seek that which breaks the darkness.

"Bring your peace into our violence.

Bid our hungry souls be filled.

Word now breaking heaven's silence,

Welcome to our world."

We can patch wounds, we can weep as one, we can pledge ourselves to service, but we cannot demolish sin. Sin is ever existent in our world. Darkness has been and is and will continue to be until it is swallowed in victory at the end of time. Where is our hope while we wait? What does heaven have for us who suffer below?

"Fragile finger sent to heal us.

Tender brow prepared for thorn.

Tiny heart whose blood will save us.

Unto us is born."

A baby enters our world. He is unassuming, seemingly simply human, yet his destiny invades the darkness. He alone will enter darkness to destroy what we cannot. Sin will meet its match through whip and thorn and nails.

"So wrap our injured flesh around you.

Breathe our air and walk our sod.

Rob our sin and make us holy,

Perfect son of God."

He who is God-man takes on our own weakness and evil, walks among us and confronts the results of our submission to sin. He, perfect, lays down himself to bring us light. Sin is brought low, we are lifted up and his righteousness pours over us. This is hope. And I welcome it to our world.

(The quotes above come from the song "Welcome to our World" by Chris Rice. You can listen to it here.)