Calendars and Christ the King

It's that time of year when we start to get new calendars in the mail. In my house, we transfer birthdays and other significant dates from the "master" calendar to the new year's calendar. (You can tell we haven't moved into the 21st century in this respect.) We want to be able to call or send a card or e-mail to people when they reach milestones.

Calendars don't just organize households and relationships, but define our sense of what and who is important in our lives. In 46 BCE, Julius Caesar adopted what is essentially the modern calendar of 365 days in 12 months beginning January 1 with a day added to February every four years. The names of the months correspond to Roman faith: January for Janus, the god who looks forward and backward to start the year; February after the purification festival held by the Romans on Feb 15; March for the god Mars, the beginning of Spring when wars (and planting) could begin; April for the opening of flowers and the fertility of Aphrodite; May for the fertility goddess Maia; June for Juno, the Roman goddess of marriage; July to celebrate Julius Caesar's birthday; August to celebrate Augustus Caesar's military triumphs; September, October, November, and December get their names from their number (septem = 7, octo = 8, novum = 9, decem = 10) in the old ten month Roman calendar.

This calendar was not and is not the only calendar in existence; but to be conquered by the Romans meant eventually to adopt their calendar, their rule over time as well as space; their imposition of spiritual power as well as political power.

Jews always have maintained a religious calendar separate from the surrounding culture, a calendar based on lunar months of 29 or 30 days, organized around the significant events in Jewish experience with God.

Christians, following in this Jewish practice, also have an alternate calendar that resists the surrounding culture's desire to control time and spiritual focus. The Christian calendar comes to an end this Sunday with a celebration of Christ the King. At the end of the Church year, we look to the end of the age when Christ will return to rule as the promised King over all creation.

The New Year begins Dec 1 for Christians: the first Sunday in Advent. It orders our lives at the beginning to wait and spiritually prepare ourselves for Christ's coming. This is not what the culture is preparing for! We will read passages from the Bible that call us to repent, to trust in forgiveness through Christ, to examine our priorities to see if they are consistent with God's priorities, and to ask how we can prepare for Christ. Read Matthew 24:36-25:46 for more!

Feeling helpless but not hopeless

I feel helpless. It is hard to hear about the destruction, the death, the extreme hunger and desperation gripping people in the Philippines, especially the city of Tacloban that received the brunt of the typhoon. The official death toll is 1,774 but expected to dramatically rise; and this does not consider begin to consider the 600,000 displaced and many who may die from injuries or starvation or thirst. What can I do?

I am helpless personally, but also grateful for the many who are responding from around the world. I am grateful that our country is sending support and I pray the world will mobilize to offer aid.

Some will point at this event as a sign of the end-times. As natural disasters increase, they say, it is a sign that Jesus' return is close.

Jesus' own words caution us away from such a conclusion. He said, "When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately. ...there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.  (Luke 21:9-11). These "dreadful portents" will happen--but "the end will not follow immediately."

Instead, Jesus calls his disciples to look for opportunities to witness that Jesus is Lord. He specifically talks about Christians being brought before Emperors and governors. Towards the end of the first century, some Christians were brought before Governor Pliny in Bithynia and asked to curse Christ and make sacrifice to Emperor Trajan:

Meanwhile, this is the method I have followed with those who were brought before me as Christians. I asked them directly if they were Christians. The ones who answered affirmatively I questioned again with a warning, and yet a third time: those who persisted I ordered led [away]. For I have no doubt, whatever else they confessed to, certainly [this] pertinacity and inflexible obstinacy ought to be punished. There were others alike of madness, whom I noted down to be sent to the City, because they were Roman citizens. Soon in consequence of this policy itself, as it was made standard, many kinds of criminal charges occurred and spread themselves abroad. A pamphlet was published anonymously, containing the names of many.

Those who denied that they were or ever had been Christians, when they swore before me, called on the gods and offered incense and wine to your image (which I had ordered brought in for this [purpose], along with images of the gods), and also cursed Christ (which, it is said, it is impossible to force those who are real Christians to do) I thought worthy to be acquitted. Others named by an informer, said they had been Christians, but now denied [it]; certainly they had been, but had lapsed, some three years ago, some more; and more than one [lit. not nobody] over twenty years ago. These all worshiped both your image and the images of the gods and cursed Christ.

Jesus encourages Christians to persevere--and use these opportunities to witness that Christ is their Lord and Savior.

Likewise, when terrible things happen in the world like Typhoon Haiyan, this is an opportunity for us to witness that Christ is our Lord. We witness to others when we tell them not to spend time worrying about the end of the age but to trust in Jesus and follow him into lives of service. We witness by our prayers to God on behalf of the suffering. We witness by encouraging the US Government to send speedy and generous support. We witness by donating our own money to be a sign of God's grace and mercy. Lutheran World Relief is already at work and can use your donation either online or through St. John's or other churches. We witness when we tell others that we do these things for God's glory and because we are God's servants. Consider one or more of these ways to witness who your Lord is!

When we feel helpless, we are not hopeless because Christ is Lord!

God of the Living

Luke reports that the Sadducees of Jesus' day ridiculed people who believed in the resurrection of the body. In Luke 20:27-38, they try to trap Jesus with a scenario of seven brothers for one bride, each brother marrying after another's untimely death. Jesus argues that there will be no marriage in the resurrection because the human race will continue without procreation. (Jesus assumes the primary purpose of marriage is procreation; elsewhere in scripture marriage also is for love, companionship, and mutual service, for example, the joy of the Wedding at Cana in John 2 or the Song of Songs).

Jesus' point is more about God than marriage. God is God of the living, not the dead. There are some today who scoff at the idea of the resurrection, either because they can't imagine a person dead who lives again, they can't conceive scientifically how its possible, or they argue if we look for justice in the resurrection we won't for justice in the here and now.

God is of the living and not the dead. God is not limited by human imagination. "My ways are not your ways, says the Lord" (Isaiah 55:8). The testimony of the first disciples is that they touched Jesus and saw him eat. The heart of the Christian message is "He is not dead. He is alive!"

God is of the living and not the dead. Scientifically speaking, we are dying all the time--and being recreated. Our cells are dying daily and being renewed (Christians claim by God's continuing creative power, but God as the agent of renewal can't be proved scientifically but is taken by faith). John Polkinghorne, physicist and Christian, writes

"After a few years of nutrition and wear and tear the atoms that make us up have nearly all been replaced by equivalent successors. It is the pattern that they form which constitutes the physical expression of our continuing personality. There seems no difficulty in conceiving of that pattern, dissolved at death, being recreated in another environment in an act of resurrection." (One World: The Interaction of Science and Theology, Princeton, 1986, p. 77.)

There is a way to scientifically conceive of the resurrection of the body! We have a small taste of that renewal every day.

God is of the living and not the dead. Knowing that our bodies will be raised from the dead does not need to drain us from the energy to work for justice and peace now or denigrate the value of this life. In fact, it has given Christians an ideal to strive after. At our best, Christians have worked to protect and heal bodies, establish hospitals, provide social services, struggle for human rights and work for justice and peace. We do this with confidence it is God's will because we know God is God of the living and not the dead!