Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ

by Fleming Rutledge

Therefore, far from escaping the world, the Christian disciple finds his or her vocation precisely here: at the collision of the ages where the struggle of the Enemy against God continues, making a space for the conquering love of God for the world.

Two world orders are opposed to one another (Paul calls them flesh [sarx] and Spirit [pneuma]). This represents a break with any idea that human beings can make progress toward bringing the kingdom of God to pass. Only God can do that, by inaugurating a wholesale change of regime. This is what he has done in the invasion (not too strong a word) of the old order by the new in Jesus Christ. The New Testament speaks of our citizenship in either one sphere of power or the other, baptism being the passage “from the dominion of darkness” into “the kingdom of his Son” (Col. 1:13).

However, the current use of “justice” as a rallying cry for the church is reductive, because it is limited to particular political and economic issues without reference to the righteousness of God. A key to the biblical meaning of justice is found in the fact that the word translated “justice” and “righteousness” is the same word in Hebrew and in Greek. The root of the word becomes, in both Testaments, both a noun and a verb, so that “justice” or “judgment” is the same thing as “righteousness” or “rectification” (making right).

All the references to judgment in the Bible should be understood in the context of God’s righteousness—not just his being righteous (noun) but his “making right” (verb) all that has been wrong.

I have personally been present when new names for the candles of the four Sundays of Advent have been proposed along the lines of Peace, Joy, Love, and Hope. This presents quite a contrast with the medieval Advent themes of death, judgment, heaven, and hell—in that order!

I make no attempt to conceal my commitment to apocalyptic interpretation of the Bible. This volume is an effort to model it in the pulpit. If there is one foundational truth that I have learned from apocalyptic theology, it is this: God is the subject of the verb.

This is surely a clue to understanding the wrath of God. A god who remained silent in the face of atrocities would not be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob or the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Advent is the season of the uncovering: “Bear fruit that befits repentance. . . . Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees”! This is the right time to root out the cover-ups in our own lives, as we wait with bated breath for the lights to come on and the announcement of the angel that God is not against us but for us.