The promise of new life

BY SIHLE MAGUBANE

At  the dawning of each day, we anticipate new challenges, new experiences and new encounters. This often is a cause for excitement and requires some sort of preparation.

In this season of Advent we eagerly await the coming of the Saviour.

As Israel waited for the fulfilment of God’s promise to them, so we wait to celebrate that fulfilment every year. It is the prominence of this season in the Church’s year that brings to life the theological significance of Christ’s birth as the beginning of our salvation, the beginning of Life.

It would be a missed opportunity if the experience of the Advent season should fail to bring about some kind of change in our lives. The coming of our Lord did not just bring some change, it caused a revolution. The era of knowledge was drawing to an end, and the age of wisdom was nearing, heralded by  John the Baptist.

Jesus lived, as the word of God, the will of God; for him, mere knowledge of the laws and prophets was insufficient for salvation.

In Jesus, love becomes the guiding rule of life, material oblation is replaced by self-sacrifice, and finally, the hope that Israel had held on to for so long became reality—but what a pity that when the Messiah arrived, few realised it.

Likewise, we have denied Christ the love and devotion that he, as the Redeemer deserves. We are thus unworthy of the gift that God has given us.

In this, our waiting, let us be enlightened; for to see Christ, we need not to just know Jesus the historical man, but have the wisdom to understand that  Christ, our God, is coming to us as the living bread—to give us life.