By Pastor Ashton Roberts
•
November 17, 2024
I heard a story on the radio yesterday that asked the question “what was the worst year to be alive on the earth in recorded human history?” The story originally aired in January of 2022, right on the heels of the pandemic, and the question had been spurred by the hosts trying to decide which year had been worse, 2020 or 2021. The host then wondered which was the worst year of all years, the year it would have been the worst to be alive. After some research, he came to the conclusion that the worst year to be alive on earth was approximately 536 CE. Quoting research done by a team who had discovered concurrent phenomena in about the year 536, and then expanding the research to other civilizations around the globe to see if they were experiencing the same thing. Their research discovered that, in fact, there was a nearly global and simultaneously occurring experience that made 536, along with the rest of that decade, arguably the worst time to be alive in human history. It seems that a chain of volcanic explosions coupled with debris in the stratosphere leftover from Haley’s comet the year before, made the sun appear bluish in color, preventing its warmth, and plunging the planet into perpetual winter from February of 536 to June of 537. Yellow ash fell over China like alien snow. Crops failed from Scandinavia, to Syria, to Korea. The Mayan Empire, in what historians call the classic period, has a smaller documented period called the ‘classic period hiatus’ where in the Mayans stopped keeping records for roughly the same period of time. The world over, crops failed and famine ensued. As fields lay fallow, rodent moved closer to human populations. Without the sun, already malnourished humans produced less Vitamin D, and their weakened immune systems succumbed to diseases. Those who didn’t die of starvation, died of disease. Entire Swedish villages were abandoned en mass. Ireland recorded a “failure of bread.” A Roman official recounts being unable to see shadows at midday. A Syrian writer recounts that the birds died from the prolonged winter and lack of food. Desperate for food, people began to butcher corpses for meat in China. To date, the 530s CE is the coldest decade in the last 2300 years. A time without warmth or shadow, without food or birds, with blue sun and yellow snow. Honestly, is there anything we take for granted more than the sun? A vail of dust which caused a temperature drop between 1.5 and 2.5 degrees Celsius was enough to cause mass death across the planet in just 15 months, with ripples that spanned the reminder of the decade. The sun is a constant, to the point that the likelihood of the sunrise tomorrow is a euphemism for certainty. With the exception of that one decade 1500 years ago, of course. The pharaohs would rule forever until they didn’t. The Roman Empire would last for eternity, until it collapsed. Pompeii counted on Mt. Vesuvius to be a silent constant of the idyllic scenery, until it exploded and killed everyone. The Library at Alexandria was a wonder of the world, until it burned. And the Jewish people would offer sacrifices in the temple in Jerusalem, until both Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed. The Gospel of Mark is most likely written in the immediate aftermath of the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE. The Jewish people, already scattered across the Roman Empire, would have to find a new way to worship, to make atonement, to orient themselves in the world. Jewish followers of Jesus, already differentiating themselves from Jewish worship practices, weren’t sure what to make of this development. Non-Jewish followers of Jesus were likely even less sure what to make of this. Mark is writing his gospel to the gentile followers of Jesus, who are trying to make sense of following this Jewish guy who is the son of the Jewish God, whose house was just destroyed. The gentile gods of the Roman pantheon would never let something like that happen. Seems pretty weak sauce for a deity. So as Mark writes, presuming that Jesus must have known what would happen in Jerusalem, he records a conversation to that effect between Jesus and the disciples. This gives Jesus the chance to address the fears and concerns of Mark’s audience directly. What are they to make of the destruction of the house of God? Well, stuff happens, to paraphrase another famous saying. Institutions fail, temples crumble, empires rise and fall, kingdoms rise against kingdoms, there will be wars and rumors of wars, there will be famines and earthquakes, blue sunlight and yellow snow. But this is not the end. If you are even a passive observer of the news, you may be able to relate to the disciples’ sense of tectonic shift in the institutions and individuals they once took for granted. We see in our churches a decline in influence and attendance. We see dysfunction and chaos in our government. We see our children gunned down in school. We see monster hurricanes, devastating wildfires earthquakes from fracking, lead-poisoned municipal water supplies, domestic terrorism, the threat of global nuclear war, and a thousand personal tragedies that never make headlines, but tear our lives apart, nonetheless. When, Lord, will the treatments start to work? When, Lord, will these pews be full again? When, Lord, will my daughter come home? What does it look like, Lord, to pay all of my bills every month? What does it look like, Lord, to be free from addiction? What does it look like, Lord, to live without fear? It is in exactly this uncertainty, Precisely this anxiety, Specifically this foreboding, That Jesus meets the disciples With hope and honesty. Jesus teaches the disciples that stuff happens, and no matter how terrible things look, no matter how much things hurt, no matter how dire their circumstances become, this is not the end. False messiahs will come, This is not the end. Many will be led astray, This is not the end. Wars, and natural disaster, and hunger will all threaten to kill them. This is not the end. In fact, Jesus himself Would be betrayed, and arrested, and wrongly convicted, and beaten, and humiliated, and killed, and buried. This is not the end. No, what feels like death, what looks like destruction, and what hurts like. Hell. Itself, is just. the beginning. Birth pangs, Jesus says, As though he’s trying to tell them The pain means it’s time to push, Because there’s new life on the other side. The promise hidden in this text Is that when the temple is destroyed God is set loose. No stone can hold the God of the Universe. And, In just 6 days from this conversation, the disciples would find that no stone could hold Jesus either. Beloved, when we find ourselves in the grip of fear, when we struggle to find hope in the headlines, when we can’t see past the diagnosis, can’t muster confidence in our institutions, can’t wait for this time, this season, this struggle to Just. Be. Over. Jesus meets us in exactly this uncertainty, precisely this anxiety, specifically this foreboding, and teaches us that no matter how terrible things look, no matter how much things hurt, no matter how dire our circumstances become, this is not the end. Illness may come, But it is not the end. Our system of government may crumble and fail. But this is not the end. Wars, and natural disaster, and hunger will all threaten to kill you, But this is not the end. Beloved, God is redeeming our pain, bringing new life and new creation through Jesus. God remakes us in the waters of baptism, And nourishes us in the Eucharist to remind us that though we are spiritually stillborn and continually given to sin, we are reborn and redeemed from our self-destruction by the self-sacrifice of Christ. We are called to live this life, with all its pain and heartache, in the confidence that for every death we die there is a resurrection. Jesus invites us to be midwives of this new creation, bearing witness to each other’s pain, holding each other’s hands, reminding each other to breathe, and promising that even if this kill us, This is not the end. Birth pangs are the beginning of our work, not the ending. We are the descendants of survivors, resilient men and women who endured the vail of dust and the cold, blue sun. We are the inheritors of the apostles and martyrs, who weathered the collapse of sacred institutions and followed the Holy Spirit from the ruble of the temple to the rock on which Christ would found his church. I have no idea what the future will bring. Likely, we will have no idea just what we are taking for granted until we are standing in the cold, blue sunlight of some terrifying tomorrow. In that day without food or birds or shadows, remember you are midwives of a new reality and the time has come. There is work to do to get to the new life on the other side. Amen.