Sermon - Tarrytown United Methodist Church

Living in the Middle

Ann Beaty
Tarrytown United Methodist Church
Fellowship Hall

May 2, 2010

Text: Revelation 21:1-6

I love this passage of scripture from Revelation. Not surprisingly, it is a scripture often read at funerals. We take comfort in knowing there is eternal life with God in this place where God is making all things new, where death and dying are no more, where mourning, and crying, and pain are no more.

Carey Dietert sings a solo on Palm Sunday in this church that has become a favorite of many called “The Holy City”. The lyrics of the song, written by Frederick Weatherly in 1892 are based on this Scripture from Revelation. It is sung on Palm Sunday because it proclaims the message of what Jesus really came to be and to bring– not just the event of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on the donkey as he is proclaimed King, but that Jesus came to usher in a different kind of kingdom - the “new heaven and the new earth”. Listen to the words of just the last verse of the song and try to imagine the scene:

I saw the Holy City beside the tideless sea;
The light of God was on its streets, the gates were open wide,
And all who would might enter, and no one was denied.
No need of moon or stars by night, or sun to shine by day;
It was the new Jerusalem that would not pass away.

Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Sing for the night is over!
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna for evermore!

This song, as well as the scripture reading from Revelation, proclaims the message of what we yearn for in this life, and of what we trust will be waiting for us in the next life.

But, John - the writer of Revelation - isn’t simply talking about a future place where we go when we die. For John, far from being separate realities, heaven and earth have an open door between them in the present age.

For example, in the book of Revelation, Satan’s expulsion from heaven comes as a result of the death of Jesus on the cross. The same fallen angels work their revenge on the saints of God. In Revelation, there is a strong role of the church on earth – the liturgy of the earthly church even has a role in heaven before the divine throne. John wants us to know that this “new heaven and new earth” has already happened. He is proclaiming that we are living in the new heaven and the new earth. As we read it, what do you think? Are we, or is it yet to come?

I’m not sure how this happened, but when I was about 14, my church sent me as the District representative to a summer camp in the Houston area with the United Methodist Women where the study for the week was focused on the Book of Revelation. I don’t remember anything about that week except that I enjoyed swimming during the free time and I came home thinking the book of Revelation was very strange. I was only 14 then, but I’m 46 now and the book of Revelation still seems a little strange in places. What is true is that the messages proclaimed in the book of Revelation as a whole have inspired and mystified Christians for years.

Revelation serves as one of the “book ends” (so to speak) of the Bible. The bible begins in Genesis with the creation story. We read that God was in the beginning of all things and that “God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good.”

And, while we believe that God was at the beginning of all things, we believe too that God is at the conclusion of all life, or as in John’s striking words in Revelation: God is “the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end”.

We would like to live in a world where everything in-between the beginning and the end is good. But, the reality is, we live in a world with a lot suffering.

So, one of the questions of the faith for me is this: How can we hold both of these realities together at the same time – the reality that God intends for the world to exist in goodness and also the reality that there is suffering?

It seems to me that John helps us, at least in some way, in this scripture in Revelation. He not only tells us what IS in this holy city – this new heaven and new earth, he describes for us what is NOT in this new city: He writes that “the sea (is) no more”.

Now, most scholars agree that the sea is a powerful biblical symbol for chaos. Throughout the Bible, the sea represents all that does not make sense. It represents what separates humans from one another and what separates humans from God. In Genesis the sea is believed to be the primordial chaos out of which evil continues to threaten to undo the goodness of God’s creation.

One of my favorite sections of The Great Thanksgiving liturgy that we use for Holy Communion is read in the Healing Service on Wednesday evenings. I’m struck by what it says every week when I read it:

“In the beginning, when darkness covered the face of the earth and nothing existed but chaos, your Spirit swept across the waters. You spoke but a word, and light was separated from darkness.”

In the beginning what existed was chaos – the waters of chaos – and God’s spirit swept across them. God spoke and light was separated from darkness. God did not create out of nothing. God created out of chaos. With God’s Word, chaos was interrupted with order.

We know that we live today in a world where chaos still exists. There is a lot of order in our world, and yet, there are most definitely still pockets of chaos.

Think about it…There is so much we don’t know or understand about what happens in life – particularly around pain and suffering. It’s pretty easy to make that list. We all know that not everyone who is sick is cured. We see people who seem to be dealt blow after blow after blow – job loss, illness, family strife, death. Severe depression, anxiety, and other forms of mental illness affect people in ways that they can’t control and they become destructive to themselves and their loved ones. Bad things happen to good people. We don’t understand why. Chaos exists.

And yet, there IS a lot of order and predictability in our universe. There are regular sunrises and sunsets, and a regular rhythm to the tides. Plants and animals have a whole cycle of life with seeds inside that allow them to reproduce. There is an order to what grows in what soil and climate and what eats what in the food chain. And, then, there are the intricacies of the human body – how a new baby is formed and grows inside the womb. Order exists.

So, how do we function as people of faith in the midst of a world that holds both chaos and order? And do we believe, as we are told in Revelation – that we are already living in the holy city – that the new heaven and the new earth HAS come?

It seems to me we live somewhere in the middle holding all of it as truth. We live our lives in the goodness of creation with all that God has given us. At the same time, we live with those pockets of chaos that still exist.

I believe we can hold all of that – as much as it might seem contradictory because we live with one of the greatest gifts God has given us. We have hope and we have hope because the center of the story from beginning to end is Jesus Christ – his life, suffering, death, resurrection, and promised return in glory – the focal point on which the destiny of the universe turns. We live as Christians in this truth.

Hope in this truth of what Jesus Christ has done and is doing for us builds us up in goodness. Hope in this truth of what Jesus Christ has done and is doing for us holds us in love in chaos. Hope in what Jesus Christ has done and is doing in this truth holds us when all we can do is sigh and put one foot in front of the other and keep on breathing.

Hope in this truth in Jesus Christ holds us in joy when we see a beautiful flower unfold or hold a new baby. Hope in this truth in Jesus Christ holds us and we can glimpse the reality of the “new heaven and the new earth”.

What is hope if it is not believing in that which is already true, and yet also believing in what is beyond us and not quite comprehendable and complete? What is hope if it is not believing that God’s love is already complete in us as it sustains us in all we go through, and yet believing it is still beyond us in terms of we have experienced.

In hope, we can see that even in the midst of a life lived in order and in chaos, the “new heaven and new earth” is a reality.

I believe we are called to live in the “middle place” and use the seasons of our life when things are more orderly and smooth to deepen and strengthen our relationship with God so we will have resources to call on when the chaos comes. We utilize the gifts of our faith God has given us – prayer, community, church, friends, family, study, worship, nature, sacrament, and we grow in faith and understanding so we have tools to ride the stormy seas when chaos comes. We develop community for support so that they will be there when chaos strikes.

We let ourselves be nourished by the Word (the scriptures) and we open ourselves to be sanctified – made holy, by the Spirit as we seek to connect what is visible and invisible – the reconciliation of heaven and earth – seeing the past, present, and future of all things through the light of God’s glory in Christ.

John says we are promised that there will come a time in our lives, in this world, in the next…some time when “the sea will be no more”. When death, and mourning, and crying and pain will be no more – because the first things – the chaos – will have passed away completely.

Apart from God’s gracious self-giving love through Christ, we could never know these things on our own, since our minds are so deeply colored by the world’s heart-breaking news as well as our own personal times of tragedy.

In this Easter season, we proclaim again, on behalf of the one seated on the throne, “Behold, I am making all things new!”

If you will, close your eyes and imagine the scene with me again: