People seem to be posting Mayan calendar jokes like there's no tomorrow.
The evening news had a story on the Mayan calendar and how it is predicting that the world will end tomorrow - and the measures that some people are going to to be prepared. A very few have access to end of the world proof bunkers (although I'm not sure how they're supposed to work) - but most of those who were interviewed seem to see this as a chance for one last party - but I'm guessing that most of those people will have done their Christmas shopping, just in case...
If we truly believe that the world will end on Friday, we don't bother making plans for the weekend. We certainly wouldn't have spent a whole heap of time and energy getting ready for Christmas - and I wouldn't have planned a Carol Service for Sunday morning. Nor would I have written and scheduled three more blog posts to go through to the 24th.
Jesus tells us that the world will come to an end, but no one knows when it will be, and therefore we are to be ready at all times. This does not mean having a bomb shelter at the bottom of the garden, or having the kitchen cupboards stocked with tins of baked beans. What it does mean is that we are living right. It means our relationship with God is right and our relationship with others is right.
The news that the world might end tomorrow should not cause the Christian any great concern...because as a Christian I should be living as if the world could end tomorrow - and that's how I should be living every day.
I'm starting to put together the list of carols for our carol service on Sunday. Some of you may not have heard this version of a traditional favourite.
The original words were written by Isaac Watts based on Psalm 98 and was first published in 1719. The music is believed to be based on a melody by Handel. Handel spent some time just up the road from here at St. Lawrence church on Whitchurch Lane. I'm sure he would have liked what Chris Tomlin has done.
Following on from the instructions on Sabbath in Leviticus 25, God gives instructions on The Year of Jubilee. This event was supposed to take place every 50 years in Israel - after 7 x 7 years. Essentially it was the year when debts were cancelled. If at any point you had fallen on hard times and had been forced to sell either your land or yourself, as a slave, then the Year of Jubilee was the year when you got your land back or you were freed from slavery. Future generations of your family were not saddled with the consequences of your misfortune.
Now depending on your perspective this is either a really good or a really bad idea. For those at the bottom, clearly it is a good thing - a year to look forward to. But for the rich and the wealthy clearly it would not be looked on in the same way - how are you supposed to build up a property portfolio if every 50 years you're supposed to give everything back?
It is perhaps no surprise that there is little or no evidence in the Old Testament that the Year of Jubilee was ever celebrated as God intended. We do find a possible reference in Jeremiah 34:8-11. Here it seems as if the people become aware that they have not been doing what they're supposed to do, and so they let their slaves go - but afterwards they changed their minds, and enslaved them all again.
What we think about the Year of Jubilee very much depends on the perspective from which we read. But we should never forget that God is concerned for the poor and the powerless, and his disciples we are called to that love and concern too.
