Have you ever fantasized about living in some other time in history? What is it about that period that appeals to you? People have often tended to look back at earlier, simpler days with a sort of nostalgia, longing for a time when the mail held nothing worse than unsolicited requests for money or past due bills. (Well, I suppose you could call that an unsolicited request for money, too...) If your child got in trouble for mentioning God at school it was as a violation of the third commandment rather than the first amendment...
Only a few years ago, many people believed that the upward economic and technical trajectory we were on seemed to be endless, with democracy defeating tyrannies of all sorts all around the world, free markets improving everyone’s economic prospects, and the dot.com boom seeming to promise a repeal of the business cycle and universal prosperity for a miraculously peaceful and cooperative global village....
But since 9/11 and the subsequent "War on Terror" people have started looking around for a security they hadn't previouly felt a need for. Some looked to our government to defend us from all the frightening new threats. Some looked to family, reorganizing their priorities around relationships. Some came to church, seeking a new or strengthened connection to the eternal. Many denied that the danger was real, or blamed the old ways for it. Others despaired of the old ways and experimented with exotic spiritual practices or abandoned the thought of religion altogether.
But perhaps you don’t look either around or backward, but instead manage the scary times we are in by looing forward. Maybe, like me, you wonder when the Lord is coming and hope that we are, in fact, coming to the end of the age... For many of us the temptation is, whenever we read one of these passages about the coming of our Lord, to intensify that hope and wander about looking upward, like the disciples in the beginning of Acts, after Jesus left them for the last time. “While ...they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. They said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? [Acts 1:10-11] They were angels, of course, and their message is for us, as well as for those 1st century disciples. I have friends who are convinced that the uncertainty and violence of the present is proof that we are entering the end times. Most are looking forward to the day, and spend more time debating the signs than preparing for it. But we need to be a little less complacent. "Alas for you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you want the day of the Lord? It is darkness, not light." [Amos 5:18]
Paul’s words in this passage turned St. Augustine, the great fourth century theologian, toward Christ and away from a life of pride and ambition and self-indulgence. In his Confessions, Augustine said of that moment when he took up the Bible his mother had left upon the garden bench and began to read, "The light shone upon my conscience and I realized that Jesus was the way." Now, the fourth century was a time of great turmoil, with danger both from a decaying culture and a collapsing empire. The barbarians were at the gates in every sense of the word. And yet Augustine took this passage personally. He was no worse than others of his age, in fact better than most: he was faithful to his mistress, he was a good son, an honest man and a respected scholar, and yet he recognized that he fell far short of what God wanted him to be. And - even though we are mostly pretty good people, coming to church pretty regularly and loving our neighbors at least most of the time, we can still do a lot worse than follow Augustine’s example.
Paul gives us two charges in this passage. There's something we’re supposed to know, and then there are some things we’re supposed to do.
First of all, he says, “you know what time it is.” [v. 11] But do we? We have more ways of measuring time than Paul ever dreamed of. And yet most people don’t know how to measure God’s time. Anybody remember the old song “Does anybody know while time it is? Does anybody really care?” Jesus said to his disciples, “You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.” [Mt 16:3]
They were fishermen; they had to know how to interpret the weather because they couldn’t afford to be caught on the lake in a storm. We have the Weather Channel. But we still don’t understand God’s forecast. Paul says that this is a strategic hour, just before dawn: "The day is near.” [v. 12] What day is that? Well, of course everybody thought that he meant the day when Jesus comes back in power to set things right. And when he didn’t, a lot of people were disappointed, they thought Paul had been mistaken, some even have abandoned the idea that Jesus will return at all.
But what if Paul didn’t mean “chronologically near” but instead meant “metaphysically near”? We know that there is no place we can hide from God... As the Psalm says, “Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence?” [Ps 139:7] A favorite verse for early Americans to hang on their walls was “Thou, God, seest me.” [Gen 16:13] How conscious are you, are we of that truth? Do we live in constant awareness of the presence of Christ within us, among us? By now we should certainly be much closer to him now than we were when we first came to know him. The minute we accepted Jesus Christ as our savior, the darkness within us began to recede, driven out by the true light. Each day should see us closer in synch with his character and purposes, as we live and walk in the light of the Lord.
Or what if Paul didn’t mean for all believers at once, but each believer in his or her own time? Every day each one of us is closer in time to the day when we will meet Jesus face to face. Every time something bad happens in the world - whether it’s an earthquake or a terrorist attack - we should be reminded that nothing on earth is permanent, and reorder our lives to reflect that fact.
Our salvation - or, if you like, our security - is never to be linked with the preservation of our homes, our families, our nation, our retirement program or our educational institutions. We may lose them all, as believers have throughout history, from the time Paul wrote these words right down to the present day. But it doesn't matter. Our rescue is guaranteed by our relationship and promised reunion with Jesus Christ. Nothing can change that wonderful, unalterable fact. We are going to see him, and we are going to be like him.
Well. That is what we are supposed to know. Now we come to what we’re supposed to do. Paul gives us three things to do, and they are the things you always do in the morning. 1) you wake up, 2) you get dressed, and 3) you go to work.
“It is now the moment for you to wake from sleep.” [v.11] The alarm has gone off. For some of us the alarm rang on 9/11; others of us were stirring restlessly before then. Whatever caught your attention, it’s time to get up. No more snooze alarm; get your feet on the floor, open the shades, plug in the coffee. And then go around and shake awake those who haven’t stirred yet. Paul tells the Thessalonians that part of their responsibility is to help keep one another on the alert. “Therefore encourage one another and build up each other... admonish the idlers, encourage the faint hearted, help the weak, be patient with all...” [1 Th 5:11,14]
It is hard - almost impossible, in fact - to remember that God is more real than things by ourselves, much less stay alert to his presence. If you are so spiritually mature that you don’t need the encouragement of others, they - we - certainly need you! Face it, we need one another. We all need to pray for one another and point each other toward Scripture. Think of it in terms of splashing a little living water on your dozing brothers and sisters, so that we all might be awakened to the presence of God. The writer to the Hebrews says much the same thing, “let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” [He 10:24-25]
Ok, so now we’re awake. What happens next? We get dressed, right? No one wears pajamas to the office. Oh - you're a distance worker? you DO wear pajamas? Don't you find that you're more effective after you've showered and dressed? In this metaphor, since you’re already bathed with the water of baptism, the quick morning sluice could refer to confession and recommitment.That’s always good... But then you really do need to get dressed, becaus God has you on video. "Let us ... put on the armor of light," [v.12] says Paul. The armor of God Paul describes in Ephesians is probably the outfit that comes most readily to mind: the “belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, shoes of peace, shield of faith, helmet of salvation, sword of the Spirit.” [Eph6:13-17] But Paul gives us another picture here of what it means to be properly dressed for the Kingdom of God, saying, “put on the Lord Jesus Christ." [v.14] That means to immerse yourself daily in the reality of his power, the truth of his word, the grace of his love. It means acting like him, speaking like him, thinking like him.
And then third, Paul says, we’re ready to go to work: “Let us live honorably as in the day.” [v. 13] A more literal translation would be, “walk around properly, as if the day had already come.” Having gotten up and put on the Lord Jesus Christ, we are to walk around in the world. That implies two things - as I’ve already said, wearing Jesus Christ means acting and thinking and speaking like him. But “walking around” also means being active. Jesus associated with every possible sort of person. He hung around with corrupt businessmen, with sleazy low-lifes, with pathetic failures, with fallen women, and - believe it or not - even with terrorists. The more militant branch of the Zealots were called Sicarii or dagger-men; they murdered civilians who were too friendly to Rome. And at least one of Jesus’ followers was a Zealot. Now, I’m not implying that God is calling us to a ministry of outreach and reconciliation to Al Qaeda. But no-one should be beyond us, or beneath us, and our call is to be Christ to whomever we meet.
The second implication is that we aren’t to put off anything until Jesus actually gets back here in the flesh. Actually, he IS here in the flesh. Only it’s our flesh that he is in, if we are properly dressed, and properly active. The body of Christ is us. He is as near as our own skin.
Our call is here, now, today. Before we walk out the door we need to be ready for whatever God has planned for us, to take Christ into whatever situation we walk into.
Oh - one last thing - Paul says to “make no provision for the flesh.” He spells out that injunction by identifying three typical reactions to danger, fear and hopelessness: “reveling and drunkenness,” “debauchery and licentiousness,” and “quarreling and jealousy.” [v. 13] When people have nothing to look forward to, and nothing meaningful to fill their time, they resort to substance abuse, sexual immorality, and violence. This all-too-human reaction of lashing out in blind anger against the darkness is a desperate and futile attempt to deny the presence of death. But we have no business even being tempted by such behavior, because neither death nor darkness have any claim on us. We are surrounded by light, and inheritors of life.
The day of the Lord is indeed near. For us, every day is his. What can you do, today, to act like it?
