“When these things begin to happen, straighten up and lift up your heads" Advent 2 2025

07. December 2025
Advent 2
Luke 21:25–33

“And there will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near” (Luke 21:25–28).

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.

On this Second Sunday in Advent, the Lord does not give you a warm Christmas card greeting. He speaks of signs in sun, moon, and stars, roaring seas, nations in distress, people fainting with fear, the powers of the heavens shaken, and then the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. That’s the picture He sets before your eyes. And then He tells you, “When these things begin to happen, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

We don’t usually talk about the future that way. When most people say “future,” they mean progress. A little more comfort, a little more convenience, a little more control over our lives. Better medicine, smarter technology, stronger economies. We’re trained to assume that history is one long upward curve and that life will keep getting safer and easier, especially for our children.

The Scriptures are not nearly so sentimental. From the very beginning, God gave man dominion over the earth. He told Adam to subdue the creation, to cultivate and harness it. That dominion is still at work. Every generation discovers more, builds more, controls more. You can see it in our machines, our computers, our weapons, our ability to shape and move and measure the world.

But the fall into sin did not remove that dominion; it corrupted the heart that wields it. So the problem is not the tools. The problem is the hands and hearts that hold them. The same mind that designs a medicine can design a weapon. The same organizational power that can coordinate relief can also coordinate slaughter. Evil is not less active in a technological age; it is more efficient, more organized, more far-reaching. One of the greatest inventions of coordination, currency like the dollar, is manipulated to devalue the value of your time, effort, and property. As time moves forward the battle does not calm down; it escalates. Wars become more brutal. Hatred becomes more destructive. Inflation runs hot. One catastrophe now can touch the whole world.

Another pious lie we like to tell ourselves is that each generation is better than the last. “We know more, we’ve seen more, we’re more enlightened, more tolerant, more humane.” But you don’t have to look very far to see that isn’t true. Scripture says that as the end draws near, lawlessness increases and the love of many grows cold. That isn’t just a verse to memorize; it’s what you see when neighbors stop caring, families fracture, children are catechized by screens instead of parents, churches empty out, and the name of Jesus is treated as a joke or an embarrassment. The more we congratulate ourselves on our enlightenment, the more openly we despise God and one another.

So the Bible speaks very soberly about the future. Think of the days of Noah, when the thoughts of men’s hearts were only evil continually, and the world was washed clean by judgment. Think of Israel’s kings, one after another, rejecting the Lord until the people were dragged off into exile. Think of our Lord Himself warning of wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes, famines, persecution, betrayal, and a world that cannot be bothered with repentance because it is too busy eating, drinking, marrying, and buying. History should have taught us by now that God’s diagnosis of the human heart is not pessimistic; it is simply true.

If that’s all there were to say, the future would be a bleak joke—just a long, miserable story of sin and judgment, circling the drain until the last day. But the Scriptures will not let you look at the future without Christ. In the fullness of time, at exactly the right moment, the eternal Son of God stepped into our world. Everything that happened before His coming was a preparation for Him—creation, promise, flood, sacrifice, exodus, kings, prophets, exile, return. Everything that has happened since finds its meaning in Him—His cross, His resurrection, His ascension, His reigning and interceding at the Father’s right hand, and His final appearing in glory.

Jesus stands at the beginning and the end. He is the Alpha and the Omega of history. You cannot talk rightly about the future unless you start with Him and end with Him. This very moment, with its wars, its sins, its fears, and your small life in the middle of it, has its goal in His return. The point of it all is not that the world becomes nicer. The point is that the Gospel is preached to all nations, that sinners are dragged out of darkness and into the light, that the great net of the kingdom is pulled through the sea of time until the full catch is brought to shore. That is why the world still turns.

So yes, there is a hardening, a cooling of love, an intensifying of evil. But at the same time, there is a ripening. The fields are white for harvest. The Gospel runs to the ends of the earth. Baptismal water is still poured. The Word is still preached. Sinners are still absolved. The body and blood of Christ are still given and received for the forgiveness of sins. The same Lord who will come in the clouds with power and great glory already comes hidden here and now, in the lowly forms of preaching, water, bread, and wine.

That is why our Lord calls these things “the beginning of birth pangs.” The labor pains are real. They are sharp. They can be terrifying. If you’re outside of Christ, they are nothing but a warning of the judgment to come—a sign that all you trusted in is collapsing. But if you belong to Him, they are something else entirely. They are the contractions of a creation about to be remade. The old world is groaning like a woman in labor. The new creation, promised by the prophets and shown to John in the Revelation—a new heaven and a new earth where righteousness dwells, where God wipes away every tear, where death and mourning and crying and pain are no more—that world is already pressing in.

So when the foundations of the earth seem to shake, the Christian does not pretend it’s fine, and he does not pretend it’s hopeless. He takes Christ at His word. “When these things begin to happen, straighten up and lift up your heads.” You do not stare at the ground and mumble about how bad things are. You do not bury yourself in distractions. You lift up your head to the crucified and risen Lord who is drawing near, the same Lord who was born of the Virgin in Bethlehem, who carried your sin to the cross, who breathed His Spirit into His Church, who washed you in Baptism, who feeds you with His own flesh and blood.

The Scriptures push two things into your hands as you look toward the future. First, be sober. Drop the illusion that with enough progress, enough education, enough technology, we can engineer ourselves out of suffering, sin, and death. You are not going to “fix” this world. You are not going to build the kingdom of God by your projects. This age will end in fire, not in a human utopia. Your hope is not in the next election, the next medicine, or the next gadget, but in the Lord who says He is coming soon.

Second, do not panic. When things move toward catastrophe, that alone does not mean the last trumpet is about to sound. Every age has had its wars, its plagues, its tyrants, its collapses. The Lord told us ahead of time that this is what a dying world looks like. If these are the last days, they are only what He said they would be. And if they aren’t the very last yet, they are still days under His cross and under His promise. Either way, He has not lost control.

What, then, should you do? You do what Christians have always done. You repent. You believe the Gospel. You cling to the words and promises of Christ. You pray. You gather with His Church. You put your children and your own body under the sound of His Word. You come to the altar hungry and empty so that He might fill you with forgiveness and life. You encourage one another with the Scriptures, because whatever was written in former days was written for our learning, that through endurance and through the comfort of the Scriptures we might have hope.

Heaven and earth will pass away. Everything you see, everything that looks so solid and permanent, will crumble—your house, your money, your health, your reputation, your plans—gone. But the words of Jesus will not pass away. The Name placed on you in Baptism will not pass away. The absolution spoken into your ears will not pass away. The body and blood you receive today are the very pledge that you will stand with joy before the Son of Man on the last day.

So lift up your heads. Your redemption is drawing near. Advent is not just about getting ready for Christmas; it is about learning to live with your eyes fixed on the Lord who is coming, who has come, and who will come again. The world may shake. Your heart may tremble. But the One who speaks to you today is the same One who will speak on the last day, and His Word will hold.

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