Loading

December 13th The Third Sunday of Advent

Today's Readings: Isaiah 65:17–25; Psalm 126; John 3:22–30

When God created the heavens and the earth, man, and every living thing, he saw what he had made and declared it "very good." Life was as God intended in every way and Adam and Eve lived in fellowship with him. But when sin came crashing into this perfect paradise, strife, brokenness, and all manner of evil entered this unspoiled world. Humanity was cast out from the presence of God. The relationship between man and God was broken. Even the whole created order was subject to the bondage of decay.

Since Eden, we have wrestled with the massive gap between the reality of what was and the reality of what is. We instinctively know that life is not as it should be as we continually face trials, suffering, and sorrow. It's the longing of every human heart to live a life full of joy and free from pain and suffering. We experience moments of joy, glimpses that are never permanent but which cause us to seek more. C.S. Lewis says these foretastes of joy "are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited." We want this life of joy so badly that we work hard to make things better.

God has a plan to fix what we have never been able to fix ourselves. Isaiah tells us God is going to create new heavens and a new earth. "Be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create." The world will be made right. Death will be destroyed, and the past and its pains, its sins and its sorrows, will be forgotten. This new creation will be a place of eternal relational joy, uninterrupted peace, and universal harmony. The effects of sin will be reversed, and we will live in the light of God's blessings.

Advent is a time of anticipation, a longing for the coming of Christ. In his first advent, Jesus defeated the curse of death when he died and rose again. We rejoice in the work he did that we could not do for ourselves. In a sense, the new creation Isaiah speaks of has already arrived. Paul writes, "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation" (2 Cor. 5:17). The new creation began in us and will be followed by the transformation of all creation.

Isaiah describes the full fruit of God's redemptive work. This heightened expectation of our future joy provides the seed for joy in the present. The angels sang together and shouted for joy when God laid the foundation of the earth (Job 38:4-7). Imagine our joy when God creates again, making all things new, forever! Advent is not merely the celebration of the birth of Jesus. Wrapped in all that his birth represents is the anticipation of the longed-for future full of joy.

— Nancy Fried

We hope you have enjoyed this Advent devotional!