{"id":545,"date":"2012-06-24T11:00:14","date_gmt":"2012-06-24T16:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/?p=545"},"modified":"2019-12-03T12:01:54","modified_gmt":"2019-12-03T17:01:54","slug":"apocalypse-then-the-apocalypse-of-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/2012\/06\/24\/apocalypse-then-the-apocalypse-of-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Apocalypse Then: The Apocalypse of God"},"content":{"rendered":"

Galatians 3: 23<\/a><\/p>\n

Click here to hear the full service.<\/a><\/p>\n

Click here to hear the sermon only.<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Something Unearthly and Final<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/em>1. \u00a0Later in the summer evenings, seated in the dark natural\u00a0womb of our hedged backyard, you can hear a strange cacophonous chorus.\u00a0 A small Toyota drives past, its muffler nearly superannuated.\u00a0 There are crickets, humming from nearby, yet from nowhere.\u00a0\u00a0 A prop jet cruises overhead, spraying its round steady roar.\u00a0 Then there is the neighbor\u2019s radio, and a couple who murmur and mutter as they stroll out front.\u00a0 Somewhere a screen door bangs shut.\u00a0 And yet another car, stereo pounding. But then, lovely and strange it comes, and as from a foreign shore or the far bank of the river Styx, one faintly overhears\u2014how unspeakably sweet\u2014the long, low mellifluous whistle of an unseen train.\u00a0 A train whistle at dusk:\u00a0 is there not something unearthly and final in such a sound?<\/span><\/p>\n

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2. \u00a0Every dawn breaks differently from the last, as the older and\u00a0sicker and more lonely among us can see, better than others.\u00a0 Some may watch from the dawn for spiritual reasons.\u00a0 Most who see it daily, one suspects, see it through the lenses of sheer loneliness, or throbbing and sleep stealing pain, or nightmarish angst.\u00a0 You are awake, again.\u00a0 And there again is the tempting, promissory light of yet another day.\u00a0 See it break!\u00a0 A luminous haze.\u00a0 Or a streak of dull yellow.\u00a0 Or even a sky now confederate gray, now federal blue, now\u2026orange! and crimson! and rose! and all manner of Fire.\u00a0 The color of dawn:\u00a0 is there not something unearthly and final in such a sight?<\/p>\n

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3. \u00a0To touch.\u00a0 To touch and to speak and to speak with touch\u00a0and to touch with speech.\u00a0 For four years you have been in uniform and at last you lie down again beside the mother of your children.\u00a0 Such a touch.\u00a0 Or maybe you were crippled, nearly killed, in an atrocious accident and slept, years, downstairs in a makeshift hospital bunk until, at last, you lie down again against the husky shoulder of husband become nurse become husband again.\u00a0 Such a touch.\u00a0 Or, maybe, you are estranged for years when Grace reunites you two and again you rub cheek to cheek.\u00a0 Such a touch.\u00a0 The touch of human love and desire:\u00a0 is there not something unearthly and final in such a feeling?<\/p>\n

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4. \u00a0The footrace is overlong and you are past the wall, the wall\u00a0of endurance.\u00a0 You have hit the wall.\u00a0 Now, only out of dumb habit do your legs move, still, forward and forward.\u00a0 Another hill, another mile.\u00a0 You ache and you hurt, but mostly you thirst with an arid dusty mouth and cracked lips.\u00a0 Now!\u00a0 Someone has thrust a cup of cold, clear water to you.\u00a0 You lift it and you drink.\u00a0 The force of water upon thirst:\u00a0 is there not something unearthly and final in such a taste as this?<\/p>\n

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5. \u00a0There is a scent, an aroma that\u00a0 your friend wears, partly natural, partly cosmetic, partly a strange mixture.\u00a0 You can sense it in his sweater, in her office, in his car, in her closeness, in his intimacy.\u00a0 It has no name.\u00a0 But it is a fragrance which outlives her, or him, if only for a few weeks or months.\u00a0 Of all things, it makes cleaning the room unbearably and sweetly awful and hard.\u00a0 This is a fragrance to end every other.\u00a0 Such a scent:\u00a0 is there not something unearthly and final about such a fragrance?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Come with me for just a moment this morning out to the very edge of life.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

For the human senses all have their own horizons, their own outer limits, their own twilight zones:\u00a0 sound, sight, touch, taste, scent.\u00a0 They all have their zenith, nadir, and apex\u2014their horizon.\u00a0 Each, bittersweet, is a foretaste, a harbinger and a chilling reminder of the brute limits of our life, even\u2014no especially\u2014at its very very best.\u00a0 They take you out to the limit.\u00a0 To the end of the pier.\u00a0 To the crest of the hill.\u00a0 To the edge of the cliff.\u00a0 To the brink of\u2026eternity.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Come with me for just a moment this morning out to the very edge of life.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Apocalypse of God<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Where human experience ends, God begins.\u00a0 Like a tangent touching a circle.\u00a0 On the far side of that train whistle and that orange dawn and that erotic touch and that slaking taste and that heavenly scent\u2014there, God.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A preacher some years ago spoke in a rowdy college auditorium.\u00a0 Posters lined the walls.\u00a0 One read, \u201cGod is other people\u201d.\u00a0 The preacher began:\u00a0 \u201cI have come to put in the comma.\u201d\u00a0 And he walked to the wall poster and penned in a comma:\u00a0 \u201cGod is Other, people\u201d.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God is Other.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When Paul spoke to the Galatians, he preached the revelation of God.\u00a0 The greek word is apocalypse.\u00a0 The apocalypse of God.\u00a0 The God beyond god.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This is why, in the first instance, the earliest Christians worshipped Jesus\u2019 death and not his life.\u00a0 For in the cross of Christ comes God\u2019s final, martial apocalypse.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

God\u2019s last word.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In Jesus Christ, and Him crucified, in this marauding and final act\u2014the revelation, the apocalypse of God\u2014God speaks and acts.\u00a0 And we today, east and west, may be with appreciation of millenium and holy war viscerally closer to the New Testament than almost any other generation, save that of Jesus and Paul and John.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Behold a mystery, out at the very edge of life.\u00a0 The apocalypse of God finishes all millenial fear and all jihadic anger.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The apocalypse of God:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Permeates<\/p>\n

Invades<\/p>\n

Steps in<\/p>\n

Attacks<\/p>\n

Transforms<\/p>\n

Eclipses<\/p>\n

Seizes<\/p>\n

Graces<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The apocalypse of God:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Is not freedom of the will but freeing of the will.<\/p>\n

Declares war on this territory of tyranny<\/p>\n

Repairs, rebuilds, replaces\u2026all else.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And there is no religious addition, no postscript to the redemptive, apocalyptic act of God in Christ.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This is why St Paul can be so outrageously, shockingly bold to say\u2014it is a baptismal formula\u2014that in Christ<\/strong> there is no longer any difference based on religion (Jew\\Greek), or on economics (Slave\\Free) or on sex (Male\\Female).\u00a0 He says it with the finality of the millenium and with the ferocity of Holy War.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Apocalypse of God invades our twilight world.\u00a0 Even in church\u2014the last refuge of a scoundrel.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

See, hear, taste, touch, smell it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

First, this church opens its doors every day to religious and unreligious, alike. \u00a0The apocalypse of God is, simply, the end of religion\u2014the end of distinction based on tradition alone, or doctrine alone, or tribe alone or habit alone.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Second, every year we pool our money in community.\u00a0 It is an uncanny event, to collect and disburse a million dollars and more, from each according to his ability and to each according to his need.\u00a0 The apocalypse of God is, simply, the end of money\u2014the end of distinction based on wealth alone, or position alone, or inheritance alone, or success alone.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Third, this month we begin to hear again the event of the preached Word.\u00a0 The apocalypse of God is, simply, the end of sex\u2014the end of distinction based on body alone, or gender alone, or orientation alone, or physique alone, or appearance alone.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Oh, I know.\u00a0 You can so easily miss the apocalypse, since it appears in a mere open door, a mere collection plate, a mere soprano voice.\u00a0 You can miss it, for it lies over the edge of our experience, and touches us as if from nowhere, on a cross.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I dare you to watch for what is real.\u00a0 The erasure of religion, the toppling of money, the disappearance of sex.\u00a0 All killed.\u00a0 All defeated in God\u2019s millenial jihad<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Without religion to separate us, without money to enslave us, without sex to divide us, what will become of us?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Why\u2026we will become a beachhead in the invasion of God\u2019s new creation.\u00a0 Real Millenium.\u00a0 Real Jihad<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Here: a New Creation.<\/p>\n

Here: a community that listens.<\/p>\n

Here: a gathering of mutual concern.<\/p>\n

Here: people of glad heart.<\/p>\n

Here: people of happy passion.<\/p>\n

Here: not I must I shall, but I may I can<\/p>\n

Here: love divine, all loves excelling\u2026.<\/p>\n

\n

~ The Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Galatians 3: 23 Click here to hear the full service. Click here to hear the sermon only. Something Unearthly and Final 1. \u00a0Later in the summer evenings, seated in the dark natural\u00a0womb of our hedged backyard, you can hear a strange cacophonous chorus.\u00a0 A small Toyota drives past, its muffler nearly superannuated.\u00a0 There are crickets, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2679,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2679"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=545"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2543,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545\/revisions\/2543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}