The
Language of God’s Kingdom
Rev
Dr Mark Porizky
Revelation 7:9-17
After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no man could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb!" And all the angels stood round the throne and round the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God for ever and ever! Amen."
Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, "Who are these, clothed in
white robes, and whence have they come?"
I said to him, "Sir, you know." And he said to me, "These are
they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes
and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the
throne of God,and serve him day and night within his temple;and he who sits upon
the throne will shelter them with hispresence. They shall hunger no more,
neither thirst any more;
the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat.
For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he
will guide them to springs of living water;and God will wipe away every tear
from their eyes."
Now
that the church has a TV hookup, I caught myself watching part of a fun
family/baseball Walt Disney movie, "Angels in the Outfield." If you
have not seen it, it's about a young boy whose mother has died and whose father
is unable or unwilling to make the commitment it takes to be a parent. So,
placed in a foster home where he awaits someone who will adopt him, the boy's
greatest pleasure is following the baseball team that plays in a nearby stadium.
It hardly matters to him that the team, the Anaheim Angels, is the worst team in
the league -- they are in last place, having played twenty-five games and lost
them all.
One
day his father pays a surprise visit. "I came to say that I'm going up
North," he says. "I said that when I came it'd be to get you, but it
ain't working out that way." They have a brief conversation, but not a
satisfying one, and then his father mounts his motorcycle to go.
"Dad," the boy says, "when are we going to be a family
again?" His father revs his engines, points to the baseball stadium, and
then answers sarcastically, "I'd say when the Angels win the pennant."
The
rest of the movie, in part at least, is about angels. Not baseball players, but
real live winged creatures from Heaven who intervene dramatically to answer the
boy's prayers -- that his favorite team reverse their own losing streak and win
the pennant. Nobody else sees them, but he does. They swoop down to give
outfielders the lift they need to be able to catch the line-drive. They emerge
behind batters -- even the team's worst batters -- to give them the extra charge
they need to knock the ball out of the park. They talk to this boy, and they
encourage him; and right there in the middle of the unholy mess he's in -- he
begins to see his life in a different light. He begins to see the angels and to
hear their voices and to believe that life is permeated, from start to finish,
with heavenly intervention.
I
think about this little family movie, and I wonder if it's not a parable for
people like you and me -- people who live in the middle of time. People who live
in the middle of time are like people who swim into the middle of a lake, from
which point it's often hard to see, with much clarity, either the shore from
which we have embarked or the one toward which we're headed. Individuals often
understand this, around middle-age if not before; but, as a culture, too, we are
people who live in the middle of time.
As
a culture, we've lived long enough to notice how much we miss our innocence, and
how lonely we are without our heroes; but, here in the middle of time, we aren't
always able to see, with much clarity, just where it is that we're headed and
what it will take to get there. Here, in the middle of time -- when we often
feel so "in over our head" and aware of how easy it might be to sink
-- we know those moments when we long, like that boy did, for evidence of some
word which will validate and permeate and give meaning to our time as we know
it.
Meaning
in our time. Such evidence is so
often hard to find.
Elbert
Hubbard is the one who said, "Life is just one damned thing after
another." And he has a point. Cynics in every age have made a case, and a
persuasive one, for the circular quality of time and history. The names and
faces might change, they have said, but ultimately, nothing else does. Herod
becomes Hitler becomes Ho Chi Minh becomes Kim il Jung becomes Saddam becomes
McVeigh, becomes Seung Cho, the Virginia Tech shooter.
But nothing really changes, they say. It's all circular. "Just one
damned thing after another."
Then,
of course, there is a great variety of people who don't subscribe to the notion
that time is circular, but who do insist that time is on some sort of slippery
slope heading downhill. The real action, they say, is behind us, in the past,
back there near the gates of what they identify as the beginning of time; when
children were more ambitious and better-behaved, and institutions were somehow
more stable and virtuous, and leaders were more noble, and communities were more
moral, and churches were more vital.
These
people look back with such skewed perspective upon the past, that they betray
their indifference toward the present or the future. Sometimes I feel that
there's one thing worse than having no history, it's having too much history.
And If there is one thing worse than not being able to remember, it' might be
not being able to forget.
Is
our world going in circles or heading downhill?
What does the church have to say about the world?
The
church speaks in a different way to people living in the middle of time. The
church looks at time as we know it, and sees it in the light of what we call
"eschatological time."
The
church looks at the time we are living in now, and asserts that -- because we
have glimpsed the future through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and
the coming of his spirit into the world; because God through Jesus Christ has
begun the ongoing redemption of the ages -- all of our time, therefore, is
charged with new possibility.
All
of our time is permeated, from start to finish, with heavenly intervention.
Having seen a glimpse of what God has in mind for the future of the world, we
haven't got to wait for that world to come in its fullness in order to begin
living in it. We can start living triumphantly into that world now! So, for
Christians, it isn't "just one damn thing after another." Even in the
middle of time we can begin living out our lives in light of the promise of an
expected future.
The
church, at its best, helps us envision that future -- even in the midst of the
lives we're living now. It does so in a number of ways, of course; but it does
so most importantly in the act of worship.
It
has been said that the church, especially in its worship, is “the language
school of the
If
you're planning a trip to a faraway country, you go to language school to learn
how to speak the language of the country to which you're traveling. You learn
what to say in that country in order to negotiate your way around it -- in order
to get directions, or to ask for a bathroom, or to call a cab.
In
language school you learn to speak the language, and to wear the costumes, and
to taste the food of the land toward which you're traveling; which is precisely
what we do on Sunday morning. We go to church to try our hand at a strange
language. It's the language of liberation, and we're still getting the hang of
it. We don't speak it near as well as we could, but we come here to practice
that language; and, as we do so, the time we live in now gets overthrown by the
time we will live in someday.
The
language school of the
We
have now, what I think, in our text for today from the Book of the Revelation to
John, is a glimpse of time as it will be, which John, the author of the
Revelation, wanted to give as a word of encouragement to a cross-shaped
community of Christians who, like us, were living in the middle of time.
These
were people who had heard the good news of the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
yes, and were striving hard to learn and to speak and to live the language of
the Kingdom of God, even though doing so was costly; but they had also been
reading the papers, and watching the news, and suffering the consequences of
their faithfulness -- so much so that some of them were beginning to wonder if,
in fact, it wasn't "just one damn thing after another."
John,
in writing to this community of Christians, gave them a gift. John pulled back
the curtain that obscured their vision of history, in order to show them a party
going on in heaven. A party, of all things, people by those who, like
themselves, had endured "the great ordeal" -- had borne the cross of
faithful living in the middle of time -- and who now, vindicated by God, were in
heaven praising and glorifying God's holy name.
This
glimpse of heaven was John's way of saying, to them and to us: Have courage, you
who bear the ministry of the cross! For you are moving toward the triumph of
God! Your life in the middle of time has meaning, because of where it's all
headed.
In
the middle of life’s most difficult moments, it helps to know that
life has meaning and ultimate beauty.
For
many years, my birthday was the occasion for my family to get tickets to
whatever musical was playing at the Schubert Theater in
Annie
depicts the adventures of an orphan girl at
“These
floors better shine like the top of the
The
children dream of being adopted, which would allow them to escape the dismal
orphanage. Annie tastes freedom when billionaire philanthropist Oliver Warbucks
decides to borrow her for a week to improve his public image. His secretary,
Grace Farrell, retrieves Annie from the orphanage and escorts her to his
mansion, where the little girl is overwhelmed by the luxurious surroundings. She
walks through the massive entryway amazed by the beauty around her. There are
immense floral displays, enormous balconies, spiral staircases, and a
full-length, stained-glass window on the ceiling. She feels as if she is in
heaven.
Grace
asks, "Well, Annie, what would you like to do first?"
Accustomed
to housework at the orphanage, Annie looks around with her hand on her chin and
responds, "Well, I could do the windows first, then the floors. That way if
I drip—"
Grace
interrupts her and says with a grin, "Annie, you don't understand. You
won't have to do any cleaning while you're with us. You're our guest."
A
big smile crosses Annie's face. One after another of the maids and butlers
curtsy in her presence. One will pick out her clothes. Another will draw her
bath. Yet another will turn down her bed. It is a dream come true. This is a
life far beyond anything the little girl has ever imagined. As the maids and
butlers dance around the room and prepare the banquet table for an enormous
feast, all Annie can say is, "I think I'm going to like it here!"
That’s
the point of Revelation. From where
we’ve been, to where we’re going. Worship
is our way to learn the language of God’s Kingdom.
So that once we cross that threshold, we, like Annie, can say, “I think
I’m going to like it here.”
Therefore,
with angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven, let us worship
and adore God's glorious name -- right here in the middle of time!
Trust
me, if you can get a glimpse of the kingdom, you will say, “I think I’m
going to like it here.”
Will you pray with me now?
St.
Andrew Presbyterian Church, Groton,
Web Site: WWW.SAPC-CT.ORG
Office Email: OFFICE@SAPC-CT.ORG
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