The Rev. Leah D. Schade
Advent 1, Dec. 1, 2013
Matthew 24:36-44; Romans 13:11-14
There they were – the faithful followers eagerly awaiting
the coming of God’s Kingdom. They stood
gawking up at the sky with a calendar in one hand and a stop watch in the
other. They were giddy with an
excitement that had spread far and wide.
Surely, the time was almost upon them – the end was almost here!
Am I talking about the disciples with Jesus? No!
I’m talking about the followers of Harold Camping who had convinced
thousands of people that May 21, 2011, would be the end of the world as we know
it.
Family Radio Network, the company that sponsored Camping,
had a huge countdown clock on their website.
They spent millions of dollars advertising about the
end-of-the-world. No matter that the
89-year-old man had been wrong before in his 1994 end-times prediction. This time he was sure he had gotten it
right. The hype was unbelievable.
And then the hour arrived - 6:00 on May 21st came
and went. No earthquakes rumbled across
the planet. No fire fell from the
sky. The planet kept on spinning as it
has done for billions of years. One of
Camping’s devoted followers stood in the middle of New York’s Times Square,
after having spent his own money to put up advertising about the end of the
world, nearly speechless with confusion and disbelief. “I can’t tell you what I feel right now . . .
I don’t understand it. I don’t
know. I don’t understand what
happened. Obviously I haven’t understood
it correctly because we’re still here,” he said.[1]
Well, he’s in good company.
Because Jesus himself said he didn’t even know when the end of the world
would occur. “But about that day and
hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the
Father.” Strange that even the Son of
God did not claim to know the end of time, but Harold Camping, like so many
apocalyptic fanatics before him, were so sure.
Of course, we all breathed a little sigh of relief on May 22. I called a friend of mine that day and said
jokingly, “Oh, I’m so disappointed to get hold of you. I thought for sure you’d have been taken up
in the rapture by now.” And we had a
good laugh. But then then we soberly
reflected on a deeper reality. The world
actually did come to an end for tens
of thousands of people on May 21, 2011. In
fact, 70,000 people died that day.
That’s approximately how many people die every day on the earth. Endings are a natural part of life. What is distressing is how many of those
deaths were due to human cruelty and systemic evil. In fact, 7000 of the people who died on May
21 suffered from entirely preventable maladies such as malaria, water-borne
illnesses, infections, and hunger – all in the poorest places on earth. People in those areas don’t get hyped up
about global cataclysmic catastrophes.
The end of the world has already swept through their villages, lives and
bodies, with or without Harold Camping’s predictions.
The real sin is just how much money was spent on this
end-times campaign for absolutely no reason.
“Family Radio spent millions on more than 5,000 billboards and 20 RVs
plastered with the doomsday message. In
2009, the nonprofit reported in IRS filings that it received $18.3 million in
donations and had assets of more than $104 million, including $34 million in
stocks or other publicly traded securities.”[2]
I know their motivation was to save souls for Jesus. But if you really want to save souls, you
need to spend that money on saving their bodies first. All those millions of dollars could have been
invested in the things that Jesus does call us to do: feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the
sick and imprisoned, and help all those who are most vulnerable.
The other reality is that the end is coming. Maybe not today. Maybe not next week, or next month, or even
in the next few years. But and end is
coming to the way of life as we know it.
The sun melting the polar ice caps because of the depleted ozone layer;
hurricanes and climate changes are wreaking havoc on the earth.
People are indeed scared, and with good reason. Always the next terrorist attack looms on the grey horizon. Always the random act of violence or the planned military attack of so-called enemy nations threatens our peaceful existence.
People are indeed scared, and with good reason. Always the next terrorist attack looms on the grey horizon. Always the random act of violence or the planned military attack of so-called enemy nations threatens our peaceful existence.
But no matter how much we try to distract or protect
ourselves from it -- bad things are going to happen. There was the flood
of the typhoon in the Philippines and Hurricane Sandy before that and Hurricane
Katrina before that, and many more catastrophic weather events to come.
And at some point, the world as you know it is going to come to an end. You will get the news from your doctor that will change your world. You will lose your job or retire. Your relationship with who you thought would be your life partner will end. Your friend or family member will die. You will die.
Two women set out for work in
the morning. One comes home in the
evening, one does not. Two men are
making supper, one collapses suddenly, one is still standing.
But there is a fine line between being prepared and being
worried to the point of distraction. It’s very easy to tip from having a
healthy concern about the future, to reacting with fear about what might
happen. And our culture and the consumer machine around us feeds on this
fear, reaping an incredible amount of wealth from our intangible feelings of
worry and dread.
So what are we going to do with this? How do we live with the reality of the end times in whatever form they come? Well, look again at our Scripture from Luke and Acts. Jesus instructs his disciples to “keep awake.” The Greek word is “gregorio” and it means to keep watch, to pay attention, to wake up.
So what are we going to do with this? How do we live with the reality of the end times in whatever form they come? Well, look again at our Scripture from Luke and Acts. Jesus instructs his disciples to “keep awake.” The Greek word is “gregorio” and it means to keep watch, to pay attention, to wake up.
How do we do that?
Our Buddhist friends have a word for this. It’s called “mindfulness.” It means being in the moment, attending to
your life, keeping your attention on the people and tasks before you. It means putting aside those things that are
trying to distract our brains from paying attention.
In our consumerist culture it is becoming increasingly
harder to do this. It saddened and
angered me on Thanksgiving that the one day that has been respected as sacred
time in our country has now been violated by stores opening as early as 6 p.m.
for shopping. Thanksgiving was the one
interfaith Sabbath day in our pluralistic society – a day regarded as holy, set
apart from the frenzy of acquiring more and more. But a line was crossed this year, and not
even that day is sacred anymore. How are
we supposed to pay attention to the things that really matter – family,
friends, serving the community, and simply resting – when we are distracted by
blaring announcements of “incredible store-wide savings”! Not to mention all the workers who are forced
to choose between their jobs and their families when the corporate demand for “more”
violates their sacred time.
Christians, this is where our message becomes
countercultural and will be regarded with hostility by many. Our Scriptures are very clear that there are
values that ground us to the love of God and hopeful expectation for the coming
of Christ. St. Paul reminds us to “lay
aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light, [to] live honorably
as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not by giving in to extreme
sensual pleasure or disregarding the sacredness of time and space, not in
fighting or desiring what others have,” (Romans 14:12-13, paraphrase).
I invite you to live your life differently this Advent. Instead of succumbing to the cultural and
consumerist expectations of spending hundreds of dollars on presents, that you talk with your family
and friends about giving the gift of “presence” instead. Presence – meaning spending time together,
talking, listening, walking, creating, doing something that does not require
the exchange of money.
It may feel awkward at first, and you may even feel like you’re
letting people down or copping out. But remember
– it is not God who is telling you to put thousands of dollars on your credit
card. It is not Jesus who is demanding
that you worship at the altar of the mall.
It is not the Holy Spirit who is guiding you to aisles and aisles of prettily-packaged
goods all waiting to disappoint as soon as the wrapping is thrown away.
St. Paul says, “Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and
make no provisions for the flesh to gratify its desires.”
People like Harold Camping and advertising executives have a
great deal of money to make from our feelings of inadequacy, our fears, and our
insatiable desires for more. Camping
convinced his followers to give him their money to secure their place with
God. Our capitalist society convinces
its followers to give their money and acquire so many material goods with the
false hope of securing their future and keeping the end away.
The longer I live, the more I am convinced that is the
relationships we cultivate that matter.
Our relationships with our friends and family, our co-workers and people
at church, and especially those who suffer who I don’t even get to see. My relationships with them matter too. I want to live my life paying attention to
them, honoring them, treating them as bearers of Christ. When I do that, I am much less afraid of the
end. I am filled with joy of the Holy
Spirit! I don’t care whether it’s Harold
Camping or or my doctor or my next-door-neighbor who tells me that
the world is coming to an end. I’m going
to say, help me pay attention, Lord.
Show me how I can praise you.
Show me how I can serve your people.
Show me how I can be filled with the Holy Spirit. Show me how I can be ready for the coming of Christ. Amen.
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