1st Sunday in Advent (Ad Te Levavi) – December 3, 2023
Trinity Lutheran Church, Block, Kansas
Rev. Joshua Woelmer
Text: Matthew 21:1–9
“Jesus Comes, Humble and Lowly”
Theme: Advent is a time of preparation to receive our King.
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
One of the things in the news recently has been the visit of the Chinese President, Xi Jinping. He met with President Biden in San Francisco. One thing that I found funny about this visit is that the city of San Francisco cleaned things up quite a bit. In fact, it’s probably the cleanest the city has been in quite a while.
There have been entire streets taken over by tent cities where the homeless live. Drug use has been a problem there. There was a map of San Francisco that showed where there were human feces on the streets in the city.
But all of that was cleaned up when a foreign leader comes to town. We wanted to put on our best image to welcome them to our nation. Maybe we should invite more foreign leaders to visit in order to get cities like Chicago, Portland, and New York City to clean up a bit.
Really, though, these cities should ideally be well functioning and clean up crime and the streets without needing prompting by the national government or by foreign leaders.
But this is the case in our own lives too, isn’t it? We let a lot of things go in our lives until we have special people visit. Thanksgiving Dinners or Christmas parties are a great excuse to clean up the house to host a lot of people. We’ve all done it, haven’t we? Keeping a clean and tidy house day in and day out would be ideal, but that doesn’t always happen. Even if it’s a matter of shoving all your stuff into closets until the guests leave, tidying up is necessary.
If you never tidy things up, then a house can get so cluttered that it’s impacting the quality of your life. You might have seen TV shows about hoarders who never throw anything away and never clean their house. That’s a problem. It’s also a problem when our cities never clean up the feces and drug needles or help the homeless actually get mental health care.
The season of Advent, which begins today, is a call from God to clean things up before his Son comes. It’s a similar season to Lent in that it’s a season of repentance before Christmas rather than before Easter. This is why we get a Palm Sunday reading as our reading for the First Sunday in Advent. It doesn’t sound like a reading that fits in December as our world is getting ready to celebrate Christmas. This text might belong better in March, before Holy Week.
But it does fit here and now. Jesus made some very conscious decisions along his path to save us. His biggest decision is described in our reading for today. He decided to enter Jerusalem. His enemies could not really get at him while he was in Galilee. But if he stayed for a time in Jerusalem, he was within their power to arrest him and to bring up on charges of blasphemy and treason. Jesus intentionally entered Jerusalem to the shouts of the crowd, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (9).
Jesus spent the next few days in Jerusalem teaching in the temple and calling fellow Jews to repentance. He cleansed the temple of the money changers. In a way, he came to clean house before he would bring salvation to man. The Jews would not do it themselves. They wanted the profit from the money changers. They wanted the power that their positions gave them. They rejected Jesus as the Messiah. He would be their Messiah nonetheless. He would demonstrate that he is their king by wearing a crown of thorns and a purple robe of royalty, and yes, dying on the cross to protect his people from their enemies.
This season of Advent looks forward a bit to that Holy Week. There was another time when Jesus made another intentional step to save us. It is when he stepped forth from his heavenly hall to join himself to our flesh within the womb of the Virgin Mary. Were the people ready for his coming? It seems like some were. Mary herself was a believer in the Old Testament promises. So too was Zechariah, Elizabeth, Simeon, Anna, Joseph, and many others. Their hearts were ready and prepared to welcome the Messiah. They knew the Scriptures, and they were joyful about what it meant.
This Advent is a time for you too to prepare to receive the Messiah. He came once in humility. He was born humbly and placed into a manger in the small town of Bethlehem. He comes to you now in grace. He comes to you when you hear and read the words of Holy Scripture, for He is the Word of God Incarnate. He comes to you when you receive His Body and His Blood on your lips for the forgiveness of your sins. Embrace His coming and prepare for it.
What you receive today is far greater than a foreign leader. It is even greater than if President Biden were to visit your home or even join us in worship today. What you receive today is the coming of your King into your hearts. He brings all the heavenly hosts. He brings his forgiveness, life, and salvation. He brings you joy.
The season of Advent is a season of repentance, but it is also a season of joy. Why? Because we can echo the people who welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” (9).
Understanding that our King comes to us today and will remind us of his special coming on Christmas, Advent does serve to reflect on preparing our hearts. It is one thing to clean up a city and clean up a house, but what clutter do you have in your hearts that might be worth addressing as you prepare to welcome your King? Is it a persistent sin of thought or deed that you need some encouragement to put an end to? Is it a persistent grief over problems or injuries or injustices of the world? Is it a love that has grown cold between spouses or children?
Perhaps it is our Epistle reading that can give us some encouragements: “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law” (8). This would encourage us to renew love between one another. “So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light” (12) encourages us in our fight against sin and sorrow.
Fight all these with the word of God. Maybe add more devotions to your life during this season of Advent. Pray that the Holy Spirit helps you in this struggle, in this cleaning up. Talk with people that you’ve been avoiding. Mend those fences by the strength of God.
In a way, just like houses, this special cleaning is good to do from time to time as we prepare for something special, like Christmas. It’s also good to do on a regular basis. After all, like a house, our sinful lives get dirtier and cluttered day after day. But that is also why coming to church week after week is healthy for the soul.
In a way, Advent highlights for us what happens every Sunday: our King comes to us in grace, to deliver to us the salvation He won for us on the cross. Thanks be to God for this gift, and may our hearts always be full of Christ as He dwells in us.
Now may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen.
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