A Farewell to Flags

A Farewell to Flags--May 3, 2019

"...Grace to you and peace from whom who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Look! He is coming with the clouds; every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail. So it is to be. Amen." [Revelation 1:4b-7]

It'll all turn to dust one day.  Every empire. Every regime.  Every administration and kingdom, every fortress and palace, every flag and every nation-state.  And with them, every last one of the imaginary dotted lines we have drawn across the globe will be erased, too, swept away with a breath.

And in their place will be a Middle Eastern Jewish man with scars on his hands and feet, gathering together people from every corner of creation into a new kind of community--a beloved one.  And the way you know that this particular Middle Eastern Jewish man will be at the center of it all is simply this: he is risen from the dead.

That, in so many words, is the message of the book we call Revelation.  The question is, do we hear that as good news or bad news?  Because the way we hear that message says a great deal about where our real allegiances lie right now.

If the end of empires and nation-states and all of their accompanying pomp and circumstance sounds scary to you, it's a sign that you're pretty strongly invested in the way  things are.  But if the idea of seeing the arrogant and puffed-up powers of the day deflated and taken down a few pegs sounds like good news, well, then you're closer in mindset to the folks for whom the book of Revelation was written.  For the first readers of these words, the end of empires and their armies, of national boundaries and the divisions they create, was a dream they only dared to whisper about.

For people who lived with the near constant presence of invading and occupying Roman soldiers, it sounded too good to be true to hear that one day, there would be an end, not just to the Roman empire, but to all empires once and for all.  For people who constantly had to listen to the incessant decrees of a long line of arrogant Caesars and the official imperial propaganda bragging that Rome would last forever, it was a word of assurance and hope to hear a voice like John's pull back the curtain and expose that Caesar was bluffing.  If you had seen your homeland plundered by centurions, or lost loved ones who had been rounded up by centurions and tortured to make an example of them, or were just disheartened that it seemed the crooked powers of the day were never going to be held to account, it was good news to hear the promise that God would one day put Caesar and all his cronies in their place.  

In other words, to the early church, the idea that one day all the old structures of nations and empires would crumble while God's anointed one (Christ) remains alive and victorious was a much needed word of good news.  The first Christian knew not to attach their hopes or give their allegiance to the flags of any empire, and they knew that their belonging was not to a country, a land, a language, or an ethnicity.  Their hope was that God in Christ would yet reign over all creation in a new kind of kingdom where the last would be first, where the poor would be blessed, and where true greatness was seen in taking turns serving.  The early Christians got excited about a future like that, even though the daily news and official imperial press releases said it would never happen.  The first followers of Jesus held onto that hope, and it not only gave them strength to endure the worst Rome could dish out, but it also gave them the power to live against the grain of the empire, as well.

And this is the key to all of it: Jesus was risen from the dead.  Without the resurrection, all this talk of empires being swept away was just wishful thinking.  There was no reason to believe that Caesar and his pompous cruelty wouldn't just go on forever... except that Jesus, whom Caesar had put to death, was alive again.  The fact that Jesus was alive meant that even after the ones with the swords and hammers in their hands had done their worst, Jesus had a power that they still could not touch. 

And that is our hope today.  On the days when it seems like the villains and voices of rottenness will never get their comeuppance... on the days when it seems like the violence of terrorist in our own cities and around the world is the "new normal" that we're just supposed to "get used to"... on the days when it seems like the bullies and blowhards will last forever... we hold onto this vision that because of the resurrection, even the worst that the powers of the day can do will not be the last word.  

But, to be clear, all of that is only good news if we are willing to let go of our attachment and investment in the powers of the day right now.  If our hopes are pinned on the Dow Jones, or your political party being in power, or your demographic grouping being in the majority, we will be scared by the vision Revelation offers, because every last one of those things will come and go in the course of history.  None of them are worth putting your hope in.  Admitting that is hard, and harder still to actually live with, even for (especially for?) Christians, especially comfortable Christians who have a pretty cushy spot in their culture, like we do.

But if we dare to face all of that, then Revelation's message is clearly good news. There will be an end to empires and a farewell to their flags. And after all those things have come and gone and been dumped into the dustbin of history, there will remain the Risen One, who with gentle and wounded hands will shepherd us all, past the rubble, into a new and beloved community.

As the visionary once put it, Amen--come, Lord Jesus.

Risen Lord, give us hope and strength for this day from the news of your resurrection, so that we can endure and live differently under the powers of the day, as your people have done from one century to another.