I grew up here in the Bible Belt…well, all over it,
really, and when I was in middle school (junior high), I remember riding the
bus through the mountains of East Tennessee…which you might call “the buckle”…with
my baby sister Elisabeth and my best friend Shannon. The three of us often shared a seat, or
Shannon would sit with her little brother in the seat just next to ours. It was a time for the important conversations
of middle school: which teacher was
being “nice” this week (this usually meant who had decided against giving us
homework), what we were hoping to get our parents to let us do over the weekend
(which usually meant trying to persuade them to let us spend all waking hours
and most sleeping ones together), and, of course, who liked who (this was
junior high, after all. Jesus says not to judge us).
But I remember one particular morning as we drove
along, past drop-off shoulders down sides of small mountains (hills in East
Tennessee…mountains to those of us who call Montgomery home) and around the
curve by the cemetery at the top of the hill, some other kids on the bus told us
that ketchup was declared a vegetable
and the world was going to end that very
afternoon. They had heard it on the radio over
breakfast, and so they knew it was
true. Jesus was coming back, and the
world would end in a blaze of fire and fury. Just. Like. That.
I was a little concerned that Elisabeth might
hear this particular conversation and be unduly worried. After all, she is 6 ½ years younger than me,
and it was my JOB to protect her from unreasonable worry (unless I was the one
administering it, of course). So my
friend Shannon and I, being the intelligent, reasonable, older siblings, began to
refute this world-ending prophesy as a possibility. I pulled out some conversation I had had with
my dad about the matter, citing my confirmation curriculum and the particular wisdom
which comes from being a Lutheran in the Bible Belt. “Of course,
Jesus isn’t coming this afternoon! The Bible
clearly says that Jesus will come like a thief in the night! If you can say the hour or the day, it just
can’t be true!! 2 Peter.” And I don’t know about Shannon, but I felt
pretty smart that morning…teaching those born-again Christians what the Bible really says.
And as we argued, voices getting louder and
louder, my little sister, whom I had nearly forgotten in my righteous fervor, piped
up: “But if Jesus is coming,” she said, “what
do we do in the meantime?”
In the meantime…
The
gospel lesson today takes me right back to that scene on the bus in the hills
of Morristown, the smell of hot vinyl seats and rubber erasers and bodies not
washed nearly recently enough.
“There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and
the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of
the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is
coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then
they will see 'the Son of Man coming in a cloud' with power and great glory. Now
when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because
your redemption is drawing near."”[1]
Can you smell the vinyl and the brimstone?
I really wish that Luke had added a “but then” in
the middle there.
Because then, we might read it like this, “It
will seem like all hell has broken loose—sun, moon, stars, earth, sea, in an
uproar and everyone all over the world in a panic, the wind knocked out of them
by the threat of doom, the powers-that-be quaking. And [But] then—then!—they’ll see the Son of
Man welcomed in grand style—a glorious welcome!
When all this starts to happen, up on your feet. Stand tall with your heads high. Help is on the way!”[2]
Help
is on the way! Jesus is coming! Not as a matter of alarm, but as a matter of alleluia!! The listeners of Luke in that day would have
understood this passage to mean that Christians should be alert, should be
paying attention, for the coming of Christ.
That is, not so caught up in the expectations of the world or of the
season…parties, drinking, shopping, maybe even the worrying that comes with
daily living…not be so caught up in all of that that they forget to remain
confident, even eager, as they look for signs that signal the coming of the Son
of Man.
The
listeners of Luke in the time of the gospel writing were all too familiar with
war, famine, and destruction. They
looked with hopeful anticipation toward the day that Jesus would return to end the
Roman Empire once-and-for-all, to end the oppression for those who followed
Christ.
Luke
was sensitive to that, of course. And he
pushed his listeners to stand in the in-between space. In other words, Luke changes the question
from “when is Jesus coming?” to “what do we do in the meantime?” It is that in-between time, that in-the-meantime,
which opens space for the mission of God and our participation in it. So that no matter what rumors are heard, the
church is to remain committed to ministry in the world.
Now
in this time and place, we know, thank you, science, that the world will not
end this afternoon. But AT THE SAME TIME, we are well acquainted
with the challenges that come while waiting for an event that seems slow to
transpire.
What
are you waiting for?
The
end of childhood hunger both here and abroad.
Biopsy
results.
Reconciliation
with a loved one.
A
welcome for refugees.
Civil
rights and acceptance for LGBTQ folks.
The
cessation of violence in this country against Black and Brown bodies.
And
how do we feel in that waiting time? Are
we fraught with tension? With anxiety or
anticipation? Maybe so. But Luke would remind us that we are also to
be leaning toward hope. Hope that comes
because we know the rest of the story.
And
that hope is where we draw strength for our participation in God’s mission in the
world.
We
await the coming of Christ, but we do not
do so idly.
My
professor David Lose says, “From
Moses to Martin Luther King, Jr., history is full of examples of those who,
because they had been to the mountaintop, had peered into the promised land,
and had heard and believed the promise of a better future, found the challenges
of the present not only endurable, but hopeful. We, too, amid the very real
setbacks, disappointments, or worries of this life, can "stand up and
raise [our] heads" because we have heard Jesus' promise that our
"redemption draws near."[3]
We, too, have heard that Jesus is coming.
How will you raise your head? How will you get up on your feet? How can you prepare the way for the coming of
Christ in the days to come? Can you find
a new or deeper way to participate in Lunches for Learning? Can you be a voice for someone who has none? Can you be an advocate for those folks who
live in the margins here in Montgomery…margins because of gender or sexuality
or poverty or religion or race? Can you
share your time and your resources? Or
can you bear witness in your daily interactions…as I like to say to the good
folks at Christ in Prattville…how can you
be an ordinary radical…that is interjecting hope into dim spaces…providing
a spark of extraordinary in the lives of your neighbors?
Speak up when you see little injustices. Write your representatives when you see big
ones. Begin conversations which might
change the lives of the ones with whom you speak…or which might just change
your own life. Welcome others in to your
presence and thereby welcome them in to the presence of God.
Turns out, my baby sister is a powerful schoolbus
theologian.
Jesus is coming. Thanks be to God!
Now,
what are we going to do in the meantime?
Amen.
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