Advent, Lord Jesus, Advent - Mark 11: 1-10

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

Today is the First Sunday of Advent. It’s the first Sunday of the church year. This helps us remember that the church operates differently than the secular world; we have a different sense of time. The world around operates in the here and now. The church also operates in the here and now, but we do so with an eye looking forward, an eye looking at what is to come.

“To come.” That’s what the word “Advent” means: “to come.” We often pray for Jesus’ advent – His coming; so often, in fact, that we probably lose that we are even saying it. Do you know it’s in the Lord’s Prayer? “Thy kingdom come.” The Latin makes it clearer: “adveniat voluntus tuum.” At the dinner table, we pray “Come Lord Jesus, be our guest and let thy gifts to us be blessed.”  In this season of Advent, our hymnody will pick up the cry as well. We will sing it twice this morning: The King Shall Come, and Savior of the Nations Come. Even the very last sentence in the Bible is, “Come quickly, Lord Jesus. Amen.”

Do you believe that He will come, that He will return? I think you do. After all, we don’t just pray it, but we also say it in the Creeds, that we believe He will come to judge the living and the dead. We should believe this, because it was Jesus’ own promise: “Behold, I am coming soon!” (Rev. 22:7) To make sure we know and believe this, He repeats himself “Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me, to repay everyone for what he has done. I am the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end,” (Re. 22:12-13).

So you sing it, you pray it, you believe it: Jesus will advent again.

But, do you expect it? Do you expect Jesus to return “soon”? I’m not splitting hairs, here, as to what “soon,” means so let’s keep it simple: do you expect Jesus to return by sunset today, sometime this week, one day this month? I think the answer is “probably not.” At best, we’ve been lulled into ambivalence by Jesus’ long delay; at worst, the world has duped us into almost not caring. While we believe Jesus is coming, we have lost the sense of expectation, urgency, and even desire. We’re so busy enjoying this life that we are forgetting about the life of the world to come when He returns.

This morning’s Gospel lesson is most commonly known as the Palm Sunday reading, also known as the Passion of our Lord. You may have been wondering if I had the right Gospel lesson, even – after all, that is supposed to be read in the spring, a week before Easter. True. But the early Church chose this text as the first Sunday of Advent to refocus our eyes and our minds on the news that Jesus advents. Jesus comes.

St. Mark tells us that at the beginning of Holy Week, with all of it’s own astounding events, Jesus enters Jerusalem to the noisy welcome of the crowds. Shouts of “Hosanna!” and “Blessed is the name of the Lord!” echo down the streets while others soften the donkey’s footsteps with their cloaks and palm branches. It was the entry celebration worthy of a king, a man of noble birth, and the welcome arrival of a conqueror and liberator.

After all, they had seen Jesus power over illness: He had restored sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, power to dead limbs and breath to dead bodies. He drove evil spirits out of people and into swine. He calmed storms that threatened to sink ships. And he fed thousands of people with only a boy’s lunch. History tells us that at this point in time, Israel – and especially Jerusalem as the capitol city – was prime for a revolution. Zealots hated the Roman army and government being in their city. Surely, this is the kind of King who could make Israel great again! Lower corporate taxes, get rid of government oversight, reduce public debt, separate church and state and bring dignity back to the palace, just as David had done long ago. Why, this Jesus might be just the guy to back – and maybe he can set us free.

Wait…were those the wants of Ancient Jerusalem, or are those the wants of so many Christians today? Is it perhaps true that we aren’t so different than those ancient Jersualem dwellers, where we expect our own socio-political messiah in our own idea of what Jesus should be like?  Perhaps we should rethink blaming the people of Jerusalem for making such a mistake, such a misunderstanding. After all, if we are honest, we make similar mistakes of what we expect of Jesus’ coming as well. What kind of Jesus are you waiting for?

A Jesus who will make you rich and eliminate your debt? A Jesus who will eradicate viruses and runaway cells? A Jesus who lowers taxes, creates jobs, all while securing the border but also increasing international trade? A Jesus who can tighten skin wrinkles, rejuvenate hair growth, and burn cellulite? A Jesus who will bring your spouse back? A Jesus who will make your children love you again? A Jesus who will get you the corner office, or the starting lineup, or admission to the perfect college? A Jesus who will make loved ones walk and remember?

Too often, whether it be in ancient Jerusalem or Victoria County 2020, the world wants a political Messiah, one who could put a T-bone on every plate and a donkey in every garage. Covid-19, the various social and cultural movements of this year, and this election cycle have exposed our culture for the kind of pseudo-messiah we want. Then, and today, people lose sight of what God’s Messiah is to be: not a socio-political leader of the rebellion, a Jedi from Judah, if you will, who would use God’s power for righting wrongs and putting bad people back in their places. No…God’s Messiah would do those things – yes, but not the way it was expected.

Jesus wasn’t coming to establish a throne; His throne had been established before eternity ever began. He wasn’t coming to overthrow Rome or any political party; He put government in authority as His representative in the first place. He wasn’t coming to make sure no stomach was left behind; He comes to give the Bread of Life to hungry souls. He wasn’t coming to wipe out sickness and disease; He comes to rescue a fallen world from the effects of the fall of sin. He wasn’t coming to fight for land and territory; He comes to rescue His own world. He wasn’t coming to do battle with an army of soldiers; He was coming to defeat Satan once and for all. But the way of this wasn’t power and prestige. It was the way of the cross. 

The cross stands as our Advent reminder. Advent: remember, it means coming. Advent is a season of preparation. It is not yet Christmas. While the world around us has had Christmas trees and lights up since October, the church is still waiting. Don’t get me wrong: you absolutely can say “Merry Christmas,” send and receive Christmas cards, and play your favorite Bing Crosby, Handel, Pentatonix, or Charlie Brown Christmas CD. You can put up your tree and deck the halls and start sampling the Christmas fruitcake and eggnog. Nothing wrong with that. But don’t forget, in the Church…well, we’re waiting. So, in here on Sundays and Wednesdays, you aren’t going to hear too many Christmas hymns; the readings don’t take us to Bethlehem where this thing has come to pass; we won’t hear of angels and shepherds - not for a few more weeks. No…no, the Church waits. We wait in expectation to celebrate Christ’s Nativity because it also serves to help us wait in expectation for Christ’s return.

Waiting is hard work. So, to strengthen us in our waiting, Jesus comes now. He comes, hiddenly, but nonetheless real – in Baptismal water, in the preached Word, in bread and wine.  He comes to prepare us for celebrating His coming in time in Bethlehem, in the Means of Grace, and into eternity.

I said the world has already moved to Christmas and the church waits. In the weeks ahead, you’ll see the tree and the lights and the Nativity scene. Yeah…even Christian churches have allowed a taste of Christmas to sneak in. That’s OK. Because what remains, always before us, is the cross. The Cross leads us into Advent. Remember: the reason Jesus entered into time in the Nativity by taking on flesh and blood was to be our Savior from sin. “You shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins,” the angel told Joseph. From manger to Cross: Behold: Your Advent king comes.

Come quickly, Lord Jesus. Come. Amen.