Isaiah 2:1 5 (RSV)
The word which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. {2} It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; and all the nations shall flow to it, {3} and many peoples shall come, and say: "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths." For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. {4} He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. {5} O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the LORD.
Psalms 122 (RSV) A Song of Ascents. Of David.
{1} I was glad when they said to me, "Let us go to the house of the LORD!"
{2} Our feet have been standing within your gates, O Jerusalem!
{3} Jerusalem, built as a city which is bound firmly together,
{4} to which the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD, as was decreed for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the LORD.
{5} There thrones for judgment were set, the thrones of the house of David.
{6} Pray for the peace of Jerusalem! "May they prosper who love you!
{7} Peace be within your walls, and security within your towers!"
{8} For my brethren and companions' sake I will say, "Peace be within you!"
{9} For the sake of the house of the LORD our God, I will seek your good.
Romans 13:8 14 (RSV)
Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. {9} The commandments, "You shall not commit adultery, You shall not kill, You shall not steal, You shall not covet," and any other commandment, are summed up in this sentence, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." {10} Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. {11} Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed; {12} the night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; {13} let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. {14} But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
Matthew 24:37 44 (RSV)
As were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of man. {38} For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, {39} and they did not know until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of man. {40} Then two men will be in the field; one is taken and one is left. {41} Two women will be grinding at the mill; one is taken and one is left. {42} Watch therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. {43} But know this, that if the householder had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have watched and would not have let his house be broken into. {44} Therefore you also must be ready; for the Son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
Advent 1 - Year A
Intended audience: EYC group at evening Eucharist.
I don't know if this works or not. I am not very happy with the results, and suspect that the material may be too light or too condescending. I had in mind trying to use the "End is Near" syndrome that seems to be the focus of youth (it was in my teenage years, and it has been with EYC groups that I have seen since) to the end of prompting an interest in the Sacrament of Reconciliation (something that I wish I had been exposed to at that time).
Advent 1 - Year A
But know this, that if the householder had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have watched and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready; for the Son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
A group of my classmates from seminary went on a road trip one weekend. We had been asked by the rector of a parish about a hundred miles from the seminary to come and speak to his congregation about our vocations, about the seminary, and about Jesus Christ. Since we were to begin early on Sunday morning, he asked us to come up the day before. Some of his parishioners volunteered to put each of us up for the night -- dinner and all.
We had been told to expect it to be a short evening and that we would likely dine on pizza or McDonalds. To the contrary, my host cooked a turkey dinner, and we stayed up until two in the morning doing reading our Bibles. This is my idea of a good time, so I was delighted. The first passage that my new friend wanted discuss was the one just read:
Therefore you also must be ready; for the Son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
And the rest of the night was spent looking at similar apocalyptic texts.
The next morning, after the first service was over, my host told me that he had to run an errand, and that he would be back before we returned to the seminary. About two hours later, Dan walked into the parish hall, and handed me a book. I later found out that he had driven to a bookstore, and waited for forty-five minutes for it to open. This man really wanted me to read that book!
I cannot now remember the title, but it had the word "Armageddon" in it. He told me that he would be very interested in my comments.
Well, I read the book, and noticed that many of the comments that Dan had made in our Bible study together were echoed in it. The author had come up with an ingenious system that dated the second coming of Christ to sometime in the 1990's. He had used a super computer to verify certain dates, and it was all very elaborate, and actually fairly convincing. Unfortunately -- or perhaps that should be fortunately -- the author made an error in the birth year of Jesus. No one knows the exact year that our Lord was Incarnate, but there is substantial evidence that Jesus was born probably in the year 4 BC, but almost certainly not in the year zero.
What this meant is that many of the things that the author believed would happen in the early nineties would have actually already have had to have happened by the time I read the book. They still haven't.
But Dan was nonplussed. There were other books, and other formulas.
What concerns me is that Dan obviously declared Jesus to be his Lord and Savior, had a strong faith, and did his best to amend his life as that faith requires. So why the anxiety?
Dan isn't alone. You can find a hugh assortment of such books at almost any bookstore, and many sell by the millions. It seems plain to me that it requires a faith in Jesus to expect his coming again, and a trust in Scripture to try to date His return. Someone with that faith, and with that knowledge of His Holy Word, and with that excited anticipation must be the last ones who ought to be worried.
Ah, but my concern was misplaced -- at least in Dan's case. Yes, Dan was worried, and anxious. But it wasn't for himself, it was for others who don't have the faith that he had.
Therefore you also must be ready; for the Son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
Dan was doing his best to be ready. But no matter what hour the latest book identifies, you can be sure that it is not the right one. It will be at an hour that we don't expect.
But let's pretend. Let's pretend that we have been given conclusive proof that this is it. Jesus will be here in four weeks, say December 25. Do we wait until the 24th to do anything? Do we need to start getting ready now?
Advent is a season of anticipation. We anticipate the celebration of the birth of Jesus, and we anticipate the return of our Lord at the final resurrection. According to TV, we make ourselves ready for Christmas starting the day after Thanksgiving, but the Church starts the preparation on the first Sunday in Advent -- today.
But rather than parties, and stringing lights, there is another kind of preparation which takes place in the Church. We prepare ourselves for the second coming of our Lord, and that means preparing our souls for the final judgement. And the Church teaches one way to do that -- confession. In a few minutes, we will all confess our sins to God in the general confession. Some of you may also wish to use the Rite of Reconciliation at some time, and Advent is always an appropriate time to consider such a thing.
What we confess, are the things that should make us very anxious if we were to learn that Jesus is coming again in four weeks. In Paul's letter, we get a fairly good list of such sins. First he mentions the ten commandments, and he also states that being ready for Christ's return includes conducting ourselves becomingly as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
I think that when Paul is talking about living our lives becoming the day, he is speaking in recognition of the tendency that we have to do things under cover of darkness that we would be ashamed of doing in broad daylight. He also speaks of the "armour of light".
Paul sums up all of the commandments by saying that:
"You shall love your neighbor as yourself." Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Jesus is coming again, and all of the theories of just when that will happen won't be of any use to us unless we intend to live our lives as if he were coming now. Now is the time to start preparing for that time, and we begin that preparation by loving our neighbors as ourselves, and then "Watch for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming."
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Copyright © 1992 W. Crews Giles
