Vampires and Saints

One of four sermons picked "out of a hat," suggestions offered by the congregation.  This topic, "Vampires and Saints: Who Live Longer," was based on two scripture passage: Leviticus 17:10-14 and Matthew 16:24-28.  The sermon was delivered on July 23, 2017.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life: John 3:16

I am one of those people who enjoy books and programs on the supernatural.  Buffy the Vampire Slayer is one of my favourite shows. “In every generation there is a chosen.  She alone will stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness.”  I read books about werewolves, ghosts, and other supernatural beings.  I like the mythology around the characters and the creativeness that people use to tell the human story through supernatural characters. 

Character created by Joss Whedon

As most of you know, the topic today was chosen out of a hat a few weeks ago.  It read, “Who lives longer: vampires or saints?”  Afterwards, I had a recommendation from someone to watch a program called, “What We Do in the Shadows.”  It’s a film created in New Zealand that feels like a documentary about four vampires who are flatmates.  One of the characters, Nick, is invited to the flat as a meal, but is instead turned into a vampire by one of these flatmates.  He is thrilled by this new journey.  He can fly, he can do a bit of hypnosis, and he can change his appearance, like turning into a bat.  He eagerly shares with regular people this new life, although he is told how important it is to keep it secret.  One day though, he tells the wrong person.  It turns out to be a vampire hunter who comes to their house and kills the oldest of the flatmates.  He’s devastated by what he’s done.  At one point, he’s is in a cafe with a friend and picks up a french fry.  One of the vampires says, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you?”  Nick responds, “Why?” and eats it anyway.  He is then violently ill   He begins to feel that being a vampire is the worst thing that could have happened to him.  He will never see a sunset, he can’t ever eat his favourite food, and his life has to be kept secret.  

Eternal life holds a kind of fascination for many.  The idea of never growing old and living forever seems attractive or sometimes it’s spending eternity with loved ones.  For some, the supernatural expresses this fascination and for others,  this fascination is around eternal life with God in heaven.  What would it mean to live forever?  Like Nick, we might discover it’s not all we hoped.  

One of the books in the bible, Leviticus, carries some of the first laws that God gave to the people of Israel.  In it, we hear of this prohibition on the drinking of blood.  “For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and…the life of every creature—its blood is its life.”  Blood is life.  It’s what flows through our bodies.  If it’s not flowing, we’re dead.  During the time of these laws, it was blood more than anything else that indicated life.  If you lost enough of it, you died.  It makes sense that this would be the one thing that would keep a vampire alive after death.

We even hear this in Jesus’ words before he died.  During the last supper with his disciples, he held up a glass of wine and said, "This is my blood, the blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many."  It’s interesting to have an old law about not drinking blood and then in the gospels hear Jesus, a Jewish man, symbolically talk about drinking his blood.  Blood though is all about life and death.  Jesus knew he would die soon but Jesus also knew that this ritual was a reminder to his disciples that this sacrifice was for them, that his blood, his life, was being poured out for many, so that they might live.  Does this mean life after death or is he talking about life while we’re living?

And what about saints?  In the United Church, and many Protestant churches, saints are seen as those who have gone before us.  When we die we join this communion of saints or we use a phrase from the book of Hebrews, “cloud of witnesses.”  We remember and we honour all those people who have gone before us and who have brought us to where we are today.

In the Catholic Church though saints are seen very differently.  There are particular people who are made saints, which means one can pray to them and they can intercede on our behalf.  Some pray to St. Anthony to help them find lost objects or St. Jude for lost causes.  St. Francis of Assisi is the saint of animals and to whom we attribute the words, “Make me a channel of your peace.”  I read that there are estimates of more than 10,000 people being made saints.  These saints are held up as extraordinary beings and as those who can continue to make a difference in this world after death by performing miracles and hearing and responding to our prayers.

These people are usually remembered as saints after their death because they made such a difference in the world before their death.  They are revered and some are worshipped.  They are seen as performing acts of miracles.  Some even see the line sometimes as being blurred between a god and a saint, but these were regular people. They weren’t perfect people.  Their faith wasn’t perfect.  People often refer to Mother Teresa’s journals expressing her doubts.  People venerated them because they lived their lives in such a profound way that people felt that their ministry must be continuing in some way after death.  They strived to make a difference in the world and must have made quite an impression to be considered as living on in such an extraordinary way.

So who lives longer, vampires or saints?  It’s an odd questions.  My first thought was that vampires aren’t technically alive.  They are dead or “undead”.  Saints are also dead but they live on in a different way, in the hearts of many.  From the stories, I also know that vampires are creatures that keep to the shadows, and most would say they don’t exist.  In a way, this is another kind of death.  They survive, if that’s want you want to call it, by feeding off the blood of other living beings.  While saints survive through story and tradition and the longing by people to connect with the divine, with God.  But who lives longer?  Do you actually know the name of any vampires that aren’t works of fiction?

Let’s look at the root of the question though.  Let’s look at what we mean when we talk about life, living, or even eternal life.  I want to share with you some words by someone who is one of my favourite people right now, Peter Rollins, a philosopher from Ireland.  He

Peter Rollins

talks about Friedrich Nietzsche, a German philosopher from the late 1800s, who tells a story about the secret to happiness.  A mythical figure is asked about the secret to happiness and the answer is to have never been born.  The second secret, because we can’t help being born, is to die quickly.  

It sounds morbid, and defeatist but the point is that we all suffer.  There is no pure happiness in this world.  We all experience pain and loss in our lives.  The point is to a accept that there is this pain, that it cannot be avoided, and then to live life to its fullest anyway.  Rollins wonders whether those who long for life after death aren’t enjoying their current lives and are striving to find this pure happiness.  Rollins expresses the thought that maybe eternal life is a transformation of the very way we experience life.  In fact, he says, we don’t experience life; it’s life that allows us to experience.  

In Matthew's gospel, Jesus tells his disciples, ““If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”  

This is Rollins’ theory:  We all feel this emptiness, this lack, that we try to erase, try to get rid of, try to fill with shiny cars, a bigger house, money, success, sometimes drugs, and sometimes even religion.  The irony is that simply by being and accepting this lack as a part of you, you become more whole. We all have this fantasy that others have achieved happiness. Rollins calls it “the unhappy tyranny of happiness.” We think others have found a way of getting rid of this emptiness. We imagine that our neighbours must be happy with their beautiful house and perfect family.  We imagine that the movie star must be happy with all of his or her success and good looks.  The truth is that we are all trying to find the secret.  We are all trying to fill this void inside of us.  Sometimes when we actually do achieve all our dreams, it’s worse because we realize this wasn’t the solution.  We still feel the emptiness.

Sometimes it’s the dark places that bring us to a whole place.  Sometimes its the places of darkness where we find light and wholeness, or, in Jesus’ words, sometimes we have to lose our life to find it or in order to save your life, you have to lose it first.  

Can we live forever is a medical question, not a theological one.  The theological question is not is there life after death but is life possible before we die.  Death is not the end of life.  Death is what infests life.  It’s not about finding the meaning of life but can we find meaning in life.  

I do not know what happens after we die.  I don’t know if we live forever in another existence, supernaturally or eternally with God.  I don’t know if vampires or saints live longer.  I know that I don’t want to be a vampire and I know that I will never be a saint.  What I do know is that I want to live and live life to it’s fullest.  I want to enjoy every day without longing for a bigger home or more money and success.  I know that life can be full of pain and hurt and that sometimes I will cry out in frustration or in sorrow and curse this life.  But that’s part of being alive.  It’s the highs and the lows of life that give my life meaning.  Instead of questing for happiness or eternal life, I’m going to appreciate the life I’ve got.

What about you?  Are you on a quest for happiness?  Is your goal eternal life?  Are you anxious to leave this life for a new one?  What gives meaning to your life?  Do you need to lose your life to find it?  May God be your guide in this life.  May the Spirit give you strength as you live into those dark places to find your wholeness.  May Christ be with you as you carry your cross and join him on this journey we call life.  May it be so.  Amen.

My Love Affair

I picked up my bible the other day, quite by accident.  I meant to pick up something else, and found the bible in my hand instead.  I realized my mistake right away and went to put it back but I couldn't.  It felt glued to my hand.  It's an average size bible, a New Revised Standard Version, without maps or commentary, but, as I held it, it felt wrong to just put it down.  I held it in my hand, looked at it, and wondered what was drawing me to this book at this time.  I looked at the clock, saw my group book study was about to begin, and intentionally placed the book on my desk where I could pick it up again later.

I continued throughout the day to look at my bible.  I touched it, picked it up, moved it, and stared at it, wondering what was pulling me.

After putting more thought into it, I began to wonder if I was having a love affair with the bible.  I know that sounds crazy, but those are the words that popped into my head.  A love affair.  You see, I am fascinated by the stories of the bible.  I love the poems and some of the phrases and verses.  I love reading commentary on it and learning about people's struggle with it.  I am always wanting to spend more and more time with the bible. 

And actually, what I have realized, is that this love affair is not new and I'm just finally able to name it.  I'm not sure when it started.  I've always had an interest but I think this love affair has heated up recently, from a casual encounter to a deeper sense of longing and purpose.

I know some may have difficulty with calling this fascination with the bible a love affair, partly because it's a book and also because it's a patriarchal book filled with violence, sexual abuse, and some very flawed people.  The bible is far from a romantic, loving novel with happy endings.

But most love affairs are also far from perfect.  I am far from perfect and I can't say I know anyone who is perfect.  My husband and I have been married for 20 years, and we continue to frustrate and get annoyed with one another, pick at each other's flaws, and wish we were different.  I still want to remain married, but our relationship comes with good and bad.  Our love affair has its ups and downs, but it holds my fascination and I still long to spend time with my husband.

After 20 years, my love affair with my husband is still growing strong.  He still makes me laugh and I still surprise him.  We look past the imperfections and flaws and try to accept one another for who we are.  We spend time together, grow together, learn from one another, and work hard to make our relationship work. 

My love affair with the bible can be seen similarly.  I've decided to be more intentional about growing and deepening this connection that I feel.  I've known for a little while that it is possible to read the whole bible in a year and that there are websites or apps that provide assistance.  I have found one that I will use and I will start from the beginning, with the book of Genesis and I'm going to use a fairly new translation called, The Inclusive Bible.  

Hopefully, by this time next year, I will have read the entire bible and maybe will be considering a second time through.

I know that some parts will feel inspirational.  Other stories will make me cringe and wonder why I'm doing this.  I know there will be times when it's so boring, that I will want to quit.  All of this really does sound like a relationship though and I look forward to strengthening this relationship and seeing where it takes me.  Love affairs can sometimes be fleeting but they can sometimes grow to be meaningful and long lasting.  We'll see where this one takes me.

Shaken By the Wind

This sermon was preached on July 9, 2017

This summer, in July, I was away for a conference in Chicago at Loyola University.  As a diaconal minister, I am part of an association called Diakonia of the United Church of Canada or DUCC.  DUCC is a member organization of a larger regional group called DOTAC - Diakonia of the Americas and the Caribbean.  This regional group is one of three regions which form the World Federation of Diakonia.  The three regions are DOTAC, DAP (Diakonia in the Asia and the Pacific), and DRAE (Diaconal Region of Africa and Europe).  In Chicago I attended the world assembly, which takes place every four years.  I came across people from Germany, Brazil, Jamaica, Fiji, Australia, South Korea, Japan, Nigeria, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Egypt, and more, including a bunch of Canadians, who were all dressed in red in honour of Canada Day (July 1).  We are diaconal ministers, deacons, deaconesses, lay, ordained, commissioned, consecrated, Reverend, Sister, Rev. Deacon, and more.  

We prayed together, we sang together, we wrestled with scripture, we struggled to understand one another with our different languages and accents and differences of culture, we were inspired, energized, frustrated, exhausted, and happy to be there but happy to go home until we meet again, four years from now, in Darwin, Australia.

The experience that I want to share with you though actually was not a part of the assembly of World Diakonia.  It happened on our day off, on the Sunday.  We were all invited to visit local churches in the area.  I joined a group that went to Trinity United Church of Christ in South Chicago.  Some of you may know this church by reputation.  Jeremiah Wright, who was pastor at Trinity from 1972 to 2008, was past President Obama’s pastor and he made some remarks that were quite controversial during Obama’s presidential campaign.  The pastor there now is Otis Moss III. 

It's very difficult to put into words my experience of worship that morning.  We arrived there just after 9:30 in the morning.  The 7:30 worship service was just leaving.  My first thought was, “Wow.  A 2-hour worship service.  How would people at home reach to that?"  My second impression was that everyone was black.  We were the only white people standing there as people gathered and talked and made ready to leave.  We stuck out like a sore thumb.  A few people approached us and welcomed us.  They asked where we were from and were delighted to hear we were visiting from Canada.  After most had left, we walked into the sanctuary.  It was very large, with a choir loft, very comfortable seats, video cameras for live-stream services, the stain glass windows were scenes of the Exodus and the birth story, all depicted with black people.  There were different instruments, no organ, but a piano, guitar, bass, and drums, and a high ceiling with seats that wrapped around 180 degrees, including the balcony.

People continued to welcome us and then the choir came in and the music began.  There were 91 people in the choir and they were all dressed in white.  The songs were simple and repetitive.  I knew none of them but was singing along in a very short time. People stood and danced.  They raised their hands, clapped their hands, swayed, and sang from the core of their beings.  We held hands and prayed.  We were invited to pray for the person next to us on either side.  We shared in communion.  

The energy and the Spirit in the place was palpable.  You could feel it in your bones.  I was moved to tears more than once by the genuine feeling people had for one another and for God.  People in that building knew Jesus and felt Jesus.  I could feel Jesus that Sunday morning in a church where I knew no one and was a stranger, but I was welcomed and embraced and I felt and knew God’s Spirit was surrounding us all in that place.

The last part of worship was the sermon, offered by an African-American preacher at his finest.  Otis Moss III had just returned from a trip to Ethiopia with 95 people.  The stories and the message he shared would make some white people very uncomfortable, but not us United Church folks.  We laughed and nodded and even shouted an Amen with the rest of them.  

This church went from 70 members back in 1972 to today’s 8500 members after Pastor Jeremiah Wright and Otis Moss III.  Why? What makes this the place to go?  What brings so many together on a Sunday morning?  I think it’s because people feel and know and experience the divine.  Because, according to a song they sang. they can be unashamedly black and unapologetically Christian.  Because they invite the Holy Spirit into their worship and into their lives and let the Spirit open them to new experiences, to each other, and to God.  Now I’ve only been once, but with a membership of 8500 people, they must be doing something right. The announcements listed programs that continue throughout the summer, including a Saturday farmer’s market, a revival, a youth revival, a justice strategy team, and a summer school that focuses on literacy.  It's obvious that the Spirit I felt during worship is also being brought out into the world and being let loose to do the work of God.

I bet you know where this sermon is leading.  After all, good sermons always bring it back to you, to us, to what’s happening in this community.  Where is the Spirit?  What is the Spirit inspiring us to do?  How do we let the Spirit loose into the world?

I am in no way implying that we be like Trinity United Church in Chicago.  For one thing, that would be totally inappropriate.  This is an African-American church, a people who have been oppressed for hundreds of years, taken from their home country, subjugated in slavery, treated as less than human, and still fighting against racism and intolerance.  That is their culture, their history, and their story.  

What is our story?  This was one of the themes of the sermon that day.  Tell your story.  Don't let others tell your story.  If you don’t tell your story, if you lose your story, you die.  When they traveled to Ethiopia, they were told that Ethiopia is the only country that was never colonized.  They know their story.  No one else tells their story.  White people have not taken their story.  African-Americans are reclaiming their story and telling it boldly.  

What is our story?  What is the good news we share?  What is the story that tells others about who we are as a community.  Diakonia across the globe is also reclaiming their story, as individual member organizations and as a world body.  We celebrated our 70th year of being a Federation, while recognizing thousands of years of service in the world.  We are learning our history and telling our story so that we don’t die, so that we can live and share the good news of the love of Christ, so that we can do the work God has called us to do. 

What is our story?  Is this what many faith communities are struggling with?  Have we forgotten our story?  Have we stopped reading the bible, stopped sharing the good news, stopped praying and putting our trust in God, stopped being a people of Christ in the world?  Are we forgetting our story?  Have we become a people who gather with no actual reason?  Have we become a club that only gathers to hang out with one another, make rules about membership and have meetings that have nothing to do with our mission.  Do we have a mission?

What would it look like for St. Paul’s to be filled with the Spirit?  What would it look like for the people of this church to come to worship and feel Christ, to know God is with them, to experience the Holy Spirit pushing them out of their pews and into the world?  In what ways do we need to let go and let the Spirit loose?  Where do you feel God in your life?  I’m not asking when you think about God, or talk about God, or read about God.  I’m talking about your heart, your gut.  When do you feel Jesus with you?  Where do you feel the Spirit?  What are you doing that was inspired by a call or a push by the Spirit?  What could you be doing if you were following that call?  Is something holding you back?  Are we a church that wants to control the Spirit or do we have the wisdom to get out of the way and let the Spirit move us in unexpected ways, unplanned ways, maybe even unwanted ways?  

The first two verses in our bible, from the New International Version, read, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”  The Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.  When the Spirit hovers, you know something is going to happen.  God spoke into that darkness and creation was born.  Light cut into the darkness, land took shape, and creatures filled the earth.  That’s powerful stuff!

I think the Spirit is hovering now.  There is the potential for something to happen.  God is speaking but are we listening?  This time, God is leaving it up to us.  This time, we are the creators.  What will we create?  What will happen when we let the Spirit loose into the world?  A new direction?  A new vision?  A new creation?  Let’s get our egos and our need for control out of the way and find out, shall we?  Let’s open our hearts, open our minds, share the story, and let the Spirit loose.  May it be so.  Amen.

A New Heaven and a New Earth

Preached on June 18, 2017 - Week 5 of a 5-Week Sermon Series on the Revelation of John 
Revelation 21:1-5 & Revelation 21:22-22:5

When a group of people are bombarded over and over again by hate, oppression, warfare, and neglect, they sometimes begin to imagine how they might be rescued from all the pain and suffering. They live in such a world of violence and instability that nothing makes sense so they try and make sense of it. Sometimes that means imagining a world where God intervenes to end the pain and suffering. Some cry out and wonder where is God while others have visions and write apocalyptic letters.

When the Jewish temple was destroyed the first time, almost six hundred years before Jesus, and the Israelite people exiled from their home to live in Babylon, there were apocalyptic writings promising God’s vengeance and salvation. In the time of Jesus, there were several more of these types of writings. The Jewish people were subjugated and under the thumb of the Roman empire. Violent rebellions were fought against the Romans in which thousands of people were killed horrifically, many of them crucified. About 30 years after Jesus death, in 66CE, their temple in Jerusalem was again destroyed, this time by Roman soldiers and this time beyond repair. This temple was not just a well-loved architectural landmark. Many truly believed that this was where their God resided.

The Book of Revelation is just one example of these writings and the one preserved for all time in our Bible, there to be debated and interpreted, or misinterpreted. Today is the last sermon in a five-week sermon series on the Book of Revelation. 

During Roman times, there were many shrines and temples created to worship several different gods, for example, temples to Aphrodite, the god of love, or temples to Jupiter, the father of the gods, and temples to Mars, the god of war. People went to these temples to burn sacrifices and entreat the gods to intercede for them by granting them riches or healing or protecting their city. For the Jewish people, who had only one god, Yahweh, this temple in Jerusalem was it for them. This is where they took their sacrifices and worshiped their god and pleaded with their god. Now it was gone. It had been demolished. All that’s left today is the Western Wall or what is sometimes called The Wailing Wall.

Western Wall - All that is left

John of Patmos, whose vision is what is recorded in the book of Revelation, was written after the temple in Jerusalem had been completely destroyed. For the Jewish people, this temple was the place of God’s presence. In fact, it is written that when the temple was first built by Solomon, almost one thousand years before Christ, fire and cloud descended from the heavens and filled the temple. So without this temple, how might the people on earth be close to their God?

People imagined that the end was upon them, but the end of what? The end of the world? The end of all life? People are constantly imagining what the end of the world might look like. For us moderns, who are now able to see the earth, the end of the world means a cataclysmic disaster, like a nuclear holocaust or giant asteroid, that would devastate all life as we know it. But in what way do these imaginings bring hope? How are they helpful?

For the past few weeks, I have said that we need to understand the Hebrew bible, or the Old Testament, in order to understand the Book of Revelation. So, we’ll start there. John Dominic Crossan writes, “Israel had long believed in an eventual great Divine Cleanup of the World, an Extreme Makeover: World Edition, in which justice and peace would replace injustice and violence.”1 Here are a few examples of that vision of God’s Kingdom, found in the Hebrew bible. I invite you to imagine the world of which it speaks.

From the prophet Amos:

The time is surely coming, says the Lord,
when the one who plows shall overtake the one who reaps,
and the treader of grapes the one who sows the seed; the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
and all the hills shall flow with it. Amos 9:13

Three passages from the prophet Isaiah:

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines,
of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear.
And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations;
he will swallow up death forever.
Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people
he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.
Isaiah 25:6-8

In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house

shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills;
all the nations shall stream to it.
Many peoples shall come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways
and that we may walk in his paths.” 
Isaiah 2:2-3a

The wolf shall live with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. 
Isaiah 11:6-8

And from the prophet Micah:

He shall judge between many peoples,
and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away;
they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more;
but they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees,
and no one shall make them afraid;
for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken.
Micah 4:3-4

Crossan then writes, “None of these visionary synonyms for the Kingdom of God is about the earth’s destruction or abandonment; they are about its transformation and transfiguration.”2

Many people imagine an apocalypse as the end of the world and that God will judge every living being and take some to heaven and the rest will be thrown into pits of fire. For some, accepting Jesus in your heart, or “being saved”, is the only way to heaven. It’s a very exclusive way of viewing how God loves humanity. Many of the passages you just heard talk about a peaceful and just future for “all peoples,” “all nations,” “God will wipe away the tears for all faces,” and “they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees.” No where does it mention that all peoples need to accept Jesus or the Hebrew god and abandon their own in order to be included in this vision.

John’s revelation, his vision, even up to the last chapters, refers to monsters being thrown into a pit to be tortured for all time, and all the dead rising to stand before God for a final judgement. Those whose names aren’t written in the book of life, join the monsters in the pit. I don’t read the bible literally. I read it metaphorically, especially this book containing a man’s dream. When I read this vision about the separation of people, I interpret it in this way:

In God’s kingdom, there is no wealth. In God’s kingdom, everyone gets an equal share. In God’s kingdom, power is shared and relationship is most important. There are many in our world who could not live with that. All are invited into God’s kingdom, but there are many who reject that invitation, who want to accumulate wealth, sometimes at the expense of others, who like to wield power over others, and who deem themselves to be most important. There is no place for people like this in God’s kingdom and they would not want to live in God’s kingdom. Those who choose God’s kingdom can’t imagine a life outside it, and thus, describe it as hell.

We just heard two scripture readings, favourites that are often used. The first declares a new heaven and a new earth, the making of all things new. The second describes a new way of life, a world with no darkness, a river with the water of life, surrounded by trees that contain all kinds of fruit during all seasons and leaves for the healing of the nations.

You might expect that in this grand vision of a new heaven and a new earth, a new temple might be included. But no. There will be no temple for it is no longer needed. Heaven has come to earth. It is a new place consisting of those who dwelled on earth and in heaven, including the Most High God. God and Jesus will now abide with us.

This beautiful planet earth is not meant to be destroyed. It is our home. Unlike many interpretations of the Book of Revelation, where the earth is destroyed with the second coming of Jesus, and where people don’t care whether the planet will be destroyed because Jesus is going to bring the saved to heaven, it states in the beginning of the 21st chapter of Revelation, that the holy city, the New Jerusalem, will come down out of heaven and that God’s home is among mortals, on this transformed earth, and that God will dwell with people.

And we are meant to collaborate with that transformation. We are not meant to sit back and wait for God to come and do all the work. We are to be a part of that clean up. We are to use our gifts, our bodies, our passions, and our love to work with God in creating a new heaven and a new earth.
Congratulations to all those who made it through all five sermons on the Book of Revelation. Hopefully, this book about one person’s dream of a new world is a little less scary and intimidating, and more hopeful and challenging.

I’ll finish with a quote from N.T. Wright, which I find to be a hopeful statement that
combines the incarnation of Jesus with this apocalyptic vision: “As heaven and earth were joined
together in Jesus; heaven and earth will one day be joined fully and forever.” May it be so.
Amen.

1 Crossan, John Dominic. “How to Read the Bible & Still Be A Christian.” 2016. Harper Collins Publishers: New York. pg 133.
2 Crossan, John Dominic. “How to Read the Bible & Still Be A Christian.” 2016. Harper Collins Publishers: New York. pg 135.

3 Wright, Nicholas Thomas. Revelation: For Everyone. 2011. Westminster John Knox Press. pg 188