Advent 1A – St. Andrew’s 2016 – The Rev. Dr. Lynne Carver
Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer. Amen
Have you started getting ready for Christmas? Did you hit the ground running the day after Thanksgiving? Have you started buying gifts? I admit to already having some presents hidden away for my sixteen month old granddaughter. Is your house decorated? I know where I put the Christmas decorations but the location of the Advent wreath is still a mystery. Have you written a Christmas letter or prepared cards to send? What holiday activities are already on your calendar?
December is one of the fullest months of the year: partly because we’re all getting ready for Christmas;partly because all our preparation happens on top of everyday routinesof studying and working to earn a living, preparing meals, chaffering children to play dates and lessons, cleaning and doing laundry, exercising, paying bills, spending time with friends, volunteering, attending community meetings - - - the list goes on and on.
We sound a lot like the people in today’s gospel: people who are caught up in the busyness of everyday life - - working in the field, grinding grain, eating and drinking,
marrying and giving in marriage. To them and to us, Jesus warns, “keep awake, for you do not knowon what day your Lord is coming.”
Jesus tells his disciples that no one other than God knows when the end of time will come. Throughout the ages, people have looked for signs of its coming and made various predictions. So far none of them have been correct. We’re still here; life goes on; so the second coming, Jesus’ return is still out there sometime in the future. None of us knows when Jesus will return in glory to judge the living and the dead.
Although Jesus makes clear that we won’t know ahead of time that the end is here, he does provide some clues about that end. From Jesus’ words, it is clear that there is danger involved. Being unprepared results in serious consequences like being swept away by floodwaters, being left behind, or having one’s home broken into. The second coming of Christ is not to be ignored or taken lightly just because we don’t know when it will happen or exactly what it will involve. Jesus says, “It’s important to be prepared.
Let’s look at the people Jesus describes and see what we can learn about being prepared. Let’s focus first on the men in the field and the women grinding grain.
Note that there is no difference in Jesus’ description of the behavior of the two men
– both are working in the field. There is no difference in Jesus’ description of the two women – both are grinding grain. There are no differences in preparation or lack of it that I can see. Yet, one is taken into heaven and one is left behind. Maybe, being prepared is about something internal – something that’s not easily observed from the outside.
Now, let’s return to the time of Noah. When you think about it, the only difference between Noah and the others seems to be that Noah built a boat and got on board
and the others didn’t. One would assume that Noah and his family were, like all the others, eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage. Yet, when the rains came,
Noah and his family are safe abroad the ark and the others are swept away,drowned by the floodwaters. It is possible that God told all of them to build arks but everyone except Noah was too caught up in the busyness of everyday life to pay attention. Maybe everyone else was so consumed with their everyday activities that they didn’t hear God’s voice or listen to what God had to say. Maybe only Noah attended to something “deeper,” something ultimately of vital importance to his own well being and that of his family.
Jesus seems to be warning his disciples, Jesus seems to be warning us about the danger of being so caught up in the busyness of everyday life that we miss the deeper things
that are vital to our well- being and to the well-being of those we love.
You and I live in a culture that seems to demand we be on the go 24-7. For many of us,
there’s always something more to do and never enough time get everything done.
Those who are constantly engaged and who produce at a high level are greatly valued by this world of ours. And, that valuing is often reflected in our socioeconomic status
and in how we feel about ourselves. There is a feeling of mastery, a high that comes from living in the fast lane. But, there’s also exhaustion and a sense of emptiness. For, when we are so focused on getting ahead, so consumed with the demands of day to day existence, we often lose touch with the spiritual dimensions life. Meeting all the demands, living up to all the expectations takes so much of our time, so much of our energy, so much of our minds that we end up with hearts that lack passion, purpose and even real pleasure. Have you ever wondered:“How can I be so busy and feel so empty?”
Notice Jesus doesn’t imply that the activities of daily life are unimportant and should be abandoned. Jesus doesn’t describe the man who is left behind as working and the man who is taken into heaven as praying. Both have been working in the field – one is taken one and one is left behind. Jesus doesn’t describe the woman who is left behind as grinding grain and the woman who is taken into heaven as having been in the Temple.
Both have been grinding together. One is taken, one is left behind. It sounds like Jesus is urging his disciples to be attentive to the spiritual dimensions of life in the midst of the busyness of every day activities.
This makes a lot of sense, particularly if we think aboutthe “coming of the Son of Man” not simply as something that will happen at the end of time but as God’s continual breaking into the midst of our lives here and now. As Christians, we believe God is continually, eternally present in our lives and in our world. God is always and forever creating, judging, redeeming and calling us to fullness of life. In today’s gospel, Jesus urges his disciples and he urges us to pay attention so we don’t miss the boat, so we don’t miss out on the life God offers.
Jesus says, “Keep awake, pay attention for you don’t know when God will speak to you,
you don’t know when God will come into your life, when God will nudge youin some new and different way.” How do we stay awake? How do we stay alert? How do we remind attentive to the spiritual dimensions of life in the midst of the busyness of our everyday activities?
I suspect that some of us need to take a serious look at our schedules, at how we spend our time and energy. We may need to take a look at where, in the list of priorities,we put the deeper, more enduring things of life, where in the list of priorities we put our relationship with God. We may discover that our values aren’t what they should be.
Maybe, we’ll need to make some changes.
Then again, we may look at our values, decide that they are what they should be but discover that how we’ve been living our lives, how we’ve been spending our time and energy, what we’ve been filling our minds with doesn’t match what we believe is truly important. If that’s the case, then we’ll need to rearrange our priorities. We’ll need to do some weeding of our schedules, some rearranging of our lives so that we can invest our time and energy in what truly matters.
Once we’ve made a commitment to stay awake, to keep alert, we need to develop ways to cultivate, to stay focused on the deeper dimensions of life. We do this in other areas of our lives, why not in our spiritual lives? We are told to take care of our bodies and most of us at least make an effort to get enough sleep, to eat right and to exercise. We know the importance of tending to the material, the financial dimensions of live. Most of us work hard. We budget our money. We save and invest for the future. But, we seem to either consider our spiritual lives as less important or maybe as a luxury to be attended to when everything else is done. Tending to our spiritual well- being, to those deeper dimensions of life requires the same kind of discipline that we exercise in other areas of our lives.
Some of the ways in which we stay awake, some of the ways in which we tend to the spiritual dimensions of our lives come from our faith traditions. Coming together to worship God nourishes us, builds community and gives depth and structure to our lives. Spiritual reading, private prayer and meditation have through the centuries have helped people of many faiths deepen their relationship with God. Having an Advent wreath on your dining table, lighting the candles and praying the Advent collect (the opening prayer for worship) of the week before your evening meal is one way to stay centered,
to stay connected to what’s really important in the midst of all the busyness
of this time before Christmas.
There are also ways of staying awake, staying alert to the deeper dimension of life
that we invent for ourselves or learn from each other. We might think of them as “home grown” spiritual disciplines. Here are some examples: A Jewish doctor says a Hebrew prayer of purification every time she washes her hands. She says that the prayer is not so much to purify but to remind herself that the person she is about to encounter is holy, to remind herself the person that she is treating is much more than their disease. The discipline of praying as she washes her hands keeps her awake to the spiritual dimension of the other person as she takes care of their body. A Christian pauses before a Christmas tree in the building where he works. He spends a moment or two remembering God’s coming to live among us through the birth of Jesus. He says that pausing also helps him remember that he too can give eyes and ears, hands and feet, and a voice to God’s love for others. He says it helps him live his faith through the way he relates to the people in his office.
Jesus says, “stay awake, keep alert for you do not know when your Lord is coming.”
When we acknowledge the importance of spirituality in our lives, when we exercise the discipline needed to nurture our relationship with God and to stay connected to the deeper dimensions of life, we increase the probability that we will stay centered and not be consumed by the frenetic busyness of our lives and of our culture. When we acknowledge the importance of spirituality in our lives, and exercise the necessary discipline, our lives here and now become fuller and more meaningful. And, we are better prepared for the time to come. In the words of this morning’s gospel, we stay dry in Noah’s ark, are safe in our own houses and are taken into the Kingdom.
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