I have been on this one social blogging website for about a decade, which seems kind of ridiculous when I say it out loud. But in that time, I have seen the Christian community on that site break into factions a few times over theological matters. The current movement is an opposition to the prosperity gospel.

What I find especially notable about it is that the condemnation of the prosperity gospel is happening alongside posts, rarely even on the same blog, that talk about 'claiming' miracles by the end of February or changes in the coming year. There doesn't seem to be a full recognition of the relationship between these things. The thing is, the prosperity gospel doesn't come out of nowhere. There are promises in scripture that, read without hearing the message the Bible actually contains, sound an awful lot like the prosperity gospel. There are stories about servants of God receiving great blessings. Why should we assume these don't apply to us?

The people of Jeremiah's day had good reason to believe what the false prophets were saying. It wasn't just comfortable for them to hear, it sounded like it made sense. God had said He would establish the throne of David forever, He had protected Judah many times in the past, He had made promises of protection and wealth and success. In light of that history, it certainly sounded like God wouldn't let the kingdom fall. The problem with the interpretation, like so many other false reads of scripture, is that they do not include a knowledge of God Himself.

The Word of God is a higher authority than our interpretation or our experiences. We have to hear what God is actually saying to us and our situation. We need to constantly go back to the scripture, and seek to truly know the God behind it, if we are ever going to make sense of the claims being made within it.

This life is not meant to be done alone. The basic promise God makes over and over again throughout scripture, in fact, is that He will be with us. Ever since leaving Eden, mankind has been cut off from relationship with God, and the condemnations laid down on Adam and Eve broke their relationships with each other and with nature. The work of restoring relationship with God is fundamental; all other relationships flow from it.

The Law was a mediator. Within very tight restraints, the people of Israel could experience a relationship with God again. They could experience being His people and having Him as their God. David wrote many psalms where he found his rest in knowing that God was with him. Jeremiah was given an incredibly difficult job, and God affirms twice in the first chapter that there is no need to fear because He would be with him.

There is much that can be said about the role of community in the life of a Christian, but that community is founded on having relationship with God. All of the promises of scripture culminate in the person of Jesus, who initiates a relationship with us that does not require constant sacrifice, or extensive ritual, or any mediator but Christ Himself. The final fulfillment of the promises of God is found in the New Heaven and New Earth, when God dwells with us for eternity.

​Our first desire must be for Him. Every other desire worth having is built on it.

God promised that He would do a new thing. Elsewhere He describes a new covenant that He would bring to His people, one in which there would be no need for further instruction of the Law because it would be written on the hearts of His people. Here, though, He focuses on the glory of that coming day, when He would do something so new and wonderful that creation itself would benefit, that the beasts would glorify God, and that His people would declare His praise.

This coming day is promised to be one where justice reigns, where the people of God have their needs met, where righteousness shall be the norm.

When Christ came the first time, He initiated the fulfillment of God's promises, but He isn't done yet. We wait in eager hope for that coming day where there will be no more wickedness, no more strife, no more injustice. As we wait, we must see the work God has done and offer Him the praise He is due. And while we wait, we must look forward in eager anticipation of the final fulfillment of His promises.

Advent is a period built into the Christian year that refocuses our attention on the waiting, on the anticipation, on the pending joy that we can feel bubbling up inside us as we look to that ever-closer day. As we inch toward Christmas, let us ask God to teach us to enjoy the waiting and take solace in the promise.