November 29, 1998

Accountability

Today, we begin the church season of Advent, the new church year. There are two signs in front of us. They remind us that life is indeed a mixture of elements. There is the dark element that we sang about this morning. The signs of endings that are marked by anxiety, or fear, or depression. But there are also other signs of light coming through. They are ways in which God's grace enters us: faith and our life in community with one another, in the sacraments of Baptism and the Holy Communion, in the loving relationships of our family and our circle of friends, and, of course, in the words of the Holy Scripture. The resources of life and the resources of light are ways that God's grace enters our lives day in and day out. And, of course, the greatest of all these resources of light and life is our relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ.

Our lives are lived between two great realities that become so apparent at this time of the year. The more prominent one of course that we all know about and we all couldn't escape if we wanted to is the first coming, our Lord's nativity, Christmas. A wonderful season of family gatherings that begin this week with Thanksgiving and continue off and on until Christmas and the New Year. It reminds us of our Lord's first visitation when love itself came down and dwelt among us, the word made flesh. And though he was struck down, that same loving God continues to live among us today in the universal Lordship of Jesus Christ.

He lives in our hearts and in the smiles of those who come to us in his name. Isaiah speaks of it back in the time of the Babylonian exile, when he says, "In the coming of the Lord all nations will stream to the mountain of the Lord." And he looks out and sees that there is a time coming when God himself will come and dwell among us. And so that first great reality of the Lord's coming, his nativity, is before us at this season of our year.

But the most important focal point is what comes next. As we look forward to the second advent, the second coming or our Lord, and as we prepare ourselves in heart, mind, and body to meet our Lord in glory, Jesus tells us in the meantime, live a life of accountability. Be accountable for what you do and say and think. Live today because the Lord may come. Live today as though in the next hour or the next quarter of the day Jesus Christ himself is coming again.

Christ gives us his own standard, the standard of the Messiah, by which to measure our lives. It is a terribly difficult standard, one in which we will all fail, but one to which we are called to strive and to measure ourselves, not against each other — never against each other, but always against the Lord, so that we may remain both humble and alert. Christ, condemned by his own perfection, but then the same Christ who stretches out his arms on the hard wood of the cross to embrace us with those arms of love — to accept us as his own redeemed children, to accept us as the ones forgiven. On the cross he says to the Father, "Lord forgive them, in every age, for they do not know what they do." The life of accountability is a life judged by love, not judged by statutory law, but judged by love.

There is the story of a man who dies and goes to heaven. He gets to the pearly gates and St. Peter meets him with the big book, the ledger book, the good deeds and the bad deeds. (We all worry about that, don't we?) And Peter says "O.K. now, why should we let you in?" And the man says, "Well, I was a Christian my whole life." Peter says, "Well that is worth five points; you only need 95 more." The man, starting to sweat a little bit says, "Well, I was a good husband to my wife and father to my children." St. Peter says, "That is 25 points, good." The man is feeling better. "I was an honest businessman." "That is worth another 10 points." He is feeling even better and says, "I served on the vestry of my parish." St. Peter says, "That is a minus 15!" The man, crestfallen, turns aside. He says, "But for the grace of God, I never would have seen the pearly gates." And St. Peter says, "That is 100!"

We are judged by the love of God which fulfills the law. We are judged by the Christ who died for us, and the law is fulfilled. When we measure ourselves, we measure ourselves against the Christ who died for us - never against each other, for we are fellow pilgrims on the way to assist each other into the kingdom, to lift each other up, and to remind each other that we are the beloved children of God - you as well as I.

Isaiah speaks to us again this morning, standing on the edge of exile, as the people in Jerusalem are being conquered and sent back to the Tigris Euphrates Valley from which Abraham came, but this time in exile from the Holy Mountain of God. And as Isaiah looks out over that gulf of exile that the people will face for 40 or 50 years, he speaks of a foretaste in the present of the future of deliverance, of the return to this place. Isaiah lives then and reminds his people as they go into exile, to live with a consciousness rooted in the new age of restoration, in the age of coming back to the Holy Mountain of Zion.

Not in a dissimilar position, St. Paul today is writing a letter to us as he continues his journey to Rome to face Nero ( not exactly one of your more favored emperors of the Roman Empire), to face Nero's judgment. Paul writes knowing where he is going and why and what the potential consequences are, saying to us that deliverance is nearer today than we first believed. He sees that black hole of judgment not as condemnation but as opportunity, and he uses every opportunity to proclaim the gospel of Christ Jesus until his dying breath in Nero's arena.

As we read Isaiah and Paul today, we are reminded that we too, in our own Christian community here, exist between those two advents of the already happened and the not yet. We know that Christ has come among us with great humility in that manger in Bethlehem; and we can see the future. We can see that Christ will come again in great glory to restore all creation to the Father, and we can have that foretaste. We can live it now because we know what it is going to be like. Jesus tells us, story after story after story, what the Kingdom of God shall be like.

Jesus calls us then to accountability in life. Life continues, he said, just as in the day of Noah's time. People married and gave in marriage, they raised their crops, they reared their children, they built their houses - but in total ignorance that God was there - in total ignorance of what they should be doing in relationship to God. And he says, now you live your lives, marrying and giving in marriage, building your houses, doing your civic duties, doing all the things that you are called to do, but recognize now that the Kingdom of God is very near. Live today not as though God has walked away and washed his hands of this enterprise, but live as though he is on the front steps and will soon ring your doorbell.

If what you are supposed to be doing today is to take a hike, get out and take your hike. If what you are supposed to be doing today is visiting someone who is lonely, go visit them. If you are supposed to dust the piano today, do it, but do it in the knowledge that Christ is present. The Christian lives in anticipation of the Lord's second coming, by living responsibly in the meantime. Our work is not unimportant. Our work is an integral part of salvation. What Christ has given each one of us to do is important to God in order that his plan of salvation may be fulfilled. It is never happenstantial occurrence. It is always what God would have us to do when we align our lives with doing his work in the world around us.

Jesus Christ came in the first century- not one of our better centuries on the planet. It was marked by corruption; it was marked by trouble; it was marked by evil; it was marked by striking bargains with the devil. Jesus walked into that arena in the first century and he called the people to throw off the works of darkness, as Paul would say later, to throw off the works of darkness and put on instead the armor of light.

And Jesus Christ comes today. Jesus Christ comes to the end of the twentieth century — not one of our better centuries. He walks into a world marked by corruption; he walks into a world marked by trouble and evil; he walks into a world where people make veritable bargains with the devil and he calls on us to throw off the works of darkness and to put on the armor of light — to live with integrity in the meantime. To live the life of accountability knowing that he is counting on us to do his work, so that when he does come into the world again he will find a Kingdom prepared for his arrival.

So let him come! Let him come! Let him walk into your heart and rule your life. Let him come to you and change you in ways that Christ would have you to be changed. Give up the resistance to doing his work and say Lord, I do not know what to do, but use these hands to do it. Let Christ come into your heart and heal the broken places and hurt places, so that you may hold yourselves ready for the second coming of the Son of God.

As St. Paul said then, so we say today, deliverance is nearer to us now than when we first believed. And that is passing good news!

AMEN

The Rev. Dr. Robert G. Certain
rgcertain@aol.com
29 November 1998