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S. Last Sunday.25 Luke 23:27–43 “What We Talk About When We Talk About Eschatology”

‘And he said to him: truly, I say to you; today you shall be with me in paradise.’

So here’s the news on the Last Day—which may strike you as good or bad or both depending on your perspective—it’s already happened, but you haven’t missed it.

Huh? What do you mean when you say: “The Last Day has already happened, but I haven’t missed it”? If it’s happened already, then I have missed it! Or is this “missing it” like Peter in “Office Space” when one of the Bobs says: “You’ve been missing a lot of work lately, Peter,” and Peter says “Oh, I wouldn’t say I’ve missed it, Bob.”?

Well, no. Not exactly. But not not entirely unlike that, either 😉 What a fine film that is. A masterpiece.

Anyway, when we talk about eschatology, the Last Things, the End Times—as the lectionary has us doing on the Last Sunday of the Church Year (which this is! ;-)—we’re talking about mysteries that go way above our pay grade. And yet, as my old teacher Paul Holmer liked to say: “It’s complex, but it’s not complicated.”

Really it’s very simple, on the surface. The Last Day was Friday, April 6, 30 AD and the world ended at precisely 3 pm that day when Jesus Christ died on the cross on Golgotha, an old limestone quarry just outside the city gate of Jerusalem where the Romans crucified bad criminals. It wasn’t just the end of him; it was the end of EVERYTHING! The whole world came crashing to an end—sun, moon and stars failed, and gave no light from noon till 3. There were earthquakes and signs in the heavens, the graves were opened and the saints raised and you could see the Son of Man coming on the clouds with glory even as he was yielding up his last breath.

It was a dark, difficult, and confusing day—like a solar eclipse for Flat Earthers. After total darkness, the sun came out again at 3:01 pm. Things kinda seemed like they went back to normal—if “normal” is your long dead great grandfather stopping by and knocking on the door quite resurrected, and going: “Hi, there!” So yeah; it was a pretty weird 36 hour-ish interim, a kind of pause in time until a new world started up just at dawn on Sunday, April 8, 30 AD, when Jesus rose from the dead.

But that Friday was the Last Day; and the compilers of our lectionary quite rightly see that, on the Last Sunday of the Church Year, it is good, right, and salutary that we contemplate the Last Day, Good Friday, the day of our Lord’s death…

So that’s what I mean when I say the Last Day has already happened, because, “Baby, that was IT!!!” when Jesus died and gave up the ghost. That was The End!

But that’s also why I say, “You haven’t missed it,” because TIME is a funny thing! Augustine well said: “I know what TIME is—until someone asks me to define it.” Like Ted Lasso and the offsides rule! Did Augustine believe in ghosts? Probably; but the important thing is that he believed in himself, right? Uhm… maybe Ted Lasso isn’t right about everything? The important thing is to believe in Jesus, as the good thief clearly did… 😉

Because, on one level, dawn Easter Sunday, April 8, 30 AD, when Jesus rose bodily from the dead didn’t seem to change a thing! For sure, a New Day dawned, a day that has no End and never will, and yet, the old world, the old time, kinda keeps trundling on “same as it ever was”. The saints who rose on Friday seem to have cleared out and gone back to Heaven or wherever. Jesus appears to his disciples (who seem just as clueless and out of it as ever 😉 and have trouble recognizing the Lord because he seems exactly the same and yet… completely different! Voice recognition was what did it—and the holes in the wrists and feet and spear’s mark in his side 😉

I think Mary couldn’t recognize him, mistook him for Fred the Gardener, because she could not imagine that he could come back to life—same body, same Jesus—so she simply couldn’t see what she was seeing when she saw him in the Garden, Risen!, and ‘same as he ever was’. It was his somewhat aggravated, “Mary!” that jarred her into seeing what she was seeing.

The point is this: from April 8, 30 AD to the present day, we sort of live in two different dimensions of time…

There is the old time marked by the movement of the sun, moon, and stars which tell us this is November 23, 2025 in which things go on pretty much as usual. And then there is the Time of the Ages, Eternity, the 8th Day, a day that dawned April 8(!), 30 AD, and will never have a sunset, because the Son of God who is the Light and Life of this Endless 8th Day will never set, never die, again. And insofar as we believe that, or don’t completely disbelieve it—to be strictly accurate—we’ve got one foot in Heaven, another earth, which is a tricky balancing act, but looks cool, when you manage it 😉

By Baptism and faith (the non-rejection of Jesus’ Word 😉 we live in the New Age, the 8th Day, full sharers in Jesus’ death and resurrection, One Body with him. But insofar as we live by our wits and works and bodily processes—which is to say insofar as we live in unbelief—we’re still stuck in the old age of sin, and death, still remain on Zombie Time, quite unfortunately…

But when we die—body, soul, and spirit—we leave the Zombie Time behind (forever!) and live only in the 8th Day, the New Day of Heaven. Then the dying of Jesus is completely fulfilled in us and we’re in Paradise with him.

So; the Last Day has happened, but you haven’t missed it. The day of your death, IT will come fully and unmissably to you…

But the hardest part—the death and damnation of the sinful you part—Jesus already handled for you, long ago. And you didn’t miss that, really, just like Peter didn’t miss working at Inatech. Jesus kinda hypnotized you by his Voice, his word, so that it was like you were fishing or something on a day when the fish were all biting, beautifully.

If that makes your head spin, a little, it’s OK! Here’s your takeaway: when you’re staring down the Last Day, your Last Day—Death and the End of Everything, the end of you—just confess with the Good Thief: “we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.”

And with your last, dying breath, tilt your head toward the Master, and beg: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

And the Last Thing you’ll hear is The Voice—soft, yet strong—golden tones all gently flowing, saying: “Today, you will be with me, in Paradise.”

And, Boom! You’re there—where Peace, surpassing understanding, guards your heart and mind in Christ Jesus. Amen.