Losing it All

 Mark 13:1-8

I hear the church bells ringing. Is it a hollow, empty ringing? Throughout the shut down in pandemic the church pivoted to online, whatever platform this might take. We prerecorded some things, we did live on others. We still came together though as a community of faith. We changed and are still in the process of this changing.

Jesus today tells his disciples that the temple, this great building, will be gone. Gone? When, how the disciples want to know. They want to know because they are afraid. They are afraid of losing place, The Place where worship happened. See somewhere between Moses and wandering in the wilderness and then David and eventually Solomon they built a place for God. They forgot God is about a people, not a place. 

Here we stand, centuries later and we are in the same predicament. "Why are we still streaming?" "Why aren't we doing two services?" "Why, why, why?" In this why is wrapped our fears. We avoid them when we ask why are we still, or why have we changed, or why do we still need to do, well fill in the blank. 

Our reality has been set for a good long time in the church. Declining numbers, old buildings, dedication to old ways of worship and never questioning them. Now is the time. See Jesus doesn't quell the fears of the disciples, neither does he give them the date their place of worship will fall. Because this isn't the point. The point is not only will they lose the building, they will lose each other. 

Now remember I started this off by saying this about community. God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit is a community and as Christians we have been asked to join this community. The thing is we want to hold onto our fears instead of asking the better question. What are we about? Why do we do what we do? Is it fulfilling to the community as a whole? What is our greatest fear about digging into these questions instead?

We are already on the downturn. It is up to us to not be afraid, to go in and discuss the harder things. Jesus lets the disciples know what hardships they are in for and we are not even at any of the point of being put to death or being betrayed by our neighbor.

We need to discover the hope. All apocalyptic literature plants hope. They see the community is in a hard spot and they highlight what there is to hope for. The end is near, but we won't be alone, Jesus is with us. Or there will be a remnant, or we will be remade, or there will be new things, yes, new things. This is what Revelation is about, this is what it means for the Kingdom of Heaven to draw near.

Jesus didn't just do the old things from the Jewish faith, he delved deeper in and did new things. A community in community without a building. A community on the streets reaching out to those who had lost hope. We are to be that hope and light, not fighting our fear and making all things the same as they always were.

This is the big call of the church right now. Can we name our fears? Can we be honest about who we are and why we do what we do? Can we be the salt and light the world needs? I believe we can, won't you join me in finding this community.