01 Advent A Isaiah 2:1-5
“While You Wait”
Greetings to you on this day that the Lord has made—a day for us to rejoice and be glad! Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and from his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
The Apostle Paul declared: “Salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.” (Romans 13:11) When you don’t know the hour or the day of the appointed time, you have to settle for just knowing that the time of waiting is getting shorter. None of us like waiting. One of the funniest comedy routines I’ve ever heard was by Ken Davis on waiting. One beauty salon, he said, was capitalizing on people’s impatience. They’d posted a big hand-written sign announcing: “Ears pierced while you wait.”
Though waiting for the main event—that is, waiting for the coming of the Son of Man arriving on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory to gather the elect—though waiting for that event wears us down, Jesus warns: “You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.” Be watchful, be ready, be prepared—these are the qualities expected of those who wait. Just like disaster preparedness, there is no end to the experts who are willing to sell you advice or market their products to you so you can be appropriately watchful, ready, and prepared for the coming of the Son of Man and be numbered among the elect.
For two thousand years there’s been one religious prescription or another as proper preparation for the end times. Various times in church history have called for retreat to the desert; isolation in monasteries, holy pilgrimages, sacred duties, giving your heart to Jesus, working for peace and justice, etc. Martin Luther saw through the pretense of all these sorts of labors to their uncomfortable truth: these prescribed labors were more about the maintenance of the religious institution and its enrichment than about doing God-given work. Luther lumped all the labors prescribed by the religious leaders into one category: self-chosen works—that is, those things people choose to do as demonstrations of their own holiness or preparedness for their being one of the elect.
In contrast, Luther held that we do not get to choose our works but that God gives work to do while we wait. He called for people to be busy doing the things God had created humanity to be doing. This work is delivered through the three estates God established: family, church, and government. These things were readily available in the first chapters of Genesis. The first people, Adam and Eve, had been given three estates—three arenas or “institutions”—in which to be doing the things God had given over to them. The very first estate was that of family: established with the “marriage” of Adam and Eve and continued through the instruction to them “Be fruitful!” The second estate was that of church: established by the Word of God which set limits upon them “You shall not eat!” while at the same time giving them everything they needed “You may eat freely…” The third estate was that of government and came after they’d been expelled from the Garden. Force and coercion was now necessary to restrain sin; read how God handled Cain after the death of Abel.
During this Advent season with its warnings to be ready, on watch, and prepared, I’ll be preaching on how our work in these three estates is our readiness and preparation.
Jesus himself points to the household as the arena of proper preparation for the coming of the Son of Man. In the verses immediately following our gospel text for the day, Jesus declares: “Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes.” (Matthew 24:45-46) The household—the family—is the first estate established by God and endorsed by Jesus as an arena for our labors while we wait.
Essential to the establishment of the family is the coming together of man and woman as husband and wife—the one flesh of Genesis chapter two. Just as scripture declares in Genesis 5:2—“He created them male and female; when they were created, he blessed them and named them “humankind,”” so too does it declare: “and the two shall be one flesh.” Marriage is the foundation upon which the estate of family—and subsequently all the activity of economy—is built. As Luther sees it, the biblical understanding is simple: strong marriages equal strong families, strong families equal strong communities, strong communities equal strong commerce between them. Marriage, family, community, commerce—in each of them humanity has a variety of vocations: husband, father, citizen, boss.
Each vocation is a God-given duty so that we are some benefit to our neighbor. In the carrying out of these various duties we are doing the work of being “wholly-human”—that’s with a “w” and two “l”s—wholly. This is the “wholly-ness” which inspired Luther to declare a mother with babe on her knees and the servant with a mop have a work more holy than any bishop in his robes.
When he comes, Jesus Christ can find us employed in no better and greater task than in doing our duty.
A black poet -- French E Oliver, 1921 writes:
“There’s a king and a captain high,
And he’s coming by and by,
And he’ll find me hoeing cotton when he comes.
You can hear his legions charging in the regions of the sky,
And he’ll find me hoeing cotton when he comes.
There’s a man they thrust aside,
Who was tortured till he died,
And he’ll find me hoeing cotton when he comes.
He was hated and rejected,
He was scorned and crucified,
And he’ll find me hoeing cotton when he comes.
When he comes! When he comes!
He’ll be crowned by saints and angels when he comes.
They’ll be shouting out Hosanna! to the man that men denied,
And I’ll kneel among my cotton when he comes.”
If you are doing your duty, however simple that duty may be, on the day Christ comes there will be joy for you.[1] Those off doing their self-chosen works of dissipating vice or religious virtue will not be ready, watchful, or prepared. God has given us work to do while we wait so that our neighbors will share in this creation’s abundance. Thanks be to God Amen
[1]The Gospel of Matthew : Volume 2. 2000, c1975 (W. Barclay, lecturer in the University of Glasgow, Ed.). The Daily Study Bible, Rev. ed. (317). Philadelphia: The Westminster Press.
1 comment:
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