First Sunday of Advent
December 3, 2023

It's Been True All Along

Tom Are Jr.
Interim Pastor

Psalm 80:1–7
Mark 13:24–27

For the first Sunday of Advent the lectionary always tees up the second coming of Christ. This year it’s Mark’s telling. We begin the Advent season with stories of trumpets blasting and Jesus riding the clouds and the world coming to an end. Merry Christmas.

In March 1968, President Johnson surprised many when he stated, “I will not seek and will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your president.”

In 1796, President Washington said the same. He or his speech writer, Alexander Hamilton, said it this way:

“Friends and fellow citizens: the period for a new election of a citizen to administer the executive government of the United States being not far distant, and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now apprise you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be made.”

See, it’s the same message. It’s just nobody talks like George Washington anymore. If you were to speak that way, folks might think you were a bit weird. However, to assume that Washington — with his strange way of speaking — has nothing to say would be quite foolish. That speech of 1796 is read on the Senate floor every year marking the first president’s birthday.

In a favorite passage from King Lear, the king is unable to escape a rainstorm. As king, he was unaccustomed to inconvenience, but being pelted with rain caused him to think of those for whom such an experience was commonplace. He reflected,

“Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,
that bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
how shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
your looped and windowed raggedness, defend you
from seasons such as these?
O, I have ta’en too little care of this.”

Nobody talks like that anymore. But to suggest that Shakespeare — with his strange talk — has nothing to say would be quite foolish.

The Gospel of Mark reads,
“But in those days, after that suffering,
the sun will be darkened,
and the moon will not give its light,
and the stars will be falling from heaven,
and the powers in the heavens will be shaken.

“Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in clouds’ with great power and glory. Then he will send out the angels and gather the elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven. … But keep awake, for you do not know when he is coming! Heh, heh, heh!” (OK, I added the Heh, heh, heh.)

But nobody talks like this anymore. This is apocalyptic language, found not only in the Gospels but in the book of Daniel, and most notably in Revelation. This language, so comfortable in the mouths of the biblical writers, sounds weird to us. Apocalyptic language uses bigger-than-life words to paint larger-than-life pictures to speak truths that are too immense for pedestrian speech. It points to that which is true, that which has always been true. The point is simple: Jesus is Lord. Even when all the evidence appears to the contrary, Jesus is Lord.

To understand its meaning, let me tell you first what it doesn’t say. Throughout history there have been folks who have read these passages literally, pretending that this is some code, and when you figure it out you know when Jesus will ride a cumulus cloud back to earth.

In the second century, there was a Christian named Montanus, who read the scripture and was convinced that Jesus would return to a little village named Pepuza; it’s in modern-day Turkey. Of course, Montanus was wrong, as Jesus did not return. His being wrong didn’t deter others from reading the texts the same way. In the 1880s followers of William Miller discerned that Jesus would return in 1884. People quit their jobs. I am told some took their suitcases and stood on their roofs with eyes cast to the skies. I don’t know what they were going to do with their suitcases. 1885 came, but Jesus didn’t, not on clouds anyway.

That didn’t stop Tim LaHaye, in the last twenty-five years, from writing a series of books called Left Behind. They read like Stephen King goes to Sunday School. There was a Left Behind movie, Left Behind T-shirts, and a Left Behind board game, which gives you something to do, I suppose, if you are left behind.

This literal read turns a promise of good news into a warning of bad news. It calls for a perpetual anxiety, because Jesus is coming and you don’t want to be caught lounging on the sofa watching reruns of Law and Order! No, you better be ready.

But these words are not written to scare people that the world might end. No, it is written to people who are already afraid that the way the world is now will never end. It’s written to those on the bottom. Language of the apocalypse promises hope to the hopeless.

The text is not teaching us how to discern when Jesus will return. It teaches us who to be when he hasn’t. It urges us to trust that Jesus is Lord, even when all the evidence suggests otherwise.

It’s a prayer that after the long journey of life that brings suffering to all — and for far too many brings little else but suffering — it is a prayer that the ways of Christ would be lived. The apocalyptic voice speaks with courage that love can be trusted, even in this city, even in this world as it is. It is not a prayer that the world end, but a prayer that the world change.

Years ago, I had a sore throat. I went to Walgreens for some throat lozenges. I was looking over the options, there being about 300 different kinds of lozenges. Next to me stood a man speaking with the pharmacist. I wasn’t trying to listen, but he was right there. This was his side of the conversation.

“Those are mighty big pills, Doc. Do you think if I break one in half that would be enough medicine? I see.”

“You know, my wife says I’m so forgetful I can’t remember my own name sometimes. If I forget to take a pill now and again, do you think that would be alright? I understand.”

“You know, I’m not as bad as I was; I think I’m getting a bit stronger. I may not need the whole month; could you tell me how much a week’s worth would cost? Yes, sir. Thank you.”

Now I don’t know if he was talking about antacid or heart medicine, but I understood what was going on. He was among those who surround us every day whom the economy has left behind, and he was trying to balance medicine and food and just trying to stay alive in a world that has forgotten him. I entered Walgreens just wanting some lozenges. I left wanting Jesus to return. Am I making any sense to you?

If I understand the text, Reverend Tim LeHaye got it exactly backwards. It is not you should be afraid that Jesus will leave you behind; no, the promise of the gospel is that even when the world has left you behind, God never will. Christ will send his angels to gather us up from the ends of earth and the ends of heaven.

This is a promise spoken to every ICU ward and to every cold street corner that serves as a bedroom. It is a promise to every child who works the cocoa fields rather than going to school. It is spoken to every person whose heart is broken in grief. It is a promise to those who are searching for their loved ones kidnapped and to the thousands who are digging their loved ones out of Middle Eastern rubble.

It is the promise to all whom the world has left behind, that the love of Christ is coming and will leave no one behind. That is why we join with our ancestors praying, “Come, Lord Jesus.”

Because Jesus is Lord — even in this city, and even in this world — it tells us who to be today. We are living toward a humanity that we have never known but a way of life that has always been true.

Clarence Darrow is widely known as the defense attorney for John Scopes in the Monkey Trial of Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925. But the year before, right here in Chicago, he defended two young men, Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb. They were two brilliant University of Chicago students who murdered fourteen-year-old Bobby Franks just to show that they were smart enough to get away with it. They didn’t. Darrow defended them to make his case to end the death penalty. His closing argument lasted eight hours. (You thought I preached long!) He said this (I won’t get you all eight hours):

“Your Honor stands between the past and the future. You may hang these boys, … but in doing so you will turn your face toward the past. I know the future stands with me.

“I am pleading for life. … I am pleading that we overcome cruelty with kindness and hatred with love.”

“I am pleading for the future; … for a time when hatred and cruelty will not control the [human heart.] When we can learn by reason and judgment and understanding and faith that all life is worth saving, and that mercy is the highest attribute.” (Edward Larson and Jack Marshall, eds, The Essential Words and Writings of Clarence Darrow, p. 235)

I am pleading for the future. I know the future stands with me.

This first Advent text does not to tell us when Christ will come, but it reminds us who we are to be until he does. For Jesus says the future stands with me.

So we join with the voices of the early church in pleading for the future. The promise of God is that, in the end, even those whom the world has left behind are not lost. As the old strange language puts it, “And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his children from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.” God’s is a love that leaves no one behind. That has always been true.

So we join with the earliest Christians pleading, “Come, Lord Jesus.”

Sermon © Fourth Presbyterian Church