Advent 1
November 30, 2003

Vodka, Alka-Seltzer, Pepto-Bismol, Coffee
by Donald Hoffman

Luke 21:34-36

On the morning when Jeeves first comes into Bertie Wooster’s life, Bertie has a hangover. Now the Jeeves of the P. G. Wodehouse stories is not your ordinary mortal. He is the ultimate gentleman’s gentleman. Most people walk from place to place. Jeeves shimmers silently. I’ve known many people who could mess up a room, just by walking through it. Jeeves can clean up a room, just by walking through it. Many people on the morning after the party have hangovers. Jeeves cures hangovers.

       “Excuse me, sir,” he said gently.
       Then he seemed to flicker, and wasn’t there any longer....
       [P]resently he came back with a glass on a tray.

       “If you would drink this, sir,” he said …. “It is a little
       preparation of my own invention. It is the Worcester Sauce
       that gives it its colour. The raw egg makes it nutritious. The
       red pepper gives it its bite.  Gentlemen have told me they
       have found it extremely invigorating after a late evening.”

So Wooster takes it. At first he feels as if someone is strolling down his throat with a lighted torch, and then everything seems suddenly to get all right.

       The sun shone in through the window; birds twittered in the
       tree-tops; and, generally speaking, hope dawned once more.

If we had Jeeves’s hangover cure, we could replace our pews with leather recliners, replace our communion cups with double tall lattes, build our new building debt-free, and buy out Bill Gates. The whole world would beat a path to our door.

Please forgive me for this. When I was starting to plan the sermon, I looked at the description of preparing for the day of the Lord in Luke 21 and I was struck by the words of verse 34:

       “Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with
       dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, …”

Dissipation, drunkenness, and worry. The story of life in America’s fast lane. But wait, it gets better:

That word “dissipation”: one scholar thinks it refers to the nausea and agony one feels on the morning after a great party. You ate too much, you drank too much, you stayed up too late, and now you’re paying for it.

So it got me thinking that there are four different ways you can live life, four different ways you can behave, four different ways to prepare for Christmas, and each way can be symbolized with a drink. The vodka comes first. It represents drunkenness, and stands for all those people who want to go through life blindly, not knowing what’s going on. You don’t have to use alcohol to accomplish this. Some people use drugs. Some just wish very hard and pretend. They close their eyes and ignore the signs around them. And what happens is that Christmas sneaks up on them unawares. Life sneaks up on them unawares. And they are never ready for it.

Then there are the people with all the regrets. Their minds are constantly on the past, and everything that went wrong. “Why did I eat that extra piece of pumpkin pie? Why did I drink those three extra glasses of punch? Why did I take that job? Why did I move to Washington State? Why did I marry that husband? Oh, if I only had it all to do over again!

This reminds me of one of my favorite scenes from the old sitcom "Night Court." Harry wants to tell Christine he loves her. But when he has the chance he doesn’t. “Why didn’t I tell her? Oh, if I could only live that moment over again!” Instantly there is a knock on the door and Christine sticks her head in. “By the way, was there anything you wanted to say?” “No, nothing.” “Okay, goodbye!” [Door slams] “Oh, if I could only live THAT moment over again!”

The symbol for overdoing it, the symbol for regret is Alka-Seltzer because I don’t know the name for Jeeves’s secret hangover cure. Alka-Seltzer, “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, oh what a relief it is!” Alka-Seltzer is about the only drink there is for fixing our past mistakes, and even it isn’t very good.

Pepto-Bismal is for the worry-warts, the people with the nervous stomachs, spastic colons, butterflies in the tummy. The people who imagine all the things that could go wrong. The people who are too caught up by the concerns of the rat race. The people beat down by the hassle of our commercial Christmas rush. They need something to coat and soothe their stomachs. But they need more than a drink. They need someone to whisper gently, “Relax, you got through last December, you’ll get through this one.”

Now, the more I think about it, the more it seems that each person typified by these three drinks is stuck. The drunkard is stuck in the present, and the whole space from Thanksgiving to New Years becomes a blur — one endless party. The people living on regret are stuck in the past, their Decembers haunted by the ghost of Christmases past, when things worked out wrong, when they made the wrong choices. And the worriers are stuck in the future, where decisions don’t come one at a time, but pile up in impossible heaps.

Stuck in the past, stuck in the present, stuck in the future. We need a way to move smoothly between. We need … coffee! (You remember I moved here from Seattle, don't you?) We need to be alert. We need caffeine.

Jesus wants you to stay awake. Jesus wants you to keep alert. Jesus wants you to observe the signs of the times. In order to do that you have to look at the present and compare it to the past and contrast it with the future. Over and over we are told, stay awake, keep on watch, The Day of the Lord is sneaking up, God is sneaking up on you! Put on another pot of coffee.

Yes, I know it is kind of silly. Alka-Seltzer and vodka and Pepto-Bismal are never mentioned in the Bible. Nor is coffee. They are just symbols, and if they don’t work for you, forget them.

But so many people are immobilized and helpless in this world. Helplessly drunk as they concentrate on the now. Helplessly stuck in the past. Immobilized by their worries about the future. They need something to shake them awake. A sobering-up pill, a hangover cure, an anxiety-reducer. Something better than coffee.

They need meaning and purpose. They need a cause bigger than themselves, they need to serve a master greater than themselves. They need to be awake and watchful. They need to get organized. They need to be waiting for Christ. They need to get ready for Christmas.

Our job in the month ahead is to prepare for Christmas. To get ready for the Day of the Lord. To wait for the coming Messiah. How are we going to do it? By stumbling blindly through one party after another, never noticing WHO the parties are for? By living in the past with our regrets, trying to cure the hangover from yesterday? By rushing madly through the commercial frenzy, worn out with anxiety, with cramps and heartburn? Or by alertly noting the signs of the times and by paying attention to the reality around us?

Are you ready for Christmas? Are you ready for God to come?

Or are you stuck in the past, present, or future? Are you trying to cure yourself with over-the-counter drugs? Are you waiting for a miracle cure? It isn’t coffee. It is Jesus Christ.

Don Hoffman, Creston Christian Church
crestnch@televar.com
Creston, Washington, USA

        To be Christian is to cease saying, "Where the Messiah is
        there is no misery" and to begin to say "Where there is
        misery there is the Messiah." The former statement makes
        no demands; the latter is an assignment.
                                        --Fred Craddock

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