Everything is Different Now

“Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

-Ananias of Damascas, Acts 9:17

Everything is different now.

At least, that’s what I hear Paul saying. Within every argument and every chapter, he meets each circumstance with the whispered implication or shouted declaration that everything is different because of the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Used to do what you wanted without considering others, particularly the less fortunate? Everything is different now.

Used to be lazy? Did a lot of taking, but not a lot of giving? Everything is different now.

You used to resent your work and your bosses, and cut corners wherever you could?  You used to milk your slaves for everything you could get out of them, without regard for their well-being?  Everything is different now.

Your life is endlessly filled with the search for a man or woman?  Everything is different now.

You find yourself wrangling for power and control, following the normal way of the world?  Don’t you see how foolish that is, because everything is different now?

You feel powerless over evil, helpless against temptation?  Everything is different now.

Scared about the people you’ve loved and lost? We no longer mourn like those who have no hope, because everything is different now.

Paul had what we call an apocalyptic worldview.  It’s an odd, dramatic expression. It means that for him, all of reality had fundamentally changed, the turning point between the eras being in the cross and resurrection of Jesus. That change still remained hidden from most of the people in the world, who moved through life as if with veiled eyes. Paul himself used to live like that, continuing in his old way of understanding the world, and living as though nothing had changed. The values, identities, and rules of the old world were fixed, in continuity with the way things had always been.

But then, he experienced an apocalypse, or revelation. God revealed to him, directly, the reality of the resurrected Christ. On the road to Damascus, he was confronted by Jesus, and the possibility of continuity with the old world was demolished.  Paul understood for the first time that everything is different now.

It was a revelation that happened in an instant, a single moment where his own personal world fundamentally changed because he realized that the reality of the whole world had become different in Jesus. But, it was also a realization that was confirmed and developed over time, as he learned to follow and listen to the holy spirit, and as his experience in the church gave him the opportunity to think about about how truly everything had changed. Struggling with the church in her divisions, ethical and moral problems, confronting her fear, despair, and selfishness, Paul could not help but understand ever more clearly that central fact, that everything had changed.

Everything is different in the world whether we like it or not, or even whether we know it or not. But once we step into that realization and allow the blindfold to be taken off of our eyes, we step out of the illusion of the world as it used to be, and the new reality becomes our reality. We see everything around us differently, and the more carefully we look, we see with increasing clarity the difference that the gospel makes to the world.  Our lives can begin to change, to be shaped by the gospel of Jesus, which is profoundly important, because the day is coming when all the veils will be torn away, and the primacy and power of that gospel will be inescapable.

This may strike you as an odd subject for a final sermon, for a last word. “Apocalyptic Theology” is not exactly conventional goodbye sermon material. But that’s a little bit of the point. I want to plead with you to be less concerned with what it means to live by the conventions of the old world. Rather, ask what it means to live by the truth of Jesus. What does it mean to model your life by the one who willingly accepted the cross, and who was raised in power?  What difference does this revelation mean to you?  What difference does the gospel make?

I think this is very close to the meaning and identity of the church.  We are bound together by this revelation, we have had the blindfold lifted and who pursue a clearer vision of this reality.  We proclaim the new reality to the world around us. Just as boldly, we proclaim it always to each other, taking each other deeper into the revealed gospel as we live in community with each other.

Tonight, I want to give you this testimony:  Here I have encountered the resurrected Jesus. I’ve met him over a thousand cups of coffee, been in his home for dinner and games. I’ve seen the crucified one in the dedication of teachers, accountants, contractors, students, and coaches —in the service of people who make sacrifice a habit. I’ve had the veil lifted from my eyes, and seen the world made new at weddings, funerals, baptisms, and baby blessings. The resurrected Lord has been revealed to me here in holy friendships, and in our partnership in God’s kingdom.  In energetic and passionate work, in tired eyes and choked-up voices, in laughter and joy, here I have encountered the resurrected Jesus.

You have indeed been my apocalypse.  What I mean is that here, my blindfold has been repeatedly torn away by God’s voice in the scriptures, but also in the way those scriptures are enfleshed by this community of faith.  God has used you to powerfully reveal to me that, indeed, everything is different now.

May it ever be so.  May the Spirit of God be at work in you, so that you consistently and boldly proclaim the kingdom of God to the world around you, to the stranger in your midst, and to each other, so that you and they may know the truth of the gospel, that everything is different now. Amen.