Advent 1B

Have you ever seen the comedy movie 

Chicken Little?

The sky is falling!

If you haven't seen the movie, what happens is that Chicken Little is sitting under a tree when a piece of sky falls and hits him on the head. 

He starts panicking.

He runs to the town bell tower and starts ringing the emergency bell.

And everyone else starts panicking.

Without knowing why.

So much so, people are running around, running into things, screaming and carrying on,

that the town water tower falls apart 

and the huge round part at the top, 

full of water,

falls down and rolls around town destroying things.

Chicken Little's panic does actually cause a real emergency.

All because he believes the sky is falling.

The sky is falling!

Jesus says it,

so it must be true.

Quite literally, Jesus says the stars are falling out of the sky.

Remember the three kinds of apocalypse?

The world ending because of natural disaster

the world ending because of human disaster

the revealing of truth

Well, this week's gospel passage is doubly apocalyptic.

Not only is the world coming to an end,

truth is being revealed as well.

On the ending of the world side of things,

What we heard was that the stars will be falling out of the sky.

However there's this grammar quirk about ancient Greek that allows both the future tense, will be, and the present tense, is

to be used at the same time.

So Jesus was both saying that the stars WILL BE falling out the sky

and

that the stars ARE falling out of the sky.

Kind of a scary prospect when you think about the fact that stars are giant balls of fiery gases which weigh over 2 octillion tons.

If the stars were literally falling out of the sky,

it would definitely be a natural disaster.

Why does that matter?

It matters because Jesus is very good at speaking in multiple ways at once,

both literally and figuratively.

This is part of the revealing of truth kind of apocalypse.

Its a metaphor... and is actually going to happen.

Also, because the author of the gospel of Mark,

let's call him Mark for good measure,

was very focused

on the urgency and immediacy and importance

of what was going on with Jesus' life

and what Jesus said.

Let's look deeper into this passage. 

Now to be fair, I will point out that this passage is

very very 

very very

deep.

We are only going to skim the surface of this passage. 

My friend Suse, a priest in Houston, wrote her entire PhD dissertation on this chapter of Mark.

Mark chapter 13 starts with Jesus coming out of the temple teaching his disciples about the temple being thrown down

and then quickly moves to Jesus sitting on the Mount of Olives with 

just Peter, James, John, and Andrew.

He tells them a bunch of things,

of which our gospel passage is at the end,

and finishes the chapter. 

Chapter 14, the next chapter,

is a long chapter which jumps forward

and takes the story all the way from preparations of the Passover

through the Last Supper and Jesus being arrested and Peter denying Jesus three times.

So Chapter 13 is Jesus' last ditch attempt to teach the disciples about what is going to happen.

Jesus tells his disciples watch out

because there are going to be false prophets

false Messiahs who come in his name

but are frauds.

Jesus tells his disciples not to be too concerned 

that they are going to suffer

and be beaten

and arrested

and that they are going to have to stand up for themselves in court.

Jesus tells his disciples that when the Emperor

sets up his statue in the temple in Jerusalem

they must abandon the temple.

So obviously, this is a lovely hill side chat between Jesus and his favored four.

Symbolically also

Jesus is telling his disciples about the end times

about the coming suffering and feeling of desolation

on the hill on which he is going to die. 

Its an intense conversation.

And then,

Jesus says, after all the suffering,

the world is going to appear to end,

and the Son of Man will arrive,

and gather up his people.

And he gives the disciples a few more signs of how they are going to know this is happening.

Unfortunately, the signs are not all that specific. 

Well, except the one. 

Jesus says that the generation he is talking to will not pass away before the end of the world happens. 

I think perhaps,

this passage is a great example of Jesus being human.

He got the timing wrong.

Or perhaps he has been very very late.

He said that the generation around him would not pass away before the end of time had come.

I think he got a little confused about God's time and its translation to linear human time.

But either way, he says over and over again

that no one,

no one,

except the Father, God in heaven,

knows when it will all go down.

So, Jesus says,

Keep Awake.

He says it not only to the disciples, but he also says it to everyone.

Keep Awake.

As the last thing Jesus teaches before the narrative of being arrested, charged, beaten, and killed, 

its very poignant.

Keep Awake.

Now, how does all of this relate to us?

How does all of this relate to Advent?

Well, we all certainly understand that feeling of

the sky is falling!

The sky is falling!

When our worlds are falling apart.

Bad grades, relationship break ups,

losing jobs, defaulting on loans,

divorces, illness, deaths.

There are plenty of big and little ways

the world falls apart each day.

The interesting thing is that no matter which kind of world falling apart you're talking about,

the pattern is always the same.

The world falls apart.

Everything seems like it is going to end.

There is great darkness,

in the world or in our hearts,

and then Jesus arrives.

The advice to "Keep Awake"

is true on both levels:

In looking forward to the coming of the end of time

or when your own world falls apart.

In either situation,

as soon as the sky is falling,

Jesus is coming.

Jesus is going to be present.

Many certainly have commented on the extremeness of the world situation at the moment in conjunction with the possibility of the coming of the end of times.

And in the darkness,

Jesus is present.

On the street, in this church,

sitting between you in the pew...

Keep awake.

You'll see him. 

Wakefulness 

is both contemplative as well as action filled.

Seeing Jesus is something which takes the ability to see

requiring watchfulness and mindfulness,

sitting quiet and allowing Jesus to make his presence known,

and also a committed, dogged, going out and looking for Jesus.

I don't know how many people I have met

who have been the midst of great darkness

and totally missed Jesus' arrival

in their lives.

Yet, that is 

always 

the time at which he shows up.

Its also interesting to hear that while Heaven and earth are going to pass away,

Jesus' words are not going to pass away.

We believe that Jesus is the Word of God made flesh,

certainly at this time of year, 

as we look forward to his birth in human form in the feast of the Nativity.

That's what this whole season of Advent is about,

getting ourselves prepared for Jesus' coming.

Which if we think about that pattern of when Jesus shows up,

means that Advent necessarily feels like a time of darkness.

But the eternal Word will not pass away.

No, it will stay with us.

The Word will exist and be with us forever

and ever 

and ever 

and ever 

and ever

in ways we cannot understand.

All in all, 

Keep Awake.

The sky might be falling.

But that means Jesus is coming!

Amen.