It's the End of the World -- Again: Reflections on Mark 13.24-37

 It’s the End of the World – Again

Reflections on Mark 13.24-37

 

RCL Advent 1B

29 November 2020

 

Holy Trinity Anglican Cathedral

New Westminster BC

 

            I entered seminary in the autumn of 1978 during a time of significant upheaval in the US Episcopal Church, the church in which I grew up.  Four years earlier three retired bishops ordained eleven women to the priesthood in Philadelphia in defiance to the church’s existing policy.  Two years later, in 1976, the church finally approved the ordination of women to the priesthood.  That year, both in the US and Canada, women were ordained but not without opposition and protest, forecasts of the church’s imminent demise and accusations that both the US and Canadian churches had abandoned the catholic faith and order.

 

            Eleven years before I entered seminary the church had embarked on a course of liturgical revision.  Some welcomed the new rites, while others were critical and reluctant.  To this day, some fifty years later, we are a ‘bilingual’ church that uses both traditional and contemporary liturgical rites.  Most of the time we do so peacefully and harmoniously, but I do remember the worship wars of the 1970’s and 1980’s.

 

            Throughout those times it wouldn’t have been too difficult to hear commentators and partisans of one side or another claiming that all these developments were signs of the end of the world as we then knew it.  And they were right.  It was the end of the world as we knew it, as I had known it since boyhood.  We became churches whose ordained leadership began to resemble more closely the people who were in the pews – women.  We became churches which valued our heritage of ‘admirable simplicity’ and eloquent language and discovered that it was possible to maintain that heritage even when employing a contemporary idiom.

 

            It was the end of the world as we knew it.  And many of us discovered that we felt just fine, thank you very much.

 

            For Mark’s audience their world really had come to an end, physically, spiritually, culturally, socially.  As followers of Jesus many of them had lost the world of family and friends.  Some who had lived in the imperial province of Palestine had witnessed Roman legions destroying towns and villages, bringing death and enslavement to thousands of people and obliterating the Temple in Jerusalem, the earthly symbol of God’s presence and sovereignty both to Jews and to Christians.

 

            It was the end of the world as they knew it, but they did not feel fine.  Charlatans arose amidst them, the first- and second-century predecessors of the quack faith healers and preachers of the prosperity gospel we know today, who claimed secret knowledge and understanding of ‘the signs of the times’.  Christian communities were divided in their loyalties and uncertain of what they should do in such times.

 

            To them Mark the evangelist proclaimed what he promised to proclaim from the very first words of the Gospel that bears his name:  “The beginning of the good news about Jesus Christ, God’s Son . . . .” (Mark 1.1 in the Common English Bible)

 

            It’s the end of the world as we know it, Mark writes, “but (Jesus’) words will certainly not pass away” (Mark 13.31b in the Common English Bible).  It’s the end of the world as we know it, but Jesus “ . . . has put (us) in charge, giving (each one of us) a job to do” (Mark 13.34b in the Common English Bible).  It’s the end of the world as we know it, but we’re to keep alert because the new world, the one we’ve been hoping to see for so long is coming.  None of us, none of ‘this generation’, will pass away without seeing the signs of this promised world.

 

            It is not always a bad thing when the world as we know it comes to an end.  In such times we find ourselves compelled by events but, at the same time, guided by the Holy Spirit.  We see the signs of the new world all around us, the world we are hoping for, the world we were meant for.  Some of the signs are as subtle as the gradual movement of a tree from the slumber of winter to the awakening and greening of spring.  Other signs are as dramatic as an unexpected lunar or solar eclipse or an earthquake.  Even though our initial response to the ending of one world and the beginning of another may be fear and apprehension, for the disciples of Jesus, the coming of God’s promised world, so long waited for, so gradual in its advent, is good news. 

 

            As we enter once again the season of Advent, the world as we have known it is coming to an end, a world enduring a COVID pandemic, and a new world is drawing near, a world post-COVID but more deeply aware of the inter-connectedness of the whole human family.

 

            Will the passing of the old world and the advent of the new world witness a renewal of humanity’s concern and compassion for one another?  Will the experiences of restricted freedoms and the pain of not being able to celebrate the cycles and passages of life deepen our empathy for others?  Will the disappointment of seeing Easter and Christmas pass without familiar and life-giving rituals kindle in our hearts a deeper longing for the God whom these festivals hold before us?

 

            It is the end of the world as we have known it.  And I feel fine.  Fig trees are ripening even as I speak.  Jesus’ disciples are still doing the jobs he gave us two thousand years ago.  A new world is coming.  And that makes me feel even better.

But What Does It Mean? Reflections on Matthew 25.14-30

 But What Does It Mean?

Reflections on Matthew 25.14-30

 

RCL Proper 33A

15 November 2020

 

Holy Trinity Anglican Cathedral

New Westminster BC

 

Mean, Mean and Mean

            You all know that I love the English language and our language’s unapologetic incorporation of words from other languages into it.  Where would we be without chutney, curry, chili and chihuahua?  We’d have to formulate Anglo-Saxon word combinations similar to German where a squirrel is an eichkätzchen – a ‘little oak cat’.  We might come up with something like my favourite word in Solomon Islands’ Pidgin, ‘kwikpiksaleta’, the word used for ‘fax’.

 

            But English is also economical with our words and often will use a word to mean many different things, sometimes with a different pronunciation.  We have to pay close attention to know whether to say ‘read’ or ‘read’, ‘lead’ or ‘lead’, ‘prophecy’ or ‘prophesy’.  One such word is the simple four-letter combination of m, e, a and n.  Without any change in pronunciation, we can communicate three entirely different things.

 

            I mean, after all, that mean can mean mean, but also mean mean.  We can use ‘mean’ as a verb about comprehension, a noun about a median point or an adjective to indicate nastiness. 

 

            I bring this up because today’s Gospel challenges us to ask what it means about ministry in the meantime and in mean times.

 

What do we do while we wait for the Messiah?

            Today’s parable is a difficult one for a preacher.  On the surface we’re faced with a story that may suggest to some audiences that God rewards those who use unjust economic systems to their own gain so that the rich get richer and the poor poorer.  Those who are cautious about how they use their resources are going to be left behind in the coming reign of God by those who are more entrepreneurial and know how to use the system.  After all, there is a current clan of televangelists who teach a ‘name it, claim it’ theology.  If you want a Mercedes Benz, then ask God for it.  If you don’t get it, then your faith is not strong enough.

 

            Another take on the parable is popular around stewardship and capital campaigns.  Give generously and your support will multiply the resources available to the organization.  Now far it be from me not to encourage generosity and even sacrificial giving, but I’m not sure I want to go there today.  So I have to go deeper into the context behind the parable we heard from the Gospel according to Matthew today.

 

            I’ll be brief.  The community of Christian disciples to whom Matthew was writing his account of the life and ministry of Jesus found themselves both in the meantime and in the mean times.  Most of them had been raised in the Jewish tradition and had come to believe in Jesus as the promised Messiah.  This had led them to be ostracized from their communities, their families and their friends.  But the pain of separation was eased by their conviction that Jesus was returning soon and everything would be made right.

 

            But Jesus had not returned as soon as they had hoped.  By the time Matthew is writing, more than sixty years had passed since the events of that last week in Jerusalem.  A Jewish revolt had led to the destruction of the Temple in the year 70.  Jewish leaders, including those who believed in Jesus as Messiah, had been forced out of the city and send into virtual exile in the regions surrounding the Mediterranean.

 

            It’s during this time that the rabbinic community begins to develop that marvellous body of work we call the Mishnah and the Talmud, commentaries on the Scriptures that help practicing Jews be faithful to the Torah without the Temple.  And for Jewish believers in Jesus, who had also been traumatized by the destruction of the Temple, writers such as Paul, Mark, Matthew and Luke were doing the same thing.  Yes, they say, Jesus has not returned, so in the meantime, in these mean times, here how we can be faithful to our vocation as disciples.

 

            At the core of today’s gospel is the exhortation that disciples, in the meantime and in the mean times, avoid digging in and creating enclosed enclaves, keeping their heads down in a hostile world.  True disciples, Matthew says, take risks even in the meantime and in the mean times, so that the good news of God in Jesus of Nazareth spreads throughout the known world.

 

 

What do we do while we wait for the end of a pandemic?

            In mid-March of this year we entered into our own meantime and our own mean times.  It is easy to identify the signs of the mean times.  We closed the doors of our churches and of our halls to prevent the spread of the virus.  We donned masks, anointed our hands with countless amounts of hand sanitizing gels and liquids, kept two metres away from one another and learned how to ZOOM.

 

            We experienced our own Ecclesiastes moments:  “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:  a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.” [1]  

 

            But unlike the writer of Ecclesiastes, we have endured all these things unable to acknowledge them with the rituals and customs integral to our sense of community.  We have not been able to visit the sick, comfort the mourning and bury our dead with the full dignity their lives have merited.  These are the signs of the mean times.

 

            And like our sisters and brothers of Matthew’s community, we are aware that we are living in the meantime.  Every time that Dr Henry reminds us to be kind, to be calm, to be safe and to be brave, she also expresses her conviction that this time will pass and a more glorious summer will follow this winter of our discontent.  In our own way we have responded as those early Christians who took the risk to spread the good news of God in Jesus of Nazareth in a world both hostile and indifferent to the message and, at the same time, eager to hear this good news.

 

            We entered into this meantime with only the basics of twenty-first century communication.  We are now truly ‘HTC Live’ and are connecting with people unable to be on-site for worship and others who are searching for religious community.  Thursday Vespers and Facebook Live updates are now a regular part of our life.

 

            We entered into this meantime wondering how to connect with our members.  We then rediscovered the telephone and the rest is history.

 

            We entered into this meantime wondering whether our doors would re-open.  They have.  On-site worship has resumed and our community partners are eager to resume their activities, all carefully safeguarded by our COVID protocols.  New West Family Place has started a drop-in program and a food hamper supported by the Greater Vancouver Food Bank is working out of our Hall.  Our Breakfast program continues to provide food to the hungry.

 

            We entered this meantime wondering whether we could pay our bills.  Through the support of the members of our Parish and Diocesan financial support, we are able to pay our bills.  This fall I ask that we all review our giving and consider how we can support the Parish financially.

 

            We entered this meantime wondering about the progress of our property redevelopment.  I am now hopeful that, in the coming weeks, not months, we shall have taken a significant stride forward.

 

            We are in a meantime with some mean times, but we have not buried our talent in a hole waiting for these times to pass.  We have acted.  We have taken risks.  We have achieved more than we could have asked or imagined.

 

Onwards into the future

            I know that we cannot help but feel tired with the restrictions and demands that the pandemic has placed and continue to place upon us.  I’m sure that there are many times when we have become impatient with others and with ourselves.  Despite the beauty of the many masks that have been made for me and I’ve worn, it still irritates me more than I can sometimes express when my glassed fog up and I cannot see.  But then I remember what we’ve achieved over these past months and how faithfully and wonderfully all of you have responded to the challenges.

 

            So let’s be kind.  Let’s be calm.  Let’s be safe.  Let’s be brave.  We are in the meantime and in the mean times.  But we are still taking the risk to proclaim in so many ways the love of God made known to us in Jesus.  We’ve come far and probably have a bit further to go.  But we can do it.

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[1] Ecclesiastes 3.1-8.