The end of the world and fleeing from death: The one with Will Smith fighting aliens, Voldemort and angels pouring out bowls of wrath

Scripture: Revelation 15:1-8

In this summer of reading through Revelation, I would be remiss if I didn’t take one Sunday to talk about the end of the world. And not just new creation, which we’ll get to by the end of the book, but the actual end of the world—you know, the Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, and Bill Pullman fighting off aliens kind of end of the world, or the Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck on an asteroid kind of end of the world. Hollywood gets these visions of the end of the world, but probably already many of you have no idea what I’m talking about, so… back to Revelation!

The book of Revelation gives us several visions of the end of the world—in fact, it probably offers too many visions to give us an accurate, unified impression of it—but there are some general themes. Firstly, there are going to be some disastrous events. This really shouldn’t come as a surprise, because whether it’s global warming, nuclear winter, meteors, aliens or angels pouring out bowls of wrath, most ways that we imagine Armageddon are not very pleasant. Secondly, these disastrous events are going to unfold in quick succession. Again, this is something Hollywood has figured out for us. Every movie about the end of the world seems to take place within a matter of days from start to finish.

And lastly, this whole end of the world business? We aren’t going to like it.

That’s probably the most obvious and, yet, most debated aspect for those who care about the end of the world, because there is this high-and-mighty mentality that many Christians take about the end times. Too often I hear three things: 1) the end of the world (not the result but the actual destruction of the earth itself) is something good, 2) we can be ready for it, and 3) Christians are going to escape it because God loves us so much. These statements lay bare something rotten inside of us. They show that our desire for the end of the world is directly opposed to our ability to come to terms with our own mortality. That was a lot of big words, so here’s what I mean: too many Christians lay their hope in the apocalypse as a means of escaping earthly death. If you are hoping for the apocalypse, you are hoping for a shortcut to hanging out with Jesus in heaven. But there are no shortcuts. The path to new life always leads through death, so this hope that we can fast-forward past our own mortality is a groundless hope. More than that, it is an affront to every other saint and sinner who has died before us. Even more than that still, it is an affront to Jesus who died for us first. How presumptuous of us to think that we deserve better than Jesus! Our road is the same road as every other human being from the beginning of time. We live; we die; and then we are resurrected. No shortcuts.

There are some decent reasons to believe in something like the rapture—you’ve probably heard this term for the time when people will be snatched up from the earth before the real destruction begins. In Matthew’s Gospel there are some oft-quoted verses that say: “Two (men) will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left” (Mt. 24:40-41). But Revelation actually seems to presuppose something different. Yes, according to Revelation the faithful will be set aside but never is it said or otherwise implied that that is to cheat death. Regardless, my problem with the idea of rapture is not the extent to which it is biblical or not—we could argue about that all day—instead, my problem with the idea of rapture is that Christians tend to use it in hope of a shortcut. The Christian life holds no shortcuts. Jesus himself commanded us to take up our crosses and follow. We aren’t following him to a heavenly picnic; we’re following him to death; and only through death to new life.

If I had a guess I think our culture’s obsession with the end of the world is all about a fear of death. We are terrible at confronting the end of our earthly lives—just terrible. When I talk about death with young people you know what they say? (It’s almost always the same thing)

They say: “That’s depressing.”

You’ve heard this before. But why? Why is it depressing? It’s not as self-evident as it may seem. Sure, death is scary, weird and not normal, but depressing? The only reason death can be described as depressing is because we have bought into the idea that death is an end. We have believed a lie that the world stops with death, and in believing this lie we have ignored the power of love. If we believe in love, and believe it is stronger than death, then it’s obvious that things do not stop in death because love carries on in those who remain. It’s why we have funerals, for goodness’ sake.

There’s one great example of this—you’re all going to think I’m using this because I’m obsessed with Harry Potter… and you’re probably right, but I can think of no better example of fearing death than Lord Voldemort in the Harry Potter books. Most authors portray villains as heroes who are corrupted by a thirst for power—like Darth Vader in Star Wars. But in the Harry Potter books, J.K. Rowling crafts a character with a very different fatal flaw. Yes, Voldemort is obsessed with power and yes, he is unquestionably evil, but what drives him is something simple and very human—he is afraid of death. Rowling captures this even in his name—"Voldemort" is French for “flees from death.”

All of this is a long-winded and circuitous way of saying that we each have more than a little of Voldemort inside of us whether we want to acknowledge it or not. The question is not whether you are going to fear death, but whether you are going to remember, when you fear death, what it is that we claim as Christians: Jesus Christ came to live and die for you. This is the promise that you received in baptism—you are drowned in the waters of baptism, so that the final death is not the big death at all but only a little passing from this world into the new creation where you have always had one foot firmly planted. 

As for this end of the world stuff, we have to ask ourselves again: why do we care? Honestly, why? When Martin Luther was asked what he would do if the end of the world were coming tomorrow he famously responded, “I would plant a tree.” Worrying and obsessing and trying to figure it all out does absolutely nothing except waste away the life you have been given. This gets at the meaning of life, which—believe it or not—I don’t have a perfect answer to, but I think a good place to start with the meaning of life is to actually live, so that when you come across the dude holding the sign on the street corner that says “The end is coming!” you can think “Sure, why not? But as for me I will keep on living,” not because you don’t care about the end but because God is in the eternal present, not some imagined future. Your problem is not the end of the world; your problem is the person further down the street begging for food.

Someday we will all die. That will be the end of our world as we know it. It might come with angels pouring out bowls of wrath but probably more likely with cancer or heart disease, an accident or Alzheimer’s. Honestly, in those moments it will probably feel like bowls of wrath being poured out one way or another. And that’s really the point. When we stand before God on the last day it will not matter how we got there, what our theology was or whether we knew how the apocalypse was going to go down. All that will matter is that Christ has gone before, and then secondarily, the good news that we have left behind. That’s actually the message of Revelation as well. Yes, there will be destruction; yes, knees will bow in worship; yes, kingdoms will fall and the sky will crumble, the waters will turn to blood and the grass will be burned—that’s going to happen—but also none of it matters. What matters is Jesus—just Jesus—dead and risen so that we will be too.