Lessons designated by the Common Lectionary include: Jeremiah 33: 14-16, Psalm 25: 1-10, I Thessalonians 3: 9-13 and Luke: 21: 25-36.
Our gospel lection this week challenges us to think about the anticipated second coming of Christ. It begins by telling us “there will be…distress among nations…People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world…Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down… and that day does not catch you unexpectedly like a trap.”
Considering the wars that impoverish us, the economy that divides us, the environment that pollutes us and the normal negativities of viruses, sickness and death that never leave us unthreatened, I’d say that we seem to be moving in the direction of this prophecy. Despite our resistance there seems to be a persistent awareness our world is about to smash into something. According to apocalyptic imagery and myth, when conditions get sufficiently out of hand, God will pronounce a great “no” or an ending in which there is both terror and promise. The terror is the judgment of God for abandoning God’s ways, and the promise is that God will vanquish evil and set things eternally right.
But what do we do until then? If the “worst” is to happen, no one really knows the day or the hour, so scripture admonishes us to be ready at all times. It seems that we’re in a period of trial and that the outcome is uncertain. Long ago, when Luke wrote the warning of our lection for this week, he almost seems to instigate despair, but then gave words that can provide us with a hope that won’t betray. For he continues, “And then they shall see the Son of Man coming on a cloud with great power and glory. When all this happens, stand upright and hold your heads high because your liberation is near.” (Luke 21:27-28)
So what can we do until then? We can stand upright and hold our heads high. We can remove needless, crippling fear. We can steer clear of either bland optimism or destructive pessimism.
I’m told that in boating, when there’s a danger of running aground there is often a safe channel marked by red and black markers. To steer between them has become a proverb for laying a prudent course with disaster waiting both to the right and to the left. Navigators know what it means when one says, “Red right returning.” As we move toward whatever the Second Advent of Christ means to us, we can steer between the red marker of optimism and the black marker of pessimism.
It is true that we live in perilous times. If it’s not the environment and the dangers of climate change, it’s the threat of fundamentalisms producing people of venom and hate who regard others as somehow less than human. For most of us with any semblance of conscience in our nation, it’s the disparity of rich and poor heightened by increasing unemployment, or the absence of adequate health care for millions of our citizens. Yes, we are facing some serious crises which are not helped by the bland optimisms or avoidance mentalities of many a religious leader. But if the role of the optimist is played out, so is the role of the disgruntled pessimist. Either way we have people who have quit doing anything. It doesn’t seem to me to be responsible to allow the wave of the future sweep over us with no preparation and no response. There is a course that will build order out of faith in God and a reverence and respect for human life — an order strong enough to resist assaults from without because it is strong enough to resist disintegration from within. While it may be that all of our efforts will be of no consequence in the framework of what God’s intends, if we look to the authority Christ as a direction and guide, we can stay between those black and red markers and trust the future.
The narrative for this week tells us that Christ is coming. It tells us that the Second Advent will destroy the remaining power of Satan (evil) over the human family. Until then, our story directs us to participate in the healing of creation and to trust that God’s purposes will in the end overcome the evil personified by Satan. And in this every one of us has a constructive role to play. The conviction of God’s providence comes only by looking as steadily as we can at Jesus and the love that stands so steadfast in him. When we see this we’ll join those early Christians, who didn’t say out of some kind of despair, “look what the world has come to!” but rather, “look what has come and continues to come into the world.”
Advent reminds us that we will yet “see the Son of Man coming on a cloud with great power and glory.” Until then and when all this happens, “stand upright and hold your heads high because your liberation is near.”
Our confident story from Luke this week tells us that ultimately our future is in God’s hands.
Ralph Ahlberg


