It’s wonderful to be here with you this morning. I look forward to this all week long. True, wonderful things go on here day after day, but it all comes together on the Lord’s Day.
There’s no other gathering like this. Men and women, children and adults, young and old, rich and poor, retired and still working, white-collar and blue-collar, Democrat and Republican, conservative and liberal—we look forward to coming together on the Lord’s Day and worshipping almighty God though our Lord Jesus Christ. And we look forward to seeing one another, renewing ties of friendship and love. What binds us together—who binds us together—is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He is why we are here. He has called us into being and made us members of his Body.
And I love this time of year. We are nearing the end of the long green season, the season that doesn’t have a name of its own. We call it the season after Pentecost. It’s not the season of Pentecost. It’s the season after Pentecost. And it lasts for about six months. At the end of the season, it takes on a different character, however. In fact, it becomes rather like Advent, and the Gospel, and sometimes other readings, have to do with the end of time.
That was the case today. The Prophet Malachi, who is greatly concerned that wicked people prosper and people trying to be faithful suffer, foretells a day when everything will be set right. He prophesies that “all evildoers will be stubble” and “for those who fear the Lord’s name the sun of righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings.”
The New Testament Church in the first few decades believed that Jesus was coming again in their lifetimes. In the Church at Thessalonica some of the people actually gave up working for a living, just waiting for the end to come. St. Paul writes to them: “If anyone will not work, let him not eat.” He goes on to command those who had become idle “to do their work in quietness and to earn their own living.” St. Paul certainly worked tirelessly for the spread of the Gospel. In the beginning of his ministry he clearly thought that Jesus would return in his lifetime, but as time passed and Jesus did not return, he came to the conclusion that it would probably not happen in his lifetime.
Do you know what the years 650 A.D., 1836, 1840, the dates 22 October 1844, and 28 June 1981 have in common? They were all predicted times of the Second Coming of Christ. St. Augustine thought it would happen by the year 650, John Wesley by the year 1836, Martin Luther by 1840, the Baptist preacher William Miller predicted the actual day of 22 October 1844. Some of you may remember when Bill Maupin, pastor of the Lighthouse Gospel Tract Foundation in Tucson, Arizona, predicted the 28th of June 1981 as the date when Christ would return. He and his congregation sold all of their possessions and went up on a hill to wait for the coming of the Lord on that day.
What does Jesus say concerning predicting when he will come again? “Of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.” In today’s Gospel, Jesus says, “Take heed that you are not led astray.”
Our Lord does talk about the end, and in today’s Gospel he links it to the destruction of the Temple, although that would only be a part of the end, which would also include wars and tumults, nations rising against each other, earthquakes, and famines. As a result of how Jesus depicts the end, the Church finally realized that whatever the time, whether we’re talking about the first century or the 21st century, we are in the Last Days. That’s how we should live our lives, for Jesus can come at any time.
People loved to go to the Temple in Jerusalem. In fact, every good Jew was supposed to go to the Temple whenever possible. The beauty of the Temple was unsurpassed. It stood at the heart of the Holy City Jerusalem. At this time it was the third to be erected on that site. The first had been erected by Solomon and had stood for 400 hundred years until it was destroyed in 587 B.C. by the Babylonians. After the return from exile, the second Temple was erected and remained intact for 500 years, but it was desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes in 167 B.C. In 20 B.C., King Herod the Great undertook the rebuilding of the Temple which, according to the historian Josephus, was twice as large as the previous two Temples. Herod put 10,000 people to work and trained 1000 priests as masons so that they could work on the most sacred parts of the Temple. It took ten years to build, but the work of decoration continued for many years.
It must have been one of the wonders of the world. Some of the blocks of green or white marble measured 67 and a half feet in length, 7 and a half feet high, and 9 feet wide. The eastern front and part of the side walls were covered with gold-plate, flashing in the sun. The rest of it was gleaming white. The pillars of the Temple were columns of white marble, forty feet high, each made of one single block of stone. Within it were permanent memorials placed there by great rulers of the world: a table from Ptolemy; a chain from Agrippa; a golden vine from Herod the Great, which was the most famous. The vine was made of solid gold, each of whose clusters was as tall as a human being. It is no wonder that the Temple inspired awe in everyone who saw it.
It was this Temple whose destruction Jesus foretold: “As for these things you see,” he told his disciples, the days will come when there shall not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.” Indeed, the Temple was destroyed, along with much of Jerusalem, in A.D. 70, by the Roman armies, some 40 years after Jesus’ resurrection.
What if Jesus were somehow to make it known to us, without a doubt, that he is coming in the very near future? How would people respond? Even if the evidence was overwhelming, some would not believe it and would continue on with business as usual. Many others, however, would move their faith up to first priority. There would be a tremendous increase in church attendance. Book stores would sell out of Bibles and prayer books. Families would find the time to pray together. Reconciliations would take place. There would be an increase in helping the needy, good things long put off would be accomplished. And, dare I mention it; the results of our pledge drive would be a rector’s dream come true!
Yet, not one thing I have mentioned should be extraordinary for the Christian. There are many sayings of Jesus in the Gospel that speak of preparing for his return, that speak of the present age as the Last Days. I am convinced that he did this in order to urge us to live our lives from the perspective of their end. How different our priorities would be, how sweet each breath taken, how zealous we would be in loving God and one another, if we lived each day as if it were our last. Our Lord did not speak of the end to inspire fear, but in order to encourage us to live abundantly in the present. Annie Dillard said something similar when she said, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.”
We are indeed blessed to be here this morning. And part of what happens, as we gather, every Lord’s Day, is encouragement to live our lives from the perspective of their end, that each day’s living may be richly abundant.
Sermon preached by the Very Reverend Fredrick A. Robinson
The Church of the Redeemer
Sarasota, Florida
26th Sunday after Pentecost
17 November 2013