Sermon by:
The Rev. Pamela Dolan
“Apocalypse Now“
Nov 17, 2024
Reading: The Gospel of Mark 13:1-8
If you are a film buff, the word “apocalypse” may bring to mind images from the 1977 movie Apocalypse Now, images of the terror and darkness, violence and death, associated with war at its most malign and chaotic depths. This is just one of many examples of how our cultural idea of apocalypse focuses almost exclusively on destruction, collapse, and even the end times. Common synonyms for the word “apocalypse” are disaster, calamity, catastrophe, and inferno.
And yet, as I have probably said every year around this time, the original meaning of the Greek noun “apokalypsis” is something that is being unveiled or uncovered. An apocalypse, then, is a revelation, a truth telling. And so, if Jesus seems to be offering an apocalyptic word to his disciples in today’s Gospel, we need to silence whatever alarm bells start going off in our minds in order to become alert to what truth Jesus is revealing, to them and to us.
To be sure, we could say that Jesus, in all of the Gospel accounts, is always going about the business of revealing truth to anyone who is willing to listen and learn and be changed by their encounters with him. Jesus speaks truth and Jesus is truth, so we come close to the truth whenever we come close to Jesus by attending to his words and actions. And yet it’s also important to note that in the Gospel of Mark, which we have been reading off and on in church since last December, the emphasis on truth and revelation has a particular slant and urgency to it.
Mark’s Gospel is known for its senes of immediacy; one of his favorite words is “at once” or “suddenly.” And that includes the idea that some new dimension of truth is being revealed in the present moment. Listen again to the very first appearance of Jesus in this Gospel: “Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the good news of God and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”
Jesus arrives on the scene in this Gospel fully formed, not as a helpless baby but as a grownup prophet announcing a new reality that is breaking into the world now. The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is near. The response required by this new reality, the change of heart and of life, is also in the present tense: repent and believe. Not tomorrow. Today.
In other words, in Mark’s Gospel Jesus really does proclaim an apocalypse now. The old ways are crumbling, old powers falling, like trees releasing their leaves to make room for new growth. So, is that a bad thing, something to fill us with fear and trembling? It can certainly sound that way in some passages. And yet Mark tells us in his very first chapter that Jesus arrives proclaiming the Good News of God. Good news, news that liberates and brings healing and encouragement to the downtrodden.
Here in today’s passage, as Mark’s Gospel is drawing near to its climax and conclusion, we have almost come full circle. Jesus and his disciples have made it to Jerusalem, and what they see there fills the disciples with awe. “What large stones and large buildings,” they gasp, and (I hope you’ll forgive me) I can’t help but think of Dorothy arriving in the Emerald City. They’re thunderstruck, but by all the wrong things.
Jesus, of course, sees everything differently. He notices the widow who has been convinced that she should give even her last red cent away. He sees how the goodness of the Temple has become corrupted by people greedy for wealth and power. Jesus is utterly uncompromising in his condemnation of any system that exploits the poor, whether it is upheld by political or religious institutions and leaders. What Jesus reveals, both the rottenness at the core of the power structures and his nonviolent resistance to it, is therefore very good news to widows, orphans, and all other marginalized persons. It is only the rich and powerful who will look at what Jesus is revealing and feel afraid, or angry, or threatened.
Yesterday, I saw a news alert with a picture of a group of armed men marching through a neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio carrying flags emblazoned with swastikas. Images like that are also an apocalypse, of sorts, a revealing of the forces of hatred and bigotry that some of us once naively believed were a thing of the past. It was a privilege to be that naïve, and a privilege that we must relinquish if we are going to stand up to what is happening.
Retired Methodist pastor Steve Garnaas-Holmes wrote a poetic reflection on today’s Gospel passage that is helping me think through, or maybe feel through, a path forward in these difficult times we are facing. He wrote,
When things fall apart, when chaos and fracture surround us,
we can stay whole.
When fear and anger rule, we can stay faithful to love.
When the temple comes down, don’t panic;
stay kind.
Empire will come and plunder,
but they can’t take the light in you.
They can’t take your courage to choose.
They can’t take your commitment to live with grace.|
No one can take the Beloved from you.
That tender, strong presence is in you to stay.
Despite what falls around us,
tend to what rises within us.[i]
I hope these words resonate with you as well. They seem to offer a kind of prescription for dealing with an apocalypse, in the sense of old systems collapsing and new ways of being coming slowly to light. I truly believe that we, the people of St. Martin’s and many of the people in our community, can follow this prescription. We can stay whole, despite the fracturing and disruption around us. We can stay faithful to love, rather than giving in to anger or fear. We can stay kind.
When we tend to what rises in us, we can choose to live by our core values of faith, hope, and love. We can remain committed to truth and courageous in our resistance to evil and corruption. Nobody can take away our light, because our light comes from God. That light has never been obliterated by darkness, and it never will.
Above all, the tender, strong presence of Christ is in us to stay. That is the promise of our baptism, which is renewed and made real whenever we come together for Communion. That is why we say “Amen” or “So be it” when we receive the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist. The real presence of Christ is here, now, among us and within us, nourishing our bodies, our souls, and our communities. Let us tend to that presence in ourselves and in one another, trusting that God will sustain us through what comes. Amen.
[i] https://unfoldinglight.net/2024/11/11/all-will-be-thrown-down/