Sermon for November 30th

One of the most important religious movements in America was the Great Awakening. The movement started in eighteenth-century New England and became associated with well known preachers such as Gilbert Tennant, George Whitefield and, most importantly, Jonathan Edwards. At its foundation, the Great Awakening was about a way of preaching, not necessarily a new way of preaching, people had made the same arguments many times before in the church, but this time the arguments seemed to resonate with the people of the new world. In our text today, Jesus says that we must “Stay Awake!” That’s where the term “Great Awakening” comes from. These preachers set to wake people up to their sin and, in turn, wake them up to the truth of the gospel.

The preachers of the Great Awakening were very gifted orators. They led revivals at a time when society seemed to have lost its moral grounding. Here you have a whole new world and a bunch of men trying to survive in it. Things got ugly pretty quickly. What did these pastors preach about? Hellfire and damnation—to scare people into changing their life. My church history professor explained that this technique really could only work before the civil war because, after the war, people couldn’t be scared by hell anymore since they felt they had already seen it and experienced it.

Experience: this was the key. The Great Awakening was about people EXPERIENCING God. The fear, the pain, the awe, the joy, the ecstasy and peace of a relationship with God. One of the mottos at this time denigrated the practice of infant baptism saying, “Christening does not make a Christian.” You needed to EXPERIENCE a CONVERSION according to these new preachers. Nothing less than a true religious experience could prove that you were a true believer.

The Great Awakening placed a lot of focus on something theologians call “Sanctification”. Just in case you’ve never heard of this word before, let me quickly explain what sanctification means. You’ve heard about creation: God created you and all that exists. You are also, probably, somewhat familiar with the word “justification”: being made right with God. When you hear that your sins are forgiven, you are justified in God’s sight, not for what you have done, but because of what God has done for you.

Finally, you get sanctification: being made holy. Sanctification is often talked about as what happens after your sins are forgiven. First creation, then justification and, finally, sanctification. The preachers of the Great Awakening looked for tears during a sermon for instance. They looked to see if people were laughing uncontrollably at the joy of knowing God for the first time. Or, perhaps they simply watched and waited to see if the newest church member had really changed their life around or was already backsliding. That’s the way sanctification is often talked about in churchy circles: what signs can you point to in order to prove someone is actually a Christian. That they are walking the walk and not just talking the talk. And after you’ve figured out who is really a Christian, the fun part becomes deciding who really isn’t.

Those who take this approach toward sanctification hear Jesus’ words in a very particular way. When Jesus says “Jump!” You say, “How high?” When Jesus says, “Keep awake!” You say, “What must I do to keep awake?” How might you keep awake? Many Christians have come up with ways to help you “stay awake” and be ready for Jesus’ return. Sometimes they are simple. Weekly Bible studies. Weekly church services. Having an extra service Sunday nights. Saying prayers at bedtime and in the morning. Sometimes they are a little more complex. Going to confession once a week. Flogging yourself for your sins. Or maybe going on a peace march against the war? Every church has different ways to encourage people to “stay awake” for Jesus but, when that is THE goal, there is a problem with all of them: You just can’t be sure these spiritual disciplines are working can you?

What spiritual contortions have you put yourself through recently in order to prove to yourself, or to someone else, that you are indeed awake for Jesus? Converted? A Christian? A good Lutheran? And yet, the problem is, no matter how hard you try, you can never be sure what you are doing is enough. You know what the most difficult part of staying awake is? The need for sleep everyday. I don’t mean this allegorically or poetically, I mean this completely literally. How in the world am I supposed to do anything spiritual when I am asleep? I can’t stay awake all night long, and I can’t imagine God wants you or me to do that, but how can I be sure I am not dreaming up some horrible sin right when I am the least able to do anything about it and down comes Jesus Christ like a thief in the night! I know that Jesus isn’t demanding that I become sleep deprived, but this scenario does bring the issue to a head: We cannot always feel spiritually awake. And furthermore, most of the time, we don’t even want to. And still Jesus drones on: Stay awake!

If Sanctification means proving to God or to anyone else that you are truly awakened and converted you will fail. No matter how much Bible study, prayer or flogging you participate in. But I believe there is a much more helpful definition of sanctification, penned by the Lutheran theologian Gerhard Forde. He said Sanctification is getting used to being forgiven. Getting used to justification. Getting used to how it feels to be awake. Getting used to being a Christian in a world of sin with other sinners like yourself. Getting used to trusting in God’s Word.

In Elementary school I lived in Saint Paul, Minnesota. My parents had divorced when I was ten and so I was living with my dad at the time. One night, after much pleading and pouting I convinced my dad to let me go on a quick bike ride before he had to go out to work for the night. He made me promise to be home early so he would not be late. But about ten minutes into my ride I must have slid on some gravel because I woke up a ways away from my bike on my face (I can’t remember what happened because I received a concussion). I knocked out my front tooth, chipped another and skinned up my face a great deal. I spent several days out of school due to my injuries and, I assume, made my dad miss whatever it was he was going to.

But the most traumatic experience of the bike accident was much later, after the sun had set and I was fast asleep. You see, my dad had been given instructions to wake me up to make sure I was ok after having my concussion. And so every hour on the hour my dad woke me up, which was a feat in itself considering I was a heavy, heavy sleeper. Then once he woke me up from dreamland, he shined a big bright flashlight into my eyes! Hour after hour he would come back in, shake me awake, force my eyes open, shine that stupid flashlight into my eyes and I would scream and yell at him until he left. Again he would return like a sadistic human alarm clock risking bodily harm while he shined that dumb light in my eyes. Finally, by 3:00, he and I were beyond what we could handle at that point, and he just left me alone to sleep. I still don’t remember what caused the accident, but I remember him waking me up again and again to shine that insanely bright light at me.

Well, that, my friends, is the best example I can give you of what the Christian life is like. Having someone who is supposed to love you wake you up from a perfectly wonderful night’s sleep again and again and again in order to shine a huge, extremely bright flashlight directly into your eyeballs at close range in order to see if your pupils are dilating. Then coming back in what seems like two minutes, once you are comfortably back to sleep, to do it all over again. Jesus Christ, the light of world, comes into your darkness, into your sleep, where you are only too happy to stay sinfully ignorant and unaware, to shine the light of his truth into your eyeballs. You are in bondage to sin and cannot free yourself. He has come to bring life so that you might have it abundantly! What must you do? Nothing. Get used to it.

The first thesis of Luther’s 95 said this, “When our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ, said "Repent", He called for the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.” I think that the same holds true for many other things as well. For instance, “When your Lord and Master Jesus Christ says “Keep awake”, He is calling for your entire life to be one of waking up.” Not one Great Awakening. Not one conversion. Not a onetime amazing experience. Waking up again and again until you finally get used to doing what you do while being awake. While living in the light of Christ. When Jesus says, “Keep awake!” You no longer need ask what you must do. Christ has already awakened you. Now it’s just a matter of getting used to it. As Forde said, “Now that you know that you don’t have to do anything, what are you going to do?”

Jesus wakes you up over and over again in your life. Ironically, you are only fully awakened to faith once you fall asleep for good, once you’re dead and Christ’s awakens you once and for all. During this Advent season, when Jesus says, “Stay awake!” don’t focus on how to make yourself more holy, but get used to opening your eyes to how Jesus has made you holy. God gets the glory. Jesus holds the flashlight. And when you fall asleep, even at your death, you will have gotten used to being awakened by your annoying and irritating heavenly Father standing in your grave and shining his light into your eyes and whispering into your ears: Wake up! Amen.