By Todd Paetznick, November 30, 2023

Where can we find hope?

In case you are not familiar with the Advent season, it is an annual reflective preparation for the celebration of Christmas.  It takes place over the four Sundays before the anniversary of the arrival (advent) of Jesus.  Each of the four Sundays leading up to Christmas has a symbolic candle to be lit to direct people’s thoughts and hearts toward the coming of the Messiah, the Christ, the birth of Jesus.  The first two weeks have purple candles symbolizing hope and peace.  The candle on week three is pink, symbolizing hope.  And the candle on the fourth week is white, representing love and the arrival of Christ.  Over the next few weeks, I will follow the Advent calendar theme for the week and draw a connection with vocational thought.  In 2023, the first Sunday of Advent will be on November 30^th.

The first week of Advent is about Hope, and the first candle is purple, symbolizing royalty.  It is also called the prophecy candle, intended to help us remember the Old Testament prophets who foretold the Messiah’s arrival.  Hundreds of years before the arrival of the Messiah, God sent prophets to foretell his people that the Messiah was coming and how they could expect the world to change as a result of his arrival.  The words of the prophets gave people hope for their futures.  

People have always wanted to know what will happen.  But, a barrier exists between the right now and what happens next.  We cannot know what will happen with any degree of certainty.  Knowledge of the future is God’s exclusive domain.

As long as people have been around, there has been a desire to know what will happen.  Fortune tellers had (and still have) a lucrative business when their guesses about the future are close to accurate.  Oracles were consulted about the outcome of battles.  Some people consult the dead, who presumably have better insight into what will happen.  Despite all our technological advances, modern people still do not know any better about what will happen than any of the people who lived before us. 

Today, we use weather apps on our smartphones to tell us what to wear to stay warm, cool, or dry.  We have “experts” telling us which investments will likely increase or decrease in value.  Economists tell us what the financial future will look like.  Computer models and Artificial Intelligence use trends from the past and project them into the future.  But as we all know, weather changes, the stock market surprises, the economy is affected by too many outside influences to be accurately predicted, and even computer models are not very accurate the more distant they project into the future.  Despite the uncertainty of predicting the future, businesses and people will attempt to predict what will happen based on the past, trends, and anything else that might offer an advantage.  We all want something in which we can hope.

The ancients hoped that the coming Messiah would rescue them from their difficulties.  Many hoped the Messiah would be a political leader who would overthrow their Roman oppressors.  They hoped the coming of the Messiah would relieve them from their tax burden and even eliminate the ever-present Roman soldiers who enforced peace through threats and iron-fisted control (Pax Romana).  Even Jesus’ disciples expected the Messiah to be a political leader and argued over who would sit in the privileged seats at his side (Mark 10:35-45).  Reading the gospels, Jesus’ disciples appear confused and disappointed after his crucifixion.  Despite being at his side during his ministry years, the disciples of Jesus did not immediately understand the necessity of his death and subsequent resurrection as God’s ultimate plan.  Like the other people around them, Jesus’ disciples hoped for something different than what they expereinced.

Faith is always future-looking.  We cannot know what will happen, but we have God’s word to advise us on the right things to do.  In faith, we take action despite not knowing with absolute certainty what the outcome of our actions will be.  This is what faith is all about.  It is always trusting that God knows the future and the outcomes of our actions.  

As we reflect on the biblical prophecy of the coming of the Messiah during Advent, take some time to feel the excitement and the hope felt by those living during Jesus’ day who anticipated his coming and saw the prophecies fulfilled.  And watch the events in our modern world with anticipation, knowing Christ’s second Advent is close at hand.  Our hope is in the Lord!

“Now faith is [the] certainty of [things] hoped for, a proof of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1 NASB20).