Rev. Eugene N. Nelson, Jr.
The Community Church of Sebastopol
April 17, 2005
Mark 13: 28-37
Does the Bible, particularly the New Testament Book of Revelation, predict the future? The answer is clear. No, it does not.
Does the Bible, particularly the New Testament Book of Revelation, predict the future? Again, the answer is clear. Of course it does.
When the question comes up about the Bible and whether or not it provides a glimpse into the future, I truly believe that the answer is both yes and no. I think it all depends on what kind of future we are talking about, and indeed what kind of Bible we are talking about. That’s what I want to explore with you today. Just what are these strange and wonderful books of the Bible, books such as Daniel and Revelation, doing in the Bible anyway? What are they trying to tell us about faith, about the future, about God?
A few months ago I received this slick promotional brochure in the mail. I suspect many of you did too. Please don’t tell me I was the only one. Someone spent a lot of money to send this out. I don’t know if you saw it. It had pictures of animals on it and it said “EXPLORE THE PROPHETIC: Revelation’s symbols hold the key to your future.” And if we attended this four night seminar at the Sebastopol Veterans Hall last January, we would learn how the prophesies of Daniel and Revelation reveal the future. Indeed, we would even learn how America is described in Biblical prophecy. It is all there, in the Bible, our future laid out for us, a future, by the way, that is just around the corner. The biblical clock is ticking. The signs are in place for the “end of days.”
Was this true? Does Revelation predict events that are now taking place in the 21st century? With the beginning of its mini-series, Revelations (interestingly with an “s”), NBC certainly seems to think so. And its advertisers are betting a pile of money that a lot of us are going to tune in to find out what God has in store for us and our world. Indeed, a poll taken not long ago indicated that 59% of Americans believe that the prophecies found in the Book of Revelation will come true. The Left Behind series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins, telling the story of the Rapture, the return of the warrior Jesus and the end of the history, has been a runaway best seller. Is it true? Is Revelation some kind of biblical crystal ball?
I’ll return to that question, but first some words about the Rapture. There is a lot of talk about the Rapture these days, from the Left Behind books, to television to Congress. The Rapture – that time when Jesus will return and take the faithful to himself, while the rest of the world, probably including you and me, will suffer terrible tribulation for seven years. Did you know that the word, “rapture” actually never occurs in the Bible? Indeed, the idea of a rapture isn’t biblical at all, having been invented in the 19th century by John Nelson Darby, a renegade Anglican priest from Ireland, who spent a large part of that century preaching something he called, ‘premillennial dispensationalsim.” Now stay with me on this. According to Darby, not the Bible, history is divided into seven ages, or “dispensations” all leading up to the end of time and we are getting close. But before we get to the end, which Darby called the “dispensation of the millennial kingdom,” things are going to get ugly. There will be a Great Tribulation, which those who Jesus recognizes as his own will not have to endure. God will remove the elect by means of the rapture before judging the earth. This is what happens in the Left Behind series. Now you see them, now you don’t. Have you seen those bumper stickers? “Warning: In case of rapture, this car will be driverless.” There aren’t a lot in Sonoma County, but they are out there! Now that’s confidence. But I like the bumper sticker that asks, “When the rapture comes, can I have your car?” If I am going to suffer for seven years, I can at least have a nice car to suffer in.
After this rapture, Israel will be restored, according to Darby, as God’s primary instrument in history, the wicked will be destroyed in the final battle of Armageddon, and Christ will begin his 1000-year reign on earth. This would explain the curious alliance between the religious right in America and the Likud party in Israel. Many evangelical Christians have supported Jewish settlements in Palestinian areas, because a restored and powerful Israel is a sure sign that the second coming cannot be far behind. Several years ago, Israel gave Jerry Falwell a Lear jet to thank him for his support. Now interestingly, one small item that the Jewish allies of the American religious right don’t seem to discuss is that, according to Darby, in the final struggle all unconverted Jews, Jews who do not confess Christ, will be burned alive. Oh well.
Again, none of this is from scripture, is not even suggested in scripture. The whole system, seven years of tribulation and all, is a fabrication, a fiction, not at all biblical. But since it claims to answer a lot of questions that scripture doesn’t, the idea of a rapture has captivated the imagination of millions of Americans, indeed of many policymakers in Washington. In the early days of the war with Iraq, a number of preachers suggested that the war was but a warm up act, predicted in the Book of Revelation, paving the way to the final conflagration on the road to redemption. For me, this is where all the end of the world stuff gets a little scary – when bad biblical prophecy is wedded to foreign policy.
I may have told you before the story of a young man rushing to catch a plane. He was late and had only seconds to pause in the airport bookstore to find something to read on his flight. He hurriedly scanned the shelves until one title caught his eye: How to Hug. Sounded pretty good so he grabbed the book, paid the clerk, and rushed to his plane. Finally airborne, he settled back to read his new book, only to discover that the book he had so hastily purchased was actually volume five of an encyclopedia.
I am convinced that today’s prophesy-peddlers go to the Book of Revelation with that same kind of misunderstanding. They pick and choose, which is interesting because that is what they usually accuse the United Church of Christ of doing, using only those parts of the book which reinforce their belief that Revelation is a kind of crystal ball through which we can trace the exact outlines of an inevitable future. They can’t see the forest for the trees. They miss the big picture – what I believe this book is really saying.
The book clearly tells us in the first and second chapters what it is about. The Book of Revelation was written with a very specific audience in mind – it was written to the churches of first century Asia Minor, churches facing deadly persecution under the Roman emperor, Domitian, who was insisting that Christians throughout the empire worship him and images of him as god. Many Christians refused, thereby quite literally putting their lives on the line. Revelation addresses their circumstance and their time. It is not written with the 21st century in mind. It is intended to meet the needs of that suffering first century church.
For me, Revelation and all the biblical apocalyptic literature, are more about promise than prediction. They are more about promise than prediction. And the sad thing is that when we turn Revelation into prediction, we miss the promise. I would argue that many of the frightening images in Revelation, the beast – the number 666 – are references to Rome and its persecution. What Revelation is trying to do is to provide the churches with Christian counter-images to the imperial images of Rome, and to demonstrate that these counter-images, this counter-cultural Christian story, will win in the end. Again, not a prediction but a promise. Speaking about both Daniel and Revelation, one of my colleagues has said, “Both of these strange books, written in veiled language, do talk about the future. But they are not blueprints; they are expressions of faith. And what they say is: take heart; God is not dead; no earthly monarch can defy God forever; in the end, God will win; so stand strong and do not waver in your faith.”
In his book, So Well Remembered, James Hilton has one character say, “I don’t ask what’s in the future, but I would like to know who is.” Well that, very simply, is what Revelation is about: not what is in the future, but who. Says Revelation: Dare to hope, dare to be faithful, dare to stand strong in your faith, do not be afraid, do not be complacent…for in spite of all evidence to the contrary, God will dwell with God’s people, and God’s will will be done. When all is said and done, God is in control of history. And that is a powerful message of hope for any church in any age
Actually, I think Revelation could be interpreted as a kind of anti-rapture. It is not about escape from the world – some kind of “beam me up” theology. No, it urges Christians to stay engaged with their world. For it is here that God will take up residence with God’s people. Isn’t this what the Jesus story is all about? In the words of New Testament professor, Barbara Rossing, “Revelation’s visions are intended as wake-up calls. They are not meant to be literal predictions of the future…they are used to wake us up to a sense of urgency for our world and for our lives…Our future is not predetermined.”
Now this is a big deal, for in the theology of the Rapture, our future is predetermined, already closed, already decided. All I need to do is make sure that I am right with Jesus and wait to be beamed up. But this is not biblical. Let me say it again - this idea of sitting around waiting for God to bring things to a close is not biblical. Did you hear what Jesus said: “But about that day or hour no one knows – hear that…no one knows – neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come.” Jesus did not know when the end would come. He refused to predict it. So I don’t know what information all those who are predicting the end have that Jesus did not have?
But Jesus isn’t finished. He goes on to say that we should not even concern ourselves with predictions of the end. Instead we should be alert, awake, ready. I hear him saying that the best way we can prepare for the future is to pay attention to – and to be engaged in – what is happening right now as we wait for the Lord who actually never tires of coming to the world.
Thinking of Kristen’s children’s sermon, today is actually the environmental Sabbath. Currently there are religious voices out there, again a constituency with a lot of clout in Washington, that insist that we need not concern ourselves with global warming or clean air and water, or conservation of oil. And why? Why care for the earth, why bother, when droughts, floods, famine, and other signs of ecological degradation, along with worldwide social and political chaos, are evidence of the coming apocalypse predicted in the Bible? Why do anything? The end is coming, let it come. Again, when talk of the apocalypse, of rapture, begins to intersect with public policy, things get a little scary. As Bill Moyers writes, “The delusional is not longer marginal.”
But this is bad Bible. Closer to the truth of Revelation and the thought of Jesus are these words by Bill Nelson: “The future does not just happen. It’s not ‘out there somewhere’ waiting for us. We help to make the future…Nothing worthwhile is likely to happen in your marriage if you just wait for it to happen; you must make it happen. Your city will not be the place in which you would wish your children raised, unless you help to make it such a city. And your world will not have peace unless you want peace; unless you find more and more ways to beat ‘swords into plowshares.’ Too many persons, religious persons, sit around waiting for God to do something. Well God is present in human life, trying to work God’s will in our midst. But we too must work, trusting that behind the vast mystery we call life and beyond the far reaches of heaven, God is!”
We’re back to where I began. Does the Book of Revelation predict the future? No, if you are asking if Revelation predicts specific events in the 21st century leading inevitably to the end of days. But yes, if you hear in Revelation the affirmation that, no matter what the future brings, God will be there. Again, not what is in the future, but who
When I think of the future, what God might or might not have in store for us, I find myself returning to words written by Mark Twain to Walt Whitman on the occasion of Whitman’s 70th birthday. Said Twain, “You have just lived 70 years which are the greatest in the world’s history… You have seen so much, but tarry for awhile, for the greatest is yet to come."