red-green team and the blue side

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The sermon from this weekend. I held up red & green and blue ribbon bows while I spoke. And I did find Luther quotes for both sides.

Advent 1A, November 28/29 “That Day and Hour” - Matthew 24:36-44

You know, it's that time of year. The church calls it Advent, and the world calls this is the time before Christmas. Those are two different orientations, you see. I’m going to call these two attitudes the Red/Green Team and the Blue Side. And these are balanced, I think, and we live, more or less, in both ways of life, some of us more, some of us less.

The Red-Green Team – those who live in the ‘Time before Christmas” find their world filled with stuff to do,
• plans to fulfill, things to buy or to make, places to go, people to see.
• These folks have no problem with hearing Christmas Music early, seeing decorations and spreading the delightful promises of the festival season early and often. Why can’t we sing Joy to the World?
• It is a time filled with doing and activity. Those are not bad things – we really try to think about what others might want, we become more generous and kind-hearted. I love the time before Christmas for its ability to stir even the least spiritual into an awareness of others, of giving to the less needy. Charity at the holidays is something we can be proud of.

Now on the church calendar, we call these 4 Sundays the time of Advent. This is where the Blue Side lives.
• The Blue side is all about waiting, listening, watching, keeping awake, becoming aware of silence and uncertainty.
• The Blue Side remembers there are old and seldom sung hymns just for this season. They are the O Come, O Come Emmanuel folks.
• It is less about doing, and more about listening, seeing, asking questions. Where is God today? What does God want? What does it mean that God became human, and was really present in this first century Jew we call Jesus?

These two attitudes are often looked at as opposites, as two things that can’t exist together, but today I see both of these orientations as having their own blessing as we live as the Advent people. Both orientations, the one that is busy and full of things to do, and the one that is quiet and attentive, both respond to the same hope, the same great news.

The hope is the one expressed in our scripture readings today – over and over again – that God will do a new thing, that the kingdom of God will be made real, that the city of God will be established, that the people of God will be safe, that all people will be gathered into God’s loving embrace.

We know that this movement of God, this new thing, began with the birth of Jesus long ago, and flowered in the life of Jesus and was testified in his death and resurrection – and we wait in hope for the next moment, that which was promised. That’s why we call this time ‘Advent’ (which is related to the word advance – this is time in advance of something). There are these strange images from the Bible and they tell us that in some way, God’s not done. God’s not done with us. God’s not done with the story.

So both the Red-Green Team and the Blue Side are working in this sense of hope, of expectation that something is going to happen, and we ought to be ready for it.

We do not know when God will complete the story of his love, his victory, his justice for all. But we know that we live in advance of it – we live in expectation, in hope, that both justice and judgment will come. Those two things – justice and judgment – are not opposed at all in the eyes of God. The kingdom of God is a place where peace is practiced, where all are called to the banquet, and no one goes hungry, no one is cold, no one is left alone. And those blessings are to come through God’s chosen people, through the grace and love and strength given by God. The story is not completed, but we play our part as this generation of those who must be prepared.

So listen to the lessons – They speak of the joy of salvation – of being God’s loved people and they speak of responsibility. They speak God’s actions, yes, but also of the expectations for God’s people. Isaiah calls the people of God to ‘walk in the light of the Lord!’ even though the complete victory of his vision is far away. Walk in the light - there is a way to live that is close to God’s intentions.

The apostle Paul has the same insight – that when we are living in the waiting time, we are living not just for ourselves, but for the hope that is in us. So he reminds his listeners to cling to honor, to seek to live well, remembering the better way that we have been taught.

And Jesus gives us this extraordinary reminder that life can be short, that encounters with God can come at any moment – we do not know the hour or the day. We might want to shrug off this passage, but it should re mind us that judgment will come, and in the Gospel of Matthew, judgment and justice lie side by side. Like the owner of the house, we should be always ready to respond – never thinking that tomorrow is soon enough for charity, that next year is soon enough for commitment. God doesn’t work that way. Now is the time.

Perhaps for each of us, whether we are on the Red-Green team or Blue Side of this season – we can take a lesson from pattern of the other.

For the busy Red-Green people – how do we listen for God’s hope beyond our own busy plans? The answer may be in those practices of quietness and mediation – in devotions and music and scripture reading that force us to take time away from planning and doing so that we are just present. Luther was asked how he fit everything into his busy life - well, I pray 2 hours a day, and if I'm really busy . . . I pray for 4 hours.

If you are like me, and make to do lists, we could put ‘PRAY’ at the top of our list. If you already do this – then you may already be leaning to the Blue Side, but for those of us who find ourselves full of tasks to do, our Advent challenge is to stop and listen, stop and contemplate, stop doing and start waiting.

For those Blue Side – we must realize that God has placed us in the world and called us to service now. So the question may be: how do we find our path of impacting and serving the world that God has placed in front of us? There is an old story about Martin Luther being asked what he would do if he were to discover that the world were coming to an end tomorrow. Luther’s response: “I would plant an apple tree.”

That’s a Red-Green response if ever there was one. It was Luther’s way, I suspect, of asserting that our calling is ever to trust in God’s faithfulness and to seek to be faithful followers of Jesus, day in and day out. Our calling is to embrace the sharp edge of expectant hope, to affirm that, even now, God may well be at work in the world around us.

So whether you identify with the Red-Green Team or the Blue Side, whether you desire to sing your Christmas Carols today or long to hear the rare and solemn ancient hymns of Advent – you are called to live in expectation that, yes, Christ is Coming, Christ is coming indeed.