"WE'RE STILL HERE"

On Friday, December 31st, the headline of the Post-Dispatch read, "At the zero hour, the world waits...and wonders...." And now we know. We know that the world did not end at the stroke ofmidnight yesterday. We did not lose power and airplanes did not fall out of the sky and surfers of the web can still log on with ease. It turns out that the whole Y2K scare was a kind of global "Blair Witch Project": big on marketing, low on content.

Perhaps some are feeling a bit disappointed. An essay appeared in the November 29th issue of Time magazine that, with tongue in cheek, warned about a phenomenon to be known as "Post-Millennial Syndrome" - a different kind of P.M.S. This, the writer said, will be a widespread feeling of letdown...an emptiness...that comes from our having, collectively, spent thousands of dollars stockpiling batteries, bottled water and cans of tuna for no reason. This syndrome might also be called "whatnextness." It includes a kind of deflation over not having anything left to look forward to other than the Presidents' Day mattress sale. We only get one year with triple zeroes. What, the essay asked, are we going to do for an encore? Have ourselves cryogenically frozen for the next millennium?

This whole experience of Y2K and a new millennium and turning the page to the year 2000 has been a wonderful object lesson on an important spiritual truth. The truth is, we do not know when the end will come. Not the end of the world nor the end of our own lives in it. What we do know, each and every day that we open our eyes, is that we're still here...and we can choose how we are going to live in this new day.

Did any of you watch ABC's all day coverage of the worldwide new year's celebrations on Friday? I saw almost all of it and, I have to tell you, as I said to Lorraine: I think that was one of the most positive uses of television I have ever experienced. To be, in some way, present with people literally around the globe...to share, in a way, in their celebrations and traditions and experiences was something that I found really moving and very enlightening.

I found tremendous hope in the fact that we, as a planet, were able to celebrate something together.. .peacefully, joyfully, supportively. We were able in some way to forget all our differences and look, together, to something much bigger than ourselves. And as far as I know, there were no reports of terrorism or killing in conjunction with the observance of this event. In fact, there were some incredible moments of forgiveness and redemption: as Nelson Mandela returned to the site of his long imprisonment in South Africa to pass a flame of hope on to the new president of that country. As two choirs.. .Protestants and Catholics...from Dublin and from Derry in the Republic of Ireland sang together. It seems that, as author and educator Stephen Jay Gould said to Peter Jennings, when it comes to solving our collective problems,"we have the ability and the basic goodness...if we will only muster the will."

Mustering the will, it seems, is our greatest challenge. Until the people of the world can give the attention to unity everyday that we gave for the New Year's arrival, the world's problems will go on, unchecked, into this new century just as if nothing had ever happened. I think one of the most profound moments of the broadcast I watched was when, after showing the celebrations and music and fireworks in places like New Zealand, Sydney, Australia, Japan, China...the report then went to sub-Saharan Africa to a camp of Samalian refugees. At midnight there, the reporter held out his microphone to show the silence. In their tents, unable to return to their homes, those people slept or starred sleeplessly into the night, without celebration.. .without hope...without change. And for all our jubilation over the incredible technology that allowed us to view this worldwide spectacle, we were also reminded that one half of the world has never made or received a telephone call. We must have the collective will to create the lasting joy and hope and unity we were able to share for one day.

Mustering the will for anything takes awareness and action. Both are required of us. To change the world...or to change our own lives. What about us individually? What does the year 2000 mean for us?

Well, we're still here. We know that. Now what? We can pack away all the souvenir 2000 do-dads and return to life as usual with its same old worries...same old problems...same old, same old. Or we can seize this amazing opportunity we've been given and muster the will to make some changes. Believe me...we will not live to see a greater turn of the calendar page than this one. In a sense, it's now or never. But, as the title of a book I purchased recently says, It's Only Too Late If You Don't Start Now.

The question for each of us may be, start what? Where do we turn...what do we change...how do we know what we should be doing for the rest of our lives? As always, the best answer comes to us from Jesus.

In the Gospel reading we heard this morning, Jesus tells a story to illustrate an important spiritual truth. We do not know when the end is going to come. Not the end of the world nor the end of our lives in it. What we do know, each day that we open our eyes, is that we're still here. And we can choose how we are going to live in each new day. Jesus calls us to live faithfully each day. He says, "Be dressed and ready for service and keep your lamps burning..." like a servant who's waiting for the master to arrive.

Now passages like this have been misused through the years to create anxiety about the return of Christ. It's been insinuated that we'd better stop our participation in the world...stop having ordinary lives...and somehow stand pious and frozen, wide-eyed and ready for the apocalypse.

That's not what Jesus is saying. What's he's saying is that, yes, sometime the end will come. And whether it's the end of the world or the end of our lives in it, we never know when that's going to be. In the meantime, we are to live faithfully. That is, with awareness and with action. We are to live conscious of our relationship with God and choosing, always, to put God's priorities before the world's. We're not being asked to stop participating in life in the world. Quite the contrary, we are asked to live our ordinary lives in such a way that the world might be better. If enough of us lived with God's priorities coming first, then unity and joy and peace wouldn't have to be a one-day-every-thousand-years thing.

It's not surprising that the whole Y2K thing got blown out of proportion. In our collective humanness, we experience great fear around the end of things...whether its the whole world or just us in it. And let's get real honest for a moment: to us as individuals, us in the world is the whole world. Our experience of conscious reality is all we have...and the thought of losing that is terrifling. And if stockpiling water and canned fish might protect us, then we'll do it!

But canned goods and all the batteries in the world can't save us. We are not capable of saving ourselves from death. If we knew exactly when death was coming, we might think we could do something about it. But God doesn't give us that information. All the better to help us realize that our salvation cannot come from our selves. The good news is that that saving grace has been freely given to us already.

Just a few verses before the reading we heard from Luke this morning, in verse 32, Jesus says, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for God has been pleased to give you the kingdom." The lesson reading we heard from Ephesians recaps the whole deal: As a gift from God, in Christ, we have been given every spiritual blessing already. We don't have to earn heaven and we certainly can't stockpile it! It's ours to have if we will accept it. And, Scripture says, when the times have reached their fullfillment - and only God knows what that means and when it will be - then all things will be brought into unity, as God has planned.

When midnight came Saturday morning in Sydney, Australia, a huge lighted sign on the bridge over Sydney Harbor spelled out "eternity." Think of that. We already live under a big sign that says "eternity." It's already been secured for us.

Our job, in the meantime, is to live this life faithfully. To be ever aware of God's presence with us and our connection with God through Jesus Christ. And to always be ready to act...to serve...to respond to that presence and to that amazing gift of love and life we're already been given! That doesn't mean that we won't continue to face the same challenges and mundane chores that life does hold, but faithfulness means that everyday when we awake and realize that we're still here, we can choose to focus anew on the things that really matter and to be ready to act on Christ's behalf in whatever ways we can. Faithfulness is our best preparation for a future that no one can know, and faithfulness is our best hope for happiness today. When we live with awareness and with some detachment from the priorities of the world, we will discover that much of our previous unhappiness was largely of our own creation.

Now living faithfUlly...filled with awareness and ready to act on God's priorities...sounds pretty but can be difficult to put into practice. And yet, there is nothing more vital to our lives, especially when life has become overwhelming. The truth is some among us may have secretly hoped the world would end at midnight Saturday just to have a release from the pain and pressure of life. But we're still here. Perhaps its time to realize that if we can't end the pain and pressure, perhaps we can learn to rise above them. And that's what faithfulness provides. The ability to rise above the hardships of this world because we are focused on something and acting on something that goes far beyond the limitations ofthe here and now.

There is someone in this church who is learning to live in faithfulness even in the midst of a terrible reality. I believe that, over time, his story is going to serve to prove to us all that faithfulness to God can lift us above even the worst of circumstances.

Our brother, Gary, is sitting today in a prison in Illinois. He will be there for at least the next five years. Many of you may have read in the paper or seen on the news some time last year about a teacher who had been accused of molesting a teenaged boy...a student. That teacher accused was Gary. Gary came to me shortly after his arrest, having been released on bail and awaiting trial. Together we talked and cried and prayed. Gary admitted that he was guilty. Not of everything he had been accused of but of the basic facts. He wanted and we prayed for: forgiveness and redemption and the strength to tell the truth and face the consequences. And he received all of those things.

Gary is a good man who had a bad problem and did a terrible thing. But he loves God and God surely loves him. Gary stood up...told the truth...and is now paying the price for what he did. But at the same time he has made a decision to live faithfully to Christ even in the midst of an ordeal that most of us cannot even imagine.

Faithfulness isn't going to get Gary out of prison any quicker...but it is going to enable him to rise above the pain and pressure of his circumstances and he is going to use his faithfulness as a witness to those around him. That is his deepest desire. And he will help change the world for the better from a prison cell by the grace of God. And, as our own kind of faithfulness, this church is not going to abandon or forget Gary either. When he comes home someday, we will be here to welcome him with open arms...having loved and encouraged him all along the way. For every day that Gary opens his eyes and says,"I'm still here," Christ will say, "And so are we." Faithfulness demands it.

Living faithfully means remembering the past and looking to the future even as we live fully in today. Janus, the Roman god of doorways, reminds us of the importance to see the past and look toward the future. The statues and pictures of Janus portray him as having eyes, nose, and mouth on both the front and the back of his head. The rationale for this unique portrayal is to show that a doorway is simultaneously both an entrance and exit. As Janus stands in the doorway - the present - he can look forward and backward at the same time. The month of January is named for Janus, as it indicates the end of the old year and the beginning of a fresh new year. As with Janus, we too can learn from where we've been while keeping our eyes focused on where we are going.

Everyday, when we realize that we're still here, we are standing in a doorway. Some day we will finally pass through the doorway into a place where time is no longer a concern. But for now, our greatest hope...our greatest joy...our greatest response to the gifts of God is to live faithfully.. .learning from the lessons of the past...looking to the future with assurance and making the most of every wonderful, ordinary, challenging, never- to-be-seen-again day that we are here. Happy New Year, Church! Amen.

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