I’d
like to start this morning with a quote from Calvin. Not John Calvin, the great reformer, but Calvin and Hobbes, the comic
strip. In the particular one I’m thinking of, Calvin speaks to Hobbes and says:
"Live for the moment is my motto.
You never know how long you got."
In
the second frame he explains, "You could step into the road tomorrow and WHAM, you get hit by a cement truck! Then you'd be sorry you put off your pleasures. That's what
I say - live for the moment." And then he asks Hobbes, "What's your motto?"
Hobbes
replies: "My motto is Look down the road."
‘Look
down the road’. Such is not a bad theme for the first Sunday in Advent. Our brief reading from Jeremiah was one that
encouraged us to look ahead. It encouraged us to look beyond the present and
to a future filled with possibilities.
Fact
is, the situation in which Jeremiah wrote these words was anything but hopeful. The Babylonian army was laying siege to Jerusalem. Jehoichin, a King in the Davidic line, had been replaced by a puppet king called Zedekiah. There
was trouble within and without the nation, and Jeremiah in previous chapters has warned that it was going to get worse before
it ever got better.
Yet
he doesn’t leave it there. He says, “Look down the Road.” Beyond these troubled times there will come a
time when God makes things right again. It won’t be the same as it ever was. Though based upon what has passed, it will
be something new. And it will be the Lord’s doing. Jeremiah 33:14: “The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah.”
Look down the road. The promise will be fulfilled.
As
we look down the road towards Christmas, expectations, particularly amongst the young ones, can run high. As an old English
carol proclaims, “Tis the season to be jolly, Fa La La La Lah, La Lah Lah Lah’. The Christmas celebration provides
a welcome break in the dark days of winter. Its theme of “Joy to the world”
is a message seldom proclaimed amongst the hullabaloo of every day endeavor.
It
is easy to become cynical about the materialism and gross excess that seems to parody the genuine message of Christmas spirit,
but what Charles Dickens’ marvelous character “Mr. Scrooge” reveals to us - to not allow room in ones life
for celebration, even when it takes place in circumstances of desperation - is a soul destroying attitude of life to adopt.
Look
down the Road. Jeremiah 33:15”: In
those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David.”
We
know about King David. That whilst he wasn’t the perfect King, he nevertheless had one thing that set him apart. He
had a heart for the things of God. Now before David ever came to the throne, before even his predecessor Saul had become Israel’s first King, the
prophet Samuel had warned the people that having a King wasn’t necessarily a good thing. His words had proved sadly
true.
Many
of the kings had led the people into the destructive worship of foreign idols. Others used their positions for selfish gain
and advantage and had depended upon military strength rather that in trust in God to get them through. In all of Israel’s history after
David, only five kings in the Southern Kingdom, and none in the Northern Kingdom, were remembered as being even marginally faithful to God.
Some
of the people began to yearn for one who would be a worthy successor to David. Hezakiah had looked promising, but then his
son Manasseh had negated much of the good he achieved. Josiah had come along with his reforms and message of renewal, but
he died a sudden death.
As
the nation faced the calamity of defeat and destruction, the longing for a righteous royal deliverer grew more intense. Though
the people knew they had fallen from God, there was also the recognition that God was faithful, and that all those promises
made to Abraham and Moses and David were promises that could not be erased by the sins of the people but had a power that
remained in force. Look down the road. God would redeem God’s people! God’s promises were solid as a rock. A righteous
branch would spring up from David’s line.
This
was far more than just being a promise that some earthly king would come along. To the people of Israel facing an immanent catastrophe,
this was a promise to them, that no matter what, God would remain faithful. It is a message about God’s faithfulness
in the face of failure and despair. It shows that God commits himself to God’s people, in spite of their disobedience,
in spite of their failure, in spite of their sinfulness.
This
morning we lit the first candle on the Advent Wreath, the candle of Hope. Let’s face it, these aren’t the brightest
days. The country remains embroiled in a fight against terrorism that seems to have come to a stalemate in Iraq. Questions as to the future
are perplexing.
On
a personal level I have recently returned from a visit with my mum as she battles Alzheimer’s disease. It was tough
to say farewell not knowing how she will be next time we meet, and facing the possibility that there may not be a next time.
Such times are difficult and it takes a good dose of holy grace to carry us through. At such times it is hard to look down
the road, because the crisis of the moment takes away our vision for the future.
Yet
here’s the thing. If the Advent message has nothing to say to these situations life throws at us, it could be that the
Christian Gospel is the emptiest hope of all. It seems to me that our belief does not make us immune to life’s troubles,
rather it is our faith that informs us and carries us through the hard times.
It
is the nature of Christian faith that sometimes the road gets tough. Sometimes it’s not our fault, but often times it
is. We mess up. We make bad decisions. We sin and are sinned against. We are offered the best way and we take the easiest.
We know what’s right yet time and time again choose the wrong.
Furthermore,
even when we are faced with the consequences of our actions, we are more likely to complain and plead innocence rather than
admit defeat! Was this not the situation of the people of Jeremiah’s day? ‘Yes we’ve been unfaithful, yes,
you told us that if we didn’t change our ways, trouble would be coming, and yes, we know it’s about to hit us
hard, but you know Lord? We just couldn’t seem to help ourselves!’
What were Jeremiah’s words of hope to these hopeless ones?
“Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safely.
And this is the name by which it will be called:
The LORD is our righteousness.”
(Jeremiah 33:16)
Did
you catch those last words? “The Lord is our righteousness.” I’ve heard it suggested that the way God justified
people in the Old Testament era was different to the way God saved them in the New; that the old way was the way only of the
law, whilst the New Testament is all about grace.
Not
so with Jeremiah! Jeremiah’s only hope for the people of Israel and Judah was in the saving act
of God. ‘Look down the Road’. You’ve tried again and again to save yourselves but it’s just not in
you. The sky is dark and your enemies are at your door, but this is not the end of the story. God will redeem God’s
people. Your salvation is in God’s hands. The Lord is your righteousness.
God
did indeed raise up a righteous branch from the line of David. As we look to celebrating the birth of Jesus, in David’s
town of Bethlehem we see the birth of new hope into the world’s darkness, a hope we are called to make our own.
It
is to Jesus Christ that we are called to turn for our salvation. He alone can be our righteousness. He alone has the power
over sin and death and hell. He alone can renew life and restore life, lift up the fallen, forgive the sinner and bind up
the wounds of those who need healing. His joy enriches the laughter of God’s faithful ones, and His tears sanctify the
tears of those who mourn.
When
I’m faced with the hard times, it seems that the faith God offers to me as a gift has a habit of rising up and taking
control. It’s when I try and suppress that reliance upon God, when in my pride and foolishness I think I can get through
on my own or could do better without God’s interference, then I fall.
I’m
so thankful that I have a God who just won’t give up on me. I’m so thankful that my destiny is not dependant on
my own works but upon the righteousness of Jesus Christ. I’m so glad that I have a Savior who calls me to “Look
down me road.” To see that, even in times that are not filled with light, there’s something good just a little
further away than I can glimpse right now.
‘Living
one day at a time’ is not the same thing as ‘Living without a care for tomorrow’. Jesus encouraged us to
live life in day-tight compartments, particularly as we never know what may be coming around the next corner. At the same
time He also suggested that we ‘Watch and Pray’, that we dream dreams and envision possibilities, and that we
trust in God our Father to take care of those things we can’t fix for ourselves.
Look down the Road.
For those who put their faith in Jesus Christ, there’s something good in store.
It
kind of puts me in a Christmas frame of mind, recapturing that feeling of not knowing exactly what Santa had left under the
tree but knowing it was something good.
I
remember one Christmas years ago being taken to my Grandmother’s. I had all kinds of questions, like ‘had my parents
left Santa a forwarding address?’ We got there and I caught the measles. But it was O.K. I’d asked Santa for a
cowboy suit, and on Christmas Day I put it on over my PJ’s, and everything was fine. There had been something good down
the road and it had given the nasty bits of the journey a new perspective.
Now didn’t Jesus say something about having the faith of a child?
Look down the Road.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
Rev. Adrian J. Pratt
