New Beginnings – a sermon for Advent 1, 2025
Isaiah 2:1-5
Romans 13:11-14
Matthew 24:36-44
Today we begin a new Christian year, and we start with the season of Advent – a season indicated by all this violet colour around the church and the absence of glorias and alleluias from the service.
Although it is the ‘lead up’ to the Joy of Christmas Day, Advent starts – a little counter-intuitively – with Jesus speaking words of warning which lack any sentimentality; words that jolt us awake:
“About that day and hour (Judgement Day) no one knows… therefore keep awake.”
Advent is a season that pulls our attention forward—to God’s promised future—but not in a frivolous, escapist way, rather, to help us use and appreciate the present more fully.
And there is a lot to appreciate ‘right here and now’ because, alongside this new liturgical year, we celebrate something else that is new among us: Sarah’s ordination to the priesthood yesterday.
A new ministry has begun, a new call has been affirmed; a new chapter in the life of this parish has opened.
Advent and ordination both remind us that God is always doing something new, often quietly, often unexpectedly, but always with purpose.
In the Gospel, Jesus’ words can sound unsettling. He paints a picture of ordinary life—people eating and drinking, working in the fields, going about their days—and then he says that the Son of Man will come quietly,
suddenly,
like a thief in the night. Yikes!
The point is not to frighten us, or to have us anxiously checking the sky. The point is this: God’s future meets us in the middle of our ordinary days. Salvation unfolds while we’re doing the washing, answering emails, sitting in traffic, or pausing for a cup of coffee. It arrives in the midst of regular life, not separate from it.
That means Advent isn’t about passively waiting. It’s an invitation to be attentive—to notice God’s presence already at work, already stirring hope in small, hidden ways. Jesus is asking us to sharpen our spiritual focus: to be awake, not just in the sense of vigilance, but awake to grace, awake to compassion, awake to the possibilities God sets before us.
And this is where Sarah’s ordination speaks so beautifully into today’s Gospel. Because yesterday’s service wasn’t simply about one person being called; it was also a reminder that God is calling all of us,
continually,
to stay awake to his activity in our lives.
Priests are ordained not so that they can do all the ministry for the church, but so they can help the whole church be awake (or awake) to God’s presence—naming it, nurturing it, and helping us respond to it.
One of the striking things about Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 24 is how ordinary the examples are:
Two people in a field.
Two women preparing grain.
Nothing extraordinary—just work.
And yet the decisive moment of God’s coming breaks right into the everyday. It suggests that holiness is not tucked away in special moments only; it is woven into daily faithfulness.
We might imagine Advent, then, as a kind of spiritual sunrise. The world is still dark, but the first light is on the horizon. We strain our eyes, not because we know exactly when the sun will rise, but because we trust that it will.
Or to use the specific word we have lit a candle to represent, we live in hope because
Christ has come,
Christ does come,
and Christ will come again.
So how might we “stay awake” this Advent?
Not by anxiety, but by attention (active waiting rather than passive waiting).
Not by fear, but by readiness rooted in love.
We stay awake when we give time to prayer—even a few small moments in a busy morning.
We stay awake when we choose generosity instead of indifference.
We stay awake when we notice those who feel overlooked and allow compassion to move us.
We stay awake when we let forgiveness take root, even when it is costly.
And we stay awake when we open our hearts to the new things God may be calling us to—sometimes before we feel fully ready; don’t worry, God will overcome the deficiencies, whether they are real or imagined.
Advent invites us to practise this kind of attentiveness, not only for four weeks, but as a way of life. Because the Christian hope is not merely that Christ will come someday in power and glory, but that he also comes to us now: in the Eucharist, in the Scriptures, in the faces of one another, in moments of surprising grace.
As Sarah begins her priestly ministry among us, she shares in the same calling that we all share: to help one another stay awake to God. To keep pointing, even in the ordinary tasks of the parish—visiting, preaching, preparing worship, listening—to God who is always approaching, always seeking us.
So as we step into Advent together, let us do so with expectant hearts. Let us look for Christ in the ordinary. Let us encourage one another to stay awake—not in anxiety, but in hope, in trust, and in joyful readiness. For the One who comes is faithful, and his coming—then, now, and in the fullness of time—is always good news.
Tony Surman