Ben Johnston-Krase, Presenter

Revelation 21:1-6

"All Things New"

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.  And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.  And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,

‘See, the home of God is among mortals.
He will dwell with them;
they will be his peoples,
and God himself will be with them;
he will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.’

And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’ Also he said, ‘Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.’  Then he said to me, ‘It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.  

There’s a Palestinian refugee camp on the southern tip of the Gaza strip.  It’s called the Rafah camp.  Rafah and close to 60 other refugee camps were established in the decade following 1948, the year of the Arab-Israeli War.  At that time, the total refugee population in these camps was about 900,000.  After all these years, however, the camps have continued to exist, and their numbers have swelled to more than 4.3 million registered Palestinian refugees. 

If you went home today and Googled “Rafah” you’d discover a tale of desperation.  Extreme poverty and homelessness abound there.  Furthermore, Rafah’s residents are continuously caught in the midst of violent conflict there.  Gunshots and mortar rounds punctuate daily living.  There’s a wall that stretches around Rafah.  Surely there are some who call it a “security” wall, though I doubt the sight of it inspires feelings of safety.  The wall is over twenty feet tall.  Dark and rusted, it’s made out of think sheets of metal that have weathered over the years.

About a year ago now, I guess, a picture from Rafah circulated through various online news services.  The picture is of a boy, maybe six or seven hears old.  He’s facing the wall that surrounds Rafah.  About six feet up from the ground, there’s a hole in the wall – a square-shaped window of sorts – and this boy has managed to climb and pull himself up so that he can just barely peek through to the others side.  There’s something hopeful about that image – about a boy struggling to see something beyond the pain and destruction. 

And I guess I read something similar into our passage from Revelation this morning.  It’s a beautiful text, really – John’s window into the next life – a life where tears and suffering and death will be no more, a life where God will make all things new. 

In the book of Revelation John’s writing to the seven churches of Asia Minor, to sisters and brothers caught in the midst of their own violent conflicts.  These early Christian communities, struggling to survive, are experiencing persecutions and severe infighting with other local religious groups.  In the midst of it all – this giant wall of violence and chaos and fear – John finds a window and he reaches and stretches and struggles to peek through it, and when he does, he declares, “I see a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth have passed away.”

There’s something hopeful about that image – about a man struggling to see something beyond the pain and destruction.  John has a vision of all things made new.  God coming to dwell among mortals!  God so with us that God can even wipe our tears away!

It’s interesting to note that in John’s vision, the ultimate picture of humanity’s union with God is not in some far-off heavenly realm.  It’s here.  God doesn’t come down from heaven and say, “Come on, kids, get in the car – let’s get you out of here!”  There is no whisking away to a far-distant paradise.  God does not retreat from the Creation; rather, God redeems it.  

And this is nothing altogether new – John’s verse is maybe the last in a long scriptural song about God’s redemptive character.  There have been other verses, too – verses about turning swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, verses about the kingdom of God being at hand – here, even!  Verses about a cross where God says to humanity, ultimately, “This is how I am with you!  In the midst of brokenness and suffering, even to the point of death, I will be with you!”  The chorus of this song is always the same:  Our Redeeming God makes all things new. 

I wonder if we’ve been hearing that song lately.  You have to listen for it sometimes, especially since the soundtrack to our culture seems to have something to do with buying all things new.  The refrain of redemption isn’t one we’re often in tune with.  But it’s everywhere!  It finds its way through the walls of fear and isolation that we build and rebuild around us and around them.  Its music invites us to stretch and peek through new windows of possibility, and to sing along with everything we’ve got.

I think that, in the book of Revelation, we hear John struggling to sing along with the music of redemption.  And granted, some of his verses stretch the limits of human imagination and have led some to startling and terrible conclusions about our final end times.  John’s chorus is simple, though:  God is with us and God will be with us.  Wherever and however we end up, God will not forsake us.  And furthermore, we are worth redeeming!  The whole creation – worth redeeming!  John sings in terms of a “New Jerusalem” – the city of God’s very presence shining in the midst of human life.  The “Master Plan” here is not a “tear-down/rebuild in the safe suburbs.”  No – it’s redemption itself – a renovation of that old city that will be so transformed “death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more.” 

You knew that something about a “Master Plan” would work itself into this sermon, didn’t you?  Something about, oh, I don’t know – a renovation project?  Sorry to be so predictable.  Now I won’t be bold or crazy enough to suggest that John’s vision of a new heaven and new earth presents a need for some sort of “divine capital campaign.”  (There is such a thing as kicking a metaphor once it’s down.)  On the other hand, we could ask ourselves, “What’s the music of redemption today?”  What Godly song is drifting over and under and around and through the windows of our walls?  What’s the music like here at UPC?

Please let me take a moment and describe it to you.

On Monday afternoon it’s a quartet led by Jennie Elliot.  They’re down by the Fellowship Hall stacking boxes, sorting bags and bags of donations, getting ready to feed people. 

On Tuesday morning, it grows to an improvisational choir when sometimes close to 70 clients arrive to receive groceries and financial assistance.  David Wofford is one of the many directors of that choir, and you can usually hear him from down the hall giving instructions in English and Spanish.

On Wednesday, the song often sounds like committee meetings, which I guess if you’re a Presbyterian, is sweet music.  The deacons, the session, the committee on worship, building and grounds, agenda items.  To the outsider, it’s elevator music, I suppose.  But to us, it’s a bass-line.

On Thursday the music is everywhere.  It’s in hospitals where people are healing and grieving and dying and being born.  On Thursday it sounds like a group of women who gather here at the church to knit.

On Friday and Saturday you never know what kind of music is coming from this place.  Youth lock-ins, retreats, confirmation classes, welcome weekends for new members, workshops, seminars, and concerts – this is the music of a church committed to its youth and to its neighborhood.

On Sunday our music is a radical symphony of sound.  It’s worship: the music of question and mystery, of awe and wonder.   Morning worship, evening worship, choirs, youth groups, a dinner for college students… all these melodies and counter-melodies… 

Some might observe and say that UPC is a pretty busy place!  But I’d say that UPC is a family of faith, struggling to sing along with the music of redemption. 

We muster up a good hallelujah chorus on occasion, say when our students graduate.  But day in and day out, our music is a persistent refrain.  And it inspires us to keep singing.  It’s no secret that UPC is entering a time of vision and transition.  For over three years now, so many of you have been straining to discern God’s sense of direction for our community and our building.  Friends, the master plan we’ve developed and the capital campaign we’ve begun are simply hopeful handholds that help us to reach out, to stretch and hang onto windows of hope and promise in our world. 

With that in mind, I’d like to invite Craig Deats to come forward and say a few more words about our capital campaign.