Advent 4: Waiting with birth pangs.

        

        Romans 8:18-25 describes another kind of waiting.  The waiting this world does for the full redemption in Jesus Christ.  The waiting for that time when God’s Kingdom is fully realized.  This passage of scripture describes a world that is suffering and in decay.  We read this passage on the hills of yet another mass shooting here in our own country.  We are reminded that the violence that is being ravaged across the world is also present right here in our back yard.  We wait and we wonder if that day will ever come when swords will be turned to plowshares. 

The writer doesn’t only speak of the world wide suffering.  He also speaks of the inner suffering we each deal with.  That inner suffering may be a broken relationship, an addiction we fight, grief over the loss of a loved one, or a lost job.  The list can go on. 

In advent we not only remember the waiting for the birth of the Messiah but we look ahead to that day when Christ comes in all of his glory to fully redeem this world.  The writer compares it to birth pangs.  Talk to any mother who has suffered birth pangs and she will tell you that as painful as that was, the end result of that baby being placed in her arms washes all that pain away. 

So we look forward to that day that day.  This day is described in the book of Isaiah.  Those days will be a day when “the wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.  The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.  The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.  They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lor as the waters cover the sea.”  Isaiah 11:6-9.  Dear God, Let it be so.