WHEN THE TREES CLAP THEIR HANDS
Isaiah 55:12-13
Matthew 24:36-44
"The mountains and the
hills before you shall burst into song,
and all the trees of the
field shall clap their hands."
"For as the days of
Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man."
Last Sunday, as I was reflecting
on my meditation for this, the third week in Advent, a message appeared on my
screen from Avaaz, that global network for justice which involves forty-two
million people in its various campaigns.
The message read:
Out of great crises, humanity has borne beautiful visions. World War
II gave rise to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, an enduring standard
for our spirit and capacity as one people. The fall of Apartheid led South
Africa to the single most bold and progressive constitution in the world.
And now world leaders at the
United Nations climate talks in Paris have set a landmark goal that can save
the planet. That is the significance of
what was achieved after intense debate and negotiation between virtually all
the nations of the world. Of course, the
Paris Declaration still has to be ratified by the relevant national authorities
and they have to put it into practice. It
is also true that the Declaration does not go nearly far enough, for even if
the targets set are achieved, this will not automatically prevent disastrous
weather patterns over the coming years. Much,
much more needs to be done, and sooner rather than later. But for the first time almost all the nations
of the world have agreed about global warming and what must be done to stop it
before our planet is destroyed.
As
I reflected on the significance of this event, and its potential to prevent
disaster, a verse from the prophet Isaiah came to mind.
"The mountains and the hills shall burst
into song,
and all the trees of the
field shall clap their hands."
This is part of Isaiah's vision of
the coming of God's reign on earth and therefore an appropriate text for Advent
when we focus among other things on the Second Coming of Christ when God's
glory will be revealed in all its fullness, when creation will be restored, and
justice and peace will finally be established.
At last the trees have reason to clap their hands.
While reflecting on Isaiah's utopian vision, another Advent biblical passage came to mind which refers to
the days of Noah when "corruption and violence filled the earth," when
people were oblivious to the consequences of their actions and ignored the
warning signs. Instead they "were eating and drinking, marrying and giving
in marriage" and did not know what hit them until "the flood came and
swept them all away." That is all
except Noah, his family and the animals that crowded into his ark. We miss the point of this ancient and
universal story if we go searching for the remains of Noah's Ark somewhere in
Sinai and try to work out how he got all the animals inside including,
presumably two tarantulas and two crocodile.
There probably was a great flood that gave rise to the story, but it was
told not to dazzle generations of Sunday School children and then turn them
into sceptics about the Bible's truth at the same time as they stop believing
in Father Christmas. No, the story of
Noah is a prophetic warning about the dire consequences that inevitably follow
corruption and violence. As such, its
message is universal and perennial, and told for our time, perhaps more so than
any other when people, as in the days of Noah, have scoffed about global
warming and continue to pursue policies that destroy the environment. Suddenly,
is seems, people and governments are waking up as floods engulf towns and
islands across the globe. The significance of the Paris Declaration is
that we might just have woken up in time, but only just. In fact during the Paris Conference the
Indian Finance Minister first came out against 100% clean energy. This was potentially an enormous set-back for
the process. But then a film was
screened the city in the conference hall
showing the city of Chennai under water that week along with messages from across
India. A day later, Prime Minister Modi
declared that he had changed his mind, and this decisively influenced the
discussions.
There are two approaches to the Second Coming of Christ. The most popular and widespread among many
Christian groups, especially fundamentalists, is that the world will come to a
violent end in the final battle of Armageddon.
Then Christ will return to establish God's reign of justice and peace. This view is based on apocalyptic passages in
the New Testament, especially the book of Revelation which are taken literally
in a way never intended. Many Christians
think this will happen in their life time -- as many have in previous
generations -- and that the sooner the Middle East blows up the better. They therefore support the wars now taking
place because these herald the return of Jesus, and they oppose those who work
for peace and justice. War in the Middle
East is part of God's plan, to put it crudely, which is also the view of ISIS
which, strangely, also anticipates the return of Jesus in that final battle of
Armageddon.
But is its God's will that the world continues on its present trajectory
of corruption, violence and war, leading to death and destruction on such a
scale? Does the God who loves the world
really plan to annihilate millions of people through bombs and bullets, as well
as devastate the earth, in order to establish his kingdom of justice and peace? Is God a cynical god for whom the end
justifies the means, so that in order to bring about peace you promote
war? That certainly does not correspond
to what we know of God's will for the world in Jesus Christ, and therefore does
not tally with any notion of a Second Advent of the Christ who is the same
yesterday, today and forever. The Christ
who is with us and who will come again, is the same Christ who came to
Bethlehem.
God's way according to Jesus and the prophets, then, is the way of justice and the renewal of the earth, not the
way of war and devastation; it is the way of loving enemies not destroying them,
fighting corruption and evil for the sake of the common good. That is the way of Christ, and it is to the
coming of this Christ of redemption, the Christ who is the healer of the
nations. The message of Advent, then, is
one of hope in the coming of God kingdom, but it is also a call to wake up
before it is too late! Too late because
we have allowed corruption and violence to get out of hand, too late because we
have so degraded the environment that it has got beyond the point of no return. That is why Advent prepares us for the coming
of Christ by calling us to conversion, to a change of heart and mind, to renew our efforts at being peace-makers and
good earth-keepers. We have every reason
to live in hope, but that means keeping awake and, with John the Baptist,
preparing the way for the coming of God's kingdom when
"The mountains and the
hills will burst into song,
and the trees of the field will
clap their hands."
John
de Gruchy
Volmoed
Advent III, 17 December 2015
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