"Do not be alarmed, it's going to be ok" - Sermon for Pentecost 25

Sermon:

Text:

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ who tells us it's going to be ok.

Our last reading from Mark this year. Next week is Christ the King and the end of the church year where we’ll read from John, then we’ll start reading from Luke with the First Sunday of Advent the Sunday after Thanksgiving. And today we end up reading from the same chapter of Mark that we started the year with last Advent. Mark 13 “But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come.” 

In today’s reading we see the lines we talked about last week of the temple stones being torn down. And to this four of the disciples come to him and say, Jesus, when is this going to happen?

And Jesus says, don’t let people lead you astray, they’ll say they are me, you’ll hear of wars, of earthquakes, nation rising against nation, famines. Don’t worry, do not be alarmed.

This is a vital text in Mark, because to the author and for the people who it is written, all these things are happening. Mark is being written and first dispersed around 65-75 AD. In 66 AD the Jewish people revolt against the Romans. The Romans in turn slowly destroy their armies, their resolve, and finally in 70 AD, destroy the Temple, throwing it down, stone upon stone, just like Jesus said.

By the time this text is written of the 4 disciples who came to Jesus to ask about it, only John is left, Peter dies before or at the very beginning of the Revolt in 64 or 67 killed by the Romans, James is beheaded in 44 AD by Herod Agrippa, the Judean Ruler put in power by the Romans, Andrew is crucified sometime mid century.

The people who knew Jesus are starting to die, and those who are left are seeing the Jewish culture they were a part of being torn apart and then the Temple, which was still the center of both Judaism and early Christianity is also destroyed, and they don’t know what to do.

In Luther’s time, the Ottoman empire was invading driving deeper and deeper into Europe at the same time the early reformers were trying to figure out what they should do now that they had been kicked out of the Catholic Church.

All of these people, of Jesus' time, of Mark's time, of Luther's time are all asking, is this the end? 

We ask this ourselves all the time. What’s going to come tomorrow? What’s going to happen next? How are we going to deal with that or this? We see shootings at schools and theaters around our country, last April we saw an attack on Garissa University in Kenya that killed 147, on Friday morning suicide bombers killed 41 in Beirut, Lebanon, and Friday evening 153 died in the attacks in Paris. What do we do in light of these when our world seems to fall apart?

And Jesus says. Do not be alarmed. Now, it’s important to note that he doesn’t say, it’s not going to happen. These things will happen, there will be wars, there will be earthquakes, there will be famines, things are going to fall apart around us, but don’t be alarmed. 

In the middle of Chapter 13 which continues it’s warnings of all the things that may happen to us and the disciples Jesus says, “Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” Jesus promises that whatever happens, the promise of eternal life given through Christ on the cross will be there.

I saw a comic this week about Gene Roddenberry, linked here http://theoatmeal.com/comics/plane. It talks about when he was a co-pilot for Pan Am that had an engine catch fire, and as the plane was going down he went into the main cabin and sat next to a woman who was alone and very distressed and told her, It’s going to be ok. 

To quote the comic, He went into the main cabin, to help with the passengers. He sat next to a young woman who was alone. He told her it was going to be okay. It’s going to be okay. He told her this as he watched the engine continue to burn. He told her this as he watched it fall from the wing. He told her this as the fuel lines became exposed, fire overtook the aircraft, the plane pitched downward. “It’s going to be ok.” He told her this knowing that every single person on that plane was about to die. The plane hit hard, crashing into the Syrian desert. The co-pilot and another crew survived the crash, and after search and rescue 22 people ended up surviving the crash.

To us, and to the disciples, and to Luther, Jesus says, it’s going to be ok.

The disciples continued the work of the church, moving on from the destruction of the temple to see that Jesus, their risen Lord, is their center. Luther has a quote attributed to him of “If I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.” 

We must do so too. When things seem to be collapsing, when they actually are collapsing, we need to hear Jesus. Don’t be alarmed, it’s going to be ok. We need to hear Jesus. My love is everlasting. My promise is sure. My grace is sufficient.

As we end this church year and begin the next, we need to remember that the one we wait for has already come, has already taught and has already died and been raised. That's all we need to know.