Readings: Exodus 12:14-20, Acts 1:6-11

“It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by His own authority.” (Acts 1:7). We did not choose the hour of our arrival, neither do we have the authority to choose the hour at which He calls us home. His grace, His time, His life are gifts to us, not by our works, but by His appointment, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9). For we, like trees planted by the river might go out and bear fruit – the fruit that is the treasure of the Kingdom of heaven.

Anyone who says they know when the hour will come bears false witness and the truth is not in them. For not even Jesus in His earthly ministry, nor the angels know the hour. God shows us the way, He leads us in the truth so that we can be ready to leave at a moments notice. Waiting for God, waiting for that moment in time, for our hour, for His return – this is not a passive process, in the beginning, at the creation of the universe, all things were set in motion, everything moves.

Stillness is not about being empty of this movement, it is about letting go – about not holding on – to possessions, for we can take nothing with us except that which has been written upon our souls. Waiting for God is a participation in His mystery, our earthly bodies engage with complete trust in and dependence upon His goodness entwinning His grace with faith.

That movement, that participation in the wait is a kind of trinitarian entanglement with God, self and other – just as He loves each of us equally without prejudice, we with gratitude and humble hearts accept a radical unknowing so that we may accept one another as brothers and sisters of one human family.

An unknowing that requires a letting go of any judgement of others or of our standing in the world. A letting go, even, of our perception of time.

Jesus tells us to, “be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” (Matthew 16:6). The false teachers of any age who speak the same word as the Pharoah in the book of Exodus; when Moses asks him when he should pray to rid them of the plague of frogs, Pharoah’s answer is “tomorrow,” – a tomorrow Jesus tells us is promised to no-one. In our reading the feast of unleavened bread is teaching us that the time is now, that there will be no more delay.

Eat with your cloak tucked into your belt, sandals on your feet and staff in your hand – eat with haste, be ready to leave at any moment, so that we are keeping the watch, because we do not know this day or this hour to come. (Matthew 25:13).

The days of preparation for the sacrifice have been and gone, the days of now, the age of the harvest has come – we are in it. The death and resurrection of Jesus represents the end of one age and the coming of another.

While He was going, the disciples were standing, gazing upwards into the heavens, rather like the workers in the vineyard standing and waiting to be hired. The two men in white robes bring them back to the job in hand – the harvest is plentiful, the labourers few – the message of these, perhaps, angels is to send them out into His harvest.

God calls every Christian to mission, never alone, He calls us together. The mission of witness, the mission of love, is to be transformed through prayer, spiritual exercises, through love for one another. We rise from worldliness, we leave the dirt in the grave behind, we rise up to meet Him in the air – we join Him in His Kingdom that is above – and He meets us. Heaven and earth are united through love for God and one another. A love that is not a box of chocolates, or dinner date. Love that is a movement in the same direction that Jesus has gone – lifted into the cloud and out of sight.

The feast of unleavened bread, and the feast of the harvest are echoes through time. The history of humanity shows us many biblical echoes so that every age believes the signs for the end times are now – it has been the age of now for over two thousand years! Yet we do not fear the world, but fear God. Are we ready to meet Him? Are we ready now? Is heaven what we long for or are we looking forward to the next Friday night or the next holiday? Where is our gaze? Does our gaze, our faith and works love the brother who sleeps on the street, does it help the sister home alone with no family to support?

Perhaps the Apostles and the early church had it right, and we have simply grown weary in the wait. Perhaps we have started looking to the world for entertainment and pleasure because we have forgotten to be ready. Like anyone waiting for a friend, we start to wonder – we check the text message or email when someone hasn’t arrived to meet us, we check that it is not us who have made a mistake.

There is no mistake. Tomorrow is promised to no-one. Church is not an organisation that needs to hit future targets; a Church is about life, and saving our souls. Human knowing is memory. It takes many generations for embodied memory to fade. The age of men from Adam until the time of Noah declines, rather like tradition or collective memory that slowly fades from one generation to another until now in our modern times, our traditions, our liturgies are seen but not always understood. Modern times believe themselves enlightened until they realise the echoes of mankind throughout the ages repeat themselves time and time again.

If the church does not remain visible with men and women clothed in the Kingdom of God – if ordained ministers are not seen on the streets, or in the heart of communities, bearing the fruit of peace, joy and love because they are hidden behind a desk shuffling paperwork, or stuck in traffic driving to the next meeting – what will happen? The Apostolic tradition like a collective memory will become the preserve of a few. The Kingdom will no longer be known through the church but the kindness of strangers.

The Lord will give the ordinary moments to us for our testing without expectation, as it is said in Hebrews 13:2 ‘do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.’ God is not a job to be compartmentalised into times. God must penetrate our being, our seeing, our minds and our hearts.

The final feast, the feast of tents or tabernacles, is a feast of meeting, a feast of entering into His rest to eat and drink and have our joy completed. This points forward to the Eucharist, to the breaking of bread and drinking of wine together in the house of the Lord now on earth and when the time is called, it will be our feast at the table in heaven.

Amen.