Sept 10, 2023, Pentecost 15A
Theme: Apocalypse
“We are leaving Lotumbe and we will not be coming back.” My dad announced at supper.
I will always remember those words. They are indelibly engraved in my memory. I don’t remember much else.
I do remember giving my dog and parrot to a friend. Where we were going, they couldn’t go. My dog’s name was Tippy. It was 67 years ago. Molly could still be alive. She was only 2 years old then. Parrots live a long time.
About a month later after feverous packing, we left. Our belongings, such as they were, on their way to the US, we, on our way to Egypt. First stop on the flight was Timbuktu – seriously!
As an eight-year-old, my life changed irreversibly.
The Hebrew slaves in Egypt, about 5,000 years ago, faced a time of drastic change. Moses, a strange man called down terrible plagues. It was both a terrible time and one of hope. This powerful man of God said he had come to free them from 400 years of bondage.
Before the last plague, Moses had everybody pack up and be ready to leave the next day. But the evening before they could leave, they were to prepare a special meal. They were to kill a first-born lamb or goat which had no blemishes. Take the blood and paint the door post where they were eating. They were to be completely packed and ready to leave very early before sunrise.
Their lives were never to be the same after that.
About 2,000 years later the Apostle Paul in a letter written to the Roman church said the Christians there should be prepared and ready for the end of time. His advice was to set things right with everyone they knew. He said the end time could be at any moment.
Obviously, no apocalypse occurred in the time the people in Rome read that letter, but they prepared anyway. We followers of Jesus, even today, believe a time is coming when the world will completely change, and God’s Kingdom will appear. Some have doubted, and do even to this day, doubt the apocalypse will ever come.
One thing is true. None of us know the time or place we will most certainly die. We also know we only have this life where we can get ourselves ready for the time God calls us to a new life.
A place where nothing will ever be the same again.
Join us this Sunday in one of our services at First Christian Church in Warrensburg, Missouri, where we will consider the new life God has in store for us.
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