Illuminations on the Lectionary readings for Nov. 30, 2025 (Advent 1A)

Christ in Glory with Saints (1660-61), oil painting on canvas by Mattia Preti (1613-1699). Museo del Prado, Madrid. (Click image to enlarge.)

First Reading: Isaiah 2:1-5

It is the First Sunday of Advent, and the circle of the Lectionary year comes around again as we turn from the Gospel of Luke to the Gospel of Matthew for the next 12 months. Advent begins the church year as a time of preparation and expectation for the coming celebration of the birth of Jesus on Christmas Day. One Advent readings foresee a bright future with the coming of the Messiah and anticipate the signs and wonders of the last days. Our first reading offers verses of poetic beauty as the Prophet Isaiah tells of a renewed Jerusalem and a restored Temple. Zion will be the highest of the mountains, the prophet declares. The Temple will be the center of a world that recognizes it as the house of God. It will be a world of peace, a time when swords have been beaten into plowshares and there is no more war.

Psalm: Psalm 122

Psalm 122, attributed by legend to King David, sings a counterpoint to the Isaiah reading. The Psalm looks toward a glorious future, too: a time of triumph and peace for Jerusalem, the city of God, the throne of the new King David, the Messiah. The house of David will be a city at peace, built on a mountain where all the tribes of Israel go up with gladness to praise God’s name. At David’s throne, the Psalmist exults; all people can expect fair judgment. There the love of God will be rewarded with security, prosperity, and peace.

Second Reading: Romans 13:11-14

We will read from Paul’s letter to the Romans in all but one of the four Sundays of Advent. This would be Paul’s last letter, written some 25 years after the death and resurrection of Christ, introducing himself to the young but growing church in Rome as he prepared to go there. In this passage, Paul exhorts the people to be prepared for the return of Jesus, an event that Christians of that time expected to come very soon. “The night is far gone, the day is near,” Paul assures his flock. To prepare for the coming of that day, he calls on them to “put on the armor of light” by behaving well, living abstemiously, and avoiding quarrels and jealousy.

Gospel: Matthew 24:36-44

Our first passage from Matthew’s Gospel for the new Lectionary year comes not from its beginning, which we will hear at Christmas, but toward its end. We find Jesus talking with the apostles on a hillside on the Mount of Olives, from where they look across a small valley toward the Temple. In preceding verses, Jesus has told them – in words similar to those we heard from Luke two weeks ago – that the Temple will be torn down amid a time of war and great suffering, before the Messiah comes to usher in a new age. Only God knows when the last days will come, Jesus says, just as sinful humans in Noah’s time had no warning of the coming flood. So, Jesus urges them to be ready. Be prepared. Live as if Christ might return at any hour.