“All will be thrown down.”

Ordinary Time XXXIII; November 19, 2006

Mark 13:1-8

This story sure jars, doesn’t it? Sometimes the Gospel comforts, but sometimes it provides a whack upside the head. On a Sunday when we’re all thinking Thanksgiving and turkey and mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie – and pecan pie – and chocolate pie – this talk about the Temple being thrown down and wars and rumors of war just doesn’t sit well.

What an ordinary reaction from the disciples as they are leaving the Temple! “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” It really was a magnificent complex, large, beautiful and a marvel of engineering. I like it that Mark does not tell us which disciple said that; it doesn’t matter, because it’s the sort of thing any of us might say. You and I admire size and elegance, don’t we? We visit St. Paul’s Cathedral in London or National Cathedral in Washington and the reaction is, “Wow!” Likewise when you see the New York skyline spread in front of you as you approach it by air or get up close to the silent, hulking power of the locomotives welcoming you to Omaha in Kenefick Park.

Wouldn’t you hate to be in a tour group with Jesus? One of his buddies says, “Wow! Look at that!” and instead of replying, “Yep, sure is big and pretty” he says, “Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.” How do you have a pleasant conversation with such a man? He’s constantly pointing out the larger meaning of things.

Jesus’ comment is, in part, a simple act of calling it as he sees it. Within a few years of these words, Jews will be in a rebellious mood against the abuses of Emperor Caligula and the Temple will be threatened. Barely forty years after these words, they will be in open revolt and the Roman Army will destroy the Temple, razing it to the ground. Massive, well-built and beautiful it may be, but an army determined to destroy any remnant of a focus of rebellion can pull it down.

But there is more at work. At the time Jesus and the disciples visited, this Temple had stood on that site for almost 550 years. Herod the Great had had it considerably enlarged and remodeled, but it was as much a symbol of permanence as anyone could imagine. It was thought of as permanent not only because of its antiquity, though, but also because of the word of God. The prophet Haggai assured the people that the splendor of the nations would come to this Temple (Haggai 2:6-9); Ezekiel had a vision of the glory of God residing in the restored Temple and he heard a voice from the Temple saying, “Mortal, this is the place of my throne and the place for the soles of my feet, where I will reside among the people of Israel forever.” (Ezekiel 43:7)

Therefore, when Jesus predicted the destruction of the Temple, the people listening to him assumed he was talking about the end of the world. Since the Temple is the dwelling-place of God, it could come to an end only when the world comes to an end, they thought. So the four boldest of them approach Jesus quietly and ask him when the world is going to come to an end.

Jesus’ answer to that question is notoriously unhelpful. St. Augustine, for example, points out that no one can remember a time in human history that there have not been “wars and rumors of wars,” and so we cannot really perceive any signs of the end. End-times speculation has been quite a lucrative industry in our day and in our country, beginning with Hal Lindsey’s The Late, Great Planet Earth (1970) and represented currently by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins’ “Left Behind” series. They represent a weird form of modern fundamentalism called “dispensationalism,” which would not be recognized by any of the great leaders of Christian tradition, including Martin Luther and John Calvin. Dispensationalism is a fringe movement everywhere in the world except in the United States, for some reason. One of the effects of this fascination with trying to predict the times and events of the end of the world has been the polarization of Christians into two camps: those who obsess on it and those who dismiss it.

The disciples assumed that the destruction of the Temple would mean the end of the world; they were wrong and Jesus gently hints that they were wrong. Likewise, a lot of modern Americans read current events as pointing to the nearness of the end of the world. Jesus does not tell us whether they are right or wrong, but gently hints not to obsess on the matter nor to dismiss it. War, natural disaster and famine may indeed be signs of the coming end; they may also be part of the ordinary messiness of human life. It is a mistake to assume that the world is soon to come to an end and therefore act as though the future bears no consequences; we should not assume that we can ruin the environment because the world is going to end soon and there will be no grandchildren to suffer from it, or that we can run up an enormous national debt because our grandchildren will not have to pay it. It is also a mistake to assume that life will go on as it has, getting consistently better and better. Christ will come again; there will be an end; it is coming; we do not know when it will be. People who claim to be able to deduce dates and times from the words of Jesus, the prophets and John the Revelator may be fooling themselves, but are certainly trying to fool you and me.

So, even though it may be annoying to tourists to have Jesus say, “All will be thrown down” when we admire the Temple, it is important to get his point: it is not permanent and its destruction is not necessarily the end of the world.

The disciples assumed that the Temple was permanent; what do you and I assume is permanent? What is permanent to you? Your job? Grandfather? Your pension? Social Security? PlayStation? The United States of America? What is permanent?

“Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.” Those are the words of Jesus. You may also remember the words of Percy Bysshe Shelley:

I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed,
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away. (“Ozymandias”)

You can nod your head and say, “Yes, I know; nothing is permanent,” but has that realization worked its way into your heart? If you lost any of the things I mentioned or neglected to mention – including the national life for which we give thanks this week – would it be as if your world had come to an end?

If so, you need to repent and turn to what is truly permanent: The God of the ages. The God who was before there was any “was” to be before is the God who will be when there is no longer any “will be.” Put your trust not in people or pension plans or patriotic nation but in God, our Rock.

There are three hints of hope in the Scripture that buzz around like no-see-ums in the summer, so I cannot overlook them. The first is that Jesus says that the conflicts between nations and natural disasters are but “the beginning of the birth pangs.” As a man, I dare not say anything about the severity of birth pangs, but I will say that as bad as they are, they are also a harbinger of hope: something new and potentially wonderful is coming. And the second hint is the reality that not every stone of the Temple has been thrown down: many of them stand in what is known as the Western Wall or the Wailing Wall. It stands as testimony to the fate of all we consider permanent and a sign that God does not completely abandon his people. And the third? Jesus has this conversation on the Mount of Olives, where he is to be arrested and taken to the Cross for our salvation. The Temple will be destroyed, but the presence of God has not abandoned his people, but lives on in the Crucified One.

God promised his presence would be permanent in his Temple and has built a new and living Temple in Jesus Christ, our Savior. Every other stone – and steel girder and concrete buttress – will be thrown down, but:

My hope is built on nothing less Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame, But wholly lean on Jesus’ Name.

On Christ the solid Rock I stand, All other ground is sinking sand;
All other ground is sinking sand.

Robert A. Keefer

Westminster Presbyterian Church

Clarinda, Iowa