A Strange Conquest (Revelation 2:1-7)

Letters Against Compromise

Today’s scripture contains the first of seven miniature letters that John of Patmos—the author of Revelation—is instructed to deliver. Each letter relays a message that John claims to have received from Jesus and is addressed to a specific church in the Roman province of Asia, or what we would call Turkey today. In each letter, Jesus encourages the church, sometimes also providing warnings or reprimands and always ending with a formulaic promise that uses these or similar words: “To the one who conquers, will be given [abundant life].” (2:7, 11, 17, 28; 3:5, 12, 21).

While each letter addresses concerns specific to the church being addressed, there is a common thread tying all these concerns together. This common thread is a simple message: do not compromise. In other words, stay faithful to the way of Jesus Christ; do not water down your faith (because of social pressures or persecution) in order to fit in with the Roman culture and way of life.

The first letter, which we will read in just a moment, addresses the church in Ephesus, one of the largest cities in the Roman empire at the time. Ephesus had all the grandeur and luxuries that the Roman empire boasted: a grand amphitheatre for plays and gladiatorial games, a stadium for sports, a huge temple to the patron goddess Artemis, saunas, marketplaces, and more. Ephesus also had one of the strongest communities of early Christ-followers, who strove never to compromise to the Roman way of life. As we will hear in just one moment, Jesus praises them for not compromising…and yet he also reprimands them for the spirit in which they resist compromise. I think his message is especially instructive for committed followers of Christ today, and so I’ve handpicked it for today’s scripture. (I do encourage you to read the other letters as well in the rest of Revelation 2 and 3.)

Scripture

1 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands:—Earlier in chapter one, John explains that the seven stars are the angels or messengers that correspond with the seven golden lampstands, which are the seven churches. So here John is envisioning Jesus walking in the midst of the seven churches, holding in his hand—in his care and guidance—the seven angels or messengers, that is, the spiritual leaders of these churches. 

2 “I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance. I know that you cannot tolerate evildoers; you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them to be false. 3 I also know that you are enduring patiently and bearing up for the sake of my name, and that you have not grown weary. 4 But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5 Remember then from what you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent. 6 Yet this is to your credit: you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. 7 Let anyone who has an ear listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches. To everyone who conquers, I will give permission to eat from the tree of life that is in the paradise of God.

The Way of Rome

Rather than try to explain this passage, let me offer a story….

Nico could still remember the first time he went to the Grand Theater. He was thirteen, and an older teenage friend had invited him. He remembered the parade before the game, how trumpets and dancing accompanied the arrival of the palm branches and wreaths that would be conferred upon the victors. He remembered the presentation of statues—Mars, Zeus, Athena, and of course Artemis, the patron goddess of the city. He remembered how a detachment of soldiers, armed to the teeth, marched in stoic fashion around the theater. He remembered how there was a statue of the emperor himself, and how the wealthy sponsor of the games led the crowd in a stirring chant: “Caesar is Lord! Caesar is Lord!” 

He remembered feeling sick the first time he saw a limb dismembered from a fighter’s body. He looked away as the crowd roared its approval. They chanted, “Nika, nika!” “Win, win!” Soon, though, he was watching again. A defeated fighter was wearily grasping the thigh of his combatant, and the crowd was crying for his death. Everyone looked to the sponsor of the game, who was acting as referee. He tilted his head one way, then the other, and then finally gave the thumbs-up signal. The victorious combatant plunged his sword into the neck of the defeated fighter, killing him. Nico remembered how after that death blow, attendants entered the fighting grounds and delivered further blows to ensure that the loser was indeed dead. (The message was clear. Caesar, and anyone who acted in his name, held the power of life and death.) He remembered how the sponsor pronounced the victor a “conqueror” or niketes, and how the crowd chanted that title again and again: “Niketes, niketes!”

The first night after watching the gladiators fight, Nico could hardly sleep. With his eyes closed, his mind’s eye kept replaying the violent images of the day. Half a year later, when his friend invited him to another game, he said “Yes.” 

Soon he was learning the names of famous gladiators. What weapons they fought with. What signature moves defined them. Their rags-to-riches backstories that told how by sheer grit and willpower and strength they had risen to fame. He didn’t know at the time, but he was learning a way of life. The Roman way of life. To some it seemed callous or insensitive, but to him it seemed true. It made sense. Whoever’s strongest…gets to live. 

At the end of the day, it’s best to be on the side that’s gonna win. And so next time he attended the game, he chanted with the crowd: “Caesar is Lord. Caesar is Lord.”

The Way of Christ

But the games and the gladiators were a cold comfort to him when illness came upon his house and took both his parents. Suddenly he felt helpless. No amount of strength or grit could get him out of his grief.

Nico was a laundryperson—a smelly vocation that placed him near the bottom rung of the Roman social order. He didn’t have enough money or good heritage to earn him a place in one of the local associations or guilds. And so he didn’t really have any connections outside the laundry world. 

But shortly after his parents died, another laundry worker invited him to tag along to a local banquet. Now Nico had never been to a banquet, but this one was different. It was celebrating a man called Jesus, a man who had been crucified—and yet his followers claimed he lived. Nico went, and his world was turned upside down. Upon arriving at a modest dwelling, he was greeted with smiles and warm embraces from all sorts of people—slaves, merchants, Jews, Romans with noble family names. There in a circle, rich and poor alike sat and passed plates and bumped elbows and swapped stories. No special privileges were given to the rich or the powerful. It was surreal. A few times during the meal, someone would speak up and share a memory about this man Jesus, in whose name they would bless the meal and give thanks. Clearly this guy was the founder of the feast. Later candles were lit, and hands were washed, and songs were sung, and stories were told—personal stories about how Jesus had overcome difficulties that the people there at the banquet had faced.

The first night after that banquet, Nico closed his eyes in bed and felt…embraced. He didn’t know at the time, but he was about to learn a new, different way of life. The way of Christ. The way of love. To some it seemed weak or foolish, but to him it would come to be true. It would make sense. The embrace he felt…gave him more strength than any amount of muscle or steel did.

At the end of the day, it’s best to know you are not alone. And so, finally, one day, he confessed, “Jesus is Lord,” and was baptized in water from death to life and given a white ceremonial robe to wear.

Resisting the Nicolaitians—and Becoming Righteous

Do you know what the name Nico means? It comes from the Greek word nikao, which means “to conquer” or “overcome.” (Our brand name today, Nike, comes from the Greek word for “conquest” or “victory.”) 

As a teenager, Nico learned that victory meant power and strength. As a new follower of Christ, Nico learned that victory meant a vulnerable love that endures all things, even death. But that is not the end of Nico’s story….

In his early life as a follower of Christ, Nico learned from other Christ-followers that certain behaviors and attitudes really were incompatible with the way of Christ. So he began to withdraw from activities that had characterized his old life. He stopped attending the gladiatorial games, where he had participated in the worship of the Roman emperor and the Roman military and had slowly become desensitized to violence. He stopped making trips to the local sauna, where he had learned to see bodies as trophies that could be acquired and traded by the strong and mighty. He stopped shopping at a lot of the local markets, where he would have been required to offer incense and a pledge of allegiance to the Roman emperor. Anything that involved the worship of the Roman emperor or Roman gods challenged the way of Christ, usually by asserting that the real authority in the world was a mighty arm, whether that arm belonged to Zeus or to a human surrogate like the emperor. To put it bluntly: the way of Rome was force, whereas the way of Christ was love. Nico was learning the way of love, and so he withdrew from the Roman way of life.

Of course, there were social consequences. He endured raised eyebrows and whispered rumors. He endured the occasional taunt and even the odd threat. But these consequences were a drop in the sea next to the embrace that he felt, to the knowledge that Christ was alive and with him.

And yet…over time, Nico thought less about the embrace that had welcomed him into Christ, and more about how righteous he had become by withdrawing himself from the polluted world of Rome. This became especially apparent when a traveling band of so-called apostles traveled through Ephesus, teaching that followers of Christ could still participate in Roman festivals and events that celebrated the emperor. These traveling apostles, who were known as the Nicolaitians, preached that Jesus Christ’s salvation had to do with a person’s interior life—that is, it concerned their soul, rather than the way they lived. Therefore, they could still enjoy the Roman way of life—a way that glorified violence and lust and wealth—as long as they didn’t worship these things in their heart, as long as Jesus was enthroned in their heart.

Nico and other Christ-followers in Ephesus strongly resisted the Nicolaitians, preaching instead that Christ had called his disciples to “follow him,” to live the way he lived, even to take up the cross. They pushed back strongly against the Nicolaitians, reminding people that they could not serve two masters—in this case, Christ and Rome.

What Changes Us in the First Place?

If you’ll recall from today’s scripture, the problem with Nico and the other Ephesians is not that they are compromising to the way of Rome—on the contrary, they are steadfastly guarding against any compromise. Jesus even commends them for this. The problem is that in resisting what they are against, they have forgotten what they are for. Listen again to Jesus’ words: “But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember then from what you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand”—that is, the church in Ephesus—“from its place, unless you repent” (Rom 2:4-5).

Remember what changes Nico’s life in the first place? What, I would wager, changed all of our lives, too, in the first place? It wasn’t a vehement argument. It wasn’t a heated debate. It wasn’t some guy saying, “Come on, prove me wrong, and you’ll see I’m right.” It was love. For Nico, it was this almost mystical sense of embrace that overwhelmed his emptiness, that brought warmth to a world that had gone ice-cold. 

Notice what Jesus is saying in this message. He is not reprimanding the Ephesians for withdrawing from the Roman way of life. He’s not criticizing their rather radical stance against cultural compromise. Rather, he’s rebuking the spirit in which they do it. Remember Paul’s words? “If I speak in the tongues…of angels…if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and knowledge…if I give away all my possessions…but do not have love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor 13:1-3). From the perspective of Christ, being right can actually be wrong, if love is not the first and final word. 

In the last half-century, Christians in our nation have waged what has been called a “culture war,” fighting against a perceived threat to the Christian religion. Many battle lines have been drawn. Prayer in school. The ten commandments in public spaces. Abortion and reproductive rights. The sincerity of many of those who are fighting is not something that I would question. What could be questioned, however, is the spirit in which their fight is fought. Christians fighting in the culture wars have effectively taken up the weapons of the world, seeking to use the coercive powers of the state to get their way, when Jesus calls us away from the weapons of the world, away from the use of coercive force. Christians fighting in the culture wars have taken up bullhorns and ad-space to tell others how they’re wrong, when Jesus calls us to love others and show them by our example—by our faithful witness—the goodness of God’s way.

What It Means to Conquer

At the end of each letter in Revelation, Jesus promises abundant life to those who “conquer.” It might not be a coincidence that the first letter goes out to Ephesus, where gladiatorial games were huge, where conquering was a Roman virtue celebrated by everyone. It seems as though Jesus is inviting his followers to consider again what it means to conquer. In the gospel of John, Jesus proclaims that he has conquered the world (John 16:33)...right before he is crucified. Right before he demonstrates the depths of his love for the world.

Prayer

Lord Jesus Christ,

Who has conquered the world,

Who has conquered death—

Help us to remember your victory

In our own lives,

How your love changes everything

…

Align us evermore with your spirit,

Gentle, humble, filled with love,

Which works not out of resentment and grievance

But with grace and forgiveness

And a deep love that conquers.

Amen.

"Patient Endurance" (Rev 1:1-11)

Get Ready?

1 The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place; he made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, 2 who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw.

3 Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of the prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and who keep what is written in it; for the time is near.

In 2012, a TV show called Doomsday Preppers premiered on the National Geographic channel. Each episode featured an individual who believed that the end of the world as we know it could be near. Some of these “doomsday preppers,” as they’re called, worried about the prospect of a global nuclear war or widespread natural disasters caused by climate change. Others feared that society would collapse as the result of the power grid failing. But one common thread that ran through many of these fears was a religious belief that our world’s problems and predicaments mirror the end-time judgments described in the book of Revelation. When these preppers read words like we just heard—“what must soon take place” and “the time is near” (Rev 1:1, 3)—they see signposts pointing toward a catastrophic end right around the corner. Their response is largely the same. It’s time to get ready. For them, “getting ready” means stockpiling resources, food, and weapons, and then bunkering down. When things fall apart, they’ll be prepared to weather the storm—sort of like Noah on the arc—while others around them flounder.

Now I’m not a prepper. (I’m guessing none of us would truly qualify.) But I’m very familiar with the beliefs that underlie the movement. I remember that one of the first albums I bought with my own money—DC Talk’s Jesus Freak—featured a cover of Larry Norman’s song, “I Wish We’d All Been Ready,” a song about a popularly imagined event called “the rapture,” an end-time phenomenon when Christians would be supernaturally vacuumed up to heaven. Around the same time in my life, I read the first book in the Left Behind series, which imagined how things would unfold at the end of time (which happens to be around the mid-1990s!). It drew a lot of inspiration specifically from the book of Revelation, and it sought to depict how some of Revelation’s more fantastic images—its dragon, its two beasts, its famines and wars—how all of this corresponded with our own emerging geopolitical situation. Its message mirrored the thinking that motivates doomsday preppers, namely “Get ready!” It’s no surprise that many churches and pastors and small groups devoured this material. Fear is a powerful motivator. We all want to make sure we’ll be safe when disaster strikes—and what’s a bigger disaster than the end of everything?

Not about the End of Things…

But what I would like to suggest today and over the next eight weeks as we read through Revelation goes against the grain of all of this. What I would like to suggest is this. Revelation is not about the end of things. It is about the essence of things. Revelation is not about the end of things, it’s about the essence of things. The very first word in the book points in this direction. The word apokalypsis—which gets translated “revelation”—means something like “unveiling.” An apokalypsis reveals the reality behind appearances. An apokalypsis helps us to see what’s really going on despite appearances to the contrary. And according to the author of Revelation—a man named John, whom church tradition considers to be John the evangelist but whom most historians suggest was a different John—according to John, what’s really going on is that Jesus Christ is in the midst of our chaotic world, alongside us in all the pressures and persecutions and seductions that we face. 

Now, specifically, John was writing to an audience that was situated in the 1st century world of the Roman empire, a world where Roman power promised everything a person could want: prestige, prosperity, peace. But to enjoy these promises, a person had to pledge allegiance (sometimes literally) to the Roman empire. A person had to say “yes” to the Roman way of life, a way of life that included dominating the weak, extracting money from the poor, and excluding (if not executing) everyone who could not serve the purposes of the empire. If you wanted peace, then sign on to Rome, who made war like no other empire on earth. If you wanted prosperity, then sign on to Rome, who indulged in abundance accumulated on the backs of slaves and the less fortunate. If you wanted prestige, then sign on to Rome, who celebrated ideals of nobility and beauty at the expense of all who fell short of those ideals.

It’s important to remember this historical context, for it serves as a helpful reminder that John did not sit down to encourage people by pointing them to events that would happen two thousand years later. He sat down to encourage people by helping them to understand events that were happening right then and there. He wasn’t writing in a code that could only be deciphered millenia later. He was writing in symbols and images that helped people to interpret what was going on in the present moment. 

And when he wrote, “The time is near,” he was not saying, “Get ready for the end.” He was saying, rather, “Get ready to follow Jesus, to live the way he lived.” For the Greek word here is kairos, which sometimes gets translated “appointed time.” I would suggest translating it as “decisive time” or “moment of opportunity.” Kairos is not the time of a clock; it’s not tick-tock time. It’s the time when memories are made and futures are decided. It’s a clutch moment that is pregnant with possibility. And according to John, it’s here, now. Will his audience hold true to their faith in the way of Christ—or compromise to the way of Rome?

“Faithful Witness”

4 John to the seven churches that are in Asia:

Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of 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, 6 and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

7 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.

8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.

In his greeting, John twice refers to the eternity of God, but in a way that contradicts our linear expectations. Did you catch it? He doesn’t move from past to present to future; he doesn’t refer to the God who was and is and is to come. Rather, he gives priority to the present tense. Twice he calls God the God “who is and who was and who is to come” (Rev 1:4, 8). It’s a small but significant reordering of time that emphasizes God’s presence, as though to remind folks that God is not just some spiritual or pious abstraction but is present here, now (closer to us than our own breath, as some mystics have put it). Despite any evidence to the contrary, John insists God is happening in every little thing.

This assurance of God’s presence is amplified by the rest of John’s greeting, which is trinitarian in formula, attribute grace and peace not only to God but also to “the seven spirits” before God’s throne (a symbol of the Holy Spirit) and to Jesus Christ (Rev 1:4-5). After this trinitarian blessing, John spends the most time talking about Jesus, which is perhaps no surprise as Jesus Christ is the content of his “apocalypse,” his revelation. His depiction of Jesus here foreshadows what’s to come in his vision. Strikingly he alludes four different times to Jesus’ crucifixion: first, calling Jesus “the faithful witness,” in which the Greek word for “witness” is martyr, thus reminding us that Jesus died for what he believe in; second, calling Jesus the “firstborn of the dead,” again reminding us that Jesus died; third, claiming that Jesus’ “blood” cleanses us of our sins, reminding us of Jesus’ blood on the cross; and fourth, insisting that “those who pierced him” will see him and mourn him (Rev 1:5-7). Why this repeated emphasis on Jesus’ death, especially when John’s final claim is that Jesus is actually “the ruler of the kings of the earth” (Rev 1:5)? 

For John, Jesus’ death is the key to understanding his life. It’s essentially the logic that if you want to know what a person is living for (what matters most to them), then find what they’d be willing to die for. A martyr’s death is the seal of their life, showing us what they lived for (what mattered most to them). So, what was Jesus living for? John calls Jesus “him who loved us” (Rev 1:5). So, Jesus lived out of his love for us–all of us. We might say, quite literally, that Jesus loves us all to death. And he shows us what real love looks like (and indeed what the God who is love looks like) under the most intense sort of pressure and persecution. Love will never spill blood to get its way. It would rather its own blood be spilled, as it holds out eternal hope that others might one day see and choose the goodness of love.

But the real surprise, the real twist—and the real encouragement—is John’s insistence that despite any evidence to the contrary the crucified Jesus is in fact “the ruler of the kings of the earth” (Rev 1:5). Which is to say, Jesus reigns; his love is not and will not be defeated but will endure forever.

Not Escape, but Endurance

9 I, John, your brother who share with you in Jesus the persecution and the kingdom and the patient endurance, was on the island called Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. 10 I was in the spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet 11 saying, “Write in a book what you see and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamum, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea.”

Doomsday preppers and people who read Revelation as a prediction about the end of the world focus their attention on the worst possible scenarios and do all they can to avoid the pain and suffering heading their way. Their plan is, in a word, escape. Whether by bunkering down amid stockpiled resources or getting raptured up into heaven. It’s an individualistic perspective: me-against-the-world, my-personal-soul-acquitted-by-God.

And it’s the opposite of what we read in Revelation. According to John, the mission is not escape but endurance. John’s encouragement is not about the fate of his audience’s individual souls but about how they’re not alone, how their experience is shared with Christ himself. In one stunning statement, John asserts that the kingdom of God is already among them, just not in a way we’re accustomed to hearing. “I, John, your brother…share with you in Jesus the persecution and the kingdom and the patient endurance” (Rev 1:9). Put otherwise, the kingdom of God is here—in persecution and patient endurance. It’s here when we suffer as Jesus suffered, when we endure patiently in love as Jesus endured patiently in love. For John, salvation is not about solitary souls. It’s about the kingdom of God, a world and a way of living infinitely better than the world and way of Rome—or any other empire.

Not Winning, but Witnessing

Over the course of John’s letter, which we’ll be reading the next eight weeks, it will become clearer and clearer that the kingdom of God is not the promise that Christians will win in the end, but the assurance that witnessing to God’s love is worthwhile and indeed its own reward. The kingdom is not about winning, but witnessing. When we align ourselves with the reality of love behind all things, we are blessed. We live well. John’s words about patiently enduring the persecutions or pressures of our world are not advocating white-knuckling—gritting your teeth and getting through it—but rather trusting in and witnessing to the reality of God’s love, especially when all the world around us seems devoid of God’s love. The light shines brighter when the surroundings get darker. We see this in the cross, where God’s love for us shines the brightest.

Toward the end of the Roman Empire’s reign over the world, when the structure of the empire was beginning to crumble and chaos grew amid its cities—and you just can imagine the fears and reactions of the common person, who much like us today might have fretted at the rising price of food and the threat of war at the border—in the midst of all this, the emperor Julian, who really did not like Christians, resentfully observed: “These godless Galileans are supporting not only their own poor but ours as well!” In other words, amid the collapse of the empire, Christ-followers were not battening down the hatches and withdrawing; they were helping each other, even non-Christians. They were not winning in any worldly sense, and yet they were already living in God’s kingdom in a way—with a witness—that was so unmistakable that the emperor begrudgingly admired them.

I think too of the early Disciples leader David Lipscomb. In 1873, when a cholera epidemic overtook Nashville, Tennessee, many residents fearfully fled the city. A little bit like doomsday preppers, they sought to escape the terror of their world. But David Lipscomb stayed. By all accounts, his steady ministry to the sick and the dying imparted serenity upon those who remained. It might be hard to believe, but he likened ministry in those trying times to a great blessing. He insisted that, despite what one may think, “Those who did quietly and calmly do their duty although in the midst of pestilence, want, suffering and death, found these the happiest days of their life.”’

I hear the echo of John’s Revelation in this wild claim. David Lipscomb is not reveling in a promise about the way things will end, in the idea that one day in the future he and other Christians will inherit the kingdom. He is, rather, rejoicing in the way things really are in Christ, in the kingdom of God that is already here where we patiently endure the world with the faith that God’s love is the essence of reality. It’s worth dying for, yes—but even more importantly, it’s worth living for too.

Prayer

Patient Christ,

Who is the faithful witness
To who God is, was, and will be:

Grant us hearts 

That do not fear the end

But have faith in your way,

And hands 

That bear witness

To the Love behind all things.

Amen.

 

"The Coming of the Lord" (Ja 5:7-20)

Sometimes an Eskimo Isn’t Just an Eskimo 

Two men are sitting in a bar in an isolated town up in Alaska. As the night grows old and their table becomes littered with empty bottles, they begin arguing over the existence of God. One man is an atheist, the other a believer in God. The atheist raises his voice and exclaims, “Look here! It’s not like I don’t have evidence, like I’m just spouting my opinion. My beliefs come from my firsthand experience. Just last month I got caught up in that terrible blizzard. Whiteout conditions—I couldn’t see a damned thing. I was lost, it was 50 below, and I was going to die. So I fell on my knees, and I cried out, ‘God, if you’re really there…I’m lost, and I’m going to die if you don’t help. Please, God, save me!’”

The believer just stared at the atheist dumbfounded. Finally he said, “Well, you must believe! I mean, after all, you’re talking to me. You’re alive and well!”

The atheist frowned and shook his head. “No, man. God didn’t do a thing for me. All it was, was these two Eskimos who happened to be passing through where I was. They showed me the way back to camp.”

I don’t think this story needs much explaining in this company. Sometimes, an Eskimo isn’t just an Eskimo…. God’s grace takes all shapes and sizes. It could be as plain as a bit of bread or a cup of juice. It could be a person who’s got all sorts of troubles and struggles of their own, and yet they speak the precise Word you need to hear, or give you the hug from God that you so needed to receive. It could be a couple of Eskimos.

Revisiting the Second Coming

Today’s scripture concludes our journey through the encyclical letter of James. In this final passage, James offers his audience of Christ-followers encouragement to be patient amid the pressures and persecutions of their world. The first verse in the passages encapsulates the essence of his encouragement: “Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord” (Ja 5:7). Shortly after this exhortation, he grounds his encouragement in a promise: “The coming of the Lord is near” (Ja 5:8).

This kind of language typically triggers a certain theological idea—almost as surely as a doctor’s reflex hammer on your knee will cause your leg to kick out. When we read James’ words about “the coming of the Lord,” we are reflexively inclined to think of a day in the far-off future, a day that is commonly referred to as “the second coming.” There’s a common refrain recited among many of our brothers and sisters in other denominations when they gather at the table: “Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again.” It’s a succinct statement of faith, and its common interpretation situates us in an interim or in-between phase, somewhere between Christ’s resurrection and Christ’s second coming. We are still waiting for Christ to come again—“‘in a cloud’ with power and great glory” (Luke 21:27; cf. Dan 7:13).

But today’s scripture and other related scriptures accommodate more than this one traditional interpretation. When James says, “The coming of the Lord is near,” he is using the same expression that Jesus used when he began his ministry, saying, “The kingdom of God is near” (e.g., Mark 1:15). Some translations render this expression as, “The kingdom of God is at hand” and “The coming of the Lord is at hand.” There is a very good grammatical reason for translation. In the Greek, the expression “is near” is made in a particular grammatical tense—called the perfect tense—which indicates a completed action with continuous results. In other words, the kingdom of God has arrived (completed action) and is arriving (continuous action). Or, the coming of the Lord has happened (completed action) even as it is happening (continuous action).

I don’t want us to get bogged down in grammar, so if that crash course in Greek made a complete wreck of things in your mind, just drop it and pay attention to what James says next: “See, the Judge is standing at the doors” (Ja 5:9). In other words, God is practically here. As close as a person knocking on the door. We might recall that John in Revelation uses a similar image for God: “See, I stand at the door and knock” (Rev 3:20). The point is, James may be referring less to a single day in the future when Christ will come in a spectacular way, closing the final chapter on history, and more to an everyday in which Christ is always at the door, always just around the corner. Put another way, James may be referring not to “the second coming” of Christ, but to the “always coming” of Christ.

When Jesus himself talks about the day of the Lord, a time of great crisis and yet also great possibility (that is often interpreted as “the second coming”), he insists, “This generation will not pass away until all things have taken place,” and “It will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth” (Luke 21:32, 35). Some smug historians and scholars have read these words and reasoned that Jesus must have goofed on his timing, because no one who has lived on the face of the earth (from Jesus’ time to our own time) has experienced this final apocalyptic event. But we can only draw that conclusion when we hear Jesus’ words in a very literal way. Alternatively, we could hear Jesus to be saying that the day of the Lord—this climactic, decisive moment in which a person endures great difficulty and yet is faced with the prospect of the Lord’s arrival—has and will come on us all, perhaps more than once!

Personally, I see in most “second coming” theology—in theology that makes a big deal about Jesus coming back once and for all—a faith that has lost its nerve, a faith that is anemic and despairing…a faith that is not really faith. If we’re all really just waiting for God to intervene in one climactic, catastrophic way that will somehow correct all our wrongs and make everything better…then what does that say about our faith in Christ and the way that he taught and lived? Do we actually believe that loving our enemies, and not fighting evil with evil, and not judging others, and not storing up material treasures but living simply and generously—do we actually believe that the way of Christ is worthwhile and leads to life? Do we actually believe that the kingdom is among us, and we can enjoy its goodness now, as Christ preached and practiced? Or do we believe that the way of Christ is secondary, a sort of consolation until the real thing happens, just some stuff that would be ideal but is ultimately impractical and ineffective, and what we really need is God to stop piddling about and get his sword out to make things right?

Where We Find Christ

Another way of posing this question would be to ask: Do we believe God can be present in our midst in the shape of two Eskimos? In the shape of a needy person asking for help? In the shape of a loaf of bread and cup a that bear the memory and hope of our Lord and savior?

In the second half of today’s scripture, James commends the practice of prayer. He basically says, “Whatever the problem is, whatever the question is…the answer is prayer.” Is someone suffering? Pray to God. Is someone joyful? Praise God. Is someone sick? Gather round and pray. Is there brokenness from sin? Be honest with one another and pray.

For James, prayer is how we acknowledge and enter into the presence of God. As he insisted earlier, the Lord has come near—he’s at the door, he’s just around the corner. Prayer is how we open the door to God’s presence. Prayer is how we turn the corner to God’s presence. I can almost hear a refrain after each of the scenarios that James outlines: “Are any among you suffering? They should pray. The Lord is near. Are any cheerful? They should sing songs of praise. The Lord is near” (Ja 5:13). In all things pray, because the Lord is near.

Theologian and church leader Tripp Fuller regularly quips that there are three places Jesus promised us we would encounter him. The table, small groups, and the needful. “This is my body”—the table; “wherever two or three are gathered…”—small groups; and “inasmuch as you did so to the least of these…”—the needful. I think James is offering a similar promise in today’s scripture. His encouragement to be patient and to pray is not simply to say, “Just wait…one day God will make everything right.” It is, rather, to say, “Keep living in the way he taught us to live, for in so doing he will always be just around the corner, just behind the door.”

He could be in a pair of Eskimos. A needy friend. A humble table shared among the faithful. The irony is that if we’re looking for the second coming—some grand, dramatic moment from on high—we may miss the fact that our Lord has already come. That his kingdom is, indeed, as he says, not coming with things that can be observed, so that folks say, ‘Look, here is it!’ or ‘There it is!’, but is in fact already among us (cf. Luke 17:20-21).

Prayer

Stranger Christ,
Who often shows up
In ways we never expected—
In a manger,
On a cross,
In a cry for help
…
Grant us faith
In your little way of love,
In the little deeds by which
We enter into your presence
And into your kingdom.
Amen.