First Reading
Isaiah 64:1–9
Oh that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at your presence— as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil— to make your name known to your adversaries, and that the nations might tremble at your presence! When you did awesome things that we did not look for, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence. From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides you, who acts for those who wait for him. You meet him who joyfully works righteousness, those who remember you in your ways. Behold, you were angry, and we sinned; in our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved? We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. There is no one who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have made us melt in the hand of our iniquities. But now, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. Be not so terribly angry, O LORD, and remember not iniquity forever. Behold, please look, we are all your people. (ESV)
Second Reading
1 Corinthians 1:3–9
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge—even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you—so that you are not lacking in any gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (ESV)
Gospel Text
Mark 13:24–37
“But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. And then he will send out the angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.
“From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.
“But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard, keep awake. For you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his servants in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to stay awake. Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning—lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I say to all: Stay awake.” (ESV)
Comments and Questions for Discussion
First Reading
It turns out that our Isaiah text for 1 Advent is only the second half of a longer lament that begins back on verse seven of chapter sixty-three. I managed to get through decades of ministry without ever realizing this. I suppose it’s what happens when you focus so intently on the Gospel texts for preaching each week and have too little time to study the others in depth. Or maybe I was just lazy. At any rate, the longer lament reads better than our truncated one, so I’m going to just copy the whole thing here.
Isaiah 63:7-64:12
I will recount the steadfast love of the LORD, the praises of the LORD, according to all that the LORD has granted us, and the great goodness to the house of Israel that he has granted them according to his compassion, according to the abundance of his steadfast love. For he said, “Surely they are my people, children who will not deal falsely.” And he became their Savior. In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them; in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old. But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit; therefore he turned to be their enemy, and himself fought against them. Then he remembered the days of old, of Moses and his people. Where is he who brought them up out of the sea with the shepherds of his flock? Where is he who put in the midst of them his Holy Spirit, who caused his glorious arm to go at the right hand of Moses, who divided the waters before them to make for himself an everlasting name, who led them through the depths? Like a horse in the desert, they did not stumble. Like livestock that go down into the valley, the Spirit of the LORD gave them rest. So you led your people, to make for yourself a glorious name. Look down from heaven and see, from your holy and beautiful habitation. Where are your zeal and your might? The stirring of your inner parts and your compassion are held back from me. For you are our Father, though Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us; you, O LORD, are our Father, our Redeemer from of old is your name. O LORD, why do you make us wander from your ways and harden our heart, so that we fear you not? Return for the sake of your servants, the tribes of your heritage. Your holy people held possession for a little while; our adversaries have trampled down your sanctuary. We have become like those over whom you have never ruled, like those who are not called by your name. Oh that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at your presence— as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil— to make your name known to your adversaries, and that the nations might tremble at your presence! When you did awesome things that we did not look for, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence. From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides you, who acts for those who wait for him. You meet him who joyfully works righteousness, those who remember you in your ways. Behold, you were angry, and we sinned; in our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved? We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. There is no one who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have made us melt in the hand of our iniquities. But now, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. Be not so terribly angry, O LORD, and remember not iniquity forever. Behold, please look, we are all your people. Your holy cities have become a wilderness; Zion has become a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation. Our holy and beautiful house, where our fathers praised you, has been burned by fire, and all our pleasant places have become ruins. Will you restrain yourself at these things, O LORD? Will you keep silent, and afflict us so terribly? (ESV)
Scholars will tell us that this lament probably originated after the return from exile and was later added into the book of Isaiah. Some will say that it was written during the exile, but none attribute it to the prophet. It is certainly true that the tone and language of this section are at odds with the material that surrounds it. I personally choose to believe that this could have and did come from the mouth of Isaiah, and that a later editor of his oracles included it in a place that didn’t fit it too well, but I don’t think that changes anything about how I/we read it. These verses, no matter their source, are included as part of the work of the Spirit to gather together that which God desires that I read, and so their source doesn’t affect their importance to me.
What matters to me is that this is a cry of anguish from the author to God on behalf of the people of Israel. Two important images jump out at me. That of the Father and that of the Potter. Three aspects of fatherhood are raised up. First that of the progenitor whose position as head of the family means that he deserves honor and obedience. “For he said, “Surely they are my people, children who will not deal falsely.” And yet the people did, and so God’s wrath was justified. “But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit; therefore he turned to be their enemy, and himself fought against them.”
Second is the image of the Father who has compassion on His children. “In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them; in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.” Much of this lament seems to be a cry to God to recall this pity and act out of it.
Then there is the third image of a Father, that whose responsibility it is to defend his household. Of the three, this seems to be the dominant one. God is the one who will “Look down from heaven and see, from your holy and beautiful habitation. Where are your zeal and your might? The stirring of your inner parts and your compassion are held back from me. For you are our Father, though Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us…” When even the great Fathers of the faith (Abraham, Jacob/Israel) have denied them, God remains their Father, and of Him the prophet says, “Where is he who brought them up out of the sea with the shepherds of his flock? Where is he who put in the midst of them his Holy Spirit, who caused his glorious arm to go at the right hand of Moses, who divided the waters before them to make for himself an everlasting name, who led them through the depths?
It has been noted in the things I studied that while God’s parenthood is mentioned elsewhere in the Hebrew Scriptures, God is rarely depicted specifically as Father. While it might be implied in other places, in many of them the image of a mother as parent fits as well or better. And yet here in this lament God is specifically named as “our Father” three times.
In the latter verses God’s fatherhood is also linked to the image of a potter. “But now, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.” This ties neatly into the earlier image of God as Creator, as Source, but it also recalls Isaiah’s earlier use of the image in chapters 29 and 30. “You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be regarded as the clay, that the thing made should say of its maker, “He did not make me”; or the thing formed say of him who formed it, “He has no understanding”? (29:16) and “Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,“Because you despise this word and trust in oppression and perverseness and rely on them, therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse, whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant; and its breaking is like that of a potter’s vessel that is smashed so ruthlessly that among its fragments not a shard is found with which to take fire from the hearth, or to dip up water out of the cistern.” (30:12–14) The potter’s right to use the vessel or to crush it as unworthy is asserted as part of the lament. The closing verses claim no right to redemption, only a hope that God will remember and for the sake of His mercy arise.
We read these verses in the context of the First Sunday of Advent, in which our vision is still pointed towards the Lord’s second coming, beginning a transition from Christ the King to the anticipation of Christmas. In the next two weeks we’ll hear from the Baptist, announcing Jesus’ first advent, then on 4 Advent we’ll hear the Annunciation of His birth. But this week, we’re still focused on the Second Coming. Isaiah’s plea is one that I hope we’ll hear in our preparations. “All our righteous deeds are as filthy rags.” As caught up as we are in a culture of “self esteem,” I do think that this position, prostrate before God leaning on nothing but His mercy, is rather unwelcome. Yet I think it necessary for us to be sufficiently open to receive the power and redemption God is more than willing to offer. It isn’t that God withholds, it is that our hands cannot hold what God offers as long as they cling to anything that tries to give us value apart from Him. As the world seems to be crumbling around us, perhaps it will be easier for us to admit that “all our righteous deeds are as filthy rags,” and let them go.
Let me be clear, though. I believe that this is a word for the church, not a word directed from the church to the world. This is only meant to be heard by ears that already know the steadfast love of God. This is the plank in our own eye that renders us unfit to remove the speck from anyone else’s. It is the Holy Spirit’s place to convict, not ours. We preach Good News to the broken and downtrodden and even the enemy. When they become convinced of their own belovedness, then God will begin to show them the falsehoods they’ve carried as armor and gently lift them away. Ours is not to point out the filth of anyone else’s rags.
(I’m sorry that came out so long.)
Second Reading
We will be reading a lot more of 1 Corinthians later in Year B, so I will refrain from writing an introduction to the whole letter for the sake of the verses chosen for 1 Advent. Instead, I will generalize so as to put our reading for this Sunday into some context.
If there were one thing that I troubled Paul about the Corinthian congregation, one thing from which most of their problems arose, I think I’d call it an “over-realized eschatology.” That is, they had bought into a kind of gnostic error that said that Jesus’ return was accomplished at Pentecost, and that they were living “eternal life” already. This “knowledge” they had meant that they were exempt from ordinary morality and that they had nothing more to look forward to. I’ll try to get into that in more detail when we read more of 1 Corinthians later in this lectionary year.
We’ve already seen in Paul’s other letters that the opening thanksgivings always tell us something about the concerns he plans to address later in the letter. This week we have the opening thanksgivings for 1 Corinthians. So how do these verses connect to what I’ve said about the Corinthian error(s) above?
…in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge…
Paul has named the problem right at the outset. They believe themselves graced with “all knowledge.” Paul is not commending this. His reference to this in the opening is ironic. Their overemphasis on the use of tongues is probably also his reason for naming “speech” as a part of that grace they’ve received.
…so that you are not lacking in any gift…
Paul will go on to talk about spiritual gifts later in the letter. The Corinthians’ overconfidence in the “gifts” has led them astray.
…as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ… The Corinthians are not waiting for any further revelation of Jesus Christ, nor do they believe in any future resurrection of the dead. They’re not “waiting” for anything.
…who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ…” For the church in Corinth, there is no “end” toward which they look, and this belief that they have already received all there is to receive means that there is no reason to worry about “guilt.” Paul reminds them that there is still more, and that moral behavior has no meaning any longer.
There are likely other connections between this opening section of thanksgivings and the rest of the letter, but these are the ones that jump off the page at me.
Gospel Text
As with the first reading for this Sunday, the focus of 1 Advent shines through, a focus on Christ’s second advent, His Second Coming. Two different approaches to that posture of expectation are represented in the verses appointed for this week.
In the first four verses we have what I view as the conclusion to Mark’s “small apocalypse.” It has been called this by scholars for ages because in the portion of the chapter preceding our lectionary Jesus describes in some detail the events that will immediately precede His return. This kind of prediction of the present (the sufferings endured by the first generation of Christians) as a mark of the vindication that is soon to follow is precisely what marks it as the genre known as “apocalypse.” Apocalypse is also known for attributing this accurate description of the present by an honored and reliable witness from the past by someone in the present. This means that apocalypse in its purest form does not come from the person who “speaks” it in the text. (You can find more on apocalypse and its function in the Divergence for All Saints, Year A, when I write about Revelation. Here’s a link.)
This means that I don’t attribute these opening verses of our reading to Jesus, which will likely be disturbing to some of you who read these Divergences. Please hear this, though. I still believe them to be inspired, I still believe they belong in the Bible, in this Gospel, and that they are a gift from God. I believe that apocalypse is inspired speech or writing. I believe that in the first generation of Christians a number of people inspired by the Holy Spirit spoke “in Jesus’ Name” to other Christians and that these particular verses were recorded and found their way into Mark’s Gospel. I believe that their inclusion was also inspired and intended not only for the edification and encouragement of those to whom they were first given, but also for us.
What they were not written for was to serve as a precise prediction of events still in your future and mine. God did not inspire these words to tell you and me which signs to look for just before Jesus returns. Think about it. Jesus also says that “this generation will not pass away” before these things come to pass. They were written for that generation. For this reason they are grouped with the teachings that follow, teachings about knowing neither the day nor the hour, but instructing us to live expectantly in every moment. By freeing them from the shackles of specific prediction, we free these verses to speak to us far more clearly. What they say is that God has always and will always come to us in power when we are enduring great suffering so that we might live with joyful expectancy even in the midst of it.
For me this is the great tension, the great paradox of the Christian. On the one side, knowing God’s heart for His children, His creation, I also know at least something of His great heartbreak and wrath at the harm that they suffer, that it suffers. This wrath is an inextricable result of His great love. At the same time, in the same moment, we also know His great joy in the redemption of all Creation through His Son. We see ourselves and everyone else through His eyes, as those redeemed by the Lamb.
I find that I tend to vacillate from one of those poles to the other, heartbreak and/or wrath, or joy. I am far less successful than I’d like to be at holding onto both of them at the same time. Yet “apocalypse” calls me to do just that, to recognize that in God what I know as “future” bleeds into the present, that I cannot survive the tribulation without the joy, and I cannot live fully into the joy without acknowledging the sorrow and the pain that the world’s brokenness inflicts. To live with the pain apart from the joy will make me bitter and angry. To live with the joy without the pain will make me, well, useless, cut off from the suffering (my own and that of others) that compels me to alleviate it.
So, yes, I think this “small apocalypse” was probably spoken in Jesus’ name by someone in the first generation of Christians. And I don’t think that it was meant to give me specific signs to look for before Jesus’ return. But I also believe that it is in the Bible to call me into that place of paradox, of glorious and difficult tension.
