Sermon on the Mount

So I know this is kind of long, but I got a couple requests. I got the opportunity to preach in the small church we've been attending on the Mount of Olives. The pastors wife had a baby and I guess I was the most qualified substitute. (Because, you know, I was breathing and all.) So the following is the text of the sermon. It's a bit weird to just post it like this since I write sermons out the way I talk. So it's not very polished. Anyway I'll stop putting long disclaimers on an already long post. Enjoy.

Advent – Anticipating God’s Presence

Sermon on the Mount of Olives

Today is officially the first Sunday of Advent. When Jamison called me I’ll have to admit it was a little short notice and I thought about just pulling an old sermon up on the computer, making some changes and printing it off. In fact I sat down at the computer yesterday to do just that. I had the computer open and was looking at an old sermon and Mandy walked by and said “Oh you’re doing the ‘Do Not Murder’ Sermon.” I said yeah, I thought it was pretty good. It’s a good old fashioned Ten Commandments Sermon with some Jesus stuff at the end. C’mon how can you go wrong? And she said “Well yeah it was but it’s the first Sunday of Advent.” I was just about to say “Yeah But” and I remembered how ticked I was last year when I realized my Church hadn’t gotten the Advent wreath out. So I couldn’t let Advent get put on the shelf on my watch. I don’t know how many of you come from churches where they make a big deal about celebrating Advent. I don’t come from an Assemblies of God background is it something that most of your churches do? Mine used to and all of the sudden last year I realized they weren’t doing an advent wreath any more. I asked the worship director and he told me it’s a part of an older style of church liturgy that most people in our congregation don’t follow anymore. They still hand out the Advent Devotionals for families to take home. So I guess in a sense I understood. I want the Church to worship in a way that’s meaningful to them not just out of ritual because that’s the way we’ve always done it but to be honest this deeply saddened me. Partly, I’ll admit out of nostalgia. I remember fondly the way the whole church used to get together in November for a big “Advent Wreath Making” party. We’d hold it in the multi-purpose room at the church. This was the room that was used for everything from Basketball to Huge Church services that wouldn’t fit in the sanctuary. They’d drag out almost every table the church owned and the whole church would smell of evergreens. Somehow amidst the chaos of a hundred church kids on the loose with evergreen branches and Parents shouting out directions and kids not listening, in the end we always ended up with beautiful wreath to bring home (and pine needles in places I didn’t know I had places. But that’s another story.) And there was always a wreath for the front of the Church. Every Sunday before Christmas a particularly Holy family from church (Or so I thought) would be assigned to go forward before the service and light the candle. What an honor. I still remember the year the Priore’s were asked to light a candle on the Advent wreath one of the Sundays during Advent. Now I realize they probably go through the Church directory alphabetically. At the time though you’d thought we’d won an Emmy. My Mom got us all new Christmas outfits and we were coached on how to walk forward and stand there “angelically” while my Dad struck the match and my mom read from the little devotional book. And you’ve got to light the candle just right, I mean nobody wants to be remembered as the family that had the candle tip over on them. As far as I remember we did fine. Our turn passed without incident. I was a little disappointed we didn’t get a little statue to take home or at least a certificate or something. But in part this was Advent to me. Something for families to enjoy with one another. Why were we letting this tradtition go? In a day and age when church membership is no longer valued and churches struggle to find things to bind their congregations together in unity it seems like traditions like the Advent wreath at Christmas are valuable and worth keeping.
But the other reason I realized this ‘lack of recognition’ for Advent saddened me was quite theological, not purely nostalgic. There is something to that ‘experience of expectation’ that should be remembered each year. I guess in a way what I’m getting at is this: Look at the thousands of years and the whole host of biblical heroes of the faith that yearned desperately to know what we know, to live in light of the promised messiah. We are so quick to jump right to the celebration of Christmas, the victorious, triumphant song of the Angels, the wonder and the majesty of the Christ child, yet we don’t take much time anymore to pause and reflect on the anticipation.
I think that anticipation is one of my favorite parts of Christmas, really. I’ve been very taken lately with the profound words of an old Christmas favorite. “Oh little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie.” Partly I’ve been reflecting on it because I live there now. It’s fun to listen to Christmas Hymns on CD…Amy Grant or Johnny Cash singing “Oh come ye oh come ye to Bethlehem.” I always shout at the CD player “We’re here Amy, where are you!?” But also this hymn captures for me the mood of reverent anticipation. “Above thy dark and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by…yet in thy dark street shineth the everlasting light. The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.” This is Advent. Hopes, Fears, Anticipation soon to be poured out at the back of cave in a little backwater town in the corner of the Roman Empire. *But pretend for a second that you don’t know that yet.* I think that’s the point of going through the motions of something like an Advent wreath. We need that reminder. We need a time to remember that period of “hope and fear” through “all the years.”
I wish we had within Christianity the attitude that Jewish folks take at Passover time. Everyone who celebrates Passover is to do so remembering that the Lord did this FOR THEM. Not for someone else 3500 years ago, but for ME, when the Lord took ME out of Egypt. Those of us who know Jesus as savior and Lord have all come out of Egypt in our own way. The Lord has saved us all. When we observe Advent we can identify with the heroes of the faith who lived before Christ because in a way we all have a “before Christ” period in our lives.
So this Advent, don’t just look forward to the celebration of Jesus’ birth but take the time to remember what the coming of Christ meant in your life. Paul spurs on the Colossians in Chapter 4 “Remember my chains.” Steven Curtis Chapman has a song called “Remember your Chains” and he says just that “Remember your chains, remember the prison that once held you before the Love of God broke through.” This advent season remember your chains. Remember WHY God set you free. Galatians 5:1 says “It was for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm then and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” Let this Advent be a time to remember what life was in your “B.C.” days; your Before Christ period. So that as Paul says you won’t be like a freed slave who willingly turns around walks back into slavery. The analogy seems ludicrous but this is what we do when we walk back into sin everyday. You…are…*FREE.*
As I thought about Advent though it hit me, in a way there’s another reason why it’s important for us to observe advent. Like the saints who lived and died before Jesus’ birth, who faithfully lived and followed God with hopeful expectation of what was to come, we have a job to do until Christ returns. In a way we live by faith in much the same way they did. They never got to see Jesus’ with their eyes. Yet they lived lives of obedience trusting that God would bring about the day of the Messiah. Here we sit some 2000 years later and what is our job until the Messiah returns? It just so happens that Jesus tells us what’s expected of us.
Turn with me to Matthew 25:14 (Read till verse 30). This parable shows us what an attitude of Advent looks like. It’s really much different from what I think of when I remember Advent as a kid. Honestly my favorite part of Advent was the Calendar my mom Hung every year that had 24 Hershey’s kisses tied to it. Every day it was a battle between my sister and me. Each would try to convince the other that it was their turn to pull off the little chocolate remembrances of the Christ-Child’s coming. Now that’s my kind of Advent but it’s not how Jesus describes it. This parable is one about investments when you get right down to it. A man going on a long journey wants to put his money to work for him so he invests certain sums in some seemingly able young men. The first two did splendid. When you look at the numbers they each earned 100% interest. If anyone knows of such investment opportunities please see me after the service, I’d like to sign up. But the third buries his in the ground. Perhaps he’s had poor luck with the investment game. Perhaps he’s a bit gun shy. Maybe this is his first time and he’s nervous about losing his master’s money. Maybe he’s just a moron. Who knows? At any rate the master comes back and is just about as indignant as you or I would be if went to a stock broker with whom we’d invested $1000 dollars and he told us “look, I didn’t want to lose your money so I buried it in my backyard. Here you go.” “What! I could have buried it in my own backyard. I brought it to you as an INVESTMENT. I could have at least taken it to a bank and gotten some interest.” Jesus says this is what the kingdom of Heaven is like for those of us anticipating His return. He’s made an investment in us and we’ve got something to do until he gets back. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the bumper sticker that says “Jesus is Coming…Look Busy.” Ok it’s flip, and it’s not just about being busy, but in a way it’s right, we’d better be busy. Not for the sake of busy-ness but because we’ve been invested in with the Presence of God and we’re supposed to share it.
I watched my tenth grade class make good Advent investments last weekend. Mandy and Melody and I brought them to the Hospital here in Jerusalem. 2 weeks ago in my History class I had a girl bring in a current events report about a little girl named Maria. The car that Maria’s family was riding in near Gaza was hit by Israeli fire by mistake. Her mother, older brother, Grandmother and Uncle were all killed. Maria is now paralyzed from the neck down. She has received charity from some Jewish doctors who’ve paid for her to stay in the hospital in Jerusalem for the past 5 months since there are no facilities in Gaza able to handle a case like Maria’s. Her father stays with her in the hospital 24/7 because he’s not sure that if he returns home that he’ll ever be allowed back. My tenth graders heard this story and they were deeply moved. I told them that we should write to her and paint her a picture. And they said to me, “Mister Doug, can we go visit her.” It was a rare and beautiful moment of High School kids thinking outside of themselves. It doesn’t happen often so when it does you’ve just got to go with it, so I said ok. For 3 hours we watched 5 tenth grade girls make this little girl feel like a princess. As it was time to leave they asked me if we could pray for her. So we asked the girl’s family and they agreed and we made a circle around her and prayed the Lord’s blessing upon her. It hit me how cool this moment was. A bunch of Christian kids in Jewish hospital, praying for a little Muslim girl. That is Advent Investment. That is sharing the Presence of God that’s how we should be investing until He returns. That is why we should remember Advent.
So as you go forth this Advent season, if you’re lucky enough to find a place around here that sells Advent wreaths, grab one. But if not, remember that the wreath is not the most important part of Advent. My legalistic side wanted to wag my finger at the worship director of my church and say “but we MUST have an advent wreath or….or…or” Or what Jesus won’t come? No that’s what I’ve come to learn, weather you attend a church that doesn’t do the Advent wreath or you live in a country where you have better luck finding a three-legged ballerina than an advent wreath you can still celebrate Advent. By Anticipating the Presence of God. By sharing that Presence with others. By remembering your chains in your B.C. days and how far the Lord has brought you. Although the wreath is fun to make and the candles bring such joy don’t get stuck on the ritual. That’s what my Tenth graders demonstrated for me last weekend. Like Hosea who reminds in 6:6 that God says “I desire mercy, not sacrifice and acknowledgement of God rather burnt offerings.” Although if anyone finds a calendar and 24 Hershey’s Kisses please give me a call. Let’s Pray.