In a Season for family gatherings prevented by the pandemic, the feeling of yearning has become stronger.

 

This Season in the Church Calendar and also as a holiday season in many parts of the world is also a time for family reunions. Children come home to their parents for a visit or parents visit sons and daughters for special get-togethers. Animated by the “spirit of the season”, which the secular and the religious world both acknowledge, everyone joins into a huge celebration of humanity, family, unity, reconciliation and love.

 

But this Season of gatherings and reunions has been greatly prevented to take place mainly because of the travel bans, border closures, quarantines and restrictions related to the pandemic.

 

In many instances, social distancing, face shield and mask-wearing prevented the usual hugs and kisses from being exchanged by loved ones and friends.

 

This is why this yearning and longing for home and family, for physically getting together remains and is growing stronger every day.

 

Perhaps this feeling is not unfamiliar to God who, not only knows all things but also ‘feels all things’, because God had felt this in the most tangible way in relation to the people of Israel, the biblical Chosen people.

 

Having lost the chosen ones because of their very own disobedience and unfaithfulness, God still reaches out to them to forgive them of their infidelity. According to prophet Jeremiah (31), God gathers the remnant of Israel like lost children from captivity, and leads them to a straight path, walking by brooks of water because God has become a father to them.

God as parent yearns for the return of lost children walking beside them to a new home.

 

Again, God experiences this feeling of longing and pining as God sends God’s own Son into the world to seek God’s children who continue to walk away from the love of God. Jesus is born as one among the people whom God had a lasting covenant with.

 

And this yearning and longing for the reunion with the Son will only come after the Son accomplishes the task of bringing back the people to God at a very dear price – the Son’s suffering and death on the cross.

 

God’s reunification with the Son also comes with the greatest of gifts for the people. Aside from being saved, they become brothers and sisters to Christ. According to Gospel writer John, those who believe and receive the Son are given the power to become Children of God (John 1:12).

 

Paul in his letter to the Ephesians shares his understanding of God ‘choosing us in Christ even before the world was founded to be holy and blameless before him in love. God destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will (Eph 1:4&5).

 

 

Becoming God’s Children

 

Becoming God’s children and possessing the power to be such has become difficult today. It remains a daunting challenge to be church as Christ’s embodiment in the world, not much because it is increasingly becoming a secularized world, but because of the great challenge to remain true to God in the face of so many temptations and distractions that the world offer. There is also threat to lives and limbs of people of faith and those who fight for genuine social change.

 

Someone told me when I arrived in Australia that it is not easy to become a Christian in the Philippines because of the on-going situation of repression to political activists and advocates for people’s rights and welfare. I responded by saying it is harder to be a Christian in Australia because life here is very comfortable and pleasant. It is easy to say that we are blessed here. But what about the people in many parts of the world who suffer greatly under tyrannical regimes, those who live each day in war-torn- and conflict-stricken areas, are they not blessed?

 

Jeremiah’s proclamation about the Lord’s goodness and faithfulness (the good news for Israel) is about concrete and practical reality. When he speaks about the Lord’s salvation, he talks about tangible manifestations such as food and drink, farms and vineyards, animal stocks and food storages etc. He speaks about liberation from Babylonian captivity. He speaks about an end to the people’s exile and the return to their land.

 

Paul has a very spiritual witness about Jesus Christ. He speaks about God’s fatherhood and love for God’s children; of salvation and redemption in spiritual ways, of blessings in heavenly places, of God’s rich grace and pledge of redemption for God’s people.

 

Within the church, there are many ways how members understand and interpret the meaning of Good News of redemption and salvation, abundance and prosperity. Because of various interpretations, churches and congregations will also have multiple ways of doing ministry and mission. Today, many churches, including those within the Uniting Church, are coming up with discernment about ‘how to be church’. The phrases “new expression churches”,  “new ways of doing mission”, “the new normal” and the “COVID-19 normal” indicate a kind of exploration on how the church today can faithfully follow Christ’s ministry and be a collective witness to God’s love and God’s kingdom as God’s children.

 

I believe that God is doing something in the world, in the same way that God did to the chosen people long ago. God will continue to manifest God’s grace and love in order to transform the world into a renewed creation; transforming mourning into joy, sorrow into gladness, disease to healing, captivity to freedom, deprivation to abundance, and death to life.

 

To be God’s children is to share God’s grace that Jesus shared to us. The power that has been given to us is God’s grace in Jesus Christ that is to be shared to all.

 

Let this year 2020 be a truly new year for us in the sense that, though the leading of the Spirit of Christ, it is us who create that newness.

 

Covid-19 will be with us like the flu virus but it shall not be the determinant of our future. The Israelites were in captivity but Babylon was not the determinant of their future. It was God who delivered them from exile and it is God through Christ’s presence in us who will deliver us from all that ails our society and the world.

 

As we come to the Lord’s Table, let us celebrate God’s grace through Jesus Christ remembering that God is with us, in us and walks with us today, in the new year, and in years to come.

 

Amen.