1 Advent A
Matthew 24:36-44 53-56
November 28, 2004
“Hurry Up and Wait”
Today marks the beginning of the season of Advent. It is a time of preparation. It is a time of going forward toward the coming again of Jesus. It is a time of great anticipation. But what exactly is it that we are anticipating? What are we getting ready for? What do we expect to happen? The kids are probably waiting for Santa Claus to come to town. Many of us adults are steeling ourselves for a month-long shopping spree, and the suicidal traffic jams at Woodfield. Or maybe we’re getting ready for the five to seven pound weight gain that the average American will gain during the holiday season. We may even be getting ready for the depression, anxiety, and even the rage that can accompany the secular holiday season. That’s why I am so grateful foe the season that the Church calls Advent.
For many who faithfully observe the consumer Christmas, the four weeks before Christmas are an inevitable prelude to disappointment. If Christmas is only about giving and receiving and impressing, it hardly ever measures up the fantasies we create about it. Even those who manage to have some of their Christmas wishes fulfilled find that the season ends too quickly, and before you know it, it’s time to make New Year’s resolutions to lose those extra pounds, or be more patient with the kids, or with the idiot drivers who somehow managed to get a license.
But the Advent that we celebrate in the church is altogether different. It has nothing to do with how many shopping days are left until Christmas. Unlike the malls, which have been decked out in red and green for weeks already, we dress the sanctuary in blue—the color of hope. The Advent wreath has been hung, and we’ll light only one candle each week, rather that plugging in a mega-watt display of lights. This ritual slows us down, and allows us to dream dreams of a better world, to imagine a vision of a new future.
What sort of images come to your mind when you think about Advent? Maybe it’s a Christmas card image of the journey to Bethlehem, or the Nativity, or the shepherds and Wise Men at the manger. Or maybe your traditional images of the season include the display of lights in downtown Arlington Heights, or the big Christmas tree in Daley Plaza. Take some time to figure it out, because the way we see Advent and Christmas determine our approach to the celebration that is coming.
Is the essential work of Advent hanging decorations and fighting the crowds at the mall, or is it more about opening our hearts and lives to the coming Christ and living in peace? Will Christmas come only if we do all the right things to get ready for it, or is Christmas a gift from God, that arrives as a gift, whether we are ready for it or not?
Well, the Bible tells us that The Advent of God has more to do with surprise than with predictability. It’s more about revelation than decoration. The message of Advent is not, “Put up the decorations! Here I come!” but “Watch and wait. You must be ready, because Jesus will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”
In the gospel reading for today from Matthew, the disciples are talking to Jesus about his second coming. They want to know when it will happen, so that they can be ready for it. Instead of giving them an answer, Jesus tells the story of Noah and the Ark. He reminds the disciples that during the days of Noah, people were living their lives with little regard for God. They were eating and drinking and generally living it up. And suddenly, the rains came. Only Noah and his family were smart enough to listen to God’s warning and seek God’s salvation.
Jesus tells his disciples that that’s what it’s going to be like when he comes again. Life will be going on as usual, with people doing what they normally do—buying and selling, working and playing—just doing ordinary things. And suddenly, unpredictably, Jesus will return. When that happens, some will be ready, and some won’t. Some will remember what Jesus said about being ready for the Kingdom of God, and others will have forgotten, because other things will have become more important to them. And those who have forgotten or disbelieved will be greatly disappointed on that day.
Do you see what Jesus is saying? The disciples asked about the timing of his Second Coming. They wanted to know when it would be. Jesus says that that is the wrong question. They should be asking what they are supposed to be doing in the meantime, while they wait for his return. And so it is with us. The important thing for us, in this season of Advent, is not when Jesus will be coming again, but what we are supposed to be doing while we wait.
Ever since Jesus predicted his return, people have been trying to figure out just when it would be. Turn on the TV some morning before church and flip through the channels. You are sure to fine at least one televangelist boldly proclaiming that right now is the time that Jesus talked about in the Bible. All the signs point to it—the world is going to end any day now, and you had better be ready for it.
But I wonder if these preachers who claim to speak for God have read the warning that Jesus gives his disciples here in Matthew, and in a few other places, too. What seems to be missing from their messages of future doom and gloom is a reminder that Jesus says not to be so concentrated on the future that we forget about the present—about the kind of life that we are living today. Jesus doesn’t call on us to a passive, do nothing kind of waiting. Jesus says to the disciples, and to us, that the way we live together in the world as Kingdom people, as Advent people, is serious business that calls for an active faith. It calls for a faith that both acknowledges God in the here and now, and the needs of God’s people in the here and now.
During Advent we look back, to the first coming of Christ as a babe at Bethlehem. And we also look forward, to his glorious return. But the gift and the meaning of Advent can be summed up in one word—Emmanuel, God with us. Not God has been with us, not God will be with us, but God is with us—Emmanuel—in the here and now.
"Jesus is coming soon” is not the whole message. There is much more to the Gospel than that, much more to Kingdom living than that. The season of Advent challenges us to hear and believe the promise of Emmanuel—God with us—and to order our lives accordingly. The challenge of waiting for Jesus calls us not to be so heavenly-minded that we’re no earthly good, so starry-eyed over the future Kingdom that we forget the present one. AMEN