PEOPLE'S CHURCH OF DOVER

I Thessalonians 5:1-11; Matthew 25:14-30           All Eschatology Points Us Back to Ethics

Sermon November 16, 2008:  People's United Church of Christ, Dover, DE:  The Rev. Dan Griggs

 

            Harriet tells the story about when she was a little girl, one day her father gave her some money and told her to walk down to the local store and buy a light bulb he needed.  She was only about eight years old, and she had never walked that far from home by herself; and in addition she would have to cross a busy street at a traffic light.  She knew how to do it,  but she felt scared and very anxious.  He told her, "Now be careful.  Stay on the sidewalk, and go straight to the store, and then come straight home."  With great trepidation she found herself moving out the front door, along the sidewalk and down to the street corner with all the cars whizzing by.  Walking across the street frightened her so much she was crying for the rest of the way to the store.  When she went into the store, the owner was waiting for her—her father had called ahead and told them what he wanted.  So she gave him the money, he rang up the sale and gave her a bag containing the light bulb to take home—and then, to her surprise, he gave her one more thing:  an ice cream cone, just for her for being a brave girl and running this errand for her father.  It was a double scoop of strawberry—her favorite.  He hadn't told her she would get the ice cream, but he had arranged for it before he even talked to her.  Now let me ask you a question.  Was Harriet's trip about the errand or the ice cream?  It's the strawberry ice cream that Harriet remembers so vividly, but the story is about doing something her father asked her to do.  The ice cream was a wonderful surprise reward at the end. 

            For the next few minutes I'm going to use some big words.  I'm going to tell you what they mean, but they're still big words; so as I talk about those big words I want you to remember the story of Harriet's errand and the strawberry ice cream.  And the point of this sermon is its title:  All eschatology points us back to ethics. 

 

            The word "eschatology" is a theological term.  It means the study of the Last Things—the End of the World, Judgment Day, and the assignment of eternal rewards and punishments.  Eschatology deals with those ideas that are so frightening to many people:  Am I going to be good enough?  How strict will the Eternal Judge be?  Is hell really an eternal lake of fire, or is it eternal absence from the presence of God?  These are some of the questions in the study of the Last Things—"eschatology."[1]

            The other big word is more familiar:  "ethics."  "Ethics" is a strange word.  Webster says that it's plural, but it's "construed as singular."[2]  I've always wondered whether to say "ethics is" or "ethics are."  It's easier in some other languages—it doesn't have the "s" on the end, so in German for example, it's "ethic is."  The word refers to behavior in several ways.  Ethics means that you don't break the law, or the Ten Commandments, or the rules of your company or your profession.  Ethics also means the books and lectures about behavior—a field of study.  Again, ethics means a desire to get beyond laws and rules and do what's really right:  the Civil Rights Movement was an ethical project to change some bad laws.  The environmental movement in our time is an ethical project to do what's needed to reverse the pollution of the earth.  Back after the First World War many Americans became pacifists, so when Hitler started invading countries and Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, these American pacifists had to do a lot of ethical thinking to accept the call to military service:  one of the leaders in this ethical re-thinking was the UCC ethicist Reinhold Niebuhr.  "Ethics" is about behavior—what you do, why you do it, and how you think about it. 

            Now let me say the theme of this sermon again:  All eschatology points us back to ethics.  What I mean is:  what you believe about the End (the End of the world, or your own death) has the practical effect of reminding you about what you ought to be doing now, or who you ought to be while you still can.  Harriet got the strawberry ice cream, but the story is about her errand. 

 

            I've said before that there are at least eight different pictures of "heaven" in the New Testament—eight different ways to describe "what comes after"—"eschatology."  But I was wrong:  there are at least twelve, not eight.  The one we're all most familiar with, of course, is the idea of "going to heaven."  That phrase, "going to heaven," is never used in the Bible; but there are pictures that show it.  Paul wrote to the Christians in Philippi:[3]

The prologue of First Peter describes it this way:[4]

The Book of Revelation has several descriptions of heaven—the ivory throne, the pearly gate, the golden streets; but this is about the only thing Revelation actually says about "going there":[5]

That is, the martyrs.  So the first picture of "what comes after" in the New Testament is about "going to heaven."  But remember, it's a picture:  it's not the reality, which is indescribable.

            There is a similar picture in Paul's First Thessalonian Letter, but it's not quite the same.  He says those who have died will be raised first:[6]

Then we who are alive… will be caught up in the clouds

together with them to meet the Lord in the air, and so

we will ever be with him.

I have this image of all our legs sticking through the bottom of the clouds, "in the air."  I doubt that's what Paul meant, but that's the picture he draws.  So that's two descriptions.

            Here's a third:  all things made new.  The Book of Revelation says it this way in the last couple of chapters:[7]

Now if there is both a new heaven and a new earth, that implies that God will rule from heaven and humans will live on the new earth.  That's a different picture than we get in the phrase "going to heaven." 

            A similar image also appears in the very next verse:[8]

These are the pictures that have led some Christians to a literal interpretation that has Christ reigning for a millennium on earth before, or after, the final Judgment.[9]

            I've described four different pictures of "what comes after," all taken from the New Testament.  I'm not going to quote passages on the other eight, but here they are:  "eating of the tree of life in God's garden" (which sounds kind of Muslim, doesn't it), "living forever," "the next age" (which Christianity took from Judaism), "eternal life" without any clear description of what it would be like, God's "dwelling with humankind" and so there is no need for the sun or moon, a "bride adorned for her wedding," God's people ruling over the whole earth, and "creation set free from its bondage to decay."

            Because there are at least twelve different pictures, I think we're supposed to get the idea that whatever "comes after" will be glorious.  I don't take any of these pictures literally—they are symbols of something that can't be described. 

 

So the question is, what do we do to get the ice cream?  And that's my point:  All eschatology points us back to ethics.  There are some Christians who have come to a place in their lives where they feel no affection for any of these pictures—they would be satisfied simply to love God and fulfill their lives here and now, and they feel no need for anything to "come after."  Even these Christians can welcome what I'm trying to say today:  all eschatology points us back to ethics. 

            Religion is something we do while we're alive on earth.  Religion is about our lives now in relation to the Eternal.  It's like that part of Harriet's story when she was simply doing what her father asked her to do—make a trip to the store for him.  Religion is the trip—the "journey," if you will.  And so what is your "journey"?  That's your "ethics"—what you choose to be or do, why you choose this and not that, and how you think it through. 

            If you want Bible statements about the journey, there are plenty:  believe in Jesus Christ,[10] share in the body and blood of Christ,[11] love one another,[12] hold a steady course and persevere,[13] live a moral life[14]--the teachings about who you are and how to live that make up so much of what I talk about in the pulpit, and which form your moral awareness from childhood. 

            But I think your "journey" is bigger than that.  I think your "journey" is the whole of your living, your self-understanding, your experiences that stretch you and make you more, the mistakes and the defeats that come your way but from which you gain wisdom.  So ultimately Christianity is not a set of doctrines to believe, and it's not a set of rules to obey—although both are there:  ultimately Christianity, our "religion," is this exhilarating, scary, beautiful, difficult, joyful, sorrowful journey  traveled  in relation to the Eternal.  Christianity is a path—a spiritual path.  And when we see our lives from this perspective, I think it's pretty obvious that all eschatology points us back to ethics.  I will come to the End; and in view of the End, however I think about it, I make my life choices now with something more in view than just getting through the day.  I become somebody, or I do something … because; and that "because" comes from my view of the End. 

 

            Maybe you don't expect any ice cream.  Maybe you've heard your Father's promise that there is ice cream.  You can be a Christian either way, by living the life you have in relation to the Eternal.  And that is your "journey."

AMEN