December 1, 2024 at St. William and St. Peter Churches in Naples. FL
Jeremiah 33: 14-16 + Psalm 25 + 1 Thessalonians 3: 12-4:2 + Luke 21: 25-28, 34-36
For those of you not here in Florida during hurricane season, you might not appreciate what happens when a storm is approaching. Plywood is the big item at hardware stores, and batteries are nowhere to be found. Sandbags are actually sold at Walgreens. The grocery store gets crowded. Bottled water is in short supply, non-perishable foods fly off the shelves, and for some reason that I fail to understand, toilet paper disappears. We are warned over and over again to be prepared, and the intensity of the warning gives someone who has not been here long fear that the final catastrophe is coming, and no one will survive who stays. The Gospels last week and today can easily give us the same fear.
What I’ve begun to realize is that the more often these storms come with these dire warnings, the less I pay attention to them, and that may not be a very good plan. Because, it might carry over to these Gospel warnings as well. We hardly think about or anticipate the end of time and the return of Christ as though it might actually happen, at least in our time. So, we carry on as though it will never happen, at least in our time, and that’s not a very good plan. I think it might cause us to miss something.
The earliest Christian communities felt very certain that the end was near and that Christ was going to come quite soon. When it didn’t happen as they expected, there was disillusionment and doubt began to creep in spoiling their joyful and charitable lives. It is for that reason that the Gospel writers all address the return of Christ at the end with a great deal of intensity and urgency not to frighten people, but to encourage them with wonderful words like: “Stand erect and raise your heads. You are redeemed.”
Now Luke actually says, “Your redemption is at hand.” So, we hear and interpret this message thinking in terms of time or “chronology.” We too often think that this means “soon” Or “tomorrow” or “next week.” Some translations will make that thinking more likely by using the word, “near.” I would like to suggest that there is another way of hearing and thinking about what “near” or “at hand” could mean.
I find it more helpful to think that “near” means vicinity, or location, not “soon.” This is far closer to Luke’s message that “The Kingdom of God is among you. (Luke 17:21)
When “near” or “at hand” becomes immediate locale, rather than tomorrow, then sure enough, the Kingdom of God is upon us. It is around us. It is near, even here, and when Luke says that this generation will not pass away until these things have taken place, he speaking to us. Understanding that “near” is locale rather than a tomorrow that never comes gives us more reason to take our preparation seriously because it is all around us, not yet to come.
We are living in the final and new age when the gates of heaven have been thrown open. Death has been overcome. Goodness and kindness have won a victory of evil and sin. Time is what passes away, not us. What the Gospel announces is simply the end of time which I think is why the sun shall be no more since the sun is our measure of time. It will not be needed. What has begun in Christ Jesus is the new creation. Death was not part of God’s plan with creation, so, it’s over with. We shall not die, but change and move into Divine Life. We need only to raise our heads, look around. See the signs of God’s goodness, love, and mercy. We already live in the Kingdom of God when we live we live like God’s children. Our redemption is at hand. It’s time to rejoice and live like it.