Creekside Church Sermon of November 3, 1996 "Ready for Heaven? " Revelation 7:9-17	Rev. David Bibbee
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This week I read the Hoosier United Methodist news. It contained responses of five pastors to the question, "Have you ever felt a personal connection with a loved one who has died?" All answered, "Yes." One said, "On All Saints sunday we read the names of Christian friends who died the previous year. I feel very connected with them who have served Christ faithfully. And at the funeral of a pastor when we pastors gather around the casket to sing Beloved, Beloved, We Are the Sons of God, I have a real sense of connectedness with those who have gone before me, and I am inspired by their faithfulness."

Today thousands will sing, "For All the Saints", and recall the link between the living and departed..."Oh, bless'd communion, fellowship divine! We feebly struggle, they in glory shine, yet all are one in thee, for all are thine." This is the theme from our passage from Revelation as well. The writer of this book, John, was exiled on the island of Patmos during a time of terrible Roman persecution against the church. His complex vision was not only a source of encouragement for Christians of his day, but Christians of every age who find themselves tested and tried by life. Revelation is a book of what is to come, not as a timetable for predicting the end of the world as some use it, but rather as a source of hope which says that at the close of the final curtain, God and the Lamb will reign. It is a passage that gets us thinking about life-not in retrospect, but prospect--not just what has happened in the past but the promise of heaven for those who now struggle with discouragement, defeat, and death.

People have different means of coping with the pain and heartache of life. I ran into a piece which said that life would be much easier if we could live it backwards...start with death and go in reverse to birth. Just listen: "Life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time, all your weekends, and what do you get at the end of it? The life cycle is all backward. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live twenty years in an old age home. You get kicked out when you are too young. You get a gold watch and go to work. You work forty years till you're young enough to enjoy your retirement. You go to college; you party till you're ready for high school; you go to grade school; you become a little kid; you play. You have no responsibilities. You become a little baby; you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating, and you finish up as a gleam in someone's eye."

The good news is that even though life goes forward, you still are a gleam in someone's eye. We are guided by a gleam from yonder heaven whose fair light still beckons on. We are watched over by One who has prepared a place for us from the beginning of time. In my ignorant stage twenty years ago when I was spiritually flat-footed, I thought that hoping for heaven was escapism which kept people from facing their fears and troubles head on. Life has handed me some experience since then. Like you, I've taken my turn walking down that dark tunnel of tribulation. There have been pains with no point in enduring, save for a gleaming, glimmering hope that will give it all meaning and one day make it all right.

I've not seen it, at least not like John did. He saw an incredible multitude of Saints of every station and persuasion, all ages and cultures for all time, who didn't give in or give up but remained faithful. They were robed in white and waving palms as a sign of victory. The thunder of their voices proclaimed, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne!" Among the great throng there is Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. There is Peter and Paul. Luther and Calvin. Look through John's eyes and see your grandparents, or parents, or perhaps a child taken before she had a chance to live. All the people you have long since loved and lost awhile. And the Lamb is there. The Lamb who suffered. The Lamb who was condemned to death, humiliated, and who died a deplorable death; the Lamb to whom the multitudes sing a song of glory, honor, and power forever; this Lamb who was disposed of by those to whom he was sent, is the one who rules forever.

Here is a vision of the wrongs of the world made right. A vision of victory won; of sinners redeemed, of relationships restored, of imperfect lives made whole. No more hunger. No more pain. Nor more tears. This is what heaven will be. This is the destiny toward which we orient ourselves. This is the hope we hold before those whose lot is anything but heavenly. But the end of a marriage, the diagnosis of cancer, and impending death, the grip of cynicism, makes it all difficult to see anything else.

I've seen glimpses of it through the eyes of hope. But I must ask a question. Are we ready for it? Are we ready for heaven? Let me remind you that those to whom Jesus came were not ready. They weren't ready to hear that he was the fulfillment of the scriptures. They weren't ready for God's will on earth as it is in heaven. He told them that the Kingdom of Heaven wasn't in some far distant future. The Kingdom had come. It was in their midst, and the sign that it arrived was in the forgiveness given the sinner, the compassion given to the neglected, the attention given to the rejected. The citizens of the world were clearly not ready when Jesus called his followers to behave as though Heaven had broken into the world.

Jesus was given a choice--keep quiet or die. In his death he revealed the central facet of being ready for heaven. Detriech Bonhoeffer said that. "When Christ calls a person, he bids them come and die." This doesn't mean that Christians have a death wish, but that they live every day with the awareness of their date with death. This is what the world tries to avoid and deny. But the man or woman in Christ isn't overwhelmed by this fact because death isn't an end. The gleam you are in God's eye continues. Jesus suffered and died so we can live. Christians do not fear death because it is a transition to life. "Save your life, and you will lose it." Jesus said. "Lose yourself for my sake, spend yourself for me and others and you will find it."

"Plan for the hereafter as if you expect to die tomorrow," an old Jewish saying goes. We have no illusions about our grand plans for ourselves because only as we give ourselves to God can we hope for anything which lasts. We prepare for Heaven and the company of those who have gone before us as we let go of what we're told will give us life, and instead follow the way of the Lamb.

Another readiness for heaven indicator is closely related to the first. We are called to live now as though heaven has already come. The twelfth century mystic, Catherine of Sienna said, "All the way to heaven is heaven; we arrive as soon as we depart." This means that praises sung to God must be sung now, not just when we join the heavenly chorus. It means that the peace, the unity, and the love which characterize heaven is not put on hold till we die, but is learned and lived now. "What if there is no heaven; no life after death?" Someone once asked me. "Would it change how you lived?" I hope not. If there's nothing after death, I'll never know. But even if not, I would still try to live as a Christian simply because it's the best way to live. It makes life precious and worthwhile and gives something positive to others. But because I do believe life continues beyond death, it makes how I live now important. Listen closely to this piece by Robert Hastings that underscores the urgency of today:

Tucked sway in our subconscious is an idyllic vision. We see ourselves on a long trip, but uppermost in our minds is the final destination. On a certain day at a certain hour we will pull into the station. Once we get there so many wonderful dreams will come true, and the pieces of our lives will fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. How restlessly we pace the aisles, cursing the minutes for loitering, waiting, waiting, waiting for the station.

"When we reach the station, that will be it!" We cry. "When I'm 18!...When I buy a new Mercedes Benz... When I put the last kid through college...When I pay off the mortgage...When I get a promotion...When I reach retirement, I'll live happily ever after." But sooner or later we must realize there is no station. The true joy of life is the trip. The station is only a dream. It always outdistances us.

"Relish the moment," is a good motto, especially when coupled with Psalm 118:24. "This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it." It isn't the burdens of today that drives us mad. It's regret over yesterday and the fear of tomorrow. Regret and fear are twin thieves who rob us of today.

So stop pacing the aisles and counting the miles. Instead climb more mountains. Eat more ice cream. Go barefoot more often. Watch more sunsets. Laugh more, cry less. Life must be lived as we go along. The station will come soon enough.

The promise of what awaits those who live for him, shapes how we face the challenges of today. We show we are ready for heaven by facing life's limit, not taking a detour around death, but giving ourselves away knowing life has a meaning death cannot deny. We show we are ready by not holding out for a better day in the future, but by embracing the reality of heaven Jesus promised now with a promise of much more to come. And another sign of readiness for heaven is trusting the sufficiency of Jesus' life for here and hereafter.

When John beheld the multitudes praising God he was asked, "Who are these clothed in white?" "Only you know," he said. "They have come from the great tribulation. They have washed their robes white in the blood of the Lamb." They were the ones who were persecuted and suffered for Christs' sake; who by his death were redeemed. But what about those who haven't yet made it? What about those who are bloodied by life's tribulations today? What about the beaten down and beaten up? What about the poor, and the losers, and those who buckle under the collective weight of their sins and failures? How will they make it to heaven? Not by sheer sweat and determination. Not by some psychological self-help. Not by the power of positive thinking. Not by either the Clinton or Dole ticket.

They make it by the self emptying love of God on the cross. Left to ourselves we can't fix ourselves, much more give ourselves life. We rely upon the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world. His life ends our hunger. His life wipes the falling tear.

Flannery O'Conner wrote a story inspired by our text. Mrs. Turpin, the main character sits in a doctor's office surrounded by people she despises. She is a good, respectable, Christian woman. She thanks Jesus she wasn't like the others in the room...those who in her words were White Trash, Niggers, Lunatics, or The Ugly. Her attitude was apparent by her conversation. Suddenly a young ugly woman across the room verbally attacked her, calling her a Warthog from Hell. The words cut to the quick. They sank as deep as if the spirit had spoken them. She went home, walked into the back yard, and as she stared at the pig pen she had a vision. Out of the ground came a bright, fiery swinging bridge raised from earth to heaven. On it countless numbers were marching to heaven.

Mrs. Turpin saw whole companies of White Trash, clean for the first time in their lives; battalions of Freaks and Lunatics shouting and clapping and leaping like frogs. And bringing up the end was a tribe of people she recognized as people like herself who had a little of everything and the God- given wit to use it right. She watched them closer. They were marching behind the others with great dignity, accountable as always for good order and common sense and respectable behavior. They alone were on key. Yet she could see by their shocked and altered faces, that even their virtues were being burned away.

It wasn't by themselves that the decent folks made it. Only by the great grace of the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world do they and we go. You who are going through the grinding experiences of life, whose garments are soiled, torn, and a little bloodied--the Lamb has a bright white garment for you, the same one worn by the picked up, cleaned up, forgiven, fed and clothed saints before you.

Go ahead. Put it on. There...now you look ready!

[The inspiration for thie message came from a sermon titles "Washed" by H. Stephen Shoemaker.]

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