Readings: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; I Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36

Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. Luke 21:33

The sun will burn out in about 5 billion years. As with other stars the size of the sun, our star will collapse on itself and die, emitting little to no light. Earth, of course, will die along with it. Though you and I will not be present for the death watch, it seems like an ignominious end to our beautiful blue and green orb we call home.

Our planet, as well as the rest of the universe, has been in continuous flux since the beginning. Data from the Webb telescope (which measures background radiation well beyond our solar system) confirms scientists’ suspicion that the universe exploded into existence billions of years ago. And the universe is expanding at unimaginable speed. Galaxies, including our own Milky Way, are hurtling through space and moving away from each other. The furthest galaxies are moving away from us faster than galaxies closer to us. As a friend once rhetorically asked me, “What is the universe expanding into?” It is indeed an exercise in courage to ponder such imponderables.  As scientific discovery expands our knowledge base, forcing us to rethink the way we relate to the universe and our place in it, we might feel uneasy if not a little insecure.  

Jesus, who himself lived through times admittedly much different from our own but difficult just the same, assured us there is a divine constancy that reaches out to us across time and space.  “God needs man,” said the mystic Meister Eckhart. Evelyn Underhill put it this way: “It is Love calling to love; and the journey, though in one sense a hard pilgrimage, up and out, by the terraced mount and the ten heavens to God, in another is the inevitable rush of the roving comet, caught at last, to the Central Sun.” 

This Advent may the whir of existence not drown out the singular message in Jesus’ words that “will not pass away:”  God loves us. 

Offered by Bryan Fredrickson, God’s beloved child.