What Advent Teaches Us about Letting Go of Control and Living with Purpose

Did you hear about the stowaway who snuck onto a Delta flight from New York City to Paris, hid in various lavatories during the flight, and was only detected as the plane was about to land? Like her, we are all “stowaways” on this planet. Like her, none of us purchased our “ticket.” But unlike her, many of us think we’re piloting the plane.

Like British lawmakers who recently approved a bill authorizing euthanasia, we think we are in charge of the way our lives end. Like college football fans who want to be buried at their favorite stadiums, we even seek to control the location of our remains after we are gone. Some of us will spend twelve thousand dollars just to change the color of our eyes and vast sums in surgeries, medications, clothing, and jewelry to otherwise alter our appearance.

But our “plane” seldom cooperates with our attempts to pilot it.

At least 335 people died in the five hurricanes that made landfall on the US mainland this year.
Lake effect snow pummeled the Great Lakes region over the weekend.
MIT Technology Review warns that “the risk of a bird flu pandemic is rising.”
The threat of war between North and South Korea is escalating.
The deadliest animals to Americans are not sharks, bears, or snakes, but deer, accounting for 59,000 injuries and 440 deaths through collisions with vehicles.

John Tinniswood, the world’s oldest man at age 112 before his recent death, said, “You either live long, or you live short, and you can’t do much about it.”

However, there is much you can do to live every day with transforming purpose and joy. But the key is not found where most people are looking today.

“They Could Look Forward with Confidence”

Yesterday was the first Sunday in Advent, a translation of the Latin adventus (“coming”). The season is so-named because it looks back to Jesus’ first coming as preparation for his return. As Henri Nouwen wrote:

I am struck by the fact that the prophets speaking about the future of Israel always kept reminding their people of God’s great works in the past. They could look forward with confidence because they could look backward with awe to Yahweh’s great deeds.
I pray that Advent will offer me the opportunity to deepen my memory of God’s great deeds in time and will set me free to look forward to the fulfillment of time by him who came and is still to come.

How can this work for us? Consider these facts:

If Jesus would be born in a feed trough in a cave, he will be born again in any heart, including yours and mine (John 3:5).
If he would welcome lowly shepherds to worship him as an infant, he welcomes anyone to worship him as our King (Hebrews 13:15).
If he would heal leprous bodies, open blind eyes, calm stormy seas, and raise the dead, he can meet any need we face with his omnipotent grace (Philippians 4:19).
If he would surprise the world at his first coming, he will surprise us again at his return (Matthew 24:44).

“That Which Is to Be Found in Christ Alone”

Our problem is that millions of Americans no longer believe we need him to do these things today.

We are too secularized to believe we are sinners in need of a Savior.
We are too materialistic to believe that religion and worship are still relevant and necessary.
We are too prosperous to believe we need what Jesus can do in our lives.
We are too scientific to believe the world will end miraculously.

Ralph Waldo Emerson spoke for millions when he said, “Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.” But this is because “every heart” is fallen and seeks to be its own god (Genesis 3:5).

The same is true of Christians as well: If Satan cannot keep us from trusting Christ as our Savior, he will work to keep us from trusting Christ as our king. He will tempt us to do God’s work in our strength, knowing that we will inevitably fail and hinder the advance of God’s kingdom. He will encourage us to seek sanctification through human effort, knowing that we cannot become like Christ without the help of Christ and may abandon the attempt altogether.

As A. W. Pink noted, “The great mistake made by most of the Lord’s people is in hoping to discover in themselves that which is to be found in Christ alone.” This is a “great mistake” because, as Bill Bright noted:

“The Christian life isn’t difficult, it’s impossible—without the power of the Holy Spirit.”

The One Path to Spiritual Victory

To be the people we long to be, we need the “fruit of the Spirit” only the Holy Spirit can produce (Galatians 5:22–23). To defeat temptation, we need the strength of the One who defeated Satan in the wilderness and won every battle he fights (Hebrews 2:18). To impact our broken world with the transforming love of Christ, we need to experience the transforming love of Christ each day (Matthew 22:37–39).

When we refuse self-reliance for Spirit-dependence and walk in the abundant life Jesus came to give (John 10:10), we embrace the miracle of the first advent and prepare our hearts and our world every day for the second.

Self-sufficiency is spiritual suicide. Christ-sufficiency is spiritual victory.

Choose wisely.

*Denison Forum does not necessarily endorse the views expressed in these stories.