by Pastor Douglas Brauner

The Importance of Dwelling on Jesus’ First Advent

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

This is the thirty-ninth Advent season in which I have pastored a Christian community. In each of these Advent seasons I have encouraged people to keep their eyes focused on Jesus’ promise that he will return in glory, yet he hasn’t come back.

Waiting is a part of the fabric of our lives.

We wait for our cancer treatments to do their thing so that we can ring the bell, declaring that we are cancer free.

We wait for the phone call that will tell us that we’ve been hired.

We wait for a vaccine that will help us deal with a virus that has ravaged our lives.

However, as we wait, it’s easy to lose hope, isn’t it?

And we keep waiting. Advent is the antithesis to our present culture which detests waiting. People walk their dogs, glued to their phones, because they can’t miss out on the latest news. People refuse to wait in line at the grocery store because they have better things to do, like looking at their phones.

Let me say it again, it’s easy to lose hope when you’re waiting.

“Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!”
Psalm 27:14 English Standard Version

The psalmists often encourage us to wait for the Lord, but it’s hard to do, especially when we struggle to understand what it means to wait for the Lord.

When we struggle to find hope in our waiting, it is God who reminds us of what he did for us in the past. To have hope in Christ’s return means spending time meditating on his first coming. God’s faithfulness to his past promise is our foundation for holding on to his promise that has yet to be fulfilled.

God kept his promise to us by sending his Son in human flesh. Our hope in Jesus’ return is based on the conviction that God kept that promise.

Maybe we’d be in a better place to hope in Christ’s return if we spent more time dwelling on his first coming. Maybe our waiting won’t seem so long.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado