He is Coming; “Like a Thief in the Night”
The second Advent
Sermon Preached by
The Rev. David McMaster
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Text: 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11
Today we begin the church-season of Advent. It is a time of looking forward, waiting and preparation. Advent actually means “coming” or “arrival,” and those interested in the finer points of the liturgical church year tell us that, during Advent, we should look backwards in time to the incarnation that began in Bethlehem, but also forward to the time when God in Christ will come again. The prescribed lectionary passages during Advent draw us to that other strong biblical theme, Jesus' return, that time when God will bring the affairs of this world to a close and usher in the new kingdom.
It was foretold when Jesus was taken up into heaven before his disciples. As the disciples stared at the heavens, two men in white, drew near and said,
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven ” (Acts 1:11).
Of that time, we read in Mark's Gospel that,
“The sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time people will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens ” (Mark 14:25f.).
One theme that keeps coming up about the Day of the Lord, this “end time,” is that we don't know when it will happen. We are not told when it will happen. As our passage today suggests, it will come like a thief in the night. As Jesus said,
“You do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the householder had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have watched and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore, you also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect ? (Mt.24:42b-44).
Have you ever had your home burgled? I was 23 years old in my first year of seminary. I lived in one of the men's residences and was preparing, one day, for a first date. Donna had caught my eye. I had plucked up the nerve to ask her out to dinner and she had, amazingly, said, “Yes.” I was a “happy camper” as I did a few errands that Saturday afternoon. There was a skip in my step, I went to the bank, sort of floated into the store. Life was good. I got back to my dorm around 5:00 p.m., closed the outer door of the suite that I shared with a couple of other guys, dropped off my groceries in my room and headed for the shower (one has to do that sometimes). Ten minutes later, I walked back into my room and noticed a few things in disarray and my wallet lying on the floor. I quickly went over to it and my heart sank as I realized that my cash was gone. Someone had come in off the street and helped themselves while I was in the shower. I sat down on my bed and put my head in my hands. Disaster! It wasn't just the lost money, it was the fact that in half an hour I had to pick up Donna and I had wanted to put my best foot forward. But, it was a Saturday evening, the banks were closed, bank machines had not yet been invented, I didn't have a credit card, because in those days students couldn't get them that easily (banks actually expected you to have a job - wasn't that a novel concept). Most of us still used cheques, which you couldn't use in a restaurant. My heart sank. With my head down, I sauntered off to tell Donna what had happened. I had been robbed; we couldn't go out.
If I'd known, I would have had my wallet in the bathroom with me … but how was I to know? The robber had come “as a thief in the night,” I did not know the day or the hour and hadn't prepared or taken enough precaution.
The first thing that the scriptures tell us about God's coming again is that it will be like a thief in the night. That is not, perhaps, one of our favourite images we associate with God. We prefer God being depicted as the good shepherd who guides his flock, or the mother bird that draws her young under her wings for protection, but like “a thief in the night???” It reminds us that life as we know it is not certain, it is not solid, it is not permanent. It reminds us that God is coming, whether at the Second Coming or when our days are done, God is coming. “There will always be tomorrow,” we say, but we lie. Life ends, things terminate, this world will cease to exist as we know it. The only permanent fact of life, forget taxes, it is our impermanence. The Lord comes “Like a thief in the night.”
Lest that thought not be unsettling enough, another aspect of God's advent is that in scripture it always seems to be tied up with the concept of judgment. This is implied in our passage when Paul writes, “For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ (I Thess.5:9).” In other related passages there is talk of separating the sheep from the goats; those who follow God enter his kingdom, while others are left outside (Matthew 25:31ff.). It is all unsettling stuff - as though God is not as soft and loving as current thought would have us believe - that his love is more like that “tough-love” concept that was put forth in the '80s.
When it comes to judgment, I can't tell you how many people have told me that they don't believe in it, that they cannot conceive of God judging and consigning some to his kingdom and some not. I can't tell you how many have said something like, “Well, we're United Church, we don't believe that.”
It intrigued me, then, this week, while at a lecture at Emmanuel College on the United Church's doctrine of “Resurrection, the Last Judgment, and the Future Life.” We surveyed the 1925, Basis of Union, the 1940, United Church Statement of Faith, and The Song of Faith from 2006. It was interesting to note that the judgment of God was very strongly included in the 1925 and 1940 documents but was left out of the 2006 statement. The professor asked those present, who were mostly third-year students due to attend Conference interviews and be ordained in the coming months, if they believed there would be a judgment. A large majority said, “Yes, we do,” though with caveats. As discussion ensued, judgment was variously defined in terms of God's righteousness and God's love. Individuals talked about being torn between our culture, which tends to view judgment as politically incorrect, and what is in the Bible, which the Protestant movement takes to be the authority for our faith. In the end, the word “accountability” was used and all agreed that there is accountability in the Christian faith, that we are accountable for our actions before God.
Thus, it may not be true to say, “We're United Church, we don't believe in judgment.” Some may wish that to be true, but at least this year's crop of ordinands, as they honestly grappled with scripture and our culture, were still talking of accountability. And as soon as you include accountability in our broader theology, it becomes unsettling. What we do matters; how we act in this world matters to God as he prepares to set up his new kingdom.
This second advent thing is unsettling - we don't know when it will happen. There's accountability, there's responsibility to be taken. Yet the message of the gospel is not for us to exist in unsettledness and uncertainty. The gospel never leaves us with negatives and doom and gloom; it points us to news that is good, something that is valuable - to life and eternity with God. Paul continues in this passage,
“But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. You are all children of the light … let us be sober, and put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation … Christ died for us so that whether we wake or sleep we might live with him ” (I Thess.5:4, 5a, 8ab-10).
Paul says, we are not in darkness and he gives us steps that we can take to prepare.
I recall, two summers ago, meeting one of my son's friends at the gym, I attended. They had gone to lower primary and upper secondary school together, had played on school sports teams together, and played hockey together all be it on different teams. At the age of 12 or so, John had grown tall and strong, over six feet. He made the AAA team, while my boy lagged the growth curve, languished down at 5' 2“ for much too long and had to settle for AA hockey. With the superior training at AAA and natural talent, John got better and better. In his Midget year, he led his team to win the All Ontario's. He got picked up in Junior by the Brampton Battalion and when I ran into him at the gym, he had just been taken in the second round of the NHL draft by the Anaheim Mighty Ducks.
It was July and John was working out in the gym. We chatted in the weight room and he told me he was getting ready for Training Camp, doing a four- to six-hour workout each day. I told him that I remembered when Training Camp was the time to get in shape and prepare for the NHL season. In fact, I had heard Ron Ellis speak of a change that occurred during his career when the young bucks began to come into camp toned and ready to displace any veteran who took too long to get his legs back. “Apparently,” I said, “You guys now spend time preparing to prepare for the season.”
“Yes,” he said, “That's the way it is. You can't afford to go to camp out of shape.”
NHL players and pretenders prepare to enter the preparatory part of the hockey season and, in many aspects of life, we prepare for things. University and college students are now preparing to write their exams. My daughter is coming home to prepare for her university exams at the end of the week. Parents and others are preparing for Christmastime when family and friends will get together for the holidays. In life, physicians, lawyers, dentists, economists, accountants and even ministers prepare for years to enter their chosen field. Who among us wants an ill-prepared doctor? Or a dentist who, in the middle of drilling, says, “Oops!” We prepare for our own things and we want people in other positions prepared too. We prepare for job interviews, our careers and retirement with pension plans, RRSPs, and various others investments.
God's word to us today calls us to acknowledge the coming of Christ. We can look back to the first advent at Bethlehem, and we look forward to the second advent, which will come like a thief in the night to usher in God's new kingdom. The word calls us to acknowledge the impermanence of this life and when Paul writes that we should don the breastplate of faith and love and the helmet of salvation (1 Th.5:8), he is saying, “Get ready; be prepared. You are not in the dark about what lies ahead.”
Advent is a season of preparation and just as we would prepare for schooling, our careers, our retirements, God calls us to give some thought to our eternal futures.
When Queen Mary of Orange was dying, her chaplain wished to read to her from the Word of God and help her into the next life. When he asked her if he could read, Queen Mary answered him, “I have not left this matter till this hour.”
She had prepared. Advent calls us to prepare. As we look back to the babe of Bethlehem and forward to the coming of the Son of Man in power and great glory… let us be prepared.
When we take up faith in Christ and live out lives of love, we are ready always and we can rejoice at the coming of the day of the Lord. Whether we are awake or asleep when he comes, we will live with him forever. “