Murder Mysteries and Apocalypse

Preached today at St. George’s Episcopal Church, Newburgh NY.

Genesis 28:10-19a
Romans 8:12-25
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

I love murder mysteries. Thanks to the public libraries of Ulster County, I’m reading three authors at the moment: The New Zealand/English Ngaio Marsh, who began publishing in the 30's; an English-speaker from Quebec, Louise Penny; and the Scottish writer Ian Rankin. Each writes in a definite genre: Marsh writes classic closed-room stories, set in picturesque British locations. Penny writes what are called “cozies” in the mystery trade – set in a fictitious rural Quebec village; and Rankin writes what are called police procedures, in Edinburgh.

They are all doing the same thing – revealing the identity of the murderer – but each does it differently. Marsh lays out the clues and gives the reader the same challenge, and the same chance, as the detective. Penny’s story evolves as time and the investigation elapses. Rankin’s stories lurch from event to event, and there is always violence before the culprit is unmasked and trapped.

Each mystery writer creates a small universe, like places in the world we live in but also not like them. There is a central character in each who is the agent for justice, and in whose life we become interested, especially if we read the novels in each series sequentially. And each of these little universes exists to embody a story, a narrative, whose ultimate end is to uncover the truth, to reveal reality, so that justice may be done and right may be established in the place of evil.

In other words, murder mysteries are little apocalypses. Just like our scripture lessons today. Like Marsh, Penny and Rankin, these passages from Genesis, Romans and Matthew are each apocalypses, moments of revealing truth, moments of setting things right at the end of the story. Because, in fact, the word apocalypse in Greek means un-covering, and when the truth is uncovered by God, things which were wrong are made right.

The story of Jacob’s dream is one of the most famous in all of scripture. In Genesis the ladder resting on the rock Jacob is using as a pillow is the opening from this world into the next, the uncovering of the entrance to the realm of God, in which the ceaseless movement of angels up and down, up and down, reveals the continual intervention of God’s energy and activity into Jacob’s world and ours. The dream of the ladder assures Jacob that his life will be the point where the divine meets the human in the world, and that his life will lead to the fulfilling of God’s purpose through the prosperity of his descendants. Jesus uses Jacob’s ladder to describe his own identity when he calls Nathanael from the fig tree in the first chapter of John: "Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man." (John 1:51) The cover is lifted, the curtain parts, and the truth is glimpsed for a moment: God’s energy, God’s angels, are always intervening. Our challenge is to find Jacob, to find the Son of Man, so that we may see heaven opened. The apocalyptic message is that there is a point of entry to the realm of God, and it is accessible to us, and if we live into its promise, God’s purpose will be fulfilled.

The eighth chapter of St. Paul is one of the greatest theological meditations on the purpose of God ever written, in any language, in any religion, in any age. His purpose is to uncover for us our real identity as children of God, to reveal God’s ultimate purpose for us individually as sons and daughters of God, but even more, to lift the cover, to part the curtain, and to see as it really is the true movement of what God has made: Creation for Paul is a living being, yearning for its fulfillment. He solves the mystery of existence, of the universe, and our place in it, when he says, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God.” (Romans 8:18-19) We are not what we thought we were. We are so much more, so very much more, to God than we could ever imagine on our own. The apocalyptic message is that there is a purpose to our life, a purpose to the universe, and it is found in the unity with God which God is preparing for each of us and for all of us, and not just us as human entities, but for the whole created order, eagerly longing for us.

After the excitement of Jacob’s ladder dream and Paul’s lyrical description of the stately progress of God’s purpose bringing all things into harmony, the parable of the wheat and the weeds seems harsh, even violent. If the story of Jacob’s dream is in form a little like Ngaio Marsh, a narrative told plainly and concentrating on the facts; and if Paul’s hymn to the unity of God’s creative purpose from Romans can be compared to Louise Penny’s narratives, which unfold from within the continuities of a much smaller created world; then perhaps the parable of the wheat and tares can be likened to the nasty underworld of Edinburgh, the non-touristy Edinburgh, in Ian Rankin’s work. In his stories evil is so palpable, and the necessity to engage that evil is so clear, that we know that in the end people will be hurt. We pray that it is the people who deserve to be hurt, and even though the just suffer injuries, even casualties along the way, the evil do always find their punishment.

The field in Matthew is not picturesque. It is a place of struggle, of hard work, of opposition to the good, where enemies sneak in at night to ruin the crop by sowing weeds. As in the detective story, a premature reaction by the owner of the field or his workers does not help, but can actually destroy the crop altogether. But there will be retribution. There will be a violent reaction. Evil will not win. What must happen first is for the difference between the wheat and the weeds to become evident as the plants grow. In God’s good time all will become clear. And in God’s good time, God will see that it all comes to a proper end, an end described so satisfyingly for those who want to see the evil suffer for what they have done. The catharsis seems as necessary to end this parable as a cathartic ending is for Rankin’s murders.

No doubt the parable of the wheat and the weeds reflects the mixture of good and evil in the Israel of the time of Jesus. It was probably remembered because soon enough the Church discovered that it too harbored different seeds, different plants. The temptation was to identify the evil and cast it out. That temptation is still with us in the Church. But Jesus’ advice then is still true today: God will do his own work. Remember who we are and what we are to do. It is not ours to judge each other. It is ours to grow, to be wheat instead of weeds. The apocalyptic message is that we are the plants which should grow into good wheat, yielding good for God. It is not our job to judge each other, and while there will be serious consequences for the weeds – for those who make themselves subject to evil – God will take care of it.

I don’t want to push the analogy of my three murder mystery writers to Genesis, Romans and Matthew too far. But there is something to it. I think we love murder mysteries because they create universes into which we can imaginatively place ourselves and participate in the double apocalyptic process of the discovery of the truth and setting things right. Today’s scripture lessons offer us the same process, but so much more profoundly. And with this difference: They are true. There really is a person upon whom the energies, the angels, of God ascend and descend. There really is an unfolding process going on which is leading inexorably to the exaltation of ourselves and all creation in God’s own being. There really is a difference between good and evil, and there really will be a time when the good wins.

May we find in our blessed Lord Jesus Christ the angelic ladder opening heaven to us on earth. May we begin to live in the awareness of the great purposes of God for each of us and for all that is. May we grow and thrive, do good in our day, and not be deflected by what is not good, in the confidence that God’s goodness will triumph over all.