Waiting and hastening
Advent 2023 • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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After Christmas, I often travel from Sydney up to Avoca on the NSW central coast to spend a week or so at the beach. I’m always struck by the way the highway cuts through huge hunks of sandstone. Even now, decades after the F3 was built, you can see where they blasted hundreds of tons of rock away to allow the road to take a nice straight path. And at other points, they’ve build viaducts and bridges over the valleys so that you can cruise along at 110 all the way. It would’ve cost millions and millions of dollars, but it put the central coast and everything north of it within reach of millions and millions of people.
A few years ago the traffic was so bad that we were directed off the F3 onto the old pacitic highway - it’s not really fair to call it a highway because it goes up and down, and round every outcrop and along every contour. Now, our dog Molly is not a great traveller at the best of times, and sure enough, within a couple of minutes of switchbacks and esses, she’d thrown up. And then, after we’d cleaned up and got going again, our kids threw up.
And I realised, if we had to take the pacific highway, we would never visit. The road is too difficult, the beach too far off and remote to be a realistic option. And I suspect many of the people who holiday there now would think the same.
We’re now well into the season of Advent, that season of anticipating the coming of Jesus. And as I said last week, Advent is not just about waiting for Christmas, Advent is also about anticipating Jesus’ second coming.
It’s a time when we recall what we confess every week - that Jesus will return to judge the living and the dead.
We’re reminded that we are people who are supposed to face the injustice of this world with hope.
But I’ll admit, it’s hard to hold onto this hope sometimes isn’t it? The idea of Jesus is coming not just to the hearts of individual people, but coming back to end history, to bring down the despots and raise up the poor and humble? It seems so far off, so unlikely, so beyond us, and so hard to believe. Maybe we could settle for something a bit closer. Maybe we could settle for the idea that ‘history will judge our actions’, or maybe that ‘Jesus should inspire us to seek justice’.
Many people have taken that road. It feels a bit bit smoother, a bit more manageable, a bit easier to get to.
The thing is, it’s not a road the bible takes. It’s not a road the creeds take. It’s not a road that the church down through the ages has taken.
As we see in
2 Peter 1:16 (NRSV)
For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty.
For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty.
One of the most striking things about the NT is how unpolished its characters are. We get Peter - the leader of the church, also the guy who disowns Jesus’ three times, and then even after Jesus’ restores him, he later caves to racist peer pressure and compromises everything Jesus’ stands for. We get ‘unreliable’ witness like women as the first to see the risen Jesus. We get unpolished, but therefore all the more believeable accounts to Jesus - including his promise to return and usher in the kingdom which he planted.
This morning as we consider Advent, I want to suggest that it’s a good thing - even for modern people like us, that we keep our belief, our hope in Jesus return.
Rather, like those people who invested in the central coast back before the F3 was built, back even before there was bitchumen on the pacific highway, when it may as well have been on another continent, we’re called to trust that investing ourselves in this distant country will be worth it. We’re called to to trust that one day, the freeway will be built, the road straightened out, the hills cut through and the valleys filled.
Advent, this time between Jesus’ first and second comings calls us to invest in this far country.
But how exactly does one do that?
A contradictory instruction
A contradictory instruction
Show
Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire?
Waiting and hastening, how on earth do you do both at the same time? It’s contradictory isn’t it?
Many of us are famliar with Isaiah 40
which speaks of every valley being raised, and every mountain being lowered. We hear John the Baptist quote it every december, and many of us can probably hear Handel’s setting of this passage from the Messiah. We hear the words, ‘a voice in the wilderness, make straight paths, every valley shall be exalted, every mountain and hill made low. And as we look around at the world, it’s very easy to think that we are the ones that need to get to work, bringing down the lofty, and raising up the lowly.
To be fair, it’s not just the fact that it’s been 2000 years, or that we’re modern people and the literal return of Jesus’ is kinda weird that makes us think we need to work for justice.
If God is the God of justice, and if his kingdom is coming, shouldn’t we be working to ready this world to receive it? Shouldn’t we be hastening?
Lately, there’s plenty of talk from some people about technology doing just this - solving the problems of humanity. People point to AI and the ability to colonise other planets as a way of fixing our issues. Perhaps AI will help us stop wars, solve poverty and cure most diseases?
As the 19th century drew to a close, many people believed that human beings, with the help of technology could solve our problems. Through enlightened and rational international relations, wars could be all but eradicated. But the technology that promised to provide goods for everyone, also poluted the air and had countless masses working in sweat shops. And then the very nations that were most committed to the idea that we could ‘build Jerusalem’ engaged in the bloodiest conflict in history, where millions died in the trenches of Europe. And then they did it again, where millions died in battle, and millions more died in gas chambers. And then millions more died in proxy wars between the great powers of the cold war, and millions more died in revolutions in the developing world.
Maybe AI will solve our problems, or maybe it will just make a few more billionaires and a few more countries better able to tell the others what to do.
The thing is, even if some in the tech industry are naive enough to think that we can bring about a world ‘where righteousness dwells’ by our own efforts, we don’t need to follow them.
No human attempts to bring about the rule of peace and justice, heaven on earth have ever succeded. And many have only succeeded in bringing about hell on earth.
That’s why we are told to prepare for God to bring about a world of justice first by leading lives of holiness and godliness. That’s why we’re told to wait, not just to get to work.
Repentance
Repentance
Back when people still read newspapers, one in London was running an essay competition with the question, “what is wrong with the world”. Heaps of people wrote very thoughtful and detailed responses about the economy, the environment, the legacy of slavery etc. The Christian author GK Chesterton replied with just 3 words. “Sirs, I am”
When John the baptist comes onto the scene telling people to prepare for God’s arrival, he doesn’t tell them to go and storm the nearest Roman barracks or the palace of King Herod. He says repent.
John recognises that the things to be straightened out are not other people, but us. It’s not that God will only uncover the corruption of dictators and billionaires - he will deal with them, but we anticipate the time when everything on earth will be revealed. We anticipate the arrival of the one ‘to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden.’
What can we possibly do in light of that but repent! Continually. What can we possibly do but voluntarily allow God to straigthen out our lives.
Advent reminds us, God will not leave us out of his cutting and filling project. That must fill us with hope, he won’t leave us out! But it must also us to humility. To patient waiting, even when are on the receiving end of horrendous injustice.
Illustration
On the morning of the first of February 2020, Samuel Davidson was drunk and stoned out of his mind. He’d been on a bender when decided to get in his car, and proceeded to hit Angelina, Anthony, and Liana Abdallah and their cousins Veronique, Mabelle and Tcharbel Sakr on their way to school. Three of the children were killed, the others were injured but survived.
As the Abdallah parents Danny and Leila were interviewed, their pain was visceral. But in the midst of the torment of losing 2 of their own children and a neice, everyone who saw Danny and Leila could see there was something else going on.
See Danny and Leila did was seems unimaginable. They forgave Samuel Davidson. Just days after he killed their children, Leila said “The guy, I know he was [allegedly] drunk, driving on this street. Right now I can’t hate him. I don’t want to see him, [but] I don’t hate him,” “I think in my heart to forgive him, but I want the court to be fair. It’s all about fairness. I’m not going to hate him, because that’s not who we are.”
How on earth is that possible?
This is what Leila said . “When Jesus walked this earth, he demonstrated to us how we should live our lives.” “For me, I look up to him. I think that if Jesus carried the cross, then I’m going to look to him, look at the glory awaiting us in heaven, and I want to carry my cross with dignity and a smile.”
Danny and Leila chose to live as if God is coming to judge the living and the dead. They chose wait for his perfect justice. They chose to live as if he is the one who will do the straightening out, not us.
Apply
The Abdullahs understand what it means to live in Advent. They understand what it means to live anticipating the day when God will raise up the valleys - including the valley of the shadow of death.
They understand that to long for God’s kingdom is to wait. Wait in patience, in holiness, in godliness. Afterall, what’s more godly than forgivening someone who killed your son?
Some of us have been deeply hurt by people. We have this urge to see justice. We would love the people who hurt us to get their comupance. Some days we can trust that God will be just, that he will uncover everything and make it right, other days we want to take justice into our own hands.
Living in Advent - which is really every day is living with this tension. Living in hope that the rough, winding, nauseating road of this life will one day be straightened out. That God will one day do what we cannot.
Transition
But does all this mean that there’s nothing we can really do about the state of the world? Is Peter just saying, it’s all going to burn so don’t waste your time? Some Christians have said that - in so many words. But Look again at what Peter says in verses 11 and 12
Hastening
Hastening
Show
Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire?
Explanation
Did you see that? Our commitment to live holy and godly lives mean that we are both waiting and hastening.
It’s saying, we we work towards true justice, we hasten the arrival of God’s righteousness in this world the same way we wait for it - by living holy and godly lives.
It’s about living in a way that says, I am going to act as if Jesus is returning to “bring the new heavens and new earth, where righteousness is at home”. I’m going to live in a way that fits not with the world as it is now, but as the world will be.
Examples?
The reason why human efforts to make this world a place ‘where righteousness dwells’ have failed time and time again is because we’ve acted as if we can establish righteousness by unrighteous means. We act as if we can bomb the world into peace. We act as if we can shame people into self-respect. We act as if we can make our families peaceful and happy by threats and manipulation.
Advent calls us to seek justice, to long for a world of peace and righteousness, not by the tired old ways of this world and its master. Because those tools can never blast through the solid rock of the human heart. Only the Holy Spirit can do that. Only lives lived in his holiness can do that.
Illustration
Illustration
I cannot fathom what the Abdullah went through. I imagine every day would feel endless. I imagine that if I were in their situation, if I’m honest, I’d want to see the man who killed my children and nephew suffer. But the fact that they don’t, is mind-blowing. People are looking on at them are wondering how they can be so gracious, so forgiving.
But that is exactly what they hoped would happen. As Leila said, she hopes that rather than the 1st of February being the day they remember a tragedy, they want it to be a day “where you could find someone you can forgive or ask for forgiveness”.
These are people who are waiting and hastening. Waiting for God to act, and hastening his coming by living as if he will keep his promises.
Waiting for God to come and straighten out this world, and hastening that work by living as if he has already started to do so. Because he has.
Just this year, Samuel Davidson become a Christian in prison. He is reading his Bible daily and talking to other prisoners about Jesus. He’s also been talking with Danny and Leila.
“I spoke to Samuel, the driver, and asked him, ‘What made you become a Christian?’” Danny told Eternity.
“He goes, ‘Because I want what you have; your act of forgiveness saved my life in prison.’
God has straightened out Samuel. He’s already started to raise up Danny and Leila.
And if he can do it for them, he can do it you and me.
Application
Conclusion
Conclusion
Waiting and hastening takes courage. Anticipating the kingdom of God is not something for the faint hearted. Like those people who were willing to brave the back-breaking, stomach churning pacific highway and time and energy and money into beach shacks on the central coast -it takes courage to actually begin to live as if the highway will be built. It takes courage to live in a world full of injustice and not just to roll up your sleeves and say, ok I’m going to get rid of those wreckers over there, or to throw up your hands and say ‘eh, it’ll never happen’.
Waiting and hastening is a call to live in that tension. To invest ourselves in the kingdom even before we see it. To do things that seem like a dead end, a dud investment.
Last week I spoke about how St John’s care run a Christmas gift appeal. They collect gifts, vouchers, food, clothing and give them to families in Canberra who simply cannot afford to make ends meet, let alone celebrate with presents and a Christmas lunch. But think about what this is, it’s a small act, giving items worth $100 or so to families in Canberra can celebrate. It won’t change the world. It doesn’t address the reasons why these families ended up so desperate. It doesn’t change the education system that might’ve failed them, or the economy that made them redundant and facing inflation and huge increases in the price of rent and food. In a way, it’s small. Tiny. It’s a very modest glimmer of light. But in another way, it’s exaclty the kind of thing that hastens the coming of the day of the Lord. Because it is investing in the kingdom of God. It is saying, I am going to enable someone to have a modest celebration at Christmas, because I trust that one day, God is going to throw the feast to end all feasts. It is saying, I’m going to invest in the kingdom, I’m going to act as if it will grow, like an investment in a gentrifying coastal community.
These are the kinds of things that alert the people around us to the possibility that perhaps God is at work, perhaps the highway will be built, perhaps there is hope after all.