The First Sunday of Advent, November 29, 2020

Mark 13:33–37

Jesus said to his disciples: “Be watchful! Be alert! You do not know when the time will come. It is like a man traveling abroad. He leaves home and places his servants in charge, each with his own work, and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch. Watch, therefore; you do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all: ‘Watch!’ ”

Today we enter the Church season known as “Advent”.  This is the four Sunday period before the Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord — Christmas — and can last from between twenty-one and twenty-eight days.  This year it will last twenty-six days.  Just as in the case of the season of Lent, Advent began as local observances of varying numbers of days or weeks.  By the early Middle Ages it had become settled, by various regional councils, to five Sundays.  Pope St. Gregory VII, who ruled from 1073-85, is responsible for the current number of four Sundays.

While this season is mostly known as a time of preparation for Christmas, especially since the later Middle Ages, we see from the Gospel readings that it is also a time for the Second Coming of the Lord Jesus.  Thus, we can understand the season as pointing us in the direction of the past, the present, and the future: the past, as in the historical Birth of Christ; the present, as in his Sacramental coming amongst us during the Holy Mass; and the future, as when the Lord comes in glory to judge the living and the dead.  Each of these helps us to understand the others.  The humble comings at Bethlehem and in the Holy Mass prepare us for the glorious coming in the future.  The coming at Mass helps us to understand that the blessed will be in intimate Union with the Lord when he comes again.  The glory of the Second Coming enables us to understand something of what actually happened two thousand years ago when God became man and dwelt with us, as well as who it is whom we receive at Holy Communion.

“Be watchful! Be alert! You do not know when the time will come.”  These words of the Lord are an essential part of his core message to us.  We are told that after his baptism by John the Baptist, he went into the towns and villages of Israel proclaiming, “The time is accomplished and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the gospel.”  The words, ““Be watchful! Be alert! You do not know when the time will come”, complete the sense.  The kingdom of God is approaching, but you do not know the time when it will arrive.  Therefore, keep watch!

We might wonder why the Lord tells us to keep watch.  After all, he will come whether we are watching or not.  Jesus means by “be watchful” that we should live our lives in view of the great judgment to come.  As St. Peter reminds us, “And if the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” (1 Peter 4, 18).  That is, it will be with difficulty that even those who are keeping watch will be saved; what will happen to those who live their lives carelessly?

“It is like a man traveling abroad. He leaves home and places his servants in charge, each with his own work, and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch.”  Jesus presents this simile of a wealthy man with a household, land that must be tilled, and animals that must be fed.  He feels confident in placing his servants in charge because they have been trained and also found to be loyal.  In other words, they know what their jobs are and how to do them.  They can be sure of reward when the landowner returns and finds everything in order, but also of punishment if he does not.  These are slaves, we should note, and not paid servants.  Because they are slaves, their position is particularly precarious.  The landowner could come back, find something amiss, and have all of the slaves beaten, resold, or killed.  The gatekeeper’s job is of great importance inasmuch as it is he who will send the trumpet or ring the bell that will bring the slaves before the returning master to render an account of their work to him.

“You do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning.”  The Fathers understood this line as referring to the stages of a person’s life: “evening” meant in middle age; “midnight”, in old age; “cockcrow”, in childhood; and “morning”, in one’s youth.  Here, we see not the Second Coming, but the coming of judgment at the end of an individual’s life.  

“May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping.”  This sounds harsh because sleep is necessary for all.  But the Lord means here to warn those who sleep during the day, when it is necessary to work.  Those who use the landowner’s apparent absence as an excuse for misbehavior or sleeping on the job will suffer for it.  “Sleeping” can also be understood as being in a state of sin, for sleep is equated with death in the Old Testament (“he slept with his fathers” is a common phrase referring to the death of a king), and death is equated with sin in the New Testament (it is the “first death” as distinct from the “second death” of Revelation 20, 14).  

“What I say to you, I say to all: ‘Watch!’ ”  The Lord says this not only to his Apostles and to all Christians, but to all people through their consciences, for everyone possesses a conscience, and our consciences, unless so worn away by constant and willful sinfulness, tell us that certain acts are wicked and that we will get into trouble of some kind if we perform them.  St. Paul writes of this in Romans 1, 18-22.  

We ought to be “watchers”, then: watchers of ourselves lest we fall through carelessness or malice, and watchers of those in our charge so that they may not be lost through sin — sin that resounds to us, along with its punishment.  And let us keep in mind as we look back in history to the Baby born in the muck of a stable outside of Bethlehem, that we shall stand before him when he returns with the angels in great power.