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Isaiah 2:1-5, Romans 13:11-14, Matthew 24:3-44
St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, West Valley City, UT
The Rev'd W. Lee Shaw
Today I begin my fifth year of ministry with you here at St. Stephen’s. These past four years have been very rich for me and I give thanks for my call to minister with you in the midst of this community. For what was, for what is, for what shall be; thanks be to God.
And so we begin again the great season of waiting, preparation,
penitence and patience: Advent. There is a two-edged sense of this
season. The first is, yes, we are preparing for the Nativity of
Jesus, Christmas. Yet, our readings continually point to the time
when Jesus will come again. Therefore you also must be ready,
for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.
This is
a time of holy waiting.
I guess I find all of the passages of Scripture that point to the end times, or eschaton, to be less descriptive of the Second Coming of Christ as metaphorical and symbolic. It is as if Jesus cannot himself find the right words to help his disciples then or now understand it the way he understands it. It is not unlike when he talks about the kingdom of God: it is like a fish net, then it is like a treasure buried in a field, or a pearl of great value, a man hiring workers for his vineyard, and how much to pay them, another man scattering seeds on the ground, and even a mustard seed to mention just a few of many, many images of the kingdom of God. Jesus continues to march out image after image in the hope that at least one of them will connect and mean something to his listeners, then and now.
For me the crux of these passages is not when as it is where: Where am I in it? Where am I in relationship with each of you and with my God? It is the relationship that is key, not the speculation of dates.
You hear this plainly from Paul. In fact, Paul strikes a note each of our mothers have said to us at some point, do you know what time it is? The night is over with! Get on with the day! Paul strikes a note of realism as a Jewish mother to limit needless speculation when he says, well, its closer today than it was yesterday or whenever you first became followers of Jesus.
Paul wants the church in Rome to stop wondering about when Jesus will return and start to live into the light of his Gospel, his Good News now. We are living in the new light of the resurrection already, so let’s get on with how this makes a difference in our lives.
Paul is looking at the fruits of our faith and not just the
confession of our faith. You say you believe, how do you show that
to me? Paul sees a clear distinction between the robust debauchery
of Rome, and what he feels the followers of Christ should be about, and
how to live. Once you have said, yes Lord I believe, then you have
choices to make in how you live through that confession of faith.
Paul is challenging the church then and now to live into alternatives
of self-defeating, self-indulgent behavior. Don’t live as in
the dark, you have the Light of Christ with you. You recall that
at baptism I give a candle lit from the Paschal Candle to each new
Christian and say: Receive the Light of Christ.
I love his language of about putting on the armor of light
as a sign of moving out of a life in darkness and now into a new
life as a follower of Christ. And finally, his put on the Lord
Jesus Christ.
What a wonderfully intimate image of Christ as
such a personal part of how we live and move and have our being.
Paul sees the Gospel of Christ in the new light of the resurrection.
Don’t speculate about when Christ will come again, he has given
you a new light to live into right now, today.
As we move through these Advent days, may be we aware of not just what we confess in the faith but also how we live out our faith in relationship to one another and to God.
In a few moments we will exchange the Peace: The Peace of Christ
be with you. And also with you.
How do we see the Peace of
Christ in the person next to us? How do we honor that person we
have just exchanged Christ’s Peace with? How do we see in each
other the image of the Christ? How do we treat one another as if
that person were the Christ? How do I live out what I believe about
loving my neighbor as myself? How do I support the many ministries
of my faith community here at St. Stephen’s, including Stewardship?
How do we live into the light given us in Christ?
All of these are part of putting on the Lord Jesus Christ. Or as we
prayed more eloquently earlier: Almighty God, give us grace to cast away
the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of
this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great
humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious
majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life
immortal; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever. Amen.