The lectionary readings today come from people writing in times of persecution and calamity. We who sit here so comfortably are a long way from these texts. We are also a long way from similar calamities that happen to people around the world, be it Palestinians or Iraqis, African, Asian or most Latin American peoples.

But we are not far from the persecutions and calamities that happen in the southside of Chicago. We try hard to insulate ourselves, lock ourselves up with fences and gates and alarms, but we find that we can’t escape it. Becky said to me on Wednesday night, "But I live in East Hyde Park, where it is supposed to be safe!" All of us who live in the southside face that kind of danger daily. We can pretend that there is no problem until the problem comes to us and holds a gun to our heads. I don’t want to sound like I am trying to excuse their incredibly violent and evil act, but I hope we understand that this is not just two isolated or deranged individuals – but that this is an on-going symptom of a larger problem. And that the problem has its roots in the racial and economic discrimination that has caused the southside to be an area of concentrated poverty.

So, what does the church do? Typically, we bury our heads in the sand, and pretend as if nothing is going on – or we busy ourselves with our internal struggles that drains our energy from engaging in God’s mission to the world. The real interesting thing is that our scripture has a great deal to say about these things. Just look at what we read today! But we allow fundamentalist preachers and peddlers of last days paranoia to interpret these scripture for us and they do that so loudly, through radio and TV and best selling books – and more reflective and insightful interpretation gets drowned out.

I hope you understand that if we want to hear and decode the messages from the writers of the early centuries, we have to try to look at the scripture from the point of view of the people to whom it was first spoken and subsequently written. But even that is not enough. We have to learn to listen to them as read through African, Asian, Latin American or Middle Eastern eyes – and through the Chicago southside experiences. In much of North America we don't have the right reading glasses, to read these scriptures from the perspective of today's persecuted and murdered witnesses and martyrs.

Hear again the words of Daniel in 12:1 and 2. "There will be a time of anguish such as has never occurred since nations first came into existence… " These words were written about a hundred and sixty five years before Christ, when Antiochus Epiphanes the Selucid Emperor invaded Israel and desecrated the Temple. Jews were hanged for keeping Sabbath, or forced to eat pork in public, or executed for saying their prayers. Renegade Jews -- those who went along with the Emperor’s program -- got jobs, safety, and political power. This is when Judas Maccabeus and his family fled to the mountains where they began an insurgent war against the Emperor. It was during the time of this Maccabean Revolt that the book of Daniel was circulated as an underground illegal tract, to inspire resistance. It was written as if it belonged to a much earlier time, another century, so that the government wouldn’t recognize that it was talking about the present--the book of Revelation would the same at a later time. They were contraband documents.

Few of us have lived in such revolutionary contexts and have read an illegal book. In the 1980s during the civil wars in Guatamala and El Salvador owning a copy of the Latin American Bible that was illegal. The Latin American Bible is illustrated with photos and art from contemporary life in Latin America, and commentary to point out the significance of Scripture to that context. It was considered anti-government and anti-dictatorship. And so it is indeed when the Bible is read as it was intended. For the same reason, several years ago, the government of Argentina banned the singing of the Magnificat, Mary’s song of praise at Advent and for the same reason, during the time of the Tsars, the Russian church was not allowed to read the book of Revelation. These are too revolutionary.

Then we come to Mark. Last Sunday, I pointed out to you that Jesus had now come to Jerusalem and was taking on the religious establishment. In chapter 11 we have a direct action on the temple and from the last few verses of chapter 11 through end of chapter 12, we have his confrontation with the religious authorities. Now, in chapter 13, we come to what amounts to a sermon on radical patience, waiting and watching as in the midst of agonizing tribulation – the birth-pangs for the dawning of a new day.

The chapter begins with Jesus exiting the temple, and as we have come to expect the disciples again have missed the point. One of them begins to marvel at the magnificence of the very temple Jesus had just criticized: "Look! Such stones, such buildings!" The temple, actually was an impressive structure and it is not unreasonable that any visitor to Jerusalem would be overwhelmed by its grandeur. Not only was it an impressive building, it also had extremely powerful spiritual and political symbolism. For anyone to go against such a structure would be no small matter. But as he had been all along, Jesus takes on the temple: "Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left upon another that will not be thrown down." And with that he takes a seat facing the temple, preparing to deliver a sermon that will utterly repudiate the temple state, and dismantle the entire symbolic world of Judaism. As we have seen, his objections have consistently based upon one criterion: the system’s exploitation of the Little Ones – poor and the oppressed. He warns his disciples against joining those who would wage a messianic war in defense of the temple, and then tells them that when these things happen, to abandon the temple and run away to the hills (vs.14). This is nothing short of the end of the temple based world, and the dawn of a new one in which powers of domination have toppled.

Attacking the center of Israel’s symbolic universe is a very serious matter. It is as if someone bombed the Lincoln Monument or desecrated the U. S. flag or destroyed the Constitution – or did away with the electoral college! If these sacred artifacts don’t hold their symbolic meaning any more, our corporate life itself is thrown into chaos. People would then look for alternatives. Messiah’s will crop up all over the place. Hi, I am George Bush one will say, I am Al Gore, the other will say. Jesus says, "Don’t believe them. Beware that no one leads you astray. The result of the chaos will be that there will be wars and rumors of wars and kingdoms rising against kingdoms.

The question for us is what is the center. For people in Jesus’ time thought the temple was the center. Jesus tried very hard to point out to the disciples that the temple, or the law or scripture or the Jewish tradition was not the center – but that God’s kingdom was the center. The disciples had a real hard time buying that, and the religious authorities went completely against Jesus. Now, the problem for us is also that. What is the center? Think about it. For many of us church is the center. For others of us scripture is the center. For yet others traditional or evangelical theology is the center. What if I told you, as I did last Sunday, that Jesus needs to supersede all those centers of symbolic meaning? What does that mean? It means that we incorporate into our lives the spirit of Jesus. That we live by the Kingdom values that he lived. Perhaps the best way to put is in Jesus’ own words to the Scribe who asked him about the greatest commandment. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.

In this sermon Jesus points out that there is no alternative but to give him complete allegiance. Check out vs. 14. "When you see the desolating sacrilege set up where it ought not be" – or translated another way, "When you see the Abomination of Desolation usurping a place that is not his" ('psst--let the reader understand'). Mark's readers would understand very well. The "Abomination of Desolation" is code, a reference to the Roman imperial standard--the "Stars and Stripes" standing in the Temple in Jerusalem, "usurping a place which is not his."

The apocalyptic language of Daniel and Revelation, and this chapter of Mark, and other places in the Bible written in this code of resistance, is language constantly mis-read and mis-interpreted by preachers who want to avoid its message: Judgment is certain in all centuries, and God's justice for the persecuted and oppressed cannot be prevented by tyranny -- not Antiochus Epiphanies, not Caesar, not Anastasio Somoza, not Bull Connor, not Augusto Pinochet, not even by those who aspire to the legacy of Ronald Reagan, or Bill Clinton. The Biblical apocalyptic reminds us that even the descendants of Richard J. Daley (a recent book on him is entitled the American Pharaoh) cannot rule forever. It reminds us that no lie can live forever. And if anyone says to you, "Look, here is the Christ!" or "Look, he's there" -- Do not believe it.

The church, through the ages has felt it very important and necessary to pray for the heads of government and all in authority. Not because they are friends of the church--they usually turn out not to be--but because they are in a position of responsibility towards the preservation of human life, and have a duty towards God to execute social justice and maintain peace in the world. If you would go to an Episcopalian church, in the intercessory litany, you would have prayers for the head of State, referred to as "William our President," and "Richard, our Mayor." You know, as far as I can see, scripture tells us to pray for "The Emperor," not "our" emperor, which he is not! In Kingdom politics, to which we owe our allegiance, it is Jesus who is our Ruler, our King – who must receive all our allegiance. In Mark’s reading today we hear another term used for an arrogant and presumptuous head of state, who in the year 40 A.D. tried to set up his own statue in the Temple in Jerusalem, to be revered as "Our Emperor." That term is "Abomination of Desolation."

It was the way Jesus would have referred to the Roman Emperor, Caligula. His real name was Gaius, but we know him by his nickname, "Caligula", which means "Little Boots." Gaius pretended to be divine, and historians for a while went all out in ridiculing him. About 40 A.D., in an attempt to wipe out Jewish resistance to the Roman occupation, Little Boots ordered his statue set up in the Temple in Jerusalem, in the most holy place of Judaism, and it was only his assassination that prevented it. Thirty years later in 70 A.D. the Romans under Titus, the son of Vespasian, completely destroyed Jerusalem in a great slaugher, and in 73 A.D. the last flames of Jewish revolt were extinguished at Masada, the mountain fortress, where the last of the revolutionaries committed suicide rather than fall into the hands of the Romans.

It is in the context of these events that Mark writes his gospel and he places this preaching of Jesus about the great tribulation as the last of Jesus' preaching, just before his own arrest and execution. It's hard to imagine Jesus bidding his disciples to pray for "Little Boots our Emperor" or the Evangelist Mark bidding us to pray for "Little Titus, our Emperor Vespasian's boy," as if they were the church's protectors and heroes. Neither are the two who are aspiring to the presidency friends of the gospel. Their allegiance is with corporate interests. They have paid lip-service to the interests of God’s kingdom. I have not heard a thing from them that address systemic causes of injustice – the concerns of the "Little Ones" that Jesus is concerned with. We should pray for them – that they may themselves shift their allegiance from lip service to real commitment to the people Jesus was committed to.

Mark's readers at the end of the first century did not have to be told that it was the Emperor Caligula's statue he was talking about. Here’s the other thing about reading the Bible, I didn't know that from the Bible alone, did I? I had to read commentaries to find that out. I had to look up the Brittanica on that one. So when Jesus' preaching on the Last Things is interrupted by the evangelist Mark to say "Let the reader understand," the readers then understood. But we need to educate ourselves to understand. We need to learn about the world around us, and its events which are important to the understanding of the gospel and of Jesus' teaching and about the stance we must take toward governments, and what action we must take to promote God’s kingdom values.

So, what does this mean for us, the people of God, who live in hope and expectation of a new way of living together in human community. It means, for instance, the destruction of our Temple-like institutions we have constructed for our established religion. "Look, teacher, what wonderful stones and wonderful buildings," said his disciples to Jesus. Who at once responded, "You see all these institutions? Not one stone will be left upon another. All will be torn down." Jesus preached judgment, identified fake messiahs, false preachers. Did Jesus have our current TV evangelists, fundamentalist preachers and other peddlers of last-days paranoia in mind? Of course not. But we had better! (Let the reader understand!). He spoke of "wars and rumors of wars, nation against nation." Did he have Palestine and Israel, Iraq and U.S., former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sri Lanka in mind? Of course not. But we had better. Was Jesus talking about earthquakes in Managua, or floods in Bangladesh, or Hurricanes in Honduras? Of course not. But we had better have these things in mind when we hear and interpret Scripture, when we pray, when we talk about God. Jesus expects of us--the good sense to be "on our guard" and be alert and aware, so that nothing on the front page of the Chicago Tribune, Sarajevo Times or Sri Lanka’s Daily News will blow our minds or destroy our hopes. "Be constantly on your guard," Jesus says, "You'll be taken to court, you'll be beaten in religious meetings". Fact is that today it's not us Christians of north America who are likely to be beaten in any kind of church. Jesus was talking to his contemporaries, and the sermon about tribulation was addressed to those who were at that time, when Mark wrote his gospel, being excommunicated from synagogues, driven out of town, indicted before imperial government --that's the context in which the gospels were written. The circumstances that Jesus describes are real ones--a man is forced to flee without time to pack his luggage, or go home to say goodbye. A woman is pregnant, another nursing a baby. Pray this won't happen in winter, it would make it all the harder on people. These are real people, fleeing political persecution. If you want to know where in our time things like this are happening, check out what’s happening in our neighborhood, pick up the newspaper, tune into CNN. Let the viewer understand.

There is a future which God has prepared for the people of God. And it is not Little Boots or Dubya Bush or Patriot Gore who are in charge of that future. It is the one we know as our Friend, who is our King-Emperor, to whom we pray as our Lord and our Liberator, and our President, and our savior and our God, Jesus the Christ. It is he whom we celebrate at this table.