Zechariah 4:1a; 4-9 | Psalm 50:1-6 | Luke 21:25-36 | 1 Thessalonians 3:11-13 (ESV)
Eighteen years. Imagine spending eighteen years bent over, unable to straighten up. Your eyes, always on the ground. Your view of the world just limited to your own shadow. You're able to lift up your head to look at faces or the beauty of the sky. And it's not just your body, that's way down, it's your spirit. Dark oppressive forces have been burning you, bounding you, stealing your dignity.
People whisper about you, they avoid you, they maybe think that you've been cursed or being punished by God. Yet, you continue to go where God's people gather. You go, maybe you've been hoping and waiting for a miracle, maybe you've given up hope, but yet still you come to hear God's word, to draw near to the one who draws near to us.
And then on this day everything changes, the one who is teaching teaches with authority is known for his power to heal and he sees you. And he calls you forward and he says you are free from all that's crippled you. And he lays his hand on you and for the first time in eighteen years you stand up tall and straight and free, eyes lifted up in your praising God.
It's a true story. Recorded in Luke chapter thirteen. Jesus was teaching in the synagogue on the Sabbath and there was a crippled woman there crippled by an oppressive spirit. And Jesus heals her, completely restores her so that she can stand up tall, her dignity restored. Surely she had a new hope in her heart, a new longing for that day when God through his messiah would straighten all that is bent in the world.
The reason I share this story is that Luke uses a word here for stand up that is unique to Luke in the Gospels. And he uses only twice in this story and in the Gospel reading we just heard when Jesus calls us to stand up and lift up our heads for our redemption is drawing near.
Today is the first Sunday of Advent and marks the beginning of the church calendar and we begin by looking forward to our coming king who's bringing that redemption. Who's going to bring his light that dispels all darkness and when his blessings are going to flow as far as the curse is found. Advent is a time to long for that redemption that's coming. A redemption that is drawing near like the dawn like we heard in Anna's poem.
And therefore like the woman in the synagogue, Jesus calls us and enables us to stand up and lift up our heads in hope. But like the woman in the synagogue, we might need Jesus to first come to us in a preliminary way to help us stand through his word and through his sacrifice. And through his sacraments and prayer to give us that strength to actually stand up in hope.
We need that to stand. It's to strengthen us there so that we can shake off whatever sin or impression has been crippling us and keeping us bent over so that we have stand actually to stand up and lift up our heads in newness, in hope and anticipation. To look for that light, that light that restores and renews and fulfills all our longings and all things.
As Tish Harrison Warren writes in her excellent book on Advent, we often think of Advent as a preparation for an anticipation of Christmas, which it is. But it's also more. Historically, the church has seen this as a season to prepare for not just his first coming, but also Christ's second coming. As Malcolm Guite aptly puts it, these are the two great events that framed the events of our lives, that framed the alpha in the omega of our lives. We live in between these two comings, his first coming and his second coming.
It's also a season for Christ to make us holy in that preparation through his word in sacrament. As we turn to the Gospel reading and we anticipate meeting Christ in the word and in the sacrament, let's do that. Let's anticipate that third kind of coming where he comes and he meets us actually here and now in between these times, through the word in sacrament, through the people of God, through strangers.
As we move through this message, we're going to follow the image, this image of standing up. And in the first movement, we're going to look at how Jesus calls us to stand up in hope when all seems hopeless. And then the second movement, we're going to look at his call to pray for grace to stand in that way. And then the third movement, we're going to come back to this story of the woman in the synagogue to wrap it all up and consider how Jesus might be calling us through these scriptures in the season.
So first movement, standing in hope when all seems hopeless. In today's Gospel reading from Luke chapter 21, Jesus describes a world that's filled with turmoil and fear, cosmic signs and earthly chaos. And he calls us to respond though not with despair, but rather instead with hope when all this is going on.
The strange thing to call people to do. He says, when you see these things begin to happen, this craziness actually stand up and lift up your heads. It's a Hebrew term for hope. Because actually what's happening is your redemption is drawing near. This is a command. So again, I get up my pencil, I circle this command, I write a little C, and I commit to memorizing and living this command.
To understand this command though, we need the larger context of the chapter. Jesus here is speaking about the last things, describing a distant future event, the coming of the Son of Man in glory. One of his favorite ways of talking about himself, the Son of Man. He's describing this future event when he's coming back, symbolized though, and anticipated by a near event. The destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 AD.
What's going on in the chapter? So this dual perspective, the near event, prefiguring the distant final redemption. These are the two events between which Jesus is inviting us to live, this tension, which very much resembles Advent. We live in between these two events of his first coming and his second coming, the already and the not yet.
Prior to verse 25, Jesus is focusing mostly on the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. That's coming to his original years, but for those who were reading, they're looking back at this as a vivid memory. In verse 25 where our gospel begins, Jesus shifts the focus to the cosmic happenings, chaos, that's coming right before his return. The cosmic signs, the global distress that's happening. Nations are in anguish, people are so overcome by fear and dread that they faint. Or if you look at the Greek, the implication is that they lose their breath, that is they're dying from just the dread of what's coming. Literally scared to death.
In Mark's version of this, Jesus uses this really surprising imagery that really helps us reframe everything. He uses the imagery of birth pangs, contractions to reframe these terrible events. So that we're to see that every horrendous happening, whether it's the fall of Jerusalem or the cosmic catastrophes coming at the end of the day, or anything terrible and tragic in between, Jesus is inviting us to see all these as contractions that are giving birth to the new creation.
To help us to see that through these things, actually what's happening is the kingdom, the redemption of God is coming in the mirror. It should give us that hope to stand up and raise our heads. At the culmination of it all, Jesus says in verse 27, we will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. He's helping us to see this should not be a moment of fear but of fulfillment. When he comes to judge evil and end suffering and gather his people to himself and make all things new, that's what we're to be imagining.
So that when Jesus says, when these things take place, these terrible contractions, and they are terrible, it's not making light of them, they're saying they're not really terrible, but when you see them, whatever and whenever they are, what you are seeing is the kingdom, the redemption, drawing near, coming closer, breaking in.
Jesus follows this with the parable of the fig tree, which is an apt tree, where its fruit are actually inverted flowers as we've named before. What's he doing with this? He's inverting our interpretation of these events. So he says, just as budding leaves signal summer's nearness, these events signal that God's kingdom is near, and then assures us his words are more enduring than heaven and earth itself, anchoring us, reminding us these promises of his are sure and certain, no matter how crazy things get.
In verses 34 to 36, we come to the second movement, praying for strength to stand. It's another command, so again, I get up my pencil, I circle, I write a little C, I commit to memorize and do this, where Jesus says, pray. He starts by warning us though to stay alert and not let life's distractions, dissipations and drunkenness. He says, or fears drag our hearts down.
These are the common responses, right, to hardship. We either numb ourselves through distraction or substances or we panic in fear. And notice this contrast here in his language, a heart burdened and weighed down versus standing up in anticipation and hope. Expectancy for good things. Jesus says, don't let your heart be weighed down in this way, rather stay awake, vigilant, praying, praying for strength to stand when he returns.
And we're going to need that strength because when he comes, he's going to come in such power and glory. It will overwhelm anyone. No matter what human strength you may think you have. Just like when John in Revelation saw the risen, resurrected, glorious Christ, he fell down as though dead. And Jesus had to come and touch him to bring him back up. Just like that woman.
We need a touch from Jesus to help us stand upright so that we have strength to stand no matter how hard things are getting and to stand in his glorious presence. Not afraid, but confident, joyful, anticipating what's coming.
Before we move into the third and final movement, did you notice how closely Jesus' words here in this chapter align with Paul's prayer that we heard in our Thessalonians passage? In Paul's letter, he is writing to this young church that's facing persecution, reminding them of their hope in Christ's return. He is praying also for their heart. He is praying for strength to stand in essence before God at Christ's return.
But then he emphasizes one of the things that strengthens us, to stand. Namely, love from God for each other. He prays that the Lord would make their love to increase and overflow for one another in the community and for all beyond the community. In times of affliction, when suffering tempts us to turn inward and put up walls and lash out that fight-flight response, Paul prays for the opposite, that they would love.
Move outward towards one another in love, or one another and for all. And he prays that for this so that their hearts would be strengthened. He prays that this love would overflow among them so that their hearts would be strengthened or established, blameless and holiness, that Jesus is coming. That word for strengthen or for establish, it's an architectural term, meaning to make strong, secure, unshakeable, firm.
That's what Paul's praying for. That's what the love of God in us through us happens. Don't you feel that? Don't you feel stronger when the love of God is being poured into your heart and then poured out into others? Don't you have more strength to stand in hopeless situations? Don't you have more strength to stand before the Son of God and long for him and his redemption to behold him? Not be afraid of him, the one from whom all this love comes.
This brings us to a third and final movement, returning to the story of the woman in the synagogue, and to reflect on what might Jesus be inviting us to think about, to reflect on, to do, to consider through these passages during Advent.
Like the woman who endured 18 years of dark forces weighing her down, crippling her, what might be crippling us in our lives? What fears or burdens keep us as Anna's poem describe like cowering cave dwellers bent over in the darkness? Do stressful, busy, chaotic times like we seem to be in mean we're no longer looking at each other in the face, friend or stranger?
Does it mean we're no longer looking up to our Father in prayer? Advent is a time to ask these questions, to step back from the noise, to step back from the artificial light that is increasing that blinds us to the true coming light, to step out and ask God, what might be crippling me in this season?
What distractions or fears are weighing me down, weakening my heart? What unseen oppression? What God-given longings have become distorted, turned into mere cravings for comfort, control, recognition? Like the woman who went to the synagogue, how can I come to these weekly gatherings, longing for the one who came, who comes and who will come again?
Anticipating his light, his light that redeems and restores and fulfills all our longings and all things. Like the woman who heard his liberating words and received his healing strengthening touch, how too can we come and hear his words and receive his touch?
As we meet him in his word with ears to hear, he declares our freedom. He teaches us how to hope again. He reshapes how we view the world so that when we hear and see of wars and rumors of wars which we're hearing now, we don't just hear chaos, which it is. We hear contractions for the coming kingdom, for the new creation, for our redemption that's drawing near, that enables us to stand up, lift up our heads.
As we meet him at the table with faith and thanksgiving, we practice that prayer posture of open hands, receptive hands, asking for and praying for a touch from him in the spirit, for strength to stand, for hearts fortified by his holy love so that we can have the strength to stand up when all is hopeless.
So we can have strength to look up to our heavenly Father in prayer so that we can have strength to look one another in love in holy love and hope. Strengthened by his love, we can obey his call. When you see these things happening, stand up, lift up your heads because your redemption is drawing near.
Amen.