“YOUR REDEMPTION IS NIGH: IT IS HERE”
Saint Luke 21: 25-36
Populus Zion (2nd Sunday of Advent): 4 December Anno Domini 2022
Fr Jay Watson, SSP
“And there shall be…upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity…men’s hearts failing them for fear…” An endemic rise of pedophiles grooming your children; butchers chopping your children up; illegal invasions of young wolf-men committing horrible crimes on shrinking native populations in France, Belgium, Italy, and Great Britain; war tensions over Taiwan; NATO’s (i.e., Washington’s) insane provocations in the Russian/Ukraine war (how about ‘Police Action?’ If it was a good enough term in 1952 why not now?); and then there’s the W.E.F.’s along with the W.H.O, and Davos…oh, and DARPA, NSA, and whatever group of sociopathic lizard-brained monsters running Washington D.C. And none of the aforementioned takes into account your own personal diseases, illnesses, pains, and losses—which are many.
How have you been affected by distress upon earth and among nations these past few years? Or maybe you’ve just been no narco-ed up with sports, entertainment (sodomite entertainment if you’re watching American movies and television), and individual hobbies that isolate you from real human beings?
“Well, it’s always been this way” you say. Okay. But I suggest you hear God’s words O Populus Zion. If you’re truly the people of Zion/God then chronic signs, chronic distress and alarms are none the less real or important. It’s the devil that wants you thinking it’s just all “more of the same.” It’s Christ wanting you to “look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh!”
But what about them stars and the moon and the sun? Holy Scripture is not an astronomy text book nor is it Nostradamus. There have been comets, meteorites, blood-moons, solar and lunar eclipses and other strange phenomena that have occurred since the Fall. The sun standing still for Joshua and the Hebrew army (legitimate), 1917’s “Miracle of Fatima in Portugal (illegitimate since, even if true, seemed only to focus people’s attention to the Blessed Virgin and not to Whom she always points—The Son of man; “your redemption draweth nigh.”). There have been others; there will be others.
But note how The Savior pulls your eyes from the skies down to your own surroundings with His parable of the fig tree, and summer drawing nigh.
Unless the Eschaton, the final end, comes in the next day or so, the next few hours, you know full well that Advent is marching toward the great Feast of The Nativity at the 24th and 25th of this blessed month. Closer and closer until red poinsettias and the Gloria in excelsis returning and The Christ Mass.
But none of this is about razzle and dazzle and flash and bang. Well, there will be some heat and flame for the unbelieving to be sure.
For you this is about Jesus; about The Word—The Word of God; about His infallible, inerrant, inspired Scriptures; and about His delivery of Grace—to you—and for you—in His Sacraments.
So yes, your hearts will fail you. Of course. You have sinful hearts by way of “old Adam.” Jesus says: “for out of the heart proceed evil thoughts…” [Mt. 15.19a]. Your hearts will fail you; your courage will fail you. You fail you. Jesus does not. Jesus saves you. Jesus guards and protects you always—you are + Baptized! For Jesus speaks to you through Ezekiel: “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh” [Ez. 36.26].
The very heart of God moved for you, obeyed Law for you, pumped hard and then slower, and then stopped for you on The Cross. The Heart of God was pierced for you and gushed blood for you. The Blood from God’s heart is your new eternal-life transplant as you drink it from His Cup.
So put on your Advent Armor! Set firm your Baptismal + Breastplate. The Spirit has you marching with The Captain of The Host! Don’t let your heart be overcharged with surfeiting (i.e., to over indulge and to filled with disgust). Stop complaining and whining and always being down at all the bad things—your bad things too. Don’t be drunk on the world but rather be filled with Jesus; His Word.
Be in The Bible. Be in The Book of Concord. Be most especially in the weekly Mass. “Watch ye therefore, and pray always.”
What will happen in the atmosphere, the sky and lower earth atmosphere will happen as it is meant to happen. Plant a tree with Dr. Luther. Sing a hymn with your family. Be Advent active in Christ. The “signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars” have already occurred in the only meaningful way that matters. The Father—“the Sun” turned His Face from The Agnus Dei, even as the sun over Judea was blackened for the final three hours on Good Friday. The “Moon” (Christ Himself—the perfect reflection of The Father, indeed more so—“Who is the image of the invisible God” [Col. 1.15a] “for in Him dwelleth all the fulness of The Godhead bodily” [Col. 2. 9]. This “Moon” went out, if you will, when buried deep in Joseph’s tomb…for a while…until signs in the “stars,” the holy angels made their appearance on Easter morning and continue to make their appearance through the voice of New Testament angels in the Holy Preaching Office of The Ministry.
There are signs! Make the “sign of the cross” now with me! (+). You “see” the “Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory”—in both actual Incense enveloping the chancel and altar and in the “incense” of prayers offered up before His throne.
“Heaven and earth shall pass away” with His final Advent and the resurrection of all flesh, when “all will be fulfilled.” But His words will never pass away: “take eat, take drink, My Body and Blood for you!”
Life up your heads. Your redemption draweth nigh and indeed is now here for you—The Supper is about to begin!
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of The Holy Ghost
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