First Sunday in Advent: December 2, 2007.

Isaiah 2:1-5

Psalm 122

Romans 13:11-14

Matthew 24:36-44

First Reading--A graceful last day

In trying to look for links between the readings for the First Sunday in Advent, I am interested in the way each casts light on images of house, household, walls, community, family, and the activities of ordinary life. We wake from sleep, eat and drink, and create relationships. It seems that Isaiah's vision of fulfillment being centered within the house of God is significant. Teaching goes out from here. Disputes are settled here. This is the place where weapons are transformed into tools for pruning/gardening. Similarly, in Psalm 122, security is found within a city where you can plant your feet, where people are bound together, where justice and peace meet in one place and way of living.

Both of these images of a place of safety remind me of the pu'uhonua, literally "place of refuge" or "sanctuary," on the Big Island of Hawaii. This lush grove of palm trees is on the ocean and surrounded on all sides by a thick wall. In a historical time when numerous actions could be against the kapu (code of living) and result in a death sentence, anyone who could make it to pu'uhonua was safe. The place cleansed you and restored you to the community. The bones of the chiefs hallowed this place and made it powerful enough to cleanse. No blood could be shed on this sacred ground. It provided a second chance for defeated warriors, enemies, women who ate the wrong foods, those who insulted the chief, anyone vulnerable.

What places are like this in our current day--places that have the power to change our broken and defeated status, places of forgiveness, of refuge? Where is it so tangible that you can feel refuge in your bones?

This earthy groundedness in the visions of Isaiah and the psalmist who describe the goodness of city, work, and community make the last part of the Romans text a bit baffling. We are just a few days past celebrating the harvest, Thanksgiving, the season of provisioning. So what does it mean in this moment to hear the words at the end of this reading from Romans, "make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires"?

This present moment may well be the time to wake from sleep, but other images in the reading seem problematic. Why is it necessary to create sharp division and contrast between dark and light, flesh and spirit, desire and honor? Are our desires for home, family, peace, and security wrong? Is the writer of Romans implying that we're all given to a kind of excess that leads us to drunkenness, wastefulness, quarreling, and jealousy?

While the reading from Matthew 24 certainly rings a bell as an advent text, it also seems to not "fit" with this part of Isaiah's vision. Is it supposed to be reassuring to not know about the day and hour of Christ's coming, or is this a dire and fearful warning? Because of history with this text from Matthew and pop-culture wisdom about those "left behind," some in our congregations cannot hear these words without feeling high anxiety. On the one hand, a sense of urgency can be a very helpful motivating force, especially if we are the type of people that work best with a little pressure. On the other hand, it is hard to feel the good news of God's grace in our bodies if anxiety is surging through them.

The opportunity at the beginning of the church year to look toward the end of life, at least to consider our own death, can be a gift. When we have the experience of facing the end, it can clarify life. We might ask, "If you knew you had a year left to live, how would you?" And then, "Why not live that way now? What are we waiting for?" This can be a way to clarify God's calling and our vocation--or that way of living that brings a sense of joy and meaning to our lives. This way of considering these readings may help us avoid the kind of looking to "the end" that is a kind of escapist longing for heaven; the danger of looking so far ahead that we miss the coming of Christ today.

An interesting challenge of this day is making sense of these diverse visions of what the days of the Lord's coming reign will look like. Each reading points to the future. One vision shows a household, a stronghold. Another shows the opposite--a time of great uncertainty, a situation of conquest or terror in which one is taken and one is left. However, whatever the future may hold, Jesus is coming. There is something to do in the meantime, while we wait. We are invited to go to the house of God, where God might teach us to walk the path. We are told, "Let peace be within you." Now is the moment to wake from sleep and be ready with anticipation for the unexpected arrival.

Pastoral Reflection

The preacher has a number of options at the beginning of this Advent season. One example is Susan Wendorf's suggestion that instead of complaining about the culture, which is already celebrating Christmas in December, we should celebrate Advent in November. (1) That way, we could do more justice to both seasons than we often do, especially since we don't gather in worship for all of the twelve days of Christmas.

Ever since I read Wendorf's suggestion, I've seen more clearly the link between the readings of the last weeks of the church year and the first weeks of Advent, all looking toward the "already and not yet" reality of the risen Christ's reign. If this kind of approach makes sense in your context, begin preaching Advent themes of preparation and singing Advent songs in November as the readings turn to questions about resurrection and the return of Christ.

In a way, this approach illumines a reality of life that is very present during this season, articulated poetically by T. S. Eliot,

What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to
make a beginning. The end is where we start from....

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time. (2)

On this weekend, throughout the world, do we see evidence of the Lord's coming? In places of terror and suffering, where is the reign of God creeping in and transforming the hearts and minds of people? Where are people beating swords into plowshares? Where are God's people refusing to learn war anymore? Whether God is entering our world and our lives in gentle or dramatic ways, we're called to be ready.

Richard Jensen writes, "The call to 'be ready' is a call to put our lives in the hands of the One Who Knows: our gracious God. Our first day with God, our baptismal day, was a day full of grace. Our last day will be gracious as well." (3) JLMC 

1. Susan Wendorf, "Let's Move Advent!" Lutheran Partners (Nov./Dec. 1991).

2. T. S. Eliot, "Little Gidding," Four Quartets (London: Faber and Faber, 1944), 43.

3. Richard A. Jensen, Preaching Matthew's Gospel (Lima: C.S.S. Publishing, 1998), 214.