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Sermon - November 29th, 2009
It Is Near!
Rev. Gwen Drake
Scripture: Luke 21:25-31 & Nov. 29, 2009
Prayer of Preparation: We give thanks, O God of sacred stories, for the witness of your word today. Through Scripture you challenge our assumptions, increase our awareness, nurture our imaginations, and touch our feelings. Bless the hearing of the word today. Speak to us and grant that by the power of your Spirit we may be hearers and doers of your word. Amen.
Be on guard! The end is near! This generation will not pass away until the Son of Man comes on a cloud with power and great glory. So stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near!
Every generation since Luke put these words on paper have had people who believe they will see the rapture in their life time.
I went to the Rapture Index online to see how we are doing. The Rapture Index was designed to measure the type of activity that could act as a precursor to the rapture. The website I looked at says the Rapture Index is a “Dow Jones Industrial Average” of end times activity. It is a “prophetic speedometer.” The higher the number, the faster we are moving toward the pre-tribulation rapture! The score on Nov. 23rd was 167 and anything above 160 means “fasten your seatbelts.”
The Rapture Index looks at the weather issues, plagues (H1N1 for example), global turmoil, Middle East turmoil, crime, economics, unemployment, the rise of globalism, ecumenical cooperation, liberalism. There are 45 things that are kept track of to come up with a weekly index. Some people are obsessed with this stuff!
I was thinking of going to see the movie 2012 before I preached this Sunday, so I could give you a film review. Except the reviews were so bad, I went to see “Blind Spot” instead.
The Rapture Index is an Evangelism tool. Maybe we mainline churches need to use it and scare people into being Christian. Don’t you sometimes wonder if we might be THE generation? Some Christians believe we are the last generation because Israel became a state in 1948. Except that Luke thought he would see Jesus come again and we are still waiting for Jesus to come again.
The Apostle Paul told early Christians not to get married, not to worry about whether they were slave or free because this world was soon to end. It didn’t. So, Paul was mistaken.
There have been wars and rumors of wars, signs of the end times, and still the world endures. The end has not come. Jesus said, “Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.” Just what is he talking about?
What kind of end is drawing near? Is it not our Christian belief that we have already seen “the end?” Don’t we believe that the world came to a decisive crisis in the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth? In his death, the entire history of that world reached a turning point. At that moment, when he was nailed to the cross, the conflict between life and death, good and evil, God and Caesar was resolved in favor of God’s power over it all. A new Kingdom was established—a Kingdom not dependent on whether we work out peace in the Middle East or establish democracy all over the world. This new Kingdom is based on what God has done and is doing for us and the world rather than what we do.
So Jesus tells us, “Be on guard. Be alert. Do not be terrified.” Because what happened in the life and death of Christ, was God entered our world and –despite what we do with the world—God will not desert us. God has a loving grasp on the future.
And I wish I could believe that 100%, all of the time—don’t you? Don’t you sometimes just thoroughly doubt what I just told you. I do. The world is a mess. The world is full of chaos. I fear for my daughters’ future and the generation after them. Jesus said, “Do not be afraid.” But Jesus didn’t live in today’s world. It’s crazy out there. If we don’t get peace, what will happen? We might not survive! We might be the cause of the end coming—and then where would we be? As the prophets of old said, not everyone who cries “Peace, peace” is talking about God’s peace.
And what in the world is God’s peace? Jesus said, “My peace I give to you, not as the world gives.” What is this peace that Jesus gives? Where is this new Kingdom that God gave us through the life and death of Jesus?
Do I have your attention? It’s like this. We think that the world is worse now than ever before, because we are in it. We are the ones who are living now. The signs of the apocalypse have always been with us. Is that a comforting thought? No. Not really. But it does remind us that the writers of the Bible were writing about their time, not our time. They were not predictors of the future; they were interpreters of the present, their present. And in the midst of their chaos; Jesus and Paul and the writers of all apocalyptic literature call us to look at the chaos with eyes of faith and faithfulness. Jesus calls us to see that God’s hand is at work even in the most nasty of circumstances.
It is true, when we are thrown into our own personal chaotic times, we think it is for sure the worst of times. When the world around us is in crisis—there are those who believe it is the worst of the worst, it’s the end, it’s close to the rapture. It’s finally happening. Oh my gosh, maybe it did happen and we’ve all been left behind!
As strange as it is, Jesus uses this language to jolt us out of that kind of thinking. When life is disastrous, it is God who provides the hope, even in the worst of times. Because when darkness is surrounding you, consuming you, controlling you, what is the one thing that shows up and pierces the darkness? It is that tiny little speck of light, it is a spark, it is a glimmer, and, guess what, the darkness is no more.
So those who listened to Jesus’ words that day, how did they feel? Were they overwhelmed? Terrified? Despairing? Did they just shake it off, and return to their daily routine unaffected? No, they left with a hope and a faith that resisted cynicism and came back early the next morning to hear more.
And you know what else? They left with the hope that, yes, there will be an end to life as they knew it, an end that was both a judgment and a redemption. It’s is the same for us. It is about waking up tomorrow morning and giving God thanks for a new day! Apocalyptic scripture is good news because it is God saying to us—nothing remains the same!
Even after saying this, there are definitely ways that we get stuck or addicted to our state of unhappiness, or our fearfulness, or our doomsday thoughts.
Anthony de Mello said, “If you look carefully you will see that there is one thing and only one thing that causes unhappiness. The name of that thing is Attachment. What is an attachment? An emotional state of clinging caused by the belief that without some particular thing or some person you cannot be happy.”
Mister Eckhart said, “As long as we look for some kind of pay for what we do, as long as we want to get something from God in some kind of exchange, we are like the merchants. If you want to be rid of the commercial spirit, then by all means do all you can in the way of good works, but do so solely for the praise of God. Live as if you did not exist. Expect and ask nothing in return. Then the merchant inside you will be driven out of the temple God has made. Thank God alone dwells there. See! This is how the temple is cleared: when a person thinks only of God and honors God alone. Only such a person is free and genuine.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote from prison before he was martyred by the Nazis: “You must not think that I am unhappy. What is happiness and unhappiness? It depends so little on the circumstances; it depends really only on what happens inside a person. I am grateful for every day…and that makes me happy.”
John Scott had this to say about the pursuit of happiness: “Those who pursue happiness never find it. Because joy and peace are extremely elusive, happiness is a will-o’-the-wisp, a phantom, and even if we reach out our hand to grasp it, it vanishes into thin air. God gives joy and peace not to those who pursue them but to those who pursue God, and strive to love. Joy and peace are found in loving and nowhere else.”
George Bernard Shaw said, “This is the true joy of life, the being used up for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the community and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die for the harder I work, the more I live. Life is no “brief candle” to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for a moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”
So, here is where I find peace and hope in the midst of this crazy world: In a quiet moment, in prayer, in a beautiful sunset, in the laughter of a delighted child, in those special gifts that God hands me every day, every moment. And if the suffering and pain you feel is still too great to even open your eyes and heart to what is right in front of you, then remember Jesus and the way of the cross. The way of the cross is a very old way to redemption, to wholeness, to healing. And it still works because the way of the cross is complete reversal. It means that the worst thing in your life will turn into the best thing that ever happened to you. And if you are anything like me, the way of the cross is the means by which I am brought kicking and screaming into God’s Kingdom. For me it is about moving into the pain and suffering until I finally surrender it to God because I can’t stand it anymore or it cost too much to hold onto. It means letting go, letting the past be the past, relinquishing it and living in the present.
Let me say this again. There have always signs of the apocalypse coming for we live in a crazy, messy world. There have always been signs of hope and peace as well—right in front of us. And since Jesus, there is the way of the cross, when the worst thing of your life is turned into a gift, into the best things that ever happened to you. That’s redemption. That’s when winter is over and summer is coming, when the fig tree sprouts brand new leaves. Redemption, you see, is always near. We are always standing before God, who is always standing with us.
Nothing will remain the same, nothing. God is always giving us a new day, a new world, a new life. Watch for it. Be on guard. Pray for the strength and courage to be in it and part of it!
Amen.
Gracious and holy God, whom we yearn for deep within our souls. We yearn for the hope God gives us. That spark of light in the darkness. A little little to show us the way. That’s what we hope for, O God. That’s what we wait for this Advent. A little sign of you. A simple sign. A profound and holy sign that your hand is on us and our future.
O God, make this Advent season special for us and we journey through it. Help us to listen and wait and be expectant. Help us to anticipate your birth into the world once again. Open our eyes to what is right in front of us that is a gift.
Open our hearts. Help us to be generous with our selves. Help us to know that we live with abundance surrounding us. We don’t have to own it to have it. Life itself is full of abundance.
Be with us this season as we prepare ourselves for Christmas—when we listen to the news, see a street person needing some change, or help someone. Help us know that being the church and being Christian is not just about Sunday morning. It is about every moment of the day. It is about being in the world.
May we take Christ out there with us. The Christ of hope. May we be your agents of hope in the world, O God. Through the name of the one called the hope of the world we pray…Our Father….