What if you are the one who is to come? When is the last time, if ever, you have put before you this thought: “What kind of person will I be 5/10/? years from now?” Perhaps we want to pad our pension, savings, and investments for those future years. Maybe get the kid(s) through college or get ourselves through college and/or grad school.
The movie, “City Slickers” dealt with male friends becoming middle- aged and struggling with a mid-life crisis, I think they had it all wrong. They kept looking back at what they had lost and were losing. Billy Crystal’s character in the movie said he would never look this good again, feel this good, or be able to do in the near future the kinds of things he could now do. Looking ahead at his future was based solely, it seemed, on the past he was losing.
In Advent we prepare for the baby Jesus, indeed the One who is to come. We prepare in our hearts, we prepare in worship with hymns, sermons, an Advent Wreath and Advent scriptures. Even in the midst of our cultural preparations for Christmas, we also occasionally see ourselves preparing for the arrival of the infant Christ child.
Might this season of Advent teach us something? Might it teach us preparation is good and necessary for desired outcomes? Baseball Hall of Fame manager, Casey Stengel, frequently said to be more lucky than good, was fond of saying, “Luck is the residue of design.” An overstatement to be sure. Yet a statement that affirms preparation.
While this pastor is fond of saying, “If you want to make God laugh, tell God your plans”, preparation generally speaking, delivers better results than no or little preparation.
So, can the One who comes push us a bit to look at our own life which, while it is happening, is also, at the same time, coming? What preparations do we need to make? What kind of person do we hope will be the one we become? Exercise and diet, among other healthy activities can prepare us to be a healthy person. What might help us become the better kind of person whom we hope to be? With what, and with whom, must we surround ourselves to become that person?
Personally I am a reader. If it has print, I read it. However, I must be careful with my choice of reading materials. Left on my own without much reflection, I continue to read the same kinds of books, periodicals, internet readings, and newspapers. All this can do is make me more of who I am. I need to go outside my interests and, at times, even outside my own values. I need to have my readings do more than reflect who I am, I need them to shape and impact me. Some of that impact needs to be an understanding of how those quite different from me think and react. What kind of different person might God want me to become?
What if you are the one who is to come? Prepare. Quoting the old Advent hymn, “Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord”, such needs to be paramount in our preparation. What kind of person might God be calling us to be? If Advent makes us look to the future both near and far, might we include ourselves in that future? Might we see the God calling us into this future is one who will be there both in our travels and in our arrival? Prepare ye! The God of Jesus knows something about coming.