So much of life seems like a cycle of unhealth. Violence begets violence; polarization begets polarization; resentments cause more resentments.

The wheel goes round and round, nothing really seems to change, and things to disintegrate and descend.

As W.B. Yeats wrote, “The center cannot hold.”

Only one thing seems to interrupt the cycle and bring a halt to the “begets and begots”…

… and that thing is grace.

Only grace—“unmerited favor”—seems to be able to press pause on the disintegration, the desire for revenge, the resentments that fester in our hearts.

As Bono wrote, “Grace… she travels outside of karma.”

And it’s my belief that God—this Great Mystery, this Great Love—is essentially a god of grace.

God’s core posture towards the world is one of unmerited favor; a sense of “I am for you.”

Grace didn’t begin with Jesus; grace began with God. Jesus was merely the fullest human expression of grace that the world has seen.

Grace in human skin; a language we could understand.

So today, may this advent be a reminder of a god of grace, and of His son Jesus, and of the gift of His Spirit in us.

Something new to interrupt our sad tendencies as humans.

A reminder every year.