|
|
Are We There Yet?
Luke 21: 5 – 19 |
|
|
Summary
When Will This Be? Anyone who has ever traveled with children is familiar with this question: “Are we there yet?” Children have little patience when it comes to long car rides. Of course, the same is true with us on the long ride of history. As Jesus begins to tell his followers what is going to happen to them in their very near future, they act like little children stuck in the back seat on a long trip, immediately they want to know “when will this be?” There is no doubt this is a common characteristic of human nature. We want to know what the future holds. Whether we are trying to invest in a stock market that is up and down or trying to decide which car will give us the best value for our money, peering into the future is a constant human activity. What we can know When we look into the unknown, what are some things we can actually know? For one thing, we know that whatever is happening right now, whatever is real for us is going to change. The great Greek historian Heraclitus said, “You cannot step into the same river twice.” In other words, as soon as you put your first foot in the river, the river has moved on. We can be certain of that as we gaze into the future. Just look at all the changes over the last 50 years. Think about how the education system, religion, politics and science have changed. What about all the changes in the world just since September 11, 2001. That river we call reality is constantly moving on. We can be certain that what was perfectly clear today will be perfectly cloudy tomorrow. We can take that to the bank. In our scripture reading for today, Jesus was making this point in spectacular fashion with his followers. And not just about something temporal. He was talking about the temple, the holiest and most sacred of all places for first-century Jews. Of course, Jesus was also reading the signs of the times. With Roman occupation rubbing at the very core of Jewish nationalism, Jesus knew that trouble was coming. He knew that eventually extremists would provoke an uprising against Rome and the stones of the temple would fall. That is precisely what happened within 40 years of Jesus’ death. He saw with prophetic precision where the nation of Israel was headed. The same is true for us. We know things are going to change, and if we pay attention to signs of the times, those social and economic trends, sometimes we can guess where the changes will actually take place and what form they will take. We may not have the visionary precision of Jesus, but if we pay attention, we can at least tell what direction the river is flowing. What we cannot know The other constant quality of human nature is the craving to know what we cannot possibly know. Jesus’ words, with their apocalyptic quality, certainly send us into our desire to know about the end of time. Not only do we want to know what is going to happen next, but we also want to know when that great promise of scripture is going to be fulfilled. When will the kingdom of God fully and finally come? When will the great injustices of history be resolved? When will we see the Son of Man coming on clouds of heaven? There is a pretty good an industry that has grown up around the suggestion that there are hints and clues that will tell us what we obviously cannot know. Even Jesus said in Matthew 24:36 that he did not know. And even if we are not dealing with the huge climax of history, we wonder about our own end. We know that death is in our future, but we don’t know when or how. Certainly part of our desire to unravel the mystery of an unfolding future has to do with our own personal part of it. What we should know So we know things are going to change. We may not be able to predict what they are, but we know things are going to be different down the road. We also believe that God has a plan for history and that He is in control, even if we cannot know exactly when and how it is going to come about. Albert Einstein once said; “God does not play dice with the universe. There is an order, a purpose and a destination.” So in the meantime, what are we supposed to do? How are we to live with all these uncertainties? Is it possible for us to simply block out our natural interest about tomorrow? And what do we do with all that anxiety that comes from knowing our own mortality? The world may not end in our lifetime, but our life on this earth will not go on forever. First, we should act on the best knowledge we have. Over time, we learn and experience things we know are true. For example, if we are married, then fidelity, loyalty and devotion for our spouse are things we know to do. If we have children, caring for them, loving them, providing for their physical and emotional needs are things we know we should do. If we have a job, faithfully performing our job, working hard and honestly to advance what the goal of our employment involves does not require any distressing surprise. Show up for work every day and do our job to the best of our ability. In other words, as we try to pick our way through life looking into an unknown and unknowable tomorrow, the best thing we can do along the way is to do exactly what we do know. Sooner or later the future will reveal itself to us in the form of a new now. When that happens, we can respond accordingly. In the meantime, we should do to the best of our ability the last thing we understood and saw clearly. What does the future hold? Jesus’ words about the end of the temple and the warning of coming persecutions may not sound like the kind of future we would like to enjoy. But we have to be honest with ourselves. Since we cannot know what tomorrow brings, we must be prepared for good or bad news. No one could have predicted what happened on September 11, 2001, or how the world would change because of those tragic events. Now we know. But there is an undercurrent to the biblical notion about the future that should inform our questions and our thoughts about it. We believe that God has created the world purposefully. There is an order to that creation that suggests a plan, maybe even a dream. God invites us in faith to embrace that order, that dream. We may not know what tomorrow will hold, but we can trust that eventually God makes all things right. This is the source of Christian hope. Tomorrow may bring us personal tragedy. We may witness national catastrophe on the scale of the fall of the Jerusalem temple or the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. But these disasters do not define for us the character of God’s ultimate reality. As we embrace the notion that at the heart of the universe there is a plan, we are able also to embrace hope. And hope will sustain us no matter what may come. Heraclitus was most certainly correct. Life is like a flowing river and we can never put our foot in the same river twice. But the promise we have from God is the river. It may change; we may change with it. But because of the grace of God, the river will always be there. |
||
