From "Amazing Grace by Kathleen Norris. In this book she takes many of the words and images of the faith and attempts to put some reality and life to them.
Eschatology
I was sixteen years of age when I discovered the word "eschatology." Right away, I knew something was different about this word. I seemed much larger - more roomy and important - than it dictionary definition would allow: "A belief or doctrine concerning the ultimate or final things." ...The motto of the Norris family crest that my father found in England reads "Regard the End." Maybe eschatology is in my blood. ...I didn't do living right, at first. When I was six months old, I nearly died. All wrong, for an infant, to be so caught up in the last things. Naturally, the hospital was called Providence; in all likelyhood, as I was in danger of dying a nun baptized me there. My official baptism came four months later, in the arms of my grandfather Norris, a Methodist pastor. Six months of age is too early to learn that one's mother and father are helples before death. But the struggle that took place in my infant body and still-forming, pre-verbal intelligence was between life and death, and I am convincedd that a sense of something vast, something yet to come, took hold in my unconscious and remains there still.
How do you see the end of the story...your story? There are many voices attempting to spell out the End. The end of our story has much to say to us as we go off into today. St. Paul would often talk about the life we are called to live today. Some churches want us to believe that as we "do" things, we gain entry or place in the grand and glorious scheme of things at the end of time. I tell our confirmation students to say "baloney" when they hear that kind of talk. I would suggest that as we contemplate the End, envision the Lord welcoming us into the great banquet - yes you!!!...and me!!!...and a strange assortment of people!!! From that vision...from knowing the End that is promised to us in Christ, Jesus, live the day at hand. The End is handed to us and it features God's eternal "Yes" that cannot be taken from us. So...what does that have to do in the face of today? Traditionally we say it has the power to shape today. Regard the End....and see what begins.
Connection: I'm on a kick of telling stories of Luther. He would have us regard each day in the light of our Baptism. We are baptized into the end of God's story for us. So as you walk around today...remember that you are still wet from your baptism...walking wet is how one person put it. Remember that as we die and rise again in baptism, we've been to the end already and today we can face what hits us as though it cannot defeat us and do us in.
Lord of the Beginning and End of all things, shape us this day so that we might know the freedom of life within your promise and challenge of life that is blessed by you from the start to the finish. Amen
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