Isaiah 2:1-5
It’s to haul out the holly, put up the tree, fill up the stocking, it’s time to deck the halls again. Yes once again we are anticipating the biggest event of our year, that wondrous day we call Christmas. Since the day after Halloween, or was that the day after Labor Day, I can’t remember, we’ve been receiving catalogs showing us pictures of happy families in matching pajamas enjoying a quiet moment together. On TV we have been regaled with commercials of a crazed woman preparing for the Target two day sale and on the internet we’ve seen ads that promise healthy living and the promise of good organization in the form of electronic gadgets. (1) For some of us this frenzied season can seem like our greatest fear but for all of us these jam packed four weeks of Christmas preparation is the manifestation of our deepest longings.
As I review the sermons that I have preached in Advents past, I have noticed a disturbing pattern. While trying to share the good news of the incarnation of God with us through the nativity of Jesus, I’ve crusaded against frenzy of the season. But I realize that I was just as steeped in the hub bub of the season as you all. No matter how hard I tried to go back to the reason for the season, the birth of the Christ child, I’d still be drawn into the excitement of finding that perfect gift. I’d get caught up in eating drinking and merry making at many a Christmas gathering. And on most Advent evenings I could be found in my living room enjoying my umpteenth Christmas cookie while watching “Frosty the Snowman.” “A Charlie Brown Christmas” “Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer” and my personal favorite “A Christmas Story.” Which I’ve probably watched over a half a dozen times just last year alone. Yes I am a Christmas show junkie!
Why do the cultural and commercial messages of the secular season have such a hold on us? What compels us in these four weeks of Advent to shop ‘til we drop, gather night after night with our friends and families at open houses, celebrate with co-workers at company Christmas parties and watch cartoons that explore the true meaning of Christmas? Perhaps it is because these things respond to our deepest, truest need for something bigger than ourselves. We yearn for the nostalgia of our bygone childhood wonder. We look forward to being together with those who are dear to us. We hope that this will be the Christmas where our dreams will come true.(2) In all of this holiday rushing around what we are straining towards is something of meaning, we longingly cry for the love, joy and wholeness of life that is not counterfeit. We hear the invitation to walk toward to the light of the world, Emmanuel, God with us, the Christ Child.
In this morning’s older testament reading we hear the prophet Isaiah offer a vision of God fulfilling the deepest longings his people. That all people from all nations will come together to seek God together so that they may learn from God his ways and so that they may walk together in God’s path. God will be the judge between nations and arbitrate for many peoples. Scholars note that Isaiah is saying that God “will make an actual difference in the way the world works: inequities will be balanced, shackles will be loosed, wrongs will be set right. Out of this justice will come transformation—weapons of violence will be turned into instruments for nourishment. The nations will put their swords down, and will not train for war anymore.” (3) This passage ends with an invitation to walk in the light of this transformation. To have hope in a world made new.
All of gift giving, the pictures of happy families on Christmas cards, the yuletide gatherings and the Christmas shows speak to a very deep and real hope for peace, harmony and love. The gatherings we partake in and the gifts that we buy for each other is our way saying, “I see you.” The beloved Christmas shows that we watch over and over and over again represent our desire to believe in things that seem impossible, such as a reindeer who saves the day with his shiny red nose, a snowman coming to life or the hope of transformation such as a Grinch finding the true meaning of Christmas.
This morning for the children’s sermon I shared the story of the Grinch who stole Christmas. We don’t why the Grinch hated Christmas, but we do know that he resented the merrymaking of the citizens of who-ville. He wanted to put a stop to the noise, the singing and the feasting. He wanted to keep Christmas from coming so that the whos of who-ville would be just as miserable as he was. He stole their presents, trees and food in hopes of taking away Christmas. But his dastardly plan didn’t work. On Christmas morning he is shocked to find:
“Every who in who-ville, the tall and the small,
Was singing! Without presents at all!
He HADN’T stopped Christmas from coming!
IT CAME!
Somehow or other, it came just the same!...
And what happened then…?
Well…in whoville they say
That the Grinch’s small heart
Grew three sizes that day!
And the minute his heart didn’t feel quite so tight,
He whizzed with his load through the bright morning light
He brought back the toys! And Food for the feast!
And He…HE HIMSELF! The Grinch carved the Roast Beast.” (4)
The Grinch was transformed on that Christmas day. Through seeing the whos of who-ville gather as a community he found peace, love and harmony that he didn’t know he was longing for.
As we commence upon activities of this season let us remember that as we are looking for gifts, cooking, merry making and yes even Christmas show viewing, we are participating in the excitement and anticipation of the incarnation of Jesus Christ. We hope for a better future with the coming of Emanuel, God-with-us and we look forward to the world becoming transformed by the culmination of our deepest longings for peace, love and harmony being satisfied. May the heart of the world grow three sizes larger on that day!
(1) Stacy Simpson Duke, “Isaiah 2:1-5 : Pastoral Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year A, Vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 2.
(2) Ibid., 3
(3) Ibid., 4
(4) Suess, How the Grinch Stole Christmas. (New York: Random House, 1957)
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Saturday, November 20, 2010
A King Like No Other
Old Testament Lesson: Jeremiah 23: 1-6
Gospel Lesson: Luke 23: 33-43
Almost three weeks ago we had an election that once again has changed the balance of power of our government both nationally and locally. It was a joyous time for some and a time of anguish for others. Unfortunately this election once again proved that our country continues to be deeply divided. The campaigning was nasty on both sides. The between the various candidates were heightened in some cases to a fight between good and evil where each side demonized the other. In the end, the body of elected leadership reflects our national mood, a divided country that fears for our future. It seems that incivility rules the day as it has become more and more difficult for those who lead our cities, our state and our nation to work with each other. There has always been differences between political parties however fear and anger have caused splits within our civic groups and divisiveness have turned people against one another rather than working with each other. The people of our nation have scattered and been driven away like the sheep in the Jeremiah reading. However God promises to bring us together, but how?
This morning’s older testament reading begins with some rather harsh words from God to concerning the leadership of Judah. Using the word shepherd as the metaphor for king, God speaks words that the kings, princes and royal officials of Judah would rather not hear, “It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil ways…Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock.” (Jer. 23:2) At the time that the prophet Jeremiah wrote this text, the invasion of Judah by the Babylonians had just begun and many of the people were being sent to exile in Babylon. However, the prophet does not blame the economy, or the weather, or even that the Babylonians had better armies then the Judeans, the blame rests upon the shoulders of the leaders of the nation of Judah. Some note that Jeremiah is accusing leaders of abusing their power by serving their own interests rather than the best interests of their own people. Their power is God given, and God calls them first and foremost to look after the widow, the children, the alien, the poor of their nation, to do everything in their power to make sure all their people have what they need to live whole lives. Instead the leaders only looked out for themselves. So God who is always in power promises to push out of the way the leaders who caused the problems injustice in the first place and to bring about a new leadership whose sole interest is the reign of God. (1) Under this new order all the people will have what they need in order to live whole prosperous lives. That sounds nice to all of us hearing the scripture today, but we wonder, thousands of years later…has this happened yet? Today we struggle with a struggling economy, a lack of jobs, hunger, homelessness in our own neighborhoods and even war we wonder why we have shortages, shortages of jobs, food, fuel etc. But the question that God would ask us is this: are these shortages real or has God’s abundance simply been unevenly distributed?(2) Could the thirst for power and influence of a few be contributing to the underlying issues that cause inequity in the first place?
Today we celebrate the Reign of Christ, also known as “Christ the King Sunday.” But today’s gospel reading does not portray Jesus as what we would imagine to be a king. He is not adorned with a crown and jewels. He is not sitting upon a majestic throne surrounded by a court of princes, duchesses and knights nor is he at the head of a mighty army ready to conquer. Jesus, the one whom we call king is hanging on a cross in between two criminals. The leaders and soldiers are mocking him, daring him to save himself and come down off that cross. The only vestige of royalty is the inscription above Jesus’ head that reads, “This is the King of the Jews.” But then again, we do see Jesus acting with the authority of a true ruler. The rule of Jesus centers upon relationship through reconciliation and forgiveness. He pardons those who crucified him by saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” And He assures the criminal hanging next to him that he will be in paradise. What we see is Jesus ruling through the power of grace.
Throughout the gospel of Luke, we hear Jesus say, “The Kingdom of God is at Hand.” But what is this kingdom of God he keeps proclaiming. His followers thought that he was going to defeat the power of the Roman Government that occupied Israel while Jesus was on earth. But Jesus was not concerned with political power or military, rather he was concerned with liberation. He speaks, over and over again, about economic justice issues. He seeks to free the oppressed. He honors women, widows, and children. He challenges the social norms of his culture by associating himself with the rejected people in his society. He eats with sinners and touches the untouchable. Jesus makes the radical claim that it is not the powers and principalities that are in charge of the world, rather it is and always will be God. The only power that Jesus was serving was God’s power. The scary thing was that in serving God’s power, he ended up being hung on a cross and jeered by the leaders and soldiers who put him there. You see, when he preached about the kingdom of God, he was putting forth the radical claim that all people are children of God, all people are worthy and that all people deserve justice! This message is very threatening to a power structure such as the Roman Government that depended upon oppression and unjust policies to keep its hold on its power.
The kingdom of God is different from any kingdom we have known. It is where sharing by all means scarcity for none. Those who are meek are lifted up as the inheritors of the earth, all those who hunger are fed, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are satisfied. Jesus was not seeking a revolution, but he was a revolutionary when he proclaimed that the kingdom of God is at hand. Through this bold statement he questioned those powers in his claim that God is for the oppressed and stands with the oppressed. The Roman Government hung Jesus on the cross because they thought he was provoking his followers to revolt against the government, but it this death sentence is what redeems us. Some believe that Christ redeems us by bearing through his death the burden of all our fears, and our hatred. This broken man forsaken, and reviled even by the criminal next to him, is the king whom we honor today. A king like no other.
The challenge for us as people of faith is to figure out how we are called to participate in the building of God’s realm with Christ as our King. How can we use Jesus’ example of leading which was centered relationship, forgiveness and reconciliation to bring all people back into right relationship with each other. The task seems insurmountable in this political climate. But we must remember what Jesus says throughout the Gospel of Luke, “what is impossible for people, is possible with God.” With God and prayerful discernment, we can take up the challenge to dialogue with each other. This may mean sitting down with someone whose political beliefs you might disagree with and truly listening to why they believe and from this conversation you both may find the common threads that bind all of us together. For instance, everyone agrees that we want to take care of our children. We want them to be housed, fed and well cared for. We want our children to be well educated and we all want to protect our children. This common thread can becomes a starting point for dialogue. Be prepared to agree to disagree on some issues. This isn’t about whose right and whose wrong, rather it is about working together to bring about a world where justice reigns. God sent Jesus to be the righteous branch of David to reign as king and deal wisely and execute justice and righteousness in the land through forgiveness and reconciliation. Let us continue to believe that the days are surely coming where we will reconcile with each other and continue the work of building the kingdom of God here and now. May it be so, Amen.
(1) Feasting on the Word
(2) Ibid.
Gospel Lesson: Luke 23: 33-43
Almost three weeks ago we had an election that once again has changed the balance of power of our government both nationally and locally. It was a joyous time for some and a time of anguish for others. Unfortunately this election once again proved that our country continues to be deeply divided. The campaigning was nasty on both sides. The between the various candidates were heightened in some cases to a fight between good and evil where each side demonized the other. In the end, the body of elected leadership reflects our national mood, a divided country that fears for our future. It seems that incivility rules the day as it has become more and more difficult for those who lead our cities, our state and our nation to work with each other. There has always been differences between political parties however fear and anger have caused splits within our civic groups and divisiveness have turned people against one another rather than working with each other. The people of our nation have scattered and been driven away like the sheep in the Jeremiah reading. However God promises to bring us together, but how?
This morning’s older testament reading begins with some rather harsh words from God to concerning the leadership of Judah. Using the word shepherd as the metaphor for king, God speaks words that the kings, princes and royal officials of Judah would rather not hear, “It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil ways…Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock.” (Jer. 23:2) At the time that the prophet Jeremiah wrote this text, the invasion of Judah by the Babylonians had just begun and many of the people were being sent to exile in Babylon. However, the prophet does not blame the economy, or the weather, or even that the Babylonians had better armies then the Judeans, the blame rests upon the shoulders of the leaders of the nation of Judah. Some note that Jeremiah is accusing leaders of abusing their power by serving their own interests rather than the best interests of their own people. Their power is God given, and God calls them first and foremost to look after the widow, the children, the alien, the poor of their nation, to do everything in their power to make sure all their people have what they need to live whole lives. Instead the leaders only looked out for themselves. So God who is always in power promises to push out of the way the leaders who caused the problems injustice in the first place and to bring about a new leadership whose sole interest is the reign of God. (1) Under this new order all the people will have what they need in order to live whole prosperous lives. That sounds nice to all of us hearing the scripture today, but we wonder, thousands of years later…has this happened yet? Today we struggle with a struggling economy, a lack of jobs, hunger, homelessness in our own neighborhoods and even war we wonder why we have shortages, shortages of jobs, food, fuel etc. But the question that God would ask us is this: are these shortages real or has God’s abundance simply been unevenly distributed?(2) Could the thirst for power and influence of a few be contributing to the underlying issues that cause inequity in the first place?
Today we celebrate the Reign of Christ, also known as “Christ the King Sunday.” But today’s gospel reading does not portray Jesus as what we would imagine to be a king. He is not adorned with a crown and jewels. He is not sitting upon a majestic throne surrounded by a court of princes, duchesses and knights nor is he at the head of a mighty army ready to conquer. Jesus, the one whom we call king is hanging on a cross in between two criminals. The leaders and soldiers are mocking him, daring him to save himself and come down off that cross. The only vestige of royalty is the inscription above Jesus’ head that reads, “This is the King of the Jews.” But then again, we do see Jesus acting with the authority of a true ruler. The rule of Jesus centers upon relationship through reconciliation and forgiveness. He pardons those who crucified him by saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” And He assures the criminal hanging next to him that he will be in paradise. What we see is Jesus ruling through the power of grace.
Throughout the gospel of Luke, we hear Jesus say, “The Kingdom of God is at Hand.” But what is this kingdom of God he keeps proclaiming. His followers thought that he was going to defeat the power of the Roman Government that occupied Israel while Jesus was on earth. But Jesus was not concerned with political power or military, rather he was concerned with liberation. He speaks, over and over again, about economic justice issues. He seeks to free the oppressed. He honors women, widows, and children. He challenges the social norms of his culture by associating himself with the rejected people in his society. He eats with sinners and touches the untouchable. Jesus makes the radical claim that it is not the powers and principalities that are in charge of the world, rather it is and always will be God. The only power that Jesus was serving was God’s power. The scary thing was that in serving God’s power, he ended up being hung on a cross and jeered by the leaders and soldiers who put him there. You see, when he preached about the kingdom of God, he was putting forth the radical claim that all people are children of God, all people are worthy and that all people deserve justice! This message is very threatening to a power structure such as the Roman Government that depended upon oppression and unjust policies to keep its hold on its power.
The kingdom of God is different from any kingdom we have known. It is where sharing by all means scarcity for none. Those who are meek are lifted up as the inheritors of the earth, all those who hunger are fed, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are satisfied. Jesus was not seeking a revolution, but he was a revolutionary when he proclaimed that the kingdom of God is at hand. Through this bold statement he questioned those powers in his claim that God is for the oppressed and stands with the oppressed. The Roman Government hung Jesus on the cross because they thought he was provoking his followers to revolt against the government, but it this death sentence is what redeems us. Some believe that Christ redeems us by bearing through his death the burden of all our fears, and our hatred. This broken man forsaken, and reviled even by the criminal next to him, is the king whom we honor today. A king like no other.
The challenge for us as people of faith is to figure out how we are called to participate in the building of God’s realm with Christ as our King. How can we use Jesus’ example of leading which was centered relationship, forgiveness and reconciliation to bring all people back into right relationship with each other. The task seems insurmountable in this political climate. But we must remember what Jesus says throughout the Gospel of Luke, “what is impossible for people, is possible with God.” With God and prayerful discernment, we can take up the challenge to dialogue with each other. This may mean sitting down with someone whose political beliefs you might disagree with and truly listening to why they believe and from this conversation you both may find the common threads that bind all of us together. For instance, everyone agrees that we want to take care of our children. We want them to be housed, fed and well cared for. We want our children to be well educated and we all want to protect our children. This common thread can becomes a starting point for dialogue. Be prepared to agree to disagree on some issues. This isn’t about whose right and whose wrong, rather it is about working together to bring about a world where justice reigns. God sent Jesus to be the righteous branch of David to reign as king and deal wisely and execute justice and righteousness in the land through forgiveness and reconciliation. Let us continue to believe that the days are surely coming where we will reconcile with each other and continue the work of building the kingdom of God here and now. May it be so, Amen.
(1) Feasting on the Word
(2) Ibid.
Saturday, November 13, 2010
The World As God Would Have It.
Isaiah 65: 17-25
Luke 21: 5-19
It was warm fall morning almost 10 years ago. I was working as an accountant for a large corporation in downtown BigCity at the time. It was early in the morning and I was processing my daily cash accounting spreadsheets and listening to the radio. My favorite DJ was reading the news in her usual joking manner but suddenly she stopped, and in a panicked voice she said that a Airline Jet had hit a sky scraper in New York. I stopped working and looked at my radio. Then my phone rang. I picked it up and my Beloved Partner told me that she had just seen on the news a jet plane hitting one of the twin towers in New York. I was stunned. I didn’t know what to say. I tried to get on CNN website on to see if there was news of this tragedy but the website was so overloaded, I could not get on. I changed the radio station to public radio to hear the news of this tragedy. At first I thought it was some bizarre accident, that someone had fallen asleep at air traffic control thus causing the planes to fly amuck. Eventually the towers collapsed.
"As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down." (Luke 21:6)
As the day wore on, the media revealed that terrorists associated with the group Al-Qaeda had hijacked the commercial airline jets planes and had flown them into the towers for the purpose of utter destruction.
“Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.” Luke 21: 10b-11
I couldn’t continue working under the distress that I was feeling. Then I heard that a plane had crashed into the pentagon. My panic shifted into high gear because my sister lives by the pentagon. I tried to call her but couldn’t get through because the phone circuits going into Washington DC were also overloaded. I sat and I worried. Eventually my workplace closed and let us go for home for the day.
As I rode the bus home from work noticed that the streets were unusually empty in our normally bustling downtown BigCity. The stores had closed early and many of the offices were empty. The skies were also empty because all planes had been grounded. I realized that my world had changed instantly in the moments that the planes had hit the twin towers. Safety was no longer something that I could take for granted.
I imagine that the Israelite people felt the same shock and life altering pain when their temple fell 70 years after the death of Jesus. The temple of Jerusalem was the worship center of the Jewish community of which Jesus was a part of. “People would[sic] gather in the large colonnades and porches around the Temple Mount for various purposes, including speech making and healing.” (1) They believed that God physically dwelled within the temple in a room which was called the holy of holies. The Jewish folk throughout the Middle East made pilgrimage to the temple on Passover to celebrate the Exodus of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. This is exactly what Jesus and his disciples were doing in the narrative of this story. His disciples were marveling at the grandeur of the buildings but Jesus tells them that the buildings will be destroyed. The disciples are shocked that Jesus would predict such a thing. This prediction implied that God’s dwelling place would be destroyed and that God would no longer be physically present among the people. They wondered if God was going to abandon them.
Forty years after Jesus made his prediction, the temple of Jerusalem was destroyed by the Roman army. At the time of the destruction, the early Christians were still a part of the Jewish people as a sect of within the religion of Judaism, and so the destruction of the temple was indeed a devastating blow for them. They were at a loss as to where worship God, because God’s dwelling place amongst the people had been torn asunder. This indeed was an uncertain time in the life of the early Christian Community.
What was it like for these early Christians to see their center of worship destroyed and yet have the words of Isaiah 65 ring in their ears, “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.” (Isaiah 65:18) Does this vision of Isaiah imply utter destruction of the present world and creation of a new one? In order to understand where Isaiah was coming from when he wrote his prophesy, we need to know the time and place of the writing of this scripture. It is understood that the last portion of Isaiah chapters 56-66 was written at the time when the Israelite people were returning to their homeland in 520 BCE after being captive in Babylon for over 60 years. They were going about the difficult task of rebuilding their community of faith in a time where people were cynical about their future. There is hardship all around them, their lives are difficult. And yet in the midst of despair the prophet Isaiah is able to testify with confidence that hope that the God who created heaven and earth does not seek to destroy, rather, God seeks to build upon the original creation and transform it into something new. (2)
This text gives us a radical vision of the world as God would have it, where the living conditions of the new Jerusalem reflect the hope of God’s creation living in right relationship with each other.
“No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime; for one who dies at a hundred years will be considered a youth, and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.” (Isaiah 65:20-22)
As people of faith we are called to testify this vision of radical transformation even in the midst of our most difficult times. Imagine what the world would look like if it were as God would have it. How would such a world spend its resources? How would the common good be embraced when all people had the opportunity to live in the fullness of time? What if we had health care, education, safe neighborhoods, plentiful good water for all and what if we all practiced good environmental stewardship of the earth. (3) Indeed, this is the very future that God has already announced for us as possible now.
How does God call us to take part in the transformation of our world? How is it possible for us to be God’s hands, feet and voice in bringing about the world as God would have it? It happens through following the patterns of justice making and mercy that Jesus taught us through his ministry. By giving one act of mercy we are able to give comfort. By giving one can of food to a local food pantry we are able to give nourishment to someone who is hungry. By giving one challenge to the systemic evil that causes injustice, the continuation of domination are dismantled piece by piece. By welcoming one stranger into this community of faith, the witness of God’s love and grace freely given can change one life. All of these one time acts accumulate to bring about the world as God would have it. (4) May it be so. Amen!
(1) Vernon Robbins, “Luke 21:5-19: Exegetical Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 309.
(2) Mary Eleanor Johns, “Isaiah 65:17-25: Pastoral Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 290.
(3) Martha Stern, “Isaiah 65:17-25: Homiletical Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 295.
(4) Isaiah 65:17-25: Pastoral Perspective.” 292.
Luke 21: 5-19
It was warm fall morning almost 10 years ago. I was working as an accountant for a large corporation in downtown BigCity at the time. It was early in the morning and I was processing my daily cash accounting spreadsheets and listening to the radio. My favorite DJ was reading the news in her usual joking manner but suddenly she stopped, and in a panicked voice she said that a Airline Jet had hit a sky scraper in New York. I stopped working and looked at my radio. Then my phone rang. I picked it up and my Beloved Partner told me that she had just seen on the news a jet plane hitting one of the twin towers in New York. I was stunned. I didn’t know what to say. I tried to get on CNN website on to see if there was news of this tragedy but the website was so overloaded, I could not get on. I changed the radio station to public radio to hear the news of this tragedy. At first I thought it was some bizarre accident, that someone had fallen asleep at air traffic control thus causing the planes to fly amuck. Eventually the towers collapsed.
"As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down." (Luke 21:6)
As the day wore on, the media revealed that terrorists associated with the group Al-Qaeda had hijacked the commercial airline jets planes and had flown them into the towers for the purpose of utter destruction.
“Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.” Luke 21: 10b-11
I couldn’t continue working under the distress that I was feeling. Then I heard that a plane had crashed into the pentagon. My panic shifted into high gear because my sister lives by the pentagon. I tried to call her but couldn’t get through because the phone circuits going into Washington DC were also overloaded. I sat and I worried. Eventually my workplace closed and let us go for home for the day.
As I rode the bus home from work noticed that the streets were unusually empty in our normally bustling downtown BigCity. The stores had closed early and many of the offices were empty. The skies were also empty because all planes had been grounded. I realized that my world had changed instantly in the moments that the planes had hit the twin towers. Safety was no longer something that I could take for granted.
I imagine that the Israelite people felt the same shock and life altering pain when their temple fell 70 years after the death of Jesus. The temple of Jerusalem was the worship center of the Jewish community of which Jesus was a part of. “People would[sic] gather in the large colonnades and porches around the Temple Mount for various purposes, including speech making and healing.” (1) They believed that God physically dwelled within the temple in a room which was called the holy of holies. The Jewish folk throughout the Middle East made pilgrimage to the temple on Passover to celebrate the Exodus of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. This is exactly what Jesus and his disciples were doing in the narrative of this story. His disciples were marveling at the grandeur of the buildings but Jesus tells them that the buildings will be destroyed. The disciples are shocked that Jesus would predict such a thing. This prediction implied that God’s dwelling place would be destroyed and that God would no longer be physically present among the people. They wondered if God was going to abandon them.
Forty years after Jesus made his prediction, the temple of Jerusalem was destroyed by the Roman army. At the time of the destruction, the early Christians were still a part of the Jewish people as a sect of within the religion of Judaism, and so the destruction of the temple was indeed a devastating blow for them. They were at a loss as to where worship God, because God’s dwelling place amongst the people had been torn asunder. This indeed was an uncertain time in the life of the early Christian Community.
What was it like for these early Christians to see their center of worship destroyed and yet have the words of Isaiah 65 ring in their ears, “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.” (Isaiah 65:18) Does this vision of Isaiah imply utter destruction of the present world and creation of a new one? In order to understand where Isaiah was coming from when he wrote his prophesy, we need to know the time and place of the writing of this scripture. It is understood that the last portion of Isaiah chapters 56-66 was written at the time when the Israelite people were returning to their homeland in 520 BCE after being captive in Babylon for over 60 years. They were going about the difficult task of rebuilding their community of faith in a time where people were cynical about their future. There is hardship all around them, their lives are difficult. And yet in the midst of despair the prophet Isaiah is able to testify with confidence that hope that the God who created heaven and earth does not seek to destroy, rather, God seeks to build upon the original creation and transform it into something new. (2)
This text gives us a radical vision of the world as God would have it, where the living conditions of the new Jerusalem reflect the hope of God’s creation living in right relationship with each other.
“No more shall there be in it an infant that lives but a few days, or an old person who does not live out a lifetime; for one who dies at a hundred years will be considered a youth, and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.” (Isaiah 65:20-22)
As people of faith we are called to testify this vision of radical transformation even in the midst of our most difficult times. Imagine what the world would look like if it were as God would have it. How would such a world spend its resources? How would the common good be embraced when all people had the opportunity to live in the fullness of time? What if we had health care, education, safe neighborhoods, plentiful good water for all and what if we all practiced good environmental stewardship of the earth. (3) Indeed, this is the very future that God has already announced for us as possible now.
How does God call us to take part in the transformation of our world? How is it possible for us to be God’s hands, feet and voice in bringing about the world as God would have it? It happens through following the patterns of justice making and mercy that Jesus taught us through his ministry. By giving one act of mercy we are able to give comfort. By giving one can of food to a local food pantry we are able to give nourishment to someone who is hungry. By giving one challenge to the systemic evil that causes injustice, the continuation of domination are dismantled piece by piece. By welcoming one stranger into this community of faith, the witness of God’s love and grace freely given can change one life. All of these one time acts accumulate to bring about the world as God would have it. (4) May it be so. Amen!
(1) Vernon Robbins, “Luke 21:5-19: Exegetical Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 309.
(2) Mary Eleanor Johns, “Isaiah 65:17-25: Pastoral Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 290.
(3) Martha Stern, “Isaiah 65:17-25: Homiletical Perspective.” Feasting on the Word. Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year C, Vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 295.
(4) Isaiah 65:17-25: Pastoral Perspective.” 292.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
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