Year B

Feb 11 2025

Reflection-Visions of the End

In the 1400s, artists depicted Doom. Jan Van Eyck painted grisly naked bodies, deformed and in torment, with a skull-like figure hovering over them. Hans Memling depicted the Last Judgment with bodies flung about; a demon seizes a helpless man by the ankle and smashes a foot on his neck. The people of Europe had just come through one of the most hellish centuries in memory—war, famine, and bubonic plague had decimated Europe. They had seen dead bodies. They had seen people starve. The artwork reflected that desolation. Where was God in all that tribulation? The mild Jesus of the thirteenth century’s artists was gone. The art of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries tended to portray God as harsh, judgmental, and aloof. If you needed help, go ask his mother or one of the other saints. God wasn’t likely to help you.

Where are we now? When we hear Jesus talk this week about tribulations and stars falling from the sky, is this more real than it used to be? Could we be wiped out by war, or famine, or disease? When the prophet Daniel speaks of a “time unsurpassed in distress,” does that feel more like a possibility?

I know a young woman who lost two of her grandparents in one day during the COVID-19 pandemic. The immediate response was, “God, where are you in this?” If desolation goes on for a hundred years, as it did in the fourteenth century, will our perspective of God change? Will we believe that God is likely to help us?

Jesus says that we cannot know the day or the hour of the end. But with the psalmist, we ask for the grace to hang onto a belief in a good end, believing God will not abandon us to Sheol, the land of the dead. God alone is our inheritance!

Consider/Discuss

How has your perspective about the end-times changed since five or ten years ago? Have recent tribulations altered your perception of God? If so, how? If not, why not?
Many recent movies and shows deal with apocalyptic scenarios. Have you seen one that has impacted you? How do the protagonists deal with the end-of-the-world trials that they face? Where is/isn’t faith in God present in those end-times situations? Six centuries from now, how will people look back and see how our artists are depicting the Divine in the twenty-first century?

Living and Praying with the Word

Jesus, from your words, you appear to have a long perspective. While we measure time in days and years, you see things in centuries and eons. If heaven and earth pass away, will your words not also pass away? That is hard for us to envision. Give us your eyesight this day. The end of the world is a scary prospect and we cannot handle that without your help. Strengthen us this day for whatever the future brings. In the midst of our fears, be our Peace. When trials come, be our Rock. No matter what happens, show us the path of life and allow us to glorify you forever.

Feb 11 2025

Visions of the End

The reading from the book of Daniel contains the only clear Old Testament reference to resurrection. The passage is situated in a section that focuses on the persecutions and sufferings of the faithful during the period of Greek rule. In standard apocalyptic language, the oracle foresees the day when God’s armies—led by the angel Michael—will come to the aid of God’s people. Those who have been faithful to God will escape the “unsurpassed distress” that will ensue when God comes to set things right. Those faithful, the “wise,” who have died will awake to live “like the stars forever” (perhaps referring to the heavenly host of angels). The unfaithful, however, will endure the everlasting disgrace merited by their wickedness.

Having established that Christ’s priesthood is perfect and that this priesthood now makes the older system unnecessary, Hebrews goes on to discuss the implications of this for believers. Christ’s sacrifice makes possible not only the forgiveness of sins, but actual salvation. The older sacrifices could atone for sins, but they could not take them away, as Christ’s does. This leaves the believers fundamentally changed, and now they are (potentially, at least) “made perfect forever.” Christ himself is now in the presence of God, not only as intercessor, but as heir and conqueror of all the forces that oppose him, including sin itself.

The Gospel reading is sometimes called the Markan apocalypse, featuring as it does several standard tropes from Jewish apocalyptic literature. Apocalyptic thought looked forward to the day when God or God’s Messiah would defeat the evil forces that currently inhabit and corrupt the world. History and the world as we know them will come to an end, a new age will begin, and God’s sovereignty will be recognized by all. The Son of Man, an image derived from Daniel, represents the messianic figure who will bring judgment on the wicked and vindicate the righteous during the final days. The cosmic catastrophe at the beginning of the reading is the sign that the time has arrived, that the world is coming to an end, and a new era is beginning.

Jan 30 2025

The King of Hearts

Both the Jesus who stood before Pilate on his way to a brutal death and the Jesus who will come as the firstborn of the dead and ruler of all can seem too far away to make much of an impression on our lives. But holding these two images together can speak a profound truth, offering our lives meaning and value.

In John’s Gospel Jesus is the revelation of the Father, the Word of God, communicating who God is and what God wants to do for us: to bring us eternal life. The image of Christ the king was one way of communicating that in Jesus, the Creator of all and everything began to reign in a way that “does not belong to this world.”

The use of power in our world has been an endless story of one individual, family, group, or country using its strength, wealth, and talents to hold sway over as many as possible. To do so, any and all means of force and violence were often legitimate. But this is not the way of Christ or those who follow him.

“For this was I born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth” (John 18:37). What truth? That God so loved the world that the Father gave his only Son, “so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life” (3:16). That’s the foundation of this kingdom and its use of power. That’s the plan. Do you want in?

Consider/Discuss

Do you think of yourself as one who “belongs to the truth” to which Jesus testifies?
What are some ways you try to listen to his voice?

Responding to the Word

Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, you spoke and the world came into being. You spoke in the fullness of time and the Word became flesh. You continue to speak so all who listen may be born into your kin-dom through the power of your Holy Spirit. Help us to listen for and obey your voice.

Jan 30 2025

Scripture Study for

The depiction of the coming and arrival of the Son of Man is colored with both mythic and royal tones. The figure comes with the clouds, which are the most frequent accompaniment of a theophany or revelation of God. He comes riding the clouds as one would ride a chariot. He is presented before God in the manner of courtly decorum. The one who sits on the throne is called the “Ancient One.” This implies that God is the one who has endured and, presumably, will continue to endure. In other words, God is everlasting. The mysterious Son of Man is installed by God as ruler over the entire universe.

Jesus is first identified as the anointed one (the Christ) and then described as such. He is a witness who faithfully mediates to others the message that he has received from God. He is the firstborn, the one to whom belong both priority of place and sovereignty. He is the ruler of all the kings of the world. These epithets sketch a “high” Christology, one that emphasizes the more-than-human aspects of Jesus. The final statement reinforces this more-than-human character. Alpha and Omega connote totality, suggesting that Jesus comprises everything that is; he transcends the limits of time; he is the almighty, the ruler of all things.

For the Jewish people, King of the Jews was a messianic title. Pilate considered it a challenge to Roman political authority. The Roman asks about a political reality that may have a religious dimension, while Jesus speaks about a religious truth that certainly has political implications. By describing his kingdom through negative contrast, Jesus has indirectly admitted that he is a king. His answers show that both the Jewish leaders and the Roman officials had reason to be concerned about his claims. Though not of this world, his kingdom would indeed challenge both messianic expectations and the powers of this world.

Jan 30 2025

All’s Well That Ends Well

The end of the church year directs our attention to what scripture says about the end of time. Two of the words used to describe these texts are not part of our ordinary vocabulary: apocalyptic, which refers to receiving a “revelation” in a vision of something concealed up until now, and eschatological, which points to events of the endtime or final age (the eschaton), when the evil powers make their final struggle with God and are defeated.

These readings have one important point to make: that all will be well. God is in charge, even when it seems that everything is coming to a catastrophic end. As we hear in the first reading today, God has designated the angelic guardian Michael to watch over the people. Such a time will prove that how one lives life has consequences. The book of Daniel offers a word of consolation to the wise and those leaders who championed God’s justice.

In the Gospel Mark’s Jesus speaks of the coming of the Son of Man in great power and glory. While Jesus indicates in Mark’s Gospel that this would happen soon, such was not the case. We continue to wait on the Lord.

When we pray the Our Father we always say, “Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” Someone asked recently why we pray that God not lead us into temptation, finding it strange to think of God doing such a thing. What we pray for is that God not let us fail in the final testing that everyone has to undergo.

Consider/Discuss

Does the idea of an “endtime” have meaning for you?
Do you find comfort in the message of these texts or do they evoke another response?

Responding to the Word

Loving God, you created all that is in the heavens and on the earth; we know our future is in your hands. Help us to entrust ourselves to your mercy and care. Do not allow temptation to overwhelm us, but send your Spirit to lead us into your kingdom, where your Son reigns forever and ever.