A Relection on when "all hell is breaking loose"

A Sermon for I Advent                                  All Saints’ Episcopal Church, Southern Shores, NC December 2, 2012 (8:30)                           Thomas E. Wilson, Rector

Jeremiah 33:14-16      Psalm 25:1-9   1 Thessalonians 3:9-13                      Luke 21:25-36

Today we are using the Eugene Peterson’s translation of the Bible, The Message. We have 12 kids being confirmed when the Bishop shows up for the 10:30 service, and that is the version they have been using. The Bishop will preach at that service while the 8:30 crowd has to put up with me.

One of the reasons I like the Message is that it uses vivid language - street language - because the New Testament was written in Koine Greek, the street language of that time, instead of the more classical Greek of the Philosophers and Tragedians.  The King James Version of the Bible was slanted in translation to remind listeners of the Majesty of God and, by extension, of God’s representative on earth in England, King James. James was tired of being a Presbyterian over in Scotland, being told what to do by Presbyterian preachers using the Geneva Bible Translation, and he wanted the pomp and ceremony of the Anglican Church when he came south to England. Listen to the way his translators did the first two verses of the Gospel lesson for today:

And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.

 
Majestic isn’t it? Yet, its beauty removes the immediacy. Now listen to how Peterson translates the same two verses: “It will seem like all hell has broken loose—sun, moon, stars, earth, sea, in an uproar and everyone all over the world in a panic, the wind knocked out of them by the threat of doom, the powers-that-be quaking.”

The King James Version has the beautiful language opening the Psalm, “Unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in thee: let me not be ashamed,” which is lovely and oh so religious. However, the Message has “My head is high, God, held high; I’m looking to you, God; No hangdog skulking for me”, which has to do with daily life.

All the lessons for today are set in times when ‘all hell is breaking loose” in daily life. Jeremiah is writing during the time when the Babylonian Empire is threatening to destroy the country he loves. The Psalmist sings of how his enemies are surrounding him. Paul is writing to the Thessalonians who he had to leave so suddenly years before because of persecution. Jesus is on his way to his death in Jerusalem. So, what is it like to be in a situation when it seems like all hell is breaking loose and so many of the things in which you trusted seemed to be letting you down?  Do you remember moments in your life when everything seemed to be falling apart? Let me prime your pump of remembrance.

Do you remember November 22, 1963? On that day I was a 16 year old senior in high school, and the announcement came over the PA system that President Kennedy had been shot and we were to go home. I remember crossing the bridge over the Chenango River with the freezing wind blowing down the valley, so that my tears and snot froze on my face. How could we possibly survive as a country? A few years later I was in Chapel Hill when I got the news that Bobby Kennedy and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King were gunned down by our love affair with violence. Then there was Watergate and so it goes through September 11, 2001 when we answered violence with violence and in which, eleven years later, we are still mired down. Yet, in the middle of human violence, I hold on to the strength of the Prince of Peace to work for peace, beginning with me. When “all hell breaks loose” is when we need glimpses of the presence of God, heaven; not the place in the sweet by and by, but the awareness of the presence of God on whom to hold. 

We trust a lot in money as a power to get us through. I remember in 1968 when I graduated from College and had a rough couple months while I was way ahead of the current trend by not being able to find a “real” job.  I worked in a restaurant for the time being, and then the manager of the restaurant skipped town with the money and we had to close down. I found work pumping gas, and then I ended up in the hospital with a bleeding ulcer.  So then I was married, out of work, and owing money to the hospital as well as the university. Years later, after that marriage fell apart and I was a Priest and Pat and I had a home, I took a job at a place where they had a Rectory. We finally sold the house and invested the money we made in the stock market, because the stock market was going great guns especially in dot-com stocks. I should have listened to Mark Twain and his advice on investing in the Stock Market - “October: This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February.”

When the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, I took the remains of the investments and took a job here where I had to find a house when there was a real estate bubble in play, so housing was much more expensive, but, I thought, it was a fool-proof investment! That bubble burst in 2007 and helped usher in the financial crisis in which we still find ourselves.  It is real interesting to see your paper financial worth dwindle. Yet, in the middle of that loss, I know that my true worth is not dependent on my portfolio, or my performance, or my job, but on Christ’s love for me. I have made lots of bad choices, but I resonate with the opening of Psalm 25: “My head is high, God, held high; I’m looking to you, God; No hangdog skulking for me.” I continue on because I know that all things lost - be it security, money, jobs, reputation, health, even life itself - is redeemed in Christ. My prayer is always the same: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Just for today.”  

Today at 10:30 there are 12 kids being confirmed, a couple babies being baptized, and a few receptions and reaffirmations.  The thing is that they will all find moments in their life when “all hell is breaking loose”. I know all of you in this room have been through those moments, and your task, the task of the church, the parents, the friends, the neighbors is to remind them by witness of your life, by word and deed, that all things are redeemed. “God, grant them (and us) the serenity to accept the things they cannot change, the courage to change the things they (and us) can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”  Just for today.