Summer is coming!  I know - it has been a week of snow falling right along with the temperature. But still, summer is coming and, on this First Sunday of Advent, I’m looking for some warm and welcoming news.  I didn’t exactly find it in the complete text that the lectionary recommended for today, which included dire predictions of “nations in anguish and perplexity “ and “men fainting from terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world . . .” but those scary words did end on a hopeful note, promising “your redemption is drawing near.”  And then, Jesus expresses the promise of the fig tree.  By the way, this is not the same fig tree Jesus cursed.  This fig tree sprouts leaves as summer approaches, and that’s what I want to focus on this morning.

    Jesus is talking about days of distress, accompanied by terrifying heavenly signs, but then suddenly he interjects a word of comfort and hope. "Now learn this lesson from the fig tree," he says. "As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door. I tell you the truth; this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away."

    Jesus is talking about discerning the signs of the times.  They may seem like bad news, but the promise is that they are actually signs of new life, of birth, of tenderness and growth. When he says that there are those listening to him that day who will not pass away before they have seen him return in power and glory, well - that is either flat out wrong, or we have to look for another, less literal understanding of what he’s talking about.

    The reason this passage is recommended for the First Sunday of Advent is that historically, Advent was a time for anticipating not only the birth of Jesus, but his Second Coming as well.  The Second Coming, like the “Left Behind” series of novels, can be pretty scary stuff, with Christ coming in clouds of power and glory. 

    But I believe he's talking about today! This is the First Sunday of Advent and Christ is coming again.  You don't have to wait until the end of history to experience his presence. There are clouds of power and glory aplenty right here and right now, this day and every day. Advent is an attitude, an inner, spiritual preparation that heightens our perception of God's presence being birthed in signs of growth and sensitivity.

    In a few moments we're going to be celebrating our awareness of Christ in our midst as we share in the Sacrament of Holy Communion, receiving the gift of Christ’s Body, and simultaneously making our commitment to the particular manifestation, or incarnation of Christ’s Body as it exists in the First UMC of Ashland.  This act of both giving and receiving is an opportunity to begin living today with the awareness that Christ is continually being born anew in the manger of every receptive heart. One of my favorite authors, Frederick Buechner, wrote a piece very simply entitled, "Today."

    “Today,” he writes, is a “moment of light surrounded on all sides by darkness and oblivion. In the entire history of the universe, let alone in your own history, there has never been another just like it and there will never be another just like it again. It is the point to which all your yesterdays have been leading since the hour of your birth. If you were aware of how precious today is, you could hardly live through it. Unless you are aware of how precious it is, you can hardly be said to be living at all!  ‘This is the day which the Lord has made,' says the 118th Psalm. 'Let us rejoice and be glad in it.' Or weep and be sad in it for that matter. The point is to see it for what it is because it will be gone before you know it. If you waste it, it is your life that you're wasting. If you look the other way, it may be the moment you've been waiting for always that you're missing.  All other days have either disappeared into darkness and oblivion, or not yet emerged from it. Today is the only day there is.” [Whistling In The Dark, p. 105]

    On this Advent Sunday of Christ's coming, we gather and give thanks for the vision to behold God's power, God's peace, and God's glory. We gather to receive the freely given gift of the sacrament of God’s love through Christ, and we pledge our commitment to carrying on the work of Christ through this church family that provides us with the opportunity to grow in our awareness of God’s loving presence in this very specific and particular time and place.

    Thanks be to God for the gift of today and for the promise of tomorrow.  As we begin this holy season of Advent, a time of prayerful preparation and watching for the signs of new life, may we remember Christ’s illustration of the flowering fig tree.  We join together in our love for God and of one another as we anticipate the future with joy, with hope, and with the confidence of Christ, in whose name we pray.  Amen.