Living In the Meanwhile
David C. Myers
December 2, 2007
Advent - 1st
Isaiah 2:1 - 5
Matthew 24:36 - 44
Text: "Keep awake, then, because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming." . . . Matthew 24:42
Today is the first Sunday in Advent and it is the beginning of the new Church year. The activities of the day as we "green" our church welcome the Advent Season and invite us to dream dreams and permit visions to dance in our heads. Advent is the season of anxiously waiting the coming of God in the flesh to restore the world. And as we wait we wonder - what will it be like?
It's a little bit like Eddie, the loveable but dumb sidekick of the cartoon Hagar the Horrible. Little Eddie comes upon Hagar's young son reading a large book. "What are you reading?" he asks. "The story of humanity," he replies.
Eddie sits down beside him for a while. Then he peers over at the book and asks, "Could I peek at the ending?"
We would like to know the ending; for we know where we are now is a place of uncertainty, disappointment and frustration. We live between the prophecy of something new to come and the "not yet" of its arrival. We live in the meanwhile.
Both passages of today's scripture convey that spirit, although from vastly different perspectives.
Isaiah had a bold dream. He dreamed of a time in which the nations and peoples of the world would unite in recognition of the sovereignty of God and declare, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that God might teach us God's ways and that we may walk in God's paths." (Is 2:3) He envisioned an end to war and the beginning of an age of peace. Listening to that dream leaves one feeling deeply moved.
Matthew reports that Jesus also had a dream, but it is a dream that sounds more like a nightmare. In the verses just prior to today's passage Jesus envisioned the destruction of the Jerusalem temple, the center of Jewish life and worship. Jesus said, "Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places: all this is but the beginning of the birthpangs." (Mt 24:7-8). Then he lamented, "There will be great suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, and never will be." (Mt.24:21) and somberly noted, "Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place." (Mt. 24:34-35). Listening to these words leaves one feeling deeply alarmed.
These dreams evoke dreams of our own, dreams which reflect both the idealistic visions of Isaiah and the alarming forebodings of Jesus.
Some of us see the foreboding. Hostilities still exist between Iraq, Afghanistan; between the US and the other oil producing countries; and these hostilities still threaten the world. Massive amounts of aid are needed in Central America and the Caribbean to recover from devastating hurricanes and crippling debt. And even as we speak the national debt remains staggering and grows daily. Our children will be forced to deal with our fiscal irresponsibility. Global warming threatens our environment. What does the future hold? What can assure us that the future will be any different? Pondering these things leaves us deeply alarmed.
On the other hand some of us dream of a promising future. Once again we have at least a ray of hope for peace in the Middle East as a summit is held. People become aware (if only for a month) of the stark realities of homelessness and hunger. Even closer to home, as we see the large number of young children in our church we dream of a stronger church tomorrow than we have today. The Spirit we feel at work in the congregation helps us dream of greater ministries to come. Dreaming those dreams leaves us deeply moved.
Most of us stand somewhere between those extremes and combine elements of both in our outlook But regardless how hopeful or how despondent we feel as we look forward to tomorrow, Advent in general and our scripture readings in particular, proclaim the same message: "God has a gift for us - the present!" In other words, how do we live in the present, the "meanwhile" between what used to be and the hoped for "not yet"? The promise of Advent is that there is a great future. We do not where or when. So we live in the meanwhile. The gift of Advent is that we have the present. In the midst of the present the great future may break in!"
It is the message of Jesus, in Matthew's Gospel: "Keep awake, then, because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming." It is the question of how do we live in the meanwhile - the time between the harsh realities of today and the hoped for future of tomorrow. How do we see the signs of the promised coming? By keeping awake.
Jesus called His hearers to prepare for the future in the present: to watch, to live in the present as if God's love may break in the very next moment. So we ask ourselves, "How can we catch a glimpse of the promised coming in the meanwhile - in the midst of our everyday realities?"
•Could it be on the joy we see in the face of a child?
•Could it be in the joy of finding the right present for one you love?
•Could it be joining 25,000 others in walking for something important on the National Mall - ending homelessness?
•Could it be in the excitement of a group exploring a new mission possibility in Nicaragua?
•Could it be even in the face of the death of one who ministered to us - Pastor Bill Wyatt; as he calmly and bravely faced his death, telling us all it was but a transition from this earthly life to the eternal life?
These are the times when the promised future begins to enter into our present and move us from the same ole same ole realities of today into an exciting future.
Advent invites us to look to the future, but its most demanding challenge and most exciting promise come in the announcement that God has a gift for us, and that gift is the present times we live in. God coming to dwell in flesh - divinity taking residence in humanity - declares the cup of the present filled to overflowing with the presence of God. Matthew describes the gift of the season with a single word: "Emmanuel", God with us - not merely God has been with us or God shall be with us, but that God is with us now! "Joy to the world, the Lord is come!"
In the classic movie, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, the character Big Daddy nears the end of his life with his world in shambles. He has built a successful business at the cost of his family life. He has never truly loved his wife or his children and thus has estranged himself from his wife, reduced his older son to cold detachment, and driven his younger son to alcoholism. At the end of the movie he discovers he has a terminal disease and soon will die. In the midst of a violent argument with his younger son, he begins talking about his plans for the future of his business only to realize that he will not live to fulfill them. Eternal realities break into his present. He embraces his younger son, begins making amends with his older son, and, for the first time in the movie, calls his wife by name as he offers her his arm for a walk around the farm. The film ends with him living each moment as if it were eternally significant.
Each moment does have eternal significance. That is the message of Advent. God, the God of all things past and all things future, offers us the gift of the present. God invites us to live in the present in expectation and awareness of the fact that eternal realities can and do break into it at any given moment.
"Keep awake, then, because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming."
The Christ comes to be born in our midst. Believe it, and watch. Watch. Every day we are urged to watch for the gift of God, the promise of Emmanuel, God with us.