“Do Not Follow Them!” by Melanie Rigney (@melanierigney)
Another angel came out of the temple, crying out in a loud voice to the one sitting on the cloud, "Use your sickle and reap the harvest, for the time to reap has come, because the earth's harvest is fully ripe." So the one who was sitting on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested. (Rev. 14:15-16)
The Lord comes to judge the earth. (Psalm 96:13b)
“… (F)or many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he,’ and ‘The time has come.’ Do not follow them!” (Luke 21:8)
Piety
Jesus, I trust in you. (St. Faustina)
Study
There is a little asterisk in the New American Bible edition of Luke 21:8 right after the word “come.” It reads: In Luke, the proclamation of the imminent end of the age has itself become a false teaching.”
It may seem a bit contradictory since the first readings as we end the liturgical year are from the Book of Revelation, full of vivid images and symbols and language about the coming apocalypse, an apocalypse some at the time believed must be imminent, given that Jesus had promised to come back.
But the way we define imminent is obviously different from the way the Lord does. For us, Advent is imminent. Christmas shopping and travel is imminent. Maybe retirement or the birth of a child or grandchild or surgery is imminent. These are all things for which we can point to something tangible, whether it’s a date on the calendar or something we can physically touch. These are all things we’ve been through in the past or have a pretty good reference point for how it’s going to look.
The end of the age is something else again. As Christians, we believe it will come. What will it look like? What will happen? While we may think we know or at least have some clues, we don’t know much at all.
And so, perhaps this is a good opportunity to stop worrying about the apocalypse, Armageddon, or however we choose to frame it. How the end will begin is something we have little control over. We do, however, have a lot of control over how our life story will be viewed by the Lord: Did we love Him with all our mind, heart, and soul? Did we care for His people, including ourselves, as He does? If the answer to those questions is yes, we have much hope for salvation. If not… start moving toward yes right now, not late today, not tomorrow, not in 2019. Don’t wring your hands about the world coming to an end. Conduct yourself as if it is.
Action
Stop putting it off—whether “it” is going to confession, upping your parish monetary commitment, or becoming active in a service ministry. Move forward today.
The image is from mysticartsdesign, https://pixabay.com/en/road-wall-end-of-the-world-flake-470798/
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