Advent 2023 - Keep Watch

However, no one knows the day or hour when these things will happen, not even the angels in heaven or the Son himself. Only the Father knows.
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So you, too, must keep watch! For you don’t know what day your Lord is coming. Understand this: If a homeowner knew exactly when a burglar was coming, he would keep watch and not permit his house to be broken into. You also must be ready all the time, for the Son of Man will come when least expected.
– Matthew 24:32,42-44

Christianity is a religion filled with anticipation, filled with an acknowledgement of the current incompleteness of life. Yes, a significant change took place 2,000 years ago when Jesus walked this earth, died, was buried, and resurrected. The world has not been the same since those events, and the testimony of the ever-multiplying and expanding Church throughout time and place continuously celebrates this change. Yet, when our Savior left us, he made it clear he would come back, he would not always be apart from his bride, the Church. We are caught up in this place of waiting and expectation. Sometimes mourning his absence with tears as we endure the difficulties of sin and death still present throughout our world. Sometimes joyfully longing for his presence as we encounter the glimpses of his glory in his creation, in his word, in the gathering of his people. But in joy and in grief, we are longing, we are hoping, things are clearly not yet where they should be, and we know he will come to make all things new.