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Advent Devotional for Sunday, November 27
Mark 13:24–37
This passage contains a great promise. But it also contains a great temptation.
The temptation is for us to claim to know more than we know. There is a long and embarrassing history in Christianity where people have named a year or a day and said: “This is when the end will come.”
Thus far, everyone who has made that claim has been wrong. Yet people continue to comb through Daniel and Revelation and similar passages, announcing their predictions with great fanfare—and it seems, often a little financial profit. But Jesus is as clear as can be: “But about that day or hour no one knows …”
People are sometimes urged to act as if the world would end tomorrow. I would suggest the opposite: Act as if the world will NOT end tomorrow. Act as if there will still be a world tomorrow, and you will still be in it, and you will have something important and significant to do in God’s service. Be aware. Watch. Keep awake. But do all these things with open eyes, busy hands, and active feet. Let the one who promised to return be with you now, and in the world now, through you. Tomorrow might not bring the end. But it can always bring a beginning.
Lord Jesus, send your Spirit to awaken us, embolden us, and energize us. Help us to work as we wait, that you may find us watching, and working as we watch. Amen.
David Johnson
Director, Program of Formation in Ministry
Assistant Professor of Christian Spirituality
For the glory of God and to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary is a seminary in the Presbyterian-Reformed tradition whose mission is to educate and equip individuals for the ordained Christian ministry and other forms of Christian service and leadership; to employ its resources in the service of the church; to promote and engage in critical theological thought and research; and to be a winsome and exemplary community of God's people.
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