This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, 10.30am.
Grace,
mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away
until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my
words will not pass away.
Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our
hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Today is the First Sunday of Advent, which is the first
Sunday of the Church Year. The calendar year begins on January 1, but the
Church Year begins on December 1. Advent is a short season in the church year
which leads up to the celebration of Christmas. Advent, though, is not
Christmas yet. Already for a month now, there have been Christmas decorations
in the shops, and Christmas events and Christmas shopping has already begun.
But the church is not celebrating Christmas yet—but Advent. Advent means
“coming”, and over the next few weeks we will be hearing a lot about Jesus
coming: his coming to earth as a baby, his continual coming to earth to be with
his people, and also his appearance at the end of the world.
In our Gospel reading, it is this last coming, the second
coming of Jesus, that we read about today. Today in the creed, we say: He
will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will
have no end.
Just before our reading begins, Jesus is talking about the
terrible hardships that will occur, and how there will be many false prophets
and even false christs will that come, performing false miracles. Then Jesus
says: But in those days, after that tribulation, 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. Jesus tells us here that
before he comes, that the sun, the moon and the stars will be affected in very
strange ways. If we are going to understand what this is about, let’s read from
Genesis chapter 1, about when God created the sun, moon and the stars. It says:
And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate
the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days
and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light
upon the earth.” And it was so. We can see that the reason why the sun and
moon exist is not just some kind of accident of the universe, but they have a
particular purpose to mark times and seasons, days and years, and to shine
light upon the earth. But Jesus now is pointing forward to the end of the
world, where there will be no need anymore for a sun or moon, because there
won’t be any need for time anymore, because he is talking about his eternal
kingdom, which will have no end. In Revelation 21 it says: I saw a new
heaven and a new hearth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed
away…And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of
God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. And so Jesus says: In
those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will
not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven. Even Jesus
says: And the powers in the heavens will be shaken. When the bible talks
about “powers in the heavens” it is often talking about angels. And so, in this
passage, we read that even the angels will be shaken and moved and disturbed
and amazed by what is about to happen. So what is this thing that Jesus is
talking about that is about to happen?
Jesus says: And then they will see the Son of Man coming
in the clouds with power and great glory. And then he will send out the angels
and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the
ends of heaven.
This is an amazing passage. Jesus says the sun, the moon,
the stars, the angels will all be shaken and disturbed, and then he will appear.
Jesus will outshine the lot of them. And it says that he will come in the
clouds with power and great glory. Now in the Apostles’ Creed, we say that
Jesus ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father
Almighty, from thence he will come to judge the living and the dead. What
this means is that just as Jesus ascended into heaven, so he will also appear
from heaven again to judge the world. In the book of Acts, where we read about
Jesus’ ascension into heaven 40 days after Easter when he rose from the dead,
it says: When [Jesus] had said these things, as they were looking on, he was
lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing
into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said,
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was
taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into
heaven.”
So just as Jesus entered into heaven on a cloud, so also he
will return at the end of the world in a completely miraculous and supernatural
way, on the clouds, with power and great glory. Just as it was the same
Jesus that had lived among his disciples and had died and risen again who
entered into heaven, so also it will be the same Jesus—the Son of Man—who
will return at the end of the world. We see here that Jesus is both true God
and a true man. He will not return like some kind of ghost, but he will return
in his human flesh, because it is Jesus’ in his human flesh that sits at the
right hand of the throne of God. But he is also true God: he will not just
return like any man, but with power and great glory, and he will also send
his angels. The angels only belong to God. And so Jesus, who is both true
man and true God, sends out his angels. He says: Then he will send out the
angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to
the ends of heaven. Now when we read about “the elect”, it means all those
people all throughout history who have heard and listened to God’s word and the
Gospel, and then the Holy Spirit has created faith in their hearts and caused
them to trust in that word and God’s promises. Even we believe that those who believe
in Jesus were chosen right from the beginning of the world. Now, sometimes
people think, “But who are the elect? Maybe I simply haven’t been chosen, and
I’m going to hell, and there’s nothing that I can do about it.” No—that’s not
what Jesus wants you to believe. He calls you through his word to recognise
first of all that you are completely and totally a sinner. Even your good words
and good thoughts are tainted by sin, and that there is nothing good in you
that can save yourself. But then he calls sinners like you to trust in him, and
to believe that he is a faithful Saviour, that he has died for you, that he has
paid not only for your sins but for the sins of the whole world on the cross,
and that he has risen again from the dead for you. The Holy Spirit creates this
living faith in you, and calls you to persevere in this faith every day of your
life until your death. Even we ask God to keep us in this faith, because we
don’t keep going in it in our own strength, but in God’s strength and in the
power of the Holy Spirit. And so, trusting in Jesus and his righteousness and
his holiness, and his atonement and his sacrifice, we look forward to that time
when he will then send his angels to gather his elect from the four winds.
Jesus up until this point has been talking about things that
are almost impossible for our tiny little earthly minds to comprehend. It’s
hard enough for us to imagine what it must have been like at the beginning of
the world, and now Jesus is talking about the end of the world! And so, now
Jesus tells us a little parable from every day life, to help us understand what
he’s talking about. He says: From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as
its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is
near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is
near, at the very gates.
Have you ever heard Aboriginal people (maybe on TV) talking
about how they want to pass on their culture and their knowledge? I once saw
something on the Aboriginal channel about a man in Arnhem Land talking about a
certain flower on a certain tree, and over the centuries they had worked out
that when the tree flowers, the crabs in the sea are ready to be fished for and
caught. Isn’t that amazing? This is a bit like what Jesus says here. He says
that when a fig tree’s branches become tender and put out its leavens, then you
know that summer is near. In the same way, when we see the sun, and moon and
stars being affected like this, and when the world gets worse, and when the
world’s suffering gets worse, and when there are more and more false prophets
and false Christs, then we know that Jesus will return soon. But when Jesus
will return, for us who trust in him and his sacrificial death and
resurrection, it will be like a glorious summer. What is happening in the world
will look like a long, slow winter—but in actual fact, it is simply a reminder
from Jesus that summer is not far away.
Jesus then says: Truly, I say to you, this generation
will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will
pass away, but my words will not pass away. Now this is the heart of our
reading today, and is a very important passage for us as Christians today.
Jesus says: This generation will not pass away until all these things take
place. What does he mean when he says: “This generation”? Who is “this
generation”? He is not talking about the people who were alive back then: they
have all died now. He is not talking about the apostles. He is talking about
his own Christian people, made up of believing Jews and Gentiles all throughout
the world, and all throughout history. Jesus promises that there will always be
a church on his earth. This is the generation of people that will not pass
away.
Now, this is so important for us today. Many people say that
the church is old-fashioned, and needs to keep up with the society. No—it
doesn’t. All throughout church history, where Christians have tried to keep up
with society, the church has died out. The church has outlived many
civilisations. In the year 300 or so, North Africa—today’s Tunisia and
Libya—was one of the strongest places for Christianity. Not any more—there are
very few Christians in those countries today, and most of the people there are
Muslims. But the church on earth didn’t die out—the church is still here. And
so it’s of such great importance for us today that we keep the faith, and pass
it on. Who knows where the people we pass it on to will take it? Jesus says: Heaven
and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. What makes a church
survive? If we want to make allegiances with this earth, then we will pass away
with it. The thing that makes the church the church is God’s word. God’s word
will not pass away. The world will pass away. Australia will pass away.
Queensland will pass away. Maryborough and Childers will pass away. But not
God’s word. And so at the beginning of a new church year, it’s of such great
importance that we build our lives and our church on this foundation and on no
other foundation, because when we stick with the word—with God’s law which
shows us our sin, and with the Gospel which shows us the Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world—when we stick with this word, then we will
be part of that generation that will not pass away until the end of the world.
As Jesus says: Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. And
also, when Peter made a faithful confession of faith that Jesus is the
Christ, the Son of the Living God, Jesus said to him: On this rock I
will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
Now, at the end of our reading today, Jesus says: But
concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven,
nor the Son, but only the Father. No-one knows when the end of the world
will be. Only God the Father knows, not the angels and not even the Son.
Now—here’s a question? If Jesus is true God, and knows everything, how come he
doesn’t know that day or that hour? Well, let me try explain. Jesus is
true God, and he has every right to know everything that there is to
know. But also, when he became man, he chose to become like us, in such a way
that he would have had to learn things from his mother, like how to talk, how
to feed himself, how to wash himself, and so on. He could have done these
things without being taught, but he chose to learn them. As soon
as Jesus was born, he didn’t begin preaching sermons, even though he could
have, because he was true God. But Jesus chooses to put away certain
knowledge from himself, such as when the end of the world will be. He has every
right to know, but even if he did know, he wants to make it very clear to us
that we will not know. And when Jesus says to his disciples: I don’t know, it
means that the disciples won’t ask him. If Jesus said, “I know, but I’m not
telling you,” then they would beg him to tell them. Imagine if I put some
chocolate at the back of a cupboard, and said to my children, “I know where it
is, but I’m not telling you”. They would beg me to tell them. But if I said, “I
don’t know where it is,” then they wouldn’t bother asking me. Now, Jesus isn’t
lying to us here, but even though he has every right and every power to know as
true God, there are many things he choses not to know when he became man, and
this was one of those things.
Now, this is also very important, because we often hear
about people who think they know when the end of the world will be. We always
know that they’re wrong, because Jesus says here in our text that they don’t
know. Even some people think they have a secret method of reading certain
numbers in the bible, and in the book of Revelation, or they make certain
predictions, like horoscopes, about the stars, and all kinds of things like
that. Even this year, there were some people who thought that the world would
end in September. Well—they were wrong! But we should have known that they were
wrong before September, because fortune-telling, or divination, as we might
call it, is forbidden in the bible. It’s even forbidden to use the bible in a
mystical, secret way, to do fortune-telling. This mystical numerology and astrology
and horoscopes are also forbidden. The word “occult” means “secret” – it means
when people want hidden power and information that God hasn’t told us. We can’t
use the devil’s means for God’s purposes. So if anyone is saying that the world
will end because “Jupiter is in Pisces”, don’t listen to them. Deuteronomy 18
says: There shall not be found anyone among you who…tells fortunes or
interprets omens…for whoever does these things in an abomination to the LORD. And
also in Isaiah 48, we read where the prophet speaks about those who divide
the heavens, who gaze at the stars, who at the new moons make known what shall
come upon you. So when Jesus spoke at the beginning of our reading about
the sun, moon and stars, he’s not telling us to listen to horoscopes.
So what is he telling us? He’s telling us to watch. Jesus
calls us to watch very carefully that we don’t mix in anything with the Word of
God that doesn’t belong there. Otherwise, we will mix in false belief with our
faith. Our faith needs a solid, pure, completely trustworthy word to hang onto.
And so, Jesus says to us: Watch. Watch. Stay awake. He says: Be on
guard, keep awake. 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 servants in charge,
each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to stay awake. Therefore stay
awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the
evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning—lest he
come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I say to all: Stay
awake.
And so this watching, this staying awake, means, being
stubborn in the faith. It means, hanging on to Jesus and his words that will
never pass away. It means, testing and sifting things and checking to make sure
we have not muddied God’s word with our human opinions. It means, to keep
coming back to Jesus again, to remember the wonderful gift of baptism, to
receive the forgiveness of sins, and to receive afresh his body and blood in
the Lord’s Supper. We will never know when the end will come, but in the
meantime, we hold to his word. And we hold to this word, because it contains
the Gospel, and the Gospel is the power of God for salvation. Let’s
place ourselves in Jesus’ hands at the beginning of this new church year, on this
First Sunday of Advent, and pray that he would bless our lives, our homes, and
our church with his Holy Spirit, that we may stay awake and stake our lives on
the pure clear word of God and the wonderful message of the Gospel of the free
forgiveness of our sins. Amen.
Dear Jesus, keep us steadfast in your word, your word that
will never pass away. Create in our sinful hearts a living trust in you and
forgiveness, so that we may look forward to your glorious appearance at the end
of the world. Amen.
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