“You better watch out, you better not cry. You better not pout I’m telling you why, Santa Claus is coming to town.”
Remember those lyrics from that childhood song?
Warning us that all of our actions mattered and if we had a misstep, then the beloved Santa wouldn’t visit.
Interesting that another passage incited the same feeling for many . . .
“Be awake. Be alert . . . You do not know when the Lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cock crow, or in the morning.”
Odds are we probably heard that passage punitively. As if Jesus is saying, “You better be good. Don’t screw up . . . or else I’m coming to get you!!!! And you won’t know when the BOOM! Is going to land.”
What if there were a different, more transformational way of looking at and understanding that passage?
Jesus is not talking about an end judgment.
He isn’t threatening us or telling us what is going to happen upon our death.
He is talking about the “forever coming of Christ, the eternal coming of Christ . . . . now . . . . and now . . . and now . . .” (Rohr, “Be Awake”).
So many have been taught to worry about the afterlife and the impending “second coming” – but Christ is always coming.
Right now.
Are we fully present in that or did we miss it?
We end up stuck in places that cause us to miss that eternal coming. Stuck thinking about the past. Wishing for the future. Not to mention we get stuck in our daily routines of the busyness we all face. And when interruptions happen among those routines, rarely do we see those interruptions as gifts, but instead as burdens.
What if instead of being stuck, we begin embracing every moment. This moment. And this moment. And – even THIS moment.
Rohr says the purest form of spirituality is to find God in what is right in front of us.
Jean Pierre de Caussade called it the “sacrament of the present moment.”
In order to experience that sacrament, may our mantra be “just this . . .”
Practice saying that to yourself multiple times throughout the day. Don’t worry about what was or what will be . . .
Just this.
Grace and Peace,
Andrea
If you missed Sunday’s message and want to watch, click here.