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Hearing
these texts proclaimed today, did it give anyone pause? I mean, there are times
when I look out at the congregation and thing, “oh, of all the days to visit a
church for the first time!” I mean really, stewardship and apocalypse! It’s a
somewhat daunting combination…
So,
first things first—before we get too deep into the specifics of the texts—is a
summary.
We
have a broken world that needs repair.
There
is violence that needs to be ended.
There
are false teachings that need to be corrected.
And,
every single one of us is desperately needed, needed to show up for our
community. To stay focused on the needs of the now, and not get distracted by
despair and fear. We are needed for the work of healing and of peace. We are
needed to spread the good news of God’s love. We are needed.
Amen.
The
end.
But,
you came expecting more, right? That wasn’t enough, was it?
So,
let’s take some time—to sit with these readings written in the then, in order
to explore what God is saying to us now.
The
word apocalypse is thrown around a great deal—it’s a genre that has always had
appeal. From Terry Pratchet and Neil Gaiman’s, “Good Omens”, a humorous
depiction of two friends, an angel and demon, who have lost the antichrist and
are trying to avert Armageddon, to the words of the prophets—apocalypse has
been part of our cultural self-understanding. But why? Why do so many of us
find ourselves drawn to narratives that depict the destruction of all that is?
I
would argue that it’s because when we stand on the brink of despair. Apocalypse
offers the possibility for the creation of all that might be.
The
word apocalypse means, “unveiling”. It is an unveiling of the violence, the
hatred, the cruelty, and the fear, that exist—that exist, regardless of whether
or not we want to see these things in the world.
What
the prophets are doing is unveiling the violence in the world—whether that
violence is spiritual, physical, emotional, political, religious—so that it can
be addressed. So that we can, through our actions, work towards peace and
liberation.
If you
were to go back to chapter 3 of Malachi, the prophet is castigating those who
have failed to set aside a portion of the harvest as an offering to God—an offering
that would have been used to feed the poor (Malachi 3:10).
Apocalypse
unveils injustices so that we can change course and be part of a new creation.
A new
creation that emerges from the hope that drives apocalyptic thinking.
Hope
and apocalypse?
Apocalyptic
literature can only be written out of hope. Hope that what has been unveiled
can be transformed.
Hope
that God’s love will prove more powerful than any human hate.
Hope
that death is not the end of the story.
If you
look at the last verses of Malachi, you see this most powerfully…
“I
will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the LORD
comes. He will turn the hearts of parents to their children and the hearts of
children to their parents, so that I will not come and strike the land with a
course.”
I will…I
will not leave you, evil will not prevail, you will dwell in mutual love and
affection. I will.
And,
this is the hope in which we dwell.
I will…
Which
brings us to the Gospel appointed for today.
Luke
wrote these words, recording them for a time and a place beyond his time and
place, to people who were scared. They were scared of the empire. They were
scared of persecution. They were scared that the world would never change.
And,
they wanted better. They longed for the in——breaking of God, and the
overturning of those structures they knew, through their experience, were
oppressive. For them, the coming of the messiah was not about heaven, it
was about the here and the now.
It was
about finding a new way forward because the present way had ceased to serve.
Next
Sunday, we observe St. Clement’s Feast Day. So we lose Christ the King Sunday
from the cycle of church year observances, which is unfortunate. It’s
unfortunate because we also lose the context for today’s readings. Readings
which are meant to set us up to analyze the brokenness of human systems in
order to welcome the reign of Christ as our true authority in heaven and on
earth.
Today’s
text sets us up for a political transformation—from a flawed human governance
to the governance of the sovereign Christ.
Further,
this text is meant to affirm the hope that this is not all we have and that
more and better will come to pass.
More
and better will come to pass. This is what the Gospel offers us as truth. And,
in this truth, Luke’s listeners would have found hope.
They
would have found hope, because they knew that the 1st Temple in
Jerusalem had fallen, and yet they continued. They found hope, because their
story is one of exile but but also of liberation. They found hope in knowing
that they were not passive victims but active participants in what would come
next. They found hope because they knew that death would become life, and the
cross the empire used to inspire fear would become a symbol that would proclaim
God’s love.
Again,
and again, and again, they found hope.
And,
our tradition has set us within the story of hope. When we gather here, we
proclaim in word and deed that what has been broken can and will be made whole.
So we
show up for hope. And, in doing so, in showing up for hope, for God’s hope, we become
the creation that God had first envisioned, we make known that we will not sit
in idleness but proclaim the way of Christ, the way of dignity and justice and
love, to a world that so often seems to have lost its way.
Which
is where we come to the epistles. The epistles, in many ways, were authored in
order to address communities that were losing their way. Communities in which
false teachings had wrought havoc, conflict had divided, and despair had taken
root.
As I
mentioned last week, the second letter addressed to the Christian community in
Thessalonica was written in part to address false teachings that the end had,
somehow, already come or was about to arrive.
This
teaching, meant that individuals in the community had given up taking
responsibility for the care of the community. They had ceased to follow the
example of their leaders--and instead of demonstrating mutual care and concern
had begun to exploit others in the community.
They
were living without hope, and without hope they were taking what they could out
of nihilistic greed and despair. If it’s all going to end anyway, why bother?
Does
anyone resonate with this, with this sense of despair that self-perpetuates the
evils of the world? If there is no hope, why would we try?
If
there is no hope, why not just smash, grab, and run?
Hear
the good news of the Gospel, "Beware that you are
not led astray; for many will come in my name and say, `I am he!' and, `The
time is near!' Do not go after them.”
Do not
go after those who would lead us into despair. Do not listen to the death
eaters or dementors of this world. Do not let go of the hope for the world to
come. Do not let go…because hope is our story and the abiding presence of God
is our truth.
So,
act out of hope. Act out of love. Act out of the teachings of the Christ who
would have us know that what is, is not all that will be.
And,
this, this my friends is where apocalypse and stewardship meet. In how actions
grounded in hope for the world that we’ve been promised. We offer what we have,
out of hope that in doing so, we will help bring into being the world we’ve
long been promised.
So,
while live in the world that is, we hope for the world to come, a world we help
to create--a world in which violence, death, hatred, and cruelty have reached
their limits, and the in-breaking love of God has utterly transformed us all.
Amen.
1 comment:
Thank you! This is certainly something to pray and act with.
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