Messages, Meditations, and Musings on the Life of Faith by Rev. Dr. Scott E. Olson, Interim Pastor, Christ Lutheran Church, Preston, MN

Sunday, July 30, 2017

"Back to the Future" - Sermon for the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost

Back to the Future
Pentecost 8 – Summer Series
July 30, 2017
Grace, Mankato, MN
Revelation 21.1-6; 22.1-5

One of my favorite cartoons has a young girl walking into the living room and, upon seeing her father, asks him what he is doing. “Nothing,” he replies. After a moment of thoughtfulness she says, “Then how do you know when you are finished?”

Today’s scripture reading calls to mind a variation. A son, seeing his father leaving says, “Where are you going?” “Nowhere in particular,” he says. The boy responds, “Then how do you know when you get there?”

Jon Kabat-Zinn, director of a stress reduction clinic and center for mindfulness in medicine at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center has written a book on mindfulness. Mindfulness is the practice of being in the present moment, because the present moment is the only one you have. In true Buddhist fashion, Kabat-Zinn’s book is titled, Wherever You Go, There You Are. So one wonders, can you both be going somewhere and yet have already arrived?

At this point, you might be wondering if this sermon is going anywhere, but the answer in Revelation seems to be a resounding “Yes!” We are both already there and yet on the way. We’ve come to the end of an all-too-brief excursion into the most perplexing book in the Bible. We’ve said this is more of a letter to churches than a literal blueprint for the end of time. Though the author John gives people a vision of the future, it’s not what people these days think.

The letter is written to churches in western Asia Minor, now Turkey, who are struggling with what it means to be church in the midst of the Roman Empire. Through the genre of apocalyptic literature, using wild visions and bizarre imagery, John wants to remind us that it is God who is in control of history, not some pseudo-god called Caesar. And, we remember from the first week, this God is the Creator God, maker of all that is “seen and unseen” as our Creeds tell us.

There’s a reason Revelation is at the end of the Bible, though not for the reasons that many people assume. It’s there because the Bible ends where it began, with the Creator God bringing forth all things out of chaos. It ends with the image of a garden just as it begins, but with significant differences. These differences underscore the idea that creation is heading somewhere, both back to the beginning and forward to the future at the same time. For the Bible is the story of God creating something and not giving up on it (or on us.) God isn’t done yet.

There are three brief points that I’d like you to take home with you today about this passage. First, Revelation reinforces what the whole Bible says, that God continually comes down to us. We’re not going to be raptured up into the air (there is no rapture in Revelation). You see, we don’t have to get to God, because God always comes down to us.

The second point follows: in addition to the garden in Genesis and here in Revelation there is a third garden in between that has great significance for creation. Arguably, the most important event for the world took place in a garden containing an empty tomb, the resurrection of Jesus.

The third final point that I’d like you to take with you is an appreciation for what the newness of creation will be like. Paradoxically, it will be the same creation we have now, only different. Some Christians believe we don’t need to care for this earth because they think that God gives us a new one. Really. First of all, John tells us that the new creation is going to come down and be smack dab in the middle of us. Second, God invites us to begin living into that new creation here and now, not in some unknown eternity. We’re not called to neither escape this world nor trash it, but to join with God as co-creators, just as Adam and Eve.

We who are gripped by just such a vision that God presents ask how this might shape our life in the here and now as we wait for its completion. We respond by figuring out a way to provide emergency shelter for the homeless during the winter and by feeding hungry college students and the food insecure. We do it by supporting missionaries who provide eye care in developing countries and helping people read the Bible in their native language. We do it by wiping away the tears of those grieving the death of loved ones such as the Reedstrom family this past week. We do it by visiting the sick by teaching the young about God’s love.

Our God who created all things continues to create in, with and through us. That’s where we are and that’s where we are going. Amen.

2 comments:

  1. Thank you pastor. I truly enjoy reading your sermons. I still have a hard time hearing and this allows me to really concentrate on what you are saying.

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  2. You're welcome, Oscar. It's so good to have you in church when you are able to be here. God bless!

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