Bible Text:

Somewhere I have a poster that shows a camel with his head resting on the top of a wooden fence. His face is ugly and his jowls are hanging down. The caption under the poster reads, “Does anyone really know what time it is?” 

When I was pledging a fraternity at Lehigh University, we had a number of responses we needed to make to certain questions from the full members of the fraternity brotherhood. One of them had to do with time. Each time a brother would ask a pledge, “What time is it?” we would have to respond dutifully as follows: “I am deeply embarrassed and greatly humiliated, but due to certain unforeseen circumstances over which I have no control whatsoever, the inner workings and hidden mechanisms on my chronometer are in such a state of disaccord with the great sidereal movement, that I can state with no degree of accuracy the correct time.” And we had to do it in eight seconds or less. 

What time is it? Some people think they know. It is the “end time.” Hal Lindsey thought that in the 1970s in his book The Late Great Planet Earth. Jim Jenkins and Tim LaHaye have thought they know, for the past 10 years. Fifty-five million copies of the “Left Behind” series of books have been sold in America. 

The implication in both cases is that all signs point to the end of time as we know it. Furthermore, for $44.95 per month on your Visa or MasterCard, you may join the Left Behind Prophecy Club website. The club says, “This is an insiders’ view and interpretation of world events as they lead toward the end of this world.” The site talks about the Rapture, when all true Christians will be instantly taken up into heaven, and it talks about the Tribulation, which is supposed to be 7 years for those who are “left behind.” 

Tim LaHaye actually makes this prediction: “I wouldn’t be surprised if the United Nations and the European Common Market will gradually grow together and join other countries against the United States, and gradually the center of government will move to Iraq.” 

Are you surprised that the most widely read books by our military troops in Iraq are the books in the “Left Behind” series? 

In a post-9/11 world, “end of time” talk has a particular lure. Check the news tonight, or any night. Did you listen to the news last week? The world gets increasingly scary. Much of the trouble centers in the Middle East. Newsweek had an article in late May on all of this. The article included this interesting statement: “Even secular Americans sometimes wonder (or at least wonder if they ought not to start wondering) whether there might be something to this “end times” stuff.” [i] 

A man by the name of Ernest Digweed, who died sometime in the late 1980s, left his estate of $57,000 to Jesus Christ for his return in the year 2000. The family fought the stipulations of the will and finally won. But the court took out an insurance policy with Lloyd’s of London for $57,000—just in case Digweed was right. 

Is all this stuff scary? Is it even intriguing? Is it possible? Or is it nonsense? What do you think? Are we in the end times? Will there be a Rapture and then 7 years of Tribulation? Will it all happen soon? 

Or will there be a different scenario? Will Jesus simply come again on a cloud to end history? And will that happen soon? 

There’s a story of a drunk who was driving down the wrong side of the highway. The police stopped him. “What do you think you are doing?” they asked. He replied, “I don’t know, but it sure must be late. Everybody’s coming home.” 

Is it late? Is God about to end history? What time is it? Does anybody really know what time it is? 

From my reading of the Bible, we are not in end times. All of this is simply sensationalism that sells books, and then also sells websites. Listen to this quotation: “Many Christians seem to love the idea that the travails of this world can be escaped in one rapturous pass of the Heavenly Hoover sucking them into the great beyond.” In my understanding of it all, end time literature is (and always has been) about prophets making a financial profit! 

Perhaps you remember a story from Korea in 1992. A man by the name of Lee Jan Rim was head of some 200 congregations in Korea. He created nationwide hysteria when he announced that the Rapture would take place on October 28, 1992. Hundreds of people left their jobs. Hundreds left their families to prepare for the trip.  

Of course it didn’t happen. What did happen was that in December of 1992, Rim was arrested and sent to prison for 2 years. He had bilked his flock of members out of 4.4 million dollars. Then he invested the money in bonds that didn’t mature until 1993. 

What is the role of Scripture in all of this? If the only purpose of life is to get us to the end times, why is the Bible so thick? Why does it take 66 books to say all of that stuff about loving the enemy, loving the neighbor, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, taking care of the earth, and doing justice? Are these simply things to do until the trumpet sounds? Or is there more to it than this? What time is it, anyway? 

Jesus speaks to this in our text for today. He says very plainly, “About that day and hour, no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.” Jesus then goes on to say, “Stay alert.” Jesus says that God is breaking into history in a new way. We are to be ready, not for the end, but for Kingdom living. 

I read a line from a commentary on the Book of Revelation, one of the strange and puzzling books of the New Testament. The writer said this; “There is a different way to read Revelation that is truer—that it’s not God’s nightmare for our world, but actually God’s dream for our world.” Listen to the words again from the Book of Revelation that were read a few moments ago, except this time listen to it from the Eugene Peterson version. Here’s what Peterson says in this text, “I heard a voice thunder from the throne: ‘Look! Look! God has moved into the neighborhood, making his home with men and women. They are his people. He is their God. He’ll wipe every tear from their eyes. Death is gone for good—tears gone, crying gone, pain gone—all the first order of things gone.’” Then God continues, “Look, I am making everything new. Write it all down—each word dependable and accurate.”[ii] 

There is a fresh word in all of this to first century Christians and to us. 

First of all, God remains in charge. Someone once said, “Every time someone predicts the end of the world, God changes the date just to make sure we know who is in charge.” I think that’s what Jesus is saying in this text. God is in control. We are not. 

There’s a wonderful African-American song that has this line in it, “God may not come when I call, but God always comes on time.” God is constantly and consistently in charge. 

The bottom line is, we live a journey of great hope. That hope is not always evident in the daily news. A second huge hurricane bears down on Florida today. A new group of suicide terrorists in Russia killed 300 children and parents this past week to try to make a point. Starvation is rampant and fierce in the Sudan. AIDS plagues Africa. But we are still called to the message of hope. Teilhard de Chardin says, in one of my favorite quotations, “The future belongs to those who give it the greatest hope.” A recent political speaker talked about the audacity of hope. That’s a faith statement. That’s a Jesus statement. Eugene Peterson translates an important passage in I Corinthians using the term, “unwavering hope.” Jesus comes to break into life and give us hope. Jesus comes to show us how to live in that hope. 

In some places hope is in very short supply. I believe this is at the root of the trouble in the Middle East. The Middle East is filled with desperate people. They are desperately poor. The economy of the 10 small Arab nations in the Middle East is less than the total economy of Spain. 

One of our United Methodist bishops returned from a recent trip to the Middle East. She said, “People without hope are extremely dangerous.” She’s exactly right. People without hope blow things up. People without hope blow themselves up. People without hope blow up the World Trade Center. 

The Christian response is to offer hope to the world. It’s the only political strategy that will work—offering hope. Paul says, “If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is naked, clothe him. If he is thirsty, give him a drink.” (See Romans 12) 

We are not yet ready to learn that lesson in America. In fact, it’s not learned very well anywhere. I think that saddens the heart of God. We have the capacity in this nation to bring hope—real hope. We do it when we feed the hungry, when we take care of the children. We do it when we sustain a hospital and medical services in Zimbabwe. We do it when we provide flood buckets to hurricane victims. We are called to change the world, not escape it. This is a world to be changed, not aborted. 

The prophets of the Old Testament called people to a more just world. They called people back to God. They called people back to doing the work of being God’s people.

Jesus came to call us back to God. God is remaking, reshaping and reforming creation. Jesus is the embodiment of that reshaping, remaking and reforming. It matters deeply how we live in this creation. It matters deeply how we live with each other. 

This is not a time to predict the end of the world. This is a time to take seriously what Jesus came to show us. 

Tom Seaver, the legendary baseball pitcher, once asked Yogi Berra, “Hey, Yogi, what time is it?” Berra replied, “You mean now?” 

This is a time to hope in God and act faithfully. 

I read a story about a man who was trying to catch a ferryboat. When he arrived at the pier, the boat was already moving. He raced down the pier in his suit, waving his umbrella and his briefcase high overhead. Finally when he got to the end of the pier, he took a gigantic leap, jumped 10 feet, and landed on the deck of the ferryboat. He was unhurt. He got up and brushed himself off, and began to regain his composure and his dignity. It was then that he discovered that the ferryboat was coming in, not going out. 

Let’s be on the right boat. Creation is coming in, not going out. Let’s be on the boat where we recognize that God is clearly in charge. Let’s be on the boat where Jesus speaks definitively. 

Albert Einstein once said, “Sooner or later, each of us has to consider this question, ‘Is the universe a friendly place?’” 

As believers, we can answer “yes.” The world is not always a pretty place. Sometimes the world is pretty ugly. But God is not at the great computer in the sky with a picture of earth on the screen and with a finger poised to press the “delete” button. 

Underneath our worries and our fears is the world that God created. It is a friendly world. It is a world for which to care deeply. It is a world for which we are ambassadors of hope.