Rev. Rosa Lee Harden,
November 28, 2004

Isaiah 2:1-5 Romans 13:11-14; Matthew 24:36-44

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                     I actually can't remember if on this first
Sunday of Advent that I've actually used this well-known
business axiom ...
                     Begin with the End in Mind ...
              But I know that every year, when I am thinking
and praying about how to approach this important task of
preaching at the beginning of the church year that I am
fascinated with the reality that "beginning with the end in
mind" is exactly what we do.
               Every year ... on Advent One we begin by looking
at what it is that we understand about what will be our end.
               This year, in Matthew, we have Jesus telling us to
stay watchful. We do not know when God will sound the
trumpet to signal the end of the world. It will happen like a
thief coming in the night. Two will be in the field; one will
be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding
meal together; one will be taken and one will be left.
               Apocalyptic literature at its highest and best:
unpredicatable, shocking, frightening ...
               I spent many an evening when I was a child
wondering if I would be taken ... or would I be left behind!
               How would I ever know if I was safe?
               How would I feel if I was taken, but my parents
were left behind?
               Or if my parents were taken and I left behind?
               It was frightening. Preachers pounding that scary
message into my brain.
               For years it seemed to me that being frightened of
what God has ultimately planned for us was the only
response that made any sense at all.

               This country is over-run (if book sales are any
indicator) with people fascinated by this idea that we are in
relationship with a god who is leaving us in the dark about
how the end will come about. You're not going to know ...
               Watch Out!
               You could be Left Behind!!

               The 'left-behind' series of books, stories that focus
primarily on what some believe will be the end of the world,
grounded in this particular passage of scripture have
become all-time best sellers.
               I have not read any of them, however comma, if
they instill the same kind of fear in their readers that
preachers of my youth gave me based on this same passage,
then we have a country full of folks who are clamoring to
believe that our God is the master thief in the night, a
trickster who sneaks in and takes some away to live with
God in glory, and leaves others ... who were not prepared
....    behind!
               I KNOW that this is what many of us were taught
when we were children. And I KNOW that this is how many
of us STILL read this particular passage of scripture.
               When we begin with THAT end in mind, then
where are we headed?
               Everything we do matters for one reason and one
reason only ...
               Will we get to go to heaven and be with God?
                             or will we be left behind?

Do we love our neighbors?
              Well, we do if we don't want to be left behind!
Do we work for peace and justice on this earth?
              I may not WANT to,  but if I don't ...
                     I might get left behind!
Do we respect the dignity of every human being?
              Well, we have to, don't we,
                     if we don't want to be left behind!

              And, yes, we DO begin with the end in mind. I
believe that our whole life experience  --- our world view ---
is shaped by our understanding of our ulimate end.

              As Christians we live our lives headed toward
God. With God coming to us: Coming to be one of us ...
Living among us ... Living IN us ...
              What we understand about what it is that God has
ultimately in store for us shapes us ... forms us ... instructs
us about how WE are to act in this world in the here and
now.
              Andrew Greeley, the famous fiction writer,
Roman Catholic priest and serious sociologist, points us to
studies he has done that show that people who understand
god as one who deeply loves us are essentially more loving
people, behave in more loving ways to their partners than
those who understand God as punishing, and vengeful.
              He has even been able to make this direct
correlation between understanding God as loving and our
level of satisfaction in our lives on a sexual level.
              Did you hear me?
              If we understand God as loving and lover we are
likely to be more sexually fulfilled in our relationships with
our partners!

              Okay ... now ... I'm glad I have your attention ...
I'm glad because what I am about to say is very important.
              How we understand who God is ... What our
image of god is ... and what we believe about where we are
headed ...
              MATTERS!
                    DEEPLY!

              It is not some silly theological principal that clergy
like to argue about but doesn't really matter to people in the
pew.
              Your image of God as one who loves you
unconditionally vs. one who is angry about us being sinners
and had to sacrifice his son to save you makes a difference
about how you live in the world.
              It makes a difference about how you treat others.
It makes a difference about how you will live out your life.
              George Lakoff, a Berkeley linguist and cognitive
scientist has been telling us for the last few months that
people on both the right and the left believe in family values,
but they believe in different kinds of parents.
              People who are more likely to agree with the
decision to send troops in a preemptive strike believe,
according to Lakoff, in a disciplining parent. They believe
there are things in the child that must be curbed, or they will
get out of control ... dangerously ...
              They believe there are influences in the world that
are dangerous and if you partake of them, or in too deep of
contact with them it will be like a slippery slope of one
choice after another leading you to be with those who are
left behind.
              The opposite view, that even expresses itself in a
different political philosophy, holds that there is a nurturing
parent. Those parents' responsibility is to guide the child, to
help the child express their gifts in the world in the way that
suits them best.
              It is about living life with an expansive view, as
opposed to a protective view. Since each child has unique
gifts, each child, with the gifts he or she brings is valued for
exactly who they are, not asked to obey a preconceived
model of what is thought to be the one safe way to live in the
world.
             That's what Lackoff tells us about how our
understanding of parenting forms us and our children.
             How much MORE can it shape us, and form us,
when we spend the time and energy looking seriously and
deeply at who our ultimate creator is, developing a
consistent and careful understanding of who God is ... of
what God is up to?

             Folks, this is NOT about who you voted for on
November 2.
             And, at the same time ... this congregation is so
clearly made up of people
             - who value diversity;
             - who questioned the sending of troops to Iraq;
             - who don't see the constitution as an instrument
that should be used to limit personal freedom;
that I feel confident saying that most of us listened to the
news on November 3rd with great dismay.
             The country spoke, and for the most part
disagreed with us. And the news reports were that they did
it because of their MORAL VALUES.
             Well, what are we, we asked?
                                  Chopped liver?

             Why didn't the news reporters understand that
those against the war,
        those who value diversity,
                      those who would vote AGAINST an
amendment banning same-sex marriage,
                            have moral values, too?

             Folks, I want to tell you, I think it is our own
damn fault!
             We have such an understanding of our own
'moral superiority' about our political correctness that we
don't stop to do the hard theological and spiritual work to
connect the dots, much less help other people to understand
who we are and how we are guided by a God who loves us.
             We don't want to offend ...
                            so we don't talk about God at all!
             We've left a huge vacuum in this country, and in
this city for people who believe in God as a punishing parent
to come in and fill that vacuum.
             We HAVE to do the spiritual, theological ... and
dare I say SCRIPTURAL work ... to understand who God is;
what Jesus was saying in texts like this one, or we forfeit the
playing field to those who will use passages like this to tell
us that we must be careful of our every move ... you
fornicators ... adulterers ... liars ... cheats ... whatever ...
             or you will be left behind.
             We have to care about what is going on here. We
have to be willing and able to enter the debate.

             So what is happening in this scripture?
                            Why did Jesus say this?
                    What is this all about?
  
             First of all ...
                    This is hyperbole at its finest ...

             I had an English teacher who told us that we
would flunk sixth-grade if we ever forgot to capitalize a
sentence. She also said she would string us up by our
thumbs if we ever wrote a sentence without a subject and
verb in it.
             I am absolutely certain that in my sixth-grade class
in rural Itawamba County, Mississippi, at that time the
poorest county in the poorest state in the union, somebody
in that class wrote a sentence without a subject and verb.
             And I never, not once, saw any child strung up by
his or her thumbs.

             But Mrs. Comer sure got my attention!

             Jesus WANTS PEOPLE TO PAY ATTENTION!
This is important stuff ...
             Jesus is asking the people following him to take
their relationship with God seriously, to stay awake. He is
telling those who are following him that what they
understand about God, and how God is at work in the world
matters! It matters to you when you are picking grain. It
matters to you as you go about your daily life.
             If you don't pay attention, if you don't stay awake,
you won't be able to know you are encompassed by God's
loving hand ... We need to pay attention to the messages of
God's love, as lived out by Jesus, because if we don't, we
will not be able to live into that love and we will, in very
many ways, be left behind.
             So what do we really think about the end of time?
What is that great ending going to be like?
             Nowhere in Jesus life, do we see ANY evidence
that it is his will or desire to leave folks out ... to leave folks
behind ...
             We even heard in the gospel reading celebrating
the Reign of Christ that Jesus' last words at the end of HIS
earthly life were not:
              Okay Father, all these people who are hanging me
up here need to be added to the list of those who will be left
behind!
              But rather ...
                     "Father, forgive them, for they do not know
what they are doing ..."

              That is the message of God's unending, undying,
love for us. A message of love and forgiveness ... A message
that we need to make sure sinks into the fiber of our being ...
A message that we can be so crystal-clear about that it will
infuse our thinking, that it will live deep within our hearts,
and become the motivator for all that we say and do.
              It is a message that we must refuse to be ashamed
of. We cannot abdicate. We must get over our fears of being
'left behind' socially ... and be willing to speak to the truth.
              The God we believe in is a God of love ... a God
who came to this earth to tell us that God is dwelling in US!
              We believe in a God who longs to be in
relationship with us ... Who came and lived among us ... as
one of us ...
              This is the message we have to share with our
friends ... with our neighbors ... Yes, even with this country
and the world.
              We must learn to speak this truth.
              As much as we fear the word evangelism, we
cannot let the good news go untold.

              Our God is a living, loving, creating, powerful
force who desires the absolute best for us. We are created in
God's image and changed because of that love ... And this
world can be changed, too.
              Can you help me tell that story?