Some moments are more than just regular moments. There was a moment like that back on Good Friday, 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama. Martin Luther King, Jr. was meeting with two dozen of his advisors in Room 30 at the Gaston Motel. He was trying to make an important decision. A protest march was scheduled for later that day. Should he march or not march?
There were plenty of reasons why the answer to that question should be “No.” The protest efforts in Birmingham had started out slow and weren’t creating the type of momentum the Civil Rights campaign needed to succeed. The national media (TIME, Newsweek, the Washington Post) all called the campaign ill-advised and ill-timed, especially since the radical city government of Bull Connor had been defeated by a more moderate, yet still segregationist, candidate. Many folks counseled that time was needed to give the new man a chance. King was criticized by whites for planning a protest around the important shopping days of the Easter holiday—and criticized by blacks for allowing outsiders to come into Birmingham and make decisions that didn’t fully include the local African-American leadership. And, to make matters worse, the courts had just passed an injunction expressly forbidding King from taking part in public marches. Plus there was no money available to bail King out of jail if he got arrested since they the city had just upped the bail bond from $300 to $2500.
King had a lot of things to consider. His wife, Coretta, had just given birth to their fourth child, his daughter Bernice, whom he’d only seen briefly. His own father, Daddy King, was against his son marching, having been heard to mutter, “Well, you didn’t get this nonviolence from me. You must have got it from your Mama.” And King was rightfully afraid of what might happen if he was arrested again. This would be his 12th time behind bars and he knew how vulnerable he was locked away far from the protection of the media and the public eye.
In remembering that moment in time, King later wrote: “I sat in the midst of the deepest quiet I have ever felt, with two dozen others in the room…I felt alone in that crowded room.” He walked to the back of the hotel suite and closed a door behind him to think and pray about what should be done that Good Friday. It was a critical moment for King and for the entire Civil Rights movement.
Some moments are more than just moments. Sometimes this weightiness of time happens because of unusual events: someone is born, someone goes to the hospital, someone dies. Sometimes it is because of the forward march of time, like when a special birthday or anniversary comes up. But sometimes this weightiness is due to the uniqueness of the moment itself—when time itself is heavy with meaning.
This particular quality of deep and meaningful time describes the way Jesus is introduced in the gospel of Mark. Mark’s gospel has no Christmas story about a babe born in Bethlehem. In this, the earliest, gospel Jesus strides fully grown onto the world’s stage. He is preceded by John the Baptist, who baptizes Jesus in the river Jordan, and a sign of God’s favor—the descent of the Holy Spirit like a dove—will bless that special sacramental moment. Then Jesus will go away to a quiet place, a secluded place, where he will struggle and be tempted (not unlike the troubles we just heard about involving Dr. King). In the end, Jesus will step back center stage and say his first words in this gospel: The time is fulfilled. The Kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe in the good news.
Obviously that was a critical time—not only in the life of Jesus but in the life of the world. In theological language, we call this a “kairos” moment—a time that is full and heavy with meaning. But the very language Jesus chose echoed earlier moments of “kairos” time—like the moment when Moses stood before the waters of the Reed Sea and by God’s grace parted them so that the Hebrew people could escape their oppression in the land of the Pharaohs. Or the time that Moses’ successor Joshua stood near the river Jordan and told the gathered tribes, “Choose this day whom you will serve, whether the ancient gods your ancestors served or the gods of the Amorites in this land; but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” And later, after the death and resurrection of Christ, the apostle Paul routinely told the people learning about Jesus to believe this gospel good news, since, in his words, “now is the acceptable time; now is the day of salvation!” That’s why I chose the double image for this sermon contrasting the inevitable ticking of chronological time which marks our daily lives (represented in the pocket watches) or the vibrant in-breaking of God’s “kairos” time, when the eternal breaks into the temporal, and when a new chapter and new hope for parched souls is dawning (represented by the green seedling).
Now, lots of things can keep us from appreciated “kairos” moments when they happen. Lots of things can keep us locked into the ruts and regimen of chronological, earthly time. One common thing that causes us to miss “kairos” moments is fear. I’ll talk more about this in the second service today, but it is worth noting that fear happens for a lot of reasons. It can be tied to “fight or flight” instincts important for survival, but mostly it is tied to unconscious anxieties we carry around within us. We don’t like pain or bad surprises or losing loved ones or thinking about death, so anything that might lead to one of those experiences can fill us with fear. This type of fear tells us that life and the times of our life are out of control—and therefore we are no longer experiencing God’s time. However we are the ones who can decide whether or not we’re going to let fear live in our hearts and control everything we do—and God is with us always, in times of fear and times of confidence.
For much of this week, the news has been all about the horrible shooting at Parkland School in Florida. That school’s name has been added to a crowded list of schools like West Nickel Mines, Columbine, and Sandy Hook—and is now included alongside other public shootings like in the church in Charleston, the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, the factory in San Bernardino, and the concert grounds in Las Vegas. We are sick to death of this homegrown and nationally-tolerated violence. We feel anger that it happens, frustration that nothing is done, and remorse that in a few days’ time we’ll be talking about something else. Out of fear people talk about safety issues, illogically wanting more guns in more hands to somehow stop gun violence. More walls, more metal detectors and defenses are touted as the answer to our fears. But there’s a fundamental flaw in this argument. Some think that fear is a signal that we need to pull back and withdraw, when in truth fear is a sign that we have withdrawn too much.
The Parkland shooting reminds us of many important things: how there is a need for political reform and national gun reform. In the end, the faithful way forward is just that, a way forward—not backward; it is a way that engages, not withdraws; a way that is humble, teachable, sympathetic, not repaying evil for evil or abuse for abuse; but looking for the hand of God, the presence of Christ in the midst of these troubled times. It is not a ticking clock, but a young plant of healing change taking root. It is not chronological time, but Christ’s time as once more he strides out fully grown in our midst to say, “The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the good news.”
We are not helpless souls who wander aimlessly trying to fill up the indifferent, chaotic void of history. We are stewards of time and partners with God, who is Lord of the past, present, and the future. Our faith reminds us that Christ’s life, sacrificial death, and most importantly, his resurrection, created the centerpiece of all time. That was the true kairos moment in history. And yes, right then the kingdom of God did draw near. But the good news is that it has never receded since. As Christ is the risen Lord, as the church is filled with the Holy Spirit to be the body of Christ here on earth, as all we hope and trust and believe tells us to walk forward by faith, then now truly is the acceptable time, the day of salvation!
This good news is why you are here this very day—why you’re in church, why you’re open to prayer, and how you’re choosing to live in the one, wild, glorious life you’ve been given. Being apathetic or numb toward the events around us is simply not a faithful option, because literally they are only ways to kill time. And how can you kill time without damaging eternity? “Kairos” time has happened for us, so that we may ever live in that same spirit and that same newness of life.
On Good Friday in 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. stood in the room in the back of a Gaston Motel suite, wondering what to do. He thought of the many advisors waiting in the next room. He thought of the 300 people waiting in the Birmingham prison and the others preparing to march that afternoon. He thought about the 20 million African Americans who dreamed someday they might cross the sea of injustice and find their way to the promised land of integration and freedom.
For King, there was no more time for doubt. He changed into his work clothes and went back to the other room to tell them he’d decided to make a faith act, to march and go to jail. King would be arrested. He’d be put in solitary confinement, which evoked from him a written response, smuggled out on scraps of paper—which we’ve come to know as the Letter from Birmingham Jail. Soon thereafter children would be allowed to march and the image of them being sprayed with fire hoses and attacked by snarling police dogs shifted the tide in the national campaign for civil rights.
Is time empty or full—ticking away or growing up fresh and hopeful through the cracks of our world all around you? The kingdom of God has come near. Where else would you rather be? Now is the acceptable time. Today believe the good news. AMEN.