Kelsi Vanada
Dear Friends,
Franciscan friar Richard Rohr emphasizes that as we seek to grow in our faith, we may need to rediscover what Advent means—to make it about more than “a sentimental waiting for the Baby Jesus.”
The incarnation is an incredibly beautiful mystery. But perhaps you know what I mean. Fortunately, our tradition has a curriculum already built in: the “Four Last Things.”
“Before the cosier, modern Advent themes of hope, peace, joy, and love were introduced, Christians were prevailed on to contemplate the Four Last Things: death, judgement, heaven, and hell,” writes the Very Rev’d CanonRichard Sewell, Dean of St George’s College, Jerusalem.*
In Advent, he continues, “we are reminded that the Christ of judgement is the same babe of Bethlehem over whom we coo and sentimentalise.” Wow.
Today’s readings link to this week’s theme of judgement, and are full of warnings: Amos 9:1-10 describes a vision of destruction for Israel and surrounding nations. Revelation 2:8-17, letters to the churches, call for testing and repentance. In the passage from Matthew 23:13-26, Jesus denounces the Scribes and Pharisees as hypocrites.
As Dr. Appel wrote recently, the Last Judgement is “admittedly a hard pill for us to swallow as modern people.” (Perhaps especially true for those of us who have, from our past experience of faith, enough guilt around our sins to last a lifetime.)
But I look again at the readings. Amos “lashed out at the elite’s prosperity gained at the expense of the poor.”** In the passage from Revelation, the churches have held to false teachings and put a stumbling block before the people of Israel. The Scribes and Pharisees care more about what their faith looks like than who it helps or how it changes their hearts.
This seems like the kind of judgment that provides the deep security that all will be made right. I remember that “He will judge the peoples with equity” (Psalm 96, emphasis mine).
Let us examine our hearts for what the prophets might be revealing to us—where we need to redirect our attention and our treasure, where we may have withheld love, and more.
Come, Lord Jesus. As a babe in a manger, and as our judge.
In Christ,
—Kelsi
* https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2024/20-december/comment/opinion/return-to-the-four-last-things
**The New Oxford Annotated Bible