November 30, 2025: May God’s words be spoken, may God’s words be heard. Amen.
Well, I hope all have recovered from the all the stuffing, turkey, mashed potatoes, pies, and other things that make us avoid the scale for a few weeks – not to mention our empty bank accounts from Black Friday. And now we continue in Advent, while some of the rest of the church is just now entering into the reflective space we have been walking for some time. And with Advent, we get familiar and also troubling texts.
I mean, that was a cheery gospel, right?
As we know by now, Advent begins with these eschatological, or end times, passages starting just after All Saints. However, we always have to remember that the passage we heard today has been used, errantly, to refer to some sort of rapture in those end times. Folks hear this and think that there will be a time when the so called “good people” get sucked up in a cataclysmic divine version of an alien mother ship right out of some sort of sci-fi movie. This is NOT what Jesus was saying.
So, just a reminder, this idea of a rapture is a fairly new concept driven out of poor biblical scholarship. Prior to the1800s, The Rapture as a concept did not exist anywhere in Christianity. In other words – the rapture is an 19th century literalist creation – which might explain why people keep predicting it, and keep having to change the date for it when it just does not happen as expected.
Jesus is not talking about anything of the sort, which means if your Christmas wish was to have some of your relatives raptured up after having spent time with them over Thanksgiving, well…you are in for some disappointment. And besides, if he WAS talking about some sort of rapture, then it isn’t the ones taken that are going to heaven. Remember the comparison to Noah? Well, the ones swept away were the ones drowned. So, not something ya want happening to you.
Now that we have that cleared up, let’s look at some of the other texts we heard – specifically, the epistle of St. Paul to the Romans, which we also quote in our Collect at the beginning of the service, and the text from Isaiah.
First let’s look at Isaiah. We hear a lot of this book in Advent. For the next several weeks we will hear passages so very familiar to us, so appropriated into a Christian context particularly in this time of year, that we have lost some of the powerful message found in its Jewish roots. So let’s first understand this book a bit better:
Scholars break the text of Isaiah into three sections, based on time of composition and authorship. This passage is from the first part, written sometime in the 8th century BCE, which is believed by scholars to have been, unlike the other two, and primarily authored by the prophet himself.
And, just a bit about Isaiah himself. He was called into the life of a prophet reluctantly. Yet, as we know from the stories of Moses, Jonah, well, really all of them, prophets are usually dragged into this work – never really feeling ready or worthy of it. The same is true for every ordained person in the church, or the good ones anyway. He was also a contemporary of other prophets – Hosea and Micah – and was the prophet of the monarchy in Jerusalem, the capital of Judah.
Now, to understand what we heard today, we need to know a little about the setting. The former united kingdom of Israel was split – Israel to the North and Judah in the South. The Assyrians were looking to conquer all of the known world, and began overtaking kingdom after kingdom working North to South, deporting the conquered people to become cheap labor on behalf of the Assyrian Kingdom. They had already defeated Israel, overtaking its capital of Samaria in 722 BCE. Heading south, they looked to do the same to Judah. However, as they neared the city of Jerusalem, a civil war broke out in Assyria’s capital city. The armies returned home, Jerusalem was spared, and Isaiah saw a vision from God – the very one we heard today.
The passage read this morning starts with this, “The word that Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.” Isaiah is going to share with the people of Jerusalem the vision of the God that saved them. And that is when we get this very familiar text: “they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
Imagine how that must have sounded then, to these people who had narrowly escaped defeat at the hands of the Assyrian army. Isaiah is essentially saying – “If you think that was awesome, just wait! The miracle you’all just experienced is nothing compared to what God has in mind – a day when armies throw their swords into the fire to forge instruments of peace. When weapons become tools to feed the hungry rather than implements to kill.” Holy cow!
And Isaiah wasn’t the only one saying this too. These recognizable verses are uttered not only by this prophet, but by his contemporary Micah, which locked them into a long legal copyright battle still not resolved to this day – kidding, of course.
As amazing as this prophetic text seems to the original audience and now to us, God’s vision doesn’t stop there. Over the next few weeks of Advent, there will be more we will hear from this book of Isaiah. Next week, it will be the beloved community where the wolf and the lamb will live peaceably together on God’s holy mountain. Then we will hear that the blind will see, the deaf will hear, creation will be restored, and a holy child will be born.
Idyllic? Sure. But it is the hope God has for all of us, and hope is a most powerful force amidst the darkness of the world. It is the stuff of transformation, and the heart of Advent. Hope is the spark in the soul that can defeat the darkness, can overcome the strongest enemies, can make dreams – God’s or our own – possible. But hope also requires something of us. And that brings us to the epistle we heard this morning.
In the epistle, St. Paul writes “You know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near. Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; …”
“You know what time it is.”
I don’t know about you, but I kinda want to respond with the band Chicago’s 1969 song “Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody really care?”
But truth be told – we do know, and, we do care, don’t we.
We know that it is a time of darkness for all those on the margins – people of color, immigrants, LGBTQ+ people, women and girls, the poor and the aged, the sick and the lonely.
We know it is a time of swords, not plowshares, as Ukrainians and Gazans are slaughtered, and so many suffer the violence of war.
And we care about it enough to pray, to dream, to protest in the streets. But St. Paul implores us to do more. He tells us that it is the time to wake up and put on the armor of light.
Well, what the heck does that mean?
Let’s think about what he is saying here. First, he tells us to be awake (very much as Jesus was doing in the gospel), and we all know that you don’t shout for people to wake up as though there is an army attacking the city if you don’t believe there is something important about to happen, or happening right that very minute that needs everyone’s attention!
And folks, there is indeed an attack happening and God needs us to pay attention.
People are being yanked off the streets and sent to far off prisons as though the Assyrian army had just conquered our country.
Military troops wearing masks are in our cities – it sure seems we are at war, but this war is our own government against the people they are supposed to serve.
And while billions are spent to support these efforts and line the pockets of the rich and powerful, healthcare costs are rising, and the poor are getting poorer.
This is a moment in our country and in the world of the greatest urgency and we sure as hell need to wake up, if we are still asleep, if we have covered our heads and allowed the night to envelop us.
St. Paul is right – It is time for us all to wake up!
But he doesn’t stop there. He says we need to put on the armor of light.
Now, that is strange imagery, right? I mean, we don’t get out of our comfy pajamas and just slip into some nice jeans and a t-shirt? He wants us to put on clunky, heavy, armor as though we were going into battle? Isn’t that is a stark contrast to the vision of God Isaiah talks about? Well, let’s think about that a bit.
If you have ever seen any movie with knights – you know, like Camelot or Monty Python – it’s not something you slip on lightly and easily take off. You know when you are wearing it – so does everyone else. It is going to slow you down a bit too. And, it will protect you from some things, but as Monty Python fans know, it will NOT protect you from killer rabbits…but let’s not go down THAT rabbit hole. Armor also usually has a way of identifying who you are fighting for – or in feudal terms, who is your Lord. And you know what, it’s isn’t a bad metaphor St. Paul is using.
Because this armor of light isn’t to shield us from harm as we do battle and harm others. Not at all. This armor is the light of Christ, the clothing of hope. St. Paul says essentially that in the final verse we heard, when he adds “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” He is telling us that our lives in Christ are not a checklist we “do” on a Sunday. It is the very clothing we wear. And he isn’t talking about wearing a cross around our neck. Lord knows, and he does, a lot of folks do that, but act as though they have never heard the words of Jesus.
Folks, you can come to church – lots of people do – and never put on Christ – never move through the world like you are wearing an armor of his light, a symbol of hope for the world.
St. Paul is telling us to make a different choice. Because, if you really put him on, you will feel the weight of what you are wearing – it is the knowledge of his presence in all people, and the shadows of darkness that have pressed on them from every direction. And yet it will not overtake you like armor of war, or be a burden to you. It will drive you forward instead with urgency.
It is armor that transforms the world – not through our own power, this isn’t some call to Christian Nationalism – that is a heresy. No, it isn’t about human power, but about human brokenness – those cracks in our very much imperfect lives through which the light of Christ may be seen by those who need it most – the vulnerable and the forgotten.
Folks – we know what time it is – it is a time of darkness and despair, and the powers of the world sure hope we remain asleep.
But we are not asleep – not by a long shot.
We are awake and wearing Christ’s armor of light.
It is the light of hope for a world in despair.
It is the light of love for a people mired in hate.
It is the light that will nourish us, guide us, and give us strength as we journey forward.
And by our every step, the very dream of God will come into view – a radical overturning of the world where swords become tools for feeding the hungry, and all of creation lives in peace.
“The night is far gone, the day is near.”
We are awake, and we will tear down the walls that divide us, and build bridges in their place.
We will defeat the despair of poverty and oppression and lift up with love all children of God.
We will forge instruments of peace out of the weapons that destroy bringing hope to a war weary world.
There is no army that can defeat us, nor any earthly ruler that can stop us.
For we are clothed in the light of Christ. The hope of the world.
Amen.
For the audio, click below, or subscribe to our iTunes Sermon Podcast by clicking here (also available on Audible):
The Rev. Diana L. Wilcox
Christ Church in Bloomfield & Glen Ridge
November 30, 2025
Advent 4 – Year A
1st Reading – Isaiah 2:1-5
2nd Reading – Romans 13:11-14
Gospel – Matthew 24:36-44
