Mark 13:1-8
“When will this happen,” the disciples ask Jesus. You may have noticed that for many Christians, this seems to be the most important question the Bible answers. We tend to look at these movements with amusement, and some bewilderment–how do they calm their anxieties and quiet their doubts enough to believe in some Biblically-based calculation?
Their firm estimates are based on their readings of some specific biblical passages like the Gospel today and the reading we had from Daniel. The Gospel reading presents a portion of what is often called the “Little Apocalypse,” as compared to the Big Apocalypse, which would be the Book of Revelation. Apocalyptic writings describe, in strange and often violent imagery, the end of the world. You may notice that as Jesus presents this description he doesn’t answer that all-important question of timing. He offers some rather vague signs of destruction and distress that serve as “birth-pangs.” If you were to read further, you would find more chaos and suffering. The basic message is that things are going to be bad and then get worse.
There’s not a lot of room for hope in apocalyptic visions, but that’s deceptive because the point of these writings is to offer hope. Things are bad and getting worse, but they are not lost. If we look for a code to break in the signs Jesus offers we miss the point. Jesus did not give his disciples a message not meant to be opened until the 21st Century. Mark, who wrote these words down, wasn’t thinking of us as he wrote them. The question this Gospel answers is about hope, not timing.
If you’ve never been able to get all warm and fuzzy over the idea that the world is going to end, then you’re in good company. The world’s end doesn’t sound like Good News because it is not Good News. Well, it’s not good news if you’re not ready. If you know what to do, where to go and how to survive, then you’ll be ok. For those who know how to save themselves in the midst of it all, the coming of the end could be good news.
But here’s the problem: these words were spoken by Jesus, the same Jesus who said that those who seek to save their lives will lose them, and that those who lose their lives for the sake of the Gospel will find them. Jesus is the one who, when his disciples were arguing about who was the best and brightest disciple, put a child in the middle of them all as a role model. Jesus points out that those who think they are so important are not, while those who serve others instead of promoting themselves are the important ones. So how does this end of the world stuff fit in? Is it a bait and switch? Do we follow these lesser teachings just until we figure out the apocalyptic code?
If there’s just one Gospel, it’s not to be found in predictions, no matter how biblically based. What Jesus is offering to his disciples, who sit, although they do not know it, on the edge of disaster, is a pathway of hope. What Mark records for his people who are now living through this chaos is the way of hope, and maybe that’s what we can find as well.
Let me first explain what this hope is not. You may have heard Christians say, “Everything happens for a reason.” Or, “God will never give you more than you can handle.” Neither of these phrases is found in scripture, but yet they seem almost, maybe even hopefully, true. After all, if they were true, then we would know what the limits are. We know, for example, that we can handle bad, probably even badder. But what we can’t handle is worst. So we are safe. God will make sure worst won’t ever happen, not to us. There are limits. Again, if we can understand something, we can control it. So if we can just figure out the reason for whatever problem there might be, then we’ll know what to do–what to change, whom to blame–whatever it takes. As long as everything makes sense, we are safe and in charge.
But here’s the problem: We know there are things that happen for which there are no reasons. Things that, in order to be reasonable, would make God into a monster or an abuser. We know that the worst happens. We know because it has. Like the disciples, whether we know it or not, we are sitting on the edge of disaster–just one wrong turn away from the accident that takes away everything, one diagnosis away, one paycheck away from the end of life as we know it. Add to that the bigger picture, whether it’s the election or the economy or the environment–there are endless scenarios, but they all add up to the same thing: we are not safe. We have very, very good reason to fear. In the midst of that, the Gospel offers hope.
It’s not the safe hope we try to construct with timetables and platitudes meant to limit our vulnerability. It’s hope that rises up in the midst of fear. Jesus doesn’t invite us to cope through denial or pretense or any of the other ways we might manage our fear. His call is to fight back by claiming, in the midst of our fears, the truth.
Who we are never changes–God’s people, called, redeemed, inspired, to follow Christ and be remade in his image. Not even the chaos of the end of the world can change that. Jesus’ disciples saw life as they knew it disappear forever. The Temple was destroyed, and with it everything that symbolized stability and holiness, security and God’s presence. They lost it all, but in the midst of that chaos, through persecution and all the rest that Jesus describes, they built something new. They did not see Christ come in glory, but they did see the glory of something new–a new community, a new way of knowing God and a new way to live.
Even living on the edge of disaster as we are, our call to follow Christ does not change. We claim our identity as God’s people by looking for the signs of the gifts he gives. Jesus saw the Kingdom in the growth of one small seed. We do the same, seeing his victory in the places where life wins, where apathy ends, where connections are made and new life begins. In the places where we recognize, even for a moment, that our enemies are like us, made in God’s image–God wins. When compassion gets a voice and sharing overcomes hostility–that’s Christ’s Kingdom in action. There is a cosmic picture to all of this–Christ does win on a large scale, that’s what the apocalyptic stuff is all about, but that’s not what our eyes are able to see. Living on a smaller, personal scale, it’s the small revelations that will give us the hope we need to gather our courage and live in faith.
The last thing to remember is that we can’t do this alone. We have to encourage each other, witness to one another, and hold each other up in hope–we are Christ to each other.
Apocalyptic hope–hope for the end–may not be what we want to hear. Do not fear–sometimes that is what the Gospel says, but not today. Still Jesus has given us the way through. Perfect love, he says, casts out fear (John 12:1, 1 John 4:7). We’re looking for the signs of that love, knowing that as we find them nothing can hold us down.