Suddenly everything falls apart.
The life we knew is over.
Where do we find the hope to go on? X2
Have you ever felt like that?
Do you feel that now?
We all will.
The 13th chapter of Mark’s Gospel is often called the “little apocalypse”.
Every year this happens, we start heading into the holiday season, and the Church begins a season of apocalyptic scripture lessons, reminding us of the great mystery of God’s Judgment.
It is important to let these scriptures sink in and remind us in a way that is true, not false.
We are surrounded by a great deal immature and poisonous understandings of apocalyptic scripture lessons, whether it is the latest incarnation of Hal Lindsey’s The Late Great Planet Earth, or the utterly hateful Left Behind series, the false prophets of bad religion love to twist God’s Judgment for their own gain.
This bad religion always comes down to: “I’m in, you’re out”.
Brothers and Sisters this is simply a lie, it is piety rotting on the vine.
The truth is that we can’t say much for sure about God’s Judgment, other than it can be trusted to be just, merciful and good.
The truth about apocalyptic scripture lessons is that they are not about putting down the latest victim dejure.
The truth is that they are about hope.
Hope for those for whom everything has fallen apart, whose old life has ended, who are looking for hope to go on.
War, injustice, disaster, refugees, lost, rootless, homeless, death, illness, betrayal all the things that come along suddenly and strip away all the relationships that make for life, all the things that send us running for the hills just to survive.
When the earth, when human society just can’t take any more abuse and things start falling apart.
When the waters of chaos flood and devour all that live.
We are given a vision of God pushing back the flood, and starting life anew, of cutting those days short.
God’s judgment is much more than doing away with all the evil doers who like a desolating sacrilege break the back of the world until the biosphere collapses, until human community collapses.
God’s judgment is about much more than that.
It is about hope, and healing, and faith and trust, and open ended mystery for all those at the end of their rope, at the end of their lives.
To read, mark, learn and inwardly digest apocalyptic scripture is to set aside judgment and trust it to God, who alone can pull it off and make it right.
To embrace and ever hold fast the blessed of everlasting life, which has been given to us, given, in our Savior Jesus Christ is to have a heart like God’s for all those who have been left out in the cold.
It is to be like the Grinch who stole Christmas whose heart suddenly grew to the point of bursting, bursting to be a life that brings gifts to others, not destruction, blessing not curse.
To truly be reminded by these apocalyptic lessons is to pray like mother Teresa when she asked God, to “break my heart so completely that the whole world falls in.”X2
Make no mistake God’s judgment is fierce, but it is also beautiful, it brings hope and light, and thanksgiving.
May our hearts be so completely broken that the whole world falls in.
That no one is left behind.