“But about that day and hour no one knows…”
“One will be taken and one will be left…”
“Keep Awake!”
As a kid every year during the first Sunday in Advent I would hear scripture like today’s Gospel—focused on the second coming of Christ—read aloud in church, and every year it scared me. Images of darkening skies and an angry Judge Jesus would enter my mind. I would imagine a rapture taking place, and books and movies from popular culture about the end times just added to my fear. Perhaps you have experienced some similar questions or anxieties on this topic. It never made sense to me as a kid that we would talk about the second coming of Christ as we prepared to celebrate a sweet little baby to be born in a manger a few weeks later. To me these texts were unnerving, but I see now that these texts were also meant, ultimately, to be a message of hope.
It is indeed right that we begin the first Sunday in Advent talking about the second coming of Christ. As we prepare to celebrate Christmas in the coming weeks, we remember Christ’s first radical in-breaking into the world as a tiny baby, Jesus Christ, the Word Become Flesh. Jesus was born into this world and lived in it doing ministry among people, and then he was crucified and rose again. When Christ resurrected from the dead everything changed. Through Christ it became possible for us to be reconciled to God. We were—and still are— living in a new age where Sin and Death no longer has the same power over us that it once did. But Christ told his disciples that his work was not yet done. He will one day come back and he will restore the world to wholeness once and for all, and in the meantime, we are to wait and be ready for his return.
But what does this mean for us exactly? Our Gospel today is a challenging one, and one that often causes misunderstandings and anxiety, so I want to take some time to unpack this text a little more. Most Biblical scholars agree that the Gospel of Matthew was written toward the end of the 1st century, probably around 70-80 AD. That means this Gospel was written 70 years or more after the resurrection of Jesus. The first Christians, however, had been living with a sense of urgency because they believed that Jesus would be coming back soon, possibly at any moment. And yet they had been waiting 70+ years and nothing had happened. Some of them were losing hope that Jesus would come again, and so the author of Matthew writes his Gospel—including today’s text—to reassure the first Christians of Christ’s promises, including his promise of the second coming. The author tells his audience that no one knows the day or the hour—it could be soon but it might not be—but keep awake! Stick with your faith for we will indeed see Jesus again! This text today was meant to be a message of hope and of encouragement for the first Christians to keep living into their new identity in Christ, trusting in God’s promises.
We are meant to hear the same message of hope and encouragement, but it can be difficult to hear that message when Jesus talks about floods, and one being taken and another left behind? These can be scary images that deserve to be understood. When Matthew’s author speaks of Noah’s flood, he is speaking about the unexpectedness of the event. The people of the world in Noah’s time were living their lives doing normal things. They were eating and drinking, marrying and having families. They were doing everyday things, but they had forgotten about God, and so they were unprepared when out of nowhere came the flood. This was a greatly unexpected event that changed everything. The second coming of Christ will also be unexpected, which is why the author of Matthew encourages his readers to “Keep Awake” and not to forget about God in their everyday living.
Jesus similarly continues with the theme of unexpectedness as he gives striking metaphors about men and women doing their everyday work when the Lord shall appear. Two men are in a field—one unexpectedly taken and the other will be left. The same happens to the two women grinding meal. Popular culture has imagined this to be a description of the rapture—the idea that the good people will be zapped up to heaven while the rest are left behind. Scripture itself, however, doesn’t say much about a rapture, but rather emphasizes that the second coming will be unexpected. Like the days of Noah, we will be going about our normal lives when Jesus returns, but in the moment of Christ’s coming all earthly things and our everyday activities will be set aside, so Jesus tells us to keep awake, to have our faith and hearts relying on God above all else. Our world as we know it will not be here forever but Christ will be, and Christ will restore all things according to God’s plan. This passage is less about the judgment or punishment that end-times theology imagines, and more about God’s restorative work coming to completion. We do not know what the end times will be like or what exactly will happen, but we do know that God is good and God is faithful, so we can rely on God and God’s promises.
So keep awake, stick with your faith and don’t lose hope! This is the message Matthew’s original audience heard, and it is the same message that we receive today. Jesus lived, died and resurrected making all things new, and through Christ we live in a new reality. Though there is still brokenness and trials, God’s Kingdom is breaking forth into the world and Christ promises to return and complete the work that has begun. Through Christ we are people of hope, beloved children of God, and while we wait for Christ to return we set aside what separates us from God, and instead participate in God’s ongoing work in the world.
And what a blessing it is that we get to participate in God’s work while we wait for Christ’s return! Each day we wake up to a new day full of opportunities to do good things and further God’s kingdom just a little bit more. In our daily lives as Christians we seek to live in a way that reflects God’s love to those around us. We worship and we pray and we show kindness to others. We reach out to the neighbor and welcome the stranger. We walk alongside those who are hurting and we tell others about God’s love for all people. We seek justice and we work to restore the marginalized to community so that all may belong in God’s Beloved Community. We live, work, and play each day trusting in God’s promises and living into Christ’s hope. So as we enter into the season of Advent may we watch for God’s presence in the world, wait for Christ’s return with hope, and live in wonder and awe of God’s promises through Jesus Christ, Our Lord and Savior. Thanks be to God. Amen.