"Where There is Despair, Hope"

“Where there is despair, Hope” (due to inclement weather on 12/16, this sermon was held over until 12/30)

John the Baptist appears in our memories as the wild firebrand out in the desert, railing against society and culture. His message of repentance stirs the heart and turns the indifferent, and he baptizes the multitudes, including Jesus. John becomes the preacher’s best friend, providing opportunities to roar in the pulpit, to toss around words like “repent!” Earlier this week, I heard of a preacher elsewhere in Vermont who cut a hole in a burlap sack (i.e. a “gunny sack” as they say back home) and last Sunday preached his sermon on John the Baptist while wearing the sack. (And for all these years, I thought the only use for burlap at church was for the church picnic sack race….)

This scene with John in jail, though, it is a different picture altogether. Last week, John the Baptist roars in the desert. A week later, he laments from a prison cell. The commanding voice that cried out in the desert is now down to a despondent whisper: “Are you the one, or should we await another?”

We tend to remember John’s ministry and proclamation, but less remembered is John’s fate thereafter. After taking the center stage, John winds up in prison for speaking against the court of Herod, and there he languishes in Matthew’s gospel until much later, nearly forgotten by the reader until this scene of despair. When I read Matthew’s gospel, I admit that I find this to be a haunting scene: the sunburned John now gaunt from little food and water, condemned to the misery and ignominy of “the system”.

It reminds me of an old iron padlock that I saw at a display at an American Baptist biennial held in Richmond, Virginia, in the summer of 2005. This padlock belonged to a Virginia Baptist historical society, part of an archive of mementos from the Baptists of the early years of our nation. The padlock was part of a prison cell door where religious dissenters found themselves incarcerated, including a number of prominent names familiar from history texts about early Baptist history. The legacy of those Baptists is something we take for granted. We live in a multi-faith nation where no one religion is to be favored, and indeed, Americans have the right to practice religious faith (or not to do so) with freedom. Nonetheless, the padlock lying under the glass, rusted from age, still has an ominous look to it, a reminder of a time when there was no thought of hope.

John believed with all his heart that there was a Messiah on the way. Like many in Jesus’ day, the belief that Messiah was coming was a point of hope as well as ongoing frustration. Persons claiming the title would crop up from time to time, especially in the midst of political strife. The messiah would be the one to bring peace and stability and great hope to the faithful.

“Are you the one, or should we await another?” is unsettling to read, as John moves from zeal to anguish, his fervor broken by the Herodian court tossing him aside as a criminal. Indeed, the story of Jesus has a similar arc: his ministry ends as his life is deemed forfeit by the Temple establishment and the local leadership of the Roman Empire. In Matthew’s gospel, the despair of John in prison is similar to that of Peter and the other disciples after they have fled their Master’s side: “Was he the one, or should we await another?” is the question crossing their minds as they flee and hide and watch the crucifixion from far away.

It is odd to hear this story on the third Sunday of Advent. Why did the scholars who designed the lectionary, the cycle of scripture readings, suggest this text as we get closer to Christmas? It seems quite the downer in the midst of a Sunday of Advent traditionally set aside to express the joy of this Advent season. And here we are being confronted with the sad scene of a forlorn prophet and a reminder that death is just around the corner for “the good guys”.

This text appears in the readings for this season of Advent because it tells us in the midst of the chaotic and seemingly unfair world that there is indeed hope. The gospel of Matthew is written to people living in the midst of a violent time, when the Roman Empire proclaimed peace but lived by the sword, when a developing religious group called “Christians” found themselves increasingly unwelcome. The gospel of Matthew is set in the midst of a world that seems all too familiar to its first century listeners, but Matthew reminds us that there is a different ending to the story: the resurrection of Christ. Indeed, this is the one watched and prayed for by the faithful. You read the story of John the Baptist in prison with due sobriety, but you are also called to read Jesus’ response as the best word you can hope for in this life. The destruction of the world and all of its shadowy sinfulness is transformed by the Christ, moving in the power of the Spirit, out in the midst of this broken world, making all things well.

Another prison padlock comes to mind. Again, a story of Baptists figures in the story of the padlock. Earlier this year, the congregation experienced some training with a denominational staff member named Ron Carlson. Ron’s father-in-law is Bozhidar Igov, a Baptist minister from Bulgaria. Bozhidar grew up under the repression of Communist rule, and it was a dangerous time to live as a Christian, especially as a minister, in his home country. As communism gave way in Bulgaria, the Baptists and other religious folk found themselves enjoying increasing religious freedom. Bozhidar recounts his experiences in a self-published book featuring a photograph of a padlock. Discarded on the ground, left to rust, the padlock has a flower growing up through it. In the midst of the rubble of a collapsed regime, there is this wonderful symbol of new life.

“Go and tell John what you hear and see,” Jesus says to John’s disciples. “The blind see, the lame walk, lepers are clean, the deaf hear, the dead raised, the poor have good news.” In the midst of this world of belligerent despots and the self-serving “powers that be” of religion and Empire, we are invited to see the real power at work, one that lives not by sword or influence. It is another sort of power altogether, imaged in the New Testament like that of a servant, a lamb, and a word, imagery less expected and therefore more provocative. A servant who rules, a lamb who is powerful, and a Word that is God made flesh. What a beautiful contrast to what we tend to think “power” looks like. And what an alternative way of expressing the power of the universe: to heal those who are marginalized, forgotten, and considered “less than”.

For many years, the Sojourners community of Washington, DC, publishes its December magazine issue with a lead story about someone who represents the life Christ calls us to lead. You might be familiar with the practice of TIME magazine declaring “Person of the Year” (previously, “Man of the Year”, but then they got with the times…). But Sojourners magazine chooses folks that are not necessarily the type that win political office or wield great affluence or influence. They pick people who tend to be the odd folks working off in the margins of society: serving the needy, building peace, advocating for those who have no other help. Sojourners magazine started this practice back in their early days (the 1970s) by selecting St. Francis of Assisi. They figured that if there was anyone found in the history of the Church whom embodies the way of Christ, it was St. Francis.

Francis lived in a time when the church was in need of reformation. The son of a rich family, Francis discovered in the call of Christ to take a vow of poverty. Living simply, Francis wove together a different sort of life: caring for all, including all Creation; tending those in need; embracing even lepers to let them know of God’s love. Francis was often called a holy fool; one given over to odd things, yet in the midst of such a life, others could see the Christ in his work and person. An odd man living an odd message, often contrary to what the world thought or said was “the way things are”, Francis called us to look not to himself but to the Christ. In the language of St. Francis’ memorable prayer, we are reminded, “where there is despair”, hope can be sown and cultivated there as well. That is part of our calling as Christians: to be sowers of hope in a despairing world.

In the journey of faith, traveled up the steep hill that we call life, we can often only see in part. Nonetheless, in hearing the story of the gospel and looking to the stories of the church throughout the centuries (or even the story unfolding right now in our own day), we are reminded that we also have the ability to believe that more is possible, even more than we see. Vincent Harding writes,

• Living in faith is knowing that even though our little work, our little seed, our little brick may not make the whole thing, the whole thing exists in the mind of God, and that whether or not we are there to see the whole thing is not the most important matter. The most important thing is whether we have entered the process. (quoted in Jim Wallis/Joyce Hollyday, eds., Cloud of Witnesses. Orbis, 1991, p. xvi)

From the Shadows into New Life

From the Shadows into New Life

The Gospel of Luke tells the most familiar sounding Nativity story: shepherds, angels, no room in the inn, birth in a manger, and even the swaddling clothes. In the midst of this story, I note that Luke uses a Greek word that is used very little in the New Testament. Perilampo is a word that means “to shine about” or to surround with light. It is an intense word that we might otherwise overlook as we read the story of Luke’s nativity. I think there’s something significant that this one little word adds to the story.

The beginning of the Nativity story sounds fairly grim and bleak. The trudging towards Bethlehem with Mary heavy with child, the clamor of the town dealing with more people than usual, the frustration of no other place to sleep, let alone have a baby, is a stable fit for animals, but certainly not a newborn child. To a reader unaware of the gospel’s full message, the story sounds more like April 15^th than December 25^th at this point! At first glance, Mary and Joseph are poor folks, just cogs in the wheels of the world, just sent off to Bethlehem to be taxed by the Roman empire.

Then the scene switches to the nearby fields, just outside of town. A group of shepherds huddle around the weak campfire, praying that the fire would keep them warm and their sheep would stay fast asleep. Nothing worse that trying to chase after a sheep in the middle of the night! Shepherds were just like the rest of the story so far, folks who had no great means in the world, and indeed, were not considered to be in a profession of much repute or respect.

And then an angel appears and announces the birth of a Savior.

Now, at this point, those of us who are familiar with the story of Luke keep reading, but there’s that little word: perilampo. Luke uses this word only one other place: over in the Book of Acts (the “sequel” to the gospel of Luke) when Saul, the great persecutor of the early Christian movement encounters a vision of the risen Christ while traveling to Damascus.

The word is important because it’s not just a message: it’s an intense moment when the glory of the heavens above brushes the grim reality of our world down below. Perilampo is a word that speaks to the all-suffusing, “night becomes day” effect of this angelic visitation. The shepherds look up from the fires, and they are justifiably terrified, but then comes that word that only the holy can truly give: “Fear not!”

The proclamation of Christ’s birth is a contrary word to the Empire that taxes even its poorest citizens. The proclamation resounds that God provides, even in the midst of a story that starts off in the most immodest way imaginable, as two young parents-to-be discover closed doors and little sympathy. The proclamation is given to those who are otherwise ignored by those who tread the halls of the powerful and mighty. “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom God favors!”

We learn in the midst of an old familiar story the words that our world still longs to hear, all these generations later. We live in a world shaped by broken dreams, graceless situations, and painful experience, personal and societal alike. In the midst of this Nativity story, we are offered a different view of the world, one where heaven comes down to sing praises of a God who dares to enter into the midst of this shadowed world and bring the light known as Jesus, Lord and Savior, incarnate, vulnerable, and compassionate.

From the poetry of John Milton, who wrote these lines in 1629 in his “On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity”:

This is the month, and this the happy morn

Wherein the Son of Heav'n's eternal King,

Of wedded maid, and virgin mother born,

Our great redemption from above did bring;

For so the holy sages once did sing

That he our deadly forfeit should release,

And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.

That glorious form, that light unsufferable,

And that far-beaming blaze of majesty

Wherewith he wont at Heav'n's high council-table

To sit the midst of trinal unity,

He laid aside; and here with us to be,

Forsook the courts of everlasting day,

And chose with us a [gloom’d] house of mortal clay.

John Milton (Selected Poems, Penguin 2007)

Odd Dreams, Imperial Delusions, & the Wee Emmanuel

Odd Dreams, Imperial Delusion, and the Wee Emmanuel

It’s an odd scene, isn’t it? This passage from Matthew does not ring much of a bell. At this time of year, we usually think of shepherds watching their flocks by night, angels singing up in the heavens above, and Mary and Joseph on their way to Bethlehem, only to discover an inn with a “no vacancy” sign. All that is over in Luke’s gospel, which will be in the Christmas Eve service. Instead, this morning, we encounter quite a little scandal brewing.

Matthew tells of Joseph, the betrothed of Mary, pacing the floor, wondering how best to get out of a very difficult situation. You have to feel a little tinge of sympathy for Joseph. After all, he is a man being overwhelmed with more than he knows how to handle. Instead of pacing the floor back and forth like an expectant father, Joseph has found out there’s a baby on the way, and he knows that he is not the father!
It might sound like the plot of a soap opera, but really, the story is rife with drama. What will Joseph do? He knows that it’s only a matter of time before the pregnancy is obvious, and it is unsettling to know what might happen next. The laws of the day held some unsettling options, and Joseph is seeking the most merciful way around what might happen. Just let Mary go, despite all the heartache it would cause, she would be better off.

Poor Joseph! Joseph is barely in the gospel, not one word about him is given elsewhere. Over in Luke’s gospel, it is Mary who takes the lead, singing a beautiful song in celebration of this promised birth. And Joseph? In Luke’s gospel, he just steers the donkey towards Bethlehem. In Matthew, he appears at the beginning, the earnest fellow who works hard and tries to do what is best, and singing the blues from all the consternation. He reminds me of Amos, a character played by John C. Reilly in the big screen version of the musical Chicago. Amos is a blue-collar average joe, who finds himself feeling near invisible in the midst of a scandal involving his girlfriend Roxie. He sings that he is like cellophane. Amos sings, “Mr. Cellophane, Mr. Cellophane/no one knows my name, Mr. Cellophane/You can look right through me/talk right to me/never know I’m there.” After the first two chapters, Joseph just seems to fade away in the narrative.

The story of Jesus’ origins is not just about Mary and Joseph, but it is important to know who Jesus’ ancestors were. The gospel starts off with the genealogy of Jesus, that long list of begats and begots. In the midst of that litany of names, Matthew unfurls a long list of the faithful, those who are the ancestors of Jesus. In the midst of those generations before, you encounter the names of those who overcame great adversity and many trials, faithful in times of fear, resolute in times of anxiety. These people may not have thought they lived exemplary lives (indeed, a few of them might strike you as odd choices to be part of God’s grand plan). But here they are in the opening of Matthew. You might think these names are just “begats” and “begots” of a long list of an otherwise dry passage of scripture, but once you get to know these persons of the faith, oh my!

Earlier this week, I learned of the death of a retired minister back in Kansas. He was not a person who really sought out attention, thus he was one of those folks that you read the obituary after their passing and feel quite astonished at what is recounted. His name was Milan Lambertson, and he served churches around the Midwest, including one that I wound up serving decades later. Milan was a gentle fellow, the type of person not given to drawing attention to himself. Nonetheless, Milan was remembered in his memorial notice as “steadfastly devoted to issues of world peace, Christian missions, feeding and clothing the poor, and good government.” You couldn’t ask for a more solid person of faith, let alone a better minister. Some folks, though, would have not paid much attention to this silent, graceful figure. If they read his memorial, though, they would have been impressed by his life’s work, might have even wished they knew him.

Take another look at Matthew’s early chapters, and you will spot in the birth narratives another nervous doubter. This man, however, would take umbrage with your calling him a doubter. Indeed, he might even take your head for such talk!

Herod the king lurks around the gospel of Matthew, a bit like one of the thugs on The Sopranos. He is in control only because he will stop at nothing to keep his control. You read Matthew’s gospel, and you realize that even as we try to gloss over with the more family friendly fare of the Magi following the star, this Nativity story is not rated “G”. Herod uses the Magi (“wise men”) to track down the prophesied child so he can eliminate the competition to the title of king. The story of Jesus’ birth as told by Matthew briefly becomes “an escape film” as the Holy Family has to lie low in Egypt lest Herod catches up with them. (And even upon returning after this Herod dies, Joseph makes the decision to move to another town altogether, Nazareth, as Herod’s son is on the throne, and Archeleaus, “Herod, Jr”, isn’t much of an improvement….)

As you read these early chapters of Matthew, Herod’s bloodthirsty paranoia starkly contrasts the quiet despair of Joseph wondering what to do. Why the emphasis on such worry? Well, it made sense to those first disciples who read Matthew’s gospel. The gospel of Matthew was written sometime after the year 70 CE, when Roman forces sacked Jerusalem and the Temple was destroyed. The disciples who listened to Matthew’s gospel knew great fear as they lived in uncertain times. The stories of Joseph’s dreams and Herod’s destruction symbolize the world that the early Christians lived in. You read Joseph’s story, and you learn of what God is doing in the world, working steadfastly, generation after generation. The story of Herod reminds us of the type of world that we know all too well with its rulers bent on achieving their own agendas and the violence and senseless destruction that such rule brings about. Which story is the one that will win the day?

Joseph finally gets tired, and he takes a nap. In the middle of his dreams, an angel comes to him and gives him an assuring word. You might think this a bit fanciful, but remember the grand tradition of dreamers in the Bible, including that one back in Genesis named Joseph, who in the midst of frustration and adversity was able to see great hope in the middle of his dreams.

“Call him Jesus”, the angel tells Joseph. Jesus, the one who will save his people from their sins, that name is a remarkable name to hear in the midst of the turmoil of Joseph’s worry and Herod’s plotting. This child is sent to bring hope in the midst of difficulty and to deliver the world from its woe. Jesus is the name that enlightens Joseph to God at work just as surely as it would confuse Herod, who represents the sinful world at its worst. Those who read Matthew’s gospel encounter in the ministry of Jesus abundant invitations to turn away from the destructive habits of society and self, to grow in love of God and neighbor, and to live as a citizen not of Empire but the reign of heaven.

And then the Christmas carol begins to resound in my head, “He rules the world with truth and grace and makes the nations prove the glories of His righteousness and wonders of His love”. This Nativity story of Matthew offers us a glimpse of what God intends, what God has been working towards in the history of Israel. Indeed, the angel recalls the prophet Isaiah, who prophesied of the One to come as “Emmanuel”, a name that means “God with us.”

We look at that little baby nestled in the cradle, and I ask you, can you wonder a bit at the Nativity stories of Jesus? Matthew’s gospel invites us into a faith that believes that God is not absent or aloof in the heavens above. Our belief is that God indeed is with us, in the life of Jesus, who is born like us, lives fully, and yes, even experiences death upon the cross. And through the resurrection, Christ beckons us to start living a different life, one modeled by Joseph, who tried to live a righteous life, perhaps worried a bit too much for his own good, but when awakened after a night of dreaming of God at work in the world, heads down to his carpentry shop and starts singing a little tune, fashioning a cradle big enough to hold the hope of the world. AMEN.

A Cranky Baptist Christmas Carol (Matthew 3:1-12)

A Cranky Baptist Christmas Carol    Matthew 3:1-12

I have yet to find John the Baptist in any nativity set, but I think he should be there. John the Baptist might strike you as an odd choice: this tall fellow with a wild shock of hair, wind-swept yet gritty from being in desert isolation for so long. He wears ragged clothes and smells slightly of honey and locust, which incidentally is NOT a lotion on sale at Bath & Body Works this season. (Sorry, ladies!) Sort of that weird relative you sort of look like from a late 19^th-century family photograph, this person who thinks he is smiling but looks about as happy as a fundamentalist preacher…caught in a bear trap! John the Baptist might be the best person for your living room manger set. One look at him, and the kids will never go near the Christmas tree!

John is not part of the Nativity narrative of Matthew, but he would be honored to be there. He would lean over the side of the manger, lurking in the shadows (perhaps a bit annoyed by the cheery angels hovering above), and simply look defiantly at you while practically contorting his body to make sure that you saw exactly where he was pointing: at that little baby in the manger.

For those who need this side note, John the Baptist was not the first “Baptist”. Indeed, we started as a movement in the 16^th-century, but we still find John the Baptist (“the Baptizer”) a figure within the New Testament with whom we would like to demonstrate our New Testament roots as a movement. We are a tradition that affirms baptism by immersion, our history of preaching has been associated with the call for repentance and the denouncing of sin, and we have provided more than a few cranky types in our days.

John speaks a word that we do not hear much during the bustle of the Christmas shopping season: repent! John enters, singing his contrary tune. Offer him a cup of eggnog at the office Christmas party, and he might call you a brood of vipers. John gatecrashes Advent each year as a powerful reminder of the self-examination that one is to undertake if one wishes to experience this season not as “the holidays” but rather as “holy days”. “Repent!” is a necessary word for those journeying toward Bethlehem.

In the Bible, repentance “involves a willingness to turn one’s life around in the sense of a complete reorientation.” (Luke Timothy Johnson, Matthew: Sacra Pagina, p. 51) The call to repentance is to look at your life, admit your sins, allowing that part of yourself that feels broken to discover an otherwise elusive sense of forgiveness and grace. At the same time, to repent is more than feeling like change has taken place. The repentant goes forth and demonstrates a radical change in one’s life. Indeed, to repent is not just to confess your sins. There is something deeper than confession at work here. Carl Daw’s hymn “Wild and Lone the Prophet’s Voice” draws us to the core of John’s teaching. I love his line “bear the fruit repentance sows: lives of truth, justice, and love”. One has not repented until one’s life reflects the reign of heaven (Matthew’s unique twist on the more familiar phrase “Kingdom of God”).

Alas, truth, justice, and love are in short supply when our hearts, minds, and souls skew toward serving our own ends or acquiescing to the dominative forces of the day. John’s crowds were comprised of those who had realized that there was something amiss in the religion and politics of their day. They heard in John’s preaching something that beckoned them to see further than their heart’s desire or myopic trust in or resignation to the socio-economic and spiritual “givens” of their day. “A complete reorientation” is exactly what it says. You do not see, think, or live in quite the same way again.

If we were to slip back a century ago, we would find a certain Baptist just gaining prominence as well as controversy. Walter Rauschenbusch taught at one of our American Baptist seminaries, now known as Colgate/Rochester/Crozer Divinity School. Indeed, the name of Rauschenbusch is synonymous with CRCDS, but about a century ago, he was a fellow who thought he might lose his seminary post for writing a book.

Rauschenbusch was a restless soul, a Baptist preacher and theologian who increasingly desired a different sort of church. He became known as the father of the Social Gospel movement, which wed together the concern for the social good with the gospel message. In 1907, he wrote Christianity and the Social Crisis, a book whose message still resounds today. A bit of his writing dealt with those in the Church who argued that the minister did not have any business commenting on social issues. He writes,

If it is religious to advocate rebuilding a church, why is it non-religious to advocate tearing down and rebuilding slum districts? If it is religious to encourage the church to recarpet the aisles and cushion the seats for the feet and backs of worshippers, why is it non-religious to speak of playgrounds for young feet and old-age pensions for aged? (Christianity and the Social Crisis, p. 365)

In a speech celebrating the centennial of Christianity and the Social Crisis’ publication, historian Gary Dorrien writes,

The greatest apostle of [the social gospel], Rauschenbusch did not rest on moral idealism alone; he had an answer to the apocalyptic thesis, though for decades he and the social gospel were ridiculed for holding out; his systematic theology had seven chapters on sin and what he called the kingdom of evil; and he preached the coming commonwealth of God with unparalleled brilliance and inspiration. (Christian Century, November 27, 2007)

I heard a bit of John the Baptist’s message coming through this voice of the past. It is near maddening, however, to realize that Rauschenbusch’s writings still criticize the church well. Baptists tend to be so confused nowadays. You have one batch grooming candidates whom promise political dividends to the faithful once elected. You have other Baptists just resigned to decline and stagnation, living in church buildings that have grand edifices but very little relevance to the mission potential of their neighborhood. Just like John the Baptist, Rauschenbusch would not be terribly well received, warning against setting kingdoms on earth or the temptation to keep the voice of the church from carrying too far beyond the sanctuary doors.

Right after reading Dorrien’s speech on Rauschenbusch, I read an interview printed in the same magazine. Will Campbell is an elderly Baptist minister whose career as a writer, activist, and commentator has led him on some interesting journeys. He fought for civil rights in the 1960s, found himself serving as a chaplain to country music legends who lived hard yet found themselves on the long, strange journey of faith eventually. He even wrote a book once about a Baptist who refused to be baptized until he could find a church that was trying to live up to the radical nature of their Anabaptist roots.

The interviewer said, “There’s a rumor that you don’t go to church.” And Campbell replies, “Well, I’m in church right now: We’re talking about the faith. We’re remembering what God in Christ has done. We’re having church. Now if you are asking me whether or not I am active in the steeples at 11 on a Sunday morning, I can’t say that I am” (Christian Century, November 27, 2007). Campbell finds that “the steeples” oftentimes become more about institutional survival than gospel relevance. Campbell’s ministry has been sometimes hindered and hassled by those who considered themselves “every Sunday” churchgoers, who nonetheless kept to deeply exclusionary practices. Campbell occupies a wilderness pulpit, not caught up in keeping up with appearances or social graces. Campbell’s acerbic humor deflects a life-long discontent with a church complacent, and those who listen to him long enough soon realize they have some repenting to do.

John the Baptist wandered the edges of society, culture, and religion, not because he was eccentric or chased out to the edges. He wandered so that others might follow him away from the seduction of complacency and the myopia of status quo. John taught these persons that there was another sort of kingdom or empire of whose values they should be living. He taught that this world would be just be firewood kindling in comparison to the righteousness that the coming Messiah would bring. And he lingers there in the Advent readings, an odd note in the midst of the consumerism image of Christmas being about gifts and trees. The troublesome part is not what he says to us. It is whether or not we will listen.

Liberating Eschatology (Sermon for Advent 1)

Liberating Eschatology   (Matthew 24:36-44)

When you looked at the bulletin this morning, perhaps there was an unfamiliar word in the sermon title printed there in the worship order: “eschatology”. It is a theological term, a word that helps define the faith. The “…ology” part is easy enough, meaning “the study of”, but then there is that first part “eschat...” that we have to address. Oddly enough, “eschatology” is better translated as “the study of the End”. The early Church had a variety of views on what would happen, and quite honestly, many of the New Testament writers presume that “the End” would happen very soon, that is, in their lifetime, or soon enough thereafter. Two millennia later, we are around, looking at these texts and wondering how to “read” them appropriately.

In the hands of some Christians over the centuries, to speak of the End has become the seedbed for some increasingly bizarre theories about what will happen. Over the centuries, stories of destruction, desolation, and the Devil have framed a way of belief for some Christians. Other Christians look at these texts and consider them less relevant, perhaps the “odd texts” that we skip over as we read our Bibles. Should the church bother with “eschatology”?

I suggest that we must talk of our beliefs about “the End”, but we must recognize that with all matters of interpretation and belief, we exercise a degree of humility. There have been too many instances (past and present) of excessive interpretation and malformed belief, but to say that our faith can be fine without talk of “the End” is to do even more harm to one’s faith and practice. This morning, let me help “liberate” eschatology a bit so we might hear the Gospel text (and others like it) with due reverence.

Let me offer two stories along the way with some commentary:

A few years ago, I was standing in line to check out at one of those warehouse stores like BJ’s. Just behind me, I heard a young woman read aloud the name of a book she picked up. It was the latest volume of the Left Behind books, a series of books about the apocalyptic end and the return of Christ. Ever the curious sort, I turned around slightly to see what she would do next. She read a little bit of the dust jacket’s description of the book, and she wrinkled up her nose a bit, “I don’t need that scary stuff!” She tossed it back where she found it: upon a pile of the same book, five feet high, sitting on one of those heavy wooden palates that require a forklift to move them. I thought, “Apparently, some folks do need that scary stuff”.

My observation is this: anxious times often produce anxious eschatology. The Left Behind series began publication in the years leading up to the millennium. The books reflect a certain take on eschatology, but an undercurrent of fear informs the writers, their plot reflecting a belief that something ominous is coming. I am skeptical of eschatology derived out of a place of deep fear, as such interpretations have a degree of resignation creeping in. “What good is the future?” asked a friend who holds this sort of belief. “It will be all over soon!” Thus, faith becomes an affair of watching and waiting, but with an edge of disregard for much of anything in the here and now. It can be understandable that such a view can be attractive, especially to persons for whom the suffering and brokenness of this world seems to be pervasive, or when world events are reaching critical (or that is your perception). Nonetheless, fear-suffused belief does not ultimately lead in a good direction.

So, what should we do if we wish to claim eschatology as part of our belief but not freight it with the wrong baggage?

Another story to help us along the way:

Once, I discovered a store with a large collection of bumper stickers for sale. While I never use them, I enjoy reading them. The box held a few political slogans here (your choice of red state or blue state politics to skewer), a few stickers protesting or supporting the War in Iraq there, and a few promoting just about every social cause imaginable. (In other words, just about everything you can read walking up Main Street in Bennington and just looking at the cars parked along the street.) In the back of the box of bumper stickers were the ones with religious themes, including one that read: “JESUS IS COMING! LOOK BUSY!”

Eschatology is more rightly concerned with the return of Christ and the drawing to a close of this present age. Rather than trading upon the edge of these texts (especially those of Revelation with its terrible battles), the better path is to go back and question the friend who said, “What good is the future?” A good response is to say, “The future is in God’s hands. What more could we want?”

However, the bumper sticker’s sarcasm highlights the question that goes without asking when people speak of eschatology. Rather than keep up appearances (“look busy!”), eschatology beckons to the Christian believer to take up a way of discipleship that is expectant as well as tethered down to the ground as the body of believers called Church, Christ’s visible reminder of Christ’s reign being at hand. We are called to a faith that says, “Jesus is coming! Live faithfully!”

In this passage from Matthew 24, if you read through the lens provided by AM radio preachers, you see a passage about “the Rapture”, a New Testament idea that the faithful will be taken up into God’s embrace, which has been laden with a lot of modern era interpretation. If you read this text through the lens of fear or anxiety, you miss what Jesus is really saying. Jesus affirms that the “Father” alone knows when the End shall come. Thus, live as if it will come suddenly, but do not try to ask questions or find answers about these matters. Theologian Stanley Hauerwas observes, “Jesus tells [his disciples] how they must learn to wait in this time between the times” (Matthew: Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible, Brazos Press, 2006, p. 204).

The friend who said, “What good is the future? It will be all over soon!” misses the invitation to be a disciple living fully in the way of discipleship. To hope for God’s end is part of faith, to wait expectantly is part of faith, but to give up or grow idle or withdrawn is a distortion of faith. It is as misfortunate as the people who spend their time feverishly looking for “the End Times” at hand in the latest headlines of the New York Times or the latest chapter in a book that predicts this political movement or incident is the lynchpin of the doom about to unfold. Hauerwas says,

Jesus is trying to help the disciples understand how they must live when their questions should not have been asked and cannot be answered. Or put differently, Jesus is trying to help the disciples live when his life must shape any questions to be asked. (Hauerwas, Matthew, p. 204)

The reason that such a text as Matthew 24 turns up at the forefront of Advent is to keep us in perspective. The mall parking lot is a zoo of honking cars. The politicians fixate more on the 2008 primaries than they do enacting policies to end global challenges like poverty, hunger, and the AIDS pandemic. You and I deal with the various types of baggage that this holiday season (or perhaps just this week alone) seems to have piled on our backs. In the midst of the cacophony of life as we know it, we are summoned to discipleship by the Son of Man, whose very appearance shall be the end of what we know and fear and bring about the peace that eludes us, even in our modern delusion of such things being solved by policies, superior military strength, and power.

We abide by Christ’s call to live the life of faith well, shaped by a belief that Jesus is indeed Lord of our lives. We are called to humility that God alone knows when these things shall draw to a close. We live in trust and abundant hope that when this day comes to pass, we will be found in the midst of the work of Christ, faithful ‘til the End.