CELEBRATING:
SERMONS
6 - Dec 2009
A sermon delivered by Rev. Gordon How
Advent 2 Watching and Waiting.
We've all met people who live somewhat on a tangent
- always answering normal questions with abnormal answers
or dressing in somewhat unusual clothing or sleeping
during the day or laughing when no one else does…
Here's a story about one such person.
A chap arrives at the gates of heaven. 'Well, here I
am.' he says invitingly to St Peter, who was watching
and waiting at the Gate! 'Can I come in?' 'Well no.'
says St. Peter, 'You see, recently, we've had such a
lot of righteous souls dying to get in that we are overcrowded
and so we have had to introduce an entrance exam.'
'Cool' says the fellow. 'What is it?' 'Three questions'
says St. Peter 'You have to get them all correct.' 'Great'
says the chap 'What are they?'
The first; says St Peter is 'How many days of the week
begin with 'T'?' The second; 'How many seconds are there
in a year?' The third 'What is the name of the man in
Waltzing Matilda?' Go away and think about the. You'll
need to reflect and come back then with your answers.
The next day St. Peter finds the fellow at the gate
again and says, 'Have you got any answers?' 'Oh yes,'
says the fellow, 'There are two days in the week beginning
with 'T' - today and tomorrow.' This takes St. Peter
a bit by surprise, but after some reflection he says,
'Well, OK, I have never had that answer before but I
think I must accept it as correct.
Now, how many seconds are there in a year?' 'Twelve'
says the fellow. 'Twelve?' says St Peter, 'How on earth
did you calculate that?' 'There's the second of January,
the second of February, the second of March, all the
way to the second of December.' 'Ah,' said St. Peter
'I need to consult.' And went back into heaven. Half
an hour later he re-emerged and said, 'We will allow
that answer providing the answer to the third question
is absolutely correct.
What is the name of the man in Waltzing Matilda?'
'Well,' said the fellow, 'This question I liked most
of all. It's the easiest.' 'Really?' said St Peter 'Yes,'
he replied 'It's Andy of course.' 'Andy?' said St Peter,
'Andy? Why is it Andy?' 'It's easy.' He said 'And-he
sat, and-he watched, and-he waited 'til his billy boiled.'
The chap got in to heaven.
And he watched and he waited. Advent is about watching
and waiting. If anything, we should put the waiting
back into Advent! Those old Advent Calendars were very
important devices! But Advent isn't to be a time of
passive waiting - it is a time of waiting, yes; but
more accurately a time when waiting is to be critical,
anxious, apprehensive waiting. The traditional Advent
season can heighten our understanding of what is important
in life and what needs to be changed in the world. During
Advent Mary was, indeed, waiting as all mothers wait,
in the last weeks of her pregnancy; it would have been
a very anxious time with added tension because she knew
the child she carried was exceptional - and because
she and Joseph had to prepare at the worst possible
time of pregnancy to make a journey to Bethlehem by
government order. Simply to speak of Advent as a time
for pausing and waiting is to fail to recognize the
imperative of practical preparation and encounter.
The Advent season contains the strong Messianic waiting
themes of the Hebrew Scriptures, 'Come thou long expected
Jesus' 'Hark, a herald voice is calling' 'O Come, O
Come Emmanuel' 'The advent of our God with eager prayers
we greet.' Advent has an urgency that no other season
contains. Waiting can sound very passive and patient,
but, it is at the same time urgent and expectant.
This is contradictory, at the very least profoundly
paradoxical. It is the very opposite of that famous
and terrible credit card advertisement: 'take the waiting
out of wanting'. Advent is the season when we are asked
to put the wanting into waiting. The world is still
in the midst of financial crisis. Our Government, many
governments, are borrowing to spend the way out of a
recession; that sounds really weird, contradictory.
It sounds enormously like: 'take the waiting out of
wanting'. It is one of the regular contradictions of
life that real urgency sometimes requires us to wait;
if we act too soon we will act badly or ill advisedly.
Here is another contradiction that is much in our
thoughts during Advent. John the Baptist came preaching
in the wilderness. The wilderness is the place of purity
and beauty, and it is the place of danger and getting
lost. If you really want to see the stars you have to
go to the wilderness or be in the middle of the ocean.
When you are out on the high seas and you look at the
stars, 'You can almost touch them'- While it is a place
of extreme beauty, it is also a place of extreme danger.
The people of Israel found their way to the Promised
Land by getting lost. That is the story of the Exodus.
Every time they lost God they lost their way, they only
found their way when they found themselves in true relationship
with God - that is what is exemplified in the Commandments.
Here's another contradiction. We owe the wonder of the
Christ child's birth by Mary to the disobedience by
Eve in the creation story of the Garden of Eden. In
that story we celebrate that God made humanity free
- the responsibility is ours, we are not automatons,
robots programmed to do God's will. God does not interfere
with our lives, we are trusted to show maturity and
to make judgments and God even gave us the freedom to
make wrong judgments and bad decisions. That is an essential
element of the Christian gospel.
I gather Mrs. Sarah Palin has said she will know whether
or not to stand for election in the next American presidential
contest because God will tell her. That really makes
me shudder; it is theological nonsense of a deeply disordered
fundamentalism which supposes that God makes our decisions
for us rather than creating us to strive to make our
own best decisions.
In the Second Epistle of Peter the writer explores
the contradictions of waiting; human time in the context
of God's timelessness. Impatience is our lot because
we cannot comprehend God's immensity and eternity.
In his opening verses, Mark starts his breathless
account of Gospel - the story of humanity's salvation
in Jesus - with characteristic brevity. One of his favourite
words is: 'immediately'. Everything in Jesus' ministry
as told by Mark happens in a hurry, and yet it is all
a contradiction. He starts by taking us back to Isaiah
- a long time before - and an exile that was a long
wait, and he brings us on to the expected forerunner
- John the Baptist - who arrives, at long last - but
arrives with a great sense of urgency. John, the greatest
and most hoped-for prophet of them all says he isn't
even worthy to untie the Messiah's sandal strap.
In Advent we are reminded that we wait impatiently
for the birth of Christ and we learn while we wait,
but if we wait patiently then we also risk complacency.
The watchman has to pause because his task is urgent,
once he spots the messenger there can be no delay. Once
you spot the messenger there can be no delay. We must
keep our eyes wide open in Advent - waiting for the
time to act!
How many seconds are there in Advent? One, this one,
the Second Sunday of Advent. Amen.
Isaiah 40.1-11; 2 Peter 3.8-15a; Mark 1.1-8
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