Seventh Sunday of Easter May 8, 2016
Easter 7 (Exaudi)
1 Peter 4:7-11 & John 15:26-16:4
May 8, 2016
“Don’t Fall Away. Know the Time.”
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Anybody know what time it is? What time is it right now? Probably about 10:20am, right? 10:20….okay. That means we’re not all that far from lunch, right? And we got the whole afternoon left, right? Yeah, okay. So we kinda know where we’re at. 10:20. And the date? It’s May 8th. Okay, so we’re getting close to summer. School’s almost out. VBS is coming. Alright, then. Knowing what time it is orients you. It grounds you. It helps you to see where you’re at. It’s important.
Did all of you have good and pleasant dreams last night? I hope you did. Sometimes we don’t, though, right? Sometimes we have those bad and unpleasant ones. Nightmares. Maybe last night you were trying to run away from someone and your legs wouldn’t work. Hate those. Maybe you were falling. Those aren’t fun at all. Maybe you went to work or school without the proper clothing and couldn’t seem to find the right clothes. Those aren’t fun either. Or maybe your dream was much scarier. At any rate, what do you do when you wake up from one of those bad dreams? I’ll give you a minute to think about it. When you wake up from one of those dreams, you have to orient yourself, right? Make sure it was just a dream. You look around and see where you’re at. But most of us will do one other important thing—we’ll look at the clock. What time is it? Because the time will orient us. “Oh, it’s 3 in the morning. Okay. It was just a dream.”
Jesus and Peter want to orient us this morning. Jesus talks in the Gospel reading and says, “I have said these things to you to keep you from falling away. They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think that he is offering service to God. And they will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me. But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you.” Jesus is telling us what time it is. “The hour is coming,” he says. Know what the hour is so that you won’t fall away.
And Peter, in the epistle today, says, “The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers.” The time, he says, is very near to the end. Know what time it is and keep sober so that you can pray.
So from both Jesus and Peter we’re getting this very important word of warning: “Know what time it is so that you won’t fall away.”
This is hugely important. Christians need to know what time it is so that they will be oriented in the right direction and can know how to think rightly about the times we’re living in. Have you ever not known what time it is? That can be really frustrating. If you can’t find a clock anywhere? Maybe you’ve slept in a room without a clock and it kinda drives you nuts because you have no idea when to get up. Of course, most of the time this doesn’t happen because we’ve got a thousand clocks around us all the time. Between cell phones, watches, clocks, microwaves, stoves, coffee pots, tvs, computers—we’ve got plenty of places to check the time.
In general, we always have a sense of what time it is just by how old we are. If I’m a toddler, time really doesn’t much matter to me at all. I’ve got plenty of time all the time. And so do Mom and Dad, presumably. If I’m a teenager, time starts to matter more to me. Like how many more years of school do I have left? Like how am I going to choose to spend my time? Then eventually you get to those mid-years where you might have one of those mid-life crises because you realize your time will eventually run out. And then you might get to those older years where time becomes more and more precious.
So what time is it, Christians? Jesus tells us. We are in the time between Jesus ascending into heaven and when He will come again to judge the world. 40 days after Jesus rose from the dead, He went to a mountain with His disciples. There a cloud came and enveloped Him and He went up into heaven. He didn’t ascend to heaven to leave us. He ascended so that He could rule over all things and fill all things with His presence. And now we wait for Him to come again.
Now in this time then, Jesus says it will not be easy for Christians. Did you hear that? It will not be easy. That’s the time. Uneasy. He says there will be trials and there will be trouble. Because much of the world doesn’t know the Father or Jesus. There will be suffering. There will be wars. There will be broken families. There will be natural disasters. That is the time. And Jesus wants you to know that so that when it happens you won’t fall away from Him.
In other words, let’s say it this way. There will be times you will be tempted to fall away. You can count on it. There will be times when you don’t understand why things are happening and you don’t understand what the Lord is doing. Count on it. There will be times where you suffer in one way or another. Count on it. There will be times when our nation no longer cares about what Christians say or think. Count on it. There will be times where we have two people running for President—neither of whom are very Christian at all. If at all. Count on it.
And in any of those times, you might be tempted to fall away. Jesus doesn’t want you to. He wants you to know what time it is. He wants you to know that He is coming again. He wants you to be oriented toward Him and toward His kingdom.
So, in this time between Jesus’ ascension into heaven and when He comes again, He gives us gifts to keep us oriented toward Him. To keep us alert to the times. He gives us His Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives us faith to believe Jesus’ word and trust Him and wait for Him. Jesus gives us Baptism. When we’re baptized and become His child—then all our time is His time. We live with Him. He gives us the Lord’s Supper. Every week we should be having the Lord’s Supper here because any Sunday may be the very time one of us needs to receive that forgiveness in Christ’s body and blood. That needs to be a consistent, weekly part of our time and schedule. He also gives us prayer. Prayer without ceasing. So that we may turn our times over to Him and know that He will keep us from falling.
Christians, Jesus has told us what time it is so that we won’t fall away. Peter clarifies it even more and says we’re at the end of all things. It’s at hand. That’s what time it is. So he tells us to be sober. That’s an interesting choice of words that he uses. Now our translation says “sober-minded”. They see in the context that Peter isn’t just talking about getting drunk. But it’s still an interesting choice of words. What happens when you’re not sober? What happens when you’re drunk? You lose your grounding, don’t you? You don’t care about what time it is. Don’t care about what and who are around you. You fall away from reality. You see why this is the perfect word here? Peter, just like Jesus, doesn’t want us to fall like we’re drunk. He doesn’t want us to lose our minds, lose our grounding, lose our orientation. He wants us to stay sober. To know what time it is. That it’s very near the end.
Stay self-controlled and sober-minded. Don’t get drunk on the times. Don’t get drunk on the craziness of this year’s presidential election. Yes, it’s important who our President will be. But stay sober-minded. Don’t get drunk on Trump or Hillary. This, too, will pass. Don’t get drunk on the materialism of this world. Man, is it easy to do that. To get drunk on all the stuff. To get drunk on spending money. To get drunk on fancy cars and clothes and phones where you forget that all of this stuff is passing away. None of it lasts. Even those fancy $500,000 homes will all crumble eventually. Don’t get drunk on stuff.
Don’t get drunk on sports. If sports are causing you to miss church, then there’s a problem. If you’re losing your mind every game, then there’s a problem. Be self-controlled. Don’t get drunk on the culture and all the latest cultural gossip. Don’t get drunk on those who are right now telling everyone that they must accept gay marriage and they must accept transgenderism and they must go along with the social agenda. Know what time it is. Know that these same sins have been around long before us and will be here after us. They were wrong before us and they will be wrong and harmful after us. Don’t gulp down every drink that the culture tells you to drink. Be sober-minded. Think clearly and rightly according to God’s Word.
Instead of getting drunk on the times, Peter tells us what to do. He says, “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins.” Don’t fall away from loving. It’s tempting at times, isn’t it? To just say the heck with everybody else and I’m just going to worry about me. That’s the devil working on us. Jesus is loving us in this time. Earnestly He is loving us. He forgives our sins in His Word and Sacrament and gives us the Holy Spirit. He covers the multitude of our sins.
So we also keep loving. Love covers a multitude of sins. We are able to love others even when they aren’t loving toward us. Even when they don’t agree with us. Even when they do things that we hate. That’s what time it is. It is time to love others and to witness to the love of God in Jesus Christ. Don’t fall away from loving. All sinners of the world need to be loved just as we do.
And Peter says, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another.” God has given each one of you many gifts. It’s time to use those gifts. Know what time it is. Use your money to help others. Use your words to encourage and support one another. Use all your gifts to bring glory to God through Jesus Christ.
Knowing the time is important. For Christians too. Jesus has told us this time will be full of trials and troubles. We know that. But He is coming again. And we wait for Him. So now is the time to be hearing His Word and receiving the Lord’s Supper. Now is the time for prayer. And now is also the time to be self-controlled and sober. Now is the time to love and serve.
Jesus has said this to you…to keep you from falling away. Don’t fall away. Know what time it is. Amen.