What to Expect

PROPERS:          PROPER 28, YEAR C  

TEXT:                 LUKE 21:5-19; ISAIAH 65:17-25

PREACHED AT HOLY TRINITY, PENSACOLA, ON SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2019.

ONE SENTENCE:        The “Day of the Lord’ is likely to be highly                                                         individualistic, and is to be anticipated and not dreaded.      

                                    

            During my high school days, I worked at a local drug store in downtown Meridian – Post Office Drugs.  In one corner of the front section of that store, there were several racks of paper back books.  They were for sale at a cost of 75 cents each.

            The owner of the store, Mr. Hammill, told me that I could borrow any book that interested me, and that I need only return it when I had finished it.

            There was one book, I remember, that fascinated me.  It was “The Late, Great Planet Earth” by writer Hal Lindsey.  It had one particularly vivid scene, I recall, that included a massive earthquake striking California late one afternoon.  The next morning, it was discovered that the bulk of California had fallen off into the Pacific Ocean.

            It was my introduction to apocalyptic literature.  Much later, I learned that Hal Lindsey was a leader of the apocalyptic visionaries of the 1960s.

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            It seems that ever since Jesus walked this earth there have been recurrent apocalyptic movements.  They have typically not ended well.

            Let me define what I am talking about.  Apocalypse means “hidden things uncovered.”  But in its popular use, it refers to the “end times”, and the various visions of that epoch.

            People have sought to interpret the Book of Revelation in various ways, to discern insights into the moment when the end will come.  Likewise, many folks have read into the words of Jesus – for example, in today’s gospel lesson – hints of his return. That has led to many contorted theories – drawing on broad interpretations of single passages.

            Various times in history have given rise to mass expectations of the end times.  Apocalyptic expectation was rampant in the time of Jesus – and many of his followers expected his imminent return after his resurrection. Paul addresses those expectations in his letters.

            The Essenes, to whom I referred in my last sermon, had a cloistered community on the shores of the Dead Sea.  They anticipated the coming end and wrote about it in the scroll The War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness.  That scroll is now held in the Israeli Museum in Jerusalem.

            Apocalyptic expectations also peaked during the time of the Black Death, the Bubonic Plague.  The same expectations have arisen around the years 1000 and 2000 – with proponents thinking those dates are indicative of end times.

            The Six Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbors raised the expectations of many.  Televangelists John Hagee and Pat Robertson have promoted the theory that the end times will come in some manner associated with the victory of Israel over the forces of evil.

            Of course, you have folks like Jim Jones and his Jonestown followers that expected some sort of apocalypse, and the Branch Davidians and their leader David Koresh, who had the same expectations.

            Through that mix, add the various popular literature, like the Left Behind books, and you can see how the expectations have become popularized.

            There are all sorts of terms that are used to describe various approaches to the apocalypse.  Dispensationalism. Premillinianism.  Postmillianianism. Amillinianism. Take your pick.

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            Let me separate the wheat from the chaff.

            Jesus, in the gospel today, is talking about things to come in the near future.  The rebellion against Rome. The crushing defeat and destruction of the city of Jerusalem.  The fall of the sacred Temple. The persecution of his followers.  All of that was within his ability to envision.

            Many make these and other words more than they need to be.

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            Let me share two thoughts with you to illustrate what I am saying.

            When I was working as a curate at Trinity Church, Pass Christian, Mississippi, I was making my rounds at a local hospital.  I checked on one patient, and her room was empty.

            I went to the nurse’s station and asked, “Where is Mrs. Norris?”  The nurse told me, “She went home.”

            Soon I drove down to Trinity Church and walked in the office.  My supervisor was the rector, the Reverend Bronson Bryant, who is a dear friend to this day.  I told Bronson I had been by the hospital and that Mrs. Norris had gone home.

            “Oh, yes, she did!  All the way home!”  Meaning, of course, that she had died.

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            The second story is a bit of a personal confession.  I have shared with you the various eye-glazing terms that are used to describe philosophies of the apocalypse.

            I place myself and my understanding in a different school of thought – and it is that school of thought which informs my theology.  It is known as realized eschatology.  In other words, the Kingdom of God came in the life and person of Jesus and that his reign has continued since that time.  We glimpse it here and there, now and again – sometimes more fully than others.  But it is here.  We recognize that we are helpless to interpret things that we cannot know.

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            Each of us will be like Mrs. Norris – we will meet our end time and go home.  That is inevitable. We need not anticipate it with fear and trembling, or with visions of planes falling from the air.  

            The prophet Isaiah wrote of it so well 2,500 years ago, and we read his words as the first lesson today.

            Hear them again:

For I am about to create new heavens
and a new earth; 

the former things shall not be remembered
or come to mind. 

But be glad and rejoice forever
in what I am creating; 

for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight.

I will rejoice in Jerusalem,
and delight in my people; 

no more shall the sound of weeping be heard in it,
or the cry of distress.

Before they call I will answer,
while they are yet speaking I will hear. 

The wolf and the lamb shall feed together,
the lion shall eat straw like the ox; 
but the serpent-- its food shall be dust!

They shall not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.