Mark 13:32-37 * November 29-30, 2008 * Advent 1 * Senior Vicar Gawel

Theme: Keep Watch! He Is Coming Soon

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Mark 13:32-37

³² “No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. ³³ Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. ³⁴ It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch.

³⁵ “Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. ³⁶ If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. ³⁷ What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’”

As America goes full swing into the Christmas season, everyone is getting ready and making preparations just as they have for years upon years in the past. Party plans have to be made again; food and drink has to be prepared again; new gifts have to be purchased… At church, the Christmas tree must be set up and decorated again; the children’s service must be planned and prepared for again; the pastors must again prepare for Sunday- and midweek- Advent services; the Advent wreath is set up again and the candles are lit, each at their appropriate time; choirs will put on concerts and go out caroling again. We make the same preparations year after year – and with good reason!: to celebrate again the miraculous event that occurred some 2000 years ago in the little town of Bethlehem: God become man; true God, our Savior Jesus, born as a real human being.

Each year as we get lulled into the routine of all the preparations that have to be made for the various goings-on of the season, we strive not to let the meaning of Christmas get entirely lost in the shuffle. We try hard to take some quiet hours away from the hustle and bustle of the season, to ponder the great wonder of the Incarnation – the human birth of the divine Son of God.

But, while we may succeed in making time in our schedules for Christmas meditation, the overarching message of Advent may often be totally obscured by the frantic preparations of the season. Though we certainly do well to meditate upon the birth of Jesus at Christmas, this is not the primary thing for which Advent intends to prepare us. Rather the Advent season intends to prepare us primarily for the second coming of our Savior Jesus – his coming at the End of Time, on the Last Day, in judgment and salvation – or for our own “end time,” when we will go to meet him when we die.

Our Christmas preparations are focused on a certain point: December 25^th – after which we can relax for the next ten months, until we have to start making plans all over again for Christmas next year. But our Advent preparations are never ending. We have no idea when Jesus will come again. Jesus says it three times in the six verses of our text: “No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come” (Mark 13:32-33).

Various Christian and cult leaders of the past have tried to determine when Jesus will come again or when the world will end. None of them have been correct so far. And none of them will be correct in the future. Jesus is crystal clear on this point: “No one knows” – not the angels in heaven; not even Jesus himself, according to his human nature. Only God knows. Jesus tells us that the Last Day could come at any time – that it will come suddenly, when we least expect it.

Well, how in the world are we supposed to be prepared for something when we don’t even know when it will come?! That’s the problem. By the very nature of things, almost all of our preparations in life are focused on certain fixed points in time that we can see coming: elections, weddings, birthdays, holidays, examinations, project deadlines, and so on. We don’t operate so well when we have to make preparations for something that will happen at an unspecified time.

Perhaps the best example of something that is supposed to be ever ready is our country’s military. Even in peacetime, we have a standing army of trained soldiers who are to be ready on short notice to be deployed as needed in defense of the country. We have mechanisms in place to ensure our national security, so that we do not need to be afraid of enemy attacks on our soil. But even these preparations are not always effective. In spite of our country’s vast intelligence and defense network, a group of terrorists was still able to conduct a devastating attack claiming thousands of lives within our own borders seven years ago. The intelligence and defense sectors were much more alert after that.

We are often quite similar. We may think we’re maintaining a pretty good level of alertness about Jesus’ second coming: We go to church. We confess our sins. We receive the Sacrament. We read the Bible. We pray. We join in Christian fellowship to encourage each other with the Word. But, often, these things that were intended to keep us alert may become a thoughtless routine. After a while these things may just enable us to float along from day to day, comfortable in our sin, tricking ourselves into believing that we’re ready. They may give the feeling or the appearance that we are awake and alert, when inside we are actually sleeping – “Christian zombies,” plodding unthinkingly through the rituals.

But then something happens to jolt us out of our spiritual slumber. Maybe it’s the sudden death of a loved one or an acute illness that makes us consider again our own mortality – that makes us realize again the need to be ever ready for the End. Maybe it’s the intervention of a brother or sister in Christ who comes to us with the Law, to knock some sense into us and wake us up from our spiritual slumber – to make us realize the rut of sinful activity that we had gotten ourselves into, which was preventing us from being prepared for the End.

I would guess that there will be moments in this coming month when, in the midst of all the holiday preparations, you realize that you have been forgetting the most important preparation of all – that of keeping your heart and mind ready for the second coming of your Savior Jesus.

What can we do, then, when we realize that our focus has been misplaced – that we have become obsessed with all the wrong preparations? What can we do right now, when we examine our hearts and recognize our sin and realize that we have not kept watch or been alert for that most important future event? We heed the words of Jesus in our text: We do the work of a watchman – making use of the God’s Word; making ourselves ready with the Gospel.

To keep watch, we go again to the manger of Bethlehem, and see there our God, born as our brother – born under the law to fulfill it perfectly in our place, so that we are clothed with his righteousness in the sight of God.

To keep watch, we go again to the cross of Calvary, and see our God, who was born as our brother, took our sins upon himself and suffered to death the punishment that we deserve. He has removed the guilt of our sins of being absorbed in trivial preparations for earthly events. He has forgiven us for all the sins we have committed that have lulled us into a false sense of security.

To keep watch, we go again to the empty garden tomb, and see our God, who was born as our brother, rose to life for us so that we may have life.

And we go again to that hill outside Jerusalem where we see our God, who was born as our brother, ascended high above the heavens. There he rules over all things for our good. We have this promise in our Epistle Reading: “He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:9). This is what makes us prepared for our Lord’s second coming – even though we don’t know when it will be.

We were rightly concerned when we heard Jesus’ words that we must always be ready for an event that could come at any time. We were rightly concerned – because we know that by our own efforts there is no way that we could be ready. But we have these words of our God telling us that he has made us ready, and he will keep us ready.

Through the grace he has given us in Christ Jesus, all of our sins have been washed away. We have died and been buried with him through baptism, and we have been raised up to new life through faith, by the working of the Holy Spirit, so that we “do not lack any spiritual gift” (1 Corinthians 1:8). God promises to keep us strong in faith through Word and Sacrament, so that we will be blameless on the Last Day, when Jesus returns. This is how we remain alert and keep watch, as Jesus exhorts us in our reading. This is what makes us ready for his arrival at any moment – even at the most unexpected moment. We are not ready because of our efforts, but because of his grace.

Jesus’ call to be alert and awake and to keep watch reminds us of our constant need to confess our sins and to look to him in faith for the forgiveness that only he provides. And this call also reminds us of the duty we have toward our brothers and sisters in Christ, as well as to those who are not yet in Christ. We are not individual watchmen waiting for Jesus’ return, but we are members of a group, keeping watch together in order to assist one another in remaining awake and alert.

Jesus tells this short parable about this time of waiting for his return. He says: “It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back – whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes back suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’” (Mark 13:34-37)

Jesus, the master of the house, has left us each with our assigned task. As we think of ourselves and of the brothers and sisters here in our church and throughout our synod, we realize that there is a wide variety of different gifts and abilities that God has blessed us with, and he has assigned us different tasks according to these abilities. Some tasks are obviously spiritual in nature, such as the tasks assigned to the pastors and elders of the church, of overseeing the spiritual care of the congregation. Other tasks are obviously physical in nature, such as those who take care of the finances and the buildings and grounds and those who prepare and serve food.

But whatever our various tasks, all of us have this one task in common: Watch! This means watching out for each other, just as much as keeping watch for ourselves. If it were up to us as individuals to keep ourselves awake and alert for the second coming of our Lord, we would almost certainly fail in the task, and be found sleeping when Jesus returns. But Jesus has given us preachers and teachers and Bible class leaders and Bible study groups and brothers and sisters in the faith as accountability partners, to encourage us with God’s Word, using Law and Gospel, so that we do not become “Christian zombies” but remain awake and alert for the day of Christ’s return. Jesus has given us the Sacrament of his body and blood for the strengthening of our souls and as a testimony and encouragement to one another. He has given us the privilege of praying for each other, and he tells us that these prayers are powerful and effective (James 5:16b).

So let us do all these things faithfully: praying for each other, building each other up with God’s Word, and reaching out with that same Word to those around us who are asleep, so that all may be found awake and ready, through the forgiving love of God in Christ Jesus.

Keep watch! He is coming soon. Amen.

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen. (Philippians 4:7)