A Sermon Based Upon Luke 21: 5-19
By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin
Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership
26th Sunday after Pentecost, November 17,
2013
“They
asked him, “Teacher, when will this be, and what will be the sign that this is
about to take place?” (Luke 21: 7 NRSV).
People are not always good at reading
signs.
In my first pastorate, we lived at an
intersection which was about a mile from the South Fork of the Yadkin. They were working on the bridge that crossed
the river and placed a ‘bridge out’ sign in front of the parsonage. It didn’t help. I wish I had a dollar for every car that went
past that sign only to realize that indeed, the ‘bridge was out’.
In a “Far Side” cartoon, a somewhat
nerdy-looking boy is trying to enter the Midvale School for the Gifted. He’s carrying a book under one arm and leaning
with his other arm, with all his weight, against the door, straining, trying to
push open the door. On the door there is a sign in great big letters that
explains his problem. It reads, “PULL.” That’s us. It doesn’t matter how smart we are. Sometimes what we think we know gets in the
way of what we need to know. We’re not always
good at reading the everyday signs.
(This sermon originates with Jeremy Troxler http://www.faithandleadership.com/sermons/coming-soon. I have adapted it, but I take no credit for originality
of this sermon altogether. His ‘take’ on
the text was that good—like cake. I only
added more icing).
That’s also how it was with Jesus and
the people he had to deal with.
Throughout the Gospels, people are coming up to Jesus and asking for a
sign. One of the most obvious parts of
the New Testament witness is that Jesus did perform miraculous signs, sometimes
performing one wonder after another. John’s
gospel is organized around 7 of them: water into wine, healing of a dying person,
healing of a cripple, the multiplication of bread, calming of the sea, opening
eyes of the blind, and raising of the dead.
But no matter how many signs Jesus gave, people wanted more---always one
more. Even when Jesus is dragged before King Herod, Herod
wants Jesus do a sign.
CAN
YOU READ THE SIGNS?
It’s pretty much the same today,
everybody wants a sign, but few know how to read one, even if they got it. People often go through life pushing at a
door that says, “Pull.” Not long ago a person was nearly killed in an
accident. They barely escaped with their
life. That person still didn’t get
it. Their life hasn’t changed much at
all. They still don’t realize the sign
of deliverance as a gift of another chance.
I know another person who got a bad diagnosis, so the doctor scheduled
them for another test. It was a scary
time, waiting, worrying, and wondering if they were going to live or die. Later, the second test came back negative. They told her that everything is fine. Go back and live your life! You’re o.k.
Do you think they came back to thank Jesus? Even in the Luke we read that 10 lepers got
the ‘sign’ of healing, but only one of them came back to thank God. People get signs all the time. Even seeing the morning sun come up and hearing
the birds sing, those are signs, signs of life, of joy and of hope, they are
signs. Hey, to look into the eyes of
person who cares about you, or to show that care to another, that’s a sign. Signs
are everything. But do you think most
people get it?
At one point, Jesus is so frustrated
with people not getting it, that he throws up his hands in exasperation and
says, “You people look up in the sky, you see the red skin in the morning, and
you say ‘sailors take warning’ “It’s
going to rain!” Or you fell the south wind
blowing and realize hot weather is on the way; you put on your shorts and
T-shirts, and sure enough, the thermometer goes up. You can interpret the signs of the sky, but
why can’t you interpret what it means that Christ has come! What’s up with that?” People are not very good at reading the
signs that that matter. We tend to
ignore them, even when it comes to reading them for the sake of our
health. A person is not exercising and
doesn’t have any energy or breath. A
person can’t fasten their belt in the same loop. Someone keeps on seeing the signs of what
they need to do or what they need not to do, but they just stop seeing,
listening, or reading the signs.
The disciples are not fairing too well
either. In our Gospel story these
disciples are sitting there opposite the massive mega-temple, gaping at the
shining stones and dazzling jewels, perhaps thinking silently that this Temple
building, the central pivot point of Judaism, is will always connects them to
God. Then Jesus, who is unimpressed with
this man-made structure, tells them, “All of that is going to be nothing more
than a pile of rubble.” The disciples, shocked, ask, “Teacher, when will this
be? What will be the sign that this will take place?”
They want to know when the Temple will
be destroyed. They want a sign to look for. Maybe they’re expecting Jesus to
tell them something kind of mysterious, secret knowledge like (as Jeremy
Troxler suggests), “In the month of April, a crow with red eyes will land on
the steeple and caw three times. It will
then be eaten by a hawk wearing a purple ribbon and suddenly lightning will
strike on the north corner and crop circles will appear in the cornfield, Mel
Gibson makes another movie, and then you’ll know” … or something like that. We all want a sign, a signal, a special
knowledge that only we have, that God just gives to his buddies, but is that
realistic for the God of the whole world?
It’s funny, and serious, how Jesus
answers. He tells them what kind of
sign they will have when it all comes down.
It’s kind of silly because it’s so obvious. The sign is not secret, hidden
or mysterious at all. Basically Jesus tells them, “Well, when you see an army
tank come into town, or soldiers marching by this big Temple about to take
over, and they have really big guns, well, that’s when you’ll know they are
going to tear it down.” That’s your sign,
Jesus says, and now here’s my advice: “When you see a great big angry-looking
army about to take over the city, don’t be patriotic, prideful or brave. No,
what I want you to do is not complicated: ‘Tuck your tail and run! Don’t stay for the gun fight, get out of
Dodge! ‘Don’t be a hero, clear and simple: head for the hills!”
There’s no mysterious sign here. It’s a very obvious sign. Even disciples who aren’t very good at reading
signs, who are always pushing on doors that say “Pull” can get this one. It’s like Jesus says, “Trust me, you’ll know. It’s not complicated. The sign will be obvious as the nose on your
face, It’ll be right in front of you and everyone else.” And sure
enough, around the year A.D. 70, about 40 years later, before ‘this generation’
fully passed away’, a large Roman army
encamped around the Temple, and eventually raze it to the ground: and figuratively
speaking, if not also very literally, “not one stone was left on another; every
one of them thrown down. When Jesus
gives a sign it could be trusted. There
was no doubt.
THE
SIGN WE CAN ALL SEE
In the next breath, though, Jesus goes
on to speak of other signs. Jesus moves
from describing the signs of the destruction of the Temple to describing the
signs that will be seen when he returns, when he comes again in final victory. And again, his message is that this final
victory moment will be obvious. They
won’t be secret, mysterious or hidden. He
says, “There will be signs in the sun,
the moon, and the stars, the roaring of the sea, people fainting, the powers of
the heavens shaken, the Son of Man coming in a cloud” (vs. 25-27).
It’s as if Jesus is saying, “In my first
coming, I came in hiddenness, born in a manger, cloaked in human flesh, visible
only to the eyes of faith. But when I
come again in fullness, it will be in power and glory.” It won’t be hidden. As
Revelation says, “He will come with
clouds and every eye will see him…!”
It will be obvious to all, like
when you go to the eye doctor and they ask you to read the largest line of the
eye chart first. The signs will be that clear to see.
And again, we need to understand what
Jesus is saying here is that when the kingdom comes, when the coming age
finally arrives, and Jesus returns to rule as the world’s prince of peace, the
sign that we see can be trusted. There
are no secret messages. There are no
hidden agendas. There will be no
opposing enemies that stand a chance against him. God’s rule will come once and for all, and it
will be clear for the all the world to see.
The message of God’s power will be clear and plain. No one will be left out. No one will be ‘left behind’.
If tomorrow, we see some crazy stuff happening
in the sun, in the and moon, and in stars; and then we see the Son of Man
surfing on a stratus cloud way up at the sky, you won’t need any kind of
preacher, prophet, or doomsday expert to tell you something’s going on. Jesus
makes it absolutely clear: the signs of Kingdom come, the final victory, and
the fulfillment of the Revelation (the unveiling)…whatever you call it and
however it looks, it will all be so very obvious, you won’t even need Fox News,
CNN or Al Roker to inform you. You also
won’t need C.I Scofield Notes, Hal Lindsey, Tim LaHaye, nor Ouija boards nor any other prophetic key.
Here’s the sign that matters most: In a sense, the sign of the end is always
near. Like I heard someone say a
few weeks ago, “I left home without kissing my wife and kids, and then suddenly
I realized, hey, I might never come back.”
The end is always near to any and all of us. And when it comes, Jesus says, “Trust what
I’m telling you---you’ll know it.” You don’t
have to be like the little kid on the long car trip who keeps asking every ten
minutes, “Are we there yet?” “Are we almost there yet?” When we get there,
we’ll all know. This is what Jesus keeps
trying to get across to his disciples. Stop wondering, quit your worrying, and get
back to work…when it’s time to quit you’ll know. We’ll all know. If everybody can’t see it, then you better
realize you’re probably seeing things.
As Governor Sarah Palin, once told Senator Joe Biden, “It’s just ain’t
so, Joe!
In early American history, a bunch of
Baptist got all hyped up thinking they could figure out when the end would
come. They all followed the teaching of
a man named William Miller who used a man-made scheme of numbering in the Bible
to figure out when he thought the end would come. It just happened to come out to 1833 New
England. I guess that’s a good a time as
any. People were so convinced that he
was right that they all sold everything and even got on their roof tops to wait
on the moment. People said they were all
crazy. Other’s didn’t see it. They should have realized that what Jesus
said is true. If everybody doesn’t see,
then you don’t see it either. But they
didn’t think it through. They were all
fooled. But do you know what they did
anyway. They didn’t go back to church
and ask for forgiveness, but they started a new denomination. The denomination of Jesus is 'coming soon'.
People still don’t realize that there is
no sign unless everybody sees it. You,
nor I, nor anyone will have an inside scoop.
Hey, Jesus didn’t even say, you needed your Bible to figure it out. When it happens, ‘they will see’, or ‘you will see’---and we
all will see. It will be that
clear.
THE
SIGN JESUS WANTS US TO SEE
So what do we do ‘in the meantime’? Are we almost there? That’s the wrong question because the ‘last days’ started 2000 years ago. Jesus gave us signs that the new age had
come close when he performed signs that the Kingdom of God had broken in
among us. God’s future is not something we have to wait
on in the future, but God’s future has already entered into our present. Jesus says, “It is at hand,” which means it’s come as close as the hand at the
end of our arm. It is “at hand” (Mark 1.15).
The kingdom has come and it’s still coming. The train of God’s final redemption has
already left the station, and we can hear its far-off whistle. Don’t you remember what it was like when you
first visited Tweetsie as a child, with your children or with your
grandkids? You enter the theme park
and you can hear it coming. You can’t
help but feel the excitement. That’s how
close God’s kingdom is. It’s coming around the mountain. Scripture defines it as
‘close’ and ‘soon.’, but ‘soon’ could mean tomorrow, it could mean a thousand
years from now, but soon means it’s really coming. Soon means we are one day closer to it today
than we were yesterday. This is where
Jesus takes us in this text: One day it will be fulfilled, and when that day comes
there will be no doubt, no hidden messages, but it will be plain and clear.
But
there is one final sign: This is the ‘sign’ that Jesus is looking for
and wants all to see, more than anything else. Jesus is much more interested in the signs to
be seen here on earth, than the signs to be seen in the heavens -- not signs in
the sun and moon and stars, but signs in me and you, and in us. Jesus says, in these final verses, that we’re
not so much looking for signs, but WE are signs.
We are the Signs of God’s kingdom. We are the sign before the signs. We live
the heavenly life here on earth, signs pointing to God’s good future and final
victory.
The theologian Karl Barth had a painting
of the crucifixion in the wall of his study that was painted by the artist
Matthias Grunewald. In the painting there is an image of John the Baptist, his
extra long finger raised this way, directing and pointing the onlooker to the
cross of Jesus in the center of the painting. It’s said that when Barth would
talk with a visitor about this work of great art, he would direct them to the
image of John the Baptist in the painting, and he would say, “I want to be that
finger.” I want to be a sign pointing to the victory of Christ. It is a victory already present in me, but it
is coming for us all and for the whole world. Could that be what the football player might mean when he scores and points to the sky. A bigger victory is coming and the victory begins with me?
Now, do you see how Jesus tells us, not only
how to read the signs, but how to BE a sign—a sign that the kingdom has come
near and will be fulfilled. Jesus says to
them and to us: “Be on guard that your
hearts are not weighed down….. Don't be constantly drunk with wine or with worry, but stay prepared (vs 34)---now that’s a good sign: staying sober and
sane because you have purpose. Then, Jesus
gives another sign: “Be alert at all times and pray to escape all these things because you are
ready to ‘stand before’ the Son of Man” (vs 36). Along with staying sane and sober, be a person of constant prayer in hope---now that’s another good sign. When we are people who know the Lord
now, who read the book, and know how the story ends, knowing in our hearts that
in the end, God wins; when we know how God
has already won our hearts, and we are living a life of love, grace and hope, so hopeful that we
are not running away from God, but we are staying with God and standing hopeful in the world, because he is in us, and we ourselves are a sign. When 'we' are a sign, we don’t have to stand on a street corner
holding a sign that says “The End is Near”,
but our life is a sign saying: “Lift up your head, Redemption is
Near” because God is as close as me to you. We are the beachhead of the kingdom. We are like the preview or trailer of the
movie that makes people look forward to seeing the full show. We're the warm-up act that gets people pumped
up for the concert. We're the
appetizer that makes people hunger for the full feast -- like the moment we
were before supper, Teresa gave me a taste of that new ice cream called Chunky
Monkey, and then later she gave me full cup. People don’t have to gaze into a crystal Bible
ball to look into the future. They can simply look at the life of the faithful,
loving Christian who is sober, alert, ready and hopeful. This is the sign Jesus wants us to be, and the world to see, right
now.
It was a wet summer and the leaves
remained green longer than normal. But
if you looked around in early September, even though the trees were still very green,
you might have seen a maple somewhere, with a one bright leaf that had already fallen
in a yard. Maybe that leaf is was
bright yellow, brilliant orange, or if you’re lucky, a vivid red that looked
like it’s on fire. It’s only one, but it
looks so different from all the others are green or already turned brown. That one single leaf has a story to tell, doesn’t
it? It’s says: “More leaves will be
turning and following after me, so get the rake or leaf blower ready.” It says:
Fall is coming. A change is in the air. Beauty
is coming. Believe it will happen.” “Look at the fig tree…”So also, when you see these things taking
place, you know that the kingdom of God is near” (vs. 29-31). We are that leaf. We are ahead of time. We are the sign that change that is coming, of
the beauty that is about to follow. We can shine some color now and be
beautiful. We don’t wait for the world to change, or for everything else to
change its color. We can go ahead and be changed. We can point others to what is coming and live
the heavenly life now. We can be a sign of God’s peace and purpose for the
world.
This world will set up all kinds of
signs for people, telling them -- us -- which way to go. Some tell people to
push when the door really only opens with a pull. Most of
them are stop signs. Most of them say
that the road we are travelling on is a dead end. There is no other way you can go. But the church of Jesus sets up another sign
in the world: “Coming Soon.” We are a sign.
A ‘soon’ sign. And we are the only
‘soon’ sign Jesus gives that can be trusted.
Amen.
