Proper
28 :: Daniel 12: 1–3; Psalm 16; Hebrews 10: 11–25; Mark 13: 1–8
This is the homily given
at St. John’s, Huntingdon, Pennsylvania by Fr. Gene Tucker on Sunday, November
18, 2018.
“BE FAITHFUL, NO MATTER WHAT”
(Homily texts: Daniel 12: 1–3 & Mark 13: 1–8)
Be faithful, no matter
what!
We must be getting close
to the season of Advent, a time when we get ready to receive our Lord Jesus
Christ in His first coming as a babe, born in Bethlehem, and as we wait
expectantly for His second coming as Lord and Judge.
Both our Old Testament
reading, taken from the Book of Daniel, and our Gospel reading, taken from
Mark, chapter, thirteen, speak of a time of trouble and difficulty. The Advent
theme of the Lord’s return as judge contains within it this theme of a time of
difficulty.
Both our reading from
Daniel and our Gospel reading are apocalyptic writings[1].
Biblical scholars attach a subtitle to the Markan passage, calling it the
“Little Apocalypse”.[2] The last
half of the Book of Daniel is apocalyptic writing, while the first half is set
in the time of the Babylonian captivity in the sixth century BC.
Before we look at the
purpose of apocalyptic writing, let’s look at the situation and the
circumstances of Jesus’ pronouncement about the destruction of the Temple in
Jerusalem, and at the situation that occasioned the writing of Daniel.
We’ll begin with Jesus’
prediction.
The Second Temple, whose
construction began in the reign of King Herod the Great, had been under
construction since about the year 20 BC. It more than doubled the size of
Solomon’s Temple, which it replaced. When Jesus and His disciples walked
through the Temple’s precincts, it was still under construction. It wasn’t
finished until about the year 44 AD or so. Then, it existed in its completed
state until it was destroyed by the Romans at the conclusion of the
Jewish-Roman War in 70 AD.
The Temple’s destruction
resulted in the destruction and removal of all of the buildings that sat on the
top of the Temple Mount. Today, one can go to Jerusalem and look down over the
wall of the Temple Mount and see the first century stone pavement, whose stones
were broken as stones were thrown over the wall to the street below. Of course,
today the Temple Mount still exists. On top of it today, the buildings are the
Dome of the Rock and a mosque. But the enormous size and grandeur of Herod’s
design still stir the imagination, for the wall of the Temple Mount is nearly a
mile in circumference. Some of its stones are enormous, weighing many tons.
No wonder that Jesus’
disciples wonder at His prediction that the time will come when not a stone
will be left upon another. That must have seemed to be an impossible thought to
fathom.
But Jesus continues His
teaching, saying that there will be “wars and rumors of wars”. This will be a
difficult time.
A bit later on in chapter
thirteen, Jesus then says this: “The one who endures to the end will be saved.
(verse13b)
Let’s turn our attention
to our passage from Daniel. Scholars are divided in their opinions about the
writing and the writer of the book: Some believe that it was actually written
during the time of the Babylonian captivity in the sixth century BC, but that
its second half predicts the time of the oppression of God’s people by the
Greek-speaking Seleucids in the second century BC, while others believe it
arose during that awful time
Whatever the true answer
might be, the bottom line remains the same: Those whom God loves will be saved
by Him in the final accounting of things. So, the message to be gleaned from
reading Daniel is: Be faithful, no
matter what.
There, we read that there
will be a time of trouble such as the world has never seen. But, as Jesus says
in our Gospel text, God will deliver those whose names are written in the book[3]
The message and the
purpose of apocalyptic writing seems to be this: Be faithful, no matter what.
We live in a difficult and
challenging time. Uncertainty abounds. Change is everywhere. Life often seems
unpredictable. We live in a violent age, one in which innocent persons’ lives
are snuffed out by acts of violence, or by natural disasters or by wars and
conflict.
Even in the Church,
trouble abounds, and it seems as though there is little to be confident about
as we look ahead at the future of God’s people who are disciples of Jesus.
And yet, in all these
challenges and difficulties and troubles, God assures us that nothing will ever
separate us from the love of God which is found in Jesus Christ, as St. Paul
writes in his letter to the Romans, chapter eight. And, we know from Matthew
16: 18 account that the Church will also endure until the
end of all things.
So, no matter what, we are
called to be faithful.
AMEN.
[1]
The word “apocalypse” comes to us from the Greek, where it literally
means “unveiling”. Its meaning is usually rendered in English as “revelation”,
as in the Book of Revelation, the last book in the New Testament, which is
often referred to as the “Apocalypse”.
[2]
The material we read in the
thirteenth chapter of Mark is also to be found in Matthew 24: 1 - 8, and
in Luke 21: 5 – 9.
[3]
I commend to your further study the Book of Revelation, for much of the
symbolism which is found in Daniel also appears there.
