THINGS TO COME

A SERMON FOR ADVENT SUNDAY

As there was no Mass last week, we didn’t get to hear the Gospel for what was the Last Sunday after Pentecost.  It was all about the end of the world.  End of the Church’s Year, end of the world.  Seems appropriate, right?  And yet today, this Advent Sunday, the first Sunday of the Church’s annual liturgical cycle, the Gospel is once again all about the end of the world.  And that somehow strikes us as not quite so appropriate as it was last week.

But of course, the Church would never present us with something that is inappropriate.  Believe it or not, the end of the world is as suitable for Advent Sunday as it was for the Last Sunday after Pentecost.  When we think about the things of God, we are no longer in the realm of nature with its causes and effects, its beginnings and its endings.  We are in the world of the eternal, the mystical everlasting present, of God who had no cause—he was caused by nothing, he just always was.  He had no beginning and will have no end, the Alpha and the Omega.  So the liturgical cycle begins and ends with the same thoughts of the world’s end, last week seen through the eyes of dread, and this week through the eyes of hope.

Unlike God, we, his creatures, had a beginning.  We were made, out of dust, and thanks to the cooperation of our parents, we were born into this world.  One day we will die, we will be buried, and we will return to the dust from which we were made.  And yet, thanks to the love that God has for us, another very special Man was born into the world, a man who would enable us to share God’s eternity with him.  Unlike us, he was not made out of dust, nor, for that matter, was he made out of anything else.  This Man was himself God.  He was born to be the Saviour, who is Christ the Lord, and on this Advent Sunday we begin the period of preparation for his birth.  

Today, our thoughts turn in anticipation, to the wondrous approach of our Redemption.  The Redeemer was a man like us, born through the cooperation of his “parents,”—his Father, who was the Most High and Almighty God, and his mother, a simple maiden from a little village in Galilee, one of the most far-flung provinces of the Roman Empire.  But when God asked this humble girl to be his bride, she was without hesitation in her reply.  And that most mystical of conceptions occurred, when the Holy Ghost overshadowed her, and the Son of God was made incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary.  

This Child, like us, was born to die.  And die he did, most savagely, most brutally, at the hands of the men he had come to redeem.   And like us he was buried.  Crucified, dead, and buried.  But unlike us he did not return to dust, because he was never made of dust in the first place.  Instead, he rose from the dead, signaling to us that although our bodies may one day lie a-mouldering in the grave, our souls will rise to judgment and the eternal life we hope for.  And when heaven and earth shall pass away, our bodies too will rise again to join our souls in their everlasting reward.

These then, are our Advent thoughts this Sunday morning.  Thoughts of hope and anticipation at the coming of our Redeemer, thoughts of hope and anticipation at the Redemption he brings to our souls, thoughts of hope and anticipation at the final coming of Christ to judge the quick and the dead, the resurrection of the body and the live everlasting.  Amen.

LO! HE COMES WITH CLOUDS DESCENDING

A HYMN FOR ADVENT SUNDAY

By Charles Wesley, 1758

1 Lo! he comes with clouds descending,
once for favored sinners slain;
thousand, thousand saints attending
swell the triumph of his train.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
God appears on earth to reign.

2 Ev'ry eye shall now behold him,
robed in dreadful majesty;
those who set at naught and sold him,
pierced, and nailed him to the tree,
deeply wailing, deeply wailing,
shall the true Messiah see.

3 Ev'ry island, sea, and mountain,
heav'n and earth, shall flee away;
all who hate him must, confounded,
hear the trump proclaim the day:
Come to judgment! Come to judgment!
Come to judgment, come away!

4 Now Redemption, long expected,
see in solemn pomp appear!
All his saints, by man rejected,
now shall meet him in the air.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
See the day of God appear!

5 Yea, amen! let all adore thee,
high on thine eternal throne;
Savior, take the pow'r and glory,
claim the kingdom for thine own.
O come quickly, O come quickly;
alleluia! come, Lord, come.

AWAKE OUT OF SLEEP

A REFLECTION FOR ADVENT SUNDAY

Today is the liturgical New Year’s Day.  It is our annual jolt of reality, our alarm clock if you like, that is meant to wake us out of complacency and sinful lifestyles.  It is a time for renewing our resolutions to become better people, to resume the hard work needed to climb our path to salvation. 

Read the Epistle today, St. Paul summarizes it perfectly.  Remember, he’s writing to the Romans, the Christians of Rome who were in the very beginnings of their faith.  St. Paul is exhorting them to cease their pagan ways and become true Christians, ready to live and die for love of the Lord who saved their lost souls.  We need no reminders how the Christians of Rome ended up—persecuted by one emperor after another, fed to the lions in the Colosseum, crucified along the highways, burnt alive on their crosses to act as “street lamps” for the pagan rulers.  What are our struggles compared to theirs?

Today, our own alarm clock has disturbed our slumbering.  We have a choice, as we do every morning when we’re woken up to go to work.  We can either hit the snooze button and go back to sleep; or we can get out of bed, make the coffee, and begin our daily duties. On this Advent Sunday, our choices are similar.  Sure, we can ignore St. Paul’s reminder to “awake out of sleep,” turning a blind eye to the call for action—but if we do, the consequences will be worse than missing the bus, or getting fired.  Really, our only sane choice is to do our Christian duty and “cast off the works of darkness.. and put on the armour of light.”  We can resolve that from now forward, our lives will be according to the will and precepts of God, avoiding sin, occasions of sin, fighting the inevitable temptations, and persevering in the perfection of every virtue.  

As always, it’s our own free will that will determine our choice.  But know this, God most certainly is allowing us sufficient grace to succeed if we make the right choice.  And if we don’t, we’re on our own!  And always will be, forever.

Every Advent we get another chance to make and then persevere in the right decision.  We never know if this will be our last, so it’s not a good idea to put it off till next year!  For every person who lives a long and fruitful life, we hear of children and young people who are taken from this life by terrible diseases and accidents.  Please pray especially today for Emilee Giamanco, who is ten, and has been diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer.  She has been given three to six months. 

On a happier note, say a prayer of thanksgiving for Mr. Eugene Berry, Sr. who celebrated his 100^th birthday last week.  Mr. Berry is a parishioner of Our Lady of the Rosary in Monroe, Connecticut where I used to work.  I first met him when I visited his son, Fr. Eugene Berry, at their home back in 1979.  Mr. Berry served his country during World War II as a member of the United States Army as a Chaplain's Assistant and in the Medical Services unit in the United States and in Europe.  He later worked as a volunteer firefighter in the Mount Vernon Fire Department.  Please pray for his continued good health.