“Remember, remember, the 5th November, Gunpowder, Treason, and Plot! I see no reason why gunpowder treason should ever be forgot. Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, ’twas his intent to blow up the King and the Parliament. Three score barrels of powder below, poor old England to overthrow. By God’s providence he was catch’d with a dark lantern and burning match. Holler boys, holler boys, let the bells ring. Holler boys, holler boys, God save the King!”
Gunpowder, Treason, and Plot
In January 1606 Parliament passed the Thanksgiving Act. This made services and sermons commemorating the Gunpowder Plot a regular feature on 5th November. Thousands of sermons were delivered on that date, over the next two centuries and hundreds were published, giving thanks for safe deliverance from Roman Catholicism and ‘Popish Plots’! The tradition grew of marking the day with bonfires. And fireworks were included in some of the earliest celebrations. The custom of burning effigies of the Pope, or the devil, seems to have begun in the reign of Charles I and grew in popularity during the crisis over the succession of James II. It was only much later that Guy Fawkes replaced the Pope as the figure burned on bonfires. Something I recall doing myself as a child, but know that my daughter would be horrified if I proposed that tradition continued with my 5-year-old grandson.
Times of collective fear and terror are nothing new – it’s just that the object of our collective fears may change. From ‘Catholic Conspiracies’ in Georgian Britain, to ‘Reds under the Bed’ in McCarthy’s America, or ‘Islamic Fundamentalists’ since 9/11. Do you remember the prophecies of doom that surrounded New Year’s Eve 1999, as the world waited with bated breath for the ‘Millennium Bug’ to wreak havoc on all our computer systems?
‘Millenarianism’, the concern that the world would end at the millennium, was around as much in 1000 AD as it was in 2000 AD. And there have been various people who have made predictions at other times too. So, what are we to make of our readings for this morning, which seem to add fuel to the fire of such fears? In fact, the Bible reflects an Ancient Israelite view that the sinful age, which it was living in, would come to an end, and an age of holiness would follow. There were various traditions about this. Some like the Qumran community – famous for the Dead Sea Scrolls, expected a priestly leader to lead a reform. Others looked for one from heaven to bring a new age. Like “the Son of Man,” from the book of Daniel – an image Jesus would use to refer to himself. And it was through such apocalyptic images that Jesus was talking about his followers living in an age when the Temple in Jerusalem was no more. A building that was so closely connected to God, that to live without it seemed unthinkable. The end of the world.
When Worlds End
When Jesus predicted the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, he was encouraging fidelity at a time when the world seemed to be falling apart. And indeed, the unthinkable did happen. As shocking as the destruction of the Twin Towers in 2001, the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 AD by the Romans. A world ended. And the authors of the Gospels witnessed this event, so that Jesus’ words took on new resonance in their generation. These readings may not be for us today, but they are for people, which may include us, at some point – who have watched their own worlds fall apart. The saints and martyrs remembered on All Saints Day. Remembrance Sunday, when many recall the fallen from warfare. Those in Ukraine or Gaza now. Perhaps ourselves, when we have witnessed our world come to an end. And we have to face the ultimate, apocalyptic question, who or what, do we really trust?
Advent is much more than getting ready for the celebrations of Christmas. In these weeks we are invited to think about the bigger picture of life and where it ends. We need both the comfort and the encouragement that biblical passages offer reflecting on the ending of things, even though we may have to look beneath them a bit to find their meaning. On one level they may speak of the actual end of the world, when the Christian faith claims, Christ will come “in the clouds with great power and glory.” But it is not only then that we move from one age to another. Like one of those films that finishes by showing the words ‘The End’ on the screen, and then after a pause, adding a question mark. Though the new age dawns with Jesus’ coming, it takes root in us now when we open ourselves to its power. The Gospels and New Testament writings in the Bible invite us to answer a simple question every single day: ‘Where in my life might God be calling me now, leaving an old age behind, to embrace the new?’
Nothing lasts forever. Neither the Earth we live on, nor the worlds we construct. But as that other apocalyptic book, Revelation, reminds us; if we trust in the eternal love of God, then we need not be afraid when worlds end, for God will make all things new.
