A Sermon for the First Sunday of Advent (Year A)
November 30, 2025
Text: Matthew 24:36-44
Now, O Lord, take my lips, and speak through them. Take our minds, and think through them. Take our hearts, and set them on fire. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
A few weeks ago, my family and I were in Auburn for the weekend. On our way out of town, heading back home, we decided to stop at Tiger Town and do a little shopping. And—much to my delight—we ended up at one of my favorite stores: World Market.
Has anyone ever been to World Market?
If you have, then you know—it’s one of those places filled with treasures from all over the world. Foods you’ve never heard of. Decorations from far-off places. Coffee, candy, and all kinds of kitchen gadgets you don’t really need but suddenly want.
It’s wonderful!
But my favorite time to go to World Market is around the holidays. That’s when the whole store lights up. There are beautiful Christmas ornaments everywhere, shelves full of Christmas cards, chocolates wrapped in shiny paper, and delicious things to nibble on and drink during the holidays.
And this time—as we were looking around—I noticed something else.
Rows and rows of Advent calendars.
Does everyone know what I mean by an Advent calendar? They’re those little boxes with numbered doors—one for each day in December—where you open a flap and find a tiny treat or surprise inside.
At World Market, you can find any kind of Advent calendar you can possibly imagine.
They have the fancy chocolate ones, of course. But they also have coffee Advent calendars. Tea Advent calendars. Hot sauce Advent calendars. They even have one for different kinds of jelly.
If you have a preference or hobby or a favorite snack, chances are they’ve figured out a way to put it behind twenty-four little perforated doors.
And as I walked around, looking at all these different calendars, I thought to myself, “You know, for a lot of people, this is what Advent is.” It’s just a fun way to count down the days to Christmas.
If you’ve ever bought one of those calendars, you know—they usually start on December 1 and go through Christmas Eve. One tiny window for each day, one tiny treat, one day closer to the big celebration.
And don’t get me wrong—there’s nothing bad about any of that. Advent calendars are fun. They’re a sweet way to mark the days—especially for children.
But for us, in the Church, Advent means so much more than just counting down the days until Christmas.
Yes, during Advent we are preparing—once again—to celebrate the birth of Jesus, and that’s an important part of the season.
Every year we light the candles on the Advent wreath, sing the hymns, and hear the Scriptures retold because we need that reminder of God’s nearness and God’s peace.
But Advent is also a season of waiting in hopeful expectation for Christ to come again.
As much as we love the story of Mary and Joseph on their way to Bethlehem, Advent refuses to let us stay there.
It pulls our gaze forward—toward God’s promised future. A future where justice rolls down like waters, where peace is restored, and where every tear is wiped away.
I heard someone recently describe Advent with an old Catholic teaching that says the season is all about “the history, the mystery, and the majesty.”
I love that phrase.”History, mystery, and majesty.”
In history, we look back and remember the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem over two thousand years ago—God coming to dwell with us in human flesh.
In mystery, we recognize that Christ is with us even now, moving and working through his Body, the Church.
In majesty, we look ahead to the day when Christ will return in glory and make all things new.
And that framework helps us understand our Gospel reading this morning. Because today’s reading is not a countdown to Christmas.
It’s not Mary and Joseph. It’s not a sweet story about angels or shepherds keeping watch over their flock by night.
It’s Jesus pointing us toward the majesty—the promised day of his return.
This is a point in the Gospels where a lot of people start to get nervous.
Because Matthew 24 is one of those passages that’s been used, and sometimes misused, to stir up fear about the “end times.”
Some Christians have even used these verses—and others like it—to build up ideas about the “rapture”—this notion that some people will be swept up into heaven with Jesus while others are left behind.
It certainly paints a dramatic picture, and it’s become popular through novels, movies, and preachers online who claim to know the exact date when it will happen.
But here’s something important for us to remember:
This is not how Christians understood these passages for most of Church history.
The whole concept of a secret rapture is actually quite new.
It didn’t appear until the 1800s, when a preacher named John Nelson Darby proposed a new way of interpreting Scripture.
Before that, for nearly eighteen hundred years, no Christian theologian, bishop, or council taught anything like it.
It’s a very modern interpretation, not something rooted in historic Christian teaching, and it can distract us from the real message Jesus is giving us—not a message of fear or escape, but one of readiness and hope.
In our passage this morning from Matthew, Jesus isn’t trying to scare us.
He isn’t describing a secret evacuation plan where God rescues a few and abandons everyone else.
He’s telling us something far simpler—and far more hopeful: Be ready. Stay awake. Keep watch.
Because the Son of Man is coming to restore all things. And none of us knows the day or the hour.
Not even Jesus knows. Only the Father.
He’s calling us to live our lives in such a way that, whenever he does return, he finds us doing the work he’s given us to do.
The Gospel tells us to trust that Christ’s return is good news for the whole creation—not just some, but all. It will be a day of restoration—a day of healing and justice. Not a day to fear, but a day to hope for.
So, the question we should be asking in this passage is not, “How we do avoid being left behind?”
The real question is, “How do we live as people who are waiting for Christ’s return?”
How do we stay awake—not fearfully, but faithfully?
I think it has everything to do with our posture of waiting.
Christian waiting is not passive. It’s not sitting on our hands or looking for secret signs in the sky.
Christian waiting is active. It’s leaning forward with hope.
It’s living today as though Christ might come tomorrow—and wanting him to find us doing the work he’s given us to do.
And we already know what that work is, because we’re doing it all the time.
It’s everything we are called to do as the Body of Christ—
It’s caring for our neighbors through outreach ministries.
It’s feeding people through a warm meal on Thanksgiving Day.
It’s welcoming the stranger, or the person who thought there was no place for them in church.
It’s nurturing our children and youth through Christian formation.
It’s praying for one another—through good times and hard times.
It’s gathering for worship.
It’s caring for the sick and the grieving.
It’s serving with generosity and compassion.
It’s loving one another as Christ has loved us.
All of this—every single bit of it—is kingdom-building work. It’s our way of preparing for Christ’s return.
Not sitting back and waiting for Jesus to come and fix everything for us, but participating in God’s healing work right now.
It’s our way of saying, with our lives, “Come, Lord Jesus.”
Because Advent is not a season of fear.
It is a season of hope.
It’s about trusting that the darkness of this world will not have the final word.
It’s about believing that Christ is coming—not to destroy, but to heal. Not to abandon, but to restore. Not to frighten us, but to bring us into the fullness of God’s reign.
So as we enter this holy season of waiting—this season of history, mystery, and majesty—may we remember that Advent is far more than just a fun way to count down the days to Christmas.
It’s God’s call for us to wake up, to open our eyes, and to live in hopeful expectation.
It’s a season to look honestly at the darkness around us—and within us—and to hold fast to the light of Christ that no darkness can overcome.
It’s a call to live today in such a way that when Christ returns—whenever that may be—he finds us ready. Not because we predicted the hour, but because we lived with love.
So let us wait with joy.
Let us serve with purpose.
Let us hope with confidence.
For Christ has come,
Christ is with us now,
and Christ will come again.
Amen.
The Rev. Eric Mancil 