Isaiah
65:17-25; Isaiah 12; II Thessalonians 3:6-13; Luke 21:5-19.
People of faith hear about paradise on earth, but also about
watchfulness before the great time.
Lectionary
Overview. This is the last set of
readings in the long “Common Time” period that started with Pentecost of Year C. It has surveyed the great prophetic tradition, from Elijah's awesome revolution for the Lord to the visions of end times in Joel and the late Isaiah. Only the special Sunday concerning the Reign
of Christ remains before a new liturgical year begins.
The readings for
this Sunday reflect this “finality” of the time, focusing on the glorious
future that will be introduced by the judgment of God. That judgment begins the “good
news” of the chosen but humble folks who are God’s servants, but those folks must also hear the warnings about false starts and persecutions that come before that glorious paradise arrives.
Isaiah 65:17-25.
The prophetic
reading proclaims God’s making the world new for the remnant of God’s chosen
and suffering people.
It begins
with God’s own joy,
…for look, I am
creating Jerusalem to be ‘Joy’
and my people to be
‘Gladness.’
I shall be joyful
in Jerusalem
and I shall rejoice
in my people.
(Verses 18-19, New Jerusalem Bible
Version.)
The visionary who speaks here pictures a restoration of paradise for God’s joyful
people. Infant mortality will disappear,
and all will live to enjoy a blessed seniority, with life expectancy well over
a hundred years.
It will not be a
world without work and constructive activity, but what is built will remain and
be useful, what is planted will grow and be fully productive. No invaders will seize the goods and produce,
no impersonal agencies will foreclose or repossess.
…For the days of my
people will be like the days of a tree,
and my chosen ones will themselves use
what they have made.
(Verse 22, NJBV.)
The comparison of
human life with the life of a tree is very favorable, for a tree can
grow again from a stump. So the sages
understood it:
There is always
hope for a tree:
when felled, it can start its life again;
its shoots continue to sprout.
Its roots may have
grown old in the earth,
its stump rotting in the ground,
but let it scent of
water, and it buds,
and puts out branches like a plant newly
set.
(Job 14:7-9; NJBV)
The Egyptian
Judeans who translated Isaiah into Greek also saw hope in the comparison to the
tree. Here's how they read the Isaiah text: “for the
days of my people will be like the days of the tree of life.” They saw here the tree of which the first couple could eat when they lived in God’s
garden, exempt from the power of death (Genesis 2:9).
The coming
conditions of paradise will include blessings for future generations (verse
23), and even the animal world will become peaceful and no longer carnivorous –
except for that wicked serpent who disrupted the first paradise; his diet will
be dust (verse 25).
Repeating
words of an earlier prophecy of paradise, the vision here concludes in
peace: “They shall not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain, says the Lord” (verse 25b, NRSV,
quoting Isaiah 11:9).
This second Isaiah reading
is a liturgy, with different voices
complementing each other in a thanksgiving and hymning of salvation
beheld. The liturgy presents a glorious
salvation suddenly at hand!
In the first scene, a
single voice speaks (“Israel
Speaking to
Yahweh:
I will give thanks to
you, O Lord,
for though you were angry with me,
your anger turned away,
and you comforted me.
Speaking to the
world:
Surely God is my
salvation;
I will trust, and will not be afraid,
for the Lord God is my
strength and my might;
he has become my salvation.
(Verses 1-2, NRSV .)
In the second scene
(verses 3-5), a group is summoned to draw water from the “wells of salvation” –
plentiful water, available as if access to wells was now possible after a
siege. They will call on others to thank
God for the victory. “Give thanks to the
Lord / … make known his deeds among the nations …” (verse 4).
Finally, the last
word of the liturgy (verse 6) is addressed to the mother city:
Shout aloud and sing
for joy, O royal Zion
for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.
God is in your midst. This
message is a fitting climax to the joy of the victorious figure who gave thanks
at the beginning (verses 1-2) and of the grateful drawers of victory water who
responded (verses 3-5).
As a part of this
set of readings, this psalm-like liturgy is a vision of salvation ahead –
salvation of a people finding its joy in a delivered figure (king) and a holy
city.
II Thessalonians 3:6-13.
This reading is
not directly about the coming salvation (as are the prophetic readings), but
makes urgently clear what people of faith should do while they wait for the
glory. They should WORK . The apostle has learned that some folks at
Thessalonica have been living in idleness, which he insists is quite
unacceptable.
The context
of the letter suggests that they do this because they expect the world to end
any day and there is no need to exert lots of effort. Paul insists that he has given them a
different example: “With toil and labor
we worked night and day, so that we might not burden any of you” (verse 8, NRSV ).
The apostle comes on a little tougher than usual. No
work, no food. He insists that the
rest of the community should make the idlers follow this principle, and
“commands” (verse 6) them to shun these idlers until they straighten up.
The judgment
of God may be at hand, but in the meantime the work goes on!
The Gospel
reading introduces Luke’s version of Jesus’ last teaching in Jerusalem
Early
Christian tradition reported that Jesus delivered a discourse about
the end times to the disciples. This
final “apocalyptic” discourse of Jesus, delivered just before the crucifixion,
is itself an important part of the meaning of Jesus’ death. (The Son of Man who dies on the cross is also
the one who will come in glory at the end of the age.)
The three
synoptic Gospels report this discourse somewhat differently. Mark gives the
most flat-out apocalyptic version (Mark 13), Matthew expands it with following
parables (Matthew 24-25), and Luke divides it into segments, one delivered in
the “Journey to Jerusalem 17:20 -37) and a second segment
delivered in Jerusalem
Luke also
changes the setting of the discourse:
Mark has Jesus give the discourse to four close disciples as they sit on
the Mount of Olives looking across the valley at the
temple; Luke has the whole discourse delivered in the temple precincts, with an
audience wider than just the disciples.
Our reading
includes only the first two parts of the whole speech.
Watch out
for false alarms (verses 8-11).
Jesus warns his followers that there will be many alarming and false
signs before the real show comes. Some
will come who say, “I am he,” and “the time is at hand,” which is what Jesus himself said at the beginning, according to Mark (1:15 ) and Matthew
(4:17). But be warned, these are deceivers or deceived;
do not follow them.
Uprisings and
wars will come and go, but the faithful must wait. There will be many opportunities to misread
the times, and this is part of the challenge of living in the latter
days!
You will
be persecuted (verses 12-19). But
even while all these false leads are appearing in the world, the followers will
be abused and mistreated, because they are identified by Jesus’ name. In the face of persecution, the followers can
be assured that Jesus himself will give them speech and wisdom to respond well
and give a good “witness.”
This concern
about “witness” or “testimony” by persecuted followers reflects the later
setting in which the Gospel traditions were shaped. Witnessing to the name of Jesus was to become
the primary mark of the faithful Jesus followers. (See especially the “Name” theology presented in Peter's speeches in Acts 3-5 .)
But they WILL
survive! While “some” of them will be
killed, not a hair of their heads will perish (verses 16 and 18) – a paradox
possible if they “endure” into the (qualitatively different) age to come. “By your endurance you will gain your souls”
(verse 19, NRSV).
The judgment
of God – which the peoples could not recognize in the death of the criminal on
the cross – will finally include victory over oppression and death, a great joy
for all the peoples to see and sing about (as in the prophetic readings!).
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