Seward Methodist Church

Stand Firm

November 13, 2022

Video

Isaiah 65:17-25 and Luke 21:5-19

Jesus’ disciples could not help but be impressed by the Temple. And with good reason. From the accounts that have survived from antiquity, it was quite an impressive structure.

Now, this was not Solomon’s Temple, the one we read about in the Old Testament books of Kings and Chronicles. That was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BC. And it was also not Zerubabbel’s Temple. The Temple was rebuilt by Jewish people returning to Jerusalem in 515 BC, under the governor Zerubabbel. That one was small and unimpressive, by the accounts of those who saw it. This was “Herod’s Temple,” as in Herod the Great. He may have been a murderous psychopath, but he was also quite the builder. He set out to restore the Temple and make it even more impressive than Solomon’s Temple. Work on the project continued for about 70 years. The Temple and its grounds were greatly expanded, and Herod’s Temple was about twice the size of Solomon’s Temple.

He built an enormous platform 100 feet high on which the new temple would sit. From the ground level of the city to the top of the new temple was just shy of 200 feet. The blocks used to build the platform weighed as much as 100 tons. The temple was built of glistening white limestone, and the front of it was clad in gold. It was a symbol of Jewish national identity. Anyone looking at it would probably imagine that such a grand and important building could not be destroyed.

But it was. Within 40 years of Jesus speaking these words, it was destroyed during the Jewish uprising. Jerusalem was captured in 70 AD, after a long and horrifying siege in which people resorted to cannibalism. According to the first century Jewish historian, Josephus, more than a million Jews died in the uprising, mostly in the siege of Jerusalem. In order to crush the Jewish spirit, the Roman general who led the siege, Titus, ordered that the Temple be completely destroyed.

It’s easy to imagine that some things are so large, strong, and important that they will never be destroyed. But there is no such security in this world. The nearest equivalent in our experience would have to be the World Trade Center and its destruction on 9/11. The World Trade Center was the tallest building in the United States. It was a symbol of American wealth and power. But it was destroyed. There is no real security in this world because this world, and everything in it will eventually pass away.

Isaiah’s prophecy, and many other prophecies in Scripture tell us that the end of this world will come, and after it does, there will be a New Creation, a New Heavens and Earth, free from all the corruption and evil of this world. But in between this creation and the one to come stands the Day of the Lord, a cosmic upheaval in which the world as we know it will pass away. While the Day of the Lord is found in both Testaments, the New Testament expands our understanding: It is also the day of Christ’s return.

Jesus relates the Day of the Lord to the destruction of Jerusalem. Now, it’s important here to understand something about the Hebrew way of thinking. In Hebrew thought, events are linked more by type than time. If two events are of a similar type, that was more significant than them being close to each other in time. They might happen hundreds of years apart, but if they are of the same type, you would talk about them in the same breath.

That’s important to understand because in our minds, time is more important. If I talk about A and B together, you’re going to assume that they happen at the same time or very close to each other. Not so in the Hebrew mind. I’ll give you an example: In the minds of many people of a theological persuasion called Dispensationalism, the Jerusalem Temple is going to be rebuilt. It has to be rebuilt so it can be destroyed again. Because the destruction of the Temple and the Day of the Lord happen close together in time in our way of thinking. After all Jesus mentions them side by side, so they must happen close to each other in time. This is why it’s important to understand the cultural mindset of the Bible writers or we misinterpret their writings.

Jesus goes on to describe the kinds of signs that show the Day of the Lord is at hand: First, false messiahs. Second, wars and insurrections. Third, earthquakes. Fourth, famines. Fifth, epidemics. Sixth, strange signs in the heavens. And finally, persecution of the faithful.

Well, let’s check it out, right? False messiahs? Donald Trump or Barack Obama, depending on your political persuasion. Check. Wars and insurrections? Ukraine, January 6th. Check. Earthquakes? Well, those happen all the time, so, check. Famines? There is fear that the war in Ukraine is going to lead to global food shortages, since they produce about a quarter of the world’s grain, so, check again. Epidemics? Oh, yeah, for sure. Signs in the heavens? We just had a lunar eclipse. There’s a solar eclipse in about 18 months, so, sure. Persecution of the faithful? That is happening in many parts of the world, including China, North Africa, and the Middle East. So, check, again. Kind of seems like it checks all the boxes. So the end of the world must be soon, right?

This way of thinking is problematic. Every generation has seen these signs in their own time. So far, they have all been wrong. It is nothing but arrogance to think we are right about the signs when every generation till now has been wrong about them. These things are all basically the normal course of history. Name a ten year span of time when there was not war, famine, earthquakes, and epidemics somewhere in the world! We can’t.

This is not the point of Jesus’ words. One of the Bible scholars I was reading for this morning said this, “Idle preoccupation with prophecies of the end is surely a perversion of the gospel.” He is right. Jesus’ words are not meant to help us predict the future. They are so we can live faithfully in the present! “Be faithful in your witness. Don’t lose faith. Stand firm. Do not panic. Do not be misled.” These are Jesus’ instructions in the midst of an unsettled world.

The Church’s work is to create faithful community, to work for peace, to oppose evil and injustice, and to proclaim God’s word. We are not called to be predictors of the future. Besides, pretty much every “disciple of Jesus” who took it upon themselves to predict the future has ended up looking like a fool, so not a great example to follow. Jesus’ words are to change how we live today, not to let us see into the future.

And Jesus assures us that we do not have to stand firm in our faith alone. When we are persecuted, he promises to stand with us and give us the words to say. We are not alone, and we are not insecure. The world around us may be insecure, but we are not. There is a great paradox here. In one breath, Jesus says, “They will put some of you to death,” and in the next, “Not a hair of your head will perish.” If we stand firm in him, no matter what happens to our bodies, our souls are secure.

The real point of this passage is to strengthen our faith, not to lead us into pointless speculation.

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