Friends, in today’s Gospel Jesus responds to questions about the end of the world. When will it come? What will happen?
Why
were the first Christians
interested in these questions? The simplest and deepest answer is that
they had experienced the end of the world—precisely in the dying and
rising of Jesus.
Jesus
came preaching the kingdom of God, and the nations conspired against
him. The old world seemed to conquer this new world that Jesus embodied.
But then, in the Resurrection, they saw that the old world—the world
predicated upon death and the world that had done Jesus in—was now
defeated.
So
awed were they by the Resurrection—and you can sense it in every book
and letter of the New Testament—that they awaited the imminent arrival
of the new state of affairs, the return of Jesus and the establishment
of God’s kingdom. Though Jesus did not immediately return, the old world
was over, broken, compromised, its destruction now just a matter of
time.
Tuesday of the Thirty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 504
I, John, looked and there was a white cloud,
and sitting on the cloud one who looked like a son of man,
with a gold crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand.
Another angel came out of the temple,
crying out in a loud voice to the one sitting on the cloud,
"Use your sickle and reap the harvest,
for the time to reap has come,
because the earth's harvest is fully ripe."
So the one who was sitting on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth,
and the earth was harvested.
Then another angel came out of the temple in heaven
who also had a sharp sickle.
Then another angel came from the altar, who was in charge of the fire,
and cried out in a loud voice
to the one who had the sharp sickle,
"Use your sharp sickle and cut the clusters from the earth's vines,
for its grapes are ripe."
So the angel swung his sickle over the earth and cut the earth's vintage.
He threw it into the great wine press of God's fury.
While some people were speaking about
how the temple was adorned with costly stones and votive offerings,
Jesus said, "All that you see here–
the days will come when there will not be left
a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down."
Then they asked him,
"Teacher, when will this happen?
And what sign will there be when all these things are about to happen?"
He answered,
"See that you not be deceived,
for many will come in my name, saying,
'I am he,' and 'The time has come.'
Do not follow them!
When you hear of wars and insurrections,
do not be terrified; for such things must happen first,
but it will not immediately be the end."
Then he said to them,
"Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.
There will be powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues
from place to place;
and awesome sights and mighty signs will come from the sky."
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