“It’s the end of the world as we know it...”

Somehow, every time I’ve visited Mark 13 in the past several years anxiety and uncertainty have been running rampant throughout the world. Perhaps this felt most acute in 2020 when we were all coming to terms with the threat of a new virus and our economy was grinding to a halt and parents were discovering just what saints their kids’ teachers are. And earlier that year Australia had been on fire and mid-year we learned of murder hornets and watched in horror as George Floyd died after a knee remained on his neck for an unspeakably long time. And then our country exploded in protest. Remember 2020? It wasn’t just sourdough bread and lots of tv. There was a controversial presidential election and really was 2021 much better? Not that long ago I watched an episode of “The Morning Show” on Apple TV that perfectly captured the good, bad, and the ugly of 2020 into 2021 and I realized how much I forgot. How much fear ran through our nation and world, how much anger, how much chaos. And I’m not sure it’s all that much less harrowing four years later— it seems we’re in World War 3, or on the brink of it, with wars raging on several continents and we just came through another high stakes election and are holding our breath through the transfer of power given all that unfolded four years ago. Such extreme, extended periods of stress often lead people to ask, “Is this the end?” And reading the thirteenth chapter of the Gospel of Mark makes us think about it all the more. Is this it? Is this how it all ends?

But I know with confidence that others have asked these questions before. I suspect that in your lifetime there have been several moments when the world seemed to be falling apart and it seemed the end of time was nigh. Even in my 48 years there has been more than one such moment. I remember young adults approaching me at a wedding reception early in the new millennium. I think it was after the tsunami in Japan, in the midst of wars in the Middle East, they asked me if the world was ending. I told them we know not the day nor the hour. I hope I told them something hopeful too. I don’t remember. I’ve often heard people testify that the world seemed to be falling apart in the late 60’s. And surely people felt that way during WW2 and the depression before that. Surely during the stock market crash before that, and the 1918 flu that claimed so many lives. And if you go back through the centuries you can find so many moments of high suffering and high anxiety, and at times like these, in part because of scripture passages like these, people wonder “Is this it? Is this how it all ends?”

But we’re still here. And Jesus sends some mixed messages in the 13th chapter of Mark. If you read the whole chapter, you’ll see what I mean. On the one hand, you can read the signs that the end is coming as clearly as one reads new growth on trees as a sign that the seasons are changing. But, on the other hand, “NOBODY KNOWS when that day or hour will come, not the angels in heaven and not the Son. Only the Father knows.” NOBODY. And those who say that they do know are deceivers. Many throughout history have said with great certainty that they did know — some of you remember when all those people drank the kool-aid offered by one such leader. One of the deceivers Jesus was warning about. If anyone tells you they know when, they are lying. Nobody knows.

Jesus suggests that great suffering is a sign that the end is near, but also says not to think that wars and reports of wars, earthquakes and famines are the end. They are just the beginning of the end. There is presently, and has been for so long, all of the above— great suffering, profound suffering, wars, natural disasters, pandemics, and more. And yet the world goes on. And most of us are glad of that. Not glad for the suffering, but glad to have another day. Glad to see children grow and seasons change, glad to have another opportunity to make things right, glad to be able to hold the people we love, glad to take in mountains and oceans, trees and flowers, glad to enjoy delicious food. We love this world in which we live. And we love life, most days. We are puzzled why some seem eager to welcome the end. Especially when we read apocalyptic passages like this. Who would want that? No one.

But remember Jesus says this suffering and devastation— this is not the end. Such struggle comes before the end. The word “end” has multiple meanings. It can mean “termination” but it can also mean “purpose.” All throughout the Gospel of Mark, Jesus talks about God’s purpose for the world and God’s people, using the metaphor of kingdom. Jesus teaches the ways of God’s kingdom, whereby fortunes are reversed, the last first, the first last, wherein earthly hierarchical status is undone, wherein there’s healing and love and light. The church exists to move the world toward this end— this purpose— the kingdom come. And this is not something to fear; it is something to pursue.

In 2020, in the midst of all that tv, my husband and I watched “Good Omens,” a show that represents an artistic representation of the beginning of the end. The two central characters in this story are an angel and a demon who have been active on earth since the beginning of all life on earth. The angel often talks about God’s ineffable plan, which is a concept at which the demon scoffs. What good is a plan if it can’t be known or understood? Well, in the denouement of the series, the anti-Christ has reached the age of 11, the four horsemen of the apocalypse: war, pollution, famine, and death - have arrived and set in motion mutually assured nuclear destruction, heaven and hell are gearing up for a war that will settle for once and for all who is in control. It seems inevitable that the end of the world is finally arriving. But the anti-Christ, with the help of the central angel and demon characters, decides he doesn’t want it to be so. His friends will peace not war, a clean and healthy earth not pollution, enough food for everyone. And he makes it so. The head angel and head demon are mad— they think he is thwarting God’s plan, it is written that this has to happen they say. But then the central characters come back to the ineffability of God’s plan, that part of the plan that could never be written down or comprehended with language. Perhaps this, they suggest, is God’s ineffable plan. Not war, but peace. Not destruction, but restoration.

All the horrific imagery linked to the end times has never made sense to me. It seemed to me that a violent end, a militaristic return of the Christ, all of this is quite inconsistent with the first coming of Christ. If God revealed Godself in Jesus, then why would something different be revealed in the second coming? Now, passages like this in which scary words come out of Jesus’ mouth have certainly helped create these horrific imaginings. But Jesus all throughout all the Gospels paints pictures of the kingdom he has come to welcome in that are filled with hope. Jesus through his healing and teaching and saving brought life, not death and destruction to people. Even though it seemed for a few days that the end of Jesus’ story was death, violent death, we know that his story lives on. That life emerged from death. That’s what we celebrate on Easter— and indeed the whole reason we gather to worship, one way or another, every week.

When the Gospel of Mark was being written, the world as the ancient Israelites knew it was ending. The second temple was destroyed, the holy city of Jerusalem conquered. Many hoped that Jesus would return imminently and make everything that seemed so wrong right. And we can feel that yearning in our reading today. And we can feel the violence and fear with which people were living. What I hear Jesus saying beneath the violence and fear at the surface is that all this suffering is not the point. It is simply an inevitable dimension of life on this earth; on the way to the kingdom, there will be suffering. But we’re heading somewhere beyond all this suffering; we have reason to hope. What Jesus says repeatedly in this chapter is that we should “Stay alert!” And one way that we stay alert is by continuing to do the work that is ours to do while we wait for God’s full kingdom to arrive.

So what is the work that is ours to do? The work of love of God and neighbor and self. And each of us lives into love by using and sharing the gifts we have been given to build a community and make the world a better place. It is hard to keep on keeping on when suffering and anxiety are high. It is hard to see the point in trying sometimes. In every circumstance God’s spirit is working in and through us and we can continue to do our part. Through feeding hungry neighbors, through care for refugees, through partnership with local, national, and global agents of justice and compassion. Through participation in all the ministry of our local congregations. By calling or writing or visiting the sick and lonely and struggling. By seeking to grow as anti racists. By praying without ceasing for neighbor, stranger, and enemy. Friends, this is how we stay alert. By continuing to connect with Christ and each other and serve our neighbors, even when the world is dark and scary, even when it feels like the world as we know it is ending.

Remember the suffering is not the end. It is not the purpose. It is what we must pass through on the way to the true end, the true purpose that God has for us. Frankly, even if this is “the end of the world as we know it” we can feel fine. Because we worship the God who brings life out of death. So stay alert and get ready for God to free you for fuller life.