These Are the Good Old Days – rebeccaellenson.com

New Heavens and a New Earth; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson; ICCM; November 17, 2019; Isaiah 65: 17-25 & Luke 21: 5-19

In both of our Scripture readings today, we see the people longing for the good old days—the times before destruction. Both the prophet Isaiah’s words and Luke’s recalling of Jesus’ words were written in the context of destruction. Both are messages of hope and promise in troubled times. Both messages acknowledge the difficult nature of this world, it’s structures and governments even as they proclaim God’s enduring provision.

Carly Simon’s song, Anticipation, has been running through my mind this week as I thought about our scripture readings.

We can never know about the days to come, But we think about them anyway
And I wonder if I’m really with you now. Or just chasin’ after some finer day

Anticipation, anticipation, Is makin’ me late, Is keepin’ me waitin’

And tomorrow we might not be together, I’m no prophet and I don’t know nature’s ways
So I’ll try and see into your eyes right now, And stay right here ’cause these are the good old days

And stay right here ’cause these are the good old days

The prophet Isaiah preached a word of hope to people living in anticipation, for them to stay right there, being glad and rejoicing in what God is creating.

For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth… be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating; for I am about to create Jerusalem as a joy, and its people as a delight

Isaiah spoke to what was left of the former kingdom of Israel. Generations before, Babylon had conquered Israel and destroyed Jerusalem and its temple. The people of Israel were marched off in captivity, having seen their land torn by war, their homes and place of worship demolished. For over 70 year they lived as exiles, longing to return. They built up expectations. Finally, Persian defeated Babylon. Cyrus was the new emperor of all the known world and he allowed the people who had been born in captivity, the ones who had only heard stories of the good old days, to go “home.”

Imagine the challenges they faced. Where to begin!? These people had never seen the place before. They had to start all over. Current residents had filled up what had once been their land. Where were those good old days? Maybe, if we get a picture in our minds of Syria right now, it’s broken walls and ruined land, 13 million of its 22 million people displaced from their devastated land; maybe if we consider what it would be like for them two or three generations from now to return and try to rebuild; maybe if we do that, we can begin to hear Isaiah’s words with some degree of understanding. What would it be like to hear those hopeful words in that kind of a situation? Words like this:

No more shall the sound of weeping be heard, or the cry of distress. No more shall there be an infant that lives but a few days or an old person who does not live out a lifetime. They shall build houses and inhabit them, they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit, they shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity. Predators and prey will feed together. They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain! The prophet was speaking their language—he described an end to all they had ever known. He painted a word picture of peace, health, stability. I am about to create new heavens and a new earth…Be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating.

Over the years they did rebuild, a bit. But, their new temple wasn’t anything like the one built in the 10^th century BC by King Solomon and destroyed in 587 by the Babylonians. The second temple was much smaller. And they didn’t have their own king again. No, the Persian Empire gave way to the Greeks and then to the Romans. It wasn’t until 500 years later, in 20 BC, that the Jews were finally able to update and expand the temple. Through all that time their longing remained strong for a Messiah to restore the good old days.

Isaiah’s message pointed the people not backward, but to their own time. He wanted them to see the present and continuing activity of God’s creative work. They longed for another time. It’s only human to do so. We spend so much of our lives wishing for another time.

I used to listen to a radio show called Car Talk. It was hosted by car mechanic brothers, Tom and Ray Magliozzi. They called themselves Click and Clack, the Tappit brothers. They answered car questions in their own funny style. One day they talked about how we always want to live in another time. They joked:

If you’re less than 10 years old, you’re so excited about aging that you think in fractions. “How old are you?” “I’m four and a half!” You’re never thirty-six and a half. You’re four and a half, going on five!

That’s the key.

You get into your teens, now they can’t hold you back. You jump to the next number, or even a few ahead.

“How old are you?” “I’m gonna be 16!” You could be 13, but hey, you’re gonna be 16!

And then the greatest day of your life… you become 21.

Even the words sound like a ceremony… YOU BECOME 21… YESSSS!!!

But then you turn 30. Oooohh, what happened there? Makes you sound like bad milk. He TURNED; we had to throw him out. There’s no fun now, you’re just a sour dumpling. What’s wrong? What’s changed?

You BECOME 21, you TURN 30, then you’re PUSHING 40.

Whoa! Put on the brakes, it’s all slipping away. Before you know it, you REACH 50… and your dreams are gone.

But wait!!! You MAKE it to 60. You didn’t think you would!

So you BECOME 21, TURN 30, PUSH 40, REACH 50 and MAKE it to 60.

You’ve built up so much speed that you HIT 70! After that it’s a day-by-day thing; you HIT Wednesday!

You get into your 80s and every day is a complete cycle; you HIT lunch; you TURN 4:30; you REACH bedtime.

And it doesn’t end there. Into the 90s, you start going backwards; “I was JUST 92.”

Then a strange thing happens. If you make it over 100, you become a little kid again. “I’m 100 and a half!”

Even though we can never know about the days to come, we think about them anyway. We keep chasin’ after some finer day. It’s hard to stay right here and see that these are the good old days, and these days are the only ones we really have.

Luke wrote our gospel reading today sometime after the temple that we were talking about in the Old Testament reading was destroyed yet again. In 66 AD the Jews revolted under the Roman rule. The Roman response was to level the temple. Now, all that remains of that glorious structure is the Western Wall. And the world is still fighting over the stones referenced in our gospel.

Worrying about the future is just as useless as longing for the past. Many people see a dire prediction of awful things to come in texts like toady’s gospel reading. But Luke’s portrayal of Jesus points us away from fretting about the things to come. As Jesus said in another place, today has enough worries of its own. Like every other generation, we have our hands full. Government corruption is universal, wars, natural disasters, fires and floods, disease, loss—these are constants in every time and place. The human reaction is to long for the past or worry about the future, to throw up our hands in despair and bury our heads in the sand and hope against hope that it all turns out alright.

Both of these texts are really about good news. Isaiah acknowledges the current reality of his time and God is about to create new heavens and a new earth. The people should be glad and rejoice forever in what God IS creating. Jesus isn’t preaching gloom and doom; Jesus is preaching reality. Jesus was not predicting some far-off day of ultimate battle; he was talking about the reality of life in Israel, which was an occupied country and had been buffeted about by war during its entire existence.

We are called to a life of endurance, patience and faith in the midst of a world that is often difficult and confusing. We are called to a faith that looks above and beyond our personal circumstances to the promise of God to hold us and keep us safe forever.

Robert Fulghum tells the story of a medieval stonecutter who was working on a Cathedral. An interested bystander saw the man working day after day carefully cutting and shaping and polishing one modest sized piece. Finally the watcher said to the cutter “This stone must be very important. Is it a part of the baptismal font? Is it the base of the pulpit? Is it the front of the altar?’

The cutter got up from his knees and wiped his hands and lead the man around the scaffolding and pointed out a very obscure corner of the building, “It goes there,” he said. The onlooker was astounded, “Really, you’re working so hard on something nobody will see?” The stonecutter smiled and said, “God will see it. We’re not building this cathedral for nobody; we’re building it for God.”

Both of our readings today are calls to faithful living, to endurance, to hanging in through tough times, to having faith in the God who has faith in us. It’s not about building a temple or a cathedral, but about building our life into a house for God, where Christ’s love motivates all actions, where we remember it’s about God and not about us.

And we then move into the world, carrying this ministry of building with us, building networks of connection in the world, networks that share God’s love with those who need it most, those stepped on by war, those persecuted by oppression, those rejected by society, those left wounded and bleeding outside, on the doorstep of life.

We can never know about the days to come, But we think about them anyway, Are we just chasin’ after some finer day, living in anticipation, waitin’. Or can we listen to God’s message and stay right here ’cause these are the good old days.

We have a purpose—to live into the resurrection faith, and to work for the new heaven and new earth, where: