The End (of the Beginning) Is Near
Scripture Reading: Mark 13:1-8
Oh boy! Wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes, and famines. Those aren’t today’s headlines, they’re today’s Gospel reading. It’s getting all apocalyptic up in here! And nothing says, “Let’s get ready to welcome the baby Jesus soon,” quite like a little apocalypse.
I’m actually being serious and literal. Chapter 13 of Mark’s Gospel is known as the “Little Apocalypse.” It’s a little apocalypse because it’s just one chapter, as opposed to the much longer apocalypses found in the Old Testament Book of Daniel and the Book of Revelation, the last book of the New Testament (which we’ll hear from next week!).
It’s an apocalypse because it uncovers or reveals a hidden truth. That’s what the original Greek word refers to—an uncovering. Apocalyptic literature, such as Mark 13, contains visions that reveal a coming judgment in which the forces opposed to God are defeated once and for all. In the context of today’s reading, the vision comes directly from Jesus, who tells his disciples of this impending judgment, much to their excitement, it seems. More on that later.
But back to what I said a moment ago. Why are we talking about Judgment Day when we’ll soon be coming up on Christmas Day? The scripture readings the last few weeks before Advent, which begins in two weeks, have an apocalyptic feel because we are drawing closer to judgment. I don’t mean the end of the world but the judgment of the cross…a cross that awaits Jesus not long after he leaves the temple. Plus, Advent itself has apocalyptic overtones because it concerns not only the first coming of Jesus, i.e., his birth in Bethlehem of Judea, but also his second coming on clouds of glory.
It’s therefore the design of the liturgical calendar that we spend months, usually June to November, following Jesus and disciples throughout Galilee and then down to Jerusalem. There in the temple, the holiest site in Judaism, the opposition to him by the religious leaders reaches a boiling point, and just before the plot to kill him is set in motion we pump the brakes. We stop and go back to the beginning of the story.
And so today marks our final reading from the Gospel of Mark. And just when things were getting exciting, too! But we finish the Gospel with a flourish, with portents of doom and destruction, of one age coming to an end while another age struggles to be born. “This is but the beginning of the birth pangs,” Jesus says.
Since arriving in Jerusalem Jesus has made his presence felt. He entered the city to shouts of praise and acclamation. He then made a beeline for the temple where he caused a commotion by overturning tables and chasing out the merchants and money changers. Next he did rhetorical battle with a succession of religious leaders who challenged his authority. Lastly, he warned of the danger of the scribes who put on the appearance of piety but who in reality devour widows’ houses.
As we find him today, Jesus is leaving the temple when one of his disciples stops and turns around to marvel at its grandeur. “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” The disciples are in awe. Isn’t this amazing? The marble, the magnificence of it all, the majesty! To think that human hands built such a wonder!
By all accounts the temple was indeed a sight to behold. Significantly refurbished and expanded by Herod the Great, the Jewish ruler at the time of Jesus’ birth, it had been built to impress. The massive complex featured vast courtyards, colonnades, covered walkways, grand staircases, porches, and porticos. As to the interior, even the Roman historian Tacitus described the temple as a place of immense wealth.
In appearance the temple inspired awe, as it did in Jesus’ disciples, but appearances could be deceiving. As we heard last week, the flip side to that immense wealth was that the temple was also the scene of a poor widow putting into the treasury her last two coins—all she had to live on. Surrounded by all that enormous wealth, no one in the temple seems to have taken note of this penniless widow until Jesus points her out to his disciples.
The temple was also the place where Jesus warned about the scribes, who love to appear pious, wearing flowing robes and saying long prayers, but who in reality are dangerous predators who devour widows’ houses.
In appearance the temple inspired awe, as it did in Jesus’ disciples, but appearances could be deceiving.
Let’s also note that Jesus shows no interest in the temple’s splendor—not in its size nor its wealth. Not in its massive stones nor its golden grandeur. The one comment he’s made about the temple was when he was overturning tables and quoting the Hebrew scriptures saying, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations?’ But you have made it a den of robbers.”
From Jesus’ point of view, the temple was more than a building, it was an institution meant to honor God and to serve the spiritual needs of the community by being a house of prayer, a house of mercy, a house in which the poor were seen and received dignity. However, institutions take on the character of the people that run them. If the people running them are corrupt, the institution itself will become corrupt. If those in charge are motivated by self-interest, the institution as a whole will become one of self-interest. That is a lesson I fear we are due to learn the hard way in the coming months and years.
The world does not lack for false prophets who offer easy solutions for complex problems…
And corrupt institutions—even those built with impressively large stones—will eventually crumble. “Do you see these great buildings?” Jesus asks. “Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”
The disciples, never failing to miss the point that Jesus is making, don’t want to know why this will happen but when. You can almost hear the excitement in their voices. “Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?”
Note that it’s a smaller group of disciples who ask this of Jesus in private. They approach him out of earshot from the others. They want to be let in on the heavenly secret. Two of them, James and John, had already gone to Jesus earlier to ask for positions of honor in his coming kingdom, one at his right and one at his left. Now here they are again, along with the brothers Peter and Andrew, seeking special knowledge as well. If they can know when these things will happen, then they can plan ahead and make arrangements. They won’t be caught unaware like so many others. They will have inside information. They will be ready when Jesus comes in his glory.
But really they won’t. They won’t be prepared for what’s coming—not in the least. In fact, Jesus has already told them three times—in quite explicit terms, no less—that he was going to Jerusalem not to be crowned king but to be crucified as a criminal. He has told them that his glory would consist of suffering, rejection, and death and that he would not sit upon a throne but instead be nailed to a cross. He has a tried to prepare them for what’s coming, which as one who will be crucified means becoming an object of scorn and derision, a spectacle to be pitied.
But the poor, deluded disciples still have their minds set on earthly glory. They’re thinking that they will have front-row seats to the insurrection. They believe that they will witness Rome’s humiliation. Yes, the temple may fall, but that’s a small price to pay for victory over the empire. Besides, the temple was destroyed once before and rebuilt on an even grander scale. Who’s to say that it can’t be rebuilt yet again bigger and better than ever?
You have to hand it to the disciples. They never miss an opportunity to misunderstand Jesus. They’re wanting Jesus to tell them the timing for D-Day—when is the invasion happening?—completely missing the bigger point that he won’t be leading the troops in the great crusade because he’ll be too busy being crucified. Crucified for Jew and Gentile alike, for the oppressed and their oppressor, for the insider and the outsider in equal measure.
And as happens virtually every time that Jesus is asked a direct question, he offers an indirect answer. The disciples ask when the temple will fall, but Jesus answers by telling them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. Many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray.”
The world does not lack for false prophets who offer easy solutions for complex problems, who promise to take control and make things right, who tell us, “I alone can fix it.” But they can’t fix their own problems, let alone ours, because they are fundamentally broken people, as we all are. The problem is beyond our ability to fix because the problem is us. We have met the enemy and he is us, Pogo! The problem is that sin has taken hold of us, and no inside information, no strong ruler, no brilliant battle plan, no temple sacrifice can fix the problem that lies within us.
We need a savior. And that is what Jesus has come to Jerusalem to be. Not a soldier but a savior. Not a liberator from Rome but a liberator from sin and death. His death on the cross marks not the end of an era, but certainly the end of the beginning. For the death of Jesus on the cross climaxes the beginning of a new era, an era in which he himself is the temple, where he is our high priest who offers himself in sacrifice for us. An era in which sin and death are on borrowed time. To be sure, death still speaks, but it no longer has the last word over human life. That word now belongs to Jesus, who was raised from the dead, who reigns as Lord of all, and who will come again on clouds of glory.