Ring ding ding ding ding d-ding d-ding d-d-ding ding.
I hate that song, "What Does the Fox Say?" It is so old.
It gets stuck in my head like the worst of ear worms.
It's ridiculous, and I hate it.
Oh, sorry, I saw a fox last night. I'm like, "Oh, sweet, a fox!"
and then that song got in my head.
My name is Father Mike Schmitz, and this is Ascension Presents.
So, I was watching on social media the other day this fantastic practical joke video
where there are these two guys, and one was dressed in all white,
kinda like a butcher's uniform, and this apron, and he had this big bushy beard, and this
crazy hair with a chainsaw, and his buddy, his accomplice in this practical joke,
um, had no legs, and he had only one arm, and so he dressed up—they dressed up that guy.
They kind of did some makeup stuff, so it looked like he was—like he had just gotten
his legs and arm cut off. He's bloody and I'm so sorry this is pretty gross.
Um, but they were in a parking garage, and people pull into the parking spot, and
they get out of the car, and then he'd pick up the chainsaw, and this guy would
try to be crawling away looking like he just got his body hurt you know, um, and
it was so hilarious.
Like the reaction of people, just, I was laughing out loud. I watched. I literally LOL'd.
I was thinking about this, and I love—I love watching people get surprised.
I mean I love—it's hilarious. Those videos are hilarious.
I love watching people get surprised. I hate ...
I hate being surprised.
Like it is so un—right?—it's so uncomfortable.
And I was thinking about this, and thinking there's this Bible connection there.
In the Bible, Jesus, St. Paul later on, the Scripture, talks about how the day of the Lord is going to come.
The day of the Lord is going to come like a thief in the night.
St. Paul, in his first letter to the Thessalonians —I'm in chapter 5—
he talks about this. He says, listen. Live in the light
not in the dark, because like a thief in the night the Lord is going to come like
labor pains upon a woman,
boom, it's gonna come out of nowhere, and you gotta be awake. You gotta be aware.
It's gonna be a surprise.
You know, there's a crazy thing: What's going to make the difference between
that being a good surprise and a bad surprise? There's good surprises,
and there's bad surprises.
What's going to make the difference between the Lord's coming being a great thing,
"Finally! This is incredible!"
or a terrible thing,
something like someone surprising you in a parking garage with a chainsaw?
I think it's this:
I was thinking about those videos, and if someone had told the people pulling in the parking garage,
"When you get there, there are going to be some people who are there playing a practical joke."
That would kill the surprise, right? That would kill the bad part of the surprise.
It might still be gross and all that kind of stuff, but it wouldn't be as disturbing.
The people won't be as disturbed as they actually were in the video.
Why? Because they were expecting it. Because they were living,
they were walking into the whole thing, like, we know, this is what's going to happen.
I think one of the things that preserves Christians from being terribly surprised,
the bad surprise when it comes to Christ's coming,
when it comes to Christ's return, is not just living like we expect it.
Think of something deeper.
It's living with him now.
If there's anything that will take the Lord's coming
from a bad surprise to make it an incredibly good surprise,
it's this reality: Do I live every day as if Jesus truly is with me already?
Because Christ's presence is truly here.
I mean, if you have the Holy Spirit, if you've been baptized, you have the Holy Spirit within you,
and when the Holy—where one person of the Trinity—is,
the other two persons of the Trinity are always present as well,
and if you have the Holy Spirit with you, then the Father and the Son are also with you.
Do we live in the presence of Jesus? This is just the big question.
And if we live in the presence of Jesus, if we live as if it's truly true, and it really is, and he's with us,
then when he comes in glory,
yes, that is a shock, probably. That is a new thing that will be astounding,
but it won't be a bad surprise,
because I'm living, as St. Paul said, I'm living in the light.
I'm living in the day, and I'm sober. I'm living in his presence.
The last thing St. Paul says here when it comes to this coming of the Lord,
a way to prepare, is in, again, chapter 5,
after he talked about that Jesus is going to come, he says the word, "therefore,"
and, Bible tip for you, whenever you see the word, "therefore," you always need to ask the question,
"Oh! What is that there for?"
See what I did there? What's it there for?
After saying Jesus is going to come in a surprise,
"Therefore, encourage one another and build one another up as indeed you do."
So it's one thing to live in the presence of Jesus, but there's also another thing:
the people around me.
Do I actually, intentionally, build them up? Do I encourage them?
St. Paul says, if you're going to live sober and alert,
ready for the coming of our Lord because you live in his presence now,
how do you treat the people around you?
Do you tear them down? Do you simply leave them alone? Or do you build them up?
Here's my invitation today:
to live in the presence of Jesus Christ,
but also to see him in others to such a degree that you are a source of encouragement,
that you, your words and your actions, your dealings with them,
actually build them up.
I think if we do this, I'm sure if we do this,
when Christ does come in his glory at the end of time, which might be this afternoon,
it will be a great surprise, and nothing like a bad surprise.
From all of us here at Ascension Presents, my name is Father Mike.
God bless.