Advent Sermon by the Revd Karl Przywala I’ve been told that people are looking forward to my Advent sermon – so, no pressure! A topical sermon can be more difficult to write than one based on one biblical passage; for the passage can provide parameters. Advent could be a big topic. And people have mixed, perhaps even confused, understandings of what Advent’s about. Confusion perhaps comes because Advent is the four Sundays before Christmas. As such it is naturally seen as a season of preparation for Christmas. But it’s also something more. Advent is a season in its own right. The clue is often in the word. Ad and vent. From the Latin, ad meaning ‘to’ and vent ‘coming’. Advent is a ‘coming to’. It’s a bit like coming round after a heavy sleep. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians: “Let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.” Advent is a wake-up call: Awake! Awake! Fling off the night, for God has sent a glorious light, and we who live in Christs new day must works of darkness put away. It’s really important for us to understand that Christianity is a linear religion. There are cyclical religions, some of them very popular. The New Age movement favours the cyclical approach; as do Hinduism and Buddhism among others. Early primitive religions followed the pattern of nature – the repeated cycle of the sun and its associated seasons. Christianity, by contrast, is a linear religion. It perceives a beginning, a middle and an end. Whilst a curate in the North East of England, I was being driven back from the cemetery by the undertakers. “Oh, don’t you believe in re-incarnation?” said one of them to me. “No, I don’t. I believe in resurrection.” It’s resurrection that we look forward to; it’s resurrection that gives us hope. Tom Wright, who was my bishop when I was in North East England, speaks helpfully of a five act biblical hermeneutic. This is helpful – yes, it really is – because what he means is there’s a discernible pattern in the Bible: a beginning, a middle and an end. The five acts are a framework that help us understand the Bible’s over-arching story: its meta-narrative. The five acts, as in a play, are: Creation, Fall, Israel, Jesus, Church. Creation: Genesis chapters one and two. Fall: Genesis chapter three. Israel: the rest of the Old Testament. Jesus: his birth, life and ministry, death, resurrection and ascension. Church: the rest of the New Testament and now. We are part of act five. The falling of the curtain, as it were, at the end of act five, is envisioned at the end of the Bible, in the Book of Revelation. John, writing on the Island of Patmos, sees a vision of what will be. It’s a city: the New Jerusalem. Revelation 21, verse 23: “The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.” Jesus is on the throne in the centre of the city and he is its light. And the end is also a new beginning. Chapter 22 verse 5, “There will be no more night. They [read, we] will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.” That’s what we have to look forward to: reigning with God for ever and ever. We can look forward to celebrating Jesus’ birth at Christmas. But we do so knowing that, as with every birthday, the actual birth is in the past. The more significant looking forward is to Jesus’ Second Coming at the end of time. In as much as Advent is a season of preparation, preparation for celebration of a past event – Jesus’ birth – logically only provides the backdrop for preparation for an event which is yet to occur: Jesus’ return. John’s vision of what will be, brought the future into his present. And his record of it in the Book of Revelation brings it into ours. Christianity is not just a religion of the past. We are called also to look forward to what is to come. And that looking forward makes what is to come, part of our present. The two hymns with which we conclude our service both tell of Jesus’ Second Coming. But they do so in a way that makes it part of our present. Isaac Watts wrote Joy to the world! The Lord is come, basing his vision of the future reign of Christ on Psalm 98. Charles Wesley adapted John Cennick’s hymn Lo! He comes with clouds descending. He made Christ’s arrival so vivid that when singing in Durham Cathedral, I found myself glancing up the central tower, expecting Christ to appear at that moment. Lord Shaftesbury was a nineteenth century Evangelical Anglican and a social reformer. He said, near the end of his life, “I do not think that in the last forty years I have lived one conscious hour that was not influenced by the thought of our Lords return.” If we actively look forward in this way, it affects our present. Whist living in Sydney – the one down-under! – I attended a course at Moore Theological College. The lecturer showed us a statement of faith – a sort of parallel Creed and asked us to critique it. What might we want to add or leave out. Foolishly, I stuck up my hand and said I’d leave out reference to the Second Coming. The lecturer, Mike Raiter, graciously indulged my whim of fancy. I now wish that he’s shot me down instead. For I was wrong. There, I’ve said it. And I repent of the fact – it was back in my salad days! Jesus’ coming to us at his return to earth, brings the promise of no more darkness. He shall reign over a city, the New Jerusalem, bathed in the light he provides. This is when we shall be resurrected, just as he was: the General Resurrection of the dead. And those whose faith is in Jesus’ death on the cross, and who await his return, can look forward to reigning with him forever. May we take the opportunity of this season of Advent to prepare ourselves for Jesus’ Second Coming. Looking forward to a future event has the capacity to make it a governing part of our present reality. Let in the light; all sin expose to Christ, whose life no darkness knows. Before his cross expectant kneel, His light will judge, and judging, heal. Amen.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Dec 2014 06:58:39 +0000
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