Your Redemption Is Drawing Near :: Luke 21:25-36

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Now when these things begin to happen, straighten up and raise your heads because your redemption is drawing near.

[Introduction]

Once upon a time, Christmas didn’t begin until midnight Christmas Eve, and it lasted for a full twelve days. But the world has hijacked Christmas. Now Advent is largely ignored. Christmas ends the day after, gift-giving ends, and thoughts of self begin. And that’s too bad. Advent is a season that we need to pay attention to. Advent reminds us [our] redemption is drawing near. 

Advent is a season that helps us prepare for the coming of Christ. He is drawing near. The word advent literally means coming. Christ is coming. The first coming of Christ was a couple thousand years ago ... at his birth in Bethlehem. The second coming of Christ will be on the clouds in power and great glory (v 27). As we will sing soon, Christ is near with his cheer; Never will he leave me (LSB 756:1). 

The first Advent of our Lord was one of humility. On Christmas, God humbled himself. He became just like you and me in every way, except without sin. He gave us a son. Born as a babe without a bed (Lk 2:7), the maker of heaven and earth literally had no place to lay his head. So Mary chose a feeding trough.

The second Advent of our Lord will leave the world in awe ... some with great joy ... some with great fear. As Saint John also tells us in his Revelation, On that day, Behold ... every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn on account of him (Rv 1:7).

His first advent brought peace on earth and goodwill to men ... pure joy (Lk 2:14). 

His second advent will be to judge the living and the dead (1 Pt 4:5).

Yes, we should pay attention to Advent. This is a season of promise and warning ... a promise of redemption and a warning of judgment. 

1.

Jesus tells us that he has appointed signs to prepare us for his Advent. Some of these signs will cause great distress among the nations. The sound of the seas will perplex others as they rise and fall. But for those who listen and believe the scriptures, these signs provide great comfort: They show us the kingdom of God is near (v 31). That your redemption is at hand. 

For those who reject Jesus’ word, these signs are ... and will be ... ignored ... explained away ... as they get wrapped up in themselves ... prioritize their feelings. It is par for the course when people ignore, pay no attention to, misinterpret, and scoff at the signs God gives us; they are too consumed with themselves. It’s also par for the course when people rebuff his promises, saying they don’t need redemption. 

Take the rainbow, for example. The rainbow is one of the most beautiful signs of God’s love and forgiveness. After violently destroying evil in the world in a deluge of rain from above and gushers from the ground below ... God set his bow in the sky as a sign that he would never again wipe out all flesh with a flood. I will remember my covenant, God told Noah (Gn 9:15). And so he does ... still today. God always remembers his covenants ... old and new alike.

Today when we see the rainbow, we are reminded ... or should be ... how faithful he really is ... that he gives us daily bread and cleanses us through a flood of water and word. As Peter says in his first epistle. Baptism now saves you. It does this, Paul says, not because of works we’ve done in righteousness, but according to God’s own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior (Titus 3:5-6). In mercy, God has brought us into the holy ark of the Christian Church, where he feeds us and cares for us, drawing us near, delivering the fruit of redemption. This is what the rainbow should remind you of.

Yet, the world scoffs at this. The rainbow ... the world says ... is just a natural process ... light reflecting and refracting as it hits raindrops. It’s as if God who created light and wrote the laws of nature could not use those same laws to remind us of his promise, of who he really is, of how he saves, and that the day of your redemption is drawing near. 

What’s worse, the rainbow, the oldest sign of God’s covenantal love, has been hijacked to be a symbol celebrating carnal lust, sexual perversion, and the destruction of God’s ordained distinctions between man and woman. The rainbow, which should be used by Christian parents to teach their children of how God saves, is now used by radicals to push the acceptance of abnormal behavior and dangerous philosophies. 

Let it remind you instead that your redemption is near.

2.

Now it is certainly possible that some signs will have no natural explanation ... like those three hours in the middle of the day when God caused the sky to go dark during the crucifixion of Jesus ... and the curtain of the temple ... which was as thick as my hand ... was torn in two. Can you also imagine how many people fainted in fear and foreboding when the dead rose from the grave that day? That was most certainly a time to straighten up and raise your heads because your redemption is drawing near. 

But now is a time to do so ... TOO! We are in the season of Advent.

Pay attention to yourselves, Jesus said, lest your hearts are burdened with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly. 

This is literally another call by Christ to repent of the sin that is literally killing us, the sin that betrays the good name of God. God did not create us to focus on worldly things. He didn’t create us to feel pain in childbearing, to sweat in the field, or to suffer with sickness and disease. God created us so that he can be with us. 

SO BEHOLD, YOUR REDEMPTION IS DRAWING NEAR IN CHRIST THE LORD

1.

To be redeemed means to be bought with a price. Whereas you are unable to compensate for your sin, God is able. That’s why he drew near the first time. And that’s why he will draw near, again. Jesus has compensated for all the sin, iniquity, and transgression of this world ... for you. He did it through his suffering and death. God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God ... became man, and was sacrificed for you. Redemption has drawn near through his bloodshed. And through his resurrection, he has given you eternal life ... right now ... and is drawing near to you today ... not just spiritually ... in body and blood. Jesus is drawing near.

[Conclusion]

Therefore, be watchful in all times, praying that you may have the strength to flee all these things that are about to happen and to stand before the Son of Man (v 36). He who has redeemed you will bring to your body the healing he has brought to your soul. The forgiveness he gained for you on Calvary he delivers to you again today ... in Jesus’ name.

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