Sermon draft 12/02 - Wake Up!

My friend Pete and I go way back. His mother recalls our first meeting of import as being in first grade, in the boys’ room, wetting bunched up paper towels and throwing them up to stick to the ceiling. Pete was a colorful character to say the least. He had a heart full of fun and a mischievous mind. He was my good friend.

Pete and I did lots of things together—played stickball, hiked, hung out—the usual teen stuff. Plus we played in a bluegrass band together; me on guitar, our friend Rich on banjo, with Pete covering the mandolin and harmonica. And he played a pretty mean fiddle too—although we suffered through many, many screechy-scratchy renditions of Mary Had a Little Lamb on his way to proficiency.

Pete was also a summer camp counselor with me at Camp Trexler for boys, in Bear Mt. State Park, New York. About 30 years ago now! Together we molded the character of a generation of Long Island’s young boys, for better or worse.

The end of our first summer at Trexler found us living in the Junior Village and working with the youngest kids at camp. They were fun, but a handful—tough to get to sleep at night, and even tougher to get up and going in the morning. They just did not want to get out of bed, and would drift back to sleep as many times as you shook or poked them awake. I was at my wits end with them!

But Pete, in his creative genius, devised a way to wake the lads up that was both non-violent, yet annoying enough to virtually guarantee getting even the sleepiest little ankle-biter vertical and moving. Here’s what he’d do:

At right about reveille each morning, grab his fiddle, and walk outside his cabin to a spot between it and the latrine building where there was an old stump. He’d hop up on that stump and precisely at 7:00 am, he draw that bow over the strings, producing a sound not unlike that of fingernails on a blackboard. Invariably that was enough to knock several children out of their bunks. But this was only his warm-up!

What came next quickly became known in Camp Trexler legend as “The Wake Up Song.” It went something like this. Now, you’ll have to imagine for yourself the obnoxious fiddle part. Went kinda like: “Wheehdidi-dedide-dedide-dedide.” Okay here goes…(Those of you in the front row may want to cover your ears.)

“Oooooooooooooooooooooooh—

it’s time to get up, it’s time to get up,

it’s time to get up, it’s time to get uuuuuuuup!”

And then repeat:

Sing it with me once! (repeat)

I never said it would have won any Grammies. It weren’t pretty, but it done the job! So, parents, I bequeath it to you for awakening your progeny on school days. And kids, remember it for Christmas morning! (But don’t mention my name!)

But seriously, truth be told, we could all use a good shot of the Wake Up Song at times. Spiritually speaking, I mean. We could use a wailing fiddle to snap us out of our spiritual lethargy and awaken us to the fact that God is doing something all around us and wants us to join him. We could use a raucous rendition of a lively song to clear the cobwebs from our secularized brains, so we can realize that it is Christ who is coming—and he’s expecting us to be waiting for him. We need to get vertical and get moving.

Anyways, that’s the image Paul is working with in today’s passage from Romans. He writes, “…Now is the moment for you to wake from sleep. The night is far gone, the day is near.” In other words, WAKE UP! Wake up and smell the coffee. Don’t let the second coming catch you unawares. Don’t fall back into that comfortably sleepy mode of existence in which anything goes. WAKE UP! Wake up, and live as children of the light. Because the day is surely coming!

In much the same way, Jesus calls for us to be awake on that day. No one knows the hour or day he says—not even he. So, the only thing to do—actually what God, I believe, intended you to do as one who lives in this in-between time—what you’re supposed to be doing, after you wake up, is this: be getting ready. Getting yourself and your surroundings into shape for the coming of the king. Not rushing into things, but not walking into them blindly either. It’s waiting—with purpose.

Well, how does one do that? Let me answer with another camp story. Another thing Pete and I did with the kids at camp was the counselor hunt. It’s like hide and go seek on a grand scale. Pete was good at that game. He’d put on a dark set of clothes, smear mud on his face and hands, and then climb up a tree and hug the trunk waaay up there. Impossible to see him. And then he’d wait. And they never found him—ever!

That’s because Pete had a plan—most of the rest of us did not. We just ran looking for whatever seemed best or easiest place (depending on your philosophy of the game). So, we ended up either poorly hidden, or bunched up in a good hiding spot, or—worst yet—not hidden at all—when that unmistakable clarion cry began the hunt!

“Ready or not, here I come!”

And then the sound of 200 sneaker-ed feet heading directly for you as you try to make yourself unnoticeable behind a skinny old pine tree! All the while Pete looking down from his perch chuckling at your ill-preparedness! He was ready, we were not.

During Advent, the call is the same, “Ready or not, here I come!” The “I” of course, being Jesus. But what does the “ready” part mean? If waiting with purpose is getting ready, then exactly how does one “get ready” for the coming of the Christ child—let alone the Son of Man!?

I think Jesus provides the answer to this in today’s gospel. He starts out by saying the people in Noah’s day had no clue as to what was cooking for them. One day the were doing everyday things, the next - they were doing the dead-man’s float. Ready or not, here I come! They weren’t ready. They were unawares.

Then Jesus builds upon that story with one of his own. Two people are in the field, one is taken, the other is not. Two are grinding meal, one is taken, the other is not. Ready or not, here I come! Again, neither of them is doing anything very special—just everyday things.

So, the point of the illustration is not that you have to DO something in order to be called up yonder. (Because that would make Jesus and the cross unnecessary!) The point is you should be aware. You should be awake. You should be conscious. You should live that everyday life in the context of the notion that “today’s the day!” The point is the unpredictability of the event—not what exactly you should be actually doing. You should be doing what you always do. But your knowing the end of the story—even if you don’t know the timing—does change those everyday tasks. It infuses them with new meaning.

Do you watch that show on TV - House? It’s a doctor/hospital drama. This past week, Dr. House’s oncologist friend, Dr. Wilson, realizes that he has misdiagnosed a patient—effectively giving him three months to live when actually there is nothing wrong with him. He calls the patient into his office, expecting him to be overjoyed with the news. But instead, he is incensed. Having sold his house and quit his job and said tearful goodbyes to all his friends and family, he has found the days that he knew he was going to die to be the most meaningful of his entire life. He was loathe to go back to life as usual. Or, as the title character in Tuesdays with Morrie says, “You have to be dying to really start living!”

As for us, we anticipate not our impending death, but our impending life! Knowing that we have an eternal future with God makes living everyday life very special and different. We eat differently – sharing food and resources with others who need it. We work differently – advocating justice over profit and the bottom line. We interact with each other differently – we listen to each other and put the needs of others over our own. And we even wait differently—we wait by being aware of what’s going on around us, and what is promised by God in the future, and by being ready for the intersection of the two. Because ready or not, here he comes.

So, today I invite all of you to wake up and smell the Advent. Now, let me warn you that what I’m going to say next is a major departure from the usual Advent sermon. So, if I get to a point where you can’t stand what I’m saying—just close your eyes, put your fingers in your ears and hum O Come, O Come Emmanuel to yourself. Hopefully it won’t come to that!

For the nine years I’ve been preaching Advent sermons, I’ve always preached a certain kind of waiting, and a certain way of getting ready. These usually involved shunning those who put up their Christmas tree and outdoor lights the day after Thanksgiving. It normally included resisting singing carols and setting up the crèche too soon. For me, “doing Advent” meant setting oneself apart from all the gift buying, Christmas partying, eggnog drinking, and Charlie Brown watching that was going on around you. Rising above all the commercial hoopla and secular shenanigans to a spiritual plane far above the real world.

And that way of doing Advent has its good points. You don’t get caught up in the financial frenzy and end up paying for Christmas all the way to Christmas in July! And you do focus more on the spiritual side of the holy days.

But I don’t think it follows the biblical model—at least not as expressed in today’s readings. The people in the field and at the mill were all doing regular everyday chores. Jesus didn’t say one person was in the temple, one was at the track—the one in the temple was taken and the other not so much.

They were living life. It’s just that some are aware. Some are awake. Some are ready. They have a plan. A plan to put on Jesus Christ and live their lives the way he modeled. Waiting – with purpose. Aware.

So, it’s Advent—can you hum along to O Holy Night at the department store while picking up tinsel for the tree and chewing on a gingerbread man? I think so. Can you go to a Christmas fair to get you into the spirit of Christmas? Why not? Can you make a list and even check it twice? Go ahead and check it three times! I propose that you can do anything everybody else is doing. The difference is you are doing it with one foot in this world and one in the next. We are operating under a promise of new life so true, that it bleeds into this world and effects both us and, through us, it. So, we’re aware, we’re awake.

And here’s the deal—here’s what I want you to do this Advent. There’s no doubt in my mind that sometime in the next four weeks, someone is going to ask you that age old question. (No, not “What do you want for Christmas?) They’re going to ask you this: “Are you ready for Christmas? Are you ready for the big day?” And when they do, here’s what I want you to answer them. Maranatha. MA-RAN-A-THA. It means, “Come, Lord.” Come, Lord Jesus, for I am ready have my heart opened to you. Come to me O Child of Bethlehem. Come to me O Ruler of the Cosmos. Come—I’m ready.

So—are you ready? Maranatha! Ready or not, here he comes!