First Reading:
14The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. 15In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David; and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 16In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safety. And this is the name by which it will be called: The Lord is our righteousness.
Second Reading:
25There will be signs in the sun, the moon,
and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the
roaring of the sea and the waves. 26People will faint from
fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers
of the heavens will be shaken. 27Then they will see 'the
Son of Man coming in a cloud' with power and great
glory. 28Now when these things begin to take place, stand
up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.
29Then he told them a parable: Look at the
fig tree and all the trees; 30as soon as they sprout leaves
you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already
near. 31So also, when you see these things taking place,
you know that the kingdom of God is near. 32Truly I tell you, this
generation will not pass away until all things have taken
place. 33Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass
away.
34Be on guard so that your hearts are not
weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this
life, and that day catch you unexpectedly, 35like a
trap. For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole
earth. 36Be alert at all times, praying that you may have
the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to
stand before the Son of Man.
Sometimes, when I talk with people about the Christian faith, one of the difficulties that arises is that the Christian faith as they know it doesn't have much to do with their real life. The stories of the early church sound too good to be true because in those stories we don't hear much of the struggle of life… People were healed and filled with courage and power to do amazing, and sometimes impossible things… and it all happens within the course of a sentence or two. Wouldn't it be nice if life worked like that. And the promises of the future all sound good too… justice and peace, abundance and plenty to go around. But often, in the midst of the daily work of trying to hold our lives together— through all the money crunches and time pressures and relationship struggles— those promises of how things will be one day almost seem like an escape fantasy.
Each year, at the beginning of Advent, the lectionary readings don't
seem terribly helpful in this regard… they bring us these
images of when Christ will come again, the coming end of the world as
we know it… and the establishment of the reign of Jesus Christ.
In theological circles it's called eschatology… the study of
the end times. And Luke does use apocalyptic language here. There
will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth
distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the
waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming
upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then
they will see 'the Son of Man coming in a cloud' with power and great
glory.
And every year when faced with that kind of imagery and
language lots of pastors cringe just a bit and wonder first if there's
anything we can say about it… and lots of people sitting in the
pews wonder what this has to do with my life and why can't we just get
to the Christmas story already?
It's clear that imagery in the gospel lesson sets a very different tone than the cultural Christmas season that surrounds us the moment we walk out the doors of the church… There aren't any gifts, no sales, no Santas and no reindeer, no happy songs and no parties. There isn't a baby in the manger or even a pregnant mom riding on a donkey and anxiously waiting for delivery.
In fact this section of Luke's gospel happens on the other end of the life spectrum from the birth stories. It's an adult Jesus, teaching the disciples about the end times right before the events of holy week which was the end of Jesus' earthly life. And there's very little doubt that the people who first heard the gospel being read to them would have heard the descriptions of the end times as referring to the chaos that was going on in the world around them… you see, by the time the gospel was written the temple had already been destroyed, and it very well may have felt like the world as they knew it was coming to an end… There was uncertainty about what the future would look like and there were parts of society that were unraveling around them. The people who heard about the fear and foreboding knew what it was like because they dealt with at least some aspects of it every day.
Now there have been plenty of books and movies in the main stream
media that deal with the end of the world as we know it
… Some of them are based in a major outbreak of a disease or
war, or an asteroid hurtling toward earth… some say climate
change is the culprit and still others use the second coming of Christ
as the advent of the end of the world. And what just about all of the
movies and books have in common is that they seem to evoke the kind of
fear and foreboding that Jesus mentions in Luke's gospel.
But when we look more closely at the gospel reading it resists that picture… Jesus says that people will be afraid, but he doesn't offer the disciples fear and damnation. To them he offers hope and expectation. In verse 28 he tells them that the Son of Man comes to bring redemption. In verses 34 and 36 he tells them to watch and be alert expecting Christ at any time. You see, Advent always involves preparing for at least two comings. The first one we know because it happened two thousand years ago on that first Christmas evening: God came to earth in Jesus of Nazareth, whose birth we celebrate every year on Christmas. The second is something that so far we only hope for and wonder about… we're told it will come at a time we don't know and in a manner we aren't certain of.
Ever since Jesus walked the earth there have been questions about the second coming of Christ. Many, perhaps most of the early Christians expected it to come almost immediately. Even today's text says this generation won't pass away until all these things have taken place… and that's one of the themes that runs through advent…in the hymn just before the scripture reading we sang watchman tell us of the night when Christ is coming… And yet that night hasn't come… people have been predicting dates and times of the end of the world for centuries… Rumor has it that there are over 200 written predictions of when Christ will be coming back… they range from only 10 years after the death of Jesus all the way to Sir Isaac Newton's prediction of 2060… but the long and short of it is that two thousand years later, we're still waiting. Today's passage, and passages like it, point to the fact that our faith is one that looks back at what God has done and also looks forward to what God will do. Christ came and Christ will come again. Both of those are statements of faith. And they both give us a clue as to how the observance of advent intersects with our real lives.
By placing texts that talk about the end of the world at the beginning of advent, every year we get a reminder of the time horizon we're talking about. As we look into the future, we see that the gospel isn't good news because it tells us that the future is going to be perfect. It's good news because it tells us that ultimately the future is in the hands of Jesus Christ, who is the faithful one of God.
In the life and ministry of Jesus we've seen the character of the God of the Universe. We've seen that God will embrace the untouchable. We've seen that God can and does heal people. We've seen that God restores hope and opens up new pathways of reconciliation and we've seen that God even has power over death. When God came into the world history changed because in all sorts of ways God offers new life.
And that's part of the point of Luke's gospel text today. We know who God is so we don't have to be afraid… we can be hopeful and expectant because the Son of Man who comes on the clouds, the one who holds the future is the same one who willingly went to the cross rather than sell short God's love for us. We may not know what the future holds but when we know who holds the future it sure is easier to live in the present.
Now earlier I said that in Advent we prepare for at least two comings… one that happened two thousand years ago and one that will happen at some unknown point in the future… But what I want to offer to you today is that perhaps when we speak of the coming of Christ it's not only talking about some specific time in the future somewhere out there… In the gospel lesson, perhaps Jesus is also telling the disciples to expect the messiah to come into their lives even in the midst of everything that's falling apart around them in their families, their communities, their world… If we know the past and we're confident that the future is in the hands of a God who is faithful, it allows us to live unafraid in the present.
In our gospel text Jesus tells his disciples to stay alert and to be ready for his coming and it seems to me that's not just instruction for the end of time but it's also instruction for the in-between times. He's not just telling them to wait and prepare, he's telling them how to wait and prepare. We're still waiting for a time when God's justice and peace are realities throughout creation. We're still waiting for a time when all people are reconciled with one another. We're still waiting for a time when everyone will be abundantly provided for. But if we know the past and we're confident that the future is in the hands of God, then when we see opportunities to move ourselves, our families, our church and our community in the direction of justice and peace, and reconciliation and stewardship we can move there, confident that we're being led by God who doesn't ask us to wait passively, but to participate, to be alert and to be always preparing ourselves for God's work. What has been written is history and what will be is only partly clear, but what is going on right now is where we are able to see and hear and know God in our own lives. Advent isn't only about what happened in the past, or what is coming in the future… it's also very much about the gift of the present moment and how God is entering our lives right now… So we pray Come Lord Jesus! Thanks be to God. Amen
The foregoing sermon was given by Rev. Dan Holland at the United Parish of Bowie on the First Sunday in Advent, November 29, 2009.
© 2009 Daniel Holland
