"The Invitation to Life"

 

            Our theme for Advent is "Jesus Came, the Heavens Adoring."

            Jesus came – he came with hope, with peace, with joy, and with love.

            Today we open our hearts to the gift of hope that Jesus brings. We come to Jesus with a sense of longing and yearning. We desire the gift of true hope. The world offers us so many varieties of false hope, and we are worn out by them: the hope of security, the hope of wishful thinking, the hope of "maybe everything will return to just the way it was for me." Those hopes lead to disappointment and defeat. We come to Christ to receive the water of life, the hope that is true and lasting, that is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness.

            Hope is not easy to talk about. It is complex. The hope that Jesus brings us is not the "happily ever after" hope of fairy tales or of our imaginations. Jesus brings a very realistic view of life, and so the hope he brings comes with persecutions and tribulations before it arrives at the victory of God. The hope that Jesus brings comes with an invitation "Come, take the free gift of the water of life." But it also comes with a warning; "Watch out! Lift up your heads! Be careful! Pray."

            We wait in hope to enter God's Kingdom. Even through trials and difficulties we receive the free gift of the water of life. There is grace in Christ. Despite all the challenges and difficulties in life, there is in the salvation of Christ a new creation, a true relationship with God, a faith that sustains us, a discipline that molds us, a living presence that heals us, a light that guides us, a love that renews us, a life that is eternal. That is the hope that Christ brings.

            This gift of hope also contains a warning: Life is not going to work out in the way you have it pictured. Life will not fit the pattern you dream up. There will be things that surprise you, challenge you, and test you. There are earthquakes and famines and persecutions of all kinds that come, and you do not know when one will greet you.

            There is also a judgment to come. One day you will give an account of your life before God. Jesus wants you to be able to stand on that day. The hope we have from him strengthens our lives to be awake and watchful in every season, and shapes us toward the day when we meet him. So the gift of hope is essential to our Christian living.

            The hope that Jesus gives sustains us in trouble to the day of God's victory. When Jesus spoke of hope in the Gospels, he did not speak of an easy path to God's Kingdom. He did not say that everything would work out in their favor on their way to heaven. For one thing, he said that their temple would be destroyed. During Jesus' day, the temple was undergoing a grand re-building, undertaken by King Herod to win support from the people. Herod constructed a building that was opulent, grand in scale, filled with gold and marble. He built something for the ages, something that had an air of indestructibility about it. The Temple looked like it would last forever. Through it, the people replaced their hope in God with the security given by a grand building: "As long as we have the temple, we don't need hope, for this building will stand forever, and this institution will be protected by God."

            It was misplaced trust. One day when the disciples were admiring the temple, Jesus said it would soon be torn down. That happened in a most dreadful way when the Romans laid siege to Jerusalem and burned the temple down in 70 A.D. That was an overwhelming disaster for the people. They lost their security. They had no hope.

Jesus said that the temple's destruction was part of the end. It did not mean the end of all things, but it was a significant sign of the work of God at the end of time. People could be crushed and defeated by its destruction, or they could leave off their trust in the security afforded by a building, and place their hope in God alone. Our hope is not in a building constructed by Herod, it is in the person of Jesus Christ.

            We keep looking for security so we do not have need of hope. I think the events of 9/11 shook our sense of security, but I don't think they have led us as a people to hope. I think the recession and the foreclosures on so many homes and the fall of the stock market and the unemployment rate have shaken our sense of security, but I don't think all those things have led us to hope in Christ. We long for security, for safety. We think things will return to be as they were.

            But Jesus offers hope. The temple will fall, the temples we build that promise security will not last. Persecutions will come. The word of hope Jesus offers is not always welcome in people's hearts. Earthquakes and wars will be part of life. The world will not calm down. When these things shake us, they provide opportunities for us to reach out and place our trust in Christ. These are doorways to hope. The victory of God is coming. But hope begins with loss, and that is hard for us. We enter the kingdom through tribulation, through "many dangers, toils and snares."

            But grace leads us home.

            "A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit."

            The destruction of the temple is not the end of the story. When our security is shaken, our hope has not ended.

            "The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together."

            The season of Advent brings to us a picture of peace. We see so much of war and conflict during the year that we can easily miss this scene of peace. But that is our sure hope. God moves us to the day when conflict will cease. It is the way of the cross.

            "He tends his flock like a shepherd: he gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young."            Jesus says, "Look up," "watch," and "pray." We go through difficult experiences, we are broken, and we lose hope because we have been hurt by believing the promises of the world. We give up, we reach for something to ease the pain, and we become anxious. Jesus says your hearts get weighed down and the result is drunkenness and anxiety. There is in Christ healing for broken lives. We sing of the shepherd who has come among us.

            "He who has compassion on them will guide them and lead them beside springs of water."

            This is the invitation to the water of life. We sing the hymns of Advent so that the Carols of Christmas might live in us. Advent is about promise and invitation and hope. Christmas is about rejoicing in the presence of the Savior who is Christ the Lord. There is a movement of the soul from one to the other.

I heard Robert Odom speak last week. He is the president of Love, INC. He said he is tired of Christians, because so often Christians invite Christ into their lives, but then hold on to a piece of their lives that they do not surrender to him, that they do not allow his healing love to touch. They cherish a secret sin, they cultivate an attitude of anger or resentment, and they receive but do not give. He said at some point that hidden piece comes alive and wounds someone.

            We can't accept part of the invitation. We can't give Christ half of our lives. We can't live partially in hope. We can't mix the water of life with the heady wine of the world's promises.

            "The river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb into the city. Beside the river stood the tree of life whose leaves are for the healing of the nations. Then I heard the Spirit and the bride say, 'Come!'

            "Let everyone who hears say 'Come!'

            "And let everyone who is thirsty come;

            "Let whoever wishes take the free gift of the water of life."

            Amen.