Advent in a time of COVID-19

Nov 29, 2020 by

By John Stonestreet and Roberto Rivera, Christian Post:

Black Friday will be different this year, thanks to COVID-19. Instead of a single day of sleep-deprived consumers trampling security guards for flatscreen TV’s, it’s more a couple weeks of online over-marketing. While the presumed decrease in physical violence is certainly an improvement, the additional appeals to fill the voids in our hearts and minds with material goods isn’t.

If there were ever a time that we needed less distraction and more focus on what really matters, it’s now. In such a context, the next four weeks is, for followers of Christ, a gift. Sunday is the beginning of the season of Advent, a time set aside in the Christian calendar to reflect on the coming of Jesus into the world.

The Latin word adventus, from which the word “Advent” is derived, literally means “coming.” Positioned as it is, in the weeks before Christmas, Advent places Christ’s first coming into the world, in a manger in Bethlehem, within the larger historical context of redemptive history and the long promises of God to send a Messiah. At the same time, Adventus is the Latin translation of the Greek word parousia, which is used repeatedly in the New Testament to describe Jesus’ second coming, when He returns in glory at the end of the age.

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