The text this morning is from Paul’s Letter to the Colossians, the first chapter:
He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.Thus far the text.
My dear friends in Christ,
Our culture today seems to be obsessed with apocalyptic visions of death and destruction. Think of how many zombie movies are on television. Netflix is a website where you can watch literally millions of hours of TV and movies, and there are entire categories dealing with dystopian or end times shows. And if you watch all of these, you discover that the world paints the end of time as a dark day. It’s scary to them. If you listen to how the culture portrays it, the idea of that last day seems like the skies will darken and the light from the sun comes through as some kind of bloody mess. There’ll be child sacrifices and people will just murder each other in the streets. It’s an apocalyptic vision of death and destruction, rape and murder, unhappiness and panic.
And you know what, I imagine that is exactly true for the unbelieving world. I think that is exactly what they will experience. In last week’s Gospel lesson, Jesus painted a picture of one of the signs of the Last Day in the fall of Jerusalem. He told His hearers how horrible it would be. And it was. In fact, the Church held on to that prophecy from Jesus, and when they started to see happen what He told them would, they took to the hills at His suggestion. The city was surrounded by the Romans, food and water were cut off. People were massacred. They starved in the street. Mothers became so hungry, we have accounts of them eating their babies to survive. Even in today’s Gospel lesson, as Luke follows Jesus to the cross, Jesus gives a picture of what will be for those people at the end, before they fall into the pit of hell and damnation. It’s not pretty. It’ll be so bad, people will beg mountains to fall on them. That prophecy was more than just something to warn the Church to escape; I wonder if it was a picture even of hell.
And you see, when the culture begins to see the end times as this scary thing, painting it the way that they do, I wonder if they’re just being honest about the future that is coming for them and for all unbelievers, a picture of hell, where you are dying but never die, where you suffer but constantly discover new depths of despair, where you are cast into pitch darkness but are constantly licked by the flames at your feet. In one way, all of these images are out there, I think, to comfort themselves: it will never be that bad. But, even though they don’t realize it, they’re prophetically preaching the future that is in store for them.
Now, realistically, I think we have to realize that the world is going to get worse and worse before the Lord returns. I don’t think zombies are going to come out of the woodwork or anything, but I think we will continue to lose our way as a culture, I think we will forsake our common morals, common sense, common decency. I think we will sacrifice our children at the altar of convenience using the knife of abortion. I think we will let children cut off their own body parts because they think God made them wrongly. Oh, wait, that’s today. I can’t imagine how it will get worse than now, but I know that it will.
But, when Jesus returns, it’ll be on a day when some mother picks her kid off the ground after he falls. The sun will have risen that morning. Someone will be on their way to work after kissing their spouse goodbye. Food will be eaten. Sleep will have been had. It’ll be a normal day. The world may get worse in many ways, but it will be just another day in the life of the world, the last day, but a day not unlike every day that came before it. And then Jesus will appear. He will come in the clouds, accompanied by all His glorious band, the angels and all the saints who have died. Every eye will look to the heavens at the sound of the trumpet blast, and those who are alive, who have waited for the day of His return will be caught up to Him, transformed into gloriously perfect bodies and come back to inherit the earth through all eternity. Those who have rejected the Lord will enter into their dystopian nightmare of hell, but those who plead His mercy will live forever.
This is what Paul tells us, that Jesus has delivered us out of the darkness that we’re gravitating towards. And we’re gravitating towards it because it is in our own souls. We are attracted to what is similar to us. But, Jesus comes to deliver us out of that dark domain and has brought us into the kingdom of light, the kingdom of the Beloved Son of God. This he does through His death, where He enters into the darkness on our behalf that He might cast us out. There He stays and suffers under the wrath of God, but we are comforted with the redemption He won for us. There, upon the cross, next to the two thieves, before all who mocked Him, stripped down and naked for all the world to see, the forgiveness of your sins was won for you by God in human flesh.
This rescue was always His purpose. He has always desired to bring you to Himself, by dying for you. It was never the plan to have you be righteous by your own merit, but by His. And so, from before the foundation of the world, God set in motion the plan to carry His Son into the world in the very flesh that He created to redeem His creation. From the first day, the last day has been in sight, that God in Christ Jesus created all things, the world, the heavens, the angels, the beasts, and humanity, that He might redeem all things.
He set an order in creation that the family might lead the world. The family gives rise to the government and government bows before the Church, the bride of Christ. Kings and nations and dominions are under His control and watchful eye for He has given them the authority and the responsibility to rule, to rule justly, to love mercy, and to make possible for all people to walk humbly with their God. He is the beginning of all things, and all things were created by Him, through Him, looking at what was to come in His cross, death, and resurrection, and ultimately, all things were created for Him, that He might rule over them with His beloved bride for all eternity.
He is before all things, before creation, before sin, before redemption, before resurrection. And yet, He is the resurrection. He is the life. He is the way and the truth. He is the beginning. He is the firstborn from dead, never to die again. He is preeminent. This means He is first, He is greatest, He is best. He is the image in which all things are made. He is the model through Him all things are formed. He is the fullness of God in all things and all things move and have their being in Him. And all of this comes through the cross. All of it.
Through His cross, He has made peace with God. Now, this doesn’t mean that God was somehow conflicted over His love for us. It doesn’t mean that the Father and Jesus were somehow fighting over us. It does mean that there is a consequence to sin, and that’s death. When sin come before God’s presence, He has to wipe it out. He has to destroy it. And when He destroys it, He destroys the one who carries it and commits it. Thus, Christ took all sins to Himself that He might suffer under the wrath of such destruction and that He would save you from it. He has taken the darkness, and when the darkness has disappeared, all that is left is the light.
He has taken you from the domain of darkness and transferred you into the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom you have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He knew, before He ever created the world, that He was going to come and redeem you. So, He created the world that He might create you. He knew our first parents would fall into sin, He knew they would pass it on to us. So, He made the plan to redeem you before you ever fell into sin, before it was ever passed on to you. He brought light into the world when there was no darkness. He cast out the darkness so there is only light.
The sin that would have brought you hell has been taken to Himself so that you receive not the darkness of the world, but the joy of everlasting life. The day when our Jesus returns is going to be bleak and dark for those who have turned from our Father’s invitation to faith. But, for those who believe in Christ, for those who have held to His promises, we are invited from this world and into the next that shall never end. This world is going to get darker, because it will ever more reflect the constancy of the sin that pervades it to its foundation. But, the saints in Christ will grow ever more glorious as we approach that day, the day when our Lord returns, the day when, through the cross of Jesus, through the peace we find in the blood of Jesus, we are welcomed forever into His marvelous light. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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