There is an urgency to Advent that is reflected in this evening's text: ":..It is high time to awake from sleep...salvation is nearer now then when we first believed...The night is far spent, the day is at hand." All of Advent tells us that the Lord is near. These three Wednesday evenings in Advent, we shall focus our hearts and minds on the nearness of the Lord, looking at three different implications of our Lord's nearness for our lives of faith and love. Tonight, is it repentance.
The world has forgotten that Christmas is the celebration of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. Hence, in the world's scheme of things, there is no room for Advent. But the mind of the church is different. We know that Christmas is the feast of the Lord's incarnation. He came among us as a baby born of Mary, born under the law to redeem those who were under the law. He came in the flesh to go to the cross and there make atonement for our sin. Advent teaches us how we are to receive this Lord who came to save us. Advent prepares us to receive Him as He comes to us in the preaching of His Word and in the Holy Supper, so that when He comes again on the Last Day, we might embrace Him with joy. In other words, Advent teaches us how to repent.
At the beginning of Mark's Gospel, Mark tells us that "John the Baptist came baptizing in the wilderness and preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins." Then, after our Lord Jesus is baptized by John, Jesus begins preaching. And the first recorded words of His preaching in Mark's Gospel are: "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the gospel." What is this repentance proclaimed both by John the Baptist and by our Lord?
Most simply put, repentance is a turning from sin to Jesus Christ. Repentance is more than remorse or regret over sin. It is more than "feeling sorry" for my sins, which easily turns into a feeling sorry that my sins have caused me misery. Repentance is a turning from sin. Paul describes it like this in our text: "Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness." What are these works of darkness that we are to put off, turn away from? Paul lists some of the most obvious. There is revelry which would squander life in frivolity and self-indulgence. Drunkenness dulls the mind and impairs the body which God has crafted to be the temple of His Holy Spirit. Lewdness and lust which casts a dirty shadow over the Creator's design and purpose of our sexuality, our being male and female. Strife sets human beings in lethal contention with one another. And envy turns an evil and greedy eye on the generosity of God to the neighbor.
These things the holy apostle catalogues as "works of darkness." These are more than character flaws or bad habits. The works of darkness are not just bad behavior patterns. No, these are manifestations of our sinful nature, and they grow from the old Adam's inbred desire to have life without God's light. These works of darkness are symptoms of a life of captivity in the dominion of the prince of darkness.
Advent spells death to the deeds of darkness - these attitudes and actions that creep out of the soul's cellar. Revelry, lewdness, lust, strife, and envy cannot be domesticated. These wild creatures cannot be domesticated, house-broken, and tamed - transformed into docile house pets. They must be put to death. They must be stripped off like infected and contaminated garments. Repentance is not renovation; it is death, death to sin. It is that daily dying to sin that continues to the day of our death when we will be forever through with sin.
But the repentance which we learn in Advent is not only a turning away from sin, a being stripped of the works of darkness. Repentance is a turning to Jesus Christ who forgives sins. It is, as Paul says in our text, putting on of "the armor of light." That "armor of light" is nothing less than the righteousness of Jesus Christ Himself. Therefore the Apostle concludes our text by saying, "But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts." Here Paul's words sound very similar to his words in Galatians 3, "For as many of you as were baptized into Christ, have put on Christ." The life of repentance is a return to your Baptism, for in Baptism you were buried with Christ. Remember Paul's words in Romans 6 , "Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life." To repent is to turn from your sin and embrace by faith the gift of salvation given you in Baptism.
The gift of Baptism is the death that Jesus died as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. In Baptism, we were buried with Christ - wrapped up in His death - for the forgiveness of our sins. In his 95 Theses Martin Luther wrote, "When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said 'repent,' He willed that the entire life of the believer be one of repentance." Advent prepares us for such a life as we learn to cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.