Wednesday Worship with Dr. Ryan Danker

The Institute on Religion and Democracy heard from Dr. Ryan N. Danker of the John Wesley Institute in Washington, D.C. on December 4 for our “Wednesday Worship” noonday prayer and luncheon.

The monthly gathering aims to foster Christian fellowship within the greater Washington area. IRD hosts prominent Christian leaders to deliver sermons, pray, and facilitate worship.

Danker, a Wesleyan scholar, spoke to the IRD staff and guests on “hold fast.”

Video of the worship service can be accessed below via IRD’s Facebook page. Text of the sermon follows.

If you are interested in joining IRD for worship, please contact Events and Outreach Director Sarah Stewart at [email protected].

Today’s Gospel reading is one of those odd ones. I have to admit that I was hoping for one of those nice stories about Jesus, perhaps involving a healing, or a nicer teaching moment. I preach often these days, but every once in a while it’s nice to get an easier text – something that makes us all feel good about ourselves and the world. Today’s text is not quite that.

We have instead the “desolating sacrilege set up where it ought not to be” and I assure you that that is not a reference to the Archbishop of Canterbury. We have an eschatological discourse.

Eschatology, one of those fancy words that academics use to keep the conversation amongst themselves, is the study the culmination of time, the fulfillment of time, or even, one might say, the consummation of God’s rescue mission. Its most often associated with the book of Revelation and oftentimes brings out the worst in its interpreters. But it excites people, or some people at least. Just think of the Left Behind book series craze some years ago, or for those with even more connection to the evangelical world, Hal Lindsey’s blockbuster The Late Great Planet Earth, a book that sold 50 million copies.

This is exciting stuff, or even scary. I gave a bible to a friend recently who didn’t have one. And he asked me where to start reading and I told him, following Billy Graham’s advice no less, to begin with the Gospel of John. He did so and then admitted to me that he only made it a few chapters into John before turning to the end of the Scriptures so he could jump into Revelation. He said that it was more exciting. I reminded him that is nothing is more exciting than Jesus, and that he needed to finish John.

We have here in Mark this morning, Jesus teaching the disciples about what is to come, about the tribulation that will be a part of the consummation. This text can be read in various ways, and these sorts of text throughout Scripture have been throughout the centuries read with layers of meaning. And I think that that is a perfectly fine thing. We will never fully mine the depths of the Bible, that is one of its hallmarks. In the words of Wesley – and you all knew that I had to quote him at least once in this sermon – he described the Bible as having “the utmost depth, together with the utmost ease. All the elegancies of human compositions sink into nothing before it,” he said. “God speaks not as man, but as God. His thoughts are very deep: and thence his words are of inexhaustible  virtue.”

But what is the inexhaustible virtue of the current text? Chapter 13 of Mark is the last teaching discourse in this particular Gospel. In the next chapter, we move right into the Jesus’ last days, the anointing at Bethany, the institution of the Eucharist, the betrayal, the passion, and finally the empty tomb. But here in chapter 13 Jesus is teaching his disciples about what is to come, or really what is to come after his passion and resurrection triumph.

The disciples, and we really can’t blame them, think that he’s talking about the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, something that had taken place before. And there is some thought that he was speaking of the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD by the Romans, but that interpretation alone doesn’t really grasp the meaning of his words nor their placement in the Gospel narrative.  

He’s speaking here of the birth pangs of the new creation, the one that will be launched just outside of Jerusalem in a grave yard when on the third day he arose from the dead.

But why the tribulation? Can’t God simply snap his fingers and fix this mess? Well the answer to that is a simple yes, but it wouldn’t be best for us. I taught both undergraduates and grad students for over ten years and I can assure you that many of my students would have preferred me to write their papers for them. At times, they pleaded for final exam study guides that were so detailed, I wonder if I was taking the exam for them too. But that’s not education, that’s not how we learn, how we develop critical thinking, the ability to write, to reason, to research, or even to communicate. And of course here I’m only talking about education. Jesus is talking about something much larger and more important, and that is the cooperative process whereby we respond to the grace of God, walking with him, step by step, trial by trial, as the work of renewal begins not just on the cosmic scale, but actually in each of our lives. Tribulation is not produced by God, but rather by humanity’s continued rebellion, a rebellion from the lives we were designed to live, lives of holiness, of wholeness. The fact that he allows it is not a question of his goodness, but points rather to his patience with us!

Solzhenitsyn was right when he said that “the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart.” And that’s where the tribulation begins and from the human heart springs the tribulation we also see on the societal level, they are linked because it was the corruption of the human heart at the fall that brought the whole creation into disarray – but here we see that the continuation of God’s plan to make all things new, but it’s not always going to be easy. 

C. S. Lewis once remarked with some wit saying, “I didn’t go to religion to make me happy. I always knew that a bottle of Port would do that. If you want a religion to make you feel really comfortable, I certainly don’t recommend Christianity.”

The problem for the comfort seeker is that Christianity isn’t just any other religion, philosophy, or self-help scam, Christianity is actually true.  

The comfort, though, comes at the end, I’m afraid, even if we do get glimpses of it in the meantime. The vision that we see laid out here in this text gives some of that, but you have to look for it.  

So hold fast.  

There’s a great old revival hymn that always comes to mind when I hear or read words such as these, and shockingly enough, it is not to be found in Hymnal 1982, so I have to share a portion of it with you now. For those of you with a revivalist background, it will get stuck in your head for the rest of the day and I offer no apologies for it: 

We have an anchor that keeps the soul, steadfast and sure while the billows roll, fastened to the Rock which cannot move, ground firm and deep in the Savior’s love. 

And this is true. The Rock which is Christ will not move and we are his body. But Christianity is not a passive religion, we have to hold on.

The Prayer Book says it so eloquently: Go forth into the world in peace; be of good courage; hold fast that which is good.

St. Paul in his closing remarks to the Philippians says something similar: “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” 

What he’s describing is a beautiful life, a good life, a Christ-like life. Only as we walk with him will we remain steadfast.

And Jesus knows this. We have this warning in the text this morning: “False Christs and false prophets will arise and show signs and wonders, to lead astray, if possible, the elect.” And this is true. 

It’s absolutely amazing what new things, what new distractions, or what new confusion arises and how often in our day and age to confuse the faithful, or turn them away from their first love, which is Christ. And these often come with good intentions or in the form of something good. But be not fooled by them. Anything counter to the faith once delivered cannot save. Anything that claims to offer redemption except by the death and resurrection of Christ is a life-less idol. Nothing that the world has to offer is eternal, not its pleasures, nor the sins we have grown to love. All of it is ultimately useless.

So hold fast.  

What I do love about this lesson from Mark, despite the calamity, the urgency, and the apocalyptic nature of the whole thing, is that ultimately it is a story about God’s love. 

And you may not have picked that up with talk of fleeing to the mountains or praying that this not take place in winter or that if the days were not shortened, no one would be saved. And I understand that. 

Keep in mind that he says these things to his disciples just before he offers himself for the sins of the whole world and unveils God’s vision of resurrection life. Embodies it even. He knows what he’s doing. And he’s equipping his disciples to see the world with eyes wide open to the reality of his saving work. 

What we can see in the text is the constancy of God’s love for his children and for the whole of the creation. It’s not a love that simply brings comfort, or a love that simply offers toleration. But a holy love, a love that transforms, that makes whole, that will not change, even as it changes everything it encounters. 

Because as exciting or even scary the culmination of all things may appear from apocalyptic texts, what they describe is God’s saving work, his ultimate work to make us whole, to bring about a new heaven and a new earth, to conquer death and the devil, and to wipe every tear from our eyes. 

“Take heed, I have told you all things beforehand.”

Trials and tribulation will come; both now and until the culmination of time. Do not be afraid. Hold fast. Unmoved. Knowing that the one who was raised on the third day will come again in glory. And even then his property is always to have mercy. Amen.