One of the problems of our media-ridden world is that, though we can read, see and hear about wars, disasters and tragedies as they happen, they are soon ousted from the spotlight by the next disaster.   Perhaps this is because we live in a world which is always fragile and vulnerable and because, as the poet T S Eliot maintained: ‘Humankind cannot stand much reality.’

What happened 20 years ago this week, at Bhopal in India, would be high on any list of the world’s forgotten tragedies.  I don’t suppose that many of us have given the people of Bhopal much thought since 1984 and we only do so now because it is an anniversary and the media is returning it to our consciousness.  At five minutes past midnight on December 3^rd 1984, at a chemical plant run by the giant American Union Carbide Corporation, a storage tank in the plant exploded and 40 tons of lethal, poisonous gas seeped over the city of Bhopal.  It was a tragedy which actually could have been prevented had the right safety procedures been in place but they weren’t. United Carbide cut corners for profit.

Within minutes of the explosion, tens of thousands of people were clawing at their throats and within hours 8,000 people were dead.  The final death toll was 200,000 and Indian officials say that even today 600,000 are living with the sickness it brought.  We cannot imagine the horror the people of Bhopal went through but oddly it is just such a horror that come to mind because of today’s Gospel in which Jesus talks of unexpected disaster being visited upon  unsuspecting and unready people.

Or that is what it seems to be on the surface.   The difference is that Jesus is not talking about man-made disasters but about the coming of the Son of Man in Judgement at the end of time.  But do we really believe it will happen. At the time the Gospel was first written down it was, perhaps, headline news. You could even imagine the headlines had the Sun or the Daily Mail been present when Jesus spoke these words.

“Preacher predicts the End of the World” or, for the Sun, “Wipe Out!” with as many exclamation marks as possible.

But, today, it doesn’t seem quite so immediate.  Part of the problem may be that in our immediate sort of world we can only deal with those things which affect us now and the end of the world isn’t high on the agenda.

We tend to leave that to Doom-watchers, film-makers and those who make a hobby out of predicting the end of the world – of which there are many including Christian groups such as Seventh Day Adventists whose origin lie in a prediction that the world ended on October 22^nd 1844.   Perhaps we don’t take it seriously because they always seem to get it wrong – like James Ussher, a 17^th century Bishop of Armagh who did some amazing biblical calculations and informed a shocked 18^th century society that the world would end on October 23^rd 1996.

Ussher’s was only one of 20 predictions for the 1990’s which didn’t quite come up to expectation, though it does seem that October 22^nd or 23^rd is a time to be particularly vigilant!

Despite any scepticism,  we do pay lip service to a time when the world will end in a Second Coming of Christ.  Every Sunday  we recite the Creed:

“He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead” and at the end of today’s service we will sing with gusto the words of the hymn ‘ Lo, He comes with clouds descending.’

Presumably, therefore, we take seriously a teaching that has been part of the Church’s message since New Testament times. The early Christians, fuelled by St. Paul, lived as if the end of time was imminent.  And in one sense it is true – because we believe that in Jesus Christ everything has been fulfilled.  What is still to happen is that what has been fulfilled in Christ is, at some time, yet to be fulfilled in us.

There are two kinds of time. One is the time which measures our days and divides them into hours, minutes and seconds – the time of now and of history.

But there is also God’s time and that a special kind of time: when the prophets spoke, as Isaiah did in today Old Testament Lesson, of  the ‘days to come’ or as they frequently said, ‘The day of the Lord’ , they were not speaking of a particular chronological time but of a point when God’s reign would be absolute and  he would claim the hearts of human beings for himself.   So, Isaiah’s picture of a world when all will gather around God and wars would cease is an idealistic picture of hope. This will happen at a point in time but, more importantly, it is an ideal to be worked for.  God can and does act decisively to bring it about but the raw material he chooses is us. If our world is to look like that which Isaiah speaks of it needs decisive action on our part.

Yet God’s action is not determined just by our desire for He knows that left to our own devises we will not achieve it. Good intentions and all that.

So He acts and how he acts is what we are concentrating on this Advent  - He sends us His only begotten Son. The Christmas event of Christ’s birth leading as it does to His self-offering on the Cross and the subsequent Resurrection is HOW God acts to bring about a change of heart and direction to both humanity and the world.  And, because Christ Jesus has acted, it is already the Time of God. We live in Jesus Christ. We live as children of the Resurrection. We live, therefore, in God’s time.    Everything that God wants to achieve in His world has been achieved in Christ.  It has yet to be achieved in us and in the whole of humanity.

So the warning that Jesus puts before us in today’s Gospel isn’t about doom-watching but about our own living out of the Gospel.   The invitation from God is always an invitation to live our lives in Christ.   We are invited to become alert and watchful not for some doom-laden event which will bring the world to the brink of destruction but for the world’s fulfilment and salvation which has already happened in Christ.

Everything that God set in motion in the birth of Jesus is bound up with our Salvation, with the world’s salvation – not destruction. So it has a lot to do with the transformation of our lives as we become caught up with the life of Christ.

We cannot escape living in time but, as we become more Christ-like, as we are touched, shaped and transformed by the love of God until we become love.    That is the point when we live not in time but in eternity.  Let me put it another way.

We can say – and hopefully do say – that we must make time for God.  Now, at one level  that may simply mean that we will try to set aside so many minutes or hours each day to pray or come to church or study our bibles.   That would be good. It would be an excellent thing to do in Advent.

But we need to mean something else if all our devotions are to take root and change us at the very core of our being.   We need to be able to mean something different when we say we want to make time for God. We need to mean that our attitude changes. That God is important and matters more than anything else and that our lives are ruled by His love, His laws, His desires for us.   To really make Time for God is to be ever awake to His claim on our lives and to embrace Him as Lord and Saviour. It’s about an attitude of heart and mind, not a number of minutes we might spare Him.

As we get caught up in the frantic activity of preparing for  Christmas – with all the claims it makes on our time then it is all the more important that we make time for God.   Only so can Christmas mean anything.

As we contemplate what God has done for us in Jesus Christ this meaning becomes clear. Our understanding will grow. We shan’t be sidetracked by all the falseness that Christmas has become – the false glitter that tarnishes on Boxing Day- but rather live in a state of being close to God who revealed His glory in the Christ-child and wants to go on revealing that glory in our own lives as Christ reigns anew in them.

That is our Advent hope and it is fulfilled when we live in a constant state of readiness for God, eagerly looking forward to the birth of Christ anew in our hearts this Christmas.  That’s what Jesus reminds us of in today’s Gospel. Be ready for God’s time, for the coming of Love afresh in your hearts.

Of course, we could neglect to do this if we get too caught up in the other kind of Christmas preparation.   We could protest: If only we had the time!   Well, maybe that’s up to us.

There was once a young man who went for a job interview with a very important company executive.   He was told that he would have exactly one hour and he arrived promptly.  Ushered into a plush office, he met the company boss who had a mean look on his face.   “You’ve only 20 minutes” he barked.   The young man sat there, not saying a word.   “I said, you’ve only 20 minutes” the puzzled executive exclaimed.   Again, not a word.   “Your time is ticking away. Why aren’t you saying anything?”   “They’re my twenty minutes” the young man replied, “I can do whatever I want with them.” 

He got the job, of course. Maybe because he could show that he wasn’t the slave of time, but it’s master.   If we really want to we can make time – for God.   After all, Christmas shows us just how much time He has for us.