Trinity Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Sermons 

those things we most need to do

are usually the hardest to do . . .

and, in fact, what often happens

is that we end up doing just the opposite?!

If you’re trying to lose weight by dieting,

the harder you try not to eat,

the more it makes you want to eat.

You want to manage your money better,

but the more carefully you plan your budget,

the more money seems to slip out around the edges.

You need to go to sleep and get some rest,

but the harder you try to relax,

the tenser and more wide-awake you become.

And, of course, just the opposite:

You absolutely, positively, must stay awake,

but the harder you try to keep your eyes open,

the heavier your eyelids become.

Amazing how we can be our own worst enemies sometimes.

Used to be,

the most trouble I had staying awake

was if I was baby-sitting really late,

and people weren’t home by the time they promised,

and all the TV stations had gone off the air.

(Remember when TV stations used to go off the air late at night?!!)

Nowadays, it’s driving late at night.

Radio doesn’t help.

Caffeine doesn’t help.

Singing old hymns at the top of my lungs doesn’t help.

Even talking with a passenger doesn’t help for long.

It seems like,

the more effort I make to keep my eyes open,

the more is feels like someone has

attached lead weights to my eyelids.

Such a simple-sounding thing to do: Keep awake.

How hard it sometimes is,

even when we give it our best effort.

Well, of course,

Jesus wasn’t talking about literally

staying awake until he returns.

Even though he apparently expected that return

to be just a matter of months,

not two thousand years and counting.

The world’s worst case of insomnia

couldn’t keep us literally awake

for more than a few days.

And even in that short a time,

without dreams,

we would rapidly become insane.

Which I doubt that Jesus would recommend!

No, he’s talking about a different kind of wakefulness.

In another part of today’s lesson,

he says it a different way: Keep alert.

If he had been a Boy Scout,

he might have said: Be prepared.

You do not know the day or the hour.

Stay awake; keep alert; be ready at any time.

Now, we twenty-first-century Christians know a fair amount

about being prepared, or being alert.

We try to be prepared for minor emergencies

by setting aside "money for a rainy day"

We try to prepare for bigger emergencies

by purchasing insurance.

We learn to keep alert for

signs of illness in our children,

strange noises at night,

rumors about layoffs at our place of work.

We may learn first aid or CPR

so we can be ready for an accident or an illness,

whether it’s in our family or a stranger.

We may keep alert for better jobs opening up,

or smart ways to invest our money.

We know how to watch closely,

and pay attention, and stay focused,

on certain kinds of things.

It’s not a lost art or skill.

The problem, though, is that the things

we prepare for and stay alert to

are not the same things Christ is talking about!

So while we haven’t lost the art,

we have lost the proper focus.

And regaining it is not necessarily a simple matter.

Because what Christ insists is that

we be prepared for his return.

And we just don’t spend a whole lot of time

thinking about that.

Our mainline Protestant tradition

doesn’t spend a lot of time talking about it.

If we were in a church that was more

Pentecostal, or fundamentalist, then we might . . .

But then we would probably miss out on hearing about

other important things . . .

We just don’t give very much thought to

Christ’s return,

and much less do we worry about it.

It comes up the first Sunday in Advent, every year,

and then we can pretty much drop it

for the other 51 weeks.

Or can we?

What if it’s more important than we’ve ever suspected?

On the one hand,

we are rightly skeptical of those who claim

they have broken the code of texts like this one,

and they have read the signs and know

when Christ’s second coming will be.

Christ stated that he himself did not know,

so for any of us to claim that we do

is more than a little arrogant.

On the other hand,

our skepticism about the possibility of predicting when

can’t be allowed to affect the question of if.

Granted, that it has not happened yet, after 2000 years,

and granted that we can’t possibly guess

when it will happen.

Grant even that the language of text like this one

is so spooky, so mythical-sounding,

that it’s hard to know what to do with it!

Nevertheless, the promise is that Christ will come again –

or I guess we could call it a threat instead of a promise

if we want to. . .

but either way,

Christ says it will happen,

and we ignore that at our peril.

Somehow, in some way,

we need to figure out how to prepare ourselves,

how to be alert to the possibility,

of Christ’s coming again.

Even if we can’t quite accept the literal vision

of his coming in clouds,

with the angels gathering in the chosen

from earth and heaven . . .

How do we think about Christ’s return

in a way that makes sense to us,

so that we truly can prepare ourselves

and be awake and alert?

Sometimes, we try to address the question

sort of like this:

If you knew Christ was coming, and the world would end,

one month from today,

what would you do?

Or, if that seems a little strange,

you can get a fairly accurate answer by asking

If you knew your own life were going to end

one month from today,

what would you do?

Answers to those might be a little different,

but either way,

if we know the time is short,

that has a way of getting us to focus

on what’s really important,

and to ignore the rest.

It also will tend to make us

more alert to and appreciative of

the things we are about to lose.

The problem is, we don’t know if it will be a month,

or a hundred years, or a thousand years,

or when!

So maybe that’s not the best way to consider the issue.

Maybe we need another angle.

What if we asked ourselves instead,

if Christ did come again, right this very minute,

would I want him to find me doing

whatever it is that I’m doing right this very minute?

This approach is a little different.

See, if I knew Christ were coming in one month,

I certainly wouldn’t waste my time

vacuuming, or doing laundry, or writing a dissertation proposal

in what little time I had left.

But since I don’t know – well, if he did come back right then

it would be okay if he found me vacuuming

or doing laundry or writing a dissertation proposal.

As long as I wasn’t neglecting something more important

by doing those.

If I knew that Christ would return exactly ten years from now,

I wouldn’t bother putting any more money

in my retirement savings!

Since I don’t know any such thing,

would it be okay with me if he did return

and found me doing that?

I think so.

Would I want him to find me spending money

on something I don’t need?

Not really . . .

Would I want him to find me watching a movie, or playing a video game,

that was really violent and ugly?

Probably not . . .

Would I want him to find me in rush hour traffic

acting the way I usually act?

Definitely not!

For me, this is the most helpful way to think about

staying awake and alert and prepared for Christ.

It means a great deal more attention to

everyday kinds of things.

It means taking our lives off of

the autopilot way we normally run.

And being alert to our actions,

to the choices we make,

to the world around us, with its problems and its beauty.

It’s a little frightening to me

that many days I will get all the way to work

and realize that I have no memory of getting there.

Obviously I was paying some attention,

or I would be lost, or dead!

And I know God doesn’t care too much about

the specifics of how I get to work,

or which exit I take,

or whatever;

but to me, that’s indicative of

how much time I spend just doing things

and not paying much attention to what I’m doing.

I need to be more awake and alert,

and I think probably most of us do.

We don’t need to live every moment in fear and terror

that Christ is going to swoop down

to pass judgment on us, once and for all.

But we do need to pay attention

to the details of our lives:

what we do, why we do it, whom it affects . . .

and how God might see it.

We don’t know when Christ will return.

But we can prepare.

We can keep awake.

And be ready to greet him,

whenever and however he comes.

Amen.

© 2005 Julie Adkins (e-mail: DrJAdkins@trinitypresdallas.org)