Advent: The God Who Was and Is and Is To Come

Two weeks ago, at the beginning of Advent, we talked about the God Who Was, and in that sermon we discussed the different conceptions of who and what the 1st century Jews thought the Messiah would be. We talked about the differences between the powerful and political Messiah they expected and the much bigger, much more significant ministry of redemption that Jesus actually came to accomplish.
After the God Who Was, we moved on in the next week to talk about the God Who Is. And if you recall, in that sermon we talked about how the ministry of Jesus isn’t merely something that occurred in the past, but how His ministry to and for us is an on-going ministry of intercession where He is REAL: Resurrected, Enthroned, Ascended, and Living.
Now after we’ve talked about the God Who Was, and The God Who Is, the most natural thing in the world to talk about this week would be the God Who Is To Come.
First, a few observations: One: I don’t want to give the impression through the titles of the past three sermons that we’re somehow talking about three different Gods. As Christians, we of course confess in the Athanasian Creed that we do not worship three gods, but one God in unity in Trinity and Trinity in unity. So we’re not talking about three Gods, the god of the past and the god of the present and the god of the future, but we are speaking of the one true God who is God over all.
The second observation that we need to make is that, just as we are not talking about three gods, neither are we talking about a God who acted one way in the past and acts differently today. Does God do that? Operate on one standard for one time and people and then go by an entirely different standard in another time and place? No, He says in Malachi 3:6 "I the LORD do not change.” He doesn’t change. Therefore we’re not trying to discover how God is going to change sometime in the future, we’re not looking at a God who will be at some future point, but a God who already is.
So, it’s not a God Who Will Be, but the God Who Is To Come, meaning that the point of our discussion today is centered on how God God will come in His 2nd Advent, Christ’s 2nd Coming to earth.
Now what does that mean? I mean, if you recall the end of the Great Commission in Matthew 28:20, Jesus promises, “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” So what do we mean by saying, “Jesus will come again”? Isn’t God here with us today? How is God with us here, today? (Word and Sacrament, present with us in our hearts in His indwelling, in Spirit, etc.)
So sure! Of course God is here with us today! So we must also understand that when we talk of His 2nd Coming, we’re speaking of Christ’s second mission the Earth. Christ’s first mission was accomplished on the cross. Jesus Himself said in Luke 5:32, “I have come to call sinners to turn from their sins, not to spend my time with those who think they are already good enough.” (NLT) His first mission was to seek and to save what was lost, it was to be a doctor to those who suffer from the sickness of sin. We could say that it was primarily a mission of mercy.
But His Second Coming is not a mission of mercy. The Scriptures call His Second Coming the Day of Judgment. It will be a great Day. It will be a terrible Day. On that Day Christ will come and the Lord will judge the world.
Since that is true, it makes sense that we would learn something about Christ’s Second Coming. So what do we know about His Second Advent?
In Matthew 24:5-12, Jesus gives us a list of signs to watch for that will lead up to His Second Coming. “5 For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many. 6 You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of birth pains. 9 "Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold.”
Let’s do a little exercise, shall we? I’m going to give that list to you again, and you tell me which—if any—of the signs that you have seen in your lifetime. You can just raise your hand for every one that you’ve seen.
People claiming to be the Christ.
Wars. Rumors of wars.
Famines.
Earthquakes.
Persecution of Christians.
False prophets leading believers astray.
An increase of wickedness.
The Christian love of some growing cold.

I doubt that we even need to take a count. We’ve all seen those signs. Does that mean we should be able to expect the End soon? Should we be able to predict when that Day will come?
That question brings us to the second thing we know about Christ’s Second Advent: No one knows when it will be. Just a little later in that same chapter of Matthew, Christ says in verse thirty-six, “No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.” Only the Father knows when that Day will come, and He is keeping that knowledge to Himself. It is the height of foolishness—the height of arrogance—to try and predict the timing of that Day.
The third we know about Christ’s Second Advent is that it will not be secretive or quiet. Unlike His first coming where many were mistaken about the coming of the Messiah—they simply couldn’t conceive of a little baby being the King of Kings—His second coming will be immediately apparent to all. 1 Thessalonians 4:16 says, “16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.” That will be a pretty dramatic event! His first coming was marked by His humility and lowly position, but in His Second Coming He will bet revealed in all His glory, with His arrival heralded loud and long by the very head of all the angels; there will be no mistaking Him that time. Not for me, not for you . . . not for anyone.
Okay, well that makes me think of a good question: If His coming is visible to everyone, how will we react to Him?
Well surprise, surprise . . . would you have guessed that C.S. Lewis has something to say about that, as well? In the seventh and last book of the Narnia series, appropriately named The Last Battle, Lewis’ Christ-figure, Aslan, The Lion, stands before a door—the only door—between the land of Narnia and his own country—a figure of our eternal home. Aslan is drawing the curtain on the final act of the land of Narnia.
He went to the Door and they all followed him. He raised his head and roared, “Now it is time!” then louder, “Time!”; then so loud it could have shaken the stars, “TIME.” The Door flew open.

The light from behind them (and a little to their right) was so strong that it lit up even the slopes of the Northern Moors. Something was moving there. Enormous animals were crawling and sliding down into Narnia: great dragons and giant lizards and featherless birds with wings like bats’ wings. They disappeared into the woods and for a few minutes there was silence. Then there came—at first from very far off—sounds of wailing and then, from every direction, a rustling and a pattering and a sound of wings. It came nearer and nearer. Soon one could distinguish the scamper of little feet from the padding of big paws, and the clack-clack of light little hoofs from the thunder of great ones. And then one could see thousands of pairs of eyes gleaming. And at last out of the shadow of the trees, racing up the hill for dear life, by thousands and by millions, came all kinds of creatures—Talking Beasts, Dwarfs, Satyrs, Fauns, Giants, Calormenes, men from Archenland, Monopods, and strange unearthly things from the remote islands or the unknown Western lands. And all these ran up to the doorway where Aslan stood.
This part of the adventure was the only one which seemed rather like a dream at the time and rather hard to remember properly afterward. Especially, one couldn’t say how long it had taken. Sometimes it seemed to have lasted only a few minutes, but at others it felt as if it might have gone on for years. Obviously, unless either the Door had grown very much larger or the creatures had suddenly grown as small as gnats, a crowd like that couldn’t have ever tried to get through it. But no one thought about that sort of thing at the time.
The creatures came rushing on, their eyes brighter and brighter as they drew nearer and nearer to the standing Stars. But as they came right up to Aslan one or other of two things happened to each of them. They all looked straight in the his face—I don’t think they had any choice about that. And when some looked, the expression of their faces changed terribly—it was fear and hatred. . . . And all the creatures who looked at Aslan in that way swerved to their right, his left, and disappeared into his huge black shadow, which (as you have heard) streamed away to the left of the doorway. The children never saw them again. I don’t know what became of them. But the others looked in the face of Aslan and loved him, though some of them were very frightened at the same time. And all these came in at the Door, in on Aslan’s right.

In that one moment, at that Door, judgment will occur. Those who have spent their life denying Christ, rejecting His offer of salvation from their rightful punishment, will be given what they have been asking for their entire lives: eternity without God. There will be no second chances for them, there will no longer be any time to repent. The time for faith will have passed, and the time for sight and an eternity of regrets and torments will have come. They will finally see Christ for who He truly is . . . and they will be horrified.
But for those who have spent their earthly life under the gracious cross of Christ, that Day will be a doorway into a never-ending story of the adventure of faith. They will look with love upon their gracious Savior, and enter into His rest.

We’ve seen the signs. We know we can’t predict when the Day will come. We’ve heard how everyone will see Christ at His coming . . . but some will spend eternity wish they hadn’t. So what, then, are the Scriptures telling us regarding the End? They tell us to be watchful. They tell us to not grow lazy. They tell us to be prepared.

How can we be prepared for such a momentous event as the coming of the King of the Universe? There’s two very simple answers for that.
The first thing we must do to be prepared is to believe upon Jesus Christ. There is nothing else that will prepare you to meet Him if you do not believe upon Him, and there is nothing else you can add to help you be prepared if you do. So the first is believe in Him. Love Him. Grow in your relationship with Him. Come to church regularly, receive the Word and Sacraments to help you stand firm in Christ. Keep a short tab on your sins before God, and above all else trust—radically trust—in Jesus Christ alone for your salvation. This will make certain that you are prepared.
The second is to help others be prepared. Is there anyone that you know that isn’t prepared to face judgment? Is there anyone that needs the love of Christ in their lives? Can they be ready to meet Christ without you first telling them how they might be made ready? Are you willing to condemn them to an eternity without God because you were too embarrassed to mention the name of Christ to them? Share your life in Christ with them . . . share what you have already been given. Help them to be prepared, even as others have helped you.

Advent: The God Who Was, And Is . . .

In the sermon last week we talked about Jesus Christ as the God Who Was. We discussed how the Jews of Jesus’ day had certain preconceptions of the coming savior, how they were looking for a certain type of Messiah—either a glorious Messiah or a powerful Messiah . . . or for that matter how some weren’t even looking for a Messiah at all—but that their preconceived notions of a Messiah were so much different, so much smaller, than the real thing that they missed out on the real Messiah, Jesus, when He made came on the scene.
What did Jesus do? Well, the words of faith that we just confessed in the 2nd Article of the Apostle’s Creed tell it nicely: And in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord; Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; He descended into hell.
Now, this is good stuff, isn’t it? I mean, we talk like this all the time: unbelievers ask us how we can have such peace, and we tell them, “Because Jesus died for me.” We tell them about what Jesus did, we tell them about the God Who Was, and that’s good and that’s right . . . but do we ever tell them about the God Who Is? Do we ever stop to think or to talk about what it means to say that we have a living God?
One of the questions that must be asked of any sermon is “So what?” I don’t mean that we should ask that in a rude manner, but simply as it stands. “So what, preacher? You’ve told us some good things about Jesus, you’ve told us about the Gospel . . . but now what? How does this fit into my life today? So what?”
So what? Why does The God Who Is matter? Because as the God Who Is, Jesus Christ is REAL. “Well, sure!” you say, “Of course he’s real! It’s not as though He’s some fiction of our imagination, or something!” Of course I know that, but I mean (holding up the sermon sheet) Jesus is REAL! He is Resurrected, Enthroned, Ascended, and Living!
If Jesus Christ is an IS and not merely a WAS, then He has got to be REAL. How do we know He is REAL? To get the answer, let’s look at the remainder of that 2nd Article of the Apostle’s Creed.
After we confess that Jesus Christ descended into Hell to proclaim His victory, we say that on “The third day He rose again from the dead.” So the first letter, the letter R, stands for resurrected. The story of Jesus Christ doesn’t end on the cross or in the tomb, because the grave wasn’t strong enough to keep Jesus Christ down. In the Apostle’s great sermon to the crowd on the day of Pentecost, Peter says in Acts 2:23-24, “23 This man [Jesus] was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. 24 But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.”
Okay, that’s good . . . but what’s the question you’re supposed to ask? “So what?” Well, I’ve got an answer for that. The Apostle Paul tells us that that a dead God—a Jesus Christ who was NOT resurrected—results in a pointless faith, a worthless faith. In 1 Corinthians 15:12-14 “12 Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13 But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain.” A God who is, a God who is resurrected from the dead, gives meaning to our faith, it makes the object of our faith—Jesus Christ—someone worth believing in.
Let’s continue on with the Creed: “ He descended into hell; the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven.” Stick with me, now . . . we’re going to do something just a bit crazy . . . we’re going to take the letters out of order. So the first letter R stands for “resurrected” and the third letter stands for “ascended.”
Christ’s ascension into Heaven is recorded in the first chapter of the book of Acts. Acts tells us what happened that day, but it doesn’t tell us why. For why, we can turn to the book of Hebrews.
The book of Hebrews tells us that the ancient Israelites worshipped God in the tabernacle, the temple, but that tabernacle was just a copy—an inferior copy—of the real sanctuary in Heaven. And when Jesus ascended into Heaven, He entered into the real tabernacle and took up His role there as the High Priest of that Heavenly sanctuary.
Hebrews 9:23 says, “24 For Christ did not enter a man-made sanctuary that was only a copy of the true one; he entered heaven itself, now to appear for us in God's presence.” Earlier in that same book, in chapter eight verse two, the author tells us that Jesus serves in that sanctuary, the true tabernacle set up by the Lord. The Old Testament system of priests and sacrifices and The Temple has been taken over and fulfilled by Jesus Christ.
Okay, so you understand that Jesus Christ now serves as the High Priest of the true, heavenly sanctuary, but the question you’re supposed to ask is . . . “So what?”
So what? The answer to the “so what?” question for the resurrection was that it makes our faith meaningful; but the answer to that question for the ascension of Jesus Christ is that it makes our faith certain.
In the Old Testament the people had the covenant of God, but there was a problem: the people weren’t faithful to the covenant. In Hebrews 8:7-8 the Bible says, “7 For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. 8 But God found fault with the people and said: "The time is coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.” The problem with the old covenant was that the people still sinned! So what was needed was a covenant that fixed that problem once and for all.
So the fix for sin and the answer to “so what?” is found in Jesus. Remember that Jesus ascended into Heaven, where He took up His role as the High Priest of the true, heavenly sanctuary, and in Hebrews 7:21 the writer says, “The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, 'You are a priest forever.'" 22 This makes Jesus the guarantor of a better covenant.”
We have a better covenant, and because of Jesus’s ascension, He serves today and forever as the guarantor! It would not be possible for Jesus to guarantee God’s covenant of salvation by grace alone if He had not ascended into Heaven. A God who is, a God who ascended into Heaven, gives certainty to our faith, a knowledge that what is promised in Jesus Christ will always be true.
Okay, so we’ve done the first letter—R for resurrected—and the third letter—A for ascended—and now we can step back to the second letter. The Apostle’s Creed continues on like this: He descended into hell; the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty.” To say that Jesus Christ sat down at the right hand of God the Father Almighty is to say that Jesus Christ took His rightful place on the Heavenly throne: He is enthroned.
Being enthroned at the right hand of the King means a few different things: it means you’ve got the power of the King at your command—that “right hand of strength” kind of idea. It also means you’ve got the job of counselor or advisor to the king. It means you’ve got the king’s ear.
Now what in the name of Heaven and Earth does Jesus do in His capacity of being enthroned at the right hand of God? If we go back to Hebrews for a minute—that’s such a great book—if we go back to Hebrews 7:25, we read, “25Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.” Being enthroned, Jesus Christ now continually intercedes for us.
The “so what?” question seems to come up really early in this discussion, so let me ask you a few questions to help sort it out. First, how are our sins paid for? Right—through Jesus’ death on the cross. So is this intercession done for the satisfaction of our sins, is it done to pay for our sins? Again, you’re right—the answer is “no.” The satisfaction of our sins was accomplished completely on the cross.
The point of Christ’s intercession is not for satisfaction, but for application. Meaning that His intercession on our behalf is not for the payment of our sins (which was accomplished once for all on the cross), but so that that payment may be applied to us. The theologian Francis Pieper puts it this way, “the object of the intercession, then, is the gathering and preserving of the Church.” In other words, if Jesus Christ were not interceding for us, the benefits of the cross could not be applied to us. That’s “so what”: Christ’s death buys you salvation, but Christ’s intercession gets it delivered to you. As the God Who is, Jesus is enthroned at the right hand of the Father, and there He continually pleads your case before the Father, and as a result you are not only brought into the true faith, but you are kept there.
So Christ is resurrected, He is enthroned, and He is ascended. Those all add up to a God who Is, a God who is Living. A God who is living isn’t always a God we can understand, and certainly not one we can control . . . but we can be assured that He is always there for us.
Do you remember the great lion Aslan from C.S. Lewis’ Narnia books? If you recall, last week I told you how Lewis uses the lion Aslan as a way to show Jesus in a fictional story. Narnia is still on my mind--the movie is due out this Friday—and so I’ve got another bit from the third book from the Chronicles of Narnia—called The Horse and His Boy—to illustrate what it means to have a living God.
In this scene a boy named Shasta has run away from his adopted father and now finds himself for the first time in the northern lands. He has become separated from his traveling companions and is now lost on a mountain ridge. He can see nothing, because a strange mist has swirled around him as he travels on. He has suddenly become aware of a very large (and very frightening) creature walking beside him in the mist.
“Who are you?” Shasta said, scarcely above a whisper.
“One who has waited long for you to speak,” said the Thing. Its voice was not loud, but very large and deep.
“Are you—are you a giant?” asked Shasta.
“You might call me a giant,” said the Large Voice. “But I am not like the creatures you call giants.”
“I can’t see you at all,” said Shasta, after staring very hard. Then (for an even more terrible idea had come into his head) he said, almost in a scream, “You’re not—not something dead, are you? Oh please—please do go away. What harm have I ever done you? Oh, I am the unluckiest person in the whole world!”
Once more he felt the warm breath of the Thing on his hand and face. “There,” it said, “that is not the breath of a ghost. Tell me your sorrows.”
Shasta was a little reassured by the breath: so he told how he had never known his real father or mother and had been brought up sternly by the fisherman. And then he told the story of his escape and how they were chased by lions and forced to swim for their lives; and of all their dangers in Tashbaan and about his night among the tombs and how the beasts howled at him out of the desert. And he told about the heat and thirst of their desert journey and how they were almost at their goal when another lion chased them and wounded Aravis. And also, how very long it was since he had had anything to eat.
“I do not call you unfortunate,” said the Large Voice.
“Don’t you think it was bad luck to meet so many lions?” said Shasta.
“There was only one lion,” said the Voice.
“What on earth do you mean? I’ve just told you there were at least two the first night, and—“
“There was only one: but he was swift of foot.”
“How do you know?”
“I was the lion.” And as Shasta gaped with open mouth and said nothing, the Voice continued. “I was the lion who forced you to join with Aravis. I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead. I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept. I was the lion who gave the Horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time. And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to share where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you.”
“Then it was you who wounded Aravis?”
“It was I.”
“But what for?”
“Child,” said the Voice, “I am telling you your story, not hers. I tell no one any story but his own.”
“Who are you?” asked Shasta.
“Myself,” said the Voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook: and again, “Myself” loud and clear and gay: and then the third time, “Myself,” whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it.

Shasta had thought he was the unluckiest boy in the whole world, but he didn’t realize that all along Aslan—Jesus—had been watching out for him, that a living God was putting all the pieces of the puzzle of Shasta’s life together . . . that all along God had been working behind the scenes to bring good into Shasta’s life.
It’s not much different with us . . . we go about our lives and never see the hand of God at work, and we think that perhaps He has abandoned us. We have troubles in life, and our eyes are taken off of God and we forget that we have a God who is. We forget we have a God who is REAL.
And all the while our Savior Jesus Christ is working behind the scenes, fulfilling the words of the prophet Isaiah in chapter 61:1-3, “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; 2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; 3 to grant to those who mourn in Zion- to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified.”
We have a God who is. He has risen from the dead to give meaning to our faith, He is enthroned at the right hand of God, where He continually and eternally intercedes for us, He has ascended into the Heavenly sanctuary to be the guarantee of our faith. And because He lives, He continues to be a very real presence in our lives today. Revelation 1:8 8 "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty."

Amen.