Revised Common Lectionary: First Sunday of Advent

---

Year B

Isaiah 64:1-9; Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19; 1 Corinthians 1:3-9; Mark 13:24-37

Jesus Christ is God’s Answer to our prayer.

We confess our sins to God - ‘We sinned... All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags’. We look to God for forgiveness - ‘Do not remember our sins for ever’ (Isaiah 64:5-6, 9). We know that God hears and answers our prayer. Jesus Christ is God’s Answer to our prayer. He has ‘come down’ from heaven to earth. ‘The Son of the Most High’ has been ‘born’ into our world. Jesus Christ is God’s way of saying ‘Here am I! Here am I!’ He is ‘God with us’ (Isaiah 64:1; 65:1; Luke 1:32, 35; Matthew 1:23). ‘The blood of Jesus, God’s Son, cleanses us from all sin’. Let us ‘confess our sins’. ‘The blood of Jesus, God’s Son, cleanses us from all sin’ - Let us come to God with faith, believing that He ‘will forgive our sins’. (1 John 1:7, 9). Let us rejoice in Jesus, our Saviour!

We pray for salvation. God gives His Answer – Jesus Christ, our Saviour.

‘Restore us, O God, make Your face shine upon us, that we may be saved’ (Psalm 80:3). This prayer for salvation is repeated with a growing sense of God’s greatness - ‘O God Almighty’ (Psalm 80:7), ‘O Lord God Almighty’ (Psalm 80:19). To those who are asking the question of salvation - ‘What must I do to be saved?’ - , God gives His answer - ‘Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved’ (Acts 16:30-31). What does the Lord say to those who look to Christ for salvation? - ‘The Lord will bless you and watch over you. The Lord will smile on you and be kind to you. The Lord will look on you with favour and give you peace’ (Numbers 6:24-26). Let us worship Him: ‘Praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! Through Christ, God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing that heaven has to offer’ (Ephesians 1:3).

Christ is our full salvation. Let us rejoice and be glad in Him.

Paul preached the Gospel, ‘not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power’ (1 Corinthians 1:17; 2:4). He preached ‘Christ crucified’ with a determination ‘to know nothing except Jesus Christ crucified’ (1 Corinthians 1:23; 2:2). This is the message of our salvation - ‘Christ crucified... Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God’ (1 Corinthians 1:23-24). All the glory belongs to God. We have no right to steal away any of the glory for ourselves: ‘Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord’ (1 Corinthians 1:26-31). Our faith is ‘not based on human wisdom but on God’s power’(2:5). ‘Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace’ (Mission Praise, 712). Christ is our full salvation. ‘Let us rejoice and be glad’ in Him’ (1 Corinthians 1:30; Psalm 118:24).

With Christ as our Saviour, we are a people of hope.

We are not to be a people whose ‘faith’ is locked in the past! We are to be a people of hope. We look to the future. We ‘see the Son of man coming in clouds with great power and glory’ (Mark 13:26). There may be ‘wars and rumours of wars’ (Mark 13:7). When Christ returns, only one thing will matter: ‘he who endures to the end will be saved’ (Mark 13:13). ‘This day - the noise of battle’: Look beyond all that to ‘the victor’s song’(Church Hymnary, 481). In human conflict, there is so much of self - ‘We are the people’. When Christ returns, nothing will matter but this: ‘When the roll is called up yonder, I'll be there’ (Mission Praise,759). We hear of ‘wars and rumours of wars’. Do we say, ‘This is part of our history. It’s always been this way’? We must remember: Preaching Christ's Gospel is far more important than ‘defending’ our ways (10)!

---

Year C

Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36

Every spiritual blessing - in Christ: Come to Him and receive His blessing.
‘I will bring Judah and Israel back from captivity and will rebuild them as they were before. I will cleanse them from all the sin they have committed against Me... Then this city will bring Me renown, joy, praise, and honour before all nations on earth...’(Jeremiah 33:7-9). What great blessing lay ahead of God’s people! God was pointing His people to the place of blessing: Jesus Christ - ‘the righteous Branch from David’s line’(Jeremiah 33:15-16). ‘In Christ’, we have ‘every spiritual blessing’: ‘No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him’(Ephesians 1:3; 1 Corinthians 2:9). God has so much blessing to give to us. Come to Him and receive His blessing: ‘Call to Me, and I will answer you; I will show you wonderful and marvellous things that you know nothing about’(Jeremiah 33:3).

We put no confidence in the flesh. Our confidence is in the Lord. He is the God of our salvation.

‘Lead me in Thy truth, and teach me, for Thou art the God of my salvation’(Psalm 25:5). We can pray this prayer with confidence. God has given His promise: ‘He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble His way’(Psalm 25:9). Our confidence is in the Lord. We ‘put no confidence in the flesh’(Philippians 3:3). Jesus teaches us that God hides Himself from the proud and reveals Himself to the humble: ‘…Father…Thou hast hidden these things from the wise and revealed them to babes’(Matthew 11:25). In the life of faith, the most important thing is the right attitude - not the ‘best education’! The proud may concern themselves with impressing ‘the right people’. For the humble, there is something more important - pleasing God. His opinion is the one that really matters!

Our love is to be holy. Our holiness is to be loving.

We need both ‘love’ and ‘holiness’(1 Thessalonians 3:12-13). Our love is to be holy. Our holiness is to be loving. Getting the right balance between love and holiness is like walking a tightrope. You can easily lose your balance and fall off. We can be too soft - all love and no holiness. We can be too hard - all holiness and no love. Love doesn’t mean ‘anything goes ’ - ‘I don’t care how you live’. That’s not love. That’s indifference, a ‘couldn’t care less’attitude. Holiness doesn’t mean looking down your nose at other people - ‘You’ve sinned and I will never let you forget it’. Don’t be like ‘the Pharisees’. They wanted to ‘stone the woman caught in adultery’. We must not ‘stone’ people with our ‘hot tongue and cold shoulder’! Be like Jesus. Show love - ‘I don’t condemn you’ - and holiness - ‘Do not sin again’(John 8:3-11).

True giving is our response to God’s grace. Let us give ourselves to Him.

The ‘poor widow’ gave her ‘all’ to the Lord (Luke 21:1-4). True giving is a response to ‘the grace of God’. Learning to appreciate ‘the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ’, we will learn to give with ‘abundance of joy’ and ‘wealth of liberality’ (2 Corinthians 8:1-2, 9). Let us give ourselves to our Lord. True Christian living will not be easy (12; 2 Timothy 3:12). The Lord will be with us in all our difficulties (Luke 21:15, 18-19). Christ will return ‘with power and great glory’(Luke 21:27). For some this will be a time of ‘distress... perplexity... fear... foreboding’(Luke 21:25-26). For others, it will be the Day of ‘redemption’(Luke 21:28). To all, there is the warning: ‘Take heed to yourselves... watch at all times’(Luke 21:34-36). Let us restore Him to His rightful place in our lives - ‘...all the people came to Him...’(Luke 21:38).