A video of this sermon can be found here.

Mal 3:3-5
Psalm 126
1 Cor. 4:4-21
Luke 3:1-6

I will begin my sermon with an outrageous statement. Advent is the season of the church year that focuses on what theologians call the doctrine of eschatology – the last things – but in the last few decades we seem to be moving into an era without eschatology. If that is so, the Christian notion of eschatology seems to be increasingly irrelevant to contemporary culture.

What do I mean when I saw that the contemporary era is one without eschatology? This has not always been the case. In the mid-twentieth century, the philosopher Karl Löwith wrote a book called Meaning in History, in which he claimed that modern philosophies of history were secularized versions of a Christian theology of history.¹ Hegelianism, Marxism, the secular notion of progress – all of these were basically secularized notions of the Christian understanding of divine providence. Modern secularism believed that history was moving in a single direction toward a goal; however, the goal was not a Christian new heavens and a new earth, but some version of a secular paradise. These were eschatologies in which humanity had taken the place of God.

All of this seems to have changed in the last couple of decades. I would suggest that this is because post-modernity is no longer living on borrowed memories. A belief in a secular eschatology was possible only so long as Christian notions of history, providence, and eschatology were still somewhat taken for granted without asking where such notions came from. The philosopher Charles Taylor has claimed that we now live in a Secular Age, an age marked by what Taylor calls the “immanent frame.”² The “immanent frame” is the notion that everything in the world is part of a natural order without any reference to anything outside itself and an “immanent” causal order. The “immanent frame” is what happens when unbelief is the “default option” for how people live in post-modern culture. Within the immanent frame, secular notions of progress or any kind of optimistic vision of the direction in which history might be moving does not make real sense.

The shift from living in a world of secular progress to living exclusively in the immanent frame means that we now seem to be living in a world of “normal nihilism.” What do I mean by “normal nihilism?” (more…)

Job 1
Acts 8: 26-40

There are certain questions that people ask generation in and generation out. They are the “greatest hits” of the generations. Who am I, and what should I do with my life? She (or he) loves me or loves me not? Did I forget to turn off the light or lock the door or did I remember to unplug the iron?

One of the oldest of these questions is “Why do bad things happen to good people?” There’s a guy on Youtube who just put out a video entitled “Why everything stinks” (except that he doesn’t say “stink”), and you would imagine listening to him that he seems to think that he’s the first person to have ever noticed that life just isn’t fair. But of course this is not a new observation. There are religons and philosophies (like Buddhism and Stoicism) whose whole starting point begins with the observation that “Life is hard.”

I am always somewhat amused at people like the guy in the Youtube video who seem to assume that Christians are naïve or polyannish about suffering, that somehow Christians do not recognize that there is any tension between believing in a good God who created a good world, and yet sometimes life stinks. Have these people never heard gospel spirituals like one of my old favorites that has the lines “Talk about suffering here below, and talk about loving Jesus, Talk about suffering here below, and let’s keep following Jesus.”

Have these people never read the Bible? (Well, of course they haven’t.)

This morning’s lectionary readings begin with the story of Job, and we will continue to hear Job’s story for the next several weeks. The whole point of the story about Job is to ask the question “Why do bad things happen to good people?” (more…)

Psalm 138
Hebrews 10: 32-39
Matt. 24:9-14

Today’s lectionary readings are for the feast day of the Martyrs of Uganda. These were a group of Roman Catholic and Anglican men who were killed by King Mwanga on June 3, 1886 for their refusal to renounce their Christian faith. The martyrs went to their deaths singing hymns, and praying for their enemies. The bravery of these young men so impressed the bystanders that many converted to Christianity, and the deaths of the martyrs of Uganda is considered the real beginning of the spread of Christianity in Uganda. There are today around nine million Anglicans in Uganda, and Trinity School for Ministry has close relations with them, especially with Uganda Christian University, and also with their Archbishop, Stanley Ntagali.

Given that today’s lectionary readings are for the feast day of martyrs, it is not surprising that the focus of the readings is on holding on to faith in the midst of doubt. The Matthew and Hebrews passages specifically mention persecution. In Matthew, Jesus says, “Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake.” (Matt. 24:9). Hebrews speaks of “the former days,” when the hearers were “publicly exposed to reproach and affliction.” Some were imprisoned, and some were “plundered” of their property. (Heb. 10:33-34). The Psalmist mentions another kind of threat to faith: “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life.” (Ps. 138:7). Jesus’ Parable of the Sower mentions a third threat to faith: those who are distracted by the “cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and desires for other things.” (Mark 4:18).

These passages might be discouraging. They indicate that it is a normal part of the Christian life to experience doubt, to be tempted to abandon one’s faith, to just give up on being a Christian. I would suggest that these passages are actually cause for encouragement. They give us advance warning that being a disciple of Jesus is not all picnics in May, or singing “I’ve got peace like a river in my soul” when we’re at summer camp, or the first day of June Term at seminary. They tell us that if you are a Christian, and you take the thing seriously, there is going to come a time when you are going to wonder, “What was I thinking?” And, “Is it too late to get out of this?” They also tell us that when it comes to reasons for doubting your faith, there is nothing new under the sun. (more…)