Hello friends,
This is Mark Gladman,
Also known as Brother Frederick James,
Your friendly neighbourhood monk in dogs.
Welcome back.
To look again.
And all do I have a doozy today.
Some of you are gonna.
.
.
Maybe not like this one too much at least to start with,
But again,
Bear with me.
You ready?
Jesus didn't come to take you to heaven.
At least not in the way we usually imagine it.
Now,
If you've grown up inside the Christian tradition,
You may have heard the whole story like this,
We're here on earth,
We die,
If we get things right,
We go to heaven.
Heaven�s a real destination,
Earth�s temporary,
Heaven�s permanent.
Christian life becomes,
In some sense,
A preparation for a departure.
In fact,
There used to be a saying,
B-I-B-L-E,
Stood for Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth.
Right?
Because it teaches us to be good,
To believe the right things,
To hold on until we die,
And then we leave earth,
Heaven.
But here's the thing that's really strange.
That's not actually how the Bible story ends.
And once you notice this,
You can't unsee it,
Because the Bible doesn't finish.
With human beings escaping Earth and floating away to Heaven,
The Bible ends with God coming to Earth.
The book of Revelation gives us this extraordinary vision saying,
I saw a new heaven and a new earth.
And then comes the really.
.
.
Interesting part.
The Holy City comes down.
Not up.
And the voice announces God's dwelling place is now among the people.
This is in Revelation chapter 21.
So did you see what happened just there?
The direction of travel has changed.
We've spent,
I don't know,
Centuries.
Imagining that the Christian story is get from earth to heaven.
But the Bible story ends with heaven coming to earth.
God comes down.
Creation is renewed.
Humanity is resurrected.
God dwells among people.
That's Restoration Friend and it starts making sense.
When you look at Jesus.
Because Christianity.
.
.
Makes a particular claim about Jesus.
God doesn't rescue humanity.
By abandoning creation,
Rather God enters.
Creation.
In John chapter 1 we read the word becomes flesh.
God gets a body and God eats and sleeps and walks and cries and touches people and bleeds and then God raises that body from death.
Now,
This is kind of weird.
If the goal were just to get human beings out of physical existence and into some purely spiritual realm.
Resurrection's a pretty weird choice.
Why raise a body?
Why not simply raise a soul?
Because maybe the point is an escape in creation.
Maybe the point.
Is that creation matters.
Your body,
Earth,
Food,
Relationships,
Justice,
Beauty,
What we do with our lives matters.
Because God hasn't given up on the material world.
God's not saying,
This was a mistake.
Let's take you off somewhere better.
No,
No.
We're told at the very beginning,
God said,
This is good.
And so what we hear then in Revelation 21,
At the other end of the book,
Is not.
This good thing's gone askew,
We're going to throw it away,
But I am making all things new.
And that's,
It's a different hope.
It changes what we mean by salvation.
Salvation now isn't,
Where do I go when I die?
It's what is God doing with this world and how can I participate in that?
And this is why Jesus talks so much about the Kingdom of God.
Remember,
It's not basic instructions before leaving Earth.
It's the kingdom of God is among you.
That's different.
Something new is arriving.
Something's beginning.
It's breaking into ordinary human existence.
And Jesus invites people to participate in that.
Feed the hungry.
Welcome the stranger.
Forgive.
Love your enemy.
Heal.
Restore.
Set people free.
Mate,
Peace.
Tell the truth.
Care for the vulnerable.
Why?
Why do these things if ultimately all that matters is the spiritual stuff?
I mean,
Wouldn't it be just better to pray for someone who's hungry and leave it at that?
Mother.
.
.
It's because these are signs of what the world looks like.
When God's reign becomes visible because it's not just about the spiritual things.
Every act of love is a glimpse of the Kingdom of God.
Every act of justice is a protest against the way things are.
Every act of forgiveness says death doesn't get the final word.
Every act of compassion says this is not the world as it should be.
And we participate in that now.
Because this physical realm that we've got going on is just as important.
As a spiritual one.
And suddenly.
.
.
The Christian hope.
Isn't about going to heaven.
Anymore.
It's about resurrection and new creation and God dwelling and living in humanity.
It's about the healing of everything that's broken down.
And it's also intensely personal,
Because if all that's true,
Then your ordinary life matters.
What you do with your body,
How you treat another person,
How you use your time,
Your care for creation.
The way you respond to suffering,
Your work,
Your relationships,
The person that you're becoming,
All of that matters.
Alright,
We're not just killing time here,
Until we get to heaven.
We're living inside God's unfinished story and that's why Christianity has always had this strange combination.
Of hope.
And responsibility.
We hope for what God will ultimately do and at the same time we're invited to live now.
As though that future has already begun.
When Jesus taught us to pray,
Your kingdom come.
It didn't follow up with,
Get us out of here.
It followed up with,
Your kingdom come.
And then on Earth.
As in heaven.
Let Heaven.
Come,
Let God's reality become visible here,
Now,
Let Earth become what it was created to be,
Let love become visible and justice and mercy and reconciliation,
Let them all become visible and left the world.
Become more like the world God dreams.
I think that's why Christian spirituality.
What should make us more present?
And aware of the world.
Not less,
Because if you become more spiritual and less interested in people,
I think something's gone wrong.
Is prayer.
Doesn't intensify your compassion,
If worship doesn't make you care about justice,
If thinking about heaven makes you indifferent to earth,
I think something's gone wrong.
And we've misunderstood heaven.
God revealed in Jesus.
Is not an escape artist.
God is an incarnational God.
God comes into the mess,
Enters the suffering,
Inhabits the ordinary,
Raises the dead,
Renews creation,
God comes home.
And that's the Christian hope.
Not that one day God will finally get us out of this world,
But that one day God will finally make this world what it was always meant to be.
So the next time someone says,
I'm just waiting to get into heaven,
Just pause,
Because the Christian hope is much bigger than that.
You're not just waiting to leave.
You're waiting for resurrection,
For renewal,
For the day when everything broken is made whole,
And in the meantime,
You get to practice the future.
Every time you forgive and make peace and feed someone and welcome someone who doesn't belong,
Every time you choose love over fear,
You are living now as though God's future is already true.
Because in Jesus,
It has begun.
So maybe we had the wrong direction.
We thought the Christian journey was about getting from earth to heaven,
But maybe the real Christian hope is that heaven is coming to Earth.
And maybe Jesus didn't come to teach you how to escape.
But rather Jesus came to teach you to see what God is already doing.
And how to do it.
All we have to do.
Is look again and may grace,
Peace and love be with us as we actively look to participate in God's will being done on earth as it is in heaven.
Till tomorrow,
Bye for now.
