"Repent! The Lord is at Hand!" Advent 1 Midweek 2025

01. December 2025
Advent 1 Midweek
Matthew 3:1-6; James 5:7-10

This is the Word of the Lord that came to me, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His + Name. AMEN.

“In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand’” (Matt. 3:1–2). And James says: “Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord… Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand” (James 5:7–8). Same Lord. Same coming. Same urgency.

John the Baptist is the man for Advent. He is the preparer, the forerunner. He stands between the old and the new, between promise and fulfillment. During these weeks of Advent, we hear him again and again: at the Jordan, in Herod’s prison, questioned by Pharisees, pointing away from himself and toward Christ.

John doesn’t build a brand. He doesn’t gather a fan club. When they ask him, “Are you the Christ?” he confesses and does not deny: “I am not the Christ.” The Christ is already among them. John isn’t worthy to stoop down and untie His sandals. That’s Advent.

Advent is the season where God puts John in front of you and says, “Listen to him. Learn from him.” Not because John is the Savior, but because John knows he isn’t. He prepares the way by preaching repentance and by baptizing sinners. He shows the church how to live in the in-between time: hear preaching, receive baptism, repent.

What you see in Matthew 3—preaching and baptizing—is not an odd preface to the “real” Gospel. It’s the pattern. Matthew begins with John preaching and baptizing, and he ends with Jesus sending His disciples to preach and baptize: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them… and teaching them… And behold, I am with you always” (Matt. 28:19–20).

John prepares the way by preaching and baptizing. The apostles continue the same work by preaching and baptizing. And in between Christ’s ascension and His coming again, this is the life of the church. That’s exactly where James puts us. “Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth… You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand” (James 5:7–8).

You are not living in neutral time. You are not just “doing life” and “celebrating holidays.” You are living between the Lord’s first coming in humility and His final coming in glory. This is the season of waiting. Not lazy waiting. Not distracted waiting. Not, “I’ll get serious later” waiting. The farmer doesn’t waste the season between sowing and harvest. He doesn’t scream at the field, but he also doesn’t sit on the couch binging nonsense while the crop dies. He works, he watches, he prays, he waits.

“Establish your hearts,” James says. Nail them down in Christ. Fix them on His coming. Because “the Judge is standing at the door” (James 5:9). John says, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” James says, “Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.” Same message: the time is short. Wake up.

So Advent is our season. First, because Jesus is coming. Not as a baby in a manger like He did two thousand years ago—that already happened. That work is finished. He has already lived, suffered, died, risen, ascended, and sent His Spirit. He has done everything.

Now we wait. We are in the in-between time, and we need to be awake. We need to repent. We need to hear preaching. We need, as Christ’s church, to go on baptizing in His Name and teaching all that He commanded. We need to live like people who know the Judge is at the door and the harvest is coming.

Second, Advent is our season because it is a season of repentance, preparation, and discipline. Like Lent, Advent is not about religious sentiment. It is about God dragging your priorities, your habits, and your heart into the light. Advent is not “pre-Christmas.” If it were, the readings would all be about Bethlehem and genealogies and angel choirs—Matthew 1, Luke 1–2. Instead, what does the church give you?

• Advent 1: Jesus rides into Jerusalem on a donkey—to die.

• Advent 2: He prophesies distress among the nations, darkened skies, and the Son of Man coming again in clouds.

• Advent 3 and 4: John the Baptist, thirty years old, preaching by the Jordan and from Herod’s jail, calling sinners to repentance and pointing to the Lamb of God.

That’s deliberate. The liturgy is catechizing you. Advent is not a warm-up act for Christmas. Advent is its own thing. It trains you to live between the comings of Christ: remembering His first coming, receiving His present coming in Word and Sacrament, and longing for His coming again in glory. And that means Advent goes right for your idols.

Advent isn’t primarily about giving up soda or sweets, as if the main problem were calories. It may be good to say no to food, drink, or comfort to curb your gluttonous flesh. That can be helpful. But if that’s where it stops, you’ve missed the point. Advent is calling you to take a hard look at where your heart is.

Repent of your pride that puts you above those around you.
Repent of your greed that obsesses over what others have and you don’t.
Repent of your lust for people and things that God has not given you.
Repent of wasting hours on brain-dead entertainment while your vocations starve.
Repent of shirking your duties as father, mother, son, daughter, husband, wife, or worker.

Just with pride, greed, and lust, you already have enough to confess to God and to your pastor. And you know there’s more. You know your heart. James doesn’t let you hide it behind pious language: “Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged” (James 5:9). Your complaining, your bitterness, your contempt for fellow Christians—Christ hears it. The Judge at the door hears it.

So stop pretending you can sin now and repent later. “The coming of the Lord is at hand.” The time is short. Repent.

And then what? Just sit and feel bad? No. John doesn’t just shout “Repent” and walk away. He baptizes. He preaches the One who is coming after him, whose sandals he is not worthy to carry, who will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. James doesn’t just say, “Be patient.” He points you to the Lord’s compassion and mercy and holds up “the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord” as examples (James 5:10-11). The Lord does not fail His people. He never has.

So Advent is also the season to return to what the Lord has actually given you for this in-between time:

• Teach your children the faith at home. Don’t outsource it. Open the Scriptures. Speak the catechism. Sing the hymns of the church—especially the Advent hymns that point not to a cute baby only, but to the cross and the Last Day.

• Pray with your family. Pray about their needs and the needs of others. Pray “Come, Lord Jesus” as more than a meal rhyme—pray it as the cry of people who actually want Him to end this broken age.

• Invigorate your own Bible study, prayer, and devotion. Put away some of the noise and fill your ears with what actually strengthens faith.

• Be a neighbor to those who are hurting. Give a listening ear, a helping hand, a clear confession of the hope you have because Jesus is crucified and risen and coming again.

God uses pain and suffering in this world to pry our fingers off of idols and to point us and others to Christ and to the end. Advent teaches you to see that, to receive even the hard days as reminders: “The Judge is at the door. The harvest is coming. The Lord is near.”

And in all of this, you are not left guessing how the story ends. “The end is certain. We know it. It’s been given to us in Holy Scripture. We know who has conquered sin, death, and the devil.” Christ has. The One John pointed to. The One James preaches about.

So you wait—not in terror, but in confidence. You wait knowing with certainty that the same Jesus who was born for you, who was crucified for you, who rose for you, will come again for you, and He will take you to be with Him forever. You have heard the preaching of the apostles. You have been baptized in water and the Word. You are fed with the body and blood of the Lamb. You are exactly where the Lord wants you to be in this in-between time.

So use this Advent well. Let John’s preaching, James’s exhortation, the readings, the hymns, the prayers all do their work: calling you to repentance, fixing your eyes on Christ, establishing your heart in the promise of His coming. “The Lord is at hand.” “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” “Be patient… establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.” Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.

This is the Word of the Lord that came to me, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His + Name. AMEN.

Rev. Christopher R. Gillespie
St. John Ev. Lutheran Church & School - Sherman Center
Random Lake, Wisconsin