Paul Boese said, “Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future.”  Who is not in need of forgiveness, and who does not need to forgive someone else? Once the hurt has occurred, nothing can change. No matter how much we’d love to change the hurt we gave to others or we have received, the hurt remains reality, our history. But those hurts do not have to affect the present or future if we forgive or are forgiven.  Forgiveness brings hope for a new relationship, a chance to start again. The future is bigger with more possibilities.

Junk mail claims “You’re a winner!” until you read the catch that costs. The gospels also have a catch: “Find life! (But first deny yourself, take up your cross, and let go of life).”

In Jesus we see in human terms what it means to be God. The gospels are the story of One who came into the world (Incarnation) and loses everything (crucifixion). So where is God found?  With those who lose.

Amid flash floods, earthquakes, riots, and war, people ask “Where is God?” Christians proclaim: God is on the cross. God suffers with us. God does not will or permit suffering. God’s will is simple: God wills love—all the time, and that is all. “So suffering is not an obstacle to the presence of God, suffering is one manifestation of the presence of God.” (Michael J. Himes, Doing the Truth in Love).

Himes continues: “The cross is not something that happens to Jesus, it is what Jesus has been aiming at all along.” Jesus predicts the cross all the way: the one who holds onto life loses it; the one who gives life away sees it become everlasting life.

Do I want to give myself away? I am made in the image and likeness of God who is pure self-gift. When I’m pure gift, I’m truly who I really am. If I hold on to my life, I will not have any life. But when I give my life away, it becomes everlasting life, and I’m a winner.

Balaam’s oracle prophesies the Messiah: “I behold him, though not near: A star shall advance from Jacob, and a staff shall rise from Israel” (Numbers 24). In Advent we often say that we need to bring Christ to birth. What does this mean? Evolution is birthing the Christ through a progression of unifying relationships and great complexity; that is, the whole universe is intended to become the fullness of Christ. Christ is always the future horizon of the cosmos.

Jesus is the Christ, who is the fully integrated person in whom God has revealed the Godself in the most complete way. ”In Jesus we see that the future of the universe is linked to the human community coming to full consciousness and ultimately toward evolution of spirit, from the birth of mind to the birth of the whole Christ.” How will we get there?  If creation is to become transformed into God, what took place in the life of Jesus must take place in our lives as well. Jesus shows us what it means to be a human person and the way to deepen our humanity toward the fullness of life. What took place in Jesus’ life must take place in ours as well, if the fullness of Christ is to come to be. As Ilia Delio writes: “Jesus is the Christ, the climax of that long development whereby the world becomes aware of itself and comes into the direct presence of God” (69-70).

Sing about this to the melody of “Rudolph.”

Body of Christ is made from cosmic dust from ancient stars.

            His cosmic earthly life is really just the same as ours.

            Jesus is not the exception;

            Yet there’s something very new.

            In him divides are passé; unity we’re called to do.

            Incarnation has emerged in our history

not because of Adam’s sin but because God’s love’s within.

            Now all things are related: that’s the really best Good News.

            Fullness of Christ is here now, for the Spirit is the glue.

  Mary’s yes to the Angel Gabriel exploded into God’s entering our world. God had been longing to be one of us for billions of years. God loved us that much that he created a universe. At the Big Bang 14.8 billion years ago God was on his way to walk among us with two feet, two hands, two ears, and ten toes. Then when Mary said yes, this was the moment of Incarnation, God’s taking on human flesh. This was a new Big Bang! While the first Big Bang was God’s way to become one of us, this second Big Bang was to make us one with God, to make us love in the God who is Love, to make us human more complex than we are now (which will mean less physicality and more spirituality) and reach the Second Coming, that point of the fullness of life and love in God, wherein God, humanity, and all creation are one in Love.

(Sing the following to the melody of “Jingle Bells.”)

New Big Bang! New Big Bang! Mary said her yes.

            In her heart the Godhead came–O womb so highly blessed!

            God became one with us.

            Now we’re one with God.

            Universe—now linked with us toward birth of the whole Christ.

             Evolution is birthing of the Christ. All relations go to great complexity.

            All will one day be the fullness of the Christ.

           What took place in Jesus must now take its place in us. Oh!

 New Big Bang! New Big Bang! So God could give love.

Universe became so large to stretch the love of God!

God is love, so that means all evolves to Love

That’s how we are made to be the image of our God.

   Water was everything to the people of Israel, so the coming of the Messiah was marked by rivers and fountains and lush greenery. Water in abundance was a definite sign of God’s presence.

God created humans with a destiny toward divine plenitude. We’re evolving toward a new heaven and a new earth that Chardin calls the “Pleroma Christi.” Humans are evolving into a super-consciousness when we all will have the mind of Christ. This far surpasses a personal process as in “I gotta get to heaven.” Rather all humanity and all created matter are on the way toward the whole universe becoming part of the divine plenitude. That’s fountain fullness.

Advent is more than pulling out the crib and musing “Jesus was so cute lying in the manger.”  Jesus Christ was born of Mary and he is other people (Mt. 25) and is one with the Universe. Let’s sing about this, using the melody “Frosty the Snowman.”

Mary and Joseph took a trip to Bethlehem,

            Had to travel there—it was census time—but they had no place to stay.

            Down to the stable soon a baby born for us.

            Jesus came to show and to help us know that God brings us happiness.

            It must have been God’s special love from billion eons past

            That put God in the heart of all—atoms and all molecules.

            Then down through all the stages—biosphere to noosphere—Christ is the one who’s present: that’s called Christogenesis!

Ebeneezer Scrooge was converted when he realized after the visitation of the three ghosts that the past, present, and future are all rolled into one. In liturgy we call that “anamnesis.” We remember the past, pray about the present, and know the potential for the future. As we look toward Christmas we remember a birth in Bethlehem, pray that God will be born in our hearts today, and realize that the fullness of the Incarnation is both coming and already here. We just haven’t experienced the fullness yet. It’s like a basketball game. If your favorite team is 20 points ahead and there’s only a minute left to play, we’re just waiting for the clock to run out. We know the victor. Similarly, we know salvation is ours, we know that the Victor is Christ, and the fullness of redemption is already here. It’s ours. We’re just waiting for the clock (the end of the world) to run out.  The Cosmic Christ (also called Christ in Evolution) is the Victory.

The First Reading today (Isaiah 40:25-31) incites us to lift up our eyes and see who has created all things. He will give us strength, so keep running toward the end of the world, help bring about the fullness of redemption, and don’t grow weary. The clock is ticking.

Throughout Advent we hear “Prepare the way.” So we get busy filling in valleys, making mountains low, smoothing the rough ways. All the earth is getting ready, actually evolving to become Love, the metaphor of Christ. The Spirit who breathed upon the waters in Genesis continues to breathe over the earth. Through the Spirit Christ unites with the universe, evolving, evolving until all will be one in the fullness of the Incarnation. All is in process—all humanity and all created matter. All will one day become part of the divine plenitude in its right relationship with Love. Let’s sing about it using the melody “Angels from the Realms of Glory.”

All creation is becoming Love, the metaphor of Christ.

            Incarnating evolution is the world of Christ’s Spirit.

            Be a part of Christ’s own myst’ry in the Spirit’s energy.

In today’s lectionary readings Jesus cured two blind men because of their faith, and the prophet Isaiah claimed that “on that day…the eyes of the blind shall see.” Whatever Jesus did and was will be fulfilled in the Second Coming, when we will all see aright.  We are evolving toward the end times when all will see completely; blindness will be no more. The mystery of Christ will become clear, for we will see it as our mystery.

Lectionary readings in Advent and Advent hymns often speak of “that day.” “On that day” all good things will happen—peace, prosperity, plentiful food. That’s certainly worth waiting for. And so in Advent we wait, but our waiting cannot be the waiting of Charlie Brown in a pumpkin patch watching for the Great Pumpkin to arrive this year—well, maybe next year or the year after.  Our waiting includes doing our part to bring about “that day.”  How?  We make the power of God come alive in our world through our lives. We are co-creators, cooperators with God in the transformation of our world. The paschal mystery begun in the life of Jesus continues in the transformation of the world into the reign of God. A reign requires a ruler, a king. Of course, this ruler is Jesus Christ. What are we doing today to bring about peace, prosperity, and plentiful food?  Many churches, businesses, and schools conduct collections. Do not underestimate the power of a grocery bag of food and paper products to bring about “that day.” “That day” depends upon today.

The wolf with the lamb, the leopard with the kid, the calf with the lion, the cow with the bear—and all led by a child. That’s unity beyond anything we can now imagine. In Advent we long for the coming of the Lord, best expressed in Jesus Christ’s own longing for unity “that all may be one” (John 17:21). For what was Jesus longing at the Last Supper? We are beginning to understand that this unity will occur when Christ’s glorified body will thrust us into another phase of creation, a cosmic dimension we call the Second Coming. Some call such unity the God-community in which the whole cosmos is incorporated, for some day God will be “all in all.” On that day the Incarnation, begun 14.8 billion years ago with the Big Bang paving the way for God to take on flesh, will be completed in a whole new Body, the universe centered in Christ. Our minds cannot grasp the fullness of the Incarnation, so we look back on the Bethlehem event. We can grasp the Incarnation as a Baby in a manger, but we can’t keep spending Advent after Advent looking back. Because Christ is the noblest perfection of the universe. the fullness of the Incarnation will be the universe when all is one.