Luke 21:5-19 NRSVue
5 When some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God, [Jesus] said, 6 “As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”
7 They asked him, “Teacher, when will this be, and what will be the sign that this is about to take place?” 8 And he said, “Beware that you are not led astray, for many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and, ‘The time is near!’ Do not go after them.
9 “When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified, for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately.” 10 Then he said to them, “Nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom; 11 there will be great earthquakes and in various places famines and plagues, and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.
12 “But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name. 13 This will give you an opportunity to testify. 14 So make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance, 15 for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. 16 You will be betrayed even by parents and siblings, by relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. 17 You will be hated by all because of my name. 18 But not a hair of your head will perish. 19 By your endurance you will gain your souls.”
Reflection
“Trust in me,”
Jesus teaches. “Not a hair of your
head will be destroyed forever. By your steadfastness
you will gain the breath of life” (Luke 21:14, 18-19).
That is the promise that Jesus gives his followers when the world as they know it begins to crumble. When the institutions start to shake, when the people start to riot, when the natural forces take lives, and when hatred is turned even toward you, one of Christ’s loving people, Jesus begs us to listen close.
“Trust in me.”
“You cannot
be destroyed forever.”
“Hold tight
and find life.”
These words of Jesus were remembered just years later as those first Christians found themselves in a world where the curtain of the temple was not only torn in two; the curtain was gone. So was the temple that housed the curtain. God’s house was mere rubble. “The days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down,” Jesus said (Luke 21:6).
The dust of the temple’s destruction settled onto the shoulders of those early Christians who were viewed by the Roman Empire as secretive and rebellious. The empire used those early Christians as a scapegoat to cover the ills of the empire. Empires always find a scapegoat to arrest, persecute, imprison, and even kill so that they do not need to look too closely at themselves.
“They will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name,” Jesus clearly warns (Luke 21:12).
But Jesus also bears a promise.
“Trust in me.”
“You cannot
be destroyed forever.”
“Hold tight
and find life.”
We cannot repeat that promise too much because the reality that we face is that everything falls apart, everything comes to an end, and nothing lasts forever.
The peace and prosperity of the 1950s fell to the riots and wars of the 1960s. The international harmony and economic prosperity of the late 1990s fell when the twin towers fell in 2001. Nothing lasts forever. Everything falls apart.
Just the other day I overheard someone mentioning that “Ten years ago I was running miles. Can you believe it? Now my knees won’t even let me walk across the room.” Nothing lasts forever. Everything falls apart.
One time while staying at my in-laws’ home I was working on some kind of project, and I needed scissors to cut some plastic. I went downstairs and found some nice, sharp scissors in a drawer just below my mother-in-law’s sewing machine. As I cut away, my mother-in-law walked in and saw the horror that was taking place right there in the sanctity of her own home! In my whole life I had never before heard the term “sewing scissors.” But I learned about them that day. I wanted to say, “Nothing lasts forever. Everything falls apart.” But I also wanted to live.
Jesus says:
“Trust in me.”
“You cannot
be destroyed forever.”
“Hold tight
and find life.”
When everything is going wrong and everything seems to be falling apart in our lives, the fundamental problem that we face each and every time is that we try to stack all the falling pieces back up and we try hold it all together someway and somehow. We try to fix it all, and when our fix does not work, we are left with nothing but rubble around our own feet.
Adam and Eve did not trust God. Rather, they ate from the tree that would let them decide good and evil for themselves. They trusted in themselves, and they ended up cast out from the life of the garden.
Moses did not trust that God could do anything about the slavery of his people. So, he took matters into his own hands and murdered an Egyptian. He ended up being cast out of Egypt into the wilderness where there is little life.
Jesus says:
“You cannot be destroyed forever.”
“Hold tight and find life.”
When life started falling apart for those early Christians who were arrested and persecuted, and brought before kings and governors because of Jesus’ name, Jesus tells them: “Make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance, for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict” (Luke 21:14-15). “Trust in me” Jesus is saying. “Trust in my wisdom.” We do not know how to pull things from destruction to wholeness, from death to life, but the one who rose from the grave does. “Trust in me,” Jesus says.
“Pastor, now that I trust in Jesus, I thought that life would go so much better. But I have to tell you, it hasn’t gotten any better. What am I doing wrong?” He was a man in his thirties, but he was still a baby Christian. Jesus had found him just a year earlier. But I do not think that his question is any different than some our questions who have been following Jesus since we were able to put on our own shirt. “Why is this happening to me? What did I do wrong?”
Here is the truth. When you are facing hardship, you might have caused it yourself, but much of the time you probably did not do anything wrong. Wars and earthquakes and famines and plagues and every other thing that we struggle with in this universe “must take place first” Jesus teaches (Luke 21:9). We live in a world outside of God’s garden. Bad things happen out in the sticks and thistles outside of the garden. Good people are brought down from well-deserved heights after being “betrayed even by parents and siblings” Jesus says. “They will put some of you to death,” Jesus continues (Luke 21:16). You might not have done anything wrong. You might not have done anything bad to anyone. But your neighbor or family member or leaders or even little viruses might have done something bad to you.
But listen to the promise from your Lord: “Not a hair of your head will perish” (Luke 21:18). Not even a hair of your head will be destroyed forever, says the one who knows how to pull people up from graves into new life.
“You cannot be destroyed forever.”
“By your endurance you will gain your souls” (Luke 21:19). Another way to say that is, “By your steadfastness you will gain your breath of life.” Trusting leads to life.
“Trust in me.”
“You cannot
be destroyed forever.”
“Hold tight
and find life.”
Years after Jesus uttered these words, one of his followers, Stephen was his name, was sentenced to be stoned because he steadfastly followed Christ Jesus. And as the stones fell, crushing Stephen under their weight, he prayed to the Lord for those showing him hate: “Lord, do not hold this sin against them” (Acts 7:60). He loved his neighbor to the end. He trusted the Lord through it all. He held tight and breathed in life eternal with the Lord. And I find it strangely comforting to know that even when I am in the wrong and I am doing something terrible, that someone might be praying for me and hoping for my forgiveness. That is powerful stuff. That is the stuff of trust.
Now, I know that life can become crushing. I know that life can completely fall apart and look completely different from all that you have previously known. But you have a Savior who, though the power of the Holy Spirit, stays with you through it all: Jesus Christ.
And that savior has a promise for you:
“Trust in me.”
“You cannot
be destroyed forever.”
“Hold tight and find life.”
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