The Believers have become fearless

Noah relaxed. He was having lots of experiences like this one over the last four weeks. He recognized the ease with which the believers seemed to deal with everyone they encountered now. They were constantly kidding around. Fearless, really. The mode of being under the spell of God, as Noah described it, took some getting used to. He was both attracted to and repelled by the enthusiasm of the believers like his priest and the minister he now spoke to.

Noah and the Crows

(Second in a series on the return of Jesus Christ)


http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/032217.cfm

DT 4:1, 5-9
MT 5:17-19


Noah watched the birds flitting around outside the window of his home office. “I should get to know the different kinds of birds,” he muttered. He’d never taken the time to educate himself about them. He called the bulk of what he could identify as either sparrows, robins, crows or hawks. All else were just birds. These were crows. They grouped in pairs and threes, and sometimes more, moving from treetop to treetop. Noah’s home sat high on a mountainside, so he could see the birds flying above the trees below him. 

The crows appeared unaffected by the return of Jesus and the saints. The new reality of constant coverage of Jesus and the Saints in the news, and now the burgeoning excitement of the believers, had changed everyone else. 

“So, what was your question again?” asked Noah’s neighbor. James was a minister of a small church in Woodland Park, and had come over to chat at Noah’s request.

“I’ve been assigned a story about how the fundamentalist churches are interpreting Jesus’ return,” Noah repeated.

“I thought that’s what you said,” James said. “So, you’re going to categorize the Living Word community up here as fundamentalists.”

Noah paused and looked around his office. He had stacks of books about business, theology, and physics. Highly educated and still clueless about the new order of folks coming into their own.

He adjusted his position in the chair opposite James, failed to hide a grimace, and said, “How about I ask the question again, more directly about what I’m trying to figure out? That be OK?”

James nodded, smiling slightly.

“What happened to the rapture?” Noah said bluntly.

“Ah,” James said. “Well, I think some of my peers are wondering about that, too. But the specifics of God’s plan are really up to him, aren’t they? Why don’t you ask Jesus?”

“How do you think I came up with your name?” Noah said. 

James raised his eyebrows. Noah explained. “You’ve got a verse on your billboard outside of Living Word. It quotes Matthew 5:17.”

Jesus said to his disciples:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.
Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,
not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter
will pass from the law,
until all things have taken place.”

“Jesus gave you my name?” James asked, feigning shock.

“Sort of,” Noah said, adjusting his seated body one more time. He looked at the crows again. They had moved to the West, still circling and hopping down the mountainside, landing among the tops of the Ponderosa pines.

“Oh,” James said. “You got an urging.”

“Yeah, that’s a good word for it,” Noah said. “I asked my pastor where he thought I should start, and he gave me a bunch of books on the subject, after he got a phone call to head over to the hospital. Someone from the parish was in a car accident.”

That’s another thing, Noah thought. Car crashes, broken bones, and heart attacks still took place. Even to believers.

“How’d my name come up?” James asked.

Noah handed James the handwritten note with Matthew 5:17-19 written down. It was Noah’s pastor’s handwriting. Noah found it sticking out from one of the books. Father Tom had jumped about, almost giddy, gathering the books for Noah. “Isn’t this whole thing amazing? So much fun,” he told Noah, grasping him by the shoulders as he ran out of the rectory.

Noah looked at James. “Then I saw your sign as I was driving by.” 

Reminding Noah about the Jesus reference, he asked, “So, your pastor is Jesus?” 

Noah almost went white, then gathered himself. “Uh, in a way, yes …”

James raised his hands in the air, waving them around. “Just kidding, Noah! Woah, calm down. Just kidding around. Jesus speaks through all of the believers, and probably especially your priest. When the community of faith asks, all ministers are available to the Holy Spirit’s whispers.” 

Noah relaxed. He was having lots of experiences like this one over the last four weeks. He recognized the ease with which the believers seemed to deal with everyone they encountered now. They were constantly kidding around. Fearless, really. The mode of being under the spell of God, as Noah described it, took some getting used to. He was both attracted to and repelled by the enthusiasm of the believers like his priest and the minister he now spoke to.

“So?” Noah asked. “Until all things have taken place. What does that mean?”

“God only knows.”

“Really?” Noah, asked. “That’s the answer?”

“Well, we’re finding out as we speak, aren’t we? Little bit at a time. Kind of like being born, falling in love, growing up, and dying. God does things a little bit at a time.”

Noah wrote down James’ words in full. No shorthand this time.

Reading over the sentence, he asked, “Many of us were told that when Jesus came back everything would be revealed. No more pain and tears. No more fighting. No more misery.”

“Everything seems to be revealed, yes,"  James asked with his arms open wide. "Little at a time. But, who’s in tears? Who’s fighting? Who’s miserable?” A smile filled his face, a full ear to ear expression.

Noah knew of many folks, slowly coming out of their homes and their simmering quiet selves, who were angry and disturbed by the apparent total overthrow of leadership in every function of life. Rumors had begun that Jesus was an alien, a demon, even the anti-Christ. The saints weren’t humans, and so on.

The proliferation of saints in the midst of everything and everybody, however, moved forward with a confidence and steady zeal foreign to an evil force. They healed people of every ill and malady, and reports of people being raised from the dead happened regularly. 

“We’ll see,” said Noah. He had his story to write, and more people to interview. Doubts kept creeping into his mind about this returned Jesus being the true Holy One. 

“People like me have all the constructs of this faith, this belief you so easily seem to express and buy into,” Noah said to James. “The amazing incidents and downright lovely stuff happening sure seems like the right thing. Yet, I’m afraid it won’t last.”

“If only it were the real deal, right?” James said. He then looked out the window as a battalion of hawks slowly flew by the window. James waved at them. They turned their wings a hundred yards out and swung back by Noah’s house, almost in a parade, one by one, unruffled feathers flicking at the two men behind the plate glass.

“They’re waving back!” Noah exclaimed.

“Of course,” said James. “Look,” he pointed down the mountain. “The crows are watching them, and hopping around. Fantastic.”

“Are they happy, or upset, though?” asked Noah.

“We’ll have to see. Until all things have taken place, I suppose.” James reached for Noah’s hand, heading out. He was beaming, shaking his head. He hummed as he left.

“OK, God,” Noah said, watching the hawks fly away in an uncommon gathering of 15 or 20. This display shouldn’t be happening, he thought. Typically alone, hawks would be floating, angling sideways, looking for prey in both the air and the ground. That much he knew about these birds, anyway. 

Maybe not. He'd only surmised his bird facts. He could be wrong. “Little by little, I guess.”

The hawks rose and dove in tandem, lifting and falling, riding on a roller coaster of invisible rails in the air, heading south toward the Peak. 

Below the fading hawks Noah saw that the crows had stopped their excited hopping. Necks craned south, they sat just below the treetops on branches, almost hiding. They watched the hawks dance away, and remained still, perched like dark holes, between the long tines of the pine needles.



Using Format