Remembrance for the Future

Scripture: 1 Thessalonians 4: 13-18 and Matthew 25:1-13 (N.B. Joshua 24:1-3a; Psalm 78:1-7; Wisdom of Solomon 6:12-16; Amos 5:18-24; Wisdom of Solomon 6:17-20; and Psalm 70 – also on Year A Ordinary 32/Proper 27)

Scripture

Thessalonians: 

• Probably Paul’s earliest letter, Sent in haste to deal with a specific issue.
• Paul is eager to help and reassure, rather than to teach complex theology.
• Particular issue of the rapture: 
  • Different views on the rapture and the end times; complex and competing theories on where this fits it – probably irrelevant!  
  • Paul was trying to reassure Christians who had lost loved ones, wondering what would happen to them – at the time he expected Jesus to return soon (this view changed later).

Matthew:

• Very probably written after Thessalonians; Matthew had to address the issue of individual Christians, even apostles dying before Jesus return.
• Hence he recalls this parable as part of long treatment (Chap 24-25) of end times.  
• Matthew urges us to use the time while we wait wisely – will we be found wanting when Jesus returns?  

Remembrance

• First Error is don’t Remember: “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it” (George Santayana)
  • Be ungrateful: Atheist “did you sacrifice any goats as well?”
  • Ungrateful Christians? – need to thank our country for our religious freedom.
• Second error is do nothing but Remember – dwell on past times and glory in them:

“Now I think I’m going down to the well tonight

and I’m going to drink till I get my fill

And I hope when I get old I don’t sit around thinking about it

but I probably will

Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture

a little of the glory of, well time slips away

and leaves you with nothing mister but

boring stories of glory days”                                                  (Springsteen)

• I don’t like the phrase ‘our glorious dead’ on the Cenotaph or war memorials:
  • Do we mean: War is glorious? God is on our side? They are in glory with God? We glorify the sacrifice of people? We glorify them for their sacrifice?
  • What about the wounded, especially the very many wo/men who have no visible wounds, living daily with their present and past?  Not so glorious?

For the Future

• We remember to guide our future actions – to have hope, be informed and not ignorant.
• As God’s people, Christians must remember better than others for good reasons:
  • To pass on the truth to future generations, to choose the real God, not false ones.
  • To reinforce our faith – the bedrock of our salvation and post-salvation Christian life.
  • To be thankful to God and sensitive to others – the proper Christian character. 
  • To have the correct perspective on our lives, on history, on why we try to live as we do.