Why Celebrate Advent?

According to the Christian story, an eternally existing force that spoke the universe into existence took the form of a human via a Jewish lady who’d never had sex with anyone, entered adulthood as a pauper itinerant rabbi, performed a bunch of miracles, claimed to be the Jewish Messiah, gathered a HUGE following of fellow paupers, died, rose from the dead, etc.

That’s a whopper of a story.

It’s funny how us Christians get so bent out of shape when people don’t embrace what’s above, or make sport of our wacko beliefs. We get especially grumpy during Christmas time because we feel like the non-Christian world should spend at least one month out of the year celebrating our religion, while we spend 0 time celebrating anyone else’s.

We also spend 0 time asking ourselves if we truly believe; the most important question to ask during the Advent season.

But today’s Christianity is struggling. Those of us who’ve “kept the faith” have, too many times, turned to anger and hatred, especially over the past 4 years. Now, the fastest growing religion in America is no longer Christianity, and that makes us really grumpy.

Our anger and defensiveness are a sign of our disbelief.

Advent, on the other hand, is a season of hope, the kind that poses a great challenge to our spiritual garbage. In this, it’s important to ask ourselves: Did the story of Jesus really happen? If it didn’t, move along, have a great Christmas, celebrate other things, defend ‘Merica, etc.

And let’s be real, there is no proof. It happened a long time ago. The only evidence we have are some ancient documents whose origins seem dubious. Other religions have their dubious documents too. What makes our so special?

I struggle to believe, especially as the world seems to be so unravelled. Embracing the Christian narrative requires a huge leap of faith.

But I don’t have anywhere else to go; there aren’t any alternative propositions that don’t require a similar leap of faith.

It’s difficult to believe that the universe created itself; there’s too much order, too much evidence of design and purpose. You might say that I need to revisit the evidence, but I’ll remind you that there isn’t any proof here either. I’m not ripping on secular views of the cosmos, and I understand and respect my believing friends, I just don’t see them taking a smaller leap of faith than I have.

We only have two choices here, right? I can believe that the universe happened as a random coincidence, or I can believe that it had an intelligent, purposeful beginning; a “god” if you will.

From there, big as that leap of faith is, all subsequent leaps get much smaller.

Jesus appeared on the scene and claimed to be that “god.” That’s why the religious leaders wanted him dead; they were jealous of his influence and angry at the many ways he threatened their livelihood. But they couldn’t kill him for that, so they got him on a technicality: equating himself with god.

Pilate asked him if he was the “king of the Jews.” He answered, “yes.” Blasphemy. During a sunday morning service, Jesus took the pulpit, read a messianic passage from the book of Isaiah and said, very basically, “this sacred text is talking about me.” Blasphemy. Those and others are a claim to messiaship, and a claim to messiahship is a claim to deity, at least in the eyes of the people who crucified Jesus.

But this great king was born in hay and feces, attended by the biggest losers an elite Jewish person could fathom, heralded by a band of criminals.

Then he grew up and roamed around the first-century Judean landscape pissing off the leaders of his religion, the very people who could exalt him to greatness. Imagine a guy who could do the stuff Jesus did, supported by all the power of Israel. What a mighty political figure he would be.

But the powerful people wanted him to follow them. Jesus wanted it the other way around, but the only people willing to follow him were the kind of people who attended his birth.

Losers.

At his death, to top it all off, Jesus removed all of humanity’s sin, another thing that us Christians struggle to believe. We say we believe, then we seem to want to remind the entire world that their sin is still intact. Blasphemy.

John the Baptist saw his cousin and said, “Behold, the sacrifice from God that takes away the sin of the world.” Jesus’ disciple John (who called himself Jesus’ favorite disciple) said:

“He himself is the payment for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the whole world’s” 1 John 2:2

That’s a mouthful for a first-century Jewish person who believed that the only way to pay for sin was ritual sacrifice.

I don’t bring all of this up to preach or force my beliefs on you. I’m simply asking if all of this is true. If it is, it’s worth celebrating because it implies so much about our world, and our future.

For example, if God exists, why become human and walk among us?

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God… In him was life; and the life was the light of all people. And the light shone forth in darkness; and the darkness couldn’t handle it…

He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us… ~ John 1:1-1:15

On top of that, why take sin out of the way? Do we need that? Aren’t we doing just fine with all of the religions that want to keep it front and center?

And why a resurrection?

If all of this is true, there’s a lot of power that we’d be celebrating all year if we really believed. We’d spend much less time trying to force our belief and way of life on others. If God has this kind of power, I can rest in the idea that he doesn’t see my sin, that I can live a life of humility and generosity without the fear of losing everything.

I also don’t have to spend the entire year celebrating my own power, or trying to prove its existence to others, or getting depressed when I realize that I don’t have the power I want.

I’m free to embrace and express the power that I do have; to bring peace and hope into the lives of others.

 

Photo by Gareth Harper on Unsplash