Keep Awake- Mark 13
I really wish COVID would just go away. I feel sad that I can’t see people I care about. I’m trying to imagine Christmas without seeing family. It’s hard to get my head around the consistency of the rules. I don’t really know how to be a priest in all this. I don’t want to make anyone sick, and I’m constantly wondering how people are doing. There are some that are not dealing with the isolations well at all, especially anyone with memory problems or mental health issues. People are drinking more, there are more drug overdoses, and more suicides. There is a tension in the air that is unrelenting and it’s emotionally draining. COVID had been pretty theoretical, but now we know people who are catching it, and dying from it. The tension in the air seems to make everything else worse. People are less patient. Everything becomes a political symbol that divides us to one side or the another. We pick up a flag that proclaims our rights to resist Government restrictions, or proclaims those who resist as murderers of the elderly and vulnerable. The middle ground where we can actually talk and ask questions seems to have disappeared. Every statement or question is read as a coded message that leaves you on one side or the other. … add to this the divisions we see just south of the border. … And then I wonder what people in the rest of the world must think as they look at us with our state-of-the-art health care. I wonder about countries where they are dealing with widespread terrorism attacks, or food shortages, or cyclones. I wonder how they see us. … I just really want to get on the other side of this.
This is a time when we can really get what Advent is all about. Usually we are a bit annoyed by Advent with its darkness and yearning for God to break in and fix things. Usually we want to skip straight into the joy and celebration of Christmas, without sitting in the darkness of a confused world yearning for a Messiah. … Maybe we get Advent a bit more this year. … The darkness of this time of year is not just a backdrop for Christmas lights. This year the darkness is perhaps a bit more symbolic. Perhaps we feel the absence of God, and the presence of the works of darkness. It’s the first step in AA- “We admitted that we were powerless over our problems…”. No amount of human ingenuity, or power, or popularity, or money, is going to fix the mess of the world. We have been optimistically telling ourselves that we can fix it since the Victorian era. And this have gotten better in many ways, but it seems like every solution creates 2 new problems. The technologies that used fossil fuels created cheap energy that lifted many out of poverty, but now we are dealing with climate change. … Even if all the outward problems are fixed, I still have to deal with all the stuff I have going on inside me.
The early Christians were very aware of being in a hostile world. And after the Ascension, they were left wondering when Christ might return. They were taught to be ready, as if it could happen at any moment. We read in the Gospel of Mark,
“’But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Therefore, keep awake--for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake’” (Mark 13:32-37).
Jesus says the phrase “keep awake” three times in that short bit of Scripture. Of course, “keep awake” is not meant to be taken literally. It means don’t go through your life like a zombie. Don’t procrastinate- the evil you can stop, stop- the good you can do, do. Be conscious of how you are living. Don’t think that you will hear that the master is returning and then will have enough time to get your life to a place where you feel prepared for him to return. We won’t have that kind of time. We can’t afford to delay. Any changes we need to make in our life shouldn’t be neglected- they shouldn’t be left for tomorrow. We are being asked to live consciously. This is a call to a moral life- There’s no time to play around with sin. We are to be people of justice and compassion. This is a call to discipleship- what has the master tasked you with in the household? What is your gift, and how are you to use it? This is a call to spiritual health and formation of character. … All of us are meant to be alert.
When martial artists take self-defence seriously, they know that they might need to defend themselves or someone they care about at any moment. They won’t have a month to train and get in shape before they need to act to defend themselves or someone else. They know they need to be ready because it can happen when they least expect it. That is the kind of alertness we are being called into.
The Master has left us in charge of the house and we don’t know when he is coming back. It could be at any moment. The house should be kept ready for the return of the Master. We should be found having been diligent with the task that was left for us. That is what it means to ‘keep awake’. No matter what moment you find yourself in, be faithful.
What if the Master arrives tomorrow? Will we be ready? Will we have been appropriately wrestling against out sin- or giving into it? Will he find us having constantly procrastinated? Will we have been people that create peace, or division? Will the fruit of the Spirit be evident in the way we use facebook or twitter- “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Gal 5:22-23)?
The episcopal priest Fleming Rutledge has said,
“the church lives in Advent. That is to say, the church lives between two Advents. Jesus Christ has come; Jesus Christ will come. We do not know the day or the hour. If you find this tension almost unbearable at times, then you understand the Christian life. We live at what the New Testament depicts as the turn of the ages. In Jesus Christ, the Kingdom of God is in head-on collision with the powers of darkness. The point of impact is a place where Christians take their stand. That is why it hurts. That is why the church has to take a beating. That is what Scripture tells us. No wonder there are so many who fall away; The church is located precisely where the battle line is drawn” (Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ. Sermon: The Doorkepper).
And yes, there is grace. The Master may seem gone, but that is only in one sense. Christ is present to us through the Holy Spirit. He has not left us or forsaken us. We may leave him, and forsake him, but he won’t give up on us. There is grace. We are not expected to be perfect. But too often we use that as an excuse to not try- to not attempt to get our lives in order. As Dallas Willard says, “we can do better without being perfect”.
If I’m honest, there is a part of me that yearns for Christ to return. But, there is another part of me that is aware that I’m not completely ready. Advent is about addressing that part of me that isn’t ready.
The Master is gone, in one sense. … But he will return. And he has warned us to be ready for that moment- to not let our guard down- to train so that we are ready for that moment. … We can’t solve the world’s problems. We need Christ to do that. But we can be faithful and awake where we are, with those who are around us, with the tasks that are before us. “Be awake” … Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.
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