Trinity Church in the City of Boston
The Rev. Morgan S. Allen
November 9, 2025
I Advent (A), Matthew 24:36-51
In you, O Lord, have we taken refuge; for the sake of your name, lead us and guide us.1 From Psalm 31. Amen.
As we begin Advent and a new liturgical year, the Gospel has come for our teeth …
The Greek word for the singular “tooth” – ὀδόντα – appears once in the Christian Testament, in a reference to the Levitical judgement standard of “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.”2 Matthew 5:38, Leviticus 24:20. The plural “teeth” – ὀδόντων – appears ten times. Seven of these – six in Matthew and one in Luke – appear in contexts resembling today’s lesson: “in the outer darkness,” Jesus warns, “there will be [the] weeping and [the] gnashing of teeth.”3 Matthew 24:51.
The related ὀδόντας appears in the Markan description of a sick child [these stories slightly less familiar]. The boy’s father says to Jesus, “Teacher, I brought you my son; he has a spirit that makes him unable to speak, and whenever it seizes him, it dashes him down, and he foams at the mouth and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid …”4 Mark 9:17-18. Jesus directs the demon to leave the child, and “after crying out and convulsing him terribly, it [released him], and the boy was like a corpse, so that [most] said, ‘He is dead.’ But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he was able to stand.”5 Mark 9:26-28.
We find that same form of “teeth” in Chapter 7 of the Acts of the Apostles, at the scene of Stephen’s stoning. You may recall that the Deacon has testified to the high priest – a screed reaching crescendo in verse 51: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors [did].” Not so surprisingly, the Temple leaders become “enraged and [grind] their teeth at Stephen.”6 Acts 7:54. With Saul of Tarsus standing witness,7 Acts 7:58. they drag Stephen from the city, torture him, and kill him.
Punishment and possession … rage and suffering … orthodontia.
In Being Mortal, Atul Gawande, the surgeon and author [known to this parish] writes:
Consider the teeth. The hardest substance in the human body is [their] white enamel. With age, it nonetheless wears away, allowing the softer, darker layers underneath to show through. Meanwhile, the blood supply to [their] pulp and [roots] atrophies, and the flow of saliva diminishes; the gums … pull away from the teeth, exposing the base, making them unstable and elongating their appearance, especially the lower ones. Experts [can] gauge a person’s age to within five years from the examination of a single tooth – if the person has any teeth left to examine.
Scrupulous dental care can help avert tooth loss, but growing old gets in the way … In the course of [an average] lifetime, the muscles of the jaw lose about 40 percent of their mass, and the bones of the mandible [become] porous and weak. The ability to chew declines, and people shift to softer foods, which are [generally high in sugar content] and more likely to cause cavities. By the age of sixty, people in an industrialized country like the United States have lost, on average, a third of their teeth. After eight-five, almost 40 percent have no teeth at all.”8 Gawande, Atul. Being Mortal. Metropolitan Books/Macmillan Publishing Group, 2014, p. 29.
Underlining these biblical testimonies and mortal inevitabilities, three weeks back my ordeal began with the removal of a lower molar. When I scheduled the procedure, the office clerk explained my options for anesthesia, none of which our insurance would cover: 950 American dollars for IV sedation; 300 bucks for nitrous-oxide; or 58 cents for a single valium and a self-applied serving of stubbornness. [I’ll give you exactly one guess as to what I chose …]
While the maxillofacial practice appointed a sterile room with the expectedly delicate and precise instruments of their trade, for my case the surgeon could have borrowed her tools from the mechanic’s box in the back of my truck: a pair of pliers and a drill. I took the pill and a deep breath, and I turned my headphones to 11. Despite the noise-cancelling and the chemical reassurances, the soundtrack of that experience has lingered with me: the crack … the crunch … the rummmmmble. After what seemed like a very long while, the surgeon gave me a thumbs-up [I think I could make out a smile behind her mask], and she held before me the remains of my tooth, alighted on her latex glove.
Lord, have mercy.
The lighting of the first candle in our Advent wreath marks the beginning of a fresh journey. Traditionally, Advent has been known as a “little Lent,” with a focus on Lenten themes of contrition, discipline, and preparation. As Lent readies us for Easter and the empty tomb, so Advent exercises us for Christmas and the welcome of the Incarnation, the babe born in a manger. Keeping these days, our Gospel lessons direct us to consider the eschaton – the fulfillment of time – and to reflect upon our community’s preparedness for Jesus’ next arrival, if you will.
Jesus commends, “Keep awake! For [we] do not know on what day [our] Lord is coming.”9 Matthew 24:42. Meanwhile, “as in the days of Noah,”10 Matthew 24:37. we remain busy with our daily lives – Thanksgiving eating and drinking, marrying and burying across the holiday weekend, getting up for work, heading off to school, coming home again – not knowing when the day of judgment will arrive.11 Matthew 24:38-39.
Whatever worries that final season might prompt, Jesus encourages us not to trouble ourselves with what we cannot control: Keep up with the work I have given you, for when the coming of the Son of Man will be, is not your concern. Do not take up salvation and judgment as your privileges, but leave them to the one – the one, among even the angels – who knows their hour.
As fate and my Altoids addiction would have it, I ended up with a “dry socket” – a painful condition that has brought me back to the surgeon’s offices more than a fistful of times, with another appointment already on the books for first thing tomorrow morning.12 … and it can’t come soon enough. During these follow-ups, the doctor crams clove-oil-soaked batting into the void where a blood clot should have [more kindly] formed. While the temporary relief arrives within minutes of these treatments, the finality of that hole – the absence of my ὀδόντα – has not let loose of me.
Rotten as it was, I miss my dadgum tooth!
In my childhood dentist’s office hung a wooden plaque a little larger than an index card. Below a prominently toothed, hand-painted rabbit [one ear upright, and the second sillily flopped], a poetic caption read, “You don’t have to floss all your teeth, just the ones you want to keep!” The specter of that message has haunted me this past month. It’s not that I didn’t believe their wisdom, I thought I had done enough [question mark?] – or at least thought I still had time before I needed to change my ways … but this excavation was so final, man.
Though our Lectionary appointments may not intend anxiety, this Gospel and this season do unavoidably and demandingly ask: How will we respond to our mortality?
As I like to observe, we in The Episcopal Church receive pulpit admonitions for altar-call-ish urgency the way we receive flatulence in an elevator: such business may be necessary and even healthy, but surely this is neither the time nor the place for such unpleasantry. We position “politeness” as a strategy for avoiding some fundamental truths: that aging will defeat even our healthiest habits, and our days will eventually come to an end. Too often this mannerliness defers healing and hope because dread and disappointment frighten us, lull us from facing the truth of our situation.
As an antidote, Advent demands faithful urgency: not that we would act out of fear, or be in a hurry, or necessarily make a public show our commitments, but that we would take an inspired, second look at what we can do here … today. Deliberate, devoted haste can anticipate the birth of Jesus, as well as the Fulfillment of Time. With a perspective of both that beginning and that end, we can steel ourselves to acknowledge the difficulties of this life, even as we recommit to the Good now.
Trinitarians, I encourage you, therefore, do not wait until tomorrow to floss your teeth! Let us not lie in dental chairs or deathbeds, grieving what we could have done and lamenting what could have been. “Let us cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now, in the time of this mortal life.”13 From the “Collect of the Day” appointed for The First Sunday of Advent, The Book Of Common Prayer (1979), p. 211. Let us love as can, while we can – and, in so doing on this and every day, make room for God to be born in us again.
For grateful hearts and gracious lives [and effective dental care], I pray;
Amen.