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DECEMBER 2 , 2007
Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires. (ESV).
Romans 13:11–14
Today is the first Sunday in Advent. Perhaps, more importantly, it’s the first Sunday of the new Church Year. During the season of Advent, we stress the threefold coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
So I have a question to ask: “Are you ready? Are you awake? Are you wide awake?” You should be, for St. Paul says in our text, “The hour has come for you to wake from sleep.”1 Now, this same text makes it clear that we will be prepared for Christ’s final coming if we have, first of all, a proper understanding of the time we are now living in. And, in the second place, if we have “put on the armor of light” and “put on Jesus Christ himself.”
I. Wide Awake: To the Time We Are Now Living In
The time we are now living in is, quite possibly, the most exciting in all of history, for we are closer to the end than anyone has ever been before. Paul says we are closer to our salvation than when we first believed. Time is moving inexorably toward the end of time. The Greek word St. Paul uses for time is kairos. We might call it “pregnant time.” It is that time which “results in grand decisive events that close one period of history as [it] inaugurates another.”2 What makes this the time of times is that the next tick of the clock, the next second, may well be the second that ushers in eternity. On the day of Christ’s final coming, eternity will swallow up time. And our Lord shall usher his beloved bride, the Church, into everlasting glory.
Please understand: The Savior of the world has already come and completed the work of our salvation. For us and for our salvation, he lived a sinless life, and, on the cross, bore all our sins on his own body that, by his death, we might have life. And his resurrection is the evidence that he has defeated all our enemies, sin, death, and the power of the devil. All that remains is for our risen Lord to return and lead us to our eternal home.
Another way to think about it is to consider the Second Article of the Apostles’ Creed. Christ has already been conceived and born. He has already suffered, died, and been buried. On the third day, he has already descended into hell to declare his victory over the forces of evil3 and has already been raised from the dead. He has already ascended into heaven, and is now sitting (body and soul) at the right hand of the Father. There is only one thing that remains, only one! That would be his final coming, or, as we say it in the Creed, “from thence he will come to judge the living and the dead!”
Since the end–times clock is holding at one second before the end, this is no time to doze or to take a spiritual nap. But from what Paul says in our text, we gather that this was what some of the Roman Christians of his day were doing. Paul does not accuse them of being dead, i.e., of having no faith. But he does tell them to wake up, i.e., not to be indifferent to false doctrine and to be on guard lest they give in to the temptations of evil. He even tells us that some of them were behaving like rank pagans, engaging in deeds of darkness. So he says to them, “Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.”4
The exhortation to wake up applies to us today as well. The temptation to become lax is a real and ever–present danger in our “do what turns you on” culture. “Thou shalt have fun” seems to have replaced “Thou shalt have no other gods” as the new 1st Commandment. Satan and our sinful flesh also encourage us in the direction of spiritual laxity and sin. There is, as all of us know full well, an enticing side to evil. When our first parents ate of the forbidden fruit, it did not appear deadly to them, but seductively attractive. So it is with us today. That which is forbidden by God presents itself to us as something to be desired. Oh, we must have it. It looks so tantalizing, so alluring. The forbidden fruit may be another’s spouse or another’s money or goods. It may even be forsaking one’s own soul in pursuit of earthly gain or pleasure. But no matter how beautiful the evil may appear, to pursue it without repentance is to put oneself one tick of the clock away from the fiery abyss.
The story is told of a lamb and its mother. It seems that the lamb passed a pig pen each morning on the way to the pasture with its mother. Watching the pigs wallow in the mud seemed like fun, and on an especially hot day the lamb asked his mother if he could jump the fence and wallow in the cool mud. She replied, “No.” Then the lamb asked the usual question, “Why?” His mother just said, “Sheep don’t wallow.” This did not satisfy the lamb. He felt that he had a right to wallow if he wanted to. As soon as his mother was out of sight, he jumped into the pig pen and soon felt the cooling mud on his body. After a few moments he decided he had better go back to his mother, but he couldn’t! He was stuck! Mud and wool do not mix. His pleasure had become his prison. He was hopelessly bound by his own folly. He cried out and was rescued by a kind farmer. When cleaned and returned to the fold, his mother said, “Remember, sheep don’t wallow!” So it is with sin. It looks so inviting but it always ensnares us. Pleasures seem seductively attractive, but they can easily become our prisons. So remember, Christians do not wallow!5
II. Wide Awake: Putting On Christ and the Armor of Light
We Christians live wide awake, don’t we? Our text also tells us that we will be properly prepared for Christ’s final coming if we “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”6 But what does it mean to put on Christ? It means that we are to clothe ourselves with Christ as if we were putting on a full–length coat. God wants us to clothe ourselves with the perfect righteousness of Christ.
But that is not something that we can do for ourselves. It is something only God can do. And God does precisely this in our baptisms. To the Galatians, Paul writes, “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.”7 Indeed, Isaiah says of God, “He has clothed me with garments of salvation; he has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness.”8
About 25 years ago, I met a godly pastor who said that the most challenging thing he ever had to do was to teach a class of three–year–olds what Jesus did for them. He gave it considerable thought and finally decided what he would do.
So, three days before the appointed day, he got a plain, metal garbage can and filled it full of table scraps. He put the lid on it and let it bake in the hot late–August sun. When the children were assembled in a cool room, the pastor drug in the covered garbage can. “Children,” he said, “I want to show you something. I want to show you what God sees when he looks at our sinful hearts.” Then he opened the garbage can. A nasty odor crept through the room. Then, every child walked by and saw the moldy mess and smelled the awful smell. It didn’t take long before everyone was holding his nose and groaning aloud. “That’s the way God looks at our sinful hearts,” the pastor said.
But he wasn’t done. From the storage room he brought in beautiful white linen cloth which he had liberally doused with a fragrant perfume. “Now watch,” he said to the children as he carefully draped the cloth over the open garbage can. “What do you see now?” he asked. They could see only the beautiful white cloth. And, then, one by one, each child was instructed to smell the new, white garbage can. A few bold ones stepped forward, took in big whiffs, and then turned around and smiled at the group. Soon everyone was marveling at the once–ugly, once–stinky garbage can that had suddenly turned into a beautiful, white, fragrant garbage can. Then the pastor said, “See how wonderful the garbage can looks and smells now. This is how God sees you when you trust in Jesus. He puts a beautiful, white, fragrant coat all around you.”
But still the pastor wasn’t done. “I want to show you,” he said, “what Jesus did to make it possible for you to look and smell so wonderful to God. Then, he took a spray bottle and sprayed a clear mist all over the white cloth. In a few seconds, an image started to appear. He held it up for all to see. It was a picture of Jesus dying on the cross!
I can’t speak for all the children, but I can tell you that every adult there had a deeper understanding of the Gospel. Truly, when God looks at the believer, he sees him wearing Christ’s perfect robe of righteousness. And the point that Paul makes in our text is that, in our baptisms, God has clothed us with Christ and has properly dressed for the great occasion of the King’s final coming. And so dressed, we have put on the armor of light. That is to say, to “put on Christ” is to put on the “armor of light,” for Jesus is the “Light of the world.”9 In fact, it is the Lord himself who gives us the full “armor of God” that Paul so urgently implores believers to put on in Ephesians 6.10
And when our Lord comes, he will usher us into heavenly glory. They tell me . . .
My friends, the night is almost over. The great Day of the Lord is just a tick of the clock away. Now, beloved, now is the time to cast off the deeds of darkness. Now is the time to be wide awake, wearing the robe of Christ and the armor of light which the Gospel gives to us.
And then, when we see the Lord coming in the clouds with power and great glory, we will lift up our heads and say, “Come, Lord Jesus, come!” And the Lord shall say to you and me, “Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”11 And in a moment’s time, we shall be eternally happy, eternally alive, and eternally loved! Truly, the Lord saved his very best for last!
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Soli Deo Gloria!
Endnotes
1 See Romans 13:11.
2 See Richard Chenevix Trench, Synonyms of the New Testament, Ed Robert G. Hoerber (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1989), p. 222.
3 Christ’s descent into hell was not part of his suffering for our sins. On Easter morning, Christ was vivified, that is, he came back to life when his soul (in heaven) was reunited with his body (in the tomb). The very first event after his vivification on the third day was his descent into hell to proclaim his victory over Satan, the demons, and the whole company of the damned. Peter says, “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh [on Good Friday] but made alive in the spirit [on Easter Sunday], in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison.” 1 Peter 3:18–19. Christ’s descent was on Easter morning and was the occasion for him to tell the damned of his victory.
4 See Romans 13:13.
5 Adapted from Pulpit Helps, Sept. 1993, p. 12.
6 See Romans 13:14.
7 See Galatians 3:27.
8 See Isaiah 61:10.
9 In John 8:12, Jesus says, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
10 See Ephesians 6:10-17 for Paul’s listing of the “armor of God.”
11 See Matthew 25:34.
© Copyright 2007 by Redeemer Lutheran Church. All rights reserved.