Sermon for November 29, 2020 Advent 1 B House of Prayer Lutheran Church

Mark 13:24-37; Isaiah 64:1-9 Rev. Karl-John N. Stone

A Season of Waiting

There’s nothing like a ripe, juicy peach. I fell in love with peaches when we lived in Pennsylvania. There was a weekly farmers market about a mile away from where I worked, so on Wednesdays in the summertime I’d walk down there, find some lunch, and walk past the stalls of the many farmers selling every variety of peach. When they were in season I’d buy as many peaches as I thought I could eat before they’d spoil.

This week, as I worked on my sermon, I sat by a window facing the backyard of my house, and I’d peak out the window and look at the peach tree the former owners of our house planted. I thought about how that tree looked a few months ago, with its long oval-shaped leaves, and hiding behind the leaves dozens and dozens of peaches. As I stared at the bare November branches of that tree this week, I thought, “wouldn’t it be nice to be able to walk out there to that tree and enjoy a ripe, juicy peach right now?” But we know this is not the season we’re in. Winter is coming; summer--and the season of fresh peaches--is a long way off.

I borrow this analogy from the similar example Jesus uses about the fig tree in today’s gospel from Mark 13. “From the fig tree learn it’s lesson,” he says. “As soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near.” Like any tree, it looks dead and bare for such a long time each year. But when it’s bare, it’s not dead--instead the tree is preparing itself for new life to come; it is waiting for the right time, the right season for the fresh fruit to burst through. And if a winter thaw comes too early, and a week of unusually warm weather makes the buds bloom when more cold days are still ahead, then there won’t be as much fruit that year. It’s not the tree’s fault, of course. But it goes to show that, even though we would enjoy an unseasonably warm week, we would also lose something in the long run. It doesn’t benefit the tree to hasten the warm weather before its time.

So “keep alert,” Jesus says, “you don’t know exactly when that time is going to come.” And when that warm weather is here to stay, and the branches become tender and put forth leaves--then you know that summer is near, then you know the season is right. “Keep awake,” Jesus tells us, so you can prepare yourself to make the most of enjoying that fresh fruit; that new life that’s a sign of a new season given by God.

Maybe it seems strange to be thinking of these examples of waiting for summertime when it’s hardly the beginning of winter. But it fits for Advent, because Advent is a season of waiting. We’re waiting for the coming of Christ. We’re waiting to celebrate his humble birth among us 2,000 years ago at Christmas. We’re also waiting for Christ to come again, to fulfill God’s promises of setting the world right with perfect justice and peace. And in the meantime--between Christ’s birth in human history, and his coming again in majesty--we are called to keep awake and alert each and every day: in other words, to live by faith. To live in the mystery of each new day that God gives us. We make our plans and try to carry them out each day as best we can--but ultimately no day is guaranteed to any of us, and each new day is a mystery that we are waiting to discover.

In the mystery of each new day, God promises that Christ himself will be among us. Christ is present in the Word of God. He is present in the water of Baptism. He is present in the bread and wine of Communion. He is present whenever 2 or 3 are gathered in his name. He is present in our faith and our prayers and our songs. He is present in the care and consolation we provide when someone is hurting or lonely. He is present in the hungry, and he is present when we provide food for the hungry.

Christ is present by his Holy Spirit flowing among us even when we are apart from one another--and that is the painful reality brought to us by the pandemic (especially now that the holiday season is here), that we are apart in ways that often just feel unnatural; yet this is the particular season of human history that we are living through right now. This particular season of waiting feels like the verse from our Old Testament reading today, Isaiah 64:6, “we have all become like one who is unclean” and that is a very uncomfortable reality to live with. It is so hard to wait for when we will all be made clean and this pandemic ends.

We are seeing light at the end of the tunnel--and we give thanks to God for skills, knowledge and effort of all those who are working so hard, sacrificing so much in so many ways to help us get to the end of the tunnel. Three promising vaccines (so far) look like they’ll be widely available by spring. To return to the peach tree analogy--we’ve been waiting all year, and it sure would feel great to eat a fresh juicy peach right now--to get that vaccine, and get back to normal life, normal socializing, normal shopping, normal eating out, normal travel, normal work, normal sporting events, and of course normal school and normal church--but that is not the season we’re in yet.

We can’t simply make the season end before its time, but we do know that a new season is coming, and that Christ is coming, and we can use the time we’re in now to prepare ourselves in faith to be ready when new life bursts forth.

From the fig tree (or the peach tree) learn its lesson. God has a purpose for each season; and God has gifts to give us within each season. Sometimes the gift is to enjoy the fruit. Other times the gift is learning to rely more on Christ and his grace, mercy, and love during a time of waiting. The season of Advent is a season for embracing the time of waiting--to put your faith in the mysterious presence of Christ among us, even when things are most difficult, as we await his return in majesty.

Another way to say “embrace the waiting” is to use a word from Christian spirituality: “surrender”. We usually think of this as a negative word, but in this case it’s a positive word. In this case, surrender doesn’t exactly mean “give up”. Instead, it means that we allow Jesus to have full access to our lives, to open our hearts for God to be God in all parts of our lives. It’s not a passive giving up, but an active surrender.

“Surrender” means letting go of our desires to want to control everything, and embracing in faith how God is mysteriously present and active as we stick with him through the difficulty of this time of waiting. Just as God was present in Christ in the ugliness of death on a cross, and active in the shocking mystery of an empty tomb--God is with us now. Through faith, we can surrender each day to God, until God makes the beautiful, ripe, juicy fruit burst forth into new life when the right season has arrived. Amen.