Revelation, the Rapture, and What's Most Important

Revelation 21:1-6

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 I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,

“See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and be their God; he 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.”

And the one who was seated on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.” Then he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.

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Do you teach them about the rapture? That’s the question a woman asked me as I sat at Starbucks trying to write a sermon. On Thursdays before I preach, I usually head to a coffee shop or the library to write. It’s not uncommon for someone to strike up a conversation—I guess it’s not every day you see someone sitting in public with a Bible open.

On this day, a woman and her husband sat at the same large table as me. I could feel her eyes on me. I knew what was coming. I made the mistake of looking up from my screen—and she got me.

“So, are you a Bible student?”

No, I’m a pastor here in New Pal.

“Well, you’re awfully young to be a pastor…” (Like I haven’t heard that one before.)

“What’s your church?”

When I said, “Cross of Grace Lutheran Church,” the back-and-forth stopped, and she proceeded to tell me how great her church and her pastor are.

Then, either noticing my intentional body language—literally leaning away—or the way I kept glancing back at my half-written sermon, she ended the conversation with one last question:

“Do you teach them about the rapture?”

The rapture? I thought. I tried to come up with a kind response instead of simply saying, “Uh… no.”

“Well, in my tradition, that’s not something we focus on…” I said.

And goodness, was she disappointed in that answer.

“Well, you gotta teach them about the rapture. It’s the most important thing.”

The most important thing? There’s so much I could have—should have—asked:

• What do you mean by rapture?

• Why is it the most important thing?

• What does your pastor say when preaching about it?

• Who do you think gets left behind—and why?

  But I had a sermon to finish, after all.

I’ve never preached on “the rapture.” I don’t think I’ve ever even preached on a passage from Revelation. So, wherever you are, lady, this one’s for you. Because you’re partially right—it is important for us to understand what the rapture is, the bad and harmful theology behind it, and what we might imagine in its place when we talk about life after death.

Some of you know all about the rapture. Maybe you grew up in a more fundamentalist church or were terrified by the Left Behind series in the mid 90s. Others of you, good Lutherans that you are, may only have a vague idea of what it means. But all of us have been exposed to some version of this belief.

Usually, when people talk about the rapture, it’s part of a theology called dispensationalism. You may have never heard that word, but you’ve definitely seen signs of it—like every time you pass a billboard like this, now how’d that pan out?

Or this…

Or when you notice our culture’s fascination with the apocalypse and end time predictions.

Not to bore you too much, but the idea of the rapture was invented by a British preacher named John Nelson Darby in the 1830s. He took the traditional understanding of Jesus’ return and split it into two parts. First comes the rapture: Jesus appears in the sky, snatches up born-again Christians, and whisks them off to heaven for seven years. During that time, God inflicts wrath on the earth and Christians watch safely from above. Then, after those seven years, comes the final return of Jesus to fight the battle of Armageddon (mentioned in Revelation) and establish an earthly kingdom.

This whole timeline is a patchwork—stitched together from one verse in 1 Thessalonians, three from Daniel, and a single verse from Revelation. Behind all that is a bad theology and a harmful hermeneutic—a way of reading and understanding the Bible.

First, this approach takes the Bible literally, as if Revelation were some sort of roadmap to the end times. But, as you’ve heard us say before, we mustn't read the Bible literally—we’re called to read it literate-ly and seriously, taking into account the many voices and genres that make up Scripture. Revelation is apocalyptic literature, a kind of writing well known to the seven first-century churches it was written for. It’s not a crystal ball—it’s a prophetic vision full of metaphor and symbolic imagery, not a literal forecast of future events.

Second, this theology takes a few out-of-context verses to offer false certainty about what’s to come, rather than wrestling with the mystery of faith. The Bible gives us many different images of Jesus’ return: a banquet in Luke, a wedding feast in Matthew, paradise, green pastures, even a return to Eden. But none of these say when this will happen. In fact, Jesus says clearly: “About that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.” (Matthew 24:36) Jesus doesn’t want us trying to piece together a divine timeline. He wants us to live in hope and with trust.

And perhaps the biggest thing the rapture gets wrong is this: the idea that we’ll float off to heaven and away from all this; that our souls get to finally escape the pain of this world and just be with Jesus. But here’s the thing: the Bible never says we’re just souls that happen to have bodies. We are both—body and soul—and they will not be separated. Resurrection always includes the beautiful body God gave you.

And what if—just hear me out—what if at the end of all things, we don’t go to heaven… What if heaven comes to us?

Which is exactly what Revelation says. God establishes a new heaven and a new earth here, in our midst, and God takes up residence with us. Doesn’t that sound more like the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ? The God who entered into our suffering? The God who heals what is hurt? The God who accomplishes the divine plan through seemingly insignificant people, places, and things.

It should be no surprise, then, that God would come down to this broken world—full of broken people—and heal it until there are no more tears, no more mourning or pain or death, and make a home here with us. That sounds like the God we know in Jesus.

Lutheran theologian Barbara Rossing, an expert on the rapture and end-times thinking, says people are drawn to rapture theology because they want to see the Bible come to life. They want to connect Scripture with their own lives. They want to experience God—and think that can only happen if they leave this place.

But the truth is: the Bible is coming to life and we do experience God—in this world, in our lives.

The Bible comes to life everytime we feed someone who is hungry, give water to someone who is thirsty, wipe the tears trickling down one’s cheek, visit the imprisoned and detained, relieve someone’s pain, or welcome the immigrant.

We are in the presence of God here on earth every time we come to the table, when we share meals with our friends and our enemies, or as Jesus says, when we love others as he loves us.

Those acts—those holy, small, grace-filled acts—create little pockets of heaven on earth. They allow us to experience God right here and now, until that great day when God comes to live among us forever, making God’s kingdom come and God’s will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

So no—the rapture isn’t the most important thing.

But trusting that God will come down, give us new life, and dwell with us in a world made new, free of pain and suffering and death?

Now that sounds more like it.

Amen.

Thomas, Francis, and Touching Wounds

John 20:19-31

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews,

Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.

Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.”

But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”

Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!”

Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

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All across the country—and the world, for that matter—congregations are hearing sermons on Pope Francis, as they should. In fact, I am certain Lutherans will have not preached this much about a pope since the days of the Reformation! I am also certain today’s sermons speak much kinder of the Pope than Luther, who called the pope of his day a sewer of wickedness and the antichrist. Today, there will be none of that.

Pastors of all denominations are lifting up Pope Francis’ advocacy on migration, environmentalism, and reform in the Catholic Church. Many will praise him for his efforts to empower women and his more open posture toward the LGBTQ faithful. Others will highlight the simple lifestyle Francis chose, long before he became pope.

In Argentina, when he was known by his birth name, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, he eschewed the opulence of the bishop’s palace, choosing instead to live in a modest apartment. He cooked his own meals, regularly visited the slums of Buenos Aires, and took public transportation. People regularly saw the archbishop on the bus. It wasn’t just about frugality—it was about solidarity. He wanted to live close to the people he served. He was a shepherd who smelled like his sheep.

This commitment continued when he became pope. In 2013, Francis declined the luxurious papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace, choosing instead a two-room suite in a guesthouse for clergy visiting the Vatican. Breaking a century-old tradition, Francis said, “I am not used to opulence. is good for me and prevents me from being isolated.”

Even yesterday, at his funeral, Francis was placed in a simple wooden box, not the traditional triple casket. His final resting place at St. Mary Major has no grand tomb, no ornate inscription—just a plain headstone with the name "Francis." A quiet, fitting end to a life marked by humility, service, and downward mobility.

How fitting it is, then, that Francis' death coincides with the story of Thomas, because both Francis and Thomas were deeply familiar with the wounds of Jesus. Usually when we hear this story from John, we focus on Thomas’ doubt. We jump to his defense—saying we all want proof, all want what others have received. But today, what stands out to me is Thomas’ courage and Jesus’ graciousness. How gracious it is for Jesus to offer his wounds to Thomas, to provide exactly what his faith needs. It’s as if Jesus says, “If it’s my wounds Thomas needs to believe, then it’s my wounds I will give.”

It is a remarkable grace—to show someone your wounds, to put on display the very thing that inflicted pain, to reveal the reminders of rejection. Yet Jesus doesn't stop there. He invites Thomas to touch them. That is grace upon grace.

And it works.

Thomas doesn’t simply see the wounds and say yes, Jesus has risen. Thomas goes further in both deed and word than all the other disciples. I imagine his fingers trembling as he touched the still-scabbing nail marks. His hand must have shook as he reached into the spear-sized hole in Jesus' side. And then, only after entering the wounds, Thomas says the deepest confession of faith yet uttered in the Gospel.: "My Lord and my God!"

Not just master, not just teacher— my God.

Jesus is revealed not through strength but through weakness. Not in greatness but in meekness. It's not a miracle of abundance, not a sign of divine power, but wounds that lead to worship. Seeing the wounds, the disciples recognize Jesus. Touching the wounds, Thomas' faith is born anew.

Francis understood this. He knew that if he wanted to encounter the risen Christ, he needed to find and touch Christ’s wounds just as Thomas did. In one homily, Francis said:

"How can I find the wounds of Jesus today? I cannot see them as Thomas saw them. But I can find them in doing works of mercy and in giving to the bodies of our injured siblings in Christ,

for they are hungry, thirsty, naked, humiliated, in prison, in hospitals. These are the wounds of Jesus in our day."

This wasn’t something Pope Francis merely preached about. He embodied this, too.

Early in his papacy, he traveled to Lampedusa to mourn migrants lost at sea and decry the "globalization of indifference." In war-torn Bangui, he entered a besieged Muslim neighborhood to preach peace, declaring Christians and Muslims brothers and sisters. In Bangladesh, he met with Rohingya refugees, embraced their suffering, and called them "the presence of God today."

But perhaps the most moving example is this:

That is Pope Francis doing a video call through WhatsApp with the only catholic church in the Gaza strip. What’s remarkable is that Francis has called that community every night at 7pm since the third day of the war. Anton, the spokesperson of the congregation, said “the pope would always ask how we were, what did we eat, did we have clean water, was anyone injured?"

Was anyone injured? Even from a video call, Francis did his best to enter their wounds, to see suffering, to understand the pain they were enduring, that they continue to endure. And he did this every night, no matter how busy he was or where he was, telling them he was praying for them.

I imagine the community on the other end of the call did in fact show the pope their wounds, like when bombs fell on the attached school, killing six Christians sheltering there. Or in these last eight weeks while no humanitarian aid has been allowed in and people have died from starvation and disease.

Anton says the pope's final call came on Saturday, two days before he died. Francis told them he was praying for them and said he needed their prayers. "He told us not to worry as he would always be there for us," Anton said. "He was with us until his last breath."

It is not our inclination to look at wounds, let alone touch them. We tend to look away from pain, suffering, and death. Yet the story of Jesus and Thomas, and the example of Francis, invite us to do just the opposite.

And I get it—looking away is easy, even necessary sometimes. All the hurt and injustice can feel overwhelming, paralyzing even. But to have the option to look away is a privilege many do not have. The invitation Jesus gave Thomas is the same invitation given to us: reach out your hand. Touch the wounds.

I know we aren’t the pope. We can’t just call someone in Gaza or travel to the war-torn places of the world. But are there not wounds here, among us? Like in our neighbors grieving losses we don't always see.

In young people fighting battles with anxiety and loneliness. In the elderly who sit in nursing homes, too often forgotten. In the struggling families trying to make rent here in Central Indiana. The wounds of Jesus are in the growing homeless population in downtown Indianapolis. They are in the food pantries and shelters that are stretched thin, even in our own backyard. They are in the racial and economic divides that persist right here in central Indiana.

Friends, the invitation Jesus gave to Thomas — "Reach out your hand and touch" — is the same invitation he gives to us. To draw near. To notice. To listen. To show up.

So where, in your daily life, is Jesus inviting you to touch a wound?

- In the coworker going through a divorce?

- In the friend who's been quiet for too long?

- In the neighbor who just lost a job?

And for the wounds across the world: stay informed. Pray. Vote. Protest. Give generously.

Stand against oppression that causes such suffering. Only when we are familiar with the wounds and what causes them can we do something about them.

And Though your fingers may tremble and your hands may shake as you do it, you are reaching out to Jesus himself. And there—in the trembling, in the reaching—we find him.

The risen and living Christ, our Lord and our God.

Amen.