Series C                                                  Pentecost XXV      November 14, 2010                                                                          

Luke 21: 5-19

SIGNS AND RESPONSE

What makes us afraid?  And what do we put our faith in?  That is the question Jesus is raising before his disciples in today’s Gospel.  No one will forget what happened on 9/11.  I helped make the steel that the World Trade Center buildings were erected with in the Bethlehem Steel Plant in Steelton.  Those buildings were symbols of a world economy that through co-operation and trade was reaching new heights.

As Jesus’ disciples looked upon the temple, it’s magnificence entranced them.  For the Temple symbolized all that was great about Israel, and stood as a monument to the eternal God that chose Israel to be His people.  They could not imagine that anything this revered and important to Israel’s faith could ever be destroyed.  Of course they knew that the one Solomon built had once been destroyed, when the people were carried off into captivity.  But certainly God would not let anything like that happen again to His Temple.

But Jesus prophesies that the whole of this system of worship, the Temple and the need for sacrifice within it for the people, would all be brought to a violent end.

As Luke recorded this prophecy for his readers, this destruction was already reality.  The Temple treasury where Jesus praised the widow for her meager offering was no more.   The Temple courtyard where Jesus overturned the money changer’s tables and drove out those selling sacrificial animals was empty.  The wealth of the Temple had been looted.  Those beautiful stones that created this awesome structure no longer stood there.  Those readers no longer wondered, like the disciples, when this was going to happen!  They were struggling with the question, “what do we do now?”

How do we continue believing in God when God allows His own house to be destroyed either by physical destruction through natural causes or by the neglect of those responsible for its care; or maybe even through spiritual/emotional destruction through the misconduct of the church’s members or leadership?  And how do we hold on to our faith when earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes or tornadoes kill thousands of people and destroy millions of dollars of property?  How do we keep trusting in a loving God when terrorists cause so much fear?  How do we keep on believing in an all-powerful, gracious God as we endure such evil and suffering in our world and sometimes in our congregation?

The only possible meaning this destruction could have is that this was God’s will, and is meant to guide our faith to seek answers not in ourselves, not in the world, but in the Lord.

Jesus tells us that there will be many signs, frightening signs. 
We should expect things like wars between nations, deceivers to claim they are the Messiah or speak for him; earthquakes, famines, plagues, and dreadful portents.  But that word “signs” is the same word used of Jesus lying in the manger by the angels.  It is the same word that the crowds used asking for a sign from heaven to show them Jesus was the Messiah.  But Jesus told them he would give them no sign except the sign of Jonah.  Could it be that the sign is Jesus himself?  His birth, death, and resurrection?  Or, perhaps Christ’s expression of God’s forgiveness even towards sinners, tax collectors, Samaritans, and other Gentiles that led them to repent and not be destroyed just like it happened to Jonah as he got angry that God did not destroy those Ninevites who also heard his message and repented?  Could Jesus’ very presence on earth be the sign that all these things will happen?

History has shown us that whenever there has been a major catastrophe false prophets have arisen to claim the end of days was nigh and even that they were the expected one to lead them through it.  But they only wanted to lead the faithful astray.  That word  “to lead astray,” means “to mislead,” “to deceive,” “to cause to wander from the truth.”  There have been those in every age, every place, every community who have told untruths, or used half truths to manipulated to mislead and misdirect the people.  And it is often very hard to separate out the truth from the fiction that would lead us astray.

The deception in this verse has two parts: false messiahs and false calculations of time.

But to be led astray you have to be on the right path to begin with.  Jesus is clearly talking of his followers here.  He wants us to be clear about the path we are on, and must stay on.  His path, a path that is love, and care and concern, and cooperation and support and fellowship.  A path that is filled with the fruit of the spirit that includes, love, peace, joy, generosity, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control.  So test the path you are on or being led to take.  If you are hearing things that are not kind, or gentle, if you are encouraged to not be generous or patient.  If peace and joy are not accompanying you, and the results are that you are no longer part of the fellowship of the church, then you are being led astray.  A false Messiah is anyone who deceives in order to create chaos, division, dissension.  When you know what to look for, you can better fend off the temptations to be led astray.

The word for “time” used in this passage is kairos.  It is different from the word chronos which also means “time” in Greek; for chronos refers to time as displayed by a clock or calendar.  Kairos refers to God’s time.  Jesus will command us to: “Be alert at all times!”  Kairos refers to the proper time as God plans it to do things.  Like when God’s Kingdom will break into our time, and knowing what is right to do, in contrast to those tenants of the vineyard in our Gospel a few weeks back to thought that by beating the servants, refusing to pay what was due the owner, and then killing the son they could take over the vineyard.  A parable about people in every time who don’t know what time it is, for the vineyard owner’s son has already come to us.  He was crucified on a cross, and people still crucify him in the way they treat him, fail to worship him, or pay the Lord His due.

With Jesus, a present reality with us always, the time, the kingdom, even the sign has come near, so what the deceiver will try to do is mislead us in what is the proper way to respond.  Should we respond by not going to worship?  Should we respond by not giving thanks to God every week?  Should we not respond by giving our proper tithe and offering to the Lord?  Should we not respond by being filled with a spirit of peace, joy, co-operation, and faithfulness?

When we are led to believe that we should not do these things for any reason we are being deceived.

Even St. Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians addresses these things, for some of them were being deceived also and were

“…living in idleness [mere busybodies, not doing any work] and not according to the tradition that they received”

Could that be a deception in St. John’s?  Do we have members who are not doing any work for the common good of the congregation or of the kingdom?  Do we sometimes act like we don’t care if the congregation falls apart, or can’t pay its bills or doesn’t have enough volunteers to carry out the ministries we struggle to accomplish?  Do we sometimes act like we don’t care that non believers or lapsed believers will be destroyed by God’s own hand when the end times come?

We can get lackadaisical because there has never been a time when there wasn’t some kind of destruction, be it by nature or terrorists, or greedy wall street bankers.   But Jesus wants us to know the time has surely come.  Now that we know this, what is the right path to follow?  One is mentioned here: “Do not be afraid!”  But we all do fear wars and deceivers, earthquakes, famines and plagues?  But Jesus promises the faithful that:

“Not a hair of your head will perish.  By your endurance you will gain your souls.”

Jesus knows because he also faced destruction.  He endured the humiliation of a trial, the excruciating pain from the whip and the cross, the finality of death and the grave. He endured all this to prevent the  annihilation of mankind from the earth and from the presence of God.  He was the gift of a loving Father who knows his children, and wants them back from the brutal ways they have developed, from the hell they create in this world, from those schemes that make us believe we could find heaven through self destruction be that by becoming human bombs, by drugs, by beliefs that make human fabrications divine, by trusting in our ability to know what is right and then believing that you and I even have the power to do what is right all by ourselves.

All these signs show us that without God there will be no justice, no peace, only hopelessness.  We need to proclaim to the world that it is not in our power, in our strength, but it is in our Savior that we have the power to be saved  and to save the world.

Pastor Roy Oswald writes in the forward to Jill Hudson’s book When Better Isn’t Enough: Evaluation Tools for the 21st-Century Church:

… Jill Hudson explodes two myths we find in many congregations.  The first is that we can grow without changing. …
The second myth congregations hold on to for dear life is that we can change without conflict. [p. xi]

If the coming of Jesus brings change, and change is going to produce conflict, then trying to avoid conflict to make everyone happy will mean avoiding our call to follow Jesus.  Can we not see that for our faith in Christ to grow that Temple had to be destroyed.  Change has a cost, and that cost produces conflict.  People who can’t change or deal with the conflict leave, and even that change can bring growth.  Jesus is teaching us not to fear change, but to embrace the sign of Jesus’ coming.  If we stay on the path, if we continue the mission, if we face unafraid any conflict, and hold on to our conviction to share Jesus’ story with the world, we will gain new life – for ourselves, for the congregation, and for the people who come to believe the gospel we have shared.

Our Christian faith does not remove us from conflict, but, we might say, it gives us a purpose and a use for the conflict – For conflict becomes times and places and opportunities to witness to the grace of God revealed in Jesus.

AMEN