Longing For Jesus

My first memory that distinctly involves Advent is of an Advent calendar – a somewhat esoteric object in 1950s Kansas, if I recall correctly.  I believe my uncle, who was in the army and stationed in Germany, sent it to us.

I was five or six years old then, and I remember the first two windows clearly.  Behind the tab of window number one was a gift-wrapped box, cube shaped, with a bow. Behind the second window was a toy locomotive with two wheels, brightly colored blue and yellow, and sporting a red, old style funnel smokestack.

After that the windows blur together. I do remember peeking at the big double window marked “25” and being vaguely disappointed that it was a nativity scene instead of a fully loaded Christmas tree half buried under a treasure trove of presents.

After all, I was five. Or maybe six.

I remember Christmas being carefully explained to me (after all, when I was three or four one of my imaginary friends was Baby Jesus).  But by the time I was six, presents loomed large in my thinking and my anticipation.

Maranatha

Maranatha (or Marana tha, or Maran atha; opinions vary) is an Aramaic word or phrase – a prayer or exhortation found in 1 Corinthians 16:22, generally translated as “Lord come!”

The early Church lived in anticipation of the second coming.  Early Christians thought the second coming was immanent, due at any time. It was a hoped for, even longed for event.  And more than once in the history of Christianity groups of people have also decided the time for the second coming is ripe. They have liquidated their belongings and sat back to wait.  But this course of action has, so far, never worked out very well.  As Jesus himself told us, “But of that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone” (Matthew 24:36).

And so we are left to wait in hope, as Israel waited for the birth we anticipate celebrating this season.

At least, that’s what we like to believe.

Felt Any Longing Lately?

Two thousand years, give or take, is a long time. As adults our attention span is significantly longer than that of a child, but it is not infinite.

During the Christmas season the yearly orgy of secular celebrations, holiday parties, gift shopping sprees, television specials and “special episodes,” and general foofaraw are regularly interrupted for an acknowledgement of “the reason for the season.” Sometimes it is pro forma. But sometimes it is sincere, sometimes mawkish and even sentimental.  This is a human response, and it spans the full range of human impulses and modes of action.

But these moments are, as near as I can tell, nearly always remembrances. For the most part they contain no anticipation for the future.  And rarely do we yearn as Israel has yearned, and as the early Church yearned. We have adopted an unvoiced resignation to being born after the exciting ferment of the early Church and before the exciting days of the end times.

My yearning for Christmas as a child came from a certainty that Christmas would come and I would be there. As an adult I also have some certainty that the end times will indeed come.  However, I have no such certainty that I will be there in this flesh I currently inhabit to see them. I do experience some longing now and again – especially when the world around me is being especially worldly. But the longing is neither continuous nor as intense as that childhood yearning for Christmas.

I find this makes me sad.

It Is Probably For The Best

It is true that my most intense longing for the second coming seems to coincide with times when the world around me is being at its most worldly and least holy. That is hardly surprising; nobody wants a party to end when it is going well.

But it also means that any longing I have for Jesus’ return is composed of some degree of melancholy. There’s nothing wrong with melancholy leading a person to deeper union with Christ, it seems that  more than a few Saints have had that experience. But it does not seem as desirable as having a genuine desire for the Lord that transcends the circumstances of the moment.

As I write it is one week until Christmas Eve.  We don’t have an Advent calendar.  This is because our daughter is 35 years old, and we have not been blessed with grandchildren.

We also haven’t bothered with a Christmas Tree for two or three years now.  Our only nod to decorating is a needlepoint “Merry Christmas” hanging we got from a relative years ago.  We keep it easily available for sentimental reasons.

I also have not made a Christmas list for years.  This year I didn’t even update my Amazon wish list.

In short, there is very little secular yearning going on around here.

But I find as the day ends and the night draws around me, a glimmer of a more meaningful yearning has begun to appear.  This happens more so when sleep proves elusive and my mind travels through memories and into future possibilities.

A Glimmer Of Yearning

I am 71 years old, one year more than the promised “three score and ten.” My family history suggests that I may have as much as 25 or even 30 years ahead of me. It seems unlikely that Jesus will return in those years. But it is also certain that at some point I will see Jesus.

“This will happen when my skin has been stripped off, and from my flesh I will see God: I will see for myself, my own eyes, not another’s, will behold him: my inmost being is consumed with longing” (Job 19: 26- 27).

No Advent calendar needed.