Sermon: "What Are We Waiting For?"

WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR?
2 Peter 3:8-15a
December 4, 2011
Second Sunday of Advent

But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.

The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.

Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire? But, in accordance with his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.

Therefore, beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him at peace, without spot or blemish; and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation.


For most of us, waiting is not one of our favorite things to do. We have to wait in line at the store, wait to get a table at the restaurant, wait for the doctor to see us, wait at traffic lights and stop signs and traffic jams, wait for the train to get through the crossing.

Statisticians claim that in a life of 70 years, the average person spends at least three years waiting! Someone has even done a study of the “Psychology of Waiting Lines” (David Maister, 1985, www.davidmaister.com). He came up with eight factors that make our waits seem longer:
1. Unoccupied time feels longer than occupied time. Time passes more quickly when we have something to distract us. That’s why hotels put mirrors by the elevators.
2. People want to get started. So restaurants give us menus while we wait and doctors put us in the exam room 25 minutes before our exam actually begins.
3. Anxiety makes waits seem longer. If we think we chose the slowest line or worried about getting a seat on the plane, the wait seems longer.
4. Uncertain waits are longer than known, finite waits. People wait more calmly when they’re told, “The doctor will see you in 30 minutes” rather than “The doctor will see you soon.”
5. Unexplained waits are longer than explained waits. We wait more patiently for the plane when we know there’s another plane at the gate.
6. Unfair waits are longer than equitable waits. That’s why many places have gone to the “Wait here for the next available counter” system where everybody waits in one line.
7. The more valuable the service, the longer we’re willing to wait. We’ll wait longer in line to buy an iPad than a toothbrush.
8. Solo waits feel longer than group waits. The more we engage with other people, the less we notice the wait time.

What we are waiting for may make the biggest difference when it comes to waiting. Waiting at the hospital for a colonoscopy is a great deal less enjoyable than waiting for the birth of a child or a grandchild, wouldn’t you agree? Waiting for your dad to get home because he’s bringing you a new bike is a lot more fun than waiting in your room after your mom has told you, “Just wait till your father gets home!”

Advent is about waiting. It’s about waiting for Christmas and the celebration of the birth of God’s Son Jesus Christ. It’s a time of expectant waiting – for more than just presents and parties and vacations from work and school. It’s about waiting for God’s gift of love and God’s presence to be renewed in our hearts and spirits.

As I mentioned last Sunday, Advent is also about waiting for Christ’s return. We may not immediately associate the Second Coming of Christ with shepherds and wise men and stables and angels. It may be a little bit jarring to our ears to hear readings like today’s passage from 2 Peter that mentions the “day of the Lord” coming like a “thief” and the heavens being set ablaze and dissolved and the “elements” melting with fire.

But Advent is about identifying with the longing and yearning of those who lived 2,000 years ago who were waiting for the Messiah’s first advent and it’s also about those in every generation since that first coming, like us, who are waiting for Christ’s return “to judge the living and the dead.” We worship the Christ who “has come, is coming, and will come again.”

2 Peter was probably written not by the apostle Simon Peter himself but by a follower writing in his name in the early second century. This was not unusual in those days. The letter was written mainly to combat heresy and false teaching that was spreading in the early church.

In today’s passage, he was writing against those who thought that since Christ had not yet returned and the final judgment had not yet happened, it wasn’t going to happen at all. After all, it had been almost a hundred years since the Christ event. Surely Christ would have come back by now if he were coming back at all.

But Peter cautions against such a conclusion. He gives two reasons why. The first reason has to do with God’s reckoning of time. God goes by a different clock than human beings do, he says. A thousand years on earth are like just one day with God. In other words, God, the one who created Time, is not bound to our rules of seconds, hours, days, months, and years. What passes for eons of time down here on earth may be just a fleeting moment in heaven.

A young man once asked God how long a million years was to him. God replied, “A million years to me is just like a single second in your time.”

Then the young man asked God what a million dollars was to him. God replied, “A million dollars to me is just like a single penny to you.”

Then the young man got his courage up and asked God, “Could I have one of your pennies?” God smiled and replied, “Certainly, just a second.”

So what seems like a long time to us to wait for Christ’s return, Peter says, may be nothing at all to God.

The other reason, Peter says, is that God is not being slow in keeping his promise of a Day of Final Judgment, but rather, God is being patient.

God doesn’t want anyone to perish in the Judgment, Peter says, so God is giving us the chance to repent. God would prefer that everyone repent and turn to him before the End. So God is giving us time.

But Peter warns that we shouldn’t presume on God’s patience. The “day of the Lord” is coming, Peter says, but it will come unexpectedly, like a thief.

When it comes, he says, everything will be made new. There will be “new heavens and a new earth.” In his poetic way, the author believed that like God brought judgment with water in the days of Noah, at the end of time God would use fire to destroy the created order to make room for God’s renewed creation.

For most of us, that doesn’t sound like something we can get all that excited about waiting for – the destruction of the universe by fire? But the important thing to remember is that this is happening to make room for something much better – the new heavens and the new earth where justice and righteousness and love will reign supreme.

Suppose you’re living in an old ramshackle house with bad wiring, bad plumbing, broken windows, leaky roof. Then suppose you get chosen by “Extreme Home Makeover” to get a new house. It might hurt a little to see your old house torn down, but think how excited you’ll be to see your brand new house!

That’s sort of like what Peter is trying to describe. It may feel scary to think about this old world passing away, but when it happens, whenever it happens, it’s because God is preparing something much, much better for us. God is making all things new. It’ll be a place where, as the Book of Revelation says, “mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away” (Rev.21:4).

The main question, according to Peter, is what sort of persons ought we to be, right now, while we’re waiting for all this to happen? We ought to lead lives of “holiness and godliness,” Peter says (3:11). We should live right now, he says, as if all this has already happened and we’re living in God’s home of righteousness.

And that’s the most important question for us also. What kind of persons should we be while we’re waiting for God’s purposes to be worked out? If wee the end of things as scary, then we might be people who live constantly in fear.

But instead we should live right now as people of love, forgiveness, grace, justice, and righteousness, because that’s what God originally intended for us and that’s what God intends his Kingdom to be like.

In a way, Advent means living right now as if the end has already come and we’re living in God’s Kingdom. We live as if we really believe what we pray in the Lord’s Prayer: “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

As God’s will is done more and more in us here on earth, earth will seem more and more like heaven until that day when the new heaven and earth come in all their glory.

That’s what we’re waiting for. Amen.