Luke 21:5-19(36)

 "Teacher, when will this be ... ?" (21:7)

And the first thing Jesus says is telling us not to be misled. (21:8) In response, Jesus doesn't go into a discussion about the sign of the end. He does that next, but first, he tells his disciples not to be led astray. It is only after warning us not to be misled that Jesus speaks a little about the signs. (21:9-11; 25-28) And notice that when he does speak of the end how very general these signs are. Despite the tendency for some to equate a conflict or natural disaster with the end, Jesus makes it difficult to correlate events in history and the end by speaking in general terms of the end. But then he says,

"But before all this occurs... "

And he mentions two sets of occurrences to occur before the end, that is, they are not signs of the end. The first is persecution. (21:12-19) By the time of Luke, this has/is happening. And the other is the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans. (21:20. Compare Mark 13:14) Again, by the time of Luke this is most likely in the past. So Jesus is explicitly separating out these dateable events (persecution and siege) from the more generalised signs earlier mentioned. That these events have taken place strengthens the prophetic credentials of Jesus. But it also gives us an added warning against too easily correlating earth-shattering events in history, in our society, or in our lives with 'the end'. 

So what does Jesus recommend instead of being led astray? 
Do not be terrified … (21:9)
By your endurance, you will gain your souls… (21:19)
Do not let your hearts be weighed down with the worries of this life … (21:34)
Be alert at all times … (21:36)
Praying … (21:36)

In Jesus we see that God is not a monster of our imaginations

When bad things happen it is easy to say something like, "What did I do to deserve this?" Probably nothing in the sense of the question above. God isn't punishing us when bad things happen. Of course, if we play with fire we get burnt, that is true. But that is not the same as saying that God is the author when bad things happen. This is so important. 'The gods' did bad things, just read Greek mythology! God does not. God dies on a cross for us, we did the crucifying, God did the rising. On the cross God judges human sin by being a victim of sin and raising the innocent Jesus from the dead. The risen Jesus sends out his disciples to preach repentance and forgiveness of sins, not vengeance. It would be wildly inconsistent for the Father of the Lord Jesus to then bring disaster down on our heads. 

People can also have a tendency to misinterpret history in a similar way. An earthquake is not God's punishment. We shouldn't impute to God the disaster that follows the earthquake. People seem to have been (and still are) infatuated with end-of-the-world scenarios. Whether divinely inspired or human-induced, people continue to guess the meaning of events and interpret them as coming from a malevolent or angry god (even secularised people have their own versions of this). In the past people have been obsessed with dating 'the end', and dates still figure prominently in all kinds of secular future dooms. Jesus tells us not to misinterpret the events of history. He knew people would say all kinds of things in his name, and make all kinds of claims. So he explicitly says, don't be fooled by false messiahs, and don't see God as the author of disasters. Disasters, whether human-inspired or not, will come, but don't make God out to be a monster. (See Mark 13:1-8) 

The event to correctly interpret is Jesus, his birth, ministry, death, and resurrection. God's response to suffering, evil, and death is not to make more of it. God’s response is to overcome suffering, evil, and death by surrendering to its power. Jesus, born in a stable, crucified and raised, interprets our history. We are loved, and in Christ our future is secure, even if it doesn't feel that way at times.

Do Not Weary Doing What is Right

Humans have a fascination – moth to flame like – with the end of the world. Think of the end of the world movies of the last twenty years or so. The end comes (or almost comes) by meteor, zombies, aliens, ecological breakdown, nuclear war, or biological pestilence. And this fascination is not a modern fascination alone. It has has been like this for thousands of years. And we have real, live apocalyptists doing their 'thing' even now through all manner of cults, messianic movements, political groups, etc. The Bolsheviks and Nazis were apocalyptic, secular cults. ISIS is their contemporary religious clone.

End-time fascination isn't restricted to the right of politics either. On the day of the US election I was watching FB and as the news came in that Donnie Trump was going to win the election FB was overwhelmed with 'the end of western civilisation if not the world' type foreboding and hand wringing from the progressive green/left. 

In the ancient world it was God who would bring the end through violence. That is one of the hallmarks of religious apocalyptic. But in today’s Gospel reading, which sounds apocalyptic because of the violence, the discourse of Jesus is shorn of its divine violence. It is human violence that Jesus is narrating. Terrifying as it is, he does not counsel joining a survivalist group. Instead, it sounds more like his disciples should keep on doing what he has already told them to do. Witness to Christ himself.

This is confirmed in our NT reading from 2Thessalonians. Those mentioned in the text as not working are likely to have given up the ordinary routines of life because they thought that Jesus was about to return and the End was coming. Paul admonishes them to return to their usual practices. And to the whole community he says that they should not weary in doing what is right. Everyday, even if in our imaginations it seems catastrophe beckons. 

Now, I Know We Don't Like Black and White, But ...

We are rightly suspicious of black and white judgmentalism. This is one of the features of the Book of Revelation that is a bit hard to take. But let's not be too hasty. People who end up at the upper extreme of the black index don't begin there. They start way back somewhere else on the continuum. And they steadily head that way over time. Sin (or virtue) is, after all a habit, and we make ourselves into the people we are through our habits. The black and white of apocalyptic is, at the very least, warning us about the decisions we make today. (Again, part of the helpful urgency embedded in the apocalyptic form.) Do this (or not do it), and the same the next time, and so on, and who will you become? The extremes of human failure often depicted in apocalyptic might appear to be a long way from where we think we stand but, according to apocalyptic, perhaps not so improbable as we would like tothink.

Jesus, the Source of Salvation

Now, this is perhaps going to sound a little underwhelming, but Jesus is meant to be the source of salvation. "For God has destined us not for wrath but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ." (1Thess 5:9) The logical obverse of this is the possibility of 'wrath', but Christianity does not present salvation and 'wrath' as two equal pathways, one of which must be chosen when you get to the fork in the road. Christianity's hope is that all will be saved. (Rom 5:12-21; 1Tim 2:4) And if we think of this in terms of 'the fork in the road', the two possibilities are not equally weighted. Jesus Christ makes the path to salvation heavily weighted in our favour. The superabundance of God's love in Christ overshadows the estrangement of creation. Could God even save me? Yes, in Christ, even me. (This is the point to start reflection upon sin and salvation, and the possibility of either.) Christ forgave sinners, and, as he pointed out, all sin. (John 8:1-11)

However, this is our hope. It is not a tenet of belief. There is just too much in Scripture (much of it straight from Jesus) and the experience of our own perversity that must leave open the possibility of damnation. For those who pay lip service to Christianity's hope of universal salvation while emphasizing judgment and 'wrath', the shock of the Jesus who calls sinners as disciples (Lk 5:27-28), ate with them (Lk 5:29-31), forgave them (Lk 7:36-50), and told parables about them (Lk 15), needs to sink into the bones once again. And by this I mean deep into ourselves, to know our perversity and the grace that heals, and from there reacquaint ourselves with grace. The superabundance of grace. For those who have forgotten that there remains a fork in the road, it is important to remember Bonhoeffer's teaching about cheap and costly grace.

But what if we were to hang onto our hope that all will be saved, but through costly grace? It seems to me that those who hold to the hope of universal salvation have a tendency toward cheap grace. Let's put our hope in God's power through Christ and the Spirit to change the human heart, and even when the human heart remains cold, let us hope in the Christ who has harrowed hell itself. And in this hope preach and live a costly grace, and still hang onto the hope of St Paul himself.

Therefore just as one man's trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man's act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all. For just as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous. (Rom 5:18-19)

Taking the Sting Out of Apocalyptic (and the Meaning From Christianity)

Taking my previous post a little further, it would seem to me that it is extremely difficult, if not impossible to extract the message from apocalyptic and retain the important stuff embedded in it. I would like to suggest that whether we like it or not, we have to remain in contact with the apocalyptic form in which we have received the Christian faith. Indeed, the relationship betwen Jesus and apocalyptic is not just receptacle to content, but is, in places, so close to make the distinction void.

The urgent preparation of apocalyptic is a case in point. I mentioned in the previous post that those who rid themselves of the second coming of Christ seem less urgent than the texts assume. Indeed, without the second coming we start to ask what exactly we are meant to be ready for. And that's when some people say death. True enough, but on its own hardly the gospel. Apocalyptic is a cosmic vision of God's completion of history, and is not an individualistic cry for immortality. We might struggle with the sun falling out of the sky type apocalyptic, but it is easy to see that the vision is cosmic in stretch. Preparing for one's own death, laudable as it is, and even necessary, is not the comprehensive vision of the end we see in the resurrection of Jesus.

So, in the same way we are not meant to read off some kind of 'wisdom' from the story of Jesus, such that we no longer need the original story, some kind of spiritual insight is not to be drawn out of apocalyptic such that we no longer need keep in contact with the original texts and their apocalypticism.

[The picture is the grotto of John of Patmos.]

Being Ready (Kids' Talk)

[Matthew 25:1-13.]

What are some things you have to be ready for?

Possible answers if they don't come up with many:

• catching the bus: be at the bus stop waiting for it
• the thief who might steal the car (have a steering lock)
• birthday party (balloons, hats, games, food and drink)

How do we get ready for these things?

There is something else we have to be ready for. Jesus bringing in the kingdom. How are we meant to be ready?

Finish with the Prayer Book, "Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again" if you like.

On apocalyptic

This is good on apocalyptic.