Does the date Dec. 21, 2012 mean anything to you?   

Did you know that the world was going to end Dec. 21, 2012?  (I confess, I did not either…)  Apparently that is the day that the Mayan Long Calendar ‘runs out’ – or at least changes to another whole set of numbers.  On that day, it changes from 12.xx.xx.xx.xx.xx to 13.00.00.00.00 etc.  It would be the equivalent, in our calendar of turning to the year 10,000… Conspiracy theorist, gloom and doom people, and those who are tired of waiting around for the kingdom to come are having a field day with this.  There are 31,200,000 sites having do to with that number….  The end is near, many would have us believe.   

My usual reaction when I listen to these kinds of predictions follows the quote from Mark’s Gospel today.  Jesus didn’t know the day nor the hour.  If he didn’t, and was not too concerned about that fact, why should I be concerned?  Ho hum.  Another movie about the end of the world.  The second coming is coming.  Isn’t that nice?  

However, my prayer and study over today’s readings, both from Daniel and from Mark, make me realize that those responses aren’t exactly the ones that Jesus intended for me to have.  There are three words that kind of bubble through our two readings today: anticipation, awareness and trust.  Both of these readings are examples of a literary style called apocalyptic.  The Greek word apocalyptic means: To take away the veil.  Apocalyptic is all about revealing what has been hidden, inviting people to a new view of reality based, interestingly enough, not on ignoring the future, but upon seeing it clearly.  Apocalyptic literature is all about the coming future where God will put an end to the old order and begin a new one. 

So, when Jesus came onto the scene, what was he doing, but preaching the arrival of that new order.  In the prayer he taught his disciples to pray, he invited them to pray: “Thy kingdom come.”  Don’t over spiritualize that folks.  He was calling his disciples to an awareness that there is a new way of doing things, a new order coming to fruition, and that it was time to get to work making that order come to being. 

How does he do this?  Again, you have to imagine the scene.  His disciples were from Galilee.  Even now, the area is pretty rustic, agrarian, not developed or build up.  The disciples are agog at its size, its splendor, its magnificence.  Coming to the temple area, Jesus takes up a spot opposite the entrance.  He intentionally sits there to develop a tension – what was in the temple and what is to come in his message and person.  Jesus tells them: “All that you see – there will come a day when it is all destroyed.”  You see, the old order WILL pass away – and the new will be revealed.  And it will be cataclysmic if you insist on trying to do things the old way.  Life will be difficult.  SO anticipate the change – and be live in the awareness that you are “just passin’ through…” and you’ll be okay.  You can see the disciples, wide eyed, slowly nodding their heads. 

As he tells them about the fig tree, the lesson becomes clearer.  They must live AWARE, in tune, in touch with the harbingers of change, ready to adapt, ready to respond, ready for that kingdom to happen at any moment.  Like the fig tree approaching summer about to produce fruit, there are moments in your journey when love springs up, when hope become real, when faith gets put into action.  Don’t miss those moments and opportunities.  All these things must take place. Live aware of each chance, each opportunity to make a difference, each moment that can help to bring the new order into being.   

And finally, he says trust.  Don’t worry about the Dec. 21, 2012’s of our world.  Because the details of history’s end are hidden in God, don’t waste a moment energy speculating on them, when you could be using that moment by serving God and others.  Know that life, by definition, can suddenly bring so many unexpected struggles, that the very luminaries in the sky that provide light in the darkness will be thrown down to the earth.  You’ll do no better than to lean your lives upon God’s unfailing grace.   

Dec 21, 2012.  Maybe the world will end then.  Maybe it won’t.  But if we anticipate God breaking into every situation with grace, if we live aware to those possibilities of holiness and life, then we’ll learn to trust the One who promises to make all things new in heaven and on earth…  Amen.  Amen…