Pilgrim Preaching

Small Lectionary Rant

Seventh Sunday of Easter
Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21

Here is one of the verses of scripture so scary that the lectionary committee decided it dare not be read in the assembly: "Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and fornicators and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood" (Rev. 22:15).

Like the gospel of Mark, Rev. 22:15 sets up a clear distinction between insiders and outsiders, but unlike Mark, Revelation does not problematize that distinction. Little in Revelation leads you to think there may be some surprises at the End regarding who is really inside and who is outside. In Rev. 22:15, we get a list of outsiders, pure and simple. Any questions?

I agree that this lack of even a hint of irony regarding the categories of "insider" and "outsider" is scary, not to mention naive, given the way that God traditionally upends human expectations about such things. However, I do not agree that the assembly gathered on Sunday morning must be protected from this verse. Please God let it be that the evil within and around us will in the End be defeated and put to death! I certainly hope that God leaves outside the holy city everything in me that would:

• regard God not as one who may be trusted to keep promises, but rather as one who must be manipulated with right incantations or actions in order to dispense blessing (sorcery),
• use people, objectify a lover to get what I want, regard sex as mere "recreation" that can be disconnected from lifelong partnership (fornication),
• kill, or wish someone dead (murder),
• fear, love or trust anything above God (idolatry), or
• deceive myself or others (falsehood).

Rev. 22:15 gives us language to say that as Christians, we hope not to have to put up with perpetrating these practices or being victimized by them for eternity! In as much as lectionary decisions take away from us language to say that we expect that God will free us from them, those decisions are selling short the dream of a new heaven and a new earth.

Doing Revelation

3 Easter C
April 24, 2004
Rev. 5:11-14

If you are preaching the Revelation text this Sunday, consider singing LBW hymn 525, "Blessing and Honor." (Here's the tune from the LBW Online Hymnal.) It's a way of "doing Revelation," as colleague Craig Koester puts it. When we sing the Hymn of Praise in the Holy Communion liturgy or a hymn like this one, we are in the place of all those gathered around the throne, and we are joining their new song (cf. Rev. 5:9). Since it seems to be my day to quote favorite praise lines, here is another one: "Ever ascending the song and the joy, Ever descending the love from on high; Blessing and honor and glory and praise— This is the theme of the hymns that we raise. This is the theme of the hymns that we raise" (verse 3, "Blessing and Honor").

Revelation Texts in Easter

We are seeing several texts from Revelation in Easter. It makes sense from the perspective of Jesus as the first fruits of those who have died and from the perspective of his resurrection as the beginning of a whole new age.

In Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Annie Dillard writes, "The lone ping into being of the first hydrogen atom ex nihilo was so unthinkably, violently radical that surely it ought to have been enough, more than enough. But look what happens: you open the door and all heaven and hell break loose" ([Bantam Books, 1974] 134).

The same is true of the empty tomb. After Christ is risen, no dream is too big. God opens that tomb and look what happens: it is not just Christ's life but also Mary's life that is restored. And that is just the beginning. God opens the tomb and the Jewish fisherman Peter finds himself saying to the Roman centurion Cornelius and his household, "I truly understand that God show no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him" (Act. 10:34f). God opens that tomb and John of Patmos sees a new heaven and a new earth breaking loose, where death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the former things have passed away" and where the one seated on the throne says, "See, I am making all things new" (Rev. 21:4-5). Before Easter, none of these witnesses to new life would have made sense. After Easter, they begin to.

Thanks to Pam Fickenscher for the news that LSTC's Professor Barbara Rossing will appear on 60 Minutes Wed. Apr. 14 to talk about Revelation, "Left Behind" and such. Link to Pam's comment here.