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Posts Tagged ‘Eschatology’
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Reflection Questions
- Isaiah chapters 40-55 are known as the ‘Book of Comfort’. The prophet is speaking encouraging words to the exiles as they return home and seek to rebuild their lives and the Temple in Jerusalem. Isaiah is also known as the ‘carrier of the hope of the Messiah’. Foretelling a time when God will come among his people. Can you see the prediction of John the Baptist and Jesus in the reading from Isaiah? What image speaks personally to you on your advent journey?
- The preparation of a straight road or a royal highway was known to happen in ancient times when a very special person was to visit. Physically, valleys were filled and hills were lowered to make the way smooth and easy. At great expense! As Advent invites us to make a clear pathway for the Lord, what roadblocks, ditches, hills require the earthmoving equipment of prayer, spiritual direction, reconciliation?
- The 2nd Letter of Peter is regarded as possibly the latest of the New Testament Letters. Obviously they are concerned with the delay of Jesus. Peter teaches God’s final judgement is not based upon human calendars. While Peter uses the popular belief of the time of a final ‘fire’ at the end of time, he also emphasises the need for good behaviour and ‘righteousness’ (whereas gnostics did not consider there would be a future judgment and therefore immorality was irrelevant). Would Christ’s coming find you ‘eager to be found without spot’? At peace? What is the source of your ‘dis-ease’?
- Today we hear the beginning of the Gospel of Mark. The Gospel we will listen to for the rest of the Year. Mark immediately shares the ‘secret’ in the first line. We are about to hear ‘gospel’ (good news about a victory battle over evil) done by Jesus Christ. He is the one who reveals by words, actions of power, that he has all the attributes of God = Son of God. Is your interest raised? Consider spending a few hours to read Mark (the shortest gospel) for Advent.
- To announce a figure of such great importance requires a voice to ‘proclaim’ the immanent arrival. This is the role of John the Baptist. Significantly John does this at the Jordan river (at the same crossing point Israel left the desert and entered the Promised Land). A new rescuing by God is taking place. John is painted to be like the great prophet Elijah who was to return to prepare for the ‘great day of the Lord’. Who has been a holy witness and ‘prophet’ like John the Baptist for your journey? Who could you be a holy witness for this advent calling them back to God?
- What is one action that you will do to ‘livetheword’ this week?
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Reflection Question 2: Isaiah promises a future time when all nations will ‘go up to Jerusalem’. This will be a time of Justice and Judgment. Fighting will change to Feeding. Outside the United Nations is a sculpture where a sword is beaten into a plough with the inscription ‘they shall beat their swords into ploughs’. What changes in the world need to take place for this ‘transformation’? What change needs to take place within ‘you’? What weaponry do you use: Wounding words? Cutting looks? Angry attitudes? Arrogant pride? Blindness toward to the hurting? How could you ‘walk in the light of the Lord’?
Advent Story: William Barclay. 3 Devils. Three apprentice devils were coming to earth to finish their apprenticeship. They were talking to Satan, the chief of the devils, about their plans to tempt and ruin people. The first said: I will tell people there is no God. Satan said, ‘that will not delude many, for they know that there is a God.’ The second said ‘I will tell them there is no hell.’ Satan answered, ‘you will deceive no on that way; they know even now that there is a hell for sin.’ The third said, ‘ I will tell them there is no hurry.’ ‘Go’ said Satan ‘and you will ruin them by the thousand’.
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Reflection Question 5: Contemporary society does not face many of us with such obvious persecution as the early christians experienced. Some writers suggest we are no longer faced with a ‘red’ (blood) martyrdom, but a ‘white’ (perseverance) martyrdom. What would a ‘modern’ synagouge or prison be? How do you experience christians being taunted, threatened, influenced away from Christ? What does it mean to ‘give testimony’ because of ‘my name’?
Enjoy and Share – Consider starting an Advent Group. ‘Make A Date’ with 6 others to meet weekly to prepare for Christmas.