[Propertalk] Quotes for Luke 21:25-36 for 1 Advent - Part 6

[Joe Parrish]

We get ready for Christmas because Christmas is our redemption drawing near to us. Christmas, the birth of Jesus, is not judgment, but our redemption. Jesus is born to redeem us, to buy us back, to free us from the measuring of our lives. Jesus comes, not to measure or judge, but to forgive the wrong doers, to forgive those who have done evil, to forgive those who do not love God and fear God more than all other things. Jesus is doing a new thing with us. Instead of judging, he has mercy. Instead of condemning, he has mercy. Instead of accusing us he marks us with his love. 

Jesus comes to be judged. Jesus comes to be condemned in our place. Jesus comes to die for us, in our place, taking that judgment that is coming and making it happen ahead of schedule. He suffers all of God's judgment and then God, out of love for us and for Jesus, raised up Jesus to life. God thereby lifted up Jesus above judgment. God has put mercy over measuring, forgiveness over condemnation. 

Look at the signs of this coming. Look at the leaves of the trees. Look at the leaves of mercy, seen in all the times we receive the Lord's Supper, the meal of mercy for us. Look at the leaves of forgiveness, sprouting here amongst us each Sunday, sprouting here amongst us in our own words of forgiveness to one another. Look at the leaves of service, of time given to help one another. 

http://www.predigten.uni-goettingen.de/archiv-9/061203-7-e.html

Timothy J. Hoyer, 2006
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Over the summer I had the opportunity to see bits and pieces of "Three Moons Over Milford," a television series in which the moon had been hit by an asteroid and shattered into pieces, which were predicted to decay in orbit and strike the earth in the future. People in the show, predictably, reacted in different ways. Some went out to enjoy life to the fullest before the day of doom. Some tried to figure out how to escape. Others went about their lives oblivious. Still others became super religious, or at least "spiritual," in some sense. The drama unfolds as people begin to live each day as though it were their last. Lives are shattered and values collapse for some in the face of the impending doom. A realtor who goes about business as usual is in a state of tragi-comic denial. None of the responses seem, in the end, faithful.
One has a sense that the living "denial of death" of our culture, and the various reactions of people to their life's end, admit it or not, are more similar than we would like to admit to the characters in this fictional drama. 

http://www.predigten.uni-goettingen.de/archiv-9/061203-9-e.html

Luke Bouman, 2006
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Barbara Kingsolver has a new book of essays called "Small Wonder," and it is a poetic proclamation of the power of hope. It is also a stinging diatribe against the hubris of self-centered America. Taking a sharp look at the wars, the natural disasters, the political violence of the 21st century, she writes a modern translation of Luke's little apocalypse. By the end of the book, we know more than we need to know about the wastefulness of our beef consumption, the natural disasters caused by genetic crop engineering, the distortion of patriotism that blind flag-waving can produce, the barbarity of war and capital punishment. But she ends with soaring words of hope--a call to self-discipline and compassion and tolerance and moral living--a vision that matches the energy of Jesus' words to us today.

http://day1.org/488-a_gods_eye_view

Susan Andrews, 2003 
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 Advent and  Christmas represent a very special intervention of God in the human condition, a revolution indeed because it revealed to us just how much God loves us, one that, as G.K. Chesterton said, turned the world upside down and, astonishingly, when viewed from that perspective the world made sense. God, in the words of the Irish Dominican poet, Paul Murray, loves us so much that if we should cease to exist, he would die of sadness. 

http://www.agreeley.com/hom09/nov29.htm

Andrew M. Greeley, 2006 
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