We all know that you shouldn't read the end of a book first. You'll wreck the experience and pleasure of reading. I'll bet most of us have done it though — furtively read the last chapter or page before we really get to it. But I've learned by experience that knowing how a story ends before you should can muck-up a good story.

In the case of our faith however just the opposite is true. The Christian faith is better when we know the end of the story. By knowing the end of the story of faith, the beginning and middle get better, at once more detached and more engaged. That's why it's such a gift to hear how things end before we get there. We become better Christians, better people. On the one hand we detach ourselves a little from the world, gaining critical distance. On the other hand, we fall in love with the world so much that we become better stewards and care givers. Knowing how it all ends gives us detachment as well as vitality and hope and courage — so much so that we take a stand against death and all of its masks and manifestations. We are resurrection people. We know the end of the story.

This is why the text from Revelation we've heard this morning is such a gift. It tells us the end of the story.

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. [And a voice said] "See, the home of God is among mortals.... God will wipe every tear from their eyes.... Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away." "See, I am making all things new."

It's a wonderful promise: a new heaven and earth.

I have two points to make about this passage. First, a sense of the ending allows us to detach from the world, getting some distance and perspective. Second, a sense of the ending deepens our connection with the world, making us better stewards and caregivers.

Why would we want to detach from the world? Lots of reasons. First, you can't love without detachment. If you can't detach, you can't love. Without detachment you simply assert control or domination or codependency or some other trumped-up version of unity or togetherness. But it's not true togetherness. You can't love without boundaries. So that's one reason to detach. We also detach because life in this world is tough. It's tough because this world is the place where death reigns. There's so much sadness and pettiness, so much empty buying and selling, so much death and destruction. Wars erupt, prisoners are tortured and humiliated, good people are hungry and homeless. We exclude people from our churches, we used to exclude women from the ministry, and many churches still do. Now we merely exclude gays and lesbians. On and on it goes. We all live with sin, with heartache, with sorrow, and with grief. So the promise of a new heaven and a new earth allows us some healthy detachment, a little distance from it all.

Because we live by faith, our eyes are focused on another world — the new heaven and earth. We look toward the horizon, the end of the story. That's where our true home is, our final home — with God. And though I absolutely agree with Pastor McKee that we must reject the pie in the sky sweet bye and bye baloney, I believe that some form of detachment is crucial.

Look. Because we know the end of the story, we are filled with hope. We have real hope for a real future. Hope for peace and reconciliation. Hope for a gathering up, a comforting of the afflicted. We believe something better is coming. We believe that healing, without ambiguity or question, will come. We look at our shattered broken world and see wholeness. We look at the broken, the violent, the racists and bigots, the sad or dispossessed — and we believe that those very persons will be healed and made whole. That's the power that the sense of an ending releases in our lives — it allows us to sink more deeply into our embodied lives. We are given the gift of real adult hope.

But it's a detached hope. This sense of an ending gives us a certain lightness. If this world is not our final home, if the way things are is not the final version, if this is not a closed system, then transformation can happen. That means this version of the world is already obsolete. Be light then. This is what I mean by lightness. You can't plant your feet too firmly on the floor of a condemned building. You walk lightly. If you the Exodus people know that you're breaking camp in the morning, you won't drive your tent stakes too deep. You'll tap them lightly into the ground so you're ready to break camp, to keep moving. We take on a lightness of touch, a delicate irony, a warm playfulness. We can't take this version of things too seriously. We're living our lives in an old busted up building, fully expecting the new building that will emerge. All the rules, all the laws, all the codes and social programs — they're important, but not ultimate. This way of being, with death in the captain's seat, is provisional. A new world is coming. We live well, we love fiercely, we sow our light as we may. But we the people of God live lightly. We don't take ourselves too seriously. We mustn't. A new order has been promised us. So we live hungry and hoping. We live light.

But we can't say that truth without saying this other: the sense of the ending helps us love the world more deeply, and pushes us toward lives of stewardship. There's an incredible tension and poignancy in this eschatology business — which is what I'm trying to describe. We detach from the world and ache for the new creation, while we simultaneously love the world and sink more deeply into it. Listen. God has already come to us. The resurrected Christ is already on the loose. Redemption has already occurred. And creation, though imperfect and incomplete, is an astonishing gift.

Earlier this week I was driving in Brown County. A Flicker with a bright red head was staying steady with my car, flying a steady 25 miles per hour or so. The astonishing thing was that this bird was about 5 or 6 feet from my driver's window, and he remained there for nearly a quarter mile. It was strange, and the sun was luminous in his bright red head feathers, as though there was sunlight mysteriously directed toward him like a spotlight. The color red was extravagant, rich, explosive. This strange little event took my breath away; I can't really say why. But once again it seemed to be a message from the other side. What was the message? The world is strange and beautiful and mysterious beyond understanding, that beauty flames and strains, that undecipherable codes dog us with mysterious meanings, and that we're usually asleep like Rip Van Winkle. Wake up. Wake up. Come to your senses, that bird seemed to say. God's grace is everywhere, ubiquitous, holding us, shocking us, burning us with glimpses of beauty and truth.

So we love the world, we really do. We feel the rough pavement beneath our feet and the warm wind on our face. We smell baking bread mixed with the sweet smell of fresh cut grass. We eat the produce of our gardens and clean the dirt from the creases in our hands. We feel gratitude for those that we love. And we acknowledge that this world is good and beautiful and mysterious. And we know we are called to love and care for it. And then we detach from it all. We walk lightly. For our faith seizes with the promise of something new, something better, something not yet here. We await its arrival. We hunger for it, that other country, our home with God. We look for the new heaven and the new earth. We treasure this reality in our secret thoughts. And we continue to live in this tension, dazzled by this world, hungry for another.

But even this poignant tension is swallowed up by the sense of the ending. For God has promised that She will be our home. God will be our home, and our dwelling place will be with God. If you want the truth, I'll tell you the truth. Your faith is like a seed. And as the seed of a horse-chestnut tree contains all the horse-chestnut blossoms, and the horse-chestnut trees, and the shade they give — even so your faith contains the seed of the world that is coming. It's already here! Your faith is this seed, substantial and earthy. God is there, whispering the promise. Promising a new heaven and a new earth; promising that death will be no more, and that all your tears will be wiped away.

That's the gift of knowing the end before it arrives. That's the gift of knowing the end of the story, the poignancy of promise, the gift of eschatology.  —   Amen.