A Sermon for the First Sunday of Advent, Year C (Jeremiah 33:14-16; Luke 21:25-36)

And just like that, it’s Advent!

I hope you’ve gotten all your Advent cards in the mail!

As we all know, Advent is the season of preparation before Christmas. The four Sundays of Advent are signified by the four candles in the wreath, and the days of Advent are often marked off with the traditional Advent calendar.

In the more liturgical traditions, however, Advent is not simply a countdown to Christmas. Advent is about exactly what the name suggests – an arrival, a coming to. The Advent lessons are full of prophecy — yes, the prophecy about the coming of Jesus – the baby in the manger, God’s promised Emmanuel. But the lessons during Advent also suddenly wax dark and apocalyptic. These lessons look toward the Second Coming of Christ.

In Advent we hold both comings of Christ before our eyes. With hopeful hearts we await the quiet coming of the Christ Child in Bethlehem as well as the triumphant return of Christus Victor, Christ the Conqueror.

The lesson from the Hebrew scriptures and the Gospel Lesson today illustrate this dual focus perfectly. The lesson from Jeremiah is a prophecy about the coming of the messiah. A “righteous branch” will spring up for David. “He will execute justice and righteousness in the land.” For us, these words would portray the coming of the Christ and his earthly ministry, and yet they mean much more.

Jesus himself provides the prophecy in the gospel lesson. It too is about the coming of the messiah, but here we see a much more apocalyptic arrival. Jesus warns of much suffering among the faithful and the danger of being taken unawares. Amid much distress, turmoil and tribulation, the messiah will come “with power and great glory.”

Now without going into a long rabbit trail on the nuances of prophecy and apocalyptic writing, suffice it to say that neither prophecy nor apocalyptic writing are nearly as cut and dried as many Christians who read them would like to think. Prophecies often seem imprecise or even downright wrong. What’s more, prophecies are often layered and seem to refer to several periods of future time all at once.  What may seem like a messianic prophecy to one audience may in fact have been intended as an encouraging word to another group altogether. Some prophecy was fulfilled in the lifetime of the hearers. Other prophecies seem like they will NEVER be fulfilled.

Needless to say, prophecy is complicated. So why do we read it, and especially at this time of the year?

Today is the first Sunday of the liturgical year.  Happy New Year Church!  Welcome to Year C, the year of Luke. Most of our Gospel readings this year will be taken from Luke’s telling of the story of Jesus. For the purposes of Christmas, this is good news. Not only do we find the wonderful “And it came to pass…” But we also get to hear the birth narrative of John the Baptist as well. John has been called the “last Old Testament prophet” and his message is full of warning and calls to repentance.

Some may look in on us this morning and say, “Wow! Bad marketing choice! Visitors are looking for Christmas! People want things to make them feel good! Where are the Christmas carols? And I don’t see Santa anywhere!” My response is: “Mary isn’t due for a few more weeks. Why don’t we sit down and wait with her?” Rather than rush to Christmas, we Episcopalians choose to wait. We sing hymns, sometimes in a minor key.

Advent is about expectation. With Mary we wait. Today is actually the first Sunday of the liturgical year.  Happy New Year Church! Welcome to Year C, the year of Luke. Most of our Gospel readings in this coming year will be taken from Luke’s telling of the story of Jesus. For the purposes of Christmas, this is good news. Not only do we find the wonderful “And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.…” But we also get to hear the birth narrative of John the Baptist as well. John has been called the “last Old Testament prophet” and his message is full of warning and calls to repentance.

The prophecies of Advent, both advents, both comings of Jesus, call us to a time of awareness and of expectation but most importantly to a time of hope.

We live in difficult, uncertain times, we who live between the two Advents of Christ. We live in the now and the not yet. 

For those of us who mourn, take heart. For those living in fear, know that you are not alone. For those of us whose hearts long for the coming of true peace and lasting justice on the earth, don’t lose faith. Advent invites us to tarry awhile and remember God’s promises. Advent is a time to renew our faith in those promises. Though we may not always feel it, we can make the choice to believe it, supported by our community of faith.

In the face of darkness, we light the candles of the advent wreath. One more candle each week. As we approach the solstice, the longest night of the year, we light more candles, scattering the darkness. When the news seems dark, we practice a ritual that reminds us that the dark will NOT overcome the light, though it be just one candle. This week we lit the candle that invites us to hope.

This is our hope.  It is tied up in the mystery of faith: Christ has died.  Christ is risen.  Christ will come again. Past, Present, and Future. We are not trapped in an endless loop.  We believe that just as the story of time and humanity had a beginning, it will one day have an ending as well. There will be a resolution to the story. We believe that sin and death will ultimately be destroyed. When I say resolution, I mean a time like that described in Jeremiah, when there will be true and lasting justice and peace for all humankind. This is our hope.

We say it in the creed. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.

While some choose to focus on what I call the “special effects” of the Second Coming or what exactly is meant by “the world to come”, I do not find my hope in these speculations – trying to peer behind the curtain, as it were.  My hope lies in the promise of God – a promise to make things right, to undo the curse. For now, we may be separated from those who have died, but one day we will share in the risen life of Christ that awaits us all.

We live in a difficult time, we who live between the two Advents of Christ. We live in the now and the not yet. 

For those of us who mourn, take heart.  For those of us whose hearts long for coming of true peace and lasting justice on the earth, don’t lose faith. For all of us who wait the end of the story, tarry awhile in these days of Advent and consider God’s promises. Advent is a time to renew our faith in those promises. Though we may not always feel it, we can make a choice to believe it, supported by our community.

I close with the words of a classic Advent hymn,

Our hope and expectation, O Jesus now appear

Arise, thou Sun so longed for, above the darkened sphere.

With hearts and hands uplifted, we plead, O Lord, to see

The day of Earth’s redemption that sets your people free!

Amen.