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O come, o come EmmanuelThursday, December 23, 2010
Malachi 3:1 Tired of waiting? Take up arms and fight. Tired of waiting? Make up a new cosmology, a new philosophy, a new religion. Tired of waiting? Eat, drink and be merry. The Jews waited for the coming of the Messiah; we are waiting for the Second Coming of the Messiah. And we're tired too. Every generation expects itself to be near-to-last. The end times are upon us. Again. Come, Lord Jesus. Hurry up, Lord Jesus! Jesus did come, in the fullness of time; and when he did, everything changed. Very little remained of what the historians and scribes and teachers expected. God's statement through Isaiah was truer than true: "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways" (Isaiah 55:8). My timing is not yours, either. How then shall we live? The answer always seems to be the same. Live quietly, anticipating great things and accepting the joys and troubles of each day. Never give up, and never get ahead of God. Know the freedom of free will, and sit still rather than exercising it too often. Mary "treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart" (Luke 2:19). Treasure up. What a sweet moment, Lord, to be silent and wait and listen and watch. You are near. You will come when you will come. |
At Christmas we get to re-experience this anticipation. Suddenly he will come. Malachi was written 400 years before the appearance of Jesus, so of course the "anticipation" had changed to frustration and then despair in many of its readers. By the time of Jesus' birth some Jews had begun to take the future into their own hands. They were tired of waiting for the Messiah.