18/11/07 (2 before Advent)
Luke 21:5-19
What is the future of this planet? Doom and gloom is the answer of many TV programmes - a nice little bit of old fashioned fear raises the audience figures, probably. It seems that if we avoid disaster from H5N1 mutating into a viral cause of a 'flu pandemic we'll be devastated by terrorism, and if we avoid that we'll be annihilated by global warming, and if that doesn't happen we'll be overcome by a super volcanic eruption, or we'll suffer a direct hit from a large meteor.... it's not very hopeful, is it? Jesus tells us there is hope. BUT hope is the light at the end of the tunnel - there will be much suffering first.
What exactly is Jesus thinking of in the gospel reading and similar passages? It seems that there are two 'ends' in sight. One is the end of the Jewish state, which happened a few decades later in AD70. The other is the end of the age, which hasn't happened yet. The difficulty is disentangling the two; the language is dramatic, and may well be poetic rather than literal, and more of it may refer to the destruction of Jerusalem and the events leading up to that than is obvious at first sight. So Jesus' references to 'fearful events and great signs from heaven' may be a poetic way of telling us that the end of the temple is of great significance.
The destruction of the temple in AD70 certainly was of great spiritual significance. The whole of the Old Testament underlined the importance of worshipping God in the city he had chosen, in the way he had decreed. The sacrificial system was given as a way of atoning for sin and enabling fellowship with God. And hadn't Jesus himself said that nothing would be taken from the law until 'everything is accomplished'? The fact that the law was now impossible to keep was seen by Christians to mean only one thing: everything had been accomplished by Jesus, and a new door to fellowship with God had been opened.
The destruction of Jerusalem was a time of great suffering for the Jews. There was a terrible siege, and when the city was taken the soldiers were merciless, killing the inhabitants and razing the city to the ground. The Jews stayed on in Palestine, but the Bar Kokhba revolt 60 years later was met with even more terrible slaughter, and the Jews were scattered across the Empire with only a few small farming communities remaining in places such as Galilee. The Christian community largely escaped this suffering; they saw it coming, and remembered Jesus' warnings, and fled in time.
I cannot help but feel that there is more to Jesus' words than this. I believe they also refer to events before his return to earth to bring this age to an end before the creation of a new heaven and earth. Be that as it may, the lesson for us is not to be surprised at suffering, and to believe that despite appearances God is at work to bring a new age of peace and perfection into being. Note also the surprising words of verses 16 and 18 - some of you will be put to death, but not a hair of your head will perish. Death will not have the last word!.
Questions:
1) Where do you see hope in the circles in which you move? Where is hope needed?
2) Some people think persecution refines the church. In what ways does the church need refining, and how might that happen?