Advent

December 22, 2020

Scripture Reading: Psalm 96

Say among the nations, ‘The Lord is king!
   The world is firmly established; it shall never be moved.
   He will judge the peoples with equity.’
Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice;
   let the sea roar, and all that fills it;
   let the field exult, and everything in it.
Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy
   before the Lord; for he is coming,
   for he is coming to judge the earth.
He will judge the world with righteousness,
   and the peoples with his truth. –Psalm 96:10-13

We Christ-followers see Jesus in scriptures like the one above. To the Psalmist, It describes one who is coming who will judge our actions with righteousness. The Psalmist wrote about the long-expected savior foretold by prophets. Some Christians shortcut Jesus’ judgment to a simple separation of who is going to eternal damnation and who will spend eternity with God. That seems a little too cut and dry for me. In the first place, we have all sinned, missed the mark, so without God’s amazing grace, all of us would come up short on righteousness.

As described in the quote above, I tend to interrupt judgment about how we live our lives from day-to-day. Like a supervisory assessment, Jesus assesses how we are doing our job of being a part of the Body of Christ in the world today. Much of the supervision is done in real-time consultation. Here is a situation: how do we approach it in the best way to enhance the fulfillment of the Kingdom of God on earth. It requires praying without ceasing and routinely evaluating what we did in righteousness and where we missed the mark. When we miss the mark, we need to seek forgiveness from God and others we may have harmed in the process. We also need to change our behavior and work diligently, never to make the same mistake again.

Prayer: Thank you, Lord, for your patience with us as you help us get loving like you, right. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.