This sermon was delivered Gordon McCulloch to the congregation at Holy Trinity in Ayr, Ayrshire, Scotland on the 11th August 2019; Holy Trinity is a Scottish Episcopal Church in the Dioceses of Glasgow and Dumfries.
Genesis 15:1-6 Psalm 33:12-22 Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16 Luke 12:32-40
“Please join me in a short prayer.” Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength, and our redeemer. Amen. (Ps. 19:14)
Introduction
Throughout the gospels we read of Jesus teaching us about the kingdom of heaven, and how throughout our lives we are being prepared to meet with him in person. … This morning we read of Jesus doing just that, he is preparing the disciples for their own personal ministry once he leaves; but he is also making it very clear, that he will return to meet with them … and us too of course … at some future time.
This worries many people, as Jesus is teaching us here that we should therefore be in state of constant readiness for his return … and this is quite scary. … Also we do not know what his return really means.
Does it mean he with physically appear to us as person in this life … does he mean we will be transformed directly into his kingdom somewhere in the spirit world … does he mean that we are prepared for our own death … or does he mean that when he returns it will be the end of the world as written in the book of revelations? …
The bible is not clear on this one and we don’t know for sure, but in the parable given in support of our reading, we are presented with Jesus describing a scene in which several servants were waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet; the point being that they were to remain vigilant and ready for his return; having everything in place and in order … in the exact way that we should be in our preparations to meet with Jesus himself, in whatever manner that curtails.
… Our text this morning therefore details a three point approach to that readiness, and the first point is that we must simply be aware of his return, and be ready to meet with him, which in many ways I suppose many of us here today are, more so than we realise and I will explain.
I. Simply be aware and be prepared to meet with our master.
Verse 35 of our text starts this preparation with two commands: “Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps lit” …and from this short text we see two word pictures, the first (where the text is expanded later on in the passage), to belt their robes, and the second … to keep their lamps burning.
1. Long robes
Now the long robes of the Middle East, worn by both men and women, nearly touch the ground as we know. They are worn without belts, and in hot climates, this is the best way to cover up and keep cool … however, if they are involved in any strenuous activity like hard work, it is better and more practical to tie a belt or rope around the waist and then tucking in the bottom edge of the robes into that belt to keep it off the ground, and out of the way; that way it is more practical for heavy working.
2. Keep your lamps lit.
The second command relates to keeping their lamps lit which means little to us, unless we have lived without electricity and know the difficulty of preparing a lamp with oil and a wick after it is dark … in other words, it is best to prepare our lamps well before it is dark. In conclusion, the representation of our loins being girded and our lamps burning we are prepared and watching out in the expectancy of our coming master.
3. Be ready for the master returning from the wedding feast
Verse 36 then complements this by telling us to “be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast, so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks.”
This is an implied story of a master who went off somewhere to get married … and as these weddings in the middle east could last a week or so, the emphasise here would be on the new husband returning home with his new bride … and he is certainly not wanting to be kept waiting. … Applied spiritually, the Lord Jesus when he returns does not want to be kept waiting either. … Jesus wants us to be watching and ready for Him … and not needing to be aroused, or educated, or wait for us to put our affairs in order … he will expect us to be ready; which is quite strong.
4. Different ways to wait for the Lord.
And there are different ways in which Christians can "wait" for the Lord's return. Some people are completely unmoved by this coming event because they have only a cold theological knowledge, an attitude most superficial … that does not cause them to grow in faith.
Others, however, look expectantly to our Saviours’ return, and wish it so with a holy zeal … because they are living for His glory, and want to give Him praise and adoration, grateful for all He has done for them.
Others are like me, are confused by this, and possibly lie somewhere in between these two extremes … but just in case, we do our best to prepare ourselves anyway, by keeping the light of our devotion to Jesus trimmed and burning bright.
II. Receive a blessing when he returns.
This then takes us onto our second point in verses 37 & 38 where on his return; we are blessed by Jesus. Verse 37 says, “Blessed are those slaves whom the master will find on the alert when he comes; truly I say to you, that he will gird himself to serve, and have them recline at the table, and will come up and wait on them.” … This verse then illustrates the great reward God has in store for those whom he finds ready on his return.
Jesus has always placed a high premium on those who serve him, and here he is saying just that … that He will honour “faithfulness by serving those who served Him”.
This text always encourages me because Jesus is not saying, “Blessed are those servants who, when the Lord comes, he shall find working, witnessing, praying, preaching or studying and any other holy deed”. … No. Jesus is saying, “Blessed are the ones who the Lord finds “alert” or “watching for his return”, or simply, blessed are those who are looking forward to meeting with him.”
In this assembly this morning I can see many who are doing just that … but think, in contrast, as we go home and go about our business, we will see many people who are not. … Think on them! Can you imagine any of them saying “I am looking forward to meeting the risen Christ”.
I am sure many of them would perish the thought, particularly our youngsters of today, yet we here today “canny wait”. We are worlds apart, but that is exactly what Jesus wants. … And for us it is kind of easy, because we know that if we do not have Jesus to look forward to … what exactly do we have … and what would life be all about?
And we ask this question regularly, because we all have troubles of some kind or other … that is the nature of life. It maybe financial … it maybe we are in conflict with someone or something. … We maybe in physical pain … or have restricted mobility in some way. … We may even be in the middle of some horrible ordeal … or just simply lost … and when we suffer these ordeals, we see very clearly the emptiness of this world which I have mentioned before.
I am not being negative here; rather the opposite, I am trying to show the contrast of those who live for this world, and those who do not, and those who do not have a thing called hope, and a faith that they will survive. … They are positive, in the fact they are looking forward to their death, and life in the kingdom heaven in an exciting, positive way … being prepared, or as prepared as we can be, to meet with their maker, just as Jesus is commanding right here.
This is quite a good verse … and to finish it off, Jesus in verse 38 proclaims that the watching servant will be blessed. “whether he comes in the second watch, or even in the third, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves.”
And 2 Timothy 4:8 agrees, “Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing”. … The crown mentioned here is given to those who say, “Lord, I realize that this world is not where it’s at, that there must be more. Therefore, I’m looking for your coming and your kingdom.”
{ Hopefully now it is quite obvious that Jesus blesses those who are looking for His coming because these people realize that life is not about them, but about him … that he is far high and better than them … and realising this can be a rarity these days with people trusting in themselves or their money. }
And those, whom the Lord serves, understand that nothing is due to their own greatness, but solely to his graciousness that they are blessed. We are blessed because of our response to Jesus, and what he achieved on the Cross … when he died for all our sins.
And the blessing of verse 37 is so wonderful, that it is repeated at the end of verse 38; “blessed are those slaves.”
III. We are simply to life our lives for him and not ourselves.
We now move on to the final point this morning, where Jesus compares our readiness, to that of a thief robbing a house in the middle of the night. … Verse 39, “but be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have allowed his house to be broken into” … which is pretty obvious really … but that is the way we to expect the return of Jesus.
… We will be caught off guard, fact … as this very point is repeated more strenuously in verse 40, “you too, be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour that you do not expect”.
So we are to be alert, (that is keep or lamps burning), and we are to be ready, (dressed in readiness), and not to be caught by surprise … because Jesus will come suddenly, without any opportunity for preparation or excuses.
These verses used to frighten me, but I hope I am conveying a message of the opposite; that is it is something to look forward too, rather than something to run from.
The bible tells us clearly in verse 40 that the “Son of Man is coming at an hour that we do not expect", therefore we are not to worry about material things … we are simply not to worry, but instead to live for and trust in the Lord the best we can, and make His kingdom our priority in whatever way we can … demonstrating his faith, when the opportunities arise. That way we will be ready for his return; not desperately, nor frantically but responsibility.
… A man once commented, “I hope I don’t die suddenly. I want just a minute or so to straighten out some relationships.” A friend said, “Well, why don’t you straighten them up now … if as you say, they are worth straightening”.
If it’s worth doing, do it now; if something has to be done, do it now and get it out the way … at the very least, it will give you peace of mind. … Another man who was well aware of this was working in his garden when he was asked … “what would you do if you knew you only had one day to live”? … He replied … “I would finish this garden”. He would finish what he was doing.
We are daily, to do those things which are right, diligently and without panic because Jesus promised us that he would return … but he also told us that while we wait for His coming, we are to say in our hearts, "I am ready" … and if we can truly say that, then we are at peace; and we can truly rest in peace. Yes there are things that we would have liked to have done, but we are talking here purely on the things that must be done.
IN CLOSING,
To give you a final example of this message this morning, a teacher once told his class that he would was going away for several weeks, and he offered to give a very big prize to the student whose desk he found in the best order when he came back; but he said that they would not know when he would return.
Because the prize was so big, each child became determined to receive it, including little Jonny whose desk was always in a mess. His classmates taunted, "you will never win … your desk is never neat and tidy." … "Aye he said, but I have a plan … to clean it the first day of every week from now on". … Then someone said … "suppose he comes at the end of the week"? … Little Jonny said, "Then I'll clean it every morning" … but another classmate persisted … "He may come at the end of the day". … Little Jonny thought for a moment and said, "Well I know what I'll do. I'll just keep it clean and tidy all the time”, and he did, and he won the prize. … Do you see the point of all this now; it is totally life changing and will make every difference to our lives?
We are therefore to live as Jesus commands us, and constantly in a state of spiritual readiness in the anticipation of when he will return.
Amen,
P.S. Many thanks to Contributed by Dennis Davidson for his help in getting started in this sermon.
