First Sunday in Advent
December 2, 2007
Isaiah 2:1-5
Psalm 122
Romans 13:11-14
Matthew 24:36-44
Happy Advent. And Happy New Year, too. As you might know, this is the first Sunday of the new year for the Church. But celebrating the new year for the church is unlike any other new year celebration. First of all the Church’s celebration of a new calendar year is not based upon the first day of January in the western calendar, it is not based upon natural cycles of life, like planting and harvesting, nor is it based upon on fiscal cycles of business and industry. The beginning of the new year for the Church is based upon a birth. So you might think of our first Sunday in Advent as the birthday of the Church; not, however, a birthday which celebrates an accumulation of years; rather a birthday which anticipates new birth at Jesus’ coming to us again in the manger.
Beginning today and throughout Advent the Church will anticipate Jesus’ birth as any family anticipates the birth of a child. We will prepare a place for this child, especially in our hearts, but we will also decorate our homes and our church as well in anticipation of his arrival. Like the magi we will prepare gifts to give to those we love. Most especially, our churches will give us wonderful opportunities to talk and sing and pray about his coming. We will live in the expectation and promise and mystery which accompany Jesus’ birth. Even though he has already been born. Even though he has already lived his life. Even though we have already been given the gifts which come with new birth in him. Yet, on Christmas Day Jesus will be born anew to us. Our church will see to that. Our Advent scripture and liturgy will prepare us to take our journey to the manger so that we can greet him once again. Once there, we will walk with Jesus throughout the church year in our study of scripture and in our disciplines of worship. And it will become increasingly clear that Advent has prepared us for new birth, by the ways we are being born anew in Jesus and the new ways we are growing to God as we journey with Christ in scripture and prayer throughout the seasons of the Church year.
Our journey to the manger on this first Sunday of Advent begins in darkness, destruction and death of end time. They warn us about the end time when God will break the bonds of darkness and death and fulfill his purpose for creation. These scriptures establish the Church’s connection of God’s end time with the advent of Jesus’ birth. We are reminded that endings always hold the promise of new beginnings. We know this from the many experiences of endings in our own lives. As joyful or as difficult or devastating as endings can be, embedded in them is the potential for new life, for something new to happen. In the darkness of death, or divorce, in the loss of a job, or the onset of a life-threatening illness, God is redeeming us in the darkness of our grief into the light of the new life God is calling us to. God is always calling us out of darkness into light, out of death into life. And God’s most compelling call to new birth comes to us in the birth of Jesus. A birth which ended in a death; a death which came to a new kind of birth in resurrection.
When we look at why we celebrate Jesus’ birth on the day we call Christmas, it is clear that his birth came to matter to us because of his death. It is doubtful anyone would have known of this child born into such mean circumstances, except for his dying. It is doubtful that his life would have amounted to more than just being a gifted, if not eccentric, teacher. After all, Jesus was one of many prophets claiming to be the Messiah in their time. But something new happened by Jesus’ death, something which made his life matter to the small group of disciples who followed him. Something which made their life matter to God and to each other. Something which gave them new life and lifted them out of their hiding places of darkness and fear into the light of day to tell their story with a sense of urgency. It was a story which changed people’s lives and brought them together to be the Church. It is a story which continues to have the power to transform us anew each Sunday and every season of the Church year. It is the story of one who overcame the power of darkness and death by his resurrection from the dead. And it is only in resurrection that we can experience the advent of hope and the possibility of new life in Christ, not just in the life to come, but in this life, right here, right now. The light of resurrection continues to break into our darkness at Jesus’ birth. It is the light of resurrection which continues to lead us into new life by the example of his life. It is the light of resurrection which brings our life to fulfillment as much as that is possible in this life, but certainly in the world to come. And all because of birth; the birth we anticipate in this season called Advent.
For a Christian, then, each new season of Advent, each new cycle of the church year promises to take us to a new place within ourselves, and to a new place in our relationship with God and with each other. We come to each new Advent season anticipating the person we might yet become. Advent, then, is a turning point of the church year. We leave the past and the present of our lives and turn to the future—God’s future and ours. And what we discover is that God’s future for us in this world often begins in our endings.
So it is that in Advent God wants us to see our end in a beginning, our future in a vision, our hope in a promise, so that we can live a life worthy of the life God is calling us to live. Advent prepares us to receive God’s hope, and promise and vision for the world. According to Isaiah, our preparation begins today, the first Sunday of Advent, on a mountaintop. And as we well know, mountaintops are important to our Judeo/Christian tradition. Mountaintop experiences change us; they bring us closer to God and they prompt us to live our life in a new way. It is appropriate that our preparation for Advent begins with Isaiah mountaintop prophesies because Jerusalem represents to Jews and Christians alike God’s eschatological hope for our future. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. understood mountaintops. In his famous mountaintop speech during the height of the Civil Rights Movement characterized that hope when he said, “I have been to the mountaintop and I have seen the other side.” Dr. King’s vision of peace and justice among nations and people is Isaiah’s vision for Judah, where weapons of warfare become instruments for peace, for harvesting food and for feeding people.
Prophets like Isaiah, and Dr. King, and any one of us who journey to the mountaintop can glimpse God’s future and know what is possible for those who walk in the light of that vision in this life. In our Epistle lesson Paul advises us to “put on the armor of light…put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” For the light of Christ is the only armor that can lead us through the darkness of this world and through the dark places of our own life. It gives us the courage to live our life in love and in hope.
Matthew’s gospel account captures the essence of Advent as a time of preparation and readiness to receive the light which breaks into the darkness of our world with the birth of Jesus. Matthew tells us what can happen to those who are not attentive to God’s purpose for the light; those who are not prepared for his coming, and there is a warning in each of his examples. Matthew warns us in his example of Noah’s ark not to be complacent in our faith. He tells us that like the owner of the house we are to be watchful in the light of our wakefulness so that thieves cannot rob us of the light of our faith and leave us in darkness. Matthew’s example of the one who is taken and the one who is left is a warning that we must be ready, ready to receive the light of Christ and to bear it to others in the ordinary circumstances of our lives. Be engaged, be watchful, be ready, says Matthew. Be in Advent.
So it is that this first Sunday of Advent we find ourselves with Isaiah on the mountaintop, at the throne of God in the city of Jerusalem, glimpsing God’s vision and promise for us on the other side. But until God deems us ready to cross to the other side, until he brings us to our own end time on this earth, once each year we must journey to the manger. It is there that God will come to us with his vision for our life. It is there he will greet the people who in his light will see light. It is there we will begin our journey with him anew. As we walk with him through the seasons of the church year we will be his companions through his life, in his death and at his resurrection. We will come to know him again—and for the first time—in scripture, in teaching, in hymns and prayer. That will change us. And when we arrive once again at the first Sunday in Advent, mountain and manger will meet to draw us into an even more profound vision of God’s purpose for us in creation, where we will find even greater purpose for living into that vision by the light of Christ’s birth.
So Happy Advent, I say to the Church. Happy New Year and Happy new birthday, too. There is much to anticipate as we prepare to meet our Savior once again at the manger. We can be born anew. As we journey with him once again through his life we can also learn something new. And if we have the courage to follow him to the cross we can find new assurance that the forces of darkness and destruction and death will never be victorious over life. Jesus will take us with him into resurrection, and resurrection makes all things new.
So, let us begin again. On this first Sunday of Advent, let us begin our journey from the mountain to the manger with a new vision of how we might grow and change, and mature in Christ. Let us prepare to hear and live the good news again—and for
the first time.