Advent 2
Preaching
Lectionary Preaching Workbook
Series IX, Cycle B
Object:
Theme of the Day
Get ready! A reminder in Advent of our need to prepare for Christ's arrival on Christmas.
Collect of the Day
A prayer urging God to move us, so that we might prepare the way for Christ's coming. Strong emphasis on the role of grace and the Holy Spirit in the work involved in preparing for Christ.
Psalm of the Day
Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13
* Prayer for deliverance from national adversity.
* Reference to God's favor to His land and its people (v. 1) could be taken as messianic prophecy, describing all Christ will do.
* The bulk of the lesson (vv. 8-13) includes an oracle of assurance, likely delivered by a priest.
* Messages of forgiveness (v. 2) and salvation (v. 9) are delivered.
* Righteousness and peace meet (v. 10). This could refer to a vision of a just society or merely to what happens to faithful people through God's justifying grace.
* Salvation and these new realities are said to be close at hand (v. 9).
* The righteousness given to the faithful (God's gifts) is God's act and precedes what good His faithful people do.
Sermon Text and Title
"Get Ready! Take Comfort"
Isaiah 40:1-11
1. Theological Aim of the Sermon and Strategy
To proclaim that the Eschaton is on the horizon, giving hope despite our despair at the fragility of life in the present. The message of Realized Eschatology teaches us that the end is near (that it is in some sense already among us) and so we need to be prepared.
2. Exegesis (see Introduction to Selected Books of the Bible)
* With the Babylonian Captivity nearing an end but while the Israelites were still in bondage, consolation is offered with the announcement of God's coming. This prologue to Deutero-Isaiah focuses on the heart of his message.
* We learn of His coming from a voice crying in the wilderness (v. 3).
* Verses 3-5 are quoted in the New Testament (Luke 3:4-6; cf. Matthew 3:3; John 1:23; and even in today's gospel, Mark 1:3) to refer to the preaching of John the Baptist. This entails that we may read this text as a prophecy of John or Jesus. The idea of valleys being lifted up and mountains laid low could also be interpreted in terms of social ethics, as God's willingness to challenge the powers that be in favor of the powerless.
* The fragility of life is noted, but it is also proclaimed that God's word is forever (vv. 6-8).
* It is confidently proclaimed, despite the circumstances, that God is coming and will prevail (vv. 9-10).
* God will feed the flock like a shepherd (v. 11). The image suggests Christ as the Good Shepherd. Also implied is the Lord's resolve to restore the captives in Israel. His power over all creation to achieve this end is discussed in the remainder of the chapter (vv. 12-31).
3. Theological Insights (see Charts of the Major Theological Options)
* Help the congregation appreciate the futility of life in our sinful condition. John Wesley well describes this futility, the cause of our despair: "All that men are or have, yes, their highest accomplishments, are but like the grass of the field, weak and vanishing, soon snipped and brought to nothing" (Commentary on the Bible, p. 330).
* John Calvin claimed that humans are nothing but "smoke and vanity," their excellence is "deceitful and failing" (Calvin's Commentaries, Vol. VIII/1, p. 208).
* Reinhold Niebuhr makes a similar point but also in turn indicates why it entails our dependence on God: "Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope" (Reinhold Niebuhr: Theologian of Public Life, p. 282).
* Proclaim a word of comfort. This word is intimately related to Eschatology. In the spirit of the preceding quotation by Niebuhr, Blaise Pascal notes that without a perspective of the end in view (eschatology), human life is futile: "For it is indubitable that this life is but an instant of time, that the state of death is eternal… and thus that all our actions and thoughts must follow such different paths according to the state of this eternity…" (Pensees, p. 161).
* Because eternity, the future, still lies ahead of us, Christians will want to be prepared for the end times to come to fruition. Commenting on this text, Martin Luther elaborated on how to be prepared:
To prepare is to clear out of the way whatever will be an obstruction. This preparation is nothing else than our humbling ourselves from our arrogance and glory. Those are the chief obstacles for the hypocrites, who walk in human ways and in their own presumption and do not accept the grace of Christ. To prepare this way, however, is to walk on it naked, without merits of any kind, in the grace of God alone….
(Luther's Works, Vol. 17, p. 9)
* Reinhold Niebuhr himself made the point well that we need always to live with the end (with the future in view):
Human life is historical, and we cannot evade the constitution or our life. We must not be preoccupied about tomorrow, but it is still a fact that tomorrow is the day when the promise of youth is fulfilled… Tomorrow, of course, is also the day when death and decay impend as those of us are aware who have passed the meridian of life… The current generation must come to terms with this fact and develop trust and patience congruent with it.
(Justice & Mercy, p. 84)
* Famed New Testament scholar Rudolf Bultmann offers an equally compelling vision of what life looks like when lived in light of the end times:
To exist as Christian means to live in freedom, a freedom into which the believer is brought by the divine grace which appeared in Christ. The one justified by faith is set free from his past, from his sin, from himself. And he is set free for a real historical life in free decisions.
(History and Eschatology, p. 45)
* Bultmann had earlier noted that we come into every new situation as the person we became through previous decisions. But that suggests our decisions are not really free, but are determined by our past decisions. To be truly free, we need to be free of our past (History and Eschatology, p. 44).
4. Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights
* Calls for a new reality in which the valleys have been lifted up and the mountains (those with power) lowered (v. 4) might be developed in connection with the Psalm's link of righteousness and peace (peace and justice) (v. 10). Dietrich Bonhoeffer's 1934 sermon on the Psalm might be employed in such reflections. Criticizing political efforts at peace through military security, he wrote: "For peace must be dared. It is the great venture. It can never be safe. Peace is the opposite of security" (A Testament of Hope, p. 240).
* An unwillingness to look to the future, allowing ourselves to be bound by the past, is bad for your brain health and happiness. The brain is capable of self-organization, no matter how old it is, but when it is not challenged to make new connections (a process facilitated by the secretion and enjoyment of good-feeling brain chemicals) it stagnates and ages (Kelly Bulkeley, ed., Soul, Psyche, Brain, pp. 138ff; Sherwin B. Nuland, The Art of Aging, esp. pp. 233ff).
5. Gimmick
Ask members if they have ever been down in the dumps, in despair. After a pause, tell them about the despair of the people of Israel in the lesson (see above on the Babylonian Captivity they had endured for almost sixty years).
6. Possible Sermon Moves and/or Stories/Examples
* Elaborate on the Gimmick with this story: John has worked hard and played by the rules. But he has lost his job. He has tried to be a good father, but his children are in trouble, on drugs. His marriage is now also failing. Life is leading nowhere.
* Draw links between the story and the feelings of the people of Israel in this era. The writer of our lesson has it right: The grass withers and flower fades; the people are grass (v. 7).
* Life is meaningless without a new vision of the future and the hope of the future. Given our present perspective, all that lies ahead of us and the grave are a bunch of meaningless, frivolous undertakings that in 100 years no one is likely to care whether we did them or not. See first quotations under the Theological Analysis section above.
* Hopelessness is not ours or the prophet's last word. He proclaims that God is speaking tenderly to His despairing people to comfort us (vv. 1-2). God will be coming (vv. 9-10), he announces (just as He is coming on Christmas). There is even a hint about Jesus in the lesson. It is said that Israel has had her penalty paid (v. 2). This is suggestive of the penalty Christ paid for us.
* The Lord comes to overturn the injustices -- to raise up the lowly and level the mountains (v. 4). Highlight for listeners at this point the powerbrokers in society, the powers in the lives of parishioners (illnesses, loneliness, meaninglessness, family turmoil, the economy, and biases to the wealthy) that have caused despair. God and Christmas promise that they will be overcome and the despairing will be lifted up.
* This future promise, this vision of the end we see in our text, changes the present. The quotes by Niebuhr, Pascal, and Bultmann in Theological Thoughts illuminate this point. The despair and meaninglessness we have experienced seem to mar the future but the promise of the future breaking into the present offers new, freeing possibilities. This is what the Christmas hope is all about.
* The prophet warns that we need to make preparation for this coming of the Lord (v. 3). Preparation gets us ready to revel in the comfort Christmas and Easter afford. If prepared for this gift, life is not so full of despair. Abraham Lincoln said it well: "I will prepare and someday my chance will come." We are not likely to miss the gift if prepared. "All things are ready, if our minds be so," Shakespeare wrote.
* Brain researchers are demonstrating that preparation helps overcome despair. (See Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights.)
* Preparation for God to come into your life helps you enjoy it more; it's kind of like the preparation you do to sing a song or to play golf. The preparation you do in these instances does not guarantee that you will play well. Our preparation (really the Holy Spirit's work) does not guarantee that God and Jesus will come. But just as you are less worried when well prepared, you enjoy it so you can enjoy God more when prepared.
* What is involved in being prepared for the Lord to come? Martin Luther claims it involves walking around with no merits, getting rid of all self-reliance, counting it as garbage (Luther's Works, Vol. 17, p. 9). Preparation is all about grace, about God's work on us; He gets all the credit for our preparation.
* Also note John Wesley's comments concerning this text: He gives God all the credit for our preparation, claiming that preparation is God's use of the Spirit to dispose our hearts (Commentary on the Bible, p. 331).
* God deals with us and speaks to us so tenderly (v. 2) in all these ways. Martin Luther claimed God is like a mother and a nurse in this text (Luther's Works, Vol. 17, p. 16).
7. Wrap-Up
Suggest to parishioners that they may not be feeling good about life. Help them realize that the problem may be that they are too focused on the present and not enough on the tomorrows ahead. That is where meaning is, where your life's work will begin to make sense. No, we are often too much bound by what happened yesterday, afraid to venture. We need to be heads-up; take comfort; be prepared: The past is yesterday! Even today our good, loving, and tender God is working on tomorrow, bringing it to us.
Sermon Text and Title
"Be Prepared: God Doesn't Tell Time Like We Do"
2 Peter 3:8-15a
1. Theological Aim of the Sermon and Strategy
To provide new insights on God's sense of time and the doctrine of providence, comforting those who struggle and doubt, who feel that God is not answering prayer, not present.
2. Exegesis
* Though represented as a letter by Saint Peter, this is likely a later work of the late first century (not by the author of 1 Peter), written to respond to various false teachings. The latter date suggested in 3:3-4 indicates the disappointment experienced by the first Christian generation that Jesus had not returned.
* The epistle is likely dependent on the book of Jude and 1 Peter.
* Cast in the form of a farewell address by Peter, it is a response to critics of Christianity (probably Gnostics), who argued that Christians were free of moral constraints and that there would be no coming judgment.
* Apostolic authority (3:2) and the canonical process (1:20; 3:15b-16) are already assumed in the epistle.
* Main Sections: (1) Salutation and exhortation to holiness (ch. 1); (2) Attack on false teachers (ch. 2; vv. 1-8 closely resembling Jude 4:16); (3) Assurance that the Lord is coming again despite the delay (ch. 3).
* Central Themes: (1) Sanctification; (2) The trustworthiness of and evidence for the apostolic witness (an apology for the Catholic structures forming in the early church); and (3) Eschatology and eschatological time.
* In the assigned verses, the author responds to charges that there will be no second coming of Christ or end of the world (v. 4). This response is expected by arguing that the divine sense of time is not that of humans, that a thousand years is as one day to God (v. 8; Psalm 90:4). The delay thus far experienced is not long, and so the claim of Jesus to soon return is not negated.
* The apparent delay is really an example of God's patience, for He wants none to perish and is giving all time to repent (vv. 9, 15).
* Claims Christ will return suddenly and surprisingly, dissolving the earth with fire (v. 10). This image suggests Stoic influence. For the author it entails the call to leading lives of holiness while awaiting creation of new heavens and earth (vv. 11-13).
3. Theological Insights (see Charts of the Major Theological Options)
* Help the congregation appreciate that eschatology and hope for the future look differently and offer more comfort when history and time are examined from God's perspective.
* The lesson makes clear that God does not tell time like we do, regarding 100 years as one day (v. 8). Karl Barth also made this point:
God also lives in His time. But His time is eternity, which has no fixed span, no margins, no other measure but Himself… Man on the other hand lives in the time created and given him by God.
(Church Dogmatics, Vol. III/2, p. 558)
* Augustine in his City of God describes God's sense of time in a manner compatible with Einstein's Theory of Relativity -- the hypothesis that because time is relative at the speed of light there is no time. This entails that in the presence of God who is the light of the world there is no time -- all events are simultaneous. The African Father writes (and this is affirmed by Luther and Calvin):
God's mind does not pass from one thought to another. His vision is utterly unchangeable. Thus, He comprehends all that takes place in time -- the not-yet-existing future, the existing present, and the no-longer-existing past -- in an immutable and eternal present.
(Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 2, p. 216; cf. Luther's Works, Vol. 30, p. 196)
* Echoing Augustine, Reinhold Niebuhr offered a prayer that well says what this insight about God and time can mean for us in everyday life:
O Lord, who holds all our yesterdays, todays, and tomorrows in your eternal presence, we thank you that in imagination and reason we are fearfully and wonderfully made, transcending time and thus becoming creators with you. Give us grace to know we do not share your foresight into the future or Your power over it.
(Justice & Mercy, p. 84)
* Rudolf Bultmann offers another quotation with deep significance for the everyday implications of the Augustinian model of God's time. He wrote: "This, then, is the deeper meaning of the mythological preaching of Jesus -- to be open to God's future which is really imminent for every one of us; to be prepared for the future which can come as a thief in the night when we do not expect it…" (Jesus Christ and Mythology, p. 31).
4. Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights
* See Theological Insights pertaining to Einstein's Theory of Relativity and Augustine's view of time in God.
5. Gimmick
Ask the congregation members if they have ever been frustrated by God's seemingly long delays in answering prayer. Confess your own impatience on that matter (even using personal examples).
6. Possible Sermon Moves and/or Stories/Examples
* Impatience with God is the human condition. John Calvin put it well, while commenting on our text: "Men wish to anticipate God for this reason, because they measure time according to the judgment of their own flesh; and they are by nature inclined to impatience" (Calvin's Commentaries, Vol. XXII/2, p. 418).
* Christians living late in the first century who were addressed by the author of our lesson were experiencing this sort of impatience, beginning to wonder if Jesus would really return since it had already been several decades since He had left them with the promise of His coming again (3:3-4). Ask members of the congregation if they have wondered if Jesus would come again, given the nearly 2,000-year delay in His return. Ask if they have wondered if God is truly loving in view of the long separations they experienced with loved ones.
* Note the answer of our author to these questions has other biblical precedents: With the Lord one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day (v. 8; Psalm 90:4). Make connections to Einstein's Theory of Relativity and Augustine's view of God and time. For God, all things happen simultaneously.
* Unfold the implications of this insight. It entails that as you are preaching, Jesus is being born, as are the members' great-grandchildren. Jesus is also returning in this instant. From God's point of view, all that is happening now!
* As John Wesley has said about this text regarding God's sense of time, "… no delay is long to the eternal God" (Commentary on the Bible, p. 589) Wesley also claimed, "To the eye of faith it appears as done already" (Ibid.).
* Use the Bultmann quote in Theological Insights. The events of the future, Jesus' second coming, the better day for which we hope, reunion with lost loved ones, are immanent -- already present! Revel in them. In the midst of our despair, a better future is not far away and is already beginning to transpire in God's way of telling time.
* We need to open our eyes, see things God's way, and be prepared. Our hopes that seem to have been delayed in being realized have in fact begun to happen. What is said in the black church is true: God may not come when you want Him, but He's always on time!
7. Wrap-Up
Ask parishioners if they are anxious. Impatient? Tell them to get ready. What they hope for may be on the horizon. God does not tell time like we do. Already much of what we are yearning for has transpired in the presence of God. Oh, it may not be fame and success, but the reunion with loved ones, with God, the affirmation of who we are, the Christmas realities of love and peace, those yearnings are all coming to fulfillment in God right now. Open your eyes and look at life from God's side! Life looks good from God's eternal perspective.
Sermon Text and Title
"Getting Ready for Christmas"
Mark 1:1-8
1. Theological Aim of the Sermon and Strategy
To help parishioners prepare for Christmas by focusing them on the real meaning of Christmas (that it is all about Christ and forgiveness of sins), as well as to make clear what preparation is (waking up and rejecting sin, openness to the future) and how it happens (by grace alone, and not by what we do).
2. Exegesis (see Introduction to Selected Books of the Bible)
* Introduction to Mark's gospel (v. 1). The remaining verses report the proclamation of John the Baptist.
* Parts of the First Lesson from Isaiah (v. 3), Malachi 3:1, and Exodus 23:30 are cited (vv. 2-3). A messenger will be sent to prepare the way for the Lord, crying out in the wilderness.
* John the Baptist's ministry is described -- his nomadic way of life, subordinating to the Messiah about whom he preached, and summary of his preaching regarding repentance and forgiveness of sins as well as the contrast between his baptism of repentance and the Messiah's baptism with the Holy Spirit (vv. 4-8). What makes Jesus greater than John is not answered in this text, but we can assume that aspects of John's ministry as a prophetic ministry prefigure Jesus' own emphases.
3. Theological Insights (see Charts of the Major Theological Options)
* Help the congregation examine what is involved in spiritual preparation -- what is and how it happens. Justification, Sanctification, and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit are considered. (Also see Predestination.)
* Being prepared is an openness or readiness for an unknown future. Rudolf Bultmann made this point thoughtfully: "Therefore, this hope or this faith may be called readiness for the unknown future that God will give. In brief, it means to be open to God's future in the face of death and darkness" (Jesus Christ and Mythology, p. 31).
* Martin Luther spoke of preparation while preaching on this text: "This then is the preparation of Christ's way and John's proper office. He is to humble all the world, and proclaim that they are all sinners" (Complete Sermons, Vol. I/1, p. 124).
* Preparation is not something we do. It is a work of grace. Again Karl Barth made the point well:
Christians… are those who waken up… as they awake they look up, and rise, thus making the counter-movement to the downward drag of their sinfully slothful being. They are those who waken up, however, because they are awakened. They do not wake of themselves and get up. They are roused, and they are thus caused to get up and sit in this counter-movement.
(Church Dogmatics, Vol. III/4, p. 581)
This raising is the work of the Holy Spirit (noted in v. 8).
4. Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights
* Preparation (and spirituality) feels good. Studies have indicated that happiness is a function of experiencing the feel-good chemicals of the brain (dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin) that are secreted especially when the brain's prefrontal cortex is activated. That happens especially when we are planning (or praying). And because dopamine is a drug to which we can build a tolerance, once the planning ends and has become reality, we gradually experience less pleasure from what is the case, become less happy when we are not preparing for something new (Stephan Klein, The Science of Happiness).
5. Gimmick
Ask the congregation if they have begun preparing for Christmas. Remind them that three weeks will fly by and that there is a lot to do.
6. Possible Sermon Moves and/or Stories/Examples
* John the Baptist wants to get you ready for Christmas. How does he do it? By focusing us on the One to come -- on Jesus.
* Mark got it right in citing the First Lesson from Isaiah (40:3) that John came to prepare the way for Jesus (v. 3). And John urges his hearers to focus on the One coming (on Jesus), not on himself (v. 7).
* John gets away from material distractions (too often associated with how Christmas is celebrated today). He did not dress fancy or indulge much in the way of food or in any of the finer things in life (v. 6). Instead he spends time focusing on baptism, repentance, and forgiveness of sins (v. 4).
* Great advice for preparing for Christmas. Get off the material side of the holiday and repent. Focus more on baptism and the forgiveness of sin. John basically implies that this is what Jesus (what Christmas) is all about. As John prepared the way for Christ, so living out the main emphases of his ministry (repentance, simplicity of life, baptism, a preoccupation with forgiveness of sin) better prepares us to see Christ when He comes into our lives.
* "Be prepared." The Boy Scout motto has a point. "All things are ready, if our minds be so," William Shakespeare wrote. Christ is ready when you are.
* Good preparation helps you to enjoy the moment. Think how much more relaxed you are at the Christmas meal you prepared if all the most important preparation was completed earlier in the day, how much easier and enjoyable the days immediately prior to Christmas are if you have bought the presents weeks ago.
* If you are not always preparing for what comes next, not yearning, it seems that our brains stagnate, neurobiologists tell us. In that case we lose our mental sharpness and become less content as we reach a point where we build a tolerance to the pleasurable natural dope being secreted in our brains unless we are making new preparatory plans. We only get the fresh dope secreted in our brains that we need to make us happy when we are planning new things, in preparation.
* How to prepare for Jesus? Back to John the Baptist. Martin Luther highlighted a point John made, the repentance of sins, to confess sin. (See quotations above in Theological Insights.) In the same spirit, Karl Barth speaks of preparation as a waking up -- a raising from our sin. But we don't wake up ourselves. Somebody (the Holy Spirit) does it (v. 8).
* When the Holy Spirit comes, He does not come alone, but with Christ (Galatians 4:6; 2 Peter 1:11). God Himself gets you and me ready for Christmas, for His presence.
* In fact, Christ is already present in your life. Believing that (but remember, faith is a gift) opens you up to the future. (See the Bultmann quote in Theological Insights.) Like Martin Luther King Jr. said: "… tomorrow is today" (A Call to Conscience, p. 162).
7. Wrap-Up
Just three weeks 'til Christmas. Almost here. Even less time until the next opportunity you have to meet Jesus in your life. Don't miss Jesus. Help parishioners realize that just like all the Christmas trappings are already in the stores while we shop (Christmas has already in that sense begun), so the future Jesus has in mind for them, His presence, is already in your life, embedded in your life. Heads-up: Our loving God will be using the events of everyday life this week to get us up, to see Him (and be changed by Him)!
Get ready! A reminder in Advent of our need to prepare for Christ's arrival on Christmas.
Collect of the Day
A prayer urging God to move us, so that we might prepare the way for Christ's coming. Strong emphasis on the role of grace and the Holy Spirit in the work involved in preparing for Christ.
Psalm of the Day
Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13
* Prayer for deliverance from national adversity.
* Reference to God's favor to His land and its people (v. 1) could be taken as messianic prophecy, describing all Christ will do.
* The bulk of the lesson (vv. 8-13) includes an oracle of assurance, likely delivered by a priest.
* Messages of forgiveness (v. 2) and salvation (v. 9) are delivered.
* Righteousness and peace meet (v. 10). This could refer to a vision of a just society or merely to what happens to faithful people through God's justifying grace.
* Salvation and these new realities are said to be close at hand (v. 9).
* The righteousness given to the faithful (God's gifts) is God's act and precedes what good His faithful people do.
Sermon Text and Title
"Get Ready! Take Comfort"
Isaiah 40:1-11
1. Theological Aim of the Sermon and Strategy
To proclaim that the Eschaton is on the horizon, giving hope despite our despair at the fragility of life in the present. The message of Realized Eschatology teaches us that the end is near (that it is in some sense already among us) and so we need to be prepared.
2. Exegesis (see Introduction to Selected Books of the Bible)
* With the Babylonian Captivity nearing an end but while the Israelites were still in bondage, consolation is offered with the announcement of God's coming. This prologue to Deutero-Isaiah focuses on the heart of his message.
* We learn of His coming from a voice crying in the wilderness (v. 3).
* Verses 3-5 are quoted in the New Testament (Luke 3:4-6; cf. Matthew 3:3; John 1:23; and even in today's gospel, Mark 1:3) to refer to the preaching of John the Baptist. This entails that we may read this text as a prophecy of John or Jesus. The idea of valleys being lifted up and mountains laid low could also be interpreted in terms of social ethics, as God's willingness to challenge the powers that be in favor of the powerless.
* The fragility of life is noted, but it is also proclaimed that God's word is forever (vv. 6-8).
* It is confidently proclaimed, despite the circumstances, that God is coming and will prevail (vv. 9-10).
* God will feed the flock like a shepherd (v. 11). The image suggests Christ as the Good Shepherd. Also implied is the Lord's resolve to restore the captives in Israel. His power over all creation to achieve this end is discussed in the remainder of the chapter (vv. 12-31).
3. Theological Insights (see Charts of the Major Theological Options)
* Help the congregation appreciate the futility of life in our sinful condition. John Wesley well describes this futility, the cause of our despair: "All that men are or have, yes, their highest accomplishments, are but like the grass of the field, weak and vanishing, soon snipped and brought to nothing" (Commentary on the Bible, p. 330).
* John Calvin claimed that humans are nothing but "smoke and vanity," their excellence is "deceitful and failing" (Calvin's Commentaries, Vol. VIII/1, p. 208).
* Reinhold Niebuhr makes a similar point but also in turn indicates why it entails our dependence on God: "Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope" (Reinhold Niebuhr: Theologian of Public Life, p. 282).
* Proclaim a word of comfort. This word is intimately related to Eschatology. In the spirit of the preceding quotation by Niebuhr, Blaise Pascal notes that without a perspective of the end in view (eschatology), human life is futile: "For it is indubitable that this life is but an instant of time, that the state of death is eternal… and thus that all our actions and thoughts must follow such different paths according to the state of this eternity…" (Pensees, p. 161).
* Because eternity, the future, still lies ahead of us, Christians will want to be prepared for the end times to come to fruition. Commenting on this text, Martin Luther elaborated on how to be prepared:
To prepare is to clear out of the way whatever will be an obstruction. This preparation is nothing else than our humbling ourselves from our arrogance and glory. Those are the chief obstacles for the hypocrites, who walk in human ways and in their own presumption and do not accept the grace of Christ. To prepare this way, however, is to walk on it naked, without merits of any kind, in the grace of God alone….
(Luther's Works, Vol. 17, p. 9)
* Reinhold Niebuhr himself made the point well that we need always to live with the end (with the future in view):
Human life is historical, and we cannot evade the constitution or our life. We must not be preoccupied about tomorrow, but it is still a fact that tomorrow is the day when the promise of youth is fulfilled… Tomorrow, of course, is also the day when death and decay impend as those of us are aware who have passed the meridian of life… The current generation must come to terms with this fact and develop trust and patience congruent with it.
(Justice & Mercy, p. 84)
* Famed New Testament scholar Rudolf Bultmann offers an equally compelling vision of what life looks like when lived in light of the end times:
To exist as Christian means to live in freedom, a freedom into which the believer is brought by the divine grace which appeared in Christ. The one justified by faith is set free from his past, from his sin, from himself. And he is set free for a real historical life in free decisions.
(History and Eschatology, p. 45)
* Bultmann had earlier noted that we come into every new situation as the person we became through previous decisions. But that suggests our decisions are not really free, but are determined by our past decisions. To be truly free, we need to be free of our past (History and Eschatology, p. 44).
4. Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights
* Calls for a new reality in which the valleys have been lifted up and the mountains (those with power) lowered (v. 4) might be developed in connection with the Psalm's link of righteousness and peace (peace and justice) (v. 10). Dietrich Bonhoeffer's 1934 sermon on the Psalm might be employed in such reflections. Criticizing political efforts at peace through military security, he wrote: "For peace must be dared. It is the great venture. It can never be safe. Peace is the opposite of security" (A Testament of Hope, p. 240).
* An unwillingness to look to the future, allowing ourselves to be bound by the past, is bad for your brain health and happiness. The brain is capable of self-organization, no matter how old it is, but when it is not challenged to make new connections (a process facilitated by the secretion and enjoyment of good-feeling brain chemicals) it stagnates and ages (Kelly Bulkeley, ed., Soul, Psyche, Brain, pp. 138ff; Sherwin B. Nuland, The Art of Aging, esp. pp. 233ff).
5. Gimmick
Ask members if they have ever been down in the dumps, in despair. After a pause, tell them about the despair of the people of Israel in the lesson (see above on the Babylonian Captivity they had endured for almost sixty years).
6. Possible Sermon Moves and/or Stories/Examples
* Elaborate on the Gimmick with this story: John has worked hard and played by the rules. But he has lost his job. He has tried to be a good father, but his children are in trouble, on drugs. His marriage is now also failing. Life is leading nowhere.
* Draw links between the story and the feelings of the people of Israel in this era. The writer of our lesson has it right: The grass withers and flower fades; the people are grass (v. 7).
* Life is meaningless without a new vision of the future and the hope of the future. Given our present perspective, all that lies ahead of us and the grave are a bunch of meaningless, frivolous undertakings that in 100 years no one is likely to care whether we did them or not. See first quotations under the Theological Analysis section above.
* Hopelessness is not ours or the prophet's last word. He proclaims that God is speaking tenderly to His despairing people to comfort us (vv. 1-2). God will be coming (vv. 9-10), he announces (just as He is coming on Christmas). There is even a hint about Jesus in the lesson. It is said that Israel has had her penalty paid (v. 2). This is suggestive of the penalty Christ paid for us.
* The Lord comes to overturn the injustices -- to raise up the lowly and level the mountains (v. 4). Highlight for listeners at this point the powerbrokers in society, the powers in the lives of parishioners (illnesses, loneliness, meaninglessness, family turmoil, the economy, and biases to the wealthy) that have caused despair. God and Christmas promise that they will be overcome and the despairing will be lifted up.
* This future promise, this vision of the end we see in our text, changes the present. The quotes by Niebuhr, Pascal, and Bultmann in Theological Thoughts illuminate this point. The despair and meaninglessness we have experienced seem to mar the future but the promise of the future breaking into the present offers new, freeing possibilities. This is what the Christmas hope is all about.
* The prophet warns that we need to make preparation for this coming of the Lord (v. 3). Preparation gets us ready to revel in the comfort Christmas and Easter afford. If prepared for this gift, life is not so full of despair. Abraham Lincoln said it well: "I will prepare and someday my chance will come." We are not likely to miss the gift if prepared. "All things are ready, if our minds be so," Shakespeare wrote.
* Brain researchers are demonstrating that preparation helps overcome despair. (See Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights.)
* Preparation for God to come into your life helps you enjoy it more; it's kind of like the preparation you do to sing a song or to play golf. The preparation you do in these instances does not guarantee that you will play well. Our preparation (really the Holy Spirit's work) does not guarantee that God and Jesus will come. But just as you are less worried when well prepared, you enjoy it so you can enjoy God more when prepared.
* What is involved in being prepared for the Lord to come? Martin Luther claims it involves walking around with no merits, getting rid of all self-reliance, counting it as garbage (Luther's Works, Vol. 17, p. 9). Preparation is all about grace, about God's work on us; He gets all the credit for our preparation.
* Also note John Wesley's comments concerning this text: He gives God all the credit for our preparation, claiming that preparation is God's use of the Spirit to dispose our hearts (Commentary on the Bible, p. 331).
* God deals with us and speaks to us so tenderly (v. 2) in all these ways. Martin Luther claimed God is like a mother and a nurse in this text (Luther's Works, Vol. 17, p. 16).
7. Wrap-Up
Suggest to parishioners that they may not be feeling good about life. Help them realize that the problem may be that they are too focused on the present and not enough on the tomorrows ahead. That is where meaning is, where your life's work will begin to make sense. No, we are often too much bound by what happened yesterday, afraid to venture. We need to be heads-up; take comfort; be prepared: The past is yesterday! Even today our good, loving, and tender God is working on tomorrow, bringing it to us.
Sermon Text and Title
"Be Prepared: God Doesn't Tell Time Like We Do"
2 Peter 3:8-15a
1. Theological Aim of the Sermon and Strategy
To provide new insights on God's sense of time and the doctrine of providence, comforting those who struggle and doubt, who feel that God is not answering prayer, not present.
2. Exegesis
* Though represented as a letter by Saint Peter, this is likely a later work of the late first century (not by the author of 1 Peter), written to respond to various false teachings. The latter date suggested in 3:3-4 indicates the disappointment experienced by the first Christian generation that Jesus had not returned.
* The epistle is likely dependent on the book of Jude and 1 Peter.
* Cast in the form of a farewell address by Peter, it is a response to critics of Christianity (probably Gnostics), who argued that Christians were free of moral constraints and that there would be no coming judgment.
* Apostolic authority (3:2) and the canonical process (1:20; 3:15b-16) are already assumed in the epistle.
* Main Sections: (1) Salutation and exhortation to holiness (ch. 1); (2) Attack on false teachers (ch. 2; vv. 1-8 closely resembling Jude 4:16); (3) Assurance that the Lord is coming again despite the delay (ch. 3).
* Central Themes: (1) Sanctification; (2) The trustworthiness of and evidence for the apostolic witness (an apology for the Catholic structures forming in the early church); and (3) Eschatology and eschatological time.
* In the assigned verses, the author responds to charges that there will be no second coming of Christ or end of the world (v. 4). This response is expected by arguing that the divine sense of time is not that of humans, that a thousand years is as one day to God (v. 8; Psalm 90:4). The delay thus far experienced is not long, and so the claim of Jesus to soon return is not negated.
* The apparent delay is really an example of God's patience, for He wants none to perish and is giving all time to repent (vv. 9, 15).
* Claims Christ will return suddenly and surprisingly, dissolving the earth with fire (v. 10). This image suggests Stoic influence. For the author it entails the call to leading lives of holiness while awaiting creation of new heavens and earth (vv. 11-13).
3. Theological Insights (see Charts of the Major Theological Options)
* Help the congregation appreciate that eschatology and hope for the future look differently and offer more comfort when history and time are examined from God's perspective.
* The lesson makes clear that God does not tell time like we do, regarding 100 years as one day (v. 8). Karl Barth also made this point:
God also lives in His time. But His time is eternity, which has no fixed span, no margins, no other measure but Himself… Man on the other hand lives in the time created and given him by God.
(Church Dogmatics, Vol. III/2, p. 558)
* Augustine in his City of God describes God's sense of time in a manner compatible with Einstein's Theory of Relativity -- the hypothesis that because time is relative at the speed of light there is no time. This entails that in the presence of God who is the light of the world there is no time -- all events are simultaneous. The African Father writes (and this is affirmed by Luther and Calvin):
God's mind does not pass from one thought to another. His vision is utterly unchangeable. Thus, He comprehends all that takes place in time -- the not-yet-existing future, the existing present, and the no-longer-existing past -- in an immutable and eternal present.
(Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 2, p. 216; cf. Luther's Works, Vol. 30, p. 196)
* Echoing Augustine, Reinhold Niebuhr offered a prayer that well says what this insight about God and time can mean for us in everyday life:
O Lord, who holds all our yesterdays, todays, and tomorrows in your eternal presence, we thank you that in imagination and reason we are fearfully and wonderfully made, transcending time and thus becoming creators with you. Give us grace to know we do not share your foresight into the future or Your power over it.
(Justice & Mercy, p. 84)
* Rudolf Bultmann offers another quotation with deep significance for the everyday implications of the Augustinian model of God's time. He wrote: "This, then, is the deeper meaning of the mythological preaching of Jesus -- to be open to God's future which is really imminent for every one of us; to be prepared for the future which can come as a thief in the night when we do not expect it…" (Jesus Christ and Mythology, p. 31).
4. Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights
* See Theological Insights pertaining to Einstein's Theory of Relativity and Augustine's view of time in God.
5. Gimmick
Ask the congregation members if they have ever been frustrated by God's seemingly long delays in answering prayer. Confess your own impatience on that matter (even using personal examples).
6. Possible Sermon Moves and/or Stories/Examples
* Impatience with God is the human condition. John Calvin put it well, while commenting on our text: "Men wish to anticipate God for this reason, because they measure time according to the judgment of their own flesh; and they are by nature inclined to impatience" (Calvin's Commentaries, Vol. XXII/2, p. 418).
* Christians living late in the first century who were addressed by the author of our lesson were experiencing this sort of impatience, beginning to wonder if Jesus would really return since it had already been several decades since He had left them with the promise of His coming again (3:3-4). Ask members of the congregation if they have wondered if Jesus would come again, given the nearly 2,000-year delay in His return. Ask if they have wondered if God is truly loving in view of the long separations they experienced with loved ones.
* Note the answer of our author to these questions has other biblical precedents: With the Lord one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day (v. 8; Psalm 90:4). Make connections to Einstein's Theory of Relativity and Augustine's view of God and time. For God, all things happen simultaneously.
* Unfold the implications of this insight. It entails that as you are preaching, Jesus is being born, as are the members' great-grandchildren. Jesus is also returning in this instant. From God's point of view, all that is happening now!
* As John Wesley has said about this text regarding God's sense of time, "… no delay is long to the eternal God" (Commentary on the Bible, p. 589) Wesley also claimed, "To the eye of faith it appears as done already" (Ibid.).
* Use the Bultmann quote in Theological Insights. The events of the future, Jesus' second coming, the better day for which we hope, reunion with lost loved ones, are immanent -- already present! Revel in them. In the midst of our despair, a better future is not far away and is already beginning to transpire in God's way of telling time.
* We need to open our eyes, see things God's way, and be prepared. Our hopes that seem to have been delayed in being realized have in fact begun to happen. What is said in the black church is true: God may not come when you want Him, but He's always on time!
7. Wrap-Up
Ask parishioners if they are anxious. Impatient? Tell them to get ready. What they hope for may be on the horizon. God does not tell time like we do. Already much of what we are yearning for has transpired in the presence of God. Oh, it may not be fame and success, but the reunion with loved ones, with God, the affirmation of who we are, the Christmas realities of love and peace, those yearnings are all coming to fulfillment in God right now. Open your eyes and look at life from God's side! Life looks good from God's eternal perspective.
Sermon Text and Title
"Getting Ready for Christmas"
Mark 1:1-8
1. Theological Aim of the Sermon and Strategy
To help parishioners prepare for Christmas by focusing them on the real meaning of Christmas (that it is all about Christ and forgiveness of sins), as well as to make clear what preparation is (waking up and rejecting sin, openness to the future) and how it happens (by grace alone, and not by what we do).
2. Exegesis (see Introduction to Selected Books of the Bible)
* Introduction to Mark's gospel (v. 1). The remaining verses report the proclamation of John the Baptist.
* Parts of the First Lesson from Isaiah (v. 3), Malachi 3:1, and Exodus 23:30 are cited (vv. 2-3). A messenger will be sent to prepare the way for the Lord, crying out in the wilderness.
* John the Baptist's ministry is described -- his nomadic way of life, subordinating to the Messiah about whom he preached, and summary of his preaching regarding repentance and forgiveness of sins as well as the contrast between his baptism of repentance and the Messiah's baptism with the Holy Spirit (vv. 4-8). What makes Jesus greater than John is not answered in this text, but we can assume that aspects of John's ministry as a prophetic ministry prefigure Jesus' own emphases.
3. Theological Insights (see Charts of the Major Theological Options)
* Help the congregation examine what is involved in spiritual preparation -- what is and how it happens. Justification, Sanctification, and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit are considered. (Also see Predestination.)
* Being prepared is an openness or readiness for an unknown future. Rudolf Bultmann made this point thoughtfully: "Therefore, this hope or this faith may be called readiness for the unknown future that God will give. In brief, it means to be open to God's future in the face of death and darkness" (Jesus Christ and Mythology, p. 31).
* Martin Luther spoke of preparation while preaching on this text: "This then is the preparation of Christ's way and John's proper office. He is to humble all the world, and proclaim that they are all sinners" (Complete Sermons, Vol. I/1, p. 124).
* Preparation is not something we do. It is a work of grace. Again Karl Barth made the point well:
Christians… are those who waken up… as they awake they look up, and rise, thus making the counter-movement to the downward drag of their sinfully slothful being. They are those who waken up, however, because they are awakened. They do not wake of themselves and get up. They are roused, and they are thus caused to get up and sit in this counter-movement.
(Church Dogmatics, Vol. III/4, p. 581)
This raising is the work of the Holy Spirit (noted in v. 8).
4. Socio-Economic, Political, Psychological, and Scientific Insights
* Preparation (and spirituality) feels good. Studies have indicated that happiness is a function of experiencing the feel-good chemicals of the brain (dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin) that are secreted especially when the brain's prefrontal cortex is activated. That happens especially when we are planning (or praying). And because dopamine is a drug to which we can build a tolerance, once the planning ends and has become reality, we gradually experience less pleasure from what is the case, become less happy when we are not preparing for something new (Stephan Klein, The Science of Happiness).
5. Gimmick
Ask the congregation if they have begun preparing for Christmas. Remind them that three weeks will fly by and that there is a lot to do.
6. Possible Sermon Moves and/or Stories/Examples
* John the Baptist wants to get you ready for Christmas. How does he do it? By focusing us on the One to come -- on Jesus.
* Mark got it right in citing the First Lesson from Isaiah (40:3) that John came to prepare the way for Jesus (v. 3). And John urges his hearers to focus on the One coming (on Jesus), not on himself (v. 7).
* John gets away from material distractions (too often associated with how Christmas is celebrated today). He did not dress fancy or indulge much in the way of food or in any of the finer things in life (v. 6). Instead he spends time focusing on baptism, repentance, and forgiveness of sins (v. 4).
* Great advice for preparing for Christmas. Get off the material side of the holiday and repent. Focus more on baptism and the forgiveness of sin. John basically implies that this is what Jesus (what Christmas) is all about. As John prepared the way for Christ, so living out the main emphases of his ministry (repentance, simplicity of life, baptism, a preoccupation with forgiveness of sin) better prepares us to see Christ when He comes into our lives.
* "Be prepared." The Boy Scout motto has a point. "All things are ready, if our minds be so," William Shakespeare wrote. Christ is ready when you are.
* Good preparation helps you to enjoy the moment. Think how much more relaxed you are at the Christmas meal you prepared if all the most important preparation was completed earlier in the day, how much easier and enjoyable the days immediately prior to Christmas are if you have bought the presents weeks ago.
* If you are not always preparing for what comes next, not yearning, it seems that our brains stagnate, neurobiologists tell us. In that case we lose our mental sharpness and become less content as we reach a point where we build a tolerance to the pleasurable natural dope being secreted in our brains unless we are making new preparatory plans. We only get the fresh dope secreted in our brains that we need to make us happy when we are planning new things, in preparation.
* How to prepare for Jesus? Back to John the Baptist. Martin Luther highlighted a point John made, the repentance of sins, to confess sin. (See quotations above in Theological Insights.) In the same spirit, Karl Barth speaks of preparation as a waking up -- a raising from our sin. But we don't wake up ourselves. Somebody (the Holy Spirit) does it (v. 8).
* When the Holy Spirit comes, He does not come alone, but with Christ (Galatians 4:6; 2 Peter 1:11). God Himself gets you and me ready for Christmas, for His presence.
* In fact, Christ is already present in your life. Believing that (but remember, faith is a gift) opens you up to the future. (See the Bultmann quote in Theological Insights.) Like Martin Luther King Jr. said: "… tomorrow is today" (A Call to Conscience, p. 162).
7. Wrap-Up
Just three weeks 'til Christmas. Almost here. Even less time until the next opportunity you have to meet Jesus in your life. Don't miss Jesus. Help parishioners realize that just like all the Christmas trappings are already in the stores while we shop (Christmas has already in that sense begun), so the future Jesus has in mind for them, His presence, is already in your life, embedded in your life. Heads-up: Our loving God will be using the events of everyday life this week to get us up, to see Him (and be changed by Him)!
