Luke 21:25-36
Today is the first Sunday of the Advent season. Advent is a special season on the church calendar. This is the season of time when we prepare ourselves for the birth of the Messiah. It is also the time when we prepare for Christ’s promised return. To start the Advent season with a passage from scripture filled with apocalyptic imagery may seem a bit odd.
This passage is painfully appropriate for Christians who know that the First Sunday of Advent carries in its wake the customary December frenzy. It is the awareness that the annual “trap” of holiday preparation is about to spring upon us once again. This “trap” brings with it all the usual anxiety and excitement of the season.
There’s the trap of having to decorate the house for Christmas, negotiating the crowds of shoppers fighting one another for the best deal on gifts for family and friends, sending out Christmas cards to everyone you’ve ever known, getting together with family you may or may not want to see, attending specials events such as parades, concerts, plays, parties, and more to celebrate this special time of year.
Anxiety and fear also rear their ugly heads this time of year. In fact, psychologists have given names to almost every fear (or phobia) under the sun. For example, if you have a fear of…
· …crowds—then you have ochlophobia.
· …darkness—you have nyctophobia.
· …being looked at by other people—you have scopophobia.
· …failure—you have kakorrhaphiophobia.
· …loneliness—you have monophobia.
· …marriage—you have gamophobia.
· …poverty—you have peniaphobia.
· …responsibility—you have hypengyophobia.
· …school—yep, you guessed it, schoolphobia.
· …God—theophobia.
· …death—thanataphobia.
· …hell—hadephobia.
What are you afraid of? We all have fears—some that are good (they protect us) and some that are bad (they destroy us). If we live with too many fears, our lives will not only be miserable, but we become an easy target for the Evil One. The world preys on our fears—our fear of rejection, our fear of growing old, our fear of pain, our fear of loneliness. We really don’t have to worry. We are not to live in fear or be controlled by our anxiety. A confident steward of God’s gifts knows and believes God will take care of all our needs. A confident steward lives life with poise and grace in God’s abundance.
Our lesson today relates Jesus’ response to a disciple’s question, “Teacher, when will this be, and what will be the sign that this is about to take place?” (Luke 21:7). Jesus not only speaks of signs and persecution, but also of Jerusalem’s pending destruction.[1] The signs of the future in vv. 29-33 have become the signs of the present. The Kingdom of God lies close at hand. Verses 32-33 provide solemn assurances of the faithfulness of Jesus’ promise. Their first response is to trust. Just as the scripture can be trusted, so can the very words of Jesus.
The task of the confident steward is to look up and notice the abundance all around us and share that abundance with others. The confident steward is controlled by faith, not fear. We as Christ’s disciples are not to line up for a run through an earthly anxiety machine. Instead, we are to be preparing ourselves for the scrutiny and challenges to come. For Jesus, that means paying attention and approaching life with faith rather than fear. Jesus urges us to “stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near” (v. 28). The fig tree parable reminded the disciples to vigilantly look around for the signs of the kingdom and Jesus’ own eternal “words” instead of constantly focusing on the daily stress-producing news of calamity and disaster (vv. 29-33). When we identify and name the fears, anxieties and distractions of the people around us, we can begin to offer them hope and help them through toward a journey with Christ. “Be alert,” says Jesus, and help others do the same.[2]
Most of us find ourselves behind an unprotected target for the threatened by the worries of life. Providing for our families, difficulties related to work, concerns about the affairs of government, and clamoring after power and status. Both of these things are worthy and others more trivial. They have a way of fogging up our vision, obscuring our view, keeping the Kingdom of God just out of reach. Things are not necessarily what they appear to be. To look only at things that seem to be close at hand is to miss the big picture of what God is doing in our lives.
Our human tendency when we are anxious or afraid is to hide, to hunker down and seek cover. Jesus directs us to look up to see the big picture that is unfolding around us. For we know our help, our confidence will come from on high in the person of the Son of God. The fact that God offers us this kind of confidence in Jesus Christ is simply amazing. Faithful people know and remember that God alone is our only salvation. When handling the gifts and households God gives us to manage as stewards, it is absolutely vital we remember this promise. While we may hoard our possessions and time, God does indeed provide our every need. Faithful stewards live and serve out of this dependable confidence.[3]
May you so trust the promises of God and the salvation he offers us give you confidence to go and share the abundant blessings you have received with one another. Amen.
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