For this first Sunday in Advent, we turn our attention to Luke chapter 1. Luke chapter 1 is often overlooked as we jump straight into the Christmas narrative in Luke chapter 2. But, that's often how it goes with Christmas, isn't it? We rush right ahead. As soon as the Halloween decorations are down at Walmart, the Christmas ones are up. We're too quick to jump ahead to fulfillment, when there's something spiritually edifying in waiting in the foretelling.

In this sermon, we are introduced to Zechariah and Elizabeth, the parents of the one we will come to know as John the Baptist.

In Revelation - the apostle John gives us a glimpse of what's coming - at the end of all things. Yes, there is an ending. Not just to the Scriptural Narrative, but to the world as we know it. And then, something new. As Semisonic once penned: "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end."

But we're not thrust into an endless cycle of rebirth and recreation. We're not subjected to the same pain, suffering, and struggle that we're so accustomed to living in, in this life. You might say we don't long so much for "life after death"...but "love after death."

And that's what awaits all who fall asleep in Christ. But what does this "love" and "life" look like? What difference does it make to me now? How do I know I'll experience it? Listen as Pastor Kevin unpacks the glimpse of John, given to us in Revelation 21.

In the Scriptural narrative, Jesus death and resurrection is the climax of the story. It's everything that everyone had been waiting and hoping for. But...there's still more to the recorded story of history after the climax. This sermon focuses on the words of the Scriptures that take place after the ascension of Jesus into heaven. The New Testament is filled with the people of God living into the reality that in Christ, that (we) are a new creation. The old has gone, the new has come.

This is still our reality to this day.