https://app.dropwave.io/episode/83cfcbf3-2f62-41bf-b80c-fb05a2c65c43/ad-te-levavi-advent-1-ad-2025.mp3
1st Sunday in Advent 30 Nov 2025 – Rev. Eric Malmstrom
Jeremiah 23:5-8
5 “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “That I will raise to David a Branch of righteousness; A King shall reign and prosper, And execute judgment and righteousness in the earth. 6 In His days Judah will be saved, And Israel will dwell safely; Now this is His name by which He will be called: THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS
7 “Therefore, behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “that they shall no longer say, ‘As the Lord lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt,’ 8 but, ‘As the Lord lives who brought up and led the descendants of the house of Israel from the north country and from all the countries where I had driven them.’ And they shall dwell in their own land.”
Romans 13:8-14
8 Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,” “You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
11 And do this, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep; for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed. 12 The night is far spent, the day is at hand. Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.
Matthew 21:1-9
1Now when they drew near Jerusalem, and came to Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, then Jesus sent two disciples, 2 saying to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her. Loose them and bring them to Me. 3 And if anyone says anything to you, you shall say, ‘The Lord has need of them,’ and immediately he will send them.”
4 All this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying: 5 “Tell the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your King is coming to you, Lowly, and sitting on a donkey, A colt, the foal of a donkey.’ ”
6 So the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them. 7 They brought the donkey and the colt, laid their clothes on them, and set Him on them. 8 And a very great multitude spread their clothes on the road; others cut down branches from the trees and spread them on the road. 9 Then the multitudes who went before and those who followed cried out, saying: “Hosanna to the Son of David! ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’ Hosanna in the highest!”
1st Sunday in Advent 30 Nov 2025 – Rev. Eric Malmstrom
Happy New Year! Yes, today marks the beginning of a new church year. Today marks the beginning of the penitential season of Advent. It is similar to Lent where we prepare our hearts and minds for the miracle of Easter. Only, in Advent we prepare our hearts and minds for the miracle of the incarnation. Historically, the season of Advent donned the color purple, indicating its penitential nature. However, Advent now calls for the color blue. Blue is the color of hope. Blue is the color of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
We can think of Advent as a journey. As with any journey, we begin with the destination in mind. We journey towards the cross. We journey towards the resurrection. At the same time, we are reminded that we in no way deserve the blessings of the incarnation of Christ. That is the penitential nature of Advent. We are reminded that we fall short of the glory of God. We are reminded of our sin. In spite of this, God chose to be born under the Law. God chose to be born of the Virgin Mary in order to save us. God chose to love us. It is a miracle beyond our comprehension.
The hope of the season of Advent is different than other types of hope. We can hope to win the lottery. We can hope to have a good year. But Advent is a different type of hope. It is a sure and certain hope. Advent points us to the birth of Christ, his life without sin, his death, resurrection, as well as his return. I like to use the example of a slow cooked meal. All the ingredients for the pot roast are prepared and assembled. They are in the crock pot. You can see it cooking on the countertop. You can smell the roast throughout the day. You look forward to it from the moment it goes into the slow cooker. You know it’s going to be good. You just have to wait in eager anticipation for supper time. This sums up the season of Advent. We wait in eager anticipation for the birth of Christ and his second coming. It is not an empty or wishful hope. It is a sure and certain hope. We saw the prophetic Word fulfilled in the incarnation of Christ. Now we wait for the fulfillment of the second coming. We know that God keeps his promises.
Our readings for the First Sunday in Advent remind us of why Jesus came. It is the destination on our journey. Everything points to Holy Week. Everything points to Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection. Everything points to the second coming. In Genesis 3 we read of the offspring who will crush the head of the serpent. In Jeremiah 23 this morning we read of THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS. We do not read of our own righteousness. We read how the LORD is our righteousness. We do not become our own righteousness. We do not earn our way into God’s good favor. We do not become so righteous that God is moved to save us. God becomes righteousness for us. Justification by grace through faith is just as evident in the Old Testament as it is in the New. Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him as righteousness. The righteous branch of David is our righteousness and our salvation. All of the sacrifices point to the one sacrifice of Christ.
As we read from Romans 13, we are reminded again just how far we are from the righteousness of God. Along our journey we can expect many trials and tribulations. We will encounter roadblocks and detours. There might even be a few accidents along the way. For Christ calls each of us to love our neighbor as ourselves. But we can’t even do that right. When asked to care for the poor and needy we end up sounding more like Scrooge than a Christian. When asked for a donation in A Christmas Carol, Scrooge sarcastically asked if something had happened to the poor houses. He pays his taxes. Tax monies then go to support the poor houses and prisons. That is enough for Scrooge. He pays for someone else to love his neighbor. When we are asked to care for the needy, we say the same thing as Scrooge: “I pay my taxes to provide EBT and SNAP benefits. I pay my taxes to provide housing for the homeless.” We rely on the government to provide for the widow, the orphan, and the disabled. We pay someone else to love our neighbor, so we don’t have to.
We are no better than Scrooge. We are satisfied to outsource the requirement to love our neighbor. Then, to make matters worse, we even change the meaning of the word, love. Love has taken on the same meaning as approval. We do not separate who we are from what we do. We think that if you love me, you will accept and love everything I do. In the same way a small child may think that their parents don’t love them when they say they can’t have a cookie, we think others don’t love us when they tell us our lifestyle isn’t good for us. If you don’t approve of the things I do, you don’t approve me. We hear it all the time. If we don’t approve of certain lifestyles, we are accused of hate. If we don’t approve of various lifestyles, we don’t love those who practice those lifestyles.
The temptation is constant. We want to be loving. We want to be known as those who do not hate. We want to be accepting of others. Nobody wants to be the person who says, no. In the name of love, we call evil good and good evil. Right and wrong have lost their objectivity. We have heard of another congregation in our own Southeastern District that has given in to this temptation. It is a temptation rooted in a misapplication of love. In their eyes they are doing the loving thing by affirming the LGBTQ+ community. To be sure, we are indeed called to love them. 100%. We are called to forgive sins. But there can be no forgiveness without repentance.