Advent Day 3: Alpha & Omega | The Beginning & the End | Who Was, Who Is, Who Is to Come | The First & the Last

​​Alpha and Omega, Artisan Unknown, c. 1883.
Stained glass window near the front door of St. Paul's Episcopal Church. Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Jonathunder, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Jehovah—Alpha & Omega, Timothy R. Botts
Calligraphy, 13 x 19 in. Printed on fine art paper with archival pigment-based inks.
Used with permission from the artist.

“Alpha and Omega” from the album Best of the Gaither Vocal Band. Performed by the Gaither Vocal Band, composed by Robbie Trice.

Poetry:

from “Little Gidding”
by T. S. Eliot

With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this Calling
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Through the unknown, unremembered gate
When the last of earth left to discover
Is that which was the beginning;
At the source of the longest river
The voice of the hidden waterfall
And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
Quick now, here, now, always—
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.

Nihil moritur in te
“Nothing dies in You”

My grandmother, one of the most influential people in my life, was only 47 when I was born. She grew up in Mount Hermon, where her parents managed the grounds and accommodations, she worked in the dining hall in high school, was married in the Youth Memorial Building, and sent her daughters to Biola because she had not only appreciated hearing J. Vernon McGee and Louis Talbot preach the gospel in the auditorium, but also loved watching them laugh as they crashed their bumper cars into each other at the Santa Cruz boardwalk. Last Christmas, thanks to the entrepreneurial Biola students who founded the startup Remembrance, we had the opportunity to capture her memories on video. When I asked my grandmother questions in preparation, however, instead of my grandmother sharing her stories with me, I found myself frequently telling her ones she had shared with me long ago. Her progressing dementia had caused her to forget them.

In the poignant sadness of this realization, I recalled Augustine’s succinct but powerful statement in his Confessions: nihil moritur in te. Augustine says to the Lord that he has forgotten the days of his own infancy (Conf. 1.9). Additionally, the days of many other people have passed away before him and will pass after him; however, God is the ever living one, the one who was before the beginning of the ages and whose years do not fail, who holds everyone’s days in his eternal present, for “nothing dies in you” (Conf. 1.9-10).

As our passages from Isaiah and Revelation reveal, God declares himself to be “the First” and “the Last”, a name that is also claimed by Christ, who testifies to his own divinity and oneness with the Father when he calls himself the “Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End…who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” The fragility and fleetingness of our lives could cause us to cower in fear beside such unfathomable power and timelessness. However, Christ is not only the eternal and majestic God, but also the babe who came in human flesh, the one who walked as a man among humankind, healing their diseases, raising loved ones from the dead, speaking words of peace and comfort, and saving them from their sins.

When my sister was very young, she would take pictures with her hands, believing that God would save them in heaven for her. My sister’s pictures, my grandmother’s stories, sweet moments of my life that I have now forgotten, are all remembered by the One who came two thousand years ago. Nothing dies in him, not only the people whom we have loved and lost for a time, but even our memories of them. T.S. Eliot reminds us in “Little Gidding” of Julian of Norwich’s unwavering trust that, “And all shall be well and / All manner of thing shall be well”. We also can hold to this declaration in times of loss because we are held in the hands of a loving Father and of a personal Savior, who will never allow any good part of us to disappear or be forgotten.

Prayer:

Dear God and Father, thank you for holding us in your incomprehensible eternity. In this time of Advent, we thank you especially for the gift of your Son, Jesus Christ, who, although he is everlasting, came and met us in our finitude.
Amen.

Dr. Laurie Wilson
Assistant Professor
Torrey Honors College
Biola University

For more information about the artwork, music, and poetry selected for this day, please visit our website via the link in our bio.