Scripture reading for today:

2 Samuel 7:23-29, Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19, John 3:31-36

Make way, the King is coming

The strong was made vulnerable, made helpless, made refugee, and made all with the authority and the backing of the God of the universe. The King is coming, and sometimes the hope of the coming King catches my breath and all time around me stops. It’s this overwhelming reminder that the world isn’t in its fullness yet, but one day it will be. The God of the Universe is coming down to dwell with His people and He will wipe away tears and hold the hands of our broken bodies. He is coming to restore, to rebuild, to love and be with. The values of the Kingdom finally lived out in their full glory and everything will be at peace.

Last year, mine and my roommates hearts were broken after learning just how prevalent sex trafficking was in Canada. We learned and mourned over how close to home the brokenness actually hit. Despite my previous assumptions, sex trafficking was not a far-away issue but it was happening to Canadians, and it is happening more than any of us were aware. After learning about the gross amount of injustice seeping through our country one of the biggest things that stood out to my roommates and I was that we wanted people to know. We knew that Jesus was for the marginalized, and He was working hard towards the restoration of all things, and it was in that hope that we started talking about doing something about what we knew. We knew that although the issue was full of darkness and heartbreak that God had a plan to stop it, and even to redeem it. Knowing we had a big God backing us, we formulated our plan. It started with a simple question, and a deep hope: what do we currently have in our hands that can be used for the kingdom to break through to the issue of sex trafficking. We realized that while we did not really have any credentials or experience or years of researching backing us, we did have voices, a passion for seeing the girls set free, and of all things: we had hair. We decided that the least we could do was tell our school campus what we knew.

Through many nights spent weeping, praying, and planning, and with assistance from many people, we announced to our friends and classmates that we were going to host an event on campus with guest speakers from organizations and completely shave our heads on December 2 in order to raise awareness for sex trafficking. The idea was to get people to sit in the brokenness of our country, to sit in the brokenness of our world with one another.  It was to lament and mourn the injustice of what is going on so close to us and the night framed under this idea that Jesus is already present in the broken, we just have to meet Him there. So, we went about, proclaiming what we thought was not right, sitting in it, and calling each other to do something about it because we know that the king is coming, and he’s got a whole restoration vision in mind.

I want to join in on what God is already doing, I want to be a part of the coming peace that wipes away tears and restores things in whatever small way I can. I want to be an outpost of the kingdom, living my life through transparency that I will stand up for what is right, and I will spend my life in waiting for the great King who was, who is, and is to come.

The season of advent is about waiting for the coming Kingdom. It is about engaging the world as it is now knowing what is to come and all of the goodness along with it. If the hope is for a place where our God will wipe away our tears, along with that there is the reminder that today is still filled with so much to cry over. The world is still full of many things to mourn and to be angry about. The world is not the way that is supposed to be, and I know this because of the promise my God has made. I know that if the kingdom is not here yet, there must be God-shaped anger and God-shaped grief to go along with what I see and experience in the day today.

But the King is coming soon, and we have to make way. He’s not here yet after all and I would like to give Him a warm welcome. How does one prepare the way for King of the whole universe? It might look like recognizing His authority and standing for His values. It might mean standing for the Kingdom and taking a degree of ownership while I live and breathe and interact with a broken self, and a broken world. Making way looks like living in and participating in the kingdom, as much as is available in the world as we are. This looks like standing for kingdom values which will require me to speak out when things do not reflect the good. When things are not right, dripping with hate or injustice, I want to be a part of the Kingdom that demands better from people.

Someone that speaks truth, invites people into the journey, calls people to stand up for and act with integrity and respect and dignity and helps people be set free from even just a small portion of the brokenness of today. May the Kingdom come, and His will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven. The King is coming, I hope that I will have waited well by speaking out against the injustice of the world.

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