Comfort in the Face Of . . . 12-3-23

Comfort in the Face Of . . .

1 Cor 1:1-9; Mark 13:24-37

1 Cor 1:1-9

Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes, To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind— just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you— so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Mark 13:24-37

“But in those days, after that suffering, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in clouds’ with great power and glory. Then he will send out the angels, and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven. “From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. “But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.”

Prayer - Lord Jesus, in your first Advent you came to us in our need, you taught, healed, and revealed God’s will for us. We thank you that, even though we could not come to you, you did not hold back but came to us. You reached out to those of us who did not know how to reach out to you. We have fears and doubts about today, greater fears for the future. We wonder what tomorrow holds for us and for our world. We worry that some of our beloved institutions, our accustomed patterns and comfortable habits may be disappearing. We are afraid. Therefore we pray that you would continue to advent among us, to walk with us, and to guide us into the future.  Give us eyes to see your work among us. Keep us alert, watchful and awake, always expecting your advent into our time and place so that when you appear among us we may greet you with joy and allow ourselves to be swept up into your loving purposes for the world. Amen.

          This Sunday’s gospel lesson begins just after the disciples have admired the beauty and eternality of the great stones of the temple. Jesus tells them that the temple is not eternal and time is not so predictable. There is to be a grand, violent overturning and destruction to come. Something new is truly coming.

          Jesus speaks of the present moment apocalyptically, that is, as a time of revelation. That time must be a strange interruption in our ways of thinking and dong because only strange images will do justice to its meaning. God is entering human history, acting decisively to move events toward God’s plans and purposes. Something new is occurring, events so new that they are beyond human abilities to create. The divine work will be so decisive and literally earth shaking, cosmic if you will. Jesus is saying our world is being turned upside down.

          And as we know, anything new comes with pain. Just before this Sunday’s gospel opens, Jesus offers a frank admission, that ‘nations and kingdoms will fight against each other, there will be famines and earthquakes in all sorts of places. These things are just the beginning of the sufferings associated with the end. And the worst of the suffering is yet to come. The darkened sun and moon, the falling stars indicate to Jesus’ listeners and perhaps us today, that something new, earth-shaking, with the associated pain is on the horizon – and we need to be on the lookout, pay attention, be prepared. Promised redemption will come, but as we all are aware, one has to go through the wilderness to get to the Promised Land.

          Three times we are told to be alert, pay attention. We must not only be aware and conscious but also faithful and wise in our interpretation of these revealing moments in time. In times of trial and testing, we can have faith that God’s purposes are being worked out. And yet, Jesus reminds us today that even with the promised good that is coming, there will be some disruption and pain first. In other words, when hard times are around, take comfort because God is at work and will bring new life.

          It is important to note that God’s vindicating work is not tied to any human program, to any political climate, or to any human institution, including and perhaps especially the institution of the church. God’s work is larger than that. The events that are named come as part of the actions of God, not from any human striving. With re-creation comes some shattering, with the planting of something new, there is also the dismantling of something that had gone before.

          Apocalyptic unveiling promises that God is at work above and beyond, and perhaps in spite of our human striving. Beyond the rise and fall of our empires, there comes God’s promised reign. Even the worst and trying of times, are, as all of our time, held in the hands of an active and loving God.

          Human history moves along in fairly predictable paths. But then, occasionally, by the grace of God, God enters human time and takes hold of our history, provoking genuine newness. Although Christ is light and love, his advents, his coming to us in our place and time can instigate change in us and change is almost always costly, even painful, because in some way shape or form we are giving up something old for something new. Sometimes the world does to us what it did to Christ. Whenever Christ shows up, be prepared for something new that humanity could not have created on its own.

          You might think that Jesus, as he approaches the end of his earthly ministry and the horrible torture that awaits him, might promise his frightened followers some reward and bliss for journeying with him. No. Jesus is honest that his promised kingdom comes with a cost, the newness that he brings comes with suffering.

          Consider this, if you walked into our church for the first time this morning and you heard Jesus say, come follow me, be one of my disciples, and oh, by the way, there will be conflict, you will get persecuted, there will be hard times; but come on and follow me. How many of us would jump at the chance to follow Jesus if that was his discipleship message???

          Years ago I remember the great Presbyterian minister, William Sloan Coffin chiding the church for some of its misguided efforts in evangelism by saying, “Got problems in your life? Need help with some of your dilemmas? Answers to all of your questions? Then come to Jesus and he will fix all of that.” Coffin went on to say, “I just can’t lure people to Christ by appealing to their most self-centered, selfish motives and then end up offering them the demanding, commanding Christ who meets us in scripture.” This suggests to me that somehow we have got to figure out a way to present Christian discipleship in ways that challenge, move and dare folks to risk the potential pain that comes with following a suffering savior.

          I’m see three points from Mark’s rather scary message from Jesus. First, Follow Jesus and you can count on pain and suffering. I know you don’t hear that much in my sermons, and I understand that doesn’t promote others to follow Jesus, but there it is. And as you know, throughout all four of the gospels, Jesus says, ‘come and follow me, but it ain’t going to be a joyride hanging out with me – it will be hard, in may even be painful.’

          Second point – we need to stay alert, expectant, hopefully waiting that the advent of Jesus, into our lives, into our world, is potentially painful. Multiple times Jesus repeats these words – ‘watch out, stay alert!’ Times of suffering and persecution are predictable when you are walking and working with Jesus. Don’t let those moments catch you by surprise. But more than that, Jesus is saying that in those watchful and pay attention moments, he, Jesus, shows up too.

          Many of you may recall that when I first got here I spent a lot of time listening and learning – about you, the life and history of our church. Stories of glory as well as narratives of past decisions that turned out to be detrimental to the health of the congregation. This church has been a beacon of faithful life while also enduring times of pain and suffering and more than one or two doubts.

          Then Covid hit – talk about kicking us in the gut and if I am going to be honest with you I wondered at times if we were going to be just another church that died like so many others across our denomination and others. Then we began to talk about coming out of Covid – what did we need to do differently to have a future. We have a lot of strengths even in a smaller church, strengths that could be leveraged into new initiatives. We dreamed and we envisioned and some of those things have come into fruition while others haven’t. One thing I remembered through all of that ‘wilderness time; is that ‘no renewal is possible without growing through some pain.’ There have been some costs to our church to get where we are today – there have been financial costs of air conditioning and roof and painting and electrical repair and a new digital sign. There is also something that I didn’t see when I first came here – hope – and advent is a season of hopeful promise.

          As we enter the season of Advent, the season of coming to, Jesus says that being a follower may mean some difficult, trying, painful times are on the horizon, but most importantly, that he too is also on the horizon. The third and perhaps most important point from out passage this morning is that Jesus is coming, coming to be with us in those dark, difficult, painful moments, bringing us comfort in the face of life’s challenges. The good news of Christ’s promise – I’ll be with you, I’ll come to you, I’ll work through you, even your suffering for me, in order that the whole world gets the good news of my coming Kingdom – and that may very well be something new – thanks be to God – amen.