Revelation 17:1-18

1 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, "Come, I will show you the judgment of the great whore who is seated on many waters, 2 with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and with the wine of whose fornication the inhabitants of the earth have become drunk." 3 So he carried me away in the spirit into a wilderness, and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and it had seven heads and ten horns. 4 The woman was clothed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her fornication; 5 and on her forehead was written a name, a mystery: "Babylon the great, mother of whores and of earth's abominations." 6 And I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints and the blood of the witnesses to Jesus. When I saw her, I was greatly amazed. 7 But the angel said to me, "Why are you so amazed? I will tell you the mystery of the woman, and of the beast with seven heads and ten horns that carries her. 8 The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to ascend from the bottomless pit and go to destruction. And the inhabitants of the earth, whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, will be amazed when they see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come. 9 "This calls for a mind that has wisdom: the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated; also, they are seven kings, 10 of whom five have fallen, one is living, and the other has not yet come; and when he comes, he must remain only a little while. 11 As for the beast that was and is not, it is an eighth but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to destruction. 12 And the ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have not yet received a kingdom, but they are to receive authority as kings for one hour, together with the beast. 13 These are united in yielding their power and authority to the beast; 14 they will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those with him are called and chosen and faithful." 15 And he said to me, "The waters that you saw, where the whore is seated, are peoples and multitudes and nations and languages. 16 And the ten horns that you saw, they and the beast will hate the whore; they will make her desolate and naked; they will devour her flesh and burn her up with fire. 17 For God has put it into their hearts to carry out his purpose by agreeing to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God will be fulfilled. 18 The woman you saw is the great city that rules over the kings of the earth."

Let us pray,

May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of all of our hearts, be pleasing and acceptable to you, our rock and our redeemer…

For those of you who have been following along with our Revelation reading plan. I’m sure you’f agree that Revelation is a difficult book to understand. I believe that understanding genre is key to understanding Revelation. We have to know what type of writing revelation is. Otherwise our interpretations are going to be way off. That’s true when it comes to scripture in general, but especially Revelation. 

First and foremost, Revelation is a vision. It’s not something that literally happened. Nor is it something that the author sees, and something that will literally happen in the future. It’s full of metaphors. Figures of speech where a word or a phrase is applied to an object or action that is not literally applicable. It’s raining cats and dogs right now. Doesn’t literally mean it’s raining animals. Just that it’s raining a lot.

Secondly, Revelation is apocalypse. It is an uncovering of some sort of divine truth. Remember that apocalypse originally doesn’t mean “end of times”, it means “uncovering”. God is uncovering God’s plan and God’s purpose for humanity. Even If human history never literally unfolds the way it does in the book of Revelation.

Today I want to further complicate things by exploring how Revelation is also satire. 

Dictionary.com defines satire as:

The use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.

When done well, satire takes the ills of the world, and points them out through humor.

Saturday Night Live is a good example of satire. Have any of you seen the Zoom Church skit? In it, the pastor has to spend the entire service reminding everyone to mute themselves. Only to accidentally mute himself. And not be able to unmute himself. So all people can hear is the choir singing off key. Everyone who has attended a Zoom meeting during the pandemic knows how frustrating it is when you are in a meeting with people who can’t figure out how to mute and unmute themselves. The skit makes fun of this problem in an effort to convince people to mute themselves during worship services!

I love satire, but there is one big problem with satire: not everyone gets it. Some people just don’t think it's very funny, because we all have different senses of humor. If you’ve never attended a Zoom Church service, you won’t get the Saturday Night Live Zoom church skit. Also, maybe you are a person who thinks it is sacrilegious to make fun of the church. So instead of finding the skit funny, the skit will make you angry. For some people, satire can come across as too much, whereas for others it can go right over their heads.

The Revelation is not just meant to be silly like many of these SNL skits are. But it is taken literally in much the same wrong way that people take SNL skits literally. And we’re not here to make fun of anyone who has taken it that way. Rather, we’re here to point out the real power of what John has to say by noticing how he said it. 

One of the powerful things about the book of John’s Revelation is that one of the important functions of humor, and especially satire specifically, is that it makes the scary things less scary. It makes them easier to confront. Empires like Rome or Babylon or any large empire in history are scary. Sure, they are great for a while for the “in” crowd, but for the common every day people on the ground, they are bad news. So picturing these empires as an over the top prostitute on top of a crazy wild monster thing defuses the fear while pointing out God’s ultimate victory over this self-absorbed, opulent empire. 

The challenge of a self-absorbed, opulent empire is that it is an attractive one. One that can lure us in if we aren’t careful. The whore of Babylon makes fun of something very serious. The danger of pledging our allegiance to empire instead of to the Lamb. While it’s easy to castigate empires like Rome or Babylon. The danger of pledging allegiance to an empire still exists in our modern world. 

The world witnesses the dangers of empire last week in Beruit, Lebanon. Where an enormous explosion left 171 people dead, thousand injured, and hundreds of thousands homeless. The explosion originated in a warehouse that contained 3000 tons of ammonium nitrate. Despite repeated sanctions and warnings to the Lebanese government to remove the ammonium nitrate, the government did nothing. The government wanted to wait until the crew paid them the money they owed before they did anything with the nitrate. In other words, this enormous explosion was an accident. An accident that happened due to the Lebanese government’s failure to take appropriate action to reduce the threat. 

Days after the explosion, the Lebanese cabinet resigned. You would think this is good news right? At the very least a step in the right direction? Not necessarily. At the time that I wrote this sermon, Lebanon has no plans to elect a new cabinet. The cabinet is basically still in power because of Lebanon’s state of emergency. Someone has to make sure that the hospitals still operate, roads are open, and victims receive the supplies they need. The cabinet just cannot propose laws or issue decrees. Many Lebanese citizens see this move as political satire. The cabinet found a way to resign while effectively staying in power. 

I think the Lebanese bombing is a good example of the limits of governments and the dangers of putting all of our faith in them. While governments are useful ways of administering human services and protecting natural security, they are not powerful enough to tell us who we are. They are not powerful enough to give our lives meaning and direction. They are not powerful enough to bring about true peace on earth. As the Lebanon bombing illustrates, they certainly are susceptible to corruption, greed, and gross incompetence. 

Friends, the good news of our Scripture passage for today is that the Lamb will ultimately be victorious. In the battle between good and evil we will face many distractions. And some of those distractions may initially look good. We have to keep constantly drawing our energy and purpose from the Lamb. Otherwise we will be distracted by the bright shiny toys the enemy will throw our way to distract us from the battle raging all around us. 

This week I asked you all to reflect on what is distracting you from following the Lamb. I know for me I get distracted by laziness. For example, I know that I need to sit down and write my sermon. But I will do anything to get out of doing what I have to do. I will buy stuff on the internet I don’t need. I will do laundry. I will write birthday cards. I will draft worship plan for the fall. All to distract myself from the intimidating task of wrestling with God’s word bringing God’s word before you all. I can work so hard on being distracted that I look busy, when really I’m just being lazy. 

When under stress, I think we’re all more susceptible to that which distracts us. And that’s okay. But part of the work of Christian discipleship is to be aware of our distractions so that they don’t overpower us. I’ve accepted that I will always want to do the thing I don’t need to do. So I make to-do lists for my work days. I reward myself with breaks throughout the day after I’ve finished the tasks that I didn’t want to do. I try to be kind to myself when I don’t accomplish all that which I set out to. 

Friends as we transition from Summer to Fall, I hope you all are thinking about how you are going to deal with distractions that come with new seasons of life and ministry. Particularly as we navigate the stress of an unprecedented school year, what is bound to be a highly contested presidential election, and a socially distanced holiday season. While we have the time, the space, and the brainpower, let us discern how we can do the work God has called us to do without giving in to the distractions that derail us from our purpose. 

Thanks be to God,

In Jesus’ name, Amen.