Isaiah 65:17-25; Isaiah 12, 17-21; 2 Thess 3:6-13; Luke 21:5-19
“17You will be hated by all because of my name.”
Unfortunately, that’s a very long list of names. Starting with Jesus himself. Then his original apostles and his disciples. His mother and the women who supported him. Then scores of Saints with a capitol “S”. Then multitudes of saints with a small “s”. Hundreds and thousands of souls over thousands of years, all hated because they followed the teachings of a rogue teacher and healer from the lowly town of Nazareth.
All because of the signs that Jesus showed the world. Signs that God has not forgotten the lowly and the destitute, the lame and the sick, the widow and the orphan, the powerless, the rejected and the forgotten. Signs that something had forever changed by his coming, that power had shifted, that compassion and forgiveness and reconciliation were now the currency of the kingdom that God has instituted in him for us. Signs that God was about more than pomp and circumstance, grandiose piety and grandstanding prayers, wealth and position, institution and birthright.
Signs, as well as a proper interpretation, were important in Jesus’ day. The Israelites were continually watching for signs of salvation from God. Facing persistent abuse and possible extinction at the hands of their Roman occupiers, Jews were busy doing one of three things: making the best of the occupation and doing what they could to survive until things got better; making friends with the occupiers and hoping to secure their own future by eating the scraps at the Roman tables; or actively revolting through violence and bloodshed. Faithful Jews believed that despite all the hardship they faced, they would one day receive divine signs of God’s pending salvation, and that the key to their survival was correctly reading those signs.
The Romans, for their part, were artists at distracting someone that was looking for ways to revolt against their rule. When Rome occupied a region, the local Gods of that conquered region were simply added to the list of gods worshiped throughout the empire. This took away the religious excuse for revolt. Using crushing taxation, whereby the population was so distracted with their own literal survival, the Romans occupied a population that was, literally, too weak and too exhausted and too hopeless to mount a credible revolt.
Rome also looked for signs; not signs of God’s blessing, they believed they already enjoyed the blessing of their gods, but signs of revolt among those they occupied. Rome watched carefully, and meticulously neutralized any perceived threat to the empire. Roman governors were not shy about torturing and killing Jews to make sure their rule was not challenged. Rome fine-tuned their favorite method of capital punishment of Jews for maximum effect in humiliating those they executed and demoralizing those who watched. Being hung from a tree was a Jewish sign of God’s damnation. Being executed naked shamed both the one who was killed and any Jew who witnessed the execution. Not allowing the body to be buried but the remains to be scattered by dogs and other wild animals deprived Jews of proper burial, and of the custom of keeping a family’s bones in a common family tomb.
For the Jews, the Roman occupation and their daily humiliation were signs that God remained angry with them and continued to punish them for their sinfulness. They waited desperately for the sign of the Messiah that would free them from their bondage and destroy their enemies.
In today’s reading from Luke, Jesus and the disciples are passing through the grandeur and splendor of the Temple. The continued existence of the temple is a sign that, although God remains angry with his people, contact is still maintained between God and his chosen, the Temple remains the most important part of Jewish worship, and because of the High Priest’s actions in the temple, the Jewish people’s sins are still being forgiven. The continued existence of the Temple is also a sign that those whom the Temple authorities reject, like Jesus and his followers, are rightly to be rejected, because so long as the Temple exists, the power in Judaism remains there.
As the disciples admire the grandeur and power of the Temple, Jesus is interpreting the sign that the final destruction of the Temple will have for Jews, but the disciples are distracted by what the specific sign will be that the destruction of the Temple is at hand, not what the devastation and the consequences of the permanent destruction of Temple will bring to Judaism.
So Jesus tries to get the disciples’ focus off the sign of the destruction of the Temple for two reasons. First, the sign of the Temple’s pending destruction is not important, and searching for it is nothing more than a distraction from the work the disciples are to do. And secondly, as the remainder of Jesus’ words in this reading make clear, the destruction of the Temple has nothing to do with the destiny of the disciples, none of whom will live long enough to see that day.
The future each disciple faces is far more important than the fate of the Temple. “But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name. 13This will give you an opportunity to testify. 14So make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance; 15for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. 16You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, by relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death. 17You will be hated by all because of my name.”
Jesus might just as well have said, “What happens to the Temple is not important, because God does not live in a building, as beautiful and as holy as that building seems. What happens to you is important, because God lives in the temple of your hearts, not one made by your hands.”
And if I was one of the disciples, at this point I would have said, “Wait a minute, wait a minute… back up. What was all that stuff about prison and betrayal and death and hate? I don’t think that’s what I signed on for!”
Which is I’m sure why Jesus added, “But not a hair of your head will perish. 19By your endurance you will gain your souls.” Alright.
Signs were all around in Jesus’ day. Signs that God was doing something new, something the power structures of the world would hate, something that required faithfulness and great sacrifice to benefit from. The power of the Temple elite was ending, the power of governments to control the souls of people was no longer assumed, and the possibility that creation could be reconciled to God was becoming a reality.
We live with many signs in our day, as well. Some benefit us, some simply distract us, and some seek to destroy us. As we look around Zion this morning, we see many sighs that God is alive and well and living in our hearts and in our church and in our community.
As Christians there is only one sign that is true for us, just as true today as it was 2,000 years ago. The sign of a man, a mother’s first child, a poor man, a man healing lepers and the blind, a man treating woman and orphans and widows as though they mattered, a man teaching about God’s love and what it means for us, a man being beaten and hung on a tree to die, a man who’s tomb stands empty, a man who goes before us to show us the way, a man who is dead and yet lives, a man who died for us our sins. As Christians, as followers of the wounded healer, as champions of God’s only Son, as the Body of Christ in the world, the only sign that matters for us is Jesus Christ our Lord himself – who was and is and is to come.
In him we see the face of God. In him we see the mercy of God. In him we see the unfathomable and eternal love of God. Signs come and go, but the love of God for his children, the love of God for you, the love of God for creation is clear as crystal. And we are saved because of Him.