1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
“Hope for the End(Game)”
Preached Thursday, February 13, 2020 at ONU Chapel
I can’t believe I feel the need to say this: but this sermon has spoilers for Avenger’s Endgame. I’m pretty sure you’ve either seen the movie by now or don’t care but I wanted to give a fair warning! Also, this is so corny to say but: This sermon also has spoilers for the end -- not the end of the movie, but the end of our world as we know it.
Now, I’m not talking about the apocalypse as Hollywood generally paints it - all pain and violence, fire and brimstone - I’m talking about a more theological topic: I’m talking about what we in the church call eschatology: that is, our beliefs about the last things. About death, judgement, redemption, and resurrection.
Popular Christianity has spent too much time focusing on the apocalypse, upon God’s judgement and wrath, upon rewards in Heaven or eternal punishment in Hell. And this is often at the neglect of the needs of the least of these, the outcasts and marginalized in the here and now. And for many Christians who take seriously God’s commands to love our neighbor as ourselves and who are honestly offended at the hateful rhetoric and fear of death and judgement that often accompanies so-called Christian teachings, well, we’ve chosen to abandon beliefs about the afterlife and about the end all together - saying, “you know - it’s nice if there’s a heaven and all that. But that’s not why I do what I do. It’s not why I love God or love my neighbors. So we put those beliefs about the end to the side -- and we get on fine for a bit. I myself put these beliefs to the side, decided whatever the afterlife or the end held, it didn’t matter - I did this for a couple of years. The problem is, what happens when we don’t believe anything about the end is that we begin to lose hope. We can begin to believe that there is nothing worth fighting for. We can begin to believe that there is no point to any of this and that the world, each other, humanity, all our brokenness - is beyond redemption. We begin to mourn, as Paul says, like those without hope.
This is where the remaining Avengers find themselves at the beginning of Endgame. At the end of Infinity War, Thanos snapped his fingers and erased half of humanity -- and not just humans on earth, but half of creation throughout the universe. 23 days after Thanos snaps his fingers, the Avengers find Thanos and realize he destroyed the stones. They can’t undo what he’s done. They can’t just fix it. This is the way things are now. In a fit of rage and grief, Thor cuts the head of Thanos, killing him - but not changing anything.
The movie then skips forward 5 years. 5 year of loss. 5 years of pain and grief. 5 years of helplessness and having no hope of those lost ever being restored. The world that Endgame takes place in is a world that is broken. In a world that is overwhelmed with grief and pain. In a world that the Avengers and all humanity have accepted that they just can’t fix - the problems are bigger than them and there’s not much we can do.
Sound familiar? Our world is kind of like this. We have disease and pain. Climate change and tyranny. Hate and violence. And the problems are just...so big. And often, it feels like there’s not much we can do to change it or to fix anything.
We can begin living like we have no hope -- just like most of the Avengers did.
Captain America.
When they are on their way to find Thanos, before discovering that the Stone are destroyed, Natasha says to Steve:
“This is going to work.”
"I know it will, because I don't know what I'm going to do if it doesn't."
What he ends up doing is...well, he tells others that they can move on, that they can be better again. In a self-help group, he says: "Brave baby steps we gotta take to try and become whole again, try and find purpose." The only thing is, he doesn’t believe it for himself. He has no hope for his own life. No hope that he will be made whole again - he confesses as much to Natasha back at the Avengers compound saying: "I keep telling everyone to move on and grow. Some do. But not us."
So, Black Widow.
She gets...stuck. With no hope for the future, with no hope that the only family she knew, that made her life better, she just keeps trying to do what she did before. Even when that makes no sense. Trying to coordinate the remaining Avengers, trying to investigate earthquake tremors, and trying to hold on to a sense of normalcy when there is no normal to be had.
Thor.
Thor reacts in anger and grief, killing Thanos. But those powerful emotions with no hope, end up hurting him even more. He gives way into idle pleasures, hopelessness, listlessness, shirking all responsibility - being less than he was called to be. He can’t even picture a bigger hope because he can’t see the hope for himself, either.
Banner says to Thor: "There might be a chance we can fix everything."
Thor says: "Like the cable, that's been bothering me for a week."
"Like Thanos."
Banner says to Thor: "There might be a chance we can fix everything."
Thor says: "Like the cable, that's been bothering me for a week."
"Like Thanos."
And Thor doesn't want to hear hope. He’s not ready to accept it: "Whatever it is your offering. Not buying. Don't care. Couldn't care less." Thor is afraid to admit hope to himself in case he fails again, in case he's hurt again. Eventually, it takes Thor not only having hope in the end, in redemption of all creation, but in himself, too, for him to begin to move toward wholeness again.
And, of course, Hawkeye.
His loss overwhelms him.
He doesn't believe in a future of hope. All he has is loss. All he has is pain. And thus, he turns into someone who acts only out of violence, hate, and revenge. He is turned into someone he is not.
And then, Natasha hunts him down, and gives me some hope and it breaks him, changes him, opens him back up, redeems him:
"We found something. A chance, maybe."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't give me hope."
"I'm sorry I couldn't give it to you sooner."
I think you’re starting to get the picture of what the lack of hope does to the Avengers. It changes them. It causes them to live as less than who they are and less than they are called to be. Living with no hope makes them resentful, listless, and even hateful. And when we live without hope, the same things can happen to us. It’s hard to have hope in our world - it is. I’ve heard many things about the cynical-ness or pragmatic-ness of Gen Z and Millennials. We know the earth is dying. We know our job prospects are somewhere between bad and worse. We’re worried about World War 3 and ever having a mortgage is almost laughable. But what does this do to us? What does this do to our souls, our relationships, our outlook and actions? We need hope.
Hope changes everything.
So let’s talk a minute about hope.
In Endgame, the Avengers find their hope in the Quantum Realm - in a crazy idea from Ant-Man and in the ingenuity of Tony Stark. They have hope to restore what they lost and protect what they have. This hope changes them. This hope gives them purpose again. Gives them energy to continue fighting the good fight. Gives them a path. This path brings wholeness and restoration to their relationships. With the addition of hope, Tony and Steve mend their fractured relationship saying: "I just want peace. Turns out resentment is corrosive and I hate it...we got a shot at getting these stones..." Turns out, hope for a better tomorrow, creates a better today in our relationships and our willingness to work towards wholeness and redemption.
So where does our hope come from as Christians? Our hope comes from Christ and from the promise of the resurrection and the restoration of all creation. We do not mourn and we do not live as those without hope when we hold fast to a sound eschatology, to a vision of the end that includes the creation of a New Heaven and a New Earth.
That is: when Christ comes again in final victory. Christ will do for all of creation what he did as a first fruit when he was resurrected from the dead. He will defeat all death. All powers of evil. All forces of violence. He will also restore all that God has created. From the planet, to the birds of the air and the animals of the ground, all humanity, the heavens -- all will be redeemed, recreated: restored to that before sin and evil entered this world. Including relationships that have been broken by misunderstanding, by pain, by violence, by death - ALL will be restored.
We hear about the New Creation many times in Scripture. One of the most famous passages comes from the 21st Chapter of Revelation:
"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.'"
We also hear of the new creation in the Book of Isaiah, a vision of the wolf and the lamb feeding together, the lion eating straw, swords being beaten into plowshares, all nations being gathered together on one mountain, and there being no violence or destruction.
Our hope is found in the promise of the End, the promise of resurrection, and the promise of a New Creation.
We catch a faint glimmer of this new creation in Avenger’s Endgame. Yes, in the fight, people were lost. But the movie ends with people coming back - people being restored: Resurrection
Tell me you don't get goose bumps in that scene when all the Avengers and the armies of the Wakandans, and the Asgardians, and all the sorcerers - when they rejoin the fight! It reminds me of the great cloud of witnesses in heaven. People from all tribes and nations, together as one in the new Creation
In Endgame there are Characters. Relationships. Lives. Redeemed. Made better. Come fully into who they were created, who they were called to be. Like Thor and Nebula and the relationship between Steve and Tony. Now, The Resurrection and restoration, the reversing of the Snapture in Endgame is not perfect. Natasha is gone. Tony is gone. Vision is still gone. Lots of people are still gone and there is still a broken world. But it's a better world because of hope and the world we hope for, the New Creation, will be perfect. Perfected in love.
In the New Creation there will be no evil - Thanos and his troops are destroyed.
Now...it’s 2020. And most people don’t go around talking about the hope of the New Creation of redemption and resurrection. Most people don’t really believe that they can be made whole. Their relationships can be made whole. Our world can be made whole. Is it crazy?
Well, in the words of Natasha: "I get emails from a raccoon, so nothing's crazy any more." As Christians we might say, Jesus really was resurrected from the dead. Death does not have the final say. So nothing’s crazy anymore.
Living with hope is a million times better than the alternative. Living with hope for the future, gives us strength and courage now.
Hope helps us carry on.
Hope helps us to live into the vision of the future - of restored creation. Restored relationships. Wholeness. In the here and now.
In the wise words of the departed Tony Stark, Iron Man:
"Part of the journey is the end...everything's going to work out exactly the way it's supposed to."
Have hope.
Amen.
And, of course, Hawkeye.
His loss overwhelms him.
He doesn't believe in a future of hope. All he has is loss. All he has is pain. And thus, he turns into someone who acts only out of violence, hate, and revenge. He is turned into someone he is not.
And then, Natasha hunts him down, and gives me some hope and it breaks him, changes him, opens him back up, redeems him:
"We found something. A chance, maybe."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Don't give me hope."
"I'm sorry I couldn't give it to you sooner."
I think you’re starting to get the picture of what the lack of hope does to the Avengers. It changes them. It causes them to live as less than who they are and less than they are called to be. Living with no hope makes them resentful, listless, and even hateful. And when we live without hope, the same things can happen to us. It’s hard to have hope in our world - it is. I’ve heard many things about the cynical-ness or pragmatic-ness of Gen Z and Millennials. We know the earth is dying. We know our job prospects are somewhere between bad and worse. We’re worried about World War 3 and ever having a mortgage is almost laughable. But what does this do to us? What does this do to our souls, our relationships, our outlook and actions? We need hope.
Hope changes everything.
So let’s talk a minute about hope.
In Endgame, the Avengers find their hope in the Quantum Realm - in a crazy idea from Ant-Man and in the ingenuity of Tony Stark. They have hope to restore what they lost and protect what they have. This hope changes them. This hope gives them purpose again. Gives them energy to continue fighting the good fight. Gives them a path. This path brings wholeness and restoration to their relationships. With the addition of hope, Tony and Steve mend their fractured relationship saying: "I just want peace. Turns out resentment is corrosive and I hate it...we got a shot at getting these stones..." Turns out, hope for a better tomorrow, creates a better today in our relationships and our willingness to work towards wholeness and redemption.
So where does our hope come from as Christians? Our hope comes from Christ and from the promise of the resurrection and the restoration of all creation. We do not mourn and we do not live as those without hope when we hold fast to a sound eschatology, to a vision of the end that includes the creation of a New Heaven and a New Earth.
That is: when Christ comes again in final victory. Christ will do for all of creation what he did as a first fruit when he was resurrected from the dead. He will defeat all death. All powers of evil. All forces of violence. He will also restore all that God has created. From the planet, to the birds of the air and the animals of the ground, all humanity, the heavens -- all will be redeemed, recreated: restored to that before sin and evil entered this world. Including relationships that have been broken by misunderstanding, by pain, by violence, by death - ALL will be restored.
We hear about the New Creation many times in Scripture. One of the most famous passages comes from the 21st Chapter of Revelation:
"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.'"
We also hear of the new creation in the Book of Isaiah, a vision of the wolf and the lamb feeding together, the lion eating straw, swords being beaten into plowshares, all nations being gathered together on one mountain, and there being no violence or destruction.
Our hope is found in the promise of the End, the promise of resurrection, and the promise of a New Creation.
We catch a faint glimmer of this new creation in Avenger’s Endgame. Yes, in the fight, people were lost. But the movie ends with people coming back - people being restored: Resurrection
Tell me you don't get goose bumps in that scene when all the Avengers and the armies of the Wakandans, and the Asgardians, and all the sorcerers - when they rejoin the fight! It reminds me of the great cloud of witnesses in heaven. People from all tribes and nations, together as one in the new Creation
In Endgame there are Characters. Relationships. Lives. Redeemed. Made better. Come fully into who they were created, who they were called to be. Like Thor and Nebula and the relationship between Steve and Tony. Now, The Resurrection and restoration, the reversing of the Snapture in Endgame is not perfect. Natasha is gone. Tony is gone. Vision is still gone. Lots of people are still gone and there is still a broken world. But it's a better world because of hope and the world we hope for, the New Creation, will be perfect. Perfected in love.
In the New Creation there will be no evil - Thanos and his troops are destroyed.
Now...it’s 2020. And most people don’t go around talking about the hope of the New Creation of redemption and resurrection. Most people don’t really believe that they can be made whole. Their relationships can be made whole. Our world can be made whole. Is it crazy?
Well, in the words of Natasha: "I get emails from a raccoon, so nothing's crazy any more." As Christians we might say, Jesus really was resurrected from the dead. Death does not have the final say. So nothing’s crazy anymore.
Living with hope is a million times better than the alternative. Living with hope for the future, gives us strength and courage now.
Hope helps us carry on.
Hope helps us to live into the vision of the future - of restored creation. Restored relationships. Wholeness. In the here and now.
In the wise words of the departed Tony Stark, Iron Man:
"Part of the journey is the end...everything's going to work out exactly the way it's supposed to."
Have hope.
Amen.
