Watch and Pray
Advent I
Jesus said, “But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in the days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so, too, will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken, and one will be left. Keep awake, therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”
Matthew 24:36-44
Advent is not a season we usually remember from childhood. I, for one, don’t have any Advent stories from growing up. If you had asked me what Advent was, I would have said that in church, it was the time when we had more green plants and candles while we wait for Christmas, and out in the world, it was the time of more green plants and candy while we wait for Christmas.
But take note, fellow Christians, that it is an entirely different thing to wait for a holiday than it is to wait for Jesus. When we wait for a holiday, we set ourselves up for disappointment. I have previously told this core bit of family lore: one Christmas morning long ago, I received a bright red plastic car (foot-powered and Flintstones-style, mind you, not the fancy battery-powered Jeeps the cool kids got). I was very happy. My sister, on the other hand, asked for a bright pink ballerina watch. So instead of a car, much to her despair, she received a bright pink ballerina watch. It was so unfair, she cried and cried. Based on how many years she spoke of the injustice of getting what she asked for, this was, apparently, traumatizing. So I know without a doubt that for her, it was far more joyful waiting for Christmas than when it actually showed up.
From our lofty perch as adults in 2025, where our phones do not pirouette but always give us the perfect time in our pockets, this example might seem silly. But do most of us spend Advent waiting for Christmas rather than waiting, and watching, for Jesus? Maybe it’s not a gift, but do any of us wait for something magical to happen this holiday season? And do our desires not go far beyond waiting for material or immaterial gifts of this season, but are something we do all year round? All throughout life, do we not often get exactly what we ask for, only to despair because it wasn’t enough? What is your ballerina watch that you are waiting for?
And if we are to wait for Jesus, who, according to any colored watch, hasn’t fully come yet, what does that mean we are to do?
The answer Jesus provides is in our Gospel reading is one that the Church has followed for thousands of years, with some bouts of amnesia: keep awake. Be ready. For you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.
Over the centuries, the Church has thought of this in several ways, from the scale of the broader, cosmic kingdom to the level of the individual soul. So we stay awake, stay ready, and watch and pray not only because Jesus will come one day to bring the fullness of joy in the midst of humanity’s long wilderness winter. The medieval Church celebrated Advent in the most morbid terms; each Sunday they did not light candles for hope, peace, joy, and love, but meditated on what was called “The Four Last Things”: death, judgment, heaven, and hell, the final stages of the soul. And because your death is coming one day, you better know what time it is. Merry Christmas.
But while this seems dark, it might be because we have forgotten the confident hope that we carry. We are, I repeat, not really called to wait for a holiday, not in four weeks or in four years or in four vacations or in four cars or in four grandchildren or in four elections. We are called to wait for Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, who lived and dwelled among us, who still lives and still dwells among us, and who will come again to restore the fullness of all that has been rendered broken. With this hope, we have nothing to fear from death, judgment, heaven, nor hell. We light candles because while we do not yet live in the city described in Revelation 21:23, “The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp,” no, we are not there yet, but we still light candles because we know that while we wait, we do not wait alone, for the light has come into the world and the darkness cannot overcome it.
We wait in Advent because we remember it is important to wait for God always. We watch and pray not only for the day that he comes off in the far distance, but to watch and pray for where he is already here.
“Watch and pray,” the basic request Jesus made of his friends on his last night in the garden before his death, just two chapters after our reading today (Matt 26:36-46). They fell asleep. So do we. So he asks us again—he asks you again—will you watch and pray?
For we do not really know what time it is. A question I asked in Sunday School a few weeks ago: where are we in history? Does anyone know? I mean in true history, in history as God sees it. The Church’s best answer is seeing us in a pattern that goes all the way back to Exodus (if not further), where God’s people were saved from slavery but not yet in the Promised Land, wandering in exile, following the presence of God in a pillar of fire. You, too, have been saved from the slavery of sin. But we are still here in the desert, often disgruntled and disobedient to God, but still walking, following the light, not always knowing where our next spiritual meal will come from, but knowing that the Lord will provide, knowing that the Promised Land is somewhere if we can keep following the fire, a giant, moving, burning candle of hope in the desert. And you never know when your next step might splash into the waters of the Jordan at the edge of the Promise.
So we live in active waiting. We wait with “sober watchfulness,” the Greek word nepsis that some Church elders cultivated in response to Christ’s ask to watch and pray. In Advent, we do this by remembering to pay attention together. We pay attention to where sin tempts us each day away from the light. We pay attention each day to the overflowing graces God has given us until our dying day, which will come we know not when. We stay awake and stay ready and live the calling Christ has called us to, a waiting that is not just sitting around, but a waiting that is actively loving and doing while we wait. This is why our church does things like stock food pantries and buy gifts for children that, while not Jesus, might still give them a little bit of brightness, including a cool Spiderman watch we are giving one kid (even if Spiderman can’t do the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy).
If we are really watching and praying for Jesus in all our days, while we so often get distracted and confused by the gifts, the little joys they bring are not just empty and cynical replacements for Jesus, but are signs that point to the truly Significant one. The truth and love we see in our favorite holiday films is gesturing to the truth and love Christ, or maybe more precisely, it is through our media that Christ is breaking in like a thief in the night into our world, even when we would prefer to shut him out.
So this Advent season, let us watch and pray, watch and pray, watch and pray. Not for a holiday where happiness will fleetingly come and go. Let us wait for Christ with a waiting that itself becomes the real joy. Let us wait not only for the far-off time when Jesus comes, but so that we are ready every time today Jesus shows up at your door, whether bringing hope, peace, love, and joy, or as your neighbor in need. We watch and pray so that we are even just 10% less sucked into the awful noise of the world, not so that we ignore it, but so that we respond from faith and not fear, that we do not repay the abuses of society with more abuse. We watch and pray so that we never miss him where and when he is in our midst.
Because if Jesus is right, tonight may be the night. It may be that we have already celebrated our last Christmas. In Christ’s time, there are no holidays to wait for. The hour is at hand. And so Jesus whispers, “Stay with me. Stay with me. Watch and pray.” Amen.
