"Coming Attractions" November 17, 2013

Isaiah 65: 17-25 Luke 21 You cannot listen to the Radio or Television today without Advertisements by Billy Fucillo about buying cars, Zero Down Payment, Zero Paid Per Month, in Debt Forever, And how big is that New York? It's HUGE! Jesus was in the Temple at Jerusalem, The Temple of Solomon, destroyed by the Babylonians and rebuilt under Ezra and Nehemiah, expanded under the Greeks and Romans with exorbitant Tax Dollars. What was to have been the holiest, most sacred and most beautiful Temple in the City of God, in the Nation of God, was HUGE, but had also become a witness to the profanity of King Herod the Puppet of Rome. The Temple at Jerusalem was so HUGE, 400,000 could gather in the Courtyard. Understandably, the Disciples with Jesus said “Wow!” To which Jesus responded, “Do you think this is huge, that widow, just put into the offering Everything she had.” The disciples look at him dumbfounded, and Jesus describes “All of this, Wars and Devastation, Typhoons and Hurricanes, Economic Collapse, all of this must be, in order to prepare the world for what is to come.” It has gotten so that the best part of going to the Movies, is THE COMING ATTRACTIONS. There was a time in which “COMING SOON” was a teaser, an Appetizer intended to lift the lid and show you enough that you wanted to experience it all. Unfortunately, the Coming Attractions have come to include all the very best scenes, the best lines, the greatest special effects as if out-takes, sound bytes of what the film was about. When you sit down for a fine meal, the atmosphere and ambiance, the wine, all are to prepare your palate to savor the APPETIZER, because as the name suggests, the appetizer prepares your appetite. If the appetizer was this good, how much better will be the Main Course and the decadence of dessert? What Jesus describes, is this life, our human lives are the Appetizer, the COMING SOON of all God has to offer, the COMING ATTRACTIONS of ETERNITY. Both of our readings this morning are APOCALYPSES, which to many has come to mean the End of the World. That is not the meaning. A CALYPSE was a Lid. The Prefix APO refers to lifting, or unveiling. So an Apocalypse is “Lifting the Lid of Future” images of What is to to Come. The problem is that we have come to know and expect what FUTURISTS will predict. The field of FUTURISM is based on two things, PAST & PRESENT EXPERIENCE and the EVOLUTION OF WAR. Futurists are people like Huxley who wrote BRAVE NEW WORLD envisioning a time when Science and Technology became our Gods, became our Life Force. Huxley envisioned test-tube babies, and before The Pill a Chastity belt to allow us to conceive only when we wanted to do so. Huxley envisioned the solving of the DNA Code, the excitement over Brave New World was bigger than over anything else published. But to Huxley's dismay what he thought would take hundreds of years, was accomplished within twenty. At the unleashing of the Atomic Bomb, Albert Einstein described that “Everything in the Universe has now changed! Everything, except our way of thinking. Because the Human Mind has not changed, this earth, this life drifts toward unparalleled extinction.” Recent explorations of MARS confirmed exactly what the futurists expected, that like Earth, Mars once supported life, Mars once had water and the Building blocks of Evolution. But what ever was there exhausted the resources, destroyed the creation, all that is left, all that the future holds for humanity, is destruction. Years ago, there was a popular thriller ON THE BEACH about life after World War 3, when the only life left on earth is Australia, and a man wanting to go home, goes across the world in a submarine, arriving at San Francisco Bay. The Sub surfaces, the man gets out into a Life raft with a fishing pole, and paddles toward shore, but because of the radiation fall out he dies before ever landing on the beach. Similarly, George Lucas when at Stanford created a film about Humans living in tunnels under the earth like ants, and periodically, one wearing a helmet with a light and Gieger counter would go up a ladder to see if the world was habitable again, and die. In many ways, the new Robert Redford film is like this, One man alone on the Sea, who despite having the most expensive sailboat, and all the finest technology and resources, is sunk by a shipping container that fell off a cargo ship. One by one, everything devolves. But the point of what the Bible says, is what if our Futurists have the wrong starting point, the wrong assumptions? An Apocalypse is only an image of what is coming, and may not be the full future. What if, instead of beginning by studying the PAST & PRESENT and THE EVOLUTION OF WAR, we began with GOD. God is a GOD of Limitless CREATION, but also a God of REDEMPTION. What if instead of our the future being based on Human limitation of war, the future is based on God's Ability to Create and to Redeem? Winston Churchill was once asked: “Sir Winston, what in your education prepared you to lead Britain through her Darkest hours?” Thinking a moment, he said “The two years I spent in the same grade.” The reporter responded “So Failure?” Churchill retorted “NO, the ability to try again and again until I got it right.” Jonas Salk was the inventor of the Polio Vaccine, who was asked to compare his feelings at discovery versus the 200 failures he had getting it right. Salk dismissed this, saying my family never believed in failure. “They taught me to believe in experiences, and I had 201 experiences getting it right. The solution could not have happened without the 200 previous experiences.” Do you know the name Catherine Lawes? In 1921 her husband became Warden of SinSing Penitentiary. When he came as Warden, Sing Sing was known for having the worst Criminals, the greatest violence, most number of riots and deaths of any prison. Twenty years later when he retired, Singsing was described as one of the most humanitarian institutions. DO you imagine that over 20 years, criminals became less violent? What happened was that on his first day, Mrs. Lawes was told she should never set foot inside the prison, it was too dangerous; whereas she decided if this was where her spouse was going to work, devoting his life, she and her children would be part of it. So she brought her children to basketball games in the Prison. She began visiting the prison daily, and eating her lunch and dinner with the inmates. One day she was killed in an auto accident. The Visitation was held in the Parlor of the Family's home a mile outside the Prison gates. The inmates all gathered like caged animals at the gates, roaring and making threats, getting more and more agitated. The Acting Warden, went down into the yard and said “All right Men, you can go and pay your respects, but be back by check-in.” The gates were opened and the inmates walked with dignity the mile through town to the Warden's home, where they each came inside and said goodbye, then every one walked back to the prison. The Hebrews had a second and third and thousandth chance, Human Life is not about Limitations. Being HUGE sells Cars. Calamity, Crisis, Devastation sells the NEWS and gets Politicians elected. But Human Life, this life is the COMING ATTRACTION of REDEMPTION to live with God. What if your First Love, and the feelings on your Wedding Day, the Joy of Accomplishments, the awe and wonder of seeing our children grow up and accomplish greater things than we knew existed, if all of that were the COMING ATTRACTIONS of our life with God? In our world, there are crises every week, News of Devastation has become so disposable as to be expected. Isaiah 40 was FAR more comforting and encouraging “Comfort, Comfort My People says your God, I will make a Highway in the Desert, Every valley shall be lifted up and the Rough Places a Plain.” When the people were in bondage without hope, they needed encouragement. At Isaiah 65 the Nation have arrived back home, to witness the realities of devastation, which seem monumental. Our frustration is that we approach the future like Mountain Climbing. We look at the Peak, envisioning that if I could just scale that high, I could look out over all the world. But as soon as soon as we reach the top, we see one peak after another after another and we realize our vision was too small. This life is filled with Signs COMING SOON. But far too often we walk up to the door and PUSH and PUSH as hard as we can, ignoring the words that say PULL. This was a people who had experienced everything described, not on the news, not listening to reports from distant countries, they had lost everything. Isaiah, like an old-time Revival Preacher describes to those who have lost everything”Behold, God creates a new Heaven and new Earth, so thoroughly redeemed the sounds of weeping will be heard no more.” I remember years ago, on Maundy Thursday of Holy week, we all wrote prayers on slips of paper, that we nailed to a cross. We carried that cross from Church to Church, everyone nailing their prayers to it. This week I watched a TED Talk about an Urban Planner/ Designer / Artist who transformed a derelict house in her neighborhood, by painting all the walls with that paint that makes any surface a chalkboard. She wrote at the top of every wall “Before I die, I want to:” And one person after another, as they came passed wrote their hopes and dreams on those walls. In many and different ways, we as the Church have become a Community Center a Public Works Project, that this community owns. We were the Alternative School. We are the Music and More Infant classes. The LaLeche Mom's Support and Moms & Kids CoOp and Montessori Nursery, and SkanFest and Masterworks, and when a Husband beat his wife in our community Vera House spoke to the Community here, when 911 happened the community all gathered together. What if we put Chalk outside the Church and on the sidewalks and driveway, and brick walls, the whole world wrote down their vision of what is COMING SOON with God. We are the Chalkboards! We are the Church! As we go through life, we witness to a vision of a new Heaven and new Earth.