Wake Up Call (Mark 13:32-37)

What’s the longest you’ve ever stayed awake? Some of you are night owls, but most adults don’t look forward to losing a night’s sleep. When you’re young, it’s fun to try to stay up all night.

Randy Gardner set out on such an adventure back in 1963. He wanted to win at his local science fair, so he decided to do an experiment to see what happens when you stop sleeping. Not just miss a night of sleep, but stop sleeping as long as possible. Without any drugs or stimulants other than the odd can of Coca-Cola, Randy did not sleep for 11 days and 24 minutes.^[1]

Randy’s project got the attention of some serious scientists. The US Navy Medical Neuropsychiatric Research Unit asked if they could monitor Randy, as did researchers from Sanford University.^[2]

60 years later, “Randy’s science project remains one of the most documented accounts of a human intentionally going without sleep.” Though Randy did win the Greater San Diego Science Fair, the results of the experiment were conclusive: Humans should not go without physical sleep.

After two days awake, Randy’s vision blurred. After three days, nausea set in. His senses of taste, hearing, and smell faded. By day five, he was hallucinating and still had more than half way to go. His cognition and ability to carry out tasks diminished. He was soon unable to properly repeat back tongue twisters or finish simple calculations.

When he finally went to sleep, Randy was out for 14 hours and 46 minutes.^[3] Decades later, he would struggle with serious insomnia that he believed resulted from his science project.

This text is about not falling asleep. But Jesus doesn’t mean physical sleep. He’s talking about something more important. He’s talking about being spiritually awake. Tonight we want to see how being spiritually awake applies to the life we’re called to as Christians living in the last days.

Mark 13:32 – ³² “Now concerning that day or hour no one knows—neither the angels in heaven nor the Son—but only the Father.

These are the closing verses of the Olivet Discourse. Remember, it began when four disciples said to Jesus, “Look how awesome the temple is!” Jesus responded by saying that the whole thing was going to be destroyed. The disciples asked when that was going to happen, and Jesus took the opportunity to not only speak about that coming judgment, which would take place in 70 AD, but more importantly talk about His second coming at the end of the age after the Great Tribulation.

When speaking about the destruction of Herod’s temple, Jesus said that there will be signs that signal it’s coming. Like a fig tree heralding the arrival of summer. And, sure enough, the Roman rumblings that brought Titus and his legions could be seen and heard coming.

But here Jesus says “that day or hour” no one knows. Here He’s referring not to 70 AD, but to the Day of the Lord. No one knows. Not us, not angels, not even the Son.

Of course, the headline here is where Jesus says, “Even I don’t know when it is.” That statement is packed with a lot of implications and questions, isn’t it? How could Jesus be limited in knowledge? Does that mean He isn’t omniscient? How can He be God and not know something?

This verse became a central text in the Arianism debate of the fourth century. Arians argued that Jesus was not divine, but was, in fact, created. They thought Mark 13:32 backed that heresy up.

Historically, there have been a variety of ways faithful Christians try to answer this question. One was to say that “nor the Son” is not in the original, but was added in later. But, the manuscript evidence is clear that Jesus really did say this.^[4]

Others argue Jesus was both omniscient and ignorant of the information at the same time.^[5] One commentator says, “Jesus…left part of His divine attributes in heaven when He was incarnated.”^[6]

These are somewhat problematic ideas. Yet there are times in the Gospels where Jesus demonstrates omniscience and times when His omniscience does not seem to be informing Him.

Remember when He’s talking to the disciples about Lazarus? They misunderstand what Jesus means when He says Lazarus is “sleeping,” so He says, “No, Lazarus is dead.” He knew from afar. But then, when He goes to Lazarus’ house, He has to ask, “Where have you put him?”

We have a really difficult time understanding what theologians call the “hypostatic union.” That’s the theological term for how God took on a human nature – adding it to His divine nature.

Here’s what’s important to remember: Jesus is not just God wearing skin. And Jesus is not just a superpowered human being. He is fully God and He is fully man. And Jesus will forever be the unique GodMan for all eternity.

While on earth, Jesus did not leave parts of His divinity in heaven. But He did give up the independent use of His divine power. He was totally submitted to the leading and directing of God the Father moment by moment. And in this moment, before Jesus’ ascension and glorification, He did not exercise His omniscience and therefore did not know the day. He certainly does know, now.

That’s a sidetrack off the main point of these closing verses, but I think it’s important for us to talk through some of that doctrine because it’s significant. Historically, the divinity of Jesus is one of the most contentious battlegrounds between orthodoxy and heresy. The Arians said He wasn’t God. The Gnostics said He wasn’t a man. Cults today still attack Jesus’ divinity and nature.

But Jesus’ point in verse 32 is not the fact that He didn’t know the day. His main point was that we do not know either. So what does that mean? That means we should not be setting dates for the end of the world or the rapture or the second coming. Rather, as William Lane writes, the whole point of Jesus’ conclusion is that vigilance, not calculation is required.^[7]

Mark 13:33 – ³³ “Watch! Be alert! For you don’t know when the time is coming.

Once more, Jesus gives the command to watch. The term doesn’t just mean look at things, it refers to being on guard.^[8] It is a position and activity and responsibility given to us. We’re sentinels, not sightseers.

A couple of weeks ago we were honored to host the retirement of a navy chief. My favorite part of those ceremonies is when they recite this poem called The Watch. It begins:

For twenty years this sailor has stood the watch

While some of us were in our bunks at night this sailor stood the watch

While some of us were in school learning our trade this shipmate stood the watch

Yes even before some of us were born into this world this shipmate stood the watch

That’s the kind of watchfulness Jesus has in mind. Not just observing, but operating. A faith alive with growth and activity on behalf of the Master Who has called us and the people around us we’re positioned to serve. That we live not as passive observers but participants in a great work.

Now, we are not focused on the second coming at the end of the Tribulation. For us the day to look toward is the Rapture. And nothing needs to happen before that event. It could be tonight. It could be years from now. What we do know is that it is coming. We should be appropriately alert.

Verse 33 reminds us of a simple truth that I find easy to forget: Disciples should be disciplined. Disciplined in our faith. Why? Because we have the watch. And next Jesus gives a closing parable to explain how He wants us to carry out that calling.

Mark 13:34 – ³⁴ “It is like a man on a journey, who left his house, gave authority to his servants, gave each one his work, and commanded the doorkeeper to be alert.

There are multiple parables that describe us as members of a great household, whose Master is away, and we have been commissioned to be about His business until He returns. Here, Jesus points out that every disciple has been given authority, activity, and the attitude to maintain.

You have the authority of God in heaven. You are authorized to be Jesus’ hands and feet. To preach the Gospel, to make disciples, to bear the fruit of the Spirit, to shine light in the dark, to do greater works in the power of God. In this era, the doorkeeper held the master’s keys.^[9] Do you remember what Jesus told the disciples in Matthew 16? “I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.”^[10]

God has a great deal of confidence in you. Because He’s going to empower you and work through you. But He wants you to walk in His power and authority, not by your own strength or according to your own will, to submitted to His. But when we do, He invests all sorts of authority in us.

And then we see that the Master has given each one his work. Activity. God has assigned you some specific calling, some specific opportunity, specific people He brings into your life so that you can accomplish particular work in their midst. There are things God has prepared for me beforehand to discover and do that you can’t do. And things He has prepared for you that I can’t do. Because He scatters us into different places with different gifts and different levels of influence and access so that many activities can be accomplished.

What work has the Master assigned to you? It’s something! The question is whether we’ve clocked in, redeeming the time that we have in this life. Are we on call?

And then we have the attitude: Be alert. The term means “stay awake.”^[11] Not physically going without sleep, but staying spiritually awake. Not falling asleep on the job. Not being drowsy to the realities of culture around us. Not being spiritually asleep when the call comes in.

When Christians “fall asleep” spiritually, that means we stop serving God. We stop living distinct, holy lives. It’s not time for that. Romans 13 says the time has come for us to wake from sleep. To cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. To go into the harvest.

Mark 13:35 – ³⁵ Therefore be alert, since you don’t know when the master of the house is coming—whether in the evening or at midnight or at the crowing of the rooster or early in the morning.

When Randy Gardner stayed awake those 11 days, paranoia set in. He started thinking a radio host was trying to make a fool of him. The brain needs sleep.

God doesn’t want us to live paranoid Christian lives. It’s not that we should be terrified of not being alert enough. But He doesn’t want us to miss out on opportunities, on rewards, on future usefulness. These parables about being alert to the Lord’s coming always have this element. The virgins who did not keep their lamps ready. The servants who wasted the Master’s resources. It’s not that there’s never a time for rest, it’s that even in rest we keep ourselves ready for that moment when we might stand before our Master, or when we might get an opportunity to serve His household. Where we might get to carry out a task or bring someone through the door.

Mark 13:36 – ³⁶ Otherwise, when he comes suddenly he might find you sleeping.

We’ll see a version of this literally play out in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus, the Master, asks His disciples to dedicate themselves to prayer. Instead they sleep. And then they sleep again. And each time they’re found the Lord says, “Hey, I’m asking you to do this spiritual work right now.”

We don’t want that to happen to us in life. Where we miss some aspect of our calling because we’re too spiritually undisciplined or drowsy – too weighed down by the temporal to be active in eternal work.

Mark 13:37 – ³⁷ And what I say to you, I say to everyone: Be alert!”

What began as a private talk with Peter, James, John, and Andrew is suddenly expanded to not only the rest of the 12, not only Mark’s original Roman readers, but to all of us. Jesus says this to everyone: Be alert. That has been the consistent command throughout this discourse. It contains a lot of important eschatology information, but really Jesus sees this as a chance to direct us.

What started as a question about when some things in Jerusalem were going to happen ends with an urgent instruction about the things that should be happening in our lives, no matter where or when we live.

Clearly in Jesus’ mind, these commands are urgent and essential. But God does not want us to live in frantic, agitated, paranoid exhaustion. We shouldn’t leave the Olivet Discourse thinking, “Well I guess I can never rest. I’m always on duty. I can never sleep.”

No, Jesus made it so clear that He wants us to serve Him from a position of rest. He said, “Are you weary? Come to Me and I’ll give you rest.” And the term He uses means to be refreshed from tiredness.^[12] But, spiritually speaking, it’s a wakeful rest. We are on call. We have the watch.

You can be about the Master’s business at any moment because He has given you His authority and specific activity and the proper attitude. He has provided the resources you need. He surrounds you with fellow servants who can support you in your work.

But here is the final point: Today is the day to be a Christian. To have an operative faith. Awake, alert. Acting in the rest and authority Christ has given to us. Because our days are few. The day is coming. “Blessed is that servant whom the master finds doing his job when he comes.”^[13]