Why

Ultimately, Jesus is telling us, there is hope to be found in the destruction of our fondest dreams.

It is hard to understand and if I do understand it, then I guess the question is why.

In other synoptic gospels, in Luke especially, we read:

‘I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on, five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided:
father against son
   and son against father,
mother against daughter
   and daughter against mother,
mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law
   and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.’

Why?

Why must families be separated?

Why division and not togetherness?

Why war and rumor of wars and all of the evil that occurs during war?

Why not peace?

Why must we experience the destruction of the Temple as if that is the only way we can witness the new Jerusalem?

This is one of those situations where I would rather God would just handle things, just let God do the God things and we wouldn’t have to worry about all this strife and violence.

And yet, I am not sure how this works.

In fact, in the words of that dear lady on my TV screen, “That’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works.”

Ok.

But why?

I wonder if part of the answer lies in the Temple itself.

Now, I don’t mean physically inside the Temple, but in the story of its construction.

Built by human hands and by hands mostly cleansed of violence, the Temple was not built by King David because he shed too much blood in war and through a lust for violence.

No, the Temple was built by Solomon, David’s son.

It would not be sullied by the blood of Solomon’s ancestors.

And the Temple stood for many years, survived occupations and military campaigns.

This was the first Temple.

After having stood for six hundred years, the Babylonian troops of Nebuchadnezzar brought that temple down and the Jews were exiled to Babylon.

Upon their return from Babylon, the Jews set to work on the second Temple.

And they remained steadfast in their faith.

Through various occupiers and under Persian, then Greek, then Roman influences, the Jewish people held true to their faith.

They stayed true to their devotion to God and refused the Temple be occupied and foreign deities worshiped there.

They remembered a history of exile and would not see their ways, their mores and laws be subsumed once more.

Until that Temple was destroyed; not by God, but by human hands

From the rubble though, life continued.

Judaism and Christianity, both reformed and formed in a sense as a reaction to the Temple’s destruction, offered a way out from that destruction.

A way that pointed to God’s love and not retribution.

And still, the temple was destroyed.

And in this morning’s gospel Mark is trying to answer the question why the temple was destroyed

People held firm to their beliefs knowing the importance of the temple but if the temple remaining intact was the only confirmation, in their eyes, of the presence of God, then God could also be absent in some places.

This was a time when local deities were worshiped in the lands where their believers dwelt.

We see this in Second Kings where Naaman asks for two cartloads of Israeli soil to be brought to him in Babylon where he is exiled so that he might properly worship God, firmly on Israeli ground.

But the destruction of the Temple changed our understanding of God kept to a certain locality.

Instead, a new understanding was formed that God was in the world and one could experience God outside the Temple, outside of our churches.

Instead, the Temple was destroyed and from it became something different and not at all the destruction of all God’s peoples.

Because our destruction is not fiat from God.

Jesus is not saying there is no hope for us amidst war and rumors of war.

No.

Jesus is not asking us to suffer, but he is asking us to stand firm in our beliefs.

Hatred will try to destroy love, there is evidence of that throughout history.

When we are on the side of good, we will be attacked by those who hate good.

When we are on the side of love, those who hate love will respond with hate.

Those who hate justice will push against the change that is necessary to become just.

Those who love empire will tear down our temples.

You know, sometimes our memory tricks us.

We see things differently over time.

Some folks have these recollections of the civil rights marches, of Bull Connor and police dogs unleashed.

And it is possible then to localize racism in such a way as to call it a far-off problem, but it is not.

It is easier to have watched what was on our tv screens back in the sixties and call it a southern thing, but it is not.

In fact, one of the most violent demonstrations to have occurred at one of King’s marches happened in Chicago when the movement was campaigning for fair housing in a northern, midwestern city.

A long way from the south, in a city where Dr. King was hit with a rock thrown by those who would choose injustice over justice, hate over love.

No, evil has no locality, no center that will not hold.

Instead, it is everywhere, and when we confront evil, when we confront discord, when we love each other fully and radically and without bounds we may just witness the Temple itself destroyed.

And still, Jesus calls this chaos, this calamity as the birth pangs of something new.

Because God has no locality as well; there is a constant push and pull between good and evil for good and evil exist in all places.

It remains on us though to see all of this through.

With God’s help, it remains on us to see this through.

To remain on the side of justice that feeds those with hunger and gives a drink to those who struggle with thirst and clothes those in need of clothing.

To remain on the side of openness by welcoming the stranger.

To heal the sick and to visit the prisoner.

To love those who persecute us, to hate only that which would destroy good, that which would tear down our Temples stone by stone and body by body.

If we keep to the principles derived from Christ, then yes, we may very well witness the Temple fall.

And that is what Christ is calling us to do.

To answer violence with peace.

To oppose hatred with love.

And to always choose Christ above all things.

To do the Christian thing above all things.

To choose love over and over and over again.

Even when we are hated, love.

Even when rocks are thrown, love.

Even when we are led astray, we are to correct our paths and follow false prophets no more.

Pay no heed to those who would promise us riches not our own, false promises to make us rulers of kingdoms ruled only by God.

To do so, we might push away from our own wants or even our perceived needs, for the temptation to take up the promise or ruling God’s kingdom is real.

The temptation of riches and power is real.

So too was the temptation for Christ in the wilderness.

Still, we are not Christ, but we are Christians.

And at certain points we might even horde our food though commanded to feed.

Dam up our waters, though commanded to give the thirsty a drink.

Hate others when told to love.

Yet through the grace of God, we can seek forgiveness.

Through Jesus, realize the temple is forever and the temple is Christ.

Human walls one hundred and fifty feet tall might have fallen two thousand years ago and that was just the beginning.

And from that beginning was something birthed anew.

Though even now, we have so much farther to go.

Keep loving.

Keep the faith.

Keep believing.

God will not fail; Christ shall not tumble.

The Spirit still flies amongst us.

Amen.