The Day is at Hand

Call to Worship

Psalm 124 LSB

“Had it not been Yahweh who was on our side,” Let Israel now say, “Had it not been Yahweh who was on our side When men rose up against us, Then they would have swallowed us alive, When their anger was kindled against us; Then the waters would have flowed over us, The stream would have swept over our soul; Then the raging waters would have swept over our soul.” Blessed be Yahweh, Who has not given us to be prey for their teeth. Our soul has escaped as a bird out of the snare of the trapper; The snare is broken and we have escaped. Our help is in the name of Yahweh, Who made heaven and earth.

Elder: The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you!

Reading of Scripture

Isaiah 2:1–5 “The word which Isaiah the son of Amoz beheld concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Now it will be that In the last days The mountain of the house of Yahweh Will be established as the head of the mountains, And will be lifted up above the hills; And all the nations will stream to it. And many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of Yahweh, To the house of the God of Jacob, That He may instruct us from His ways And that we may walk in His paths.” For from Zion the law will go forth And the word of Yahweh from Jerusalem. And He will judge between the nations, And will render decisions for many peoples; And they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, And never again will they learn war. Come, house of Jacob, and let us walk in the light of Yahweh.”

Romans 13:11–14 “And do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.”

Introduction

Romans 13:11–14 LSB

And do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand. Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.

The morning at dawn and the evening at sunset look similar. Just when the sun has begun to break the horizon looks very much like the moment when the sun has just slipped beneath it. And if you awoke from a long sleep at that time, you would not know if it was evening or morning.

C. S. Lewis, in The Great Divorce, gives us an imagined pre‑judgment picture of heaven and hell in these terms. The “grey town” is always stuck in a kind of twilight: it may be evening or it may be morning, depending on your point of view and where you are going. Some of its inhabitants say that a great morning will eventually appear and all will be saved; others insist it is the great evening and that everything will drift into deeper darkness. In the story, some of these shadow‑people ride a bus from the grey town to the borders of heaven, where they are met by solid, redeemed spirits who plead with them to come further up and further in. Those who begin to let go of their sin and their bent perspectives start to “thicken” and acclimate to heaven—a painful process of becoming truly solid—while those who cling to their shrunken, self‑absorbed lives grow smaller, more insubstantial, and finally slip back toward the outer darkness.

We are now in the season of Advent, the time when we await the dawn—the coming of the Light of the world. Christ’s coming brings light into the world, and that light burns away everything that cannot live in it, including what is sinful in you and me. Some will embrace that burning light as they let go of themselves; others will shrink from it as they grasp their own lives. Some will have their bent perspectives straightened, begin to thicken, and acclimate to heaven, whereas others will hide from the light, refusing to accept the purification Christ offers, become more insubstantial, and finally be burned into the outer darkness.

Some will be clothed with the light as armor so that they are protected from evil. Others will hide with their deeds in the darkness: they will hide with their carousing, drunkenness, sexual immorality, sensuality, strife, and jealousy.

Just as Lewis’s protagonist in The Great Divorce rode a bus from the grey town to the borders of heaven, you have ridden here in your vehicle to the sanctuary—a kind of prelude to heaven similar to Lewis’ story—where God has sent His emissaries to plead with you to come further up and further in. The day is about to dawn. So: time is running out. Let go of yourself. Embrace the light.

It is well known that Augustine was converted out of a dark life of carousing and sexual sin through this very passage which we will consider today.

With all this in mind, let’s pray to our King.

Time is running out (Rom 13:11–12)

“And do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is at hand.”

“And do this…”

Refers to what Paul has just exhorted in verses 1–10:

“be in subjection” (v. 1)

“do what is good” (v. 3)

“render to all what is due them” (v. 7)

“love your neighbor” (v. 8)

“Knowing the time”

Do all these things because of what time it is. The sun is coming up. It is the dawn of daytime. The New Covenant age was coming into being. Christ’s coming into the world as a baby was the light arriving—it was the dawn of the New Creation. For those of us in Christ, we are now living two thousand years into the full light of that day which dawned with His arrival.

Matthew Henry says, “It is high time to awake; for the sun has been up a great while, and shines in our faces.” In other words, we are living in the New Covenant daylight. And there is a lot of work to do.

I remember Saturdays being woken up by my dad because he always had work for us to do. To this day I feel guilty if I sleep past seven; I can still hear his voice down the hallway: “It’s seven o’clock! The sun is shining and there’s work to do!” That is how Paul’s urgency feels: the Father is calling down the hallway of history. The sun is up. There is work to do.

We have the opportunity now, during the day, to get the work done. Don’t waste daylight. Get busy. “The darkness is passing away and the true Light is already shining” (1 John 2:8). It is noon for us. What are we doing with the daylight?

“Salvation is nearer to us than when we believed.”

In one sense, Paul is speaking of the end of the Judaic age and the looming judgment of 70 AD, when the first‑century church would soon be freed from intense Jewish persecution. In another sense, our final salvation—our resurrection life—is today nearer to us than it was yesterday. We are moving toward something glorious.

And we are already living in our resurrection life now, but in the already/not yet. We are still in the “grey town.” We still deal with sin, the flesh, and the Devil. But Christ has come. The Light has entered the darkness. If we can lose ourselves in His light—let go of our flesh, let it fall into the darkness, and submit to the burning of that light—then you are already living the resurrection life even now. He is making you ready for heaven.

There was a series presented by HBO called Band of Brothers following Easy Company from their parachute into Normandy all the way to the taking of the Eagle’s Nest at Berchtesgaden. And there was an American officer in that company named Speirs who had a reputation for fearless combat leadership. In the series, when he was asked how he could do what he did without fear, he replied, “The only hope you have is to accept the fact that you’re already dead. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you’ll be able to function as a soldier is supposed to function.”

Paul is saying something like this in a holier key. We are already living in resurrection life—but only if you can let go of yourself. You must die.

Let go of yourself (Rom 13:12–13)

“Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy.”

“Laying aside the deeds of darkness”

This is what I am calling “let go of yourself.” Rather than grasping our sins and holding onto our flesh, we are putting it off, laying it aside, hacking it to pieces.

If you’ve read The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, you’ll recall Eustace’s “undragoning.” He was thinking dragonish thoughts—a mean and nasty boy—sleeping in a dragon’s cave on a dragon’s hoard, and he became a dragon. Through this he came to see himself for what he really was: a beast, a selfish hoarding monster. And he was allowed to see the others for what they really were in putting up with him. But then the question comes: how will he be undragoned?

Aslan enters the story and brings Eustace to a pool, telling him he must undress before he bathes. So Eustace takes his dragon claws and sheds his outer skin. But just when he begins to feel proud of himself, he looks down and finds his skin just as scaly and ugly as before. He does this again. Still no change. A third time. Still a dragon.

Then Aslan says, “You will have to let me undress you.” That is Lewis’s picture of regeneration. When we are told to repent and believe, we make an attempt. We try to turn from our sin. But we continually find that our efforts are inadequate. We confess and repent, only to find ourselves just as sinful as before. That is our attempt to “undragon” ourselves. It cannot be done. Then Jesus Christ enters the story and says, “You will have to let Me do it for you.” That is repentance and faith. It is only when we are brought to the end of our effort that we begin to understand “by grace alone through faith alone.”

Here is the simple good news: Jesus, the Son of God, took on flesh, lived the life we have failed to live, died on the cross for our sins, and rose again. Everyone who turns from sin and trusts in Him is forgiven, counted righteous in God’s sight, and given a new heart. Your standing with God rests wholly on Christ’s finished work, received by faith—not on how dragon‑free you feel today.

When you realize you cannot earn God’s favor by your repentance, your confession, your baptism, or any such thing—when you finally see your scaly self for what you are, a sinner—you realize you need Jesus to undress you. You need Jesus to burn away your deeds of darkness. And you need to rest on the fact that Jesus already accomplished this 2000 years ago.

We must be careful here. If you say, “Well, if I cannot undragon myself, I won’t even bother to repent. Jesus will undragon me if and when He chooses,” that is the attitude of a depraved heart. The redeemed say, “I believe; help my unbelief.” The depraved say, “I will not believe unless You make me.” They refuse even to try to repent.

Eustace took his own skin off three times, and that was good. He was seeking to be obedient. But in his seeking he saw his own inadequacy. That is the Christian life. We believe and repent. We seek to put to death the deeds of the flesh, all while resting in Jesus Christ alone for our salvation.

So, let go of yourself. Lay aside those deeds of darkness. Let yourself die, so that you can be raised to walk in newness of life. You must be born again. As long as you are grasping your sin, you will never truly walk in the light. You will never be acclimated to heaven.

There are three pairs of sins: carousing and drunkenness; sexual promiscuity and sensuality; strife and jealousy.

All three pairs are connected, as Poole notes, citing Proverbs 23: “Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has contentions? Who has complaining? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness of eyes? Those who linger long over wine, those who go to search out mixed wine.” Matthew Henry adds verse 33: “Your eyes will see strange things [women in KJV] and your heart will speak perverse things.” This is what comes to those who try to live between day and night—those who profess faith in Jesus but do not want to get dressed for the day, who hang onto their desires and give in to their flesh. They will not acclimate to heaven, and when the day comes they will be burned away.

Carousing and drunkenness

partying and excessive alcohol. This is feasting gone wrong: overindulgence in good things. We engage in it when we give ourselves to excess, when we routinely indulge our appetites without restraint.

Sexual promiscuity and sensuality

any form of sexual immorality: adultery, fornication, flaunted impurity. We engage in this not only in acts, but in unchaste thoughts and words. Many of us have avoided open fornication and adultery, but not lustful and lascivious thinking. Are we living up to the creation ideal of radical monogamy?

Strife and jealousy

verbal fighting, quarrelling, resentments. Instead of speaking only “what is good for building up,” we complain, tear down, accuse, assume, slander, react, stew in bitterness.

365 Days with Calvin 14 August: Blessing from Heresy (1 Corinthians 11:19)

“...disagreements that arise when everyone is mightily pleased with his own way and finds fault with everything done by others.”

There is a common thread: untempered passions. We overindulge in time‑wasting and partying, in drink, and this opens the door to sexual immorality, and all of this spills into quarrelling and envy. These three pairs are Paul’s exposition of “deeds of darkness.”

In verse 14, Paul says, “Make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.” Do not make space in your life for these things. Live in the light with daytime clothes, not in the darkness with deeds that correspond to darkness.

We will either acclimate to heaven and become solid, or hide from the light and become more unsubstantial until we are pushed into the outer darkness.

Embrace the light (Rom 13:14)

“But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.”

Matthew Henry, like Sproul, connects “put on the armor of light” with “put on the Lord Jesus Christ,” and then points to Galatians 3:27: “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.”

So we come full circle:

Time is running out – you believe, so you exercise faith in Jesus. You hear that the night is far spent and the day is at hand.

Let go of yourself – you repent of your sin. You die. You are dead indeed unto sin.

Embrace the light – you are raised to walk in newness of life, continually exercising a diligent use of the outward means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of our redemption.

In our baptism, Christ communicates to us the benefit of our redemption: we have been cleansed from our sin. It is not just a covering. It does not merely hide our sin. It kills it. He is making us into new creations. The cutting away of the old flesh in circumcision pointed to this. “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come” (2 Cor 5:17).

Christ makes us new. If He did not, we would have no salvation. And we are reminded of this in the sacraments. We believe, we repent, and then we are continually reminded and confirmed in our redemption through the visible symbols that Christ has instituted. It is through the ordinary means of grace that Christ prepares us for heaven.

Time is running out. Let go of yourself. Embrace the light.

Let’s pray.

Communion

The Day is at Hand – Lord’s Supper Homily

If you were paying attention during the sermon, you will have felt a tension between conversion and sanctification. On the one hand, we need to be regenerated, converted, reborn. We need to be “undragoned” by Jesus. In this sense, a person is in the “grey-town.” They need the light of Jesus to dawn in their heart. They need a change of spirit, and this cannot be done by our own strength.

On the other hand, we are told to do a great deal because the sun is shining already: “lay aside, put on, walk properly, make no provision….”

So have we been talking about how to be converted, or about how Jesus prepares those He has converted for heaven? The answer is yes—both. In Scripture these two are never really separated.

Be converted

And now, I am going to plead with you to leave the “grey town” for good and stay in heaven with Jesus.

Think of this “putting off” in the language of letting go. Laying aside is a release, a giving up of yourself. You are letting yourself fall into the great ocean of God’s light. It will kill you. But there is resurrection life on the other side. Make the leap.

You might ask, “How do I jump?” Paul tells us: “lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” And the Reformed instinct says, “But that is the one thing I cannot do.” Jesus responds, “Get undressed.” You begin to obey and discover how inadequate your efforts are; and then He says, “You will have to let Me do it for you.”

We obey the command to repent, and at the same time we continually look to Jesus, who gives the grace to do whatever He commands. That is conversion: all of Christ as the ground of our hope, none of our works as the ground of our hope. This is why we come to this table. It represents our need of a sacrifice. Here we are reminded that we live by Christ’s broken body and shed blood, not by our own strength. We eat and drink Him by faith so that we are reminded of, and nourished in, our ultimate spiritual need for Jesus. It is through water, bread, and wine that Jesus “undragons” us and confirms His work in us.

And what kind of life does this produce in His people?

Be busy

A busy one. Because it is noon for us. The sun is shining and time is short.

Let’s not only think of this in the negative—“be busy killing sin.” Think of it positively: what does it mean to “walk properly as in the day”?

To work instead of carouse.

To love your wife rather than pursue immorality.

To love your neighbor rather than live in strife and jealousy.

Because of what Jesus has done for us and in us, we now desire to walk in the light as He is in the light, so that we may have fellowship with Him and with one another. Once you have been undragoned, your affections must change. And this, too, is symbolized in the Supper. We all partake of the same loaf because we are all of the same loaf; we all drink of one cup because we share one Savior and one Spirit.

Now, instead of selfish, individualistic hoarding, there is self‑sacrificial, communal giving. Now, instead of lustful self‑indulgence, there is chaste marital intimacy. Now, instead of bitter quarrelling, there is joyful, patient edification. We have been redeemed. We have been given life, and life more abundant. So work, give, and build up—all for the glory of God.

During this season we expectantly wait for the dawning of the day with the coming of Jesus as a baby. We come to this sanctuary, this foretaste of heaven, and we hear God saying, “Come further up and further in.” Lose yourself and gain everything. Or hold onto yourself and lose everything. Live as if you have nothing to lose and everything to gain in Christ.

If you are baptized and in good standing with the body of Christ, harboring no unrepented sin against God or your neighbor, then we invite you to eat and drink with us in remembrance of Christ.

If you are not baptized, or if you are harboring sin in your heart toward God or your neighbor, then we ask you to refrain from the Supper, repent of your sins, and receive Christ—and we invite you to seek membership in His church.

The Bread

Give thanks

1 Corinthians 11:23–24 LSB

...the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was being betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.”

Read during distribution:

Psalm 122 “A Song of Ascents. Of David. I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of Yahweh.” Our feet are standing Within your gates, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which is built As a city joined altogether; To which the tribes, the tribes of Yah, go up— A testimony for Israel— To give thanks to the name of Yahweh. For there, thrones sit for judgment, The thrones of the house of David. Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: “May they prosper who love you. “May peace be within your walls, And tranquility within your palaces.” For the sake of my brothers and my friends, I will now say, “May peace be within you.” For the sake of the house of Yahweh our God, I will seek your good.”

The Cup

Give thanks

1 Corinthians 11:25 LSB

In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.

Read during distribution:

Matthew 24:36–44 ““But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone. “For just as the days of Noah were, so the coming of the Son of Man will be. “For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and they did not understand until the flood came and took them all away; so will the coming of the Son of Man be. “Then there will be two in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. “Two women will be grinding grain at the mill; one will be taken and one will be left. “Therefore stay awake, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. “But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. “For this reason you also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will.”

1 Corinthians 11:26 LSB

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until He comes.

The Lord’s Prayer

Matthew 6:9–13 LSB

“...Our Father who is in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, On earth as it is in heaven. ‘Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”

Matthew 6:14–15 LSB

“For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. “But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.

The Commission

Matthew 28:18–20 LSB

And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to keep all that I commanded you; and behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Numbers 6:24–26 LSB

Yahweh bless you, and keep you; Yahweh make His face shine on you, And be gracious to you; Yahweh lift up His face on you, And give you peace.’