Sermon for the Second Sunday in Advent
“Heaven and earth shall pass away; but my words shall not pass away”
Strong words, but then, this is a day of strong words, strong words reminding us of the strength and power of God’s Word coming to us in judgment and in hope.
“Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning,” St. Paul tells us in a powerful passage signifying the fundamental idea of a theology of revelation, a point by no means lost on the architect of common prayer and the author of the fine and wonderful collect for The Second Sunday in Advent, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer. The collect captures and establishes an entire Anglican sensibility about the purpose of Scripture as revelation. Something is made known to us about the high things of God and about our lives with God in the witness of the Scriptures and through the creedal tradition of the Church faithful to that witness. The issue for our day is whether we are willing to hear and receive that Word coming so powerfully to us.
“That we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.” Hope. Hope for something more beyond the struggles and limits of human experience. And yet there can be no hope without the theme of judgment awakening us to the reality of the human situation, described so powerfully and accurately in the Gospel. There shall be, it seems, “upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth”. It seems? Let’s be frank. There is much to disturb and trouble us in our own world and day, in our own church and country, in our own hearts and souls. To deny this would be utter folly.
It would also mean to deny the true desire of our hearts which is always for something more beyond the agony and the pain of the conflicts and divisions within and among ourselves. But where the Word of God is faithfully proclaimed and the Sacraments faithfully celebrated, there and then “know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand”. Such are the signs of the presence of God with us. These lessons are a strong reminder to us of the very nature of the liturgy and its purpose. It is about our being faithfully with the one who comes in judgment and in hope.
