{"id":601,"date":"2014-11-30T18:46:39","date_gmt":"2014-11-30T18:46:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/?p=601"},"modified":"2020-12-02T08:34:37","modified_gmt":"2020-12-02T08:34:37","slug":"get-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/get-ready\/","title":{"rendered":"Get Ready"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Mark 13:24-37<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

November 30, 2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are now past the end of the church year and at the beginning of a new year. It\u2019s Advent. But is this a time of beginning or a time of ending? What time is it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of you seeing that it\u2019s Advent came to church this morning with the sentimentality of the Christmas season on your mind. While we do have our first Advent candle lit today, there is no holiday good cheer in the passage we read. These verses follow a harrowing account of suffering and turmoil that resulted from idolatry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is this website that is called the \u201cRapture Index.\u201d The purpose of this website is to \u201celiminate the wide variance that currently exists with prophecy reporting\u201d into a \u201ccohesive indicator.\u201d The Rapture Index is a \u201cDow Jones of end times,\u201d a prophetic speedometer. The higher the number the faster we\u2019re moving towards the rapture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These people with way too much time on their hands wait for the end of time to come with a list of 42 categories in which they assign a score of one to five. Indicators of the end of the world include the occult, Satanism, false prophets, the Anti-Christ, earthquakes, floods, plagues, unemployment, inflation, interest rates, globalism, ecumenism, liberalism, and civil rights. Civil rights? These people probably added Obama\u2019s speech last week on immigration! The scale for the total score ranges from below 85\u2014\u201cslow prophetic activity\u201d to above 145\u2014\u201cfasten your seat belt.\u201d The last time I checked the rapture index was 164! Stay calm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We know this is goofiness but how many times have we lived through these Second Coming embarrassments. One of the clearest things Jesus said was, \u201cNo one knows the day or the hour.\u201d Fortunetellers have been guessing the day and the hour ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, it\u2019s Hollywood that is releasing blockbuster science fiction hits after hits of asteroids and tsunamis and supernovas. The apocalyptic genre of end-time movies includes astronomical catastrophe or one triggered by humans, usually by some scientific experience that went awry or our pollution of the planet. Now as good church members, are we tempted to believe in some of these Second Coming prophecies?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mark\u2019s Passage<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 The early Christians believed that the end of the world was around the corner. The Gospel of Mark was written forty years after Jesus\u2019 death, just after the Romans destroyed the temple in Jerusalem. Mark writes to tell persecuted Christians about how two days before his death, Jesus told his friends about the end of it all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Imagine if you were describing the end of time, what kind of language would you use? Would you use scientific language because of what we know about science today? Or would you use theological language that ministers might use? Or would you use the kind of apocalyptic language Jesus used? The word, \u201capocalyptic\u201d literally means, \u201ctaking away the veil\u201d or revealing what was hidden or \u201cuncover.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When things are at their most horrible, when it is worse than you can imagine, when the sun does not shine, the moon goes black, the stars fall from the sky, and creation falls apart, know that God is coming for you is what Jesus is saying. The whole universe will melt away like a dream and something new\u2014something that has never entered into our heads\u2014will come about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jesus said that we can know God is coming in the same way that a fig tree knows that summer is coming. The change of seasons can be seen in the tree\u2019s softening branches and spouting leaves. We can feel God\u2019s coming in the softening of our hearts. In this parable the signs of God\u2019s coming are not the catastrophes that some look for in Hollywood movies, but the hope that stirs within our spirits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jesus\u2019 next story gives the disciples insomnia. A master goes on a trip and leaves the servants to manage the house. They need to constantly be on the lookout, because though the master may have marked the date on his calendar, he decided not to share that information with his servants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s like we say, \u201cWhen the cat is out, the mice come out to play.\u201d Any teenager who has ever been left in charge of the house knows how good the first few moments feel. The whole house is yours. You can eat what you want and leave your clothes on the floor. The dishes pile up. The plants need to be watered. But sooner or later, the teenager has to clean up the mess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have seen the bumper sticker that reads, \u201cJesus is Coming. Look Busy!\u201d This parable tells us to get busy and pay attention. As you vacuum, keep watching for who may drive up on your driveway. As you pick up the living room, listen to hear the front door open. None of us ever know when the end will come\u2014for us, for those we love, or for the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jesus kept saying: \u201cDon\u2019t take anything for granted. God could show up any time.\u201d If you fall asleep for fifteen minutes you might miss the most important moment of your life. You might wake up to find God standing over you with luggage in both hands saying, \u201cWhere were you when I arrived? The door was wide open, and there were no lights on. I told you to stay awake.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wake up and understand that what we believe about the future affects the way we live each day. When we look for God\u2019s coming, we hear the ticking of the clock and understand that every minute is filled with hope and despair. Our job is to stay awake to everything that life brings\u2014so that we do not miss God when God comes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main point that I am trying to say to you is that believing that the end belongs to God breaks the power of the world on us, and fills us with a hope that continues even in sorrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Waiting<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Jesus compares God\u2019s advent among us to a thief breaking into a house, it all sounds rather frightening. And sometimes that\u2019s the way apocalyptic writings strike us\u2014\u201cJesus is coming! Are you prepared? Well, you had better be. Just you wait until Jesus comes and you\u2019ll get yours!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I can\u2019t imagine that was the tone in which Jesus spoke these words. Rather, Jesus used apocalyptic language to make the point, in the most vivid way that God is coming! Be prepared to be surprised. Be ready to see God finally get what God wants in the world. Be ready for the God who at once seems so very far away to come very close to you. And one can imagine what a comfort these words were to the tiny band of believers on the fringes of the big, bad Roman Empire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even in the difficulty of present circumstances, Jesus is saying, \u201cTake heart!\u201d The day will come when your faith shall be vindicated, meaning that there will be triumph. We hope for the future on the basis of what we\u2019ve already experienced of God in Christ in the past and in the present. The source of our hope is Jesus Christ and his love for us. We believe that Christ loves us so much he will bring to completion the work begun in his life, death and resurrection. So this apocalyptic message for us today is about God\u2019s continuing invasion of the world, God\u2019s determination to get back what belongs to God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While we want to know what comes next and more specifically when will God appear so that we may banish our sense of aloneness, estrangement, of exile, even of doubt, the answer is \u201cnot yet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The heart of Advent is expectant waiting; eagerly we anticipate the future we cannot yet see, the very definition of hope. Patience is a virtue, we are told, and psychologists tell us that \u201cdelay gratification\u201d is a sign of emotional health and maturity. Those reminders, however, don\u2019t always make our waiting easier. We wait eagerly for the college admission letter, the outcome of our job interview, or our beloved\u2019s response to our proposal for marriage. We pray that our offer on a new home will be accepted or that the stock market will improve before we retire. Some of us purchase lottery tickets in hopes of ensuring our financial future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it is much harder to be patient when the consequences that lie in the future are matters of life and death\u2014a man fearing a potential diagnosis of cancer, a couple facing the possibility of infertility, or the life-threatening illness of a child.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it\u2019s even harder when an entire nation or race of people is at risk but we have been asked to wait and be patient. The people of West Africa grasping at the hope of when there would be enough health workers and medicine to stop the spread of Ebola. What about those who have been victims of systemic injustice for generations and daily confront the realities of racism and cultural biases that have led to mass incarceration and killings of young Black men in places like Ferguson, Missouri?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The response Jesus calls for is to keep watch, stay awake. We are to be attentive to the signs that God is about to do something new, that redemption draws near, that God is at the gates. Neither passive acceptance of whatever happens nor an urgency to bring about God\u2019s kingdom by ourselves will do. We are to wait, but we are also to watch and to be ready. While redemption is God\u2019s work, our participation is far from optional.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Know the Secret<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

God wants us to stay awake and wait. And while we are waiting, for now we know a secret. God is coming near. Every Sunday we pray in the Lord\u2019s Prayer, \u201cYour kingdom come on earth as in heaven,\u201d and we pray that both as a petition to God and as a challenge to ourselves. We are to live as those who know the end of the story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We already have assurance of God\u2019s love in what we have already experienced in Christ\u2014Emmanuel, God with us, even when the final victory is not yet secured. Instead of speculation on God\u2019s future time frame whether it\u2019s with the Rapture Index or Hollywood movies, we do know what God is doing now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The near presence of God is not a human product; it is always an undeserved, and as Jesus puts in today\u2019s Gospel, an unexpected gift. God\u2019s transformation is different from merely human innovation. The Gospel message for us today is that God\u2019s world is here already, is yet to come and is becoming a part of God\u2019s move upon the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Christ is drawing all things to himself, about God continuing to create the world so at last the world is more in line with God\u2019s original intent. For those of you who maybe interested, this is the reason why I have become a vegetarian in my commitment to live more in line with God\u2019s original intent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is always some degree of un-fulfillment in our view of present time. We just know or feel that not everything is just right. Christ has come, but not in fullness. The kingdom of God has broken in among us, but not completely. God is near, but not fully among us. There is still pain and regret, tragedy and tears, and there is more yet to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even in our honest recognition of the incompleteness of the world, we have an expectation that rests upon confidence in the ultimate direction of the movement of history. Every week we in the church testify to our conviction that all history will be gathered up into the loving grip of Christ, that all things in this world, good and bad, are being drawn toward him, toward final consummation of judgment and mercy of God worked out by God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On this First Sunday of Advent, the \u201cComing of the Son of Man\u201d that Jesus speaks about in today\u2019s Gospel is simply a wonderful, richly apocalyptic way of speaking of God\u2019s gracious intent to draw all to God. And when that happens, at some future time and place, we call that \u201csalvation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This church and all that we do as the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco, in all our ambiguity and frailty is, by the grace of the \u201cGod With Us,\u201d Emmanuel is a sign, a signal, an instrument, a foretaste, a vanguard, a seed of hope in God\u2019s momentous turn toward us in Christ and God\u2019s refusal to be a God without a people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are a congregation who knows the secret: God\u2019s will shall triumph.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Be patient, stay awake, be ready. God is drawing near. Our salvation is at hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let us pray.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saving God, we pray that you stir us from our complacent sleep and deliver us from where and who we are that we may become all you intend us to be. That we be a church that never ceases to dream and long for that future day. We pray for the gift of fullness of faith that enables us to firmly believe for what will be beyond the present in that envisioned day. Help us to be ready to believe a new day is coming. In Christ we pray, Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mark 13:24-37 November 30, 2014 Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco. We are now past the end of the church yearContinue readingGet Ready<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[11,22],"class_list":["post-601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-donald-ng-sermons","tag-fcbc","tag-mark"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2254,"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601\/revisions\/2254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.followgreg.com\/revdonaldng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}