Preparing for the Advent of Christ

This sermon was preached by Pastor Ted Carnahan on the First Sunday of Advent on December 1, 2024.

Transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace be with you all from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

The Discipline of Preparation

When we look around we might think that it's the Christmas season. Wrong! Christmas is coming, but it's not here yet.

But I don't mean to be a killjoy with all of that. I mean to encourage you to a discipline of preparation. Christmas means more when you have been anticipating it through the weeks of Advent. Christmas means more when you have been preparing your heart for the coming of Christ at Christmas.

Signs of Christmas and Consumerism

And there are, just as Jesus predicted, that at his second coming, there will be signs in the heavens and on the earth. There are signs of Christmas all around us. We had Holiday Fest and the parade last night. We had the great performance by Shawn Johnson on Friday night at the JCC Performing Arts Center. We've had all sorts of wonderful things. We had Black Friday. How many of you went Black Friday shopping? A couple of you. The rest of you aren't willing to admit it. That's okay. I was there at 5 a.m., Pastor, but I don't want to talk about it.

And then, of course, tomorrow is Cyber Monday. Don't tell me you didn't throw a few elbows, didn't you? Cyber Monday is tomorrow. Giving Tuesday. We're going to have a special name for pretty much every day of the week here in a couple of years. You might as well get used to that.

And, of course, the biggest thing that we do as consumers in a consumeristic culture is to prepare for Christmas. We spend! American consumers will spend upwards of $200 billion dollars on Christmas this year. It's good to celebrate. There's a reason why everybody loves Christmas. It's fun and exciting. But we should prepare ourselves.

Preparing for Jesus' Return

And when we start to turn to thinking about preparing ourselves for the coming of Jesus, we start realizing that Jesus gives us a very different way to live and to prepare ourselves. And we see some of that in our readings, especially from 1 Thessalonians and Luke chapter 21.

And I really think that the way that this is arranged in Luke's gospel is a little bit backwards. Because Jesus starts talking about signs in the sun, moon, and stars and distress among the nations. And he says, "Look at the fig tree and all the trees. As soon as the leaves sprout, you know it's coming. Summer is coming." And then, he says, "Be on your guard."

And I really think that if I were arranging this, if I were St. Luke arranging these teachings, we have this separate little thing that he says at the end. "Be on guard so that your hearts will not be weighed down." And I think that ought to come first. I think you ought to get on guard and start getting ready. Because these things are coming and these signs are coming and you want to be ready when they come to meet them.

The Imminence of Christ's Return

Because Jesus Christ is coming soon. This is not an abstract idea. It's not a coming soon in our hearts. It's not just talking about, well, Christmas is the 25th and today is December 1st. Jesus Christ himself will return physically and bodily. We will see him with our eyes. Even if we die between now and then, we will rise and see him and meet him in the air as he comes.

Jesus Christ is coming and we ought to be prepared. If we would prepare for the coming of Jesus, with a whole month of festivities and planning and parties and decorations around our homes and all the things that go into preparing for an excellent Christmas, just for the return of a day that we can remember basically Jesus' birthday, how much more should we prepare for the actual, physical, literal return of Jesus Christ among us?

Hindrances to Readiness

And Jesus tells us, as he says he's coming, he says, "Be on guard." And then he also says, "Be alert at all times, praying that you might have the strength to escape all these things that take place and to stand before him, before the Son of Man." He says, get ready because it's going to take strength. It's going to take an investment of your time and effort in order to build the strength necessary to stand blameless before the Lord our God.

And in particular, he's warning us about things which can be a hindrance to being ready for the coming of Jesus. In particular, he names three things. He says, "Be on guard that your hearts are not weighed down by dissipation, drunkenness, and the worries of this life." In fact, he says, if you are weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness, and the worries of this life, that day will catch you unexpectedly. You will not be ready for the return of Jesus. You will not be ready to welcome him because you will be so caught up in your sin that you will not be prepared. You will not be strong in the Lord to greet his coming.

The Worries of Life

Now, I think we know what the worries of this life are, but I don't think we take them seriously. I'm going to take them in reverse order. Let's talk about worry first. One of the hardest things that Jesus says to you and me in this day and age is "Be not anxious." He says the anxieties of this life, the worries of this life, run the serious risk of weighing our hearts down to the point where we are unprepared to greet him when he returns.

We are to give all of what we are over to God. Fundamentally, anxiety is a struggle with faith. Now, I struggle with anxiety sometimes. Some of you struggle with anxiety mightily. And I'm not saying that it's not bad to go talk to somebody about that or even to take medication to help you with that. But fundamentally, at its core, anxiety is a spiritual problem, not just a physical problem. And anxiety is really about how much trust are we willing to put in the hands of God? Are we willing to trust him with everything that we are - or not?

And so the first thing that Jesus says is don't be weighed down by the worries of this life, but rather, be expectant and hopeful. You'll notice that we have blue candles here in our Advent wreath. We have blue pyramids on the chancel here. The blue is a symbol of hope. In fact, that's a fairly new reintroduction of that idea. Up until roughly the 60s, the color was always purple, the same as Lent. And Advent was thought of as a miniature Lent because of the part where we are repenting of our sin and preparing for Jesus to come.

But here, having used blue, and that's been the tradition in this place for nearly 50 years at least. I don't know what the practice was before this church building was built. But blue is a symbol of hope. But that hope does not come simply from the touchy-feely feelings of, well, Christmas is coming and that makes me feel hopeful. All earth is hopeful because of the return of Christ. And when he returns, we worry about will be set aside.

Drunkenness and Carelessness

Taking things in reverse order, now let's talk about drunkenness. Now, yes, this is Jesus warning that alcohol consumed to excess is a problem. And I'll be honest that this time of year, there's a little bit more holiday cheer flowing. But I would offer to you that there's more to this idea of drunkenness than simply the ingestion of alcohol. That this drunkenness is being, if the first thing we talked about, worries, was about being so careful, so worried about everything, this is about not being concerned enough. Being so carefree that we just don't care about what's going on around us.

Alcohol's primary, the primary problem with alcohol is not alcohol in and of itself. Remember, Jesus' first public miracle was taking water and turning it into wine for people who were already drunk at a wedding. The purpose of this is to remind us that we oughtn't be too carefree about the way that we follow Christ. We ought to be paying attention to the world around us and especially paying attention to ourselves.

In a time of preparation, in a season of advent, by the way, the word advent comes from a Latin word, adventus. It means a visitation. And an advent would be a visitation of a king or a noble person. Because the advent of Jesus is coming. We ought to be fully in possession of ourselves in order to do the things that are necessary to get ready.

Dissipation and Stewardship

And then finally, the first thing he says here is "dissipation." And if there's one thing that I know about you all, because I know it about myself, is that I didn't really know what dissipation meant. I mean, maybe you do, but I had to look it up. Dissipation is spending ourselves in things that don't matter. Especially talking about our finances. Especially talking about how we spend our money, but also time and other things.

We ought to be on our guard against dissipation and dissipating our assets to no profitable use. Maybe I should have preached this sermon before Black Friday! Because we ought to be cautious about the way that we spend the things that God has entrusted us to manage. Maybe we ought to be more careful about the things that we do with our money and our possessions. Not to dissipate them in useless ways, but to use them for practical good purposes that enrich our lives and the lives of the people around us.

The Coming of Jesus and the Flood of Noah

Now, I said I wanted to rearrange Luke's telling here, and I'm going to. So, if we are weighed down with dissipation, with drunkenness, and the worries of this life, we will be so unfocused from the possibility of Jesus' coming that that day will catch us unaware like a trap. For it will come "upon all who live on the face of the whole earth."

And that phrase is really interesting. It's not just live on the earth or live on earth. It says live on the face of the whole earth. And when I hear that, I hear an echo of Genesis 7. Genesis 7 is the story of Noah's ark. And several times, God is speaking to Noah, and the story is told in a way that it talks about the face of the whole earth.

The coming of Jesus is like the coming of the flood of Noah. In that, Noah is not just a story of God said to Noah, we're going to, there's going to be a God said, "go build an arky-arky." It's not just a thing to decorate your children's bedrooms with. The story of Noah and the flood is a story of judgment, of God coming to wipe out all the things that oppose him and to start over.

It's like as if God took the whole world and took it and upside down like an Etch-a-Sketch and shook it and erased it with water. He says, "It will come upon the face of all who live on the face of the whole earth." It will be as ubiquitous as the flood. And in the same way, the flood cleansed the earth of all who sinned against God, except Noah and his family. So also will the coming of Christ cleanse the earth as well.

That sounds pretty ominous. That sounds scary. And I'm not trying to scare you, but I am trying to let you know what Jesus said about his return. And importantly, I don't think it's a reason to be afraid. Remember I said earlier that it's hard for us sometimes to hear Jesus say, "Be not afraid." I think here, Jesus is giving us a reasonable warning. Get ready. I am coming soon. Be ready in this life. Be ready because it won't be long until he returns. And when it comes, it will be complete. And there will be no escaping it.

Standing Up and Raising Our Heads

But then he says this, now at the beginning, "there will be signs in the sun, moon, and stars on the earth, distress among the nations." That sounds scary. People will faint from fear and foreboding. That sounds scary. Then they will see the son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. That's Jesus. He's coming back.

Now, when these things begin to take place, he doesn't say "run and hide." He doesn't say "go find a hole and crawl into it." He doesn't say "go to a bunker and get all the guns and food you possibly can." What does he say? He says, "Stand up and raise your heads for your redemption is drawing near."

For those who are in Christ, there is no fear of the coming of Jesus. Yes, it will be a complete coming. It will come as a flood, just like the days of Noah. But it will not be for those of us who trust the Lord an opportunity or an occasion for fear. But rather, it will be our vindication. That all the things that oppose God that seem to have ruled over us, including our own sin, will be wiped from the face of the earth. Stand up and raise your heads. Your redemption is drawing near!

When Jesus Christ comes back, there's no reason to be afraid because those who are in Christ will be saved.

The Parable of the Fig Tree

And then he tells them this parable, and it's the same sort of thing. He says, "Look at the fig tree and all the trees. As soon as they sprout leaves, for yourselves, and know that summer is already near." He doesn't say, look at the leaves. They're turning yellow and red and they're falling off the trees and now "winter is coming." This is not Game of Thrones. This is Jesus saying, when you see the buds on the trees, you know good things are coming.

There is this weird idea: the evangelicals and their idea that when Jesus comes back, there's going to be this "rapture" and all this sort of thing. That kind of thinking is driven by fear. And this is not fearful talk, this is faithful talk. It says, yes, there will be people who are shaken by fear. There will be things that we have to be, that people will feel the need to be afraid of.

But for those of us in Christ, our redemption is near. For those of us in Christ, we see the bad things happening in the world and we say, look, there are buds on the trees. Summer is coming! Beautiful weather is coming! It's going to be 72 and sunny! It's going to be perfect!

We have everything to look forward to. Just be alert and be ready for it.

Christ will come again!

For Jesus Christ will surely come again. And those who have been baptized into Christ belong to him. And no matter what happens to you, no matter what happens to you in this life, no matter what suffering you endure, no matter what distance, spiritual distance you feel from God, you can always cling to that reality and say, "I am baptized. I belong to Jesus Christ. And no matter what befalls me, when my Lord comes, no matter what happens in this life, no matter what wars and rumors of wars and the other things that threaten our peace and our harmony and our stability, no matter what happens, our Redeemer is near and the bud is on the tree and summer is coming."

We have something to be hopeful for. Our Lord draws near and we will greet him with joy. So raise up and stand up and lift up your heads. Your redemption is coming soon.

I leave you with the prayer that St. Paul prayed for the Thessalonians: "May he so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints." For Christ, by his blood has made you blameless. Cling to him. Amen.