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Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ be unto you. Amen. The text for this morning comes from the Old Testament reading. You may be seated. Bless you.
We begin Advent this season, and Advent is a time of waiting for Jesus’ coming. In fact, the Latin word Advent means coming. But if you listen carefully in the Scriptures, there were two comings mentioned. The Old Testament is about his first coming, when he is born, the righteous branch from David, who is our righteousness. But both the epistle and the gospel speak about his second coming. In fact, you may think, if this is Advent, the gospel reading was just almost like last Sunday’s gospel reading. And the answer is, yes, it is. Because this transition from the end of one church year to the beginning of another, from the end of one end of the season of the church year to the beginning of Advent, is very similar because it is this waiting and transition of waiting in which we find ourselves.
Now the rest of Advent on Sunday, there won’t be mention of this again. It goes about John the Baptist and the preparation of John the Baptist and then fully the incarnation of our Lord by the Virgin, the Holy Spirit working there. But for today, it is this transition Sunday, this waiting for his coming. But that really describes your and my life. We, like the people of old, are waiting for his coming. The difference is the waiting that we’re waiting for is for his second fleshly coming. The waiting of which Jeremiah wrote was for his first fleshly coming. But either way, he came in the flesh. God became man, human flesh. So that he would rescue and save humanity who had lost their divine image given to them.
The prophet Jeremiah wrote, “Behold, the days are coming when I will fulfill the promise I made.” Now, Jeremiah was preaching to a people that were in bondage in Babylon. And it’s interesting to note that while they were there, the culture of Babylon was prosperous. So if the culture that was controlling you was prosperous, then that means you too were prosperous. It’s no different than your life and my life in this country. Our nation is fairly economically prosperous, which means you are prosperous because of it.
The temptation, though, in living in such a prosperous place is to not listen to the prophets when they speak. About repentance. About being ready when Christ returns. About his coming again in flesh to rescue us. You see, Jeremiah was proclaiming this, and most of the people did not go back to the promised land when the 70 years was over. Yes, a goodly number stayed in Babylon enjoying the prosperity and not the spiritual freedom. There is that same temptation to you and to me. We live in a very prosperous place. We have to confess that we are prosperous compared to the vast number of the rest of the world. And yet, this is not our home. But the sirens of this world are always calling unto us to put down roots here. Establish yourself here. And yet, this world is dying. And its prosperity is waning, even if it’s not seen with the eyes or experienced in our flesh. God’s Word proclaims its truth.
Secondly, God’s Word makes it clear that Jesus will return at a time in an hour when we know not. Just as He came the first time at a time in an hour known not. In fact, His coming the first time was as unremarkable… In the opposite extreme as his coming will be for the second time. The first time he was just a baby born. Didn’t look very glorious and yet there was God in the flesh. Just as when he hung on the tree, it didn’t look very glorious and yet there is God in the flesh. Fulfilling all righteousness for you. His second coming will not be so dampened and will not be so unremarkable. It will be… Great and glorious indeed.
We struggle with waiting. We have since we were little boys and little girls. Your teachers and your parents always were reminding you to sit still, wait for your turn, be patient, it will happen. And though we grow up and we think that we’re much more patient, not so, is it? For if God allows us to prosper, we don’t want the coming to come at that time. We’re enjoying these gifts and these great things. Why would we want Jesus to come now? But let our lives be turned upside down and our prayers are much more consistent with, “‘Come, Lord Jesus, come.'” You see, the people who were in Babylon, as long as it was prosperous for them in Babylon, they could cry out, okay, you know, we can put this going back to Israel another time because that promised land is not so wonderful now. It’s been full of weeds and not farmed and diligently taken care of. It’s been fought over. There’s all these half-breeds who live there. Why should we go back? We’ve made this place our home now. As I said, most stayed. Not as many went back home.
Waiting is very difficult. It just depends upon what we’re waiting for. Our Lord gives us faith to trust in his promises, and his promises he will come and cause a righteous branch to spring up out of David. If you’ve ever walked around the front yard of our church, you ought to sometimes because there’s some massive old oaks out there. But then there’s this one stump that’s been dead for decades. Decades dead, and it sits there. And every so often, if the weather’s just right, out comes a sprout, as if it’s going to grow up and be a big oak tree again. It looks unremarkable and it looks very innocent.
But the problem is, that is how it always is when it first looks that way. Unremarkable. Innocent. And yet unremarkable and innocent was your righteousness conceived in the womb of Mary, so that you would have his righteousness, that which you and I lack. And every facet of his life that was part of that springing up, seemingly unremarkable in that little village known as Bethlehem, was every facet was righteous for you, not for himself. He’s God in the flesh. He is righteousness incarnate. But he lives, conceives, and lives out all of his life in a righteous fashion for no one else but for you.
And then he dies the righteous death, which no one has died, and no one will die a righteous death except him. And then he gives you that righteousness so that like him you too will have a righteous resurrection, for he was the only one who did. That is why Jeremiah said he will be called the Lord your righteousness. But when righteousness, which seems so abstract, is compared to the joy of the fleshly things we experience in this life, it seems unremarkable, doesn’t it?
But let us come to terms with who we are as sinners, and then we see how clearly we lack that which is not ours, but which dwells within Him alone. When we see life take its toll on us with each passing decade, we see the lack of our righteousness and that which fills that cross, heaven and earth, and filled Mary’s womb. And yet Mary’s womb could not contain it all. So he wishes to be your righteousness.
The temptation of waiting for him to return is that very thing, a temptation. One of the things that you and I can notice as we grow older, we lack a little of impetuousness that we had when we were younger. To a good degree, we’re very thankful for that. Impetuousness always did get us into trouble. But sitting back and charting our presence and considering sometimes where our passion lies, we fool ourselves into thinking that it’s here. And it really isn’t. And then by God’s grace, when we get enough gray hair, enough physical maladies, enough internal family problems or external physical problems, we begin to realize… Oh, take me home, Jesus, take me home. And we wait until he comes.
But we know he’ll come. Just as he came the first time in that manger, that straw-filled, dung-smelling manger, did he come. Just as he comes to you today in this straw-filled, dung-smelling manger. Just as he comes to your heart, that straw-filled, dung-smelling heart. And he makes it his and gives you his righteousness. That you become sweet and pure. That you no longer have the death of straw, but the life of that sprig that comes out of that dead stump. That you, though you look unremarkable to this world and even to yourself, are God’s child.
We wait to see it, and we will wait to see it. And it will take a great deal of faith that he carries us to see it, but he promises that you will see it as we wait because he’s promised to come. And he never breaks a promise. In the name of him who comes to you this day, now, and feeds you his flesh and blood, Jesus, amen.
