"Watch!"

Isaiah 63:16-64:8; 1 Corinthians 1:8-9; Mark 13:32-37

In our Old Testament lesson for today, the phrase that sticks out most in my mind is the one which comes at the end. It is the passage where Isaiah says: "Yet, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand."

As we prepare for the coming of our Lord, as indeed we should be doing at this season of Advent, one of the things we need to do is simply yield to the will of God. In Isaiah's day the people of God had gone their own way. They had simply forgotten that they were the people of God, the ones who God had chosen. Nevertheless, there was a small number of Israelites who had remained faithful. And they prayed for the day when God would restore Israel to its former stature and greatness. They longed for the day when Israel would, once again, return to the righteous ways which had been theirs. And, so, it was Isaiah's cry to his people that they once more yield themselves to the will of God in their lives.

Every once in a while you hear people in our own society lamenting how things just aren't what they used to be. You hear people talking, for instance, on how much differently little kids talk compared to the way kids talked even fifty years ago. You hear people lamenting on how much fewer people seem to be concerned about religion than there used to be. Much like in Isaiah's time there are many people, today, who are concerned that our nation isn't the righteous place it used to be.

Dr. Karl Menninger suggests that American society has become much more tolerant of sin because we don't call sin for what it is anymore. The famous psychiatrist is distressed that modern society tries to figure out its problems and talk about morality without ever mentioning the word "sin." He is convinced that the only way to raise the moral tone of present-day civilization and deal with the depression and worries that plague clergy, psychiatrists, and ordinary persons is to revive an understanding of what "sin" is.

For Isaiah the definition of sin was fairly simple. Sin was when people decided to do things their way instead of God's way. And its the same way today. Sin is when ever we decide to do our own thing at the expense of God's thing. Sin is when human beings decide that God's will isn't important enough to warrant trying to find out what it may be and doing it. And, certainly, we have a lot of this kind of behavior in our country, today. Many parents are even unwilling to tell their own children how to behave, either because they're too lazy, or because they believe so firmly in a person's right to do what ever they want to do.

Faced with a similar situation among his own people, the prophet Isaiah reminded those who would listen to him that we are the clay, and that God is the potter; we are all the work of God's hand. Thus, it is our duty to seek out and yield to God's will.

Dr. Arthur Pierson once told of being alone in the study of a biblical scholar. Thinking it would be a good time to look at the scholar's bible, he opened it and was thumbing through its pages when he came to a verse in Psalms where it reads, "The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord."

Opposite it, on the margin, the scholar had made this notation: "And the stops, too."

Advent is certainly a time when we can stop to put ourselves into the position of yielding to God's will. Jesus put it another way. In our gospel lesson for today he told his followers to keep watch.

I am reminded of a story that I heard once: Waiting to be interviewed for a job as a telegraph operator, a group of applicants paid little attention to the sound of the dots and dashes which began coming over a loud speaker. Suddenly one of them rushed into the employer's office. Soon he returned smiling. "I got it!" he exclaimed. "How did you get ahead of us?" they asked. "You might have been considered if you hadn't been so busy talking that you didn't hear the manager's coded message," he replied. "It said, 'The man I need must always be on the alert. The first one who interprets this and comes directly into my private office will be hired.'"

Certainly, the lesson is clear for us: Too many Christians are not tuned in, so they do not hear God's directives. Too many people are so busy doing their own thing that they aren't yielded and still to the One who comes.

I found a poem that perhaps you'd like to hear:

If Christ should come next Sunday

And it may be that He will,

Would the thing that I'll be doing

Set the Master's heart athrill?

If the Christ should come next Sunday

Would he find me loyal, true,

In my place with my influence

Doing what He'd have me do?

If the Christ should come next Sunday,

Let's suppose He came at ten,

Would he see me with my family

In the church I should attend?

If the Christ should come next Sunday,

If he came just at eleven,

Would He find me in a class room

Learning more of God and heaven?

Jesus told his disciples to watch and pray, for no ones knows when the time of the fulfillment of God's kingdom will come. Indeed, Jesus' appeal for watchfulness speaks directly to every generation, just as it spoke to the first Christian century. It is a plea for living on the alert, living on tiptoe, with eyes, mind, and heart at ready. The word "watch" reaches into the whole spread of life.

Someone has said that the worst "ism" in the world is not fascism or communism but somnambulism. There are so many forms of sleepwalking -- the glazed eyes which never notice that one's ideals are being whittled away, one's purposes being pared down; never notice the evil powers of the world gaining strength.

Jesus warned his disciples and he warns us to watch and pray against the sin that so easily trips us up. Jesus warns us against the compromise with wrong, so reasonable in the beginning, so deadly in the end. Jesus warns us to watch, lest we neglect the renewal of life in communion with God, lest our spiritual life become dead! Jesus warns us to watch, lest the great opportunities for service to God's kingdom come and pass by, unseen and unseized. Amen.