Last week when I preached over Resurrection Hope I did not mean to come back this week and preach over that topic again.  In fact, while I knew I had not said everything I could on the subject, I had said enough, for now, at least that is what I thought.  I’m not really a fan of sermon series.  I think they get overused.  I think they try to boil the gospel to too few themes.  You hear the same message week after week just in slightly different ways.  I know a lot of people like Joel Osteen, but he does this.  One of my seminary friends had a great Joel Osteen impression.  He could say, “God wants to bless you” and you would think Joel was right here with you.  Now I think Joel is right, God does want to bless you.  God also wants to do a whole host of other things too which are equally important and if preachers did not preach about those things you be less likely to know about.  I’m not really ranting here.  I’m striving to tell you how extraordinary of an occurrence this is that I am preaching about the same theme two weeks in a role.  If for no other reason all this highlights how vital I think this is. 

          Your reaction after last weeks sermon shows how vital many of you think all of this is as well.  I get a lot of “good sermon pastor” or “another good one” from people as I am shaking hands.  I appreciate that, it at least shows that you were awake.  After last weeks service, I got those comments and much more.  I firmly believe it is the power of the Holy Spirit working here.  It is not just me up here talking, but it is God working in you.  The seeds are being planted and the first sprouts of new life for our church are beginning to punch through. I see a new energy in this church from the first days I was here.  You are starting to believe a little more every week that things really will change.  People who were on the edges of our church have started to come back.  We have a huge amount of people signed up for the Thanksgiving meal.  I’m glad to see so many faces. So it is no wonder that we latched on to this resurrection hope idea.  We are living it.

          The passage that Dick just read at first glance does not noticeably carry on this resurrection hope idea. In fact, it sounds done right depressing.  The Temple is going to be destroyed.  Wars and rumors of war. Arrests and persecution.  In fact, you might think that I have lost my mind. Did you know that in some African-American churches the opposite of “Amen” or “preach it” is “mind yourself”.  Meaning “mind yourself” before you lose your mind.  Well I have not lost my mind.  This passage is hopeful.

          Last week we looked forward to the resurrection. To the resurrected bodies.  To the closeness to God.  We even backtracked a little said that God was lifting us up now.  I painted a very positive picture.  And it is indeed positive, but there will be bad days too and that is where this passage comes in.  The true test of faith, the truth test of hope, resurrection hope like we all wanted to believe in so much last Sunday, is not when things are going well, but the true test is when they are going poorly.  Our passage tells about the poorly time.

          At the time Luke was writing his gospel, the Temple had just finished or was nearing completion of a complete remodel.  I talked about Herod a few weeks ago building new palaces and buildings in Jericho.  Well he was doing major building projects in Jerusalem too.  The biggest was the remodel of the Temple. Now the temple had been reconstructed following the Babylonian exile, but the reconstructed temple was not as grand as it had been before the exile or as Herod thought it could be for twenty BC.  So he set out to improve it.  The most noticeable change would have been what Jesus noted in verse 5, that it had been “adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God”.  Herod had literally covered the inside and outside of the walls and every pillar of the temple, everything with gold.  So that it shone in the sun. The second most noticeable change, and this was a close second, was the total disassembly and rebuilding of the temple on top of a huge platform prior to all the gold being put on the temple.  The bible gives the dimensions for the Temple.  Those dimensions could not be changed, but Herod realized that if want to make a truly grand and spectacular Temple to Israel’s God, he could tear the Temple, maintaining all of the sacrifices, and reconstruct the temple on top of a massive stone and earth platform.  And that is what he did.  If it had survived, the Temple in Jerusalem would have been the greatest wonders of the ancient world. With massive walls constructed of bricks weighing up 628 tons. It was an outstanding sight.  And as Jesus tells us, it will be destroyed.

          The destruction of the Temple, the wars, earthquakes, famines, plagues, and betrayals are all signs of this coming day.  In last weeks passage, Jesus contrasted this age with the age to come.  All of this destruction and just simply badness is a part of that day too.  What we lifted up as so cheerful and rosy last week is little less happy and fun that we might have realized.  But it was important to talk about resurrection hope the way we did last week first.  Because that is the truth.  That is true life.  And yet, in spite of that hope there will be difficulty.  Persecutions, death, destruction all the things this passage points to.  They will happen, but we can have hope in the middle of all of that.  We have the opportunity to testify knowing that God will give us the words and knowing that in spite of the threats against our lives not a hair of your head will perish.  Now why is this true, because of what we heard last week: “Indeed they cannot die anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection.”  You are children of the resurrection.

          Jesus’ context was different.  Because of the time of his life and the place, things like earthquakes, plagues, famines, and wars were common.  Three tectonic plates meet and create earthquakes just north of Israel.  Famines were common. As a crossroads of the Mideast, Israel was the battle ground for the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Greeks, and now the Romans.  Jesus’ context, the context of the disciples, and of the first readers of the gospel was familiar with what Jesus was saying.  These were less extraordinary than they are for us.  In many ways, Jesus could say what he said confidently, knowing that because all these things had happened in the past and would inevitably happen in the future and Israel had gotten through because God was with them, they would get through it again.  They would get through it if they lived by faith and if they lived with this sense of resurrection hope.

          Jesus becomes the ultimate example of this resurrection hope.  Think about Easter and Jesus’ death, his persecution and punishment.  The history that he is foretelling for Israel and for his disciples, he lives, but he also overcomes because of his resurrection.  These things had to happen, but because of God he and all of us can have hope.

          Our church is there too.  Rapped up in the midst of this struggle and search for hope.  Too many years, we lived through destruction.  Saw our friends die or move as the pews got emptier and as the life drained away from here.  We endured the earthquakes of church splits.   The plagues of silence and suspicion.  The famine of decreased spiritual health.  We lived through those times.  And we did not perish. “And our endurance will gain our souls” as Jesus says in verse 19.

          As we celebrate this thanksgiving meal today, I give thanks to you for your faith and for your hope.  That hope has brought us here to the threshold of new era in the life Greystone Presbyterian Church.  A time of growth and fellowship and joy.  Part of that new era begins today as the pledges for next year’s budget come in.  I give you thanks for you commitment.  I look forward to next year.  I look forward to the new opportunities that God will give us to testify to our faith by our worship, by mission and evangelism. Live into this resurrection hope.  Believe in this church, but most importantly believe in God.