Text: Matthew 24:36-44
A church musician first threw down the gauntlet for me concerning Advent. She had grown up as a Lutheran and came to the Presbyterian Church in her late twenties, able to direct a choir with expertise but also filled with boundaries about what should and shouldn’t be sung during the days preceding Christmas. It made great sense to me theologically.
Ever since, I have had to deal with the inquiry of complaint, meant more as an allegation against my Christmas spirit, “Why aren’t we singing carols, everyone else is?” There is no question that once you have been to Bethlehem it is hard to get back on the road again and do it all over. But here it is Advent and the texts we are asked to read and to proclaim put us on the winding road upon which we have walked before. How do we get there, again?
The reality is that Advent is out of step with the prevailing mood most people find themselves in during December and like always the first Sunday of Advent has us reading disturbing words. This year is it from the 24th chapter of Matthew’s Gospel. It is a passage stuck right in the middle of a series of ominous words from Jesus. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” he laments, followed by the prediction of the destruction of the temple, the center of worship. Sitting with his disciples on the Mount of Olives, the conversation turns on the question of what will be the sign of the end. Jesus paints a picture of conflict and of alarm, of darkness and false hope. How do you read that sort of Scripture when the music is blaring and the smiles on people’s faces are simply the sign of determination to get to another annual celebration of survival and not to the end of the world?
I’ve often related Advent to the old practice of tying a string around my index finger to force me to remember. But what is it I need to remember?
People have long been fascinated about the future, but more, about when it is all going to end. But I probably exaggerate if it sounds like a mass movement. Years ago I attended my tenth high school reunion. Sitting next to me was a friend I had not seen since graduation. In the middle of dinner he paused over a bite of roast beef to ask me, “So, when do you think the world is going to end?” He was serious and it wasn’t even Advent.
Jesus said, about that day and hour no one knows. And maybe a part of the message of the season is “get used to it.” You aren’t going to know. Even Jesus didn’t know, a point of some discomfort because it points to an even more difficult conversation about what it meant for him to be both human and divine. The attitude of faith, then, is that if we are faithful in our living, then what’s the problem? The road to Bethlehem is one we can walk joyfully despite how many times we have done it.
There is another problem, though. If we are faithful and there is no need to be anxious about the times and the signs, what are we supposed to be doing?
The 24th chapter of Matthew could command a book all by itself. There is plenty of fodder for thought. Let me point to what I think is most appropriate for us living in the days of Advent once more. Jesus points back to the days of Noah. He could have pointed forward to the life of Americans. It is all about the ordinariness of life. Eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage! How easy it is for us to get caught up in the expectation that life is meant to repeat itself. We need our routines, for sure, but when we become so preoccupied in preserving the routine and take no time to think about what it does mean to get ready again for the return of Jesus, we will be surprised.
And how does that preach? How do we skin the eyes of our people so that they can see their indifference to this word of Jesus, our indifference to the message of Advent? My suggestion is to read on and find that the best way to get ready is to feed the hungry and provide water for the thirsty and welcome the stranger and clothe the naked and visit the sick. To use John Wesley’s words, to “do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you can.”
Our church will host forty homeless women for a week during Advent this year. We’ve done it before, but never in December. There are so many distractions it has been hard to imagine how we could do it. But we’ll try and my prayer is that we’ll discover one of the great truths of life, that while we are headed to Bethlehem, Bethlehem has come to us. I hope we’ll be ready!
LARRY CHOTTINER is pastor of Salisbury Church in Midlothian, Va.
