When I saw the word “Advent” as a child, my heart instinctively read “adventure.” The Advent season has always stirred in me a sense of anticipation, as though something wondrous, transformative, and deeply holy is just beyond the horizon.
As a child, I thought it was an “adventure” for Christians to wait for Christmas to arrive. This is partially true, as Advent is a theological journey and path that we participate in.
Advent is not simply about waiting. It is about preparing ourselves for a journey with God.
In the Christian calendar, Advent marks the four Sundays leading up to Christmas. We gather each year with the lighting of candles around the wreath, the reading of biblical texts, and the singing of hymns of the coming of Christ.
We participate in this yearly mystery as Advent asks us to wait with joyous expectation for the birth of Christ. But this raises questions.
If Christ was already born two thousand years ago, then why do we still wait? Why does Advent even matter today?
The answer lies not only in liturgical tradition, but in the very nature of the God we worship.
The God Who Becomes
When Moses encountered the burning bush and asked for God’s name, God replied, “I am who I am,” or more accurately, “I will be who I will be” (Exodus 3:14). In Hebrew, this verb appears in the imperfect tense, which conveys an action unfolding across time. It is not static, not confined to a single moment in history.
God’s self-revelation spans past, present, and future. It is ongoing.
Therefore, Christ is not simply a historical figure but the one who was, who is, and who continually becomes in our world. This is the mystery of God.
The birth of Jesus in Bethlehem is a past event, but the incarnation did not end there. The light that broke into the world continues to break into new places today.
Christ continues to be born in hearts awakened to compassion, in communities yearning for liberation, and in movements working for justice, healing, and peace. Christ continues to come to us in our own broken, hurting, and dark world, where wars rage, people are hungry, and the oppression of people continues.
In such a despairing and desperate world, we wait with high anticipation and hope for the coming of Christ during this season of Advent. It is the season when we open ourselves to this holy possibility, and it is an open invitation to all of us to participate in God’s ongoing becoming.
The beauty and mystery of Advent is that it honors time in all its dimensions.
Christ was incarnated in history, born in Bethlehem, Palestine, and raised by a young Mary who was courageous and faithful. Christ is present with us now, walking alongside our joys, pains, and sorrows. Christ is becoming—still emerging, still illuminating, still calling the world toward justice, compassion, and peace.
This is why Advent remains relevant and important to all of us. It is not merely a countdown to Christmas; it is a sacred lens through which we understand God’s presence and movement in our lives and in the world.
Listen, Hope, and Prepare
We wait during Advent because Christ’s coming is not merely an event but a divine revelation—not a single moment but a continual unfolding. The world today is broken with climate crisis, racial injustice, political turmoil, and global violence. Creation groans for redemption, and communities carry deep ache, such as grief, exhaustion, and loneliness.
In such a world, Advent meets us with hope, joy, peace, and love. It acknowledges that things are not as they should be and that God is still at work. Our waiting is not passive but active, hopeful, and courageous as we engage in God’s work for justice in this world.
We do not fully understand or grasp the mystery of how Christ came into the world as a vulnerable baby and how the Creator chose to dwell among us. Nor do we know how Christ continues to appear in our world—in the face of strangers, in resistance against injustice, in communities creating beauty where despair once reigned.
In such a mystery, our faith gives us enough light to keep walking and moving forward.
We believe that Christ is continually being born in and among us. We trust that the incarnation is not locked in the past but eternally unfolding. We confess that hope is not naïve; it is courageous, an act of resistance against despair that leads us toward justice.
To enter Advent is to step into an adventure of transformation and healing.
It asks us: Where do we need Christ to be born in our lives? What in our world hungers for Christ’s light? How might we make space for God in the places we have forgotten, avoided, or resisted?
Advent calls us to slow down enough to listen, to hope, and to prepare. We are to become people who can recognize Christ’s presence in unexpected places—among the poor, the weary, the displaced, and the marginalized.
Christ was born in the margins, to a young mother, in a stable, and under the Roman Empire—and Christ continues to be born there today.
As we enter this sacred season, may we embrace Advent not only as preparation for a holiday but as participation in God’s ongoing work of love. May we open our hearts to the adventure of becoming, trusting that the One who came still comes to us today.
Christ has changed the world and continues to change the world. Therefore, we enter this season with gratitude, wonder, and joy as Advent teaches us to wait expectantly, live faithfully, and hope courageously.
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Grace Ji-Sun Kim (Ph.D. University of St. Michael’s College) was born in Korea, educated in Canada and now teaches in the USA as Professor of Theology at Earlham School of Religion, Richmond, Indiana. She is the author or editor of 26 books, most recently, Earthbound: God at the Intersection of Climate and Justice.
Kim is the host of Madang podcast which is sponsored by the Christian Century. She blogs on her substack: Loving Life: Loving Life and has written for Huffington Post, The Nation, Sojourners, Baptist News Global, Faith and Leadership and TIME. Kim has appeared on MSNBC, PBS and C-Span. She has been a guest on BBC Radio, Soul Search Radio, WBEZ Radio, and Keep Hope Alive Radio. She is an ordained PC(USA) minister and enjoys being a guest preacher on most Sundays.
