Advent Mid-week 2
December 10, 2003
Malachi 3: 1-4
CAN YOU ENDURE?
The second candle is lit! We are less than two weeks away from the birth of our Lord and Savior! We are waiting with expectation! I am like the little boy who is watching Mom put presents under the tree! Wanting to open all the presents that belong to me, and to help others open their presents, just in case they don’t want to open theirs right away.
We are waiting patently, but we are impatient! Who can take the coming of Christ at Christmas? Each year, Christmas is becoming more and more difficult to endure. We all have experienced it with the buying and the exchanging of gifts, the cost of the gifts, what should you get that one member of the family who is so difficult to buy for, or, who seems to have everything. And, if that were not enough, there are all the stresses and strains which come along during Christmas. Social agencies report that at Christmas there are more personal problems that occur than at any other time of year. It seems at Christmas there are more loneliness, more heartaches, and more disappointments. Who can take Christmas!?
Our text from which our thoughts will focus, cuts away the fluff and focus on the real issue which is at hand, and that is the problem which all of us must deal with and that is how do you and I rest and find peace when we know that the Lord will return? Malachi in verse two of our text asks us, “But who can endure the day of His coming?”
[1] The first thing we must ask ourselves is this: can we endure the secularization of Christmas? In a sense we can say that it is easy to endure the secularization of Christmas because Christians have been doing that for centuries. The celebration of Christ’s coming to our world was introduced to the world because already pagans were celebrating the coming of Winter. (December 21, “Winter Madness”) And times have not changed much over the years.
It was Lutheran Christians who brought the celebration of our Lord’s natal day to Fort Wayne and the surrounding areas. Soldiers at the fort saw December 25th, as just another day. And other religious groups in the area believed that any type of celebration as pious and as Christianized as it was, was just not proper.
Today, it seems that merchants and store keepers, and internet businesses try to get as much “bang” for their buck as possible, offering sales and displays for their customers long before December, and in some locations long before November, or September!
Yes, it is easy for some to be distracted, and it is easy for one to focus on all of the lights, and trappings of the season, forgetting the reason for the season. But you and I can endure the secularization of Christmas for as soon as December 25th comes around, the shopping frenzy will be over! The real question for us is this: can we endure the refiner’s fire of cleansing of sin? In short, can we take and can we endure the Holy presence of Jesus Christ? That is the question, that is the issue which we must face!
[2] When Malachi wrote this verse, he saw the coming of Christ. He saw the Lord coming to the world, not as a baby, but as the King and Judge of all. This is how we must see Him too! We must see Him as Judge and King!
No wonder some are so miserable during this time of the year! They look at their sin and they see nothing but despair and misery. They try to be happy but they can’t. The reality of their sinful condition jaunts them. Who can endure the coming of the Lord? The answer short and sweet is, NO ONE CAN!! No one can stand before Jesus for He is a holy and a perfect God. Malachi tells us that. He is a consuming and purifying fire.
That is why we need to look and see just who it is who was born there in the small city of Bethlehem some 2,000 years ago. Yes! It is a baby which we worship, but He is more than just a baby. He is at the same time God made flesh. He did not stay in the crib, but grew up to be a man. He lived and died in our place, that we might be freed from sin and restored to be the children of God as we were created to be in the first place.
Without forgiveness we cannot come into the holy presence of our Lord. We could not endure the refiner’s fire. We could not endure His holy presence. That is why if you and I are to make any sense of this celebration of Christmas – if we are to endure this season – we must look beyond the trappings and the lights and the sentimental sounds and realize with Simeon of old, that there is this little boy is all of God’s promise, all of God’s forgiveness, all of the remedies of our sin!
This is a merry Christmas for you and for me, for only one reason . . . and that is, that we see in the baby the answer to all our prayers; the solution for all of our problems; the only way out for our problem with sin.
If we focus only on trappings and the wrapping, and we cannot see God’s miracle of stamping out sin in this baby – then the misery and the pre and post Christmas blues will probably continue.
But our text reminds us to wake up and sing, rejoice, and shout! For God has come to you! He has been set to restore and rescue you! He has come to bring you and me salvation and eternal life! You and I will have a merry Christmas for here we stand, redeemed and saved and restored by a Savior who loves us with an everlasting love, who has promised to never leave us nor forsake us!
Who has promised to walk with us each day of our life! In these days and weeks of preparation may we each see that the cross is only a few weeks away from the Creche and the cradle. For it was at the cross, there at Golgotha, that salvation was completed. When we do that, we will be able to take Christmas. We will be able to enjoy the season. And we will be able to understand that YES, in the baby Jesus, there really is PEACE on Earth and Good will to Men. There is peace and safety for all who believe.
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord, to everlasting life. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment