Luke 21:25-36
‘There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see “the Son of Man coming in a cloud” with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.’
Then he told them a parable: ‘Look at the fig tree and all the trees; as soon as they sprout leaves you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.
‘Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day does not catch you unexpectedly, like a trap. For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth. Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.’

In a world of bombarded senses it is difficult to follow the injunction of Jesus to “Be on your guard” and “Be alert” because there is just so much that demands our guardedness and alertness.

As a Pastoral Counsellor living in crime ravaged South Africa, I regularly debrief the victims of violence. There are many dreaded symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) but one of the worst in hyper-vigilance. That heightened sense where all your scanners are on high alert and every situation resembles the conditions of your trauma and is therefore threatening. Surely this isn’t what Jesus is promoting? A neurotic joining of dots that sees everything as a threat and portent?

What we have here is not a doomsday-prepper consciousness but rather that kingdom-centred insight that is able to see the implications of current events and how they point to certain outcomes. This is, after all, the true understanding of prophecy.

Jesus is pointing to an important distinction between neurosis and awareness. In spiritual practice it is easy to confuse the two. As one who has been privileged to journey between the worlds of Christianity, Buddhism and Advaita (Hinduism) I can assure you Christians don’t have a monopoly on neurosis!

The Orthdox St Porphyrios of Mt Athos(1906-1991) writes:

For many people, however, religion is struggle, a source of agony and anxiety. That’s why many of the ‘religious minded’ are regarded as unfortunates, because others can see the desperate state they are in. And so it is. Because for the person who doesn’t understand the deeper meaning of religion and doesn’t experience it, religion ends up as an illness, and indeed a terrible illness. So terrible that the person becomes weak willed and spineless… They make prostrations and cross themselves in Church and they say, ‘we are unworthy sinners’, then as soon as they come out they start to blaspheme everything holy whenever someone upsets them a little.

So how is the follower of Jesus to be alert and on guard without being neurotic?

One of the clues he gives us lies in the phrase “pass away“.

It is the impermanence of every created thing which is the signpost to the existence of an alternative way of being under the reign of God. Heaven and earth, the entire created order will pass away, (The Greek literally means “become voided”) but not the logos of Jesus.

The fake news, the manipulated media, the lying and fraudulent leaders, layered as they are on top of the all too real, all too true suffering of humanity is enough to weigh the most devout soul down to distraction and drink.

The worries of this life, its crushing debt, religious enervation, biological conflagration, relational consternation and value dissipation is not all there is to the story, says Jesus.

Stand up and raise your heads Jesus suggests as an antidote to the conflagration all around us.

Jordan Peterson, Professor of Psychology at Toronto University in his book “12 Rules for Life: an antidote for chaos” writes about standing up straight and pulling our shoulders back as the first of the twelve rules. the What does he mean? In what seems a completely irrelevant piece of information Peterson describes how lobsters which are three hundred year old organisms, (that’s from before the dinosaurs) live in dominance hierarchies just as humans do. it is Part of the neurological structure of the lobster has evolved its way into ours with interesting effect. One way we can identify the top lobster in an area is to look for the most erect one. Dominance of an area means erect posture. As evidence of dominance and posture in humans have a look at sportsmen who have lost a game or a point. The first thing they do is drop their heads and the soulders slump. It is even more significant in that tests have revealed that erect posture releases more seratonin, the feel good hormone to the brain.

Jesus who knew nothing of third world neurology, knew that standing up straight and looking up was a way to face turmoil and chaos. One could translate his words as, “Don’t be defeated lift your heads and pull your shoulders back.”

You are not the victims here.