The scriptures referred to are Daniel 12:1-3 and Mark 13:1-8.
We've heard a lot of language recently that makes it sound like we are facing an apocalypse. Unfortunately, we use the word “apocalypse” wrongly. The Greek word means “unveiling,” a revelation of heavenly secrets. But the most sensational aspect of apocalyptic literature, like the books of Daniel and Revelation and today's passage in Mark (cf. Matthew 24 and Luke 21), is God's supernatural breaking into history, when he brings the current evil age to a close and inaugurates his kingdom. So the word “apocalypse” has come to be associated with the end of the present world order and that's all it means to most people. It is not even an exclusively religious term these days. After the world saw the power of the atomic bomb at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it realized that God's wrath was not the only thing capable of bringing about such destruction. Now any worldwide catastrophe is called apocalyptic. It is routinely faced by fictional heroes in TV, movies and in science fiction and fantasy novels. In one episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Giles, Buffy's source of information on demons, announces solemnly that the world is going to end. Buffy and her friends look at him in amazement and say, “Again?” In another episode, her boyfriend says he's going to have to learn the plural for “apocalypse.”
Living in the shadow of a nuclear world war that hasn't yet come to pass, we have become a bit jaded and we make jokes. But the fact is that apocalyptic literature arose from a grim situation for God's people. After Solomon's reign, the kingdom of David split into two nations. The northern one kept the name Israel and the southern one, ruled by David's descendants, called itself Judah after David's tribe, though it also included the tribe of Benjamin. Surrounded by much larger neighbors, the two kingdoms were frequently threatened and sometimes were vassals of the empires that contested for control of the Middle East. Then the Assyrians conquered Israel's capital at Samaria and took its royals, nobles, and other elites into exile. The Assyrians resettled other conquered peoples in their place. These people intermarried with the poorer Israelites left behind and became known as the Samaritans. Israel was no more.
You can imagine the shock to the people of Judah. One of the kingdoms of God's people had been obliterated. Their cousins were swallowed up by the Gentiles and they never returned. They became the legendary “Ten Lost Tribes of Israel.” Then, nearly 150 years later, the successor to the Assyrian empire, the Babylonians, did the same thing to Judah, just as the prophets had warned them. It felt like the end of the world for God's people.
The Jews spent 70 years in exile. Then Cyrus the Persian conquered Babylon and let the Jews return home. Scholars think that it was during and after the Babylonian captivity that many of the historical books of the Bible were edited and put into their final form. Examining their history, the Jews came to agree with the prophets that their downfall could be attributed to their spotty record of only occasional faithfulness to God and obedience to his word.
Empires came and went. Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes, the descendant of one of Alexander the Great's generals, conquered Judea and tried to make the Jews adopt Greek culture. He forbade circumcision and observance of the Sabbath. He commanded that all copies of the Torah be burned. He demanded that the Jewish priests make a sacrifice to Zeus and then he had a pig, the ultimate unclean animal, slaughtered on the altar of God's temple. This was the appalling desecration prophesied by Daniel and which was later used by Jesus as an archetype of a future abomination. (Daniel 11:31; Matthew 24:15) The very existence of Jewish faith and worship were threatened. This is the environment that gave birth to apocalyptic literature.
Apocalyptic literature was a successor to the prophetic writings. In the absence of prophets, religious writers put down visions of how the present evil age would be interrupted by God's judgment in his own good time. Evil would be defeated and those people who remained faithful to God would be rewarded. These visions were meant to encourage and comfort God's suffering people, who were living in a culture that didn't merely disapprove of them but was aggressively intolerant of them. Society rejected them so in apocalyptic writings God rejects that society. Apocalyptic literature rarely offers ethical instruction because they portray the gulf between the faithful and sinners as being too vast.
Because they come out of and depict times when God's people were persecuted and even killed, apocalyptic writings appeal to those who identify with these martyrs. I'll bet they resonate most strongly with our Christian brothers and sisters in Asia, Africa and the Middle East, where persecution of the church still exists. But there are Christians in the developed West who also see our culture as hostile to Christianity and who show a keen interest in the Last Things. Some of them show too much interest. Because I see the true danger of our current times as not one of confrontation with those who want to destroy our faith but of dealing with those who want to co-op and corrupt our faith. Our culture is not trying to wipe out the gospel but to dilute, tweak and amend it. Our problem is not that of being asked to denounce Christ and bow instead to certain idols but of being asked to invoke Christ to bless certain non-Christian ideas. It is an altogether subtler temptation.
This temptation started when the emperor Constantine the Great endorsed Christianity. But he only made it a legal religion, albeit a favored one. When Theodosius 1 made it the official religion of the empire the church acquired political power and authority which corrupted its moral power and authority. It condemned heretics to death and eventually split into factions. In trying to serve both God and the emperor, it confused which things it should give to God and which it should give to Caesar. (Mark 12:17) And it lost its independent voice.
In ancient Israel there wasn't any separation of church and state. But there were schools of prophets who criticized both kings and priests for not acting in accordance with God's word. The twin themes of the prophets were holiness and justice. They were just as concerned with the people's conduct before God as they were with the way they treated the poor. The two are connected. You show respect and love for God by also showing respect and love for the image of God in yourself and others.
Our founding fathers made sure we had a separation of church and state by putting it in the very first amendment to our constitution, along with freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom to assemble with others of like mind. They knew that European countries had official state religions and they wanted to make sure the United States did not. The concern, said James Madison, was for the freedom of religion. He remembered Baptists and Quakers being thrown into jail for preaching their beliefs in the days before the constitution. The government should not be able to tell anyone how to think about God, let alone punish them for following their conscience on the matter. People could not be persecuted for their faith, Christian and non-Christian.
So people with dissenting views have the right to express them. They may voice, print, broadcast and stream their viewpoints. I may not legally shut them up, let alone threaten them with harm. I must tolerate them expressing their views. But I do not have to approve of their views. I can in turn voice, print, broadcast and stream my views. We must tolerate the expression of all views but we needn't approve of them. No one has the right to approval.
This is something that has been forgotten in this country. Ours is a diverse land. We have people of every race, national origin, political view, and sexual orientation. The constitution gives each the right to their own views and the freedom to express those views. Our national unity is not based on uniformity but on mutual commitment to the constitution and the rights it guarantees. That does mean, however, that our unity has been tested by extreme views. At times we have even done things that contradict our stated beliefs in individual rights and freedoms. The Sedition Act, the Dred Scott decision, the forced relocation of Native and Japanese Americans, the House UnAmerican Activities Committee and other regrettable actions have gone against the principles upon which this country was founded. But we usually recover our senses, prodded by those who call us back to those basic principles. We have survived and corrected many of those mistakes.
Both parties in the recent election have made it sound like the other side winning would spell the end of the world as we know it, or at least the end of the country as we know it. This is not the first time an election has been spoken of in apocalyptic terms. So it is important that we listen to our Lord in regard to such things. In our gospel passage today he says, “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. This is but the beginning of the birth pangs.” Really bad and scary things will happen, Jesus says, but this is not yet the end. And we can take comfort from that.
Just 40 years after Jesus said this, the nation of Judea rose up in rebellion against Rome and was defeated. The temple was destroyed, Jerusalem was burned and its walls were demolished. The Jewish historian Josephus estimates that over 1 million people died from violence and from starvation. To the Jews it must have felt like the end of the world. Yet the Jewish people survive to this day.
When Abraham Lincoln was elected, the southern states left the union and the Civil War broke out. Historians estimate that 1.5 million Americans died in that war, more than have died in any other American war and in fact more than have died in all the other American wars combined. The US, however, survives.
Jesus warns us not to confuse him with other false Christs who will arise. And we must not confuse the kingdom of God with our country. As Jesus tells Pilate, his kingdom does not come from this world. (John 18:36) As evidence, he cites the fact that his disciples were not fighting to save him. In fact, when Peter pulled out his sword to save Jesus from arrest, Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Those who live by the sword will die by the sword.” (Matthew 26:52) And then Jesus healed the man whose ear Peter had cut with his sword. (Luke 22:50-51) That is the hallmark of Jesus' kingdom: healing, not violence. Peacemaking, not war.
Will things change after this election? Undoubtedly. But you know what will not change? Our duty as Christians to love God above all and our neighbor as ourselves. (Mark 12:28-31) Our duty to love our enemies and do good to those who hate us. (Luke 6:27) Our duty to feed the hungry, give water to the thirsty, clothe those who need it, care for the sick, visit the imprisoned, and welcome the foreigner. (Matthew 25:34-40) Our duty to help women who have lost their husbands and children who have lost their fathers. (Jeremiah 5:6) The commandments not to murder, commit adultery, steal, say false things about others, or want things that belong to others. (Exodus 20:13-17) The commandment to go and spread the good news of God's love and forgiveness and to make disciples of Jesus. (Matthew 28:19-20) None of those have changed. It's not the end of the world. And even if it is, when Jesus returns he wants to catch us doing those things, the work he has given us to do. (Matthew 24:45-46)
For the first 300 years of its existence, the church lived under emperors, some of which persecuted Christians. Yet they prayed for the emperor and showed him due honor, as both Peter and Paul instructed them. (1 Peter 2:17; 1 Timothy 2:1-2) Whether it was Nero, Caligula, Decius, Valerian, or Diocletian, they were to acknowledge him as emperor. But Jesus was their King. They lived by Roman law. (Romans 13:1-7) But if there was a clear conflict between the laws of men and the law of the Spirit, they obeyed God rather than men. (Acts 5:28-29)
We are Christians who happen to be American, not Americans who happen to be Christian. Our ultimate allegiance is to Jesus, who is not American. He is our King. We are his ambassadors. (2 Corinthians 5:20) And our King commands us to love one another. (John 13:34) We are to love our neighbors, which is anyone we encounter, and we are to love our enemies. So there is no one we can hate. And we must remember that this country, like every country, will one day pass away. Heaven and earth will pass away. (Matthew 24:35) Jesus' kingdom will never pass away. (Daniel 7:14) So let us not put our trust in mortal rulers. (Psalm 146:3) We trust in Jesus Christ alone.
First preached on November 15, 2003. It has been revised and updated.