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The First Sunday Of Advent
Almighty God, give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which thy Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the quick and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal; through him who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
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The First Sunday Of Advent
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A Sermon by
Fr. Mead
✛
A Grandchild Speaks the Truth
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the living God who is, and who was, and who is to come.
Advent means coming, and for the Church it means the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior and our Judge. God our Father created us in the image of God the Son, the Word by whom all things were made. When man abused his freedom and marred the divine image in which he was made, the Father addressed the human race through his Word in the calling of Israel to be his people and in that Word spoken through the prophets. This is the same Word and Son who came to us in the flesh by the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Virgin Mary. He took our nature as the true Son of Man, and his mission was to overcome our sin and subjection to evil and death, to bring us back into the communion and fellowship of the Holy Trinity.
The Good News is that Jesus Christ has overcome our sin and died our death on the cross; and that on the third day he rose from the dead. Christ is risen, and he lives. The Resurrection of Jesus is the great Fact of all facts, the Reality in which we live, which means that this same crucified and risen Lord will appear in glory to the whole world to judge the living and the dead and to inaugurate God’s kingdom in its fullness. You and I live in the “meantime,” that is, between Christ’s first advent in great humility and his Second Advent in power and great triumph.
When will Christ return? When will the End come? To these questions Jesus replied, “Watch.”
Two weeks ago my five-year-old grandson was sitting at the supper table with his two-year-old brother, Father Fletcher, and me. His parents had brought the children into town to leave with my wife Nancy (and me too) while they went out for the evening, a long-scheduled arrangement. Of course, Nancy, their grandmother, was the crucial factor in the success of this arrangement; but she was trapped in traffic on the Triboro Bridge. Ready or not, tag, you’re it – meaning Grandpa (me), and of course Father Fletcher; quite a pair. Remarkably, we did all right. Thanks to some pasta and frozen food and the microwave, and a call or two to Grandma in her car on the cell phone – “Where is the baby chair?! – the grandchildren ate heartily. All seemed well.
Then Liam, the five year old, got serious after I said something like, “Not a bad kids’ supper by a couple of geezers.” He then said, “Only old people die.” This I think was a test statement, hopefully asserted. I said, “Well, that’s the way it’s supposed to be. But sometimes it isn’t, and it’s very sad. A younger person can get sick. Or there can be an accident. And there are wars.” He knows this. He overhears the news. He lives in a rectory. He and his parents have talked about this already. He looks back knowingly, and says, “But God has them.” Yes, God has them. “Out of the mouths of babes” God speaks his truth; this is the truth of Advent. Christ is risen: God has us all.
We do not know the day or the hour of the End: of Christ’s coming or of our leaving this world and going to Christ. But the Lord who will return, to whom we are going, getting closer day by day, is the same Lord who has loved us to the uttermost. When he rose from the dead, he showed his disciples the wounds of his crucifixion. When he comes again, his glorious body will bear the same tokens of his passion. Just as did Saint Thomas in the upper room on Easter, we shall see the risen Lord in the End.
And then what? Well, God does not force his love on us; salvation is for all who will. All who love Christ’s appearing, Jew and Gentile, baptized church member or known to God alone, will come to him in his kingdom. All, good and bad, shall rise from death on the Day of Resurrection: those who desire good, to the Resurrection of the just; those who desire evil, to the Resurrection of the unjust We all shall look on him whom we have pierced – for our sins have been the hammer and nails of his crucifixion. But we shall know that the bad news of our sin has been overwhelmed by the Good News of Jesus’ love.
Behold, the dwelling of God is with his people: Finally the heavenly Jerusalem shall descend like a bride adorned and coming to her husband. It is populated by multitudes beyond numbering. Its gates are pearl; its streets are pure gold, clear as glass, full of jewels. There is no temple in it, because God and the Lamb, the Son who died to save us all, are its temple and its sun and light as well. There are no tears or crying, no pain, no sorrow or loss. Death will be no more. There will reunions and introductions and all the time in the world. All peoples, nations and languages will come into the City, and there will be plenty of room for them, because the city is as large as a continent. There is much more, more than can be told or written. But what has been told and written is trustworthy and true. The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” “Surely,” the Lord said, “I am coming soon.” Even so, Come Lord Jesus! [1]
Our King and Savior draweth nigh: O come, let us adore him.
_______________
[1] The entire paragraph is from Revelation 21-22.
