A way to the future
Commentary
Advent shifts our attention to the future. As children, when we realized that our birthday was coming, most of us were filled with anticipation. We focused our attention on the future and could hardly wait for that day. As adults, there are other things that turn our attention to the future: the promise of a Christmas bonus; the arrival of a new baby; or the closing on our dream house. Attention is shifted toward the future when we sense that the future holds some promise for us.
The shift toward the future in our liturgical journey has been aided by the last Sundays of the church year. Proper 28 and the celebration of Christ the King have both entailed the promise of what the future holds. Advent, however, works with greater precision gradually to rivet our attention on what is to come. This season is not concerned with the future in general, as are the eschatological themes of some of the passages we have discussed. It is not the future in general but a very specific future to which this season points us.
The Gospel readings for Advent direct a congregation through three steps in the course of the four Sundays of the period. The first step is to entice us with the promise of what God might do in the final days. The Gospel lesson for the first Sunday of Advent is always from the so-called "Gospel apocalypse," Mark 13 and its parallels in Matthew and Luke. This first step connects the beginning of Advent with the conclusion of Ordinary Time. The second step in the gradual focusing of the future entails John the Baptist. The one who prepared the way for Christ is featured in the preparation of our way to the Nativity. In this case, John serves as a bridge between concern for the end of history and attention to the decisive event in history's conclusion, namely, the birth of Christ. The final step we take in the Advent journey is to the preludes to that birth itself. The lessons for the fourth Sunday of Advent draw on the pre-birth narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Charting the course through the four Sundays involves moving steadily closer and closer to the crucial event, the Nativity of our Lord. The Sundays of Advent adjust our vision in stages until we are ready to envision the main subject of the future.
The lessons for the first Sunday of Advent suggest that a relationship provides a future. We often feel and think that we have no future -- at least not a pleasant one. Those stricken with an illness or a crucial loss of a loved one often have trouble grasping a future for themselves. The fatally ill may find it difficult to think in positive terms about their future; all that matters, it seems, is that they will be deprived of their loved ones. The future holds little promise for them. Their life is understood in the past tense. Others of us may also find it hard to glimpse a future, like those who have lost their job and livelihood.
Relationships sometimes give us a future. Those whose lives seem to be totally in the past often find a future in their children, their grandchildren, a spouse, or a friend. The Hospice program operates at least in part on the assumption that relationships sustain and empower the dying. It has always intrigued us that the movie, Back to the Future, features a relationship between the young adventurer and the old professor. We can find a trail through the lessons for this Sunday equipped with the question of how relationships figure into the appropriation of a future.
Isaiah 64:1-9
A bit of Third Isaiah comprises the first lesson. Presumably this portion of the book of Isaiah was addressed to the exiles who have returned to their homeland and are settling in there and rebuilding their homeland. The author is anonymous, although it appears she or he was a disciple of Isaiah of Jerusalem (of the eighth century) and wanted to continue the prophet's message to the people in their new time and situation. This reading comes from the third section of Isaiah 56:1--66:24. The previous section, beginning at 63:15, is a lament, pleading for God to intervene and save Israel from its enemies. Chapter 64 continues that lament, and in chapter 65 YHWH responds to the people's pleas.
This appeal for mercy and intervention is complex. Its sequence of moves seems at best random. There is a supplication to God to intervene with might (v. 1), followed by a recollection of God's actions in the past (v. 3). Verses 3-5a comprise a kind of affirmation of faith which turns into a confession of sin in verses 5b-7. The reading peaks in the last two verses (8-9), which reaffirm a relationship with God and plead for forgiveness and mercy.
What stands out in the reading is the pathos of a sinful people throwing themselves on God's mercy. There's no pretense that they are worthy of God's forgiveness -- no effort to atone for themselves -- only recognition of need. All of this goes on, however, within the context of a relationship implied throughout the passage but clearly articulated in the final verses. The people regard themselves as God's children and as clay in the potter's hands. The two metaphors seem contradictory, but together they form a picture of the prophet's conception of the relationship with God. We are God's adopted offspring. Yet at the same time, we are totally at the mercy of God who is free to mold us however the divine will wishes. However, the relationship between the people and their parent-potter has been strained. It has even been broken. But still it is a relationship.
The passage articulates an expectation that God will act in a powerful way, as God has done in the past. The relationship has a history. These two -- God and Israel -- have been together for years, even centuries. Consequently, the people can draw on the past to grasp a hope for the future. Hope for the future builds on the past. More importantly, hope for the future is drawn from a relationship that has a history. When a human relationship is strained, it is not uncommon for the parties to draw on their past to fashion a new future in which the relationship is made right. You may know what we mean. Have you ever had to say to a dear friend, "Well, we've been through some tough times together; so we can certainly weather this storm between us"? The human analogy helps us read this passage.
1 Corinthians 1:3-9
Here too the past history of a relationship fashions the hope for the future. Paul assumes that the people have already been given grace (v. 4) and that they have been nurtured in that grace (vs. 5-7). However, now they await a new future, what Paul calls a "revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ" (v. 7). In the future Christ's true identity will become known, unmasked for all to see.
In the meantime, however, during the waiting, God is not absent or inactive. God "strengthens" the Corinthians "to the end" (v. 8). In his exuberance Paul even claims that they lack nothing -- a claim that seems strange given the contents of the rest of this letter! (For example, read 5:1-2.) The point is that God's activity among the Corinthian Christians has a goal. It is designed to prepare them for "the end." That preparation entails nothing less than making them "blameless" (v. 8). The last verse concludes with two affirmations: that God is faithful and that the Christians are invited into a relationship ("fellowship") with God through Christ.
This reading is Paul's thanksgiving in the structure of the letter and is a frequent part of his way of starting a conversation with the recipients of his letters. In fact the letter to the Galatians is the only Pauline letter in the New Testament that does not have a section of thanksgiving in its introduction. Paul typically begins his correspondence by naming the sender (v. 1) and the recipient (v. 2), and then offers a greeting (v. 3). Paul's sections of thanksgiving seem often to accomplish at least two things, both of which are evident in this reading. First, it expresses Paul's feelings for the congregation to which he is writing. This creates a context for all that he has to say and suggests that he is saying it out of love and concern. Second, the thanksgiving is often an affirmation of the congregation, highlighting what they have accomplished in their Christian community. Paul wants his readers to understand his appreciation of their faith and life together, and it never hurts communication to begin on a positive note.
However, the Pauline thanksgivings are tough to read and interpret. Paul often piles statements one on another in ways that create a tangle of words. This is obviously true of the section in 1 Corinthians. What is particularly interesting about this thanksgiving, however, is what we learn about the Corinthians as we read on in the letter. This is a congregation in real trouble. They are divided among themselves, quarreling with one another, grappling with theological questions, wrestling with difficult issues arising from the congregation's diversity, and dealing with issues resulting from the fact that they are a hodgepodge of young Christians who do not always understand what their faith means for daily living.
The context for our reading makes Paul's words all the more powerful. As a Christian congregation, they may be a mess. They may be a long way from any sort of faithful living. Notwithstanding all of this, Paul assures them of their future in Christ. It is not their faithfulness that matters but the simple fact that "God is faithful." In spite of how messed up they are, they are invited into a relationship that promises a new future. This is a relationship that does not depend on the moral accomplishments of one party but only on the faithfulness of the other and primary party. It's like a human relationship in which one person is the offender, who makes no effort to apologize, and the other is the forgiver, who alone is responsible for the re-creation of the friendship. That kind of a relationship is rich with possibilities for a promising future.
Mark 13:24-37
The role of the relationship between God and the Christian community does not immediately leap off the page of this Gospel reading. We have to read carefully to find it there. Mark 13 is the "Gospel" or "little apocalypse." This means only that the passage uses language and images that are associated with apocalyptic literature. Apocalypticism (from the Greek word that means revelation or unveiling) is simply a particular way of conceiving and speaking of the eschatological times. The writings (e.g., Daniel 7-12) are notoriously difficult to interpret, as is evident from the varieties of interpretation of Revelation that are promulgated today. As we suggested in the context of the first reading for All Saints' Day, we think the best way to comprehend this kind of literature is by reading it as a series of elaborate word-pictures. By the first century of the Common Era, many of the word-pictures of Christian apocalyptic literature had become conventional devices in Jewish apocalyptic thought for speaking of God's final victory. We suggest that you let the language of the passage wash over your mind and immerse you in its pictorial extravagance, and don't try intellectually to define or interpret everything you read.
For the first Sunday of Advent, we are treated to the final and climactic section of Mark's version of the Gospel apocalypse. The chapter begins with the disciples asking Jesus about the Temple. He predicts its destruction, and they ask when this will happen and what signs will precede its occurrence (vv. 1-4). Jesus then elaborates all the terrible things that will happen before the grand conclusion of history (vv. 5-23). These are the "messianic woes" -- the convulsion of the universe as the end of time approaches.
Our reading has two distinct parts: Verses 24-27 describe the glorious coming of the son of man. Verses 28-34 suggest how the disciples are to prepare for this occasion. In the first part, Jesus pictures the events immediately preceding the parousia (Christ's reappearance in glory -- v. 26) and then the appearance itself and the gathering of God's elect people (v. 27). The lesson of the fig tree is essentially an admonition to observe the "signs of the time" (vv. 28-29), and then Jesus affirms that the grand climax of history is very near (vv. 30-31). However, Jesus clearly acknowledges that the time of this ominous day is unknown to everyone except the Father (v. 32). (We wonder, then, how some contemporary preachers and interpreters can be so certain that they know the time!) Finally Jesus answers the question: "What are we to do?" The answer is simple: Be watchful (vv. 33-37). It is important that Mark places this chapter immediately before the death plot against Jesus is set in motion (14:1-2) so that it stands in relationship with the passion story. Preachers are well-advised, therefore, to read this lesson with Christ's suffering in mind.
Preachers may be hard-pressed to find a gospel word in this message. What is puzzling about apocalyptic literature and the way it is appropriated today is that we seem to see only the gloom and fearfulness of its imagery. It is often used to scare people into faith. In its origin, however, this literature (including Mark 13) was designed to nurture hope. You need not despair! God is going to right the wrongs of history. In spite of all the talk about the woes and the spasm of creation, we need to read behind the word-pictures for the general intent of this passage.
The intent of Mark 13 is to assure readers of a future in Christ. Apocalyptic literature is strangely relevant in our day, not because it predicts the end of time that is upon us, but because it offers hope for a future. History often seems lost and pointless, but apocalyptic thought affirms that God has a goal and a design for the progression of time (see the discussion of Proper 28).
That hope is, however, premised on the assumption that Christians have a relationship with this son of man who gloriously comes riding on the clouds and dispatching angels to gather the believers. That glorious and heavenly figure is none other than Jesus of Nazareth, who went to the cross out of love to create a new relationship between us and God. The relationship with this crucified-cloud-riding-savior is suggested in two images in our passage. The first is the "elect" (v. 27), which ought not to be read strictly in terms of some divine predestination. We are elected by virtue of the fact that Christ's life is "poured out for many" to make a new covenant with us (Mark 14:24). That life given for us binds us to God as part of the divine family. The other image is tucked away in the little parable of the doorkeeper (v. 34). We are those slaves (or servants) who are invited to watch for their master's return.
A relationship creates a future. But not just any relationship is creative in terms of the future. It is the relatedness with our Creator and the One who holds the future of the universe. And it is not just any future that such a relationship promises. The future that arises in the context of our association with God in Christ is a future of love and justice. Oh, how much we today need the power to embrace that kind of a future!
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Isaiah 64:1-9
"In our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved?" (v. 5d). It's a good question for this first Sunday in Advent, isn't it? For we are looking forward to Christmas and to the joyful news that there has been born in Bethlehem of Judea a Savior, who is Christ the Lord (Luke 2:11). But will he save us? Do we deserve to be saved this Christmastime?
The season of Advent is not only a season of expectation. It is also a season of repentance, a time when we look back over our lives, with all of their weaknesses and wrongs, and confess that yes, indeed, we do need someone who can wipe out our guilty past and cleanse our sinful hearts and make us good in the eyes of our God again.
Certainly our text exempts no one from that repentant review. Did you hear what it says? "We have all become like one who is unclean ... We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away" (v. 6). And that's true, isn't it? "All our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment" (v. 6b). As church people, we do lots of good deeds, helping out in service projects, praying for others, supporting the ministry of this congregation. But in it all, is there not always some pollution of self-interest -- that people will admire us for our saintliness, or that perhaps we will be rewarded for our goodness? And yes, our iniquities, like the wind, do take us away, because for all the miracles of modern medicine and our good nutrition and health, eventually we all end up in the grave and after awhile are forgotten. As the Psalmist says, the wind passes over us, and we are gone, and our place is known no more (Psalm 103:16).
Certainly when we look at our society and the turmoil in the world around us, we have to agree with our text: "There is no one that calls upon thy name, that bestirs himself to take hold of thee" (v. 7). Our society is far from what we would call "Christian" any more. We live in a post-Christian era, our writers tell us. And the aim of most is not to know God, but to make a buck. Buying and selling, accumulating things, beating the stock market, being wealthy or slim or beautiful or admired -- those are our American goals. And a living fellowship with the Lord God is the last thing on anyone's mind.
The result is that God has just loosed us from his hand. That's often the judgment that God brings upon us when we forget about him (cf. Romans 1:26, 28). "Okay," he says in so many words, according to the scriptures, "if that's what you want, I set you free to wallow in it and to suffer the consequences." God gives us over to our chosen sins and lets us reap our sad rewards. And our lives and the morning headlines are full of violence and bloodshed, broken hearts and broken relationships, and a world unable to heal itself. Yes, we have a lot of which to remember and repent on this first Sunday of Advent. "In our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved?"
Are there any forgiveness and healing, then, that can come to us at this Christmastime? Is there any plea that we can make to God to save us? Our text for the morning gives us two possibilities. First, God is the Father, in the Old Testament as well as the New. And so our text says that we can call on our Father God to remember that he is the one who created us in the first place. Like a potter working with a lump of clay, he carefully fashioned you and me, lining those distinctive fingerprints that mark out each of us as unique, clothing us each with bones and sinews, and giving us our own DNA. Surely God will not then just destroy those of us whom he has made? As Job prays, "Remember that thou hast made me of clay; and wilt thou turn me to dust again?" (Job 10:9). That is a plea that each one of us can make.
But more than that, our text reminds us that God created this church in the beginning. And so our plea to God might be, as Isaiah says, "We are all thy people" (v. 9c). We did not choose him, but God chose us (cf. John 15:16), and entered into covenant with us at our baptisms, and promised to be our God and we would be his people. God loved us before, and so we might appeal to his love in the past to rescue us once again from our sins that have cut us off from him. Israel made that appeal time and again throughout her history, and God always heeded and never deserted his covenant people.
Christmas is the time when God in his love does not desert us either. He sees our desperate plight brought about by our sinfulness, and in an overwhelming love he sends his only begotten Son to be our Savior. Jesus Christ is the merciful love of God made flesh, and the answer to all our prayers for rescue.
As we approach the day that commemorates the birth of our Savior, we should note very carefully the nature of the God who loves us still in Jesus Christ, however. What does the prayer of Isaiah 64 say? "O that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down" (v. 1), because no one can forgive and heal us except the Lord of heaven and earth. There are no man-made remedies for our maladies, and there is no god of this world who is able to deliver us. Can any other deity of any other sect or cult or man-made religion overcome our death? But the Almighty God of heaven, the Lord of Hosts, has sent us his very Son from above, "God of God, of one substance with the Father." And he alone can and has defeated the powers of evil and sin and death that have so corrupted our lives.
We're talking about a majestic Lord, the King of kings, the Ruler of all, when we talk about the God of the Bible. In his presence, proclaims our text, the nations tremble, and when he performs his awesome deeds, the very mountains tremble (vv. 2-3). Therefore, it is no accident that at the death of our Lord on the cross there is a great earthquake and tombs are opened (Matthew 27:51-52), and the earth is darkened for three hours, while the sun's light fails (Luke 23:44). We're dealing with the God who rended the heavens and came down when we're dealing with Jesus Christ. And he is a Ruler beyond all our imagining, that no one has ever seen before or of whom no one has ever heard (Isaiah 64:6; cf. 1 Corinthians 2:9). Christ embodies in his flesh the very being of his Father, and that Father is awesome, overpowering, magnificent Lord of all.
Perhaps we should remember that when we so love the story of the tiny and helpless babe, lying in a manger. How we do sentimentalize Christmas, turning Jesus into a cooing child over whom we feeble souls have power! But no. The infant in the cattle feed-trough incarnates the majesty of the Lord of heaven and earth, and angels on high must announce his birth and wise men from the East must bow down before him. And that is our proper stance at this Christmas that is coming. God has acted! God has seen our sufferings! God has rent the sky and come down in his Son! And you and I can know forgiveness and salvation from that overwhelming love!
The shift toward the future in our liturgical journey has been aided by the last Sundays of the church year. Proper 28 and the celebration of Christ the King have both entailed the promise of what the future holds. Advent, however, works with greater precision gradually to rivet our attention on what is to come. This season is not concerned with the future in general, as are the eschatological themes of some of the passages we have discussed. It is not the future in general but a very specific future to which this season points us.
The Gospel readings for Advent direct a congregation through three steps in the course of the four Sundays of the period. The first step is to entice us with the promise of what God might do in the final days. The Gospel lesson for the first Sunday of Advent is always from the so-called "Gospel apocalypse," Mark 13 and its parallels in Matthew and Luke. This first step connects the beginning of Advent with the conclusion of Ordinary Time. The second step in the gradual focusing of the future entails John the Baptist. The one who prepared the way for Christ is featured in the preparation of our way to the Nativity. In this case, John serves as a bridge between concern for the end of history and attention to the decisive event in history's conclusion, namely, the birth of Christ. The final step we take in the Advent journey is to the preludes to that birth itself. The lessons for the fourth Sunday of Advent draw on the pre-birth narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Charting the course through the four Sundays involves moving steadily closer and closer to the crucial event, the Nativity of our Lord. The Sundays of Advent adjust our vision in stages until we are ready to envision the main subject of the future.
The lessons for the first Sunday of Advent suggest that a relationship provides a future. We often feel and think that we have no future -- at least not a pleasant one. Those stricken with an illness or a crucial loss of a loved one often have trouble grasping a future for themselves. The fatally ill may find it difficult to think in positive terms about their future; all that matters, it seems, is that they will be deprived of their loved ones. The future holds little promise for them. Their life is understood in the past tense. Others of us may also find it hard to glimpse a future, like those who have lost their job and livelihood.
Relationships sometimes give us a future. Those whose lives seem to be totally in the past often find a future in their children, their grandchildren, a spouse, or a friend. The Hospice program operates at least in part on the assumption that relationships sustain and empower the dying. It has always intrigued us that the movie, Back to the Future, features a relationship between the young adventurer and the old professor. We can find a trail through the lessons for this Sunday equipped with the question of how relationships figure into the appropriation of a future.
Isaiah 64:1-9
A bit of Third Isaiah comprises the first lesson. Presumably this portion of the book of Isaiah was addressed to the exiles who have returned to their homeland and are settling in there and rebuilding their homeland. The author is anonymous, although it appears she or he was a disciple of Isaiah of Jerusalem (of the eighth century) and wanted to continue the prophet's message to the people in their new time and situation. This reading comes from the third section of Isaiah 56:1--66:24. The previous section, beginning at 63:15, is a lament, pleading for God to intervene and save Israel from its enemies. Chapter 64 continues that lament, and in chapter 65 YHWH responds to the people's pleas.
This appeal for mercy and intervention is complex. Its sequence of moves seems at best random. There is a supplication to God to intervene with might (v. 1), followed by a recollection of God's actions in the past (v. 3). Verses 3-5a comprise a kind of affirmation of faith which turns into a confession of sin in verses 5b-7. The reading peaks in the last two verses (8-9), which reaffirm a relationship with God and plead for forgiveness and mercy.
What stands out in the reading is the pathos of a sinful people throwing themselves on God's mercy. There's no pretense that they are worthy of God's forgiveness -- no effort to atone for themselves -- only recognition of need. All of this goes on, however, within the context of a relationship implied throughout the passage but clearly articulated in the final verses. The people regard themselves as God's children and as clay in the potter's hands. The two metaphors seem contradictory, but together they form a picture of the prophet's conception of the relationship with God. We are God's adopted offspring. Yet at the same time, we are totally at the mercy of God who is free to mold us however the divine will wishes. However, the relationship between the people and their parent-potter has been strained. It has even been broken. But still it is a relationship.
The passage articulates an expectation that God will act in a powerful way, as God has done in the past. The relationship has a history. These two -- God and Israel -- have been together for years, even centuries. Consequently, the people can draw on the past to grasp a hope for the future. Hope for the future builds on the past. More importantly, hope for the future is drawn from a relationship that has a history. When a human relationship is strained, it is not uncommon for the parties to draw on their past to fashion a new future in which the relationship is made right. You may know what we mean. Have you ever had to say to a dear friend, "Well, we've been through some tough times together; so we can certainly weather this storm between us"? The human analogy helps us read this passage.
1 Corinthians 1:3-9
Here too the past history of a relationship fashions the hope for the future. Paul assumes that the people have already been given grace (v. 4) and that they have been nurtured in that grace (vs. 5-7). However, now they await a new future, what Paul calls a "revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ" (v. 7). In the future Christ's true identity will become known, unmasked for all to see.
In the meantime, however, during the waiting, God is not absent or inactive. God "strengthens" the Corinthians "to the end" (v. 8). In his exuberance Paul even claims that they lack nothing -- a claim that seems strange given the contents of the rest of this letter! (For example, read 5:1-2.) The point is that God's activity among the Corinthian Christians has a goal. It is designed to prepare them for "the end." That preparation entails nothing less than making them "blameless" (v. 8). The last verse concludes with two affirmations: that God is faithful and that the Christians are invited into a relationship ("fellowship") with God through Christ.
This reading is Paul's thanksgiving in the structure of the letter and is a frequent part of his way of starting a conversation with the recipients of his letters. In fact the letter to the Galatians is the only Pauline letter in the New Testament that does not have a section of thanksgiving in its introduction. Paul typically begins his correspondence by naming the sender (v. 1) and the recipient (v. 2), and then offers a greeting (v. 3). Paul's sections of thanksgiving seem often to accomplish at least two things, both of which are evident in this reading. First, it expresses Paul's feelings for the congregation to which he is writing. This creates a context for all that he has to say and suggests that he is saying it out of love and concern. Second, the thanksgiving is often an affirmation of the congregation, highlighting what they have accomplished in their Christian community. Paul wants his readers to understand his appreciation of their faith and life together, and it never hurts communication to begin on a positive note.
However, the Pauline thanksgivings are tough to read and interpret. Paul often piles statements one on another in ways that create a tangle of words. This is obviously true of the section in 1 Corinthians. What is particularly interesting about this thanksgiving, however, is what we learn about the Corinthians as we read on in the letter. This is a congregation in real trouble. They are divided among themselves, quarreling with one another, grappling with theological questions, wrestling with difficult issues arising from the congregation's diversity, and dealing with issues resulting from the fact that they are a hodgepodge of young Christians who do not always understand what their faith means for daily living.
The context for our reading makes Paul's words all the more powerful. As a Christian congregation, they may be a mess. They may be a long way from any sort of faithful living. Notwithstanding all of this, Paul assures them of their future in Christ. It is not their faithfulness that matters but the simple fact that "God is faithful." In spite of how messed up they are, they are invited into a relationship that promises a new future. This is a relationship that does not depend on the moral accomplishments of one party but only on the faithfulness of the other and primary party. It's like a human relationship in which one person is the offender, who makes no effort to apologize, and the other is the forgiver, who alone is responsible for the re-creation of the friendship. That kind of a relationship is rich with possibilities for a promising future.
Mark 13:24-37
The role of the relationship between God and the Christian community does not immediately leap off the page of this Gospel reading. We have to read carefully to find it there. Mark 13 is the "Gospel" or "little apocalypse." This means only that the passage uses language and images that are associated with apocalyptic literature. Apocalypticism (from the Greek word that means revelation or unveiling) is simply a particular way of conceiving and speaking of the eschatological times. The writings (e.g., Daniel 7-12) are notoriously difficult to interpret, as is evident from the varieties of interpretation of Revelation that are promulgated today. As we suggested in the context of the first reading for All Saints' Day, we think the best way to comprehend this kind of literature is by reading it as a series of elaborate word-pictures. By the first century of the Common Era, many of the word-pictures of Christian apocalyptic literature had become conventional devices in Jewish apocalyptic thought for speaking of God's final victory. We suggest that you let the language of the passage wash over your mind and immerse you in its pictorial extravagance, and don't try intellectually to define or interpret everything you read.
For the first Sunday of Advent, we are treated to the final and climactic section of Mark's version of the Gospel apocalypse. The chapter begins with the disciples asking Jesus about the Temple. He predicts its destruction, and they ask when this will happen and what signs will precede its occurrence (vv. 1-4). Jesus then elaborates all the terrible things that will happen before the grand conclusion of history (vv. 5-23). These are the "messianic woes" -- the convulsion of the universe as the end of time approaches.
Our reading has two distinct parts: Verses 24-27 describe the glorious coming of the son of man. Verses 28-34 suggest how the disciples are to prepare for this occasion. In the first part, Jesus pictures the events immediately preceding the parousia (Christ's reappearance in glory -- v. 26) and then the appearance itself and the gathering of God's elect people (v. 27). The lesson of the fig tree is essentially an admonition to observe the "signs of the time" (vv. 28-29), and then Jesus affirms that the grand climax of history is very near (vv. 30-31). However, Jesus clearly acknowledges that the time of this ominous day is unknown to everyone except the Father (v. 32). (We wonder, then, how some contemporary preachers and interpreters can be so certain that they know the time!) Finally Jesus answers the question: "What are we to do?" The answer is simple: Be watchful (vv. 33-37). It is important that Mark places this chapter immediately before the death plot against Jesus is set in motion (14:1-2) so that it stands in relationship with the passion story. Preachers are well-advised, therefore, to read this lesson with Christ's suffering in mind.
Preachers may be hard-pressed to find a gospel word in this message. What is puzzling about apocalyptic literature and the way it is appropriated today is that we seem to see only the gloom and fearfulness of its imagery. It is often used to scare people into faith. In its origin, however, this literature (including Mark 13) was designed to nurture hope. You need not despair! God is going to right the wrongs of history. In spite of all the talk about the woes and the spasm of creation, we need to read behind the word-pictures for the general intent of this passage.
The intent of Mark 13 is to assure readers of a future in Christ. Apocalyptic literature is strangely relevant in our day, not because it predicts the end of time that is upon us, but because it offers hope for a future. History often seems lost and pointless, but apocalyptic thought affirms that God has a goal and a design for the progression of time (see the discussion of Proper 28).
That hope is, however, premised on the assumption that Christians have a relationship with this son of man who gloriously comes riding on the clouds and dispatching angels to gather the believers. That glorious and heavenly figure is none other than Jesus of Nazareth, who went to the cross out of love to create a new relationship between us and God. The relationship with this crucified-cloud-riding-savior is suggested in two images in our passage. The first is the "elect" (v. 27), which ought not to be read strictly in terms of some divine predestination. We are elected by virtue of the fact that Christ's life is "poured out for many" to make a new covenant with us (Mark 14:24). That life given for us binds us to God as part of the divine family. The other image is tucked away in the little parable of the doorkeeper (v. 34). We are those slaves (or servants) who are invited to watch for their master's return.
A relationship creates a future. But not just any relationship is creative in terms of the future. It is the relatedness with our Creator and the One who holds the future of the universe. And it is not just any future that such a relationship promises. The future that arises in the context of our association with God in Christ is a future of love and justice. Oh, how much we today need the power to embrace that kind of a future!
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
By Elizabeth Achtemeier
Isaiah 64:1-9
"In our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved?" (v. 5d). It's a good question for this first Sunday in Advent, isn't it? For we are looking forward to Christmas and to the joyful news that there has been born in Bethlehem of Judea a Savior, who is Christ the Lord (Luke 2:11). But will he save us? Do we deserve to be saved this Christmastime?
The season of Advent is not only a season of expectation. It is also a season of repentance, a time when we look back over our lives, with all of their weaknesses and wrongs, and confess that yes, indeed, we do need someone who can wipe out our guilty past and cleanse our sinful hearts and make us good in the eyes of our God again.
Certainly our text exempts no one from that repentant review. Did you hear what it says? "We have all become like one who is unclean ... We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away" (v. 6). And that's true, isn't it? "All our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment" (v. 6b). As church people, we do lots of good deeds, helping out in service projects, praying for others, supporting the ministry of this congregation. But in it all, is there not always some pollution of self-interest -- that people will admire us for our saintliness, or that perhaps we will be rewarded for our goodness? And yes, our iniquities, like the wind, do take us away, because for all the miracles of modern medicine and our good nutrition and health, eventually we all end up in the grave and after awhile are forgotten. As the Psalmist says, the wind passes over us, and we are gone, and our place is known no more (Psalm 103:16).
Certainly when we look at our society and the turmoil in the world around us, we have to agree with our text: "There is no one that calls upon thy name, that bestirs himself to take hold of thee" (v. 7). Our society is far from what we would call "Christian" any more. We live in a post-Christian era, our writers tell us. And the aim of most is not to know God, but to make a buck. Buying and selling, accumulating things, beating the stock market, being wealthy or slim or beautiful or admired -- those are our American goals. And a living fellowship with the Lord God is the last thing on anyone's mind.
The result is that God has just loosed us from his hand. That's often the judgment that God brings upon us when we forget about him (cf. Romans 1:26, 28). "Okay," he says in so many words, according to the scriptures, "if that's what you want, I set you free to wallow in it and to suffer the consequences." God gives us over to our chosen sins and lets us reap our sad rewards. And our lives and the morning headlines are full of violence and bloodshed, broken hearts and broken relationships, and a world unable to heal itself. Yes, we have a lot of which to remember and repent on this first Sunday of Advent. "In our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved?"
Are there any forgiveness and healing, then, that can come to us at this Christmastime? Is there any plea that we can make to God to save us? Our text for the morning gives us two possibilities. First, God is the Father, in the Old Testament as well as the New. And so our text says that we can call on our Father God to remember that he is the one who created us in the first place. Like a potter working with a lump of clay, he carefully fashioned you and me, lining those distinctive fingerprints that mark out each of us as unique, clothing us each with bones and sinews, and giving us our own DNA. Surely God will not then just destroy those of us whom he has made? As Job prays, "Remember that thou hast made me of clay; and wilt thou turn me to dust again?" (Job 10:9). That is a plea that each one of us can make.
But more than that, our text reminds us that God created this church in the beginning. And so our plea to God might be, as Isaiah says, "We are all thy people" (v. 9c). We did not choose him, but God chose us (cf. John 15:16), and entered into covenant with us at our baptisms, and promised to be our God and we would be his people. God loved us before, and so we might appeal to his love in the past to rescue us once again from our sins that have cut us off from him. Israel made that appeal time and again throughout her history, and God always heeded and never deserted his covenant people.
Christmas is the time when God in his love does not desert us either. He sees our desperate plight brought about by our sinfulness, and in an overwhelming love he sends his only begotten Son to be our Savior. Jesus Christ is the merciful love of God made flesh, and the answer to all our prayers for rescue.
As we approach the day that commemorates the birth of our Savior, we should note very carefully the nature of the God who loves us still in Jesus Christ, however. What does the prayer of Isaiah 64 say? "O that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down" (v. 1), because no one can forgive and heal us except the Lord of heaven and earth. There are no man-made remedies for our maladies, and there is no god of this world who is able to deliver us. Can any other deity of any other sect or cult or man-made religion overcome our death? But the Almighty God of heaven, the Lord of Hosts, has sent us his very Son from above, "God of God, of one substance with the Father." And he alone can and has defeated the powers of evil and sin and death that have so corrupted our lives.
We're talking about a majestic Lord, the King of kings, the Ruler of all, when we talk about the God of the Bible. In his presence, proclaims our text, the nations tremble, and when he performs his awesome deeds, the very mountains tremble (vv. 2-3). Therefore, it is no accident that at the death of our Lord on the cross there is a great earthquake and tombs are opened (Matthew 27:51-52), and the earth is darkened for three hours, while the sun's light fails (Luke 23:44). We're dealing with the God who rended the heavens and came down when we're dealing with Jesus Christ. And he is a Ruler beyond all our imagining, that no one has ever seen before or of whom no one has ever heard (Isaiah 64:6; cf. 1 Corinthians 2:9). Christ embodies in his flesh the very being of his Father, and that Father is awesome, overpowering, magnificent Lord of all.
Perhaps we should remember that when we so love the story of the tiny and helpless babe, lying in a manger. How we do sentimentalize Christmas, turning Jesus into a cooing child over whom we feeble souls have power! But no. The infant in the cattle feed-trough incarnates the majesty of the Lord of heaven and earth, and angels on high must announce his birth and wise men from the East must bow down before him. And that is our proper stance at this Christmas that is coming. God has acted! God has seen our sufferings! God has rent the sky and come down in his Son! And you and I can know forgiveness and salvation from that overwhelming love!
