God's Dream for Us

Advent is a time to “stay awake” and be watchful “for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect” (Mt. 24:44).

I’ve always had a hard time grasping why the Church focuses on the Second Coming of Jesus during Christ the King Sunday and for most of the Advent season. With the beginning of the new liturgical year on the first Sunday of Advent, and Christmas less than a month away, it just doesn’t seem like “Christmas Spirit” to hear about the “end times” – or in Church parlance, the four “last things”: death, judgment, heaven and hell.

However, it is important to remember that Jesus Christ is the “spirit” of Christmas. The reason He was born was to die for us, so if we live and die for Him, we could live with Him forever at the end of our lives. In this way, the two celebrations are understandably linked.

I’m not a George Clooney fan, but I recently watched the movie “Up in the Air.” In the movie during one of the many firings Clooney conducted, he had a line that stuck in my mind. After looking at a disgruntled employee’s resume, Clooney tells the man, “Do you know why people admire professional athletes? Because they follow their dreams.” Apparently the guy he was firing had studied culinary arts earlier in his career, and Clooney wanted to redirect the employee back to his initial calling to be a chef.

After reflecting on that statement, I pictured myself face to face with Jesus after I died, and I imagined Him asking me, “Do you know why people admire the saints? Because they followed my Father’s dream.”

God’s dream for each one of us is to be spiritually perfect, like Him, and it’s in the pursuit of our spiritual perfection that we become holy. As it is, we are all a work in progress, and it is up to us to choose the speed of our progress.

Similar to the U.S. Army’s recruiting slogan, one could say that the motto for God’s army is: “Be all that I created you to be.”

In the letter to the Romans, St. Paul gives us a timeless blueprint to help us become all that God wants us to be: “But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires” (Rom 13:14).

Although Advent has a penitential dimension to it, just as Lent does to a greater extent, perhaps we should approach Advent in a more literal way: as a new beginning in our spiritual lives. The Advent season is a good time to avail ourselves of the sacrament of reconciliation and atone for our sins by helping the poor and the marginalized according to our state of life, “since love covers a multitude of sins” (1 Pet 4:8).

This Advent, let’s live out the Father’s dream and prepare ourselves for the return of our King, “For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed” (Rom 13:11).