“Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it. The vision is for an appointed time, but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry” (Habakkuk 2:2-3).
The birth of Jesus was a big deal. It still is. So let’s take some time to pause, linger, think and glean the nuances of this epic story.
Advent begins with anticipation, the pondering of the promise that God would intervene in our personal and planetary brokenness. It began in the garden where thistles and thorny vines would soon begin to compete for space with the lush landscape filled with fruits and vegetables and trees worthy of tree houses any kid would claim as his domain. As the young “first family” stood there in their tragic fallenness, partially covered with fig leaves, God promised a male savior, mysteriously born of the woman’s seed. He would be the one who would crush the head of the tempter who coaxed Eve and Adam into disobedience and blind rebellion.
So the guarantee of Christmas began in that Eden. Then down through Biblical history, by the count of some scholars, there are over 350 Messianic reminders that our Savior, the Christ, would come.
When we pause at Christmas to remember the humble scene in a Bethlehem barn, shed, cave or under an olive tree in an open field, we are pondering the fulfillment of a promise that hopeful souls have lashed their hearts to throughout human history. God keeps His Word, so as the prophet Habakkuk instructed us…“Wait for it, because it will surely come; it will not tarry.”
