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So the day of the Lord is not some future event that is fearful. Rather, it happens every day for us as people for whom Christ died. So we should wait for God's action with the same

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kind of expectation that the early Thessalonians had. And when we do so in the present moment, as we wake up, we will find that kingdom already at work within us. In the first letter to

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the Thessalonians penned as the very earliest document of the early Christian movement. That's the first earliest book in the New Testament. I kind of wish they would arrange them chronologically sometimes. Do you ever wish that

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too? But this seems like it's the earliest book in the New Testament and Paul's trying to craft the boundaries that would shape the Christian community. Some of his recommendations have to do with sexual eth ethics,

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others with work fundamentally. However, the theme that he keeps returning to throughout the book is he reminds people that Christ died for them and that, that is the hallmark of their new identity as a Christian

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community. Paul. In this letter may be speaking into a particular pastoral care concern first century pastoral care concern. He might be addressing fears that the Thessalonians had, that Christ had already come and that some

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of them had been left behind. See some of their loved ones had died and they had been buried . But they might have this question in mind because they were expecting Jesus to come back. Like right

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now, their question might be was my loved one saved or what? Like were they kind of left to die on their own? Because Jesus hasn't come back. Did we miss something? They might have

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been wondering? So this reminds me of some of our conversations we've been having in the lost death and dying class this fall at Austin Seminary, reflecting on how our death anxiety and our religious beliefs often interact

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with one another in specific and interesting ways. I don't know about you, but I grew up around a Christian culture that had end times, end times fears surrounding it or maybe in the background of it

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. Um We had a uh Tim Lahay Left Behind series was at our local Christian bookstore. These were books that foretold events surrounding the end of time. And then Christians had to plan in specific ways to

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be ready for those events. I wish we'd all been ready by Larry Norman was a dramatic Christian anthem of the uh Left Behind rapture style movement. I don't mean to criticize aspects of Christian culture that have

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been meaningful, but I wonder sometimes if the more extreme versions of this thinking when you're expecting punishment from God, when you're feeling unworthy isn't rooted in some kind of trauma. There's an old therapeutic adage,

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what you fear has already happened. But such speculation wasn't part of the denomination in which I was raised . Indeed, it was actively frowned upon. They did believe in the second coming, but you weren't

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supposed to speculate, it, speculate about it or devote too much energy to it. And this has kind of been the direction that Christian history has taken as well. Even in the time of the New

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Testaments writing, there was a shift from Paul's early radical belief that Christ would return any moment to one that was might be called more realized eschatology. Jesus was already involved in our day to day lives and

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Christ's mission was already at work in the world, bringing a little bit of the kingdom into the present with us here and now. So the passage for today starts with a confidential wink and nod. Paul

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encouraging the Thessalonians that there are gonna be some events about which he has special knowledge. And this special knowledge was that God was not done with creation but had ongoing purposes for it. He calls this event

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the day of the Lord. And one of the implications of it was that Jesus wasn't done with creation um but was going to come back and do something with this world. So this world wasn't going to

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be discarded but was still gonna be useful in God's economy. The day of the Lord just think about that. What does it mean to think about this as a day belonging to God of the Lord?

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A way of emphasizing that God's involved in history in a meaningful way. The early Christians seem to believe that when you died, you were buried in the ground until Christ returned and resurrected you breaking the spell

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of sleep. That's what they call it. Sometimes sleep in the light of the Christ event. These early Christians believed that Christ could come at literally at any minute and finish the work of salvation. So

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we should actively wait for God's presence. Paul tells us in the final part of the passage. He says, we should continue to actively wait for God's presence because it's through attention wedded with God's love that

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we can encourage one another. And here's where I'd really like to land for today. This notion of waking up of attention of noticing the present moment, our attention or our awakeness that sacred and precious power

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, we each have to bring our focus on the current moment is precisely what's needed for the purposes of faith. Paul says Christ died for us and that needs to undergird our waking up in the present moment

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. Paul uses a range, a range of metaphors for this. We should be people who are awake in the daytime and sober and alive with Christ. He tells us that even mysteriously, this passage suggests

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that even people who have died, have the power to live with Christ. So we should wait for God's action with the same kind of expectation that the early Thessalonians had. And in the present moment as

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we wake up, who would it think? What would, what would it mean to think about faith as a process of waking up, we will find the kingdom already at work within us. So how

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can we stay serious in our waiting when so much time has passed between now and the New Testament? Al Also how can we trust that God is present that God's in charge of history? When there's such

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a feeling of powerlessness all around us? This passage doesn't answer all the questions, but it does offer a method of coping with the daily crisis trying to wake up, fostering a gentle awareness and attention and

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becoming day people. Attention is surprisingly powerful. It actively shapes what we see and experience. I've been thinking lately about how Christian meditation along with prayer can be a well fitting tool for honing our attention practices

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that have been cultivated through the centuries, like breath prayer, sacred reading of the scriptures, walking the labyrinth and many others. I try to do them from time to time and just experience my mind wandering

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, you know, right. What a crazy mind we all have in addition to the conversational prayer practices that are so much a part of our tradition. We also have these Christian meditation practices, these forms

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of practicing the presence of God that involve inviting God into our daily daily life more fully. These forms of attention suggest that the sacred presence of God is found in each moment in the sacrament of the present

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moment as we dwell more richly in the here and now, rather than being caught up in ruminations about the past or fears about the future, you see , we're so rarely in the present and our thoughts

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when we attend to them can seem full of petty grievances and ill content. Do you know what I'm talking about? The kind of thoughts that occur to you when you stop and just listen to your thinking

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. We feel cheated, slighted. We want to be remembered, we want to win, we want to feel big in others eyes. We're afraid of being abandoned and alone or maybe it's just me.

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But these are the kinds of things that come to mind when I try to practice practices of Christian silence . In the Christian practice of waking up. Though we can even transform our fears into the sights of

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the living and active presence of God. Paul mentions that we should put on the breastplate of faith and love and the helmet of hope of salvation. I don't know if Paul would be wedded to these particular

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military metaphors, but what I hear in the passage is the need to protect our head, our hearts . And the reminder again, that faith, love and salvation are what we're destined for in this trying

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time. When peace and security seem far away. Paul offers a new identity to the Thessalonians as day people completely awake to the presence of love in their lives because they're immersed in an awareness that Christ died

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for them. Waiting as a community for the day of the Lord. Paul encourages the Thessalonians that they belong to God because Jesus died for them as we wait now, not with the same sentence of imminent

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expectation, but with a persistent longing. Nevertheless, we can find God's purposes worked out even in the spiritual practice of waiting his self. This is the nature of the encouragement that Paul wants us to do

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with one another. In and in what he reminds the Thessalonians of encourage each other and build each other up out of the ongoing presence of God amongst you as you dwell with God reminded that you are people