Tuesday, December 3, 2024

---

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1 (CSB)

---

Last year we took the vacation of a lifetime. We’ve been to Florida numerous times – we love it there – but we had never spent four weeks there. Four weeks! It was glorious. I did work half-time for two out of the four weeks, but is it even work when you’re in Florida?

Here’s a trick question; when did that trip begin? 

Did it begin on the day we got in the van and started to drive? 

Did the vacation begin when we got to the destination? 

Did it begin when we started packing or when we started planning? 

Did the vacation begin when the last one ended in 2020 just before the pandemic stalled the universe in its course? 

Some people love the planning. We always knew when a road trip was imminent because Dad would start talking routes. We might find the road atlas on Dad’s desk or by his chair in the playroom. I too can be found in those planning months, staring listlessly into space and running different plans in my head. (And then checking them on Google Maps, then Apple Maps, then Google Maps again. Heck I might even be found in the garage sitting in the car checking the Google/Apple Map against the in-car GPS.) 

I tell you what, I’ve been planning my next trip since before we left the rental house in spring. 

The logistics of going somewhere for four weeks with as many kids as we have, not to mention the family members that were in and out of the fun in Florida, is no simple feat. I had spreadsheets with days planned out – complete with emojis – all researched meticulously through Underground Tourist for the best days to do whatnot while in the Sunshine State. 

I wonder what the logistics for the arrival of God on earth entailed. When was that plan put into motion? My favourite Gospel is John’s. It famously begins as recorded above, “In the beginning, was the Word…” But in what beginning? The beginning of time? Surely not the beginning of God… He’s always been there. The beginning of the universe – the Big Bang? Who knows, but He was there. A God named Word. 

Everything was created through this marvellous Word. That plan must have taken some time – I sometimes wonder what transpired that God suddenly thought to Himself, “Yup. It’s time.” Did the Holy Spirit look up from His magazine and say, “Now?” If that is when they got to work that that Now, was literally the first Now ever! Crazy. 

This beginning, was it also the beginning of the end? Some theologians think that God doesn’t know the future because He only knows what is real and the future isn’t real yet. Of course, they would concede as the most creative, powerful, and intelligent Being in the universe, He would have a pretty good educated guess about what might happen in the future. 

I’m not saying they are right, but it is an interesting thought because if God knew from the first Now that things would go awry with us folk, then from that first Now, He was planning the End. The very, very, very first nanosecond Now, was also the first nanosecond on the trip to the End – with a brief interlude hanging out with us. On earth. 

The Word, which was at the beginning of beginnings would “take up residence among us.” That has to be the craziest notion ever dreamt up in the mind of a god. And the logistics… holy smokes… I can’t imagine the planning that would go into the conception of a God in a virgin human. 

Nevertheless, in a similar way that our trip to Florida started years ago with decisions that led up to our vacation last winter, the Word that would eventually take up residence among us and usher in a new age of Hope started planning that long winding route millennia before He dwelt among us. 

Hope. Anticipation. That’s Advent. But it didn’t begin with Advent, it began so much earlier. In the very first Now… if not before.