November 30, 2025, Advent 1
Matthew 24:36-44, Romans 12:11-14
Introduction
I have a confession… I am a chronic snoozer. I know, I know…shocking. But I’ve been this way my whole life. Always trying to stay in my comfy warm bed just a little but longer. I mean, who jumps out of bed the moment their alarm goes off and starts their day?! People who can’t be trusted—that’s who!
Mass General Brigham did a sleep study using data from the sleep analysis app Sleep Cycle, where researchers analyzed sleep data from more than 21,000 people around the world. They found that the snooze button was pressed in 56% of the 3 million nights studied. Around 45% of study subjects hit the snooze button on more than 80% of mornings.
Lead author of this study, Dr. Rebecca Robbins, PhD in the Division of Sleep and Circadian Disorders Medicine at Brigham Hospital, states, “The snooze button disrupts some of the most important stages of sleep.” Now, frankly I don’t know how this “Dr. Robbins” got a PhD in sleep studies, because if you ask me, the snooze button doesn’t “disrupt” my sleep! It adds to my sleep! The alarm disrupts my sleep! But that glorious snooze button gently says, “There, there old friend. Sleep another nine minutes.”
But as much as I love my snooze button, I know that Dr. Robbins is right, and I am kind of jealous of those who can just jump out of bed the moment their alarm goes off. And when I read today’s texts for this first Sunday of Advent, I have to think that both Jesus and the Apostle Paul were never the types to hit the snooze button because these two texts are undoubtedly telling us… don’t snooze on Advent.
Move 1
I recently read this statement about sleeping… it said, “The thing about sleeping; we don’t know we’ve been asleep until we wake up.” I’ve never thought of sleep like that, but it’s a true statement. And because it’s true, I think that is why in today’s Gospel Jesus tells us, “Keep awake,” and in today’s epistle Paul writes, “You know what time it is, how it is now the moment to wake from sleep.” They both are saying that we are asleep but don’t know it so it’s time to wake-up.
For Jesus and Paul being asleep and being awake aren’t just physical states, they are also spiritual states of being. We’re either awake to the life within and around us or we are asleep and snoring our way through life. But I think there is actually a third a possibility—we are either awake, or we’re asleep and snoring, or we are woken up to what’s happening around us, but we hit the snooze button, and go right back to sleep.
Move 2
The people to whom Paul writes didn’t even know they were asleep. They were just going about business as usual. That’s probably what most of us do. And so did the people in the days of Noah. “They knew nothing until the flood came and swept them away.” “They were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage.” It was business as usual for them, just like it was for the two men working in the field and the two women grinding meal together. They knew nothing until one was taken and one was left.
Haven’t there been times when business as usual, the routine and ordinariness and everydayness of life, lulled you to sleep? We all know what that’s like, right? You get into a rhythm, but it becomes a rut. You do the same things again and again day after day. Not much changes. It’s as if life is on autopilot and we’re going through the motions. We show up but we’re not really present. We’re not awake to what is going on around us, the needs of others, or sometimes our own needs. Life becomes mechanical and we are no longer dreaming or imagining what might be. The colors of life give way to shades of gray. We don’t expect anything to change and don’t look for anything new. There’s no mystery, discovery, or surprise. Everything is a mundane, known quantity.
And when we lay out this reality on paper it probably looks incredibly boring, dull, and listless keeping us willing to stay in this seemingly languid place. And why do we stay? We stay because at least it feels safe.
We want and need to feel safe but languishing in the places we feel safe can and will eventually lull us into a way of being that is anything but safe. In these places we begin to take life, people, and relationships for granted. Patterns and habits replace thinking, questioning, and wondering. We shake our heads when we read news about: the war in Ukraine, climate change, or gun violence in schools. We’ve seen it all before at least a hundred times, but we don’t ask what we can do because we believe there’s nothing we can do. We stay busy but not energized. We go-go-go, but we don’t ever get anywhere. Life is stagnant and nothing is bubbling or fermenting within us. We’re not growing. Life is stable and predictable in a stuck sort of way. It’s all as if we are awoken from our sleep, but then we hit the snooze button over and over again.
And ironically, after going through these motions, we wonder why we’re always so tired, why we don’t seem to be getting anywhere, and why nothing changes. We want to feel awake and alive but it’s business as usual so we get up in the morning and do the same old things we did the day before. We are sleepwalking through life.
I know what that’s like and I’ll bet you do too. When has that been your life? In what ways does that describe your life today? To what parts of your life are you not awake? In what ways have you hit the snooze button and fallen back asleep?
I can’t answer those questions for you, but I can tell you when I’ve done this. I know of times when I was sleepwalking through relationships—even my closets ones such as with my kids and my wife. I’ve certainly known times when I was asleep to my own emotional needs and wellbeing; when prayer was a box to be checked rather than relationship to be nurtured; when I anesthetized myself to the pain of the world.
All of this means then, is what Jesus and Paul are saying to us today… “Keep awake. You know what time it is. It is already the moment for you to wake from sleep.” Fortunately for us, we’ve come to the best time of the year to wake from our sleep.
Move 3
Advent is the season of waking up. It interrupts business as usual and calls us to ready ourselves for the coming of the Son of Man. Advent is, however, more than just getting ready to welcome Jesus or celebrate his birth. Advent is the time when we get to truly live the lives of hope filled followers of Christ we claim to be.
Advent is the time when we get to participate in giving existence to the future Jesus offers and makes possible. And we were given glimpse of that future in today’s Old Testament reading (Isaiah 2:1-5) shared during our Call to Worship.
Isaiah sees a time when we “shall beat [our] swords into plough-shares, and [our] spears into pruning-hooks; nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall [we] learn war anymore.” He dreams of a nonviolent future, a future where all people from all places never fight, are never at war with one another. He dreams of a future where peace prevails. And that’s my dream too. That’s what I want for our community, for our divided nation, for a war-torn world. That’s what I want now, and that is what I want for those who will come after me. Don’t you?
Isaiah describes the future as a time when Jerusalem is at unity with itself, peace is within its walls and quietness within its people. There is prosperity and doing good for others. That is what Advent reminds us is surely coming—so let us wake up to Advent… and dare not snooze through it.
Conclusion
Advent brings with it the unexpected hour that shatters business as usual and ushers in the new future. But that future doesn’t begin by changing the world. It begins by changing ourselves— the thoughts we think, the words we speak, the choices we make, the actions we take. That’s not only about how we relate to others. It’s also about how we relate to ourselves.
And so in this season of Advent it needs to be asked, and answered…
What swords can you beat into ploughshares? How might you be less harmful in words and actions toward yourself and others? What would it take to be a bit more wholehearted and at unity with yourself and others? What might happen to our hearts and spirits if we prayed for the prosperity of others as much as we prayed for our own prosperity? How might you quieten the voices in your head and live with a heart at peace and filled with hope for the future God is creating, rather than a heart at war? To whom are you seeking to do good and how might you expand that to others?
Every one of those questions is about waking up, and being part of what God is doing. So what would it mean and look like for you and me to wake up? What would it take?
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I might be a chronic snoozer every morning, but I don’t want to sleep my life away and I don’t want you to either. So let’s use this season of Advent to decide… Are we going to wake up to what God is doing? Or are we going to keep hitting the snooze button? Amen.
Pastoral Prayer, November 30, 2025, Advent1
Gracious God, we come before You this morning on the first Sunday of Advent, with hearts that are weary for we see strife, experience anxiety, and face uncertainties that shake our foundations. Which is why we need the message of your word today, that reminds us we do not know the hour of your coming; we only know that we must be awake for it, that we must decide if we will simply go through the motions of being filled with your hope, or if we will be active participants in spreading and sharing the hope of the future that is surely coming.
So we pray Lord, stir in us a holy anticipation. In a culture that prioritizes immediate gratification and encourages anxiety about the future, help us to live in a state of watchful readiness, not out of fear, but out of faith in the future you are bringing into the world.
And we pray for such because we know that often we are complacent and get caught up in the ordinary rhythms of life—eating, drinking, marrying, building our barns—and we forget to look up, to lift our heads, and to tend to the state of our souls and our world. Forgive us for our distraction, our spiritual slumber, and our short-sightedness.
Then wake us up, O God, like those left behind in the field or the mill, and show us we are called to be attentive and to keep watch not just for a moment, but for a lifetime. Wake us to the sick, the grieving, the lonely, and the anxious, and use us to bring your presence of hope. Wake us to abuses of power so we can speak truth to that power. Wake us to those in our community who are struggling to find hope right now and make us a source of comfort that reminds us all that sorrow is not the final word. Joy is coming. The world You are bringing is one of peace, justice, and perfect love.
We ask that you would receive now the prayers of our hearts that are shared with you in this time of Holy Silence.
We offer this prayer in the mighty and merciful name of Jesus Christ, our coming King, who fills us with hope, and taught us to pray saying, “Our…”