ADVENT 2
Sometimes the drama of some of our scripture writers can feel like a bit much, especially in the genre known as apocalyptic literature – something we don’t recognize readily in our time. Both Jewish and Greek apocalyptic imagery is used in this letter - chaos, destruction, fire and earth-shaking power and upheaval that we find hard to stomach but would have been familiar to those receiving this letter. (I like to imagine a first century person trying to make sense of our sarcastic banter-filled romcom genre).
When we struggle with how to read something in the bible, it helps to come back to our question, Who is God and what is God up to?
God is bringing about a future, this letter tells its recipients, in which there is a definitive and dramatic end to evil.
Apocalypse in the Greek means to “uncover, reveal, lay bare, or disclose.” Apocalyptic literature often paints scenes and stories of destruction that tears open the status quo to bring God’s justice and peace by first exposing and revealing all that is for what it really is.
This is good news if you’ve got nothing to hide.
Everything done on this earth will be disclosed, we’re told – no powerful secrets, no profiting on the back of the weak, no back room deals, no human degradation, systemic injustice, no abuse or destruction will prevail, all arrogance and greed and cruelty will be revealed for what it really is.
And God is generous and patient with us. God’s preference is that that everyone let their life and heart be put back in alignment to God’s way of love and connection, so that none have to face the condemnation of judgment. But the bottom line message is that evil will not go on forever, there is an end to it, and what will remain is the very essence of God in Christ – love and belonging goodness, and connection that is stronger, deeper, wider, eternal, and cannot be broken.
That’s what God is up to.
Like many people before us, in many times before this, we, now, are in apocalyptic times. There is a great upheaval and change, things are being revealed, laid open for all to see, and through the chaos and struggle something is coming on the other side of this that we are not yet in. It’s painful, confusing, and the ground beneath us feels very unstable.
And one paradox in apocalyptic times is that when people don’t feel peace, we tend to work against it. In our desperation for security we scramble for footing and we end up pushing away the very thing we long for most. These times are ripe for conspiracy theories – they’re a way to feel powerful and know “the truth,” so predictably, right now we can see them everywhere. And these times are also filled with invitations to demonize each other, demands to pick sides and pass judgment, to define battle lines and destroy enemies.
Friday on the PBS NewsHour Mark Shields said, “…the first thing I learned when I came to Washington [is] that you don't question the motives of somebody on the other side, that they love their country and their children as much as you do. And they may be mistaken, they may be ill-informed, they may be illogical, but you don't start off with, ‘they're evil.’”
Now we start off calling each other evil. And when we don’t even hesitate to label each other as evil, we open the door for evil. We downplay evil and open our hearts to welcome in wider division, deeper hatred, greater revulsion toward our human siblings – we make it ok to threaten others with violence and destruction. We cease to live in our true identity as those who belong to each other and to God. And when we stop seeing others’ humanity we begin to lose our own humanity.
If this is our starting point, how can we ever find peace?
This brings us to our second question. This letter is written to a community struggling to figure out - what is a good life and how do we live it? They were dealing with dissention and strife on top of persecution and suffering, and while people were peddling conspiracy theories among them, they were wondering how to tell what’s true.
“Scoffers are going to scoff” the letter says earlier, exposing with colorful language those whose greed and deception are on full display as they manipulate and lie and take advantage of others for their own gain, undermining the message of Christ. But, when we are stirred up, divided and afraid, exposing lies for what they are just entrenches us further in our division.
So, what do we do? How should we live? Peter answers: We should live like God’s reality is really real. Live in peace. Anticipate God’s future with our lives.
Remember last week we said: Hope is trust in the future that doesn’t come later. And it comes not from within us but from outside us- from God. And that we get to hope through contagious patience, through acknowledging our need, naming the despair and waiting for God’s arrival there.
Hope is what fuels peace.
But while hope meets us from outside us, peace is something we can make. Jesus said, ‘Blessed are the peace-makers.” Peace is the experience of life as God intended - everyone belonging to God and belonging to each other. It is Shalom, completion wholeness – of you and me, of creation, of society, of life. So blessed are the wholeness bearers, the rift-menders and pain-sharers, the unity-rememberers and future-forecasters.
Peace-making is not weakness, capitulation, burying your head in the sand. Peace is the strongest, truest form of life –that God created us for and is leading us to. Peace outlasts all conflict and chaos.
So the most powerful thing we can do in these times is to be peace-makers.
But that means we must first be grounded in peace.
In challenging and uncertain times, without peace ourselves, we will feel threatened and overpowered by chaos and fear, easily persuaded that we should rise up and fight dirty. The way of fear convinces us we are in an urgent, constant, competitive battle - for the soul of our nation, for the future of our church, for the honor of our family, for the integrity of our position, for our own well-being and survival, whatever it is, the stakes, we’re told, are life and death. So we are justified in contributing to the division and pandemonium, because we tell ourselves that if we don’t, then evil –evil ideology, evil decisions, evil policies, evil practices, let’s face it, evil people will win.
But, there’s another way. If we fueled by hope we can be rooted in peace. And hope tells us that nothing is hidden that won’t be revealed, that evil will not stand, that love is stronger and permanent, that all brokenness will be healed and all injustice and wrong will be made right, and the future that doesn’t come later consists of peace, God’s wholeness, and we can right now live from that place.
The Holy Spirit is here, now, already doing that work. It will not end.
We are made free. We need just to let go our crazy tight grip and trust that. We can see each other through eyes washed by grace, hear each other with hearts humbled by belonging, reach out to each other with compassion stirred by recognizing the powerful motivator fear wreaking havoc, that needs love to cast it out.
We can embody that love by sharing each other’s suffering, standing with one another where Jesus is - in our shared vulnerability and weakness. We can live our unity, even in disagreement and disappointment. We can sink into our own forgiveness and walk around forgiving excessively. We can welcome, and welcome, and welcome each other, all others, welcome this whole wide world in all its pain and beauty and let it break us open to welcome it some more, without end, and without fear of losing anything, because we are already found in Christ. We can be people who contribute to wholeness and home, calm and solidarity, people who invest in cooperation, and highlight goodness, and attend to wonder, and celebrate joy, and add harmony whenever, and wherever, and however we can. We can be at-peace peace-makers.
Making us into this is also what God is up to.
Heads up, though: When we live that way in this climate, we will get pushback.
It might look to some like we’re not on “the right side.”
We’re not.
There are no sides. That’s fear talking.
So look past the rhetoric and the noise. See the tender, fearful hearts of our human family members. See the longing of the tired earth and the anxiety of shaky governments and uneasiness of the apocalyptic moment of revealing that we are standing in and, hear this promise today, children of God:
Evil will not prevail. God’s peace will one day be all in all.
So pay attention. God is doing this in the world. And we get to be part of it.
By the Spirit of God moving through our own words and actions, you and I can actually help bring that peace into this life now from the future that is coming. May it be so. Come, Lord Jesus.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment