Living between the times

Peter Neilson May 01, 2024 4 6

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Acts 1: 9-11 (NIVUK)

9 After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.

10 They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. 11 ‘Men of Galilee,’ they said, ‘why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.’

“This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

We live between the times. The Ascension and the Return of Jesus are the punctuation marks that bracket this phase of history. In the United States of America at this moment, we will hear preachers mapping out the countdown to the return of Jesus. They defend vigorously Israel’s indefensible war tactics, and the expulsion of the Palestinians from the Holy Land. For many, the return of the Jews to that strip of land on the Eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea in 1948 was a tipping point in the acceleration of the Lord’s return.

Maybe it is. Maybe we need to re-read Jesus’ rebuke about faulty timetables.

This much is certain. When Jesus returns, in the same mysterious way he left, he will judge Israel along with every other nation, says the parable of the sheep and goats, according to their treatment of the oppressed, the weak and the starving. He will not be impressed by nationalistic justifications of comprehensive violence against the many in order to defend against the few. There will come a day when the Judge who defends the weak will have His say.

Time to wake up, look up and look around. Time to go wild about injustice!

Prayer:

Lord, have mercy on us all.

Too easily we choose making war over making peace.

Too quickly we are consumed by revenge rather than fired by justice.

Lord, have mercy on us all.

Too easily we see things from our side alone.

Too easily we justify ourselves to feel good about ourselves.

Lord, have mercy on us all.

Melt the hard hearts of warmongers,

Wherever and whoever they may be.

Heal the broken hearts of the war victims,

Too many, too often, too helpless.

Lord, have mercy on us all. AMEN