AN UNPREACHED SERMON (207)
Photo by Karren McPherson from Dawson Community Church
“Christmas seems to come around earlier and earlier each year”. That often-heard remark is true and it is not true.
It isn’t true because, just like your own birthday, it takes a full twelve months for the seasons of the year to revolve. The arrival of 25th December is no exception. It will come, as it did last year, neither sooner nor later.
It seems to be true, in that the shops, special parties and events and the world of advertising jump on the band wagon and make us think of Christmas earlier and earlier. Unfortunately, the Christian church has succumbed to the pressures of a secular society and in the process dumbed down the whole significance of the Incarnation of Christ.
Speeches by royalty, politicians, non-biblical preachers and purveyors of the current wokeness, will happily talk about light, darkness, hope, celebration, but conveniently skirt around the only Person who gives meaning to such words. We have all too easily embraced an Xmas without the One who gives substance to it all.
Nowhere is this “earlier and earlier” mentality and dumbing down more clearly seen than in Advent services, with their attendant man-made rituals. The four Sundays leading up to Christmas are, in the popular imagination, seen as “getting ready for Christmas”. In truth, however, Advent is meant to be a season of reflection on the fact that He who came once will come again. In the various lectionaries and prayer books across the denominations who use them, the suggested Bible readings are passages of warning that Christ is coming as Judge. It’s a note that does not chime well with a society set on having a good time in the here and now. It is not accidental that as western society has become more secular and the church more liberal, the imperative note of Christ’s coming again has been muted. In consequence this has obliterated the real meaning of His first coming. Incidentally, if you are one of those people who do follow some kind of lectionary, Christmas celebrations begin on 25th December and run through to Epiphany on 6th January with the arrival of the wise men. Advent is the time to do some serious thinking about how we have responded to Christ’s first coming and whether He has been accepted or rejected by us. Such solemn thought determines our destiny, for “He came unto His own and His own received Him not; but to as many as did receive Him to them gave He the power to become the children of God...” (John 1:11, 12).
Jesus gave clear information and information about the momentous event of His return to this planet (Luke 21:25-38), but in looking at it we must beware of falling in to two traps regarding it.
Becoming so obsessed with its complexities to the point of futile speculation and timetabling.
Neglecting it by only focusing on the first Advent to a total rejection of the whole idea.
Raymond Brown reminds us, “Christ’s teaching about the future is not meant to promote speculation but inspire holiness” - the real purpose of the Advent season. Jesus tells us a number of things here about what to expect when He returns.
IT WILL BE A VISIBLE EVENT.
There will be plenty to see, which is in sharp contrast to His first coming. What happened in Bethlehem was obscure and hidden; how silently, how silently the wondrous Gift was given. But His second coming will be so different (vv27, 42). The mention of clouds is a reminder that it will not be something obscure (the normal function of clouds) but gloriously out in the open for all to see.
IT WILL BE A UNIVERSAL EVENT.
He points to an event of cosmic proportions (vv25, 26, 33). A time when the whole structure of the universe will show signs of collapse. This, too, is in sharp contrast to His first coming which was localised to just this planet, one small country, a particular village and a backstreet stable. It is the picture of creation undergoing cataclysmic change and the emergence of a new world order (vv29-31).
IT WILL BE A FINAL EVENT.
In fact, this final event of human history will signal the end of death and of time as we now know it, the ushering in of the eternal state, the goal of creation realised and the vindications of God’s purposes for the planet.
IT WILL BE A DEFINING EVENT.
There are only two possible reactions to all this.
· People will faint for terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world (v26)
· Stand up and lift up your heads; your redemption is near (v28)
So much of today’s anxiety about the future of the planet is based on fear. By contrast, the Christian knows that life is to be lived in the light of that great defining moment. We don’t read more into the signs of His coming than is warranted. But we do seek to discern them.
Nobody caught the theme more biblically than Charles Wesley in the Advent hymn which will have been sung worldwide last Sunday.
(1) “Lo! He comes with clouds descending, once for favoured sinners slain;
Thousand, thousand saints attending, swell the triumph of His train:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! God appears on earth to reign.
(2) Every eye shall now behold Him robed in dreadful majesty;
Those who set at nought and sold Him, pierced and nailed Him to the tree,
Deeply wailing, deeply wailing, shall the true Messiah see.
(3) The dear tokens of His passion still His dazzling body bears;
Cause of endless exaltation to His ransomed worshippers:
With what rapture, with what rapture gaze we on those glorious scars.
(4) Yeah, Amen! Let all adore Thee, high on Thy eternal throne;
Saviour, take the power and glory, claim the kingdom for Thine own;
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Everlasting God come down”
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