A Time of Dragons

“The Time of Dragons”
The Rev. Dr. Fred G. Garry

Matthew 24.1-2;15-28

As Jesus came out of the temple and was going away, his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. Then he asked them, ‘You see all these, do you not? Truly I tell you, not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.’

‘So when you see the desolating sacrilege standing in the holy place, as was spoken of by the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand), then those in Judea must flee to the mountains; someone on the housetop must not go down to take what is in the house; someone in the field must not turn back to get a coat. Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days! Pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a sabbath. For at that time there will be great suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had not been cut short, no one would be saved; but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short. Then if anyone says to you, “Look! Here is the Messiah!” or “There he is!”—do not believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and produce great signs and omens, to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Take note, I have told you beforehand. So, if they say to you, “Look! He is in the wilderness”, do not go out. If they say, “Look! He is in the inner rooms”, do not believe it. For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.

Many years ago, I had a colleague who was obsessed with boundaries.  "That is an obvious boundary violation," she would declare.  There were times when I would speak to her, and I could follow her facial expressions as I described an event or a person.  At some point her eyes would narrow and there would be pursing of the lips and then, and as if on cue, "well, that is a boundary violation, plain and simple."  Sometimes I told her stories just to see that response, hear her make a pronouncement. Which I must believe, had she known she would have with all confidence declared that I had committed a boundary violation.

I worried about my colleague.  For when you see bad things everywhere, and true boundary violations are really bad, when you see the really bad everywhere, you are not ready for the moment when the bad things really appear.  Like the boy who cried wolf, reserve the dire warning for when the threat has really happened.

At a training on boundaries, I heard a speaker describe this in a helpful way.  He said, there are mistakes, which are common and can be reasoned with and amended and corrected; and, then there are abuses, which are not common, cannot be reasoned with, amended or corrected.  Mistakes are a necessary part of life, the trial and error of living.  Abuse is the breaking of life; it is destruction, crossing the boundaries keeping us safe. What the trainer said was, don't confuse mistakes with abuse.  Understand the difference between the foibles and faults and misunderstandings which make us human and the ill intent, the violence, and deception which is inhuman.

Seeing the difference between the two is not always easy.  Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book about this.  His book Talking to Strangers explores a phenomenon that shapes us all.  The phenomenon is called the default to trust.  You may call it the benefit of the doubt or not jumping to conclusions.  In this we are patient, forbearing, long suffering with mistakes.  We default to trust when someone says something or does something wrong because maybe this is a bad day, maybe they don't understand, maybe I am just not seeing things right.  We resist the temptation to judge or to see evil in the mistake.

The classic default to trust is about age.  "They are young; they haven't learned yet."  Or "their old, what can you do?"  We trust that time will fix errors in judgment or too much time has elapsed for correction to be possible. "You can't teach an old dog new tricks."  In this we default to trust.  Which for the most part, for the common foible, for the minor misdeed, this is fine.  This is civility, the grease in the grooves of everyday life.  Default to trust is how we get along and not cry wolf or see every misstep as a boundary violation.

At the limit of civility is what Jesus calls the desolating sacrilege standing in the holy place.  This is when the sky falls, things fall apart.  When boundaries are truly broken, there is real destruction.  In this destruction you want to hope that you are not vulnerable, like someone who has an infant.  Mostly though you need to recognize that this is not a mistake, this is not a bump in the road.  Don't "get your coat", don't look back, "run."  Outside the proper boundary of civility is destruction, abuse, violence, deception, theft.  Unfortunately, sometimes, we bear the weight of those who cross the line. Here we are not in the land of mistake, but the darkness of abuse.

On your bulletin cover is a cartoon.  I saw this thirty years ago and it made quite an impression.  The image is of a dragon resting against a tree.  He has just finished a meal and he is using the lance of a knight as a toothpick.  Beside him are the remnants of shining armor. The dragon ate the knight.  And this happens.  Because sometimes the dragon wins.

This is not the story we like to tell.  The knight is supposed to slay the dragon and rescue the damsel in distress and then there are rainbows and sunsets and perhaps a dove fluttering about as they all live happily ever after.  Which is good and true and has a lot to do with the default to trust.  We trust everything will work itself out.  "Give it time," we say.  And we should.  The path to authentic peace where we know who we are and can be kind not just to others but to ourselves, this authentic life where we are honest and love the truth, humble and ready to make amends, this takes time to achieve.  Time and a lot of grace.

But there are times, places, and people where there is no longer time.  The wolf has come; the trust is broken; the one who was your guide has led you astray on purpose.  And the impulse in us to say, there is always time for amendment of life, this voice in us that is so needed if we are talking about mistakes, this voice is not the one to trust now.  This voice saying, "there is a way out; we can fix this; it's not that bad" this voice, Jesus says, is false when the desolating sacrilege stands in the holy place.  This is a time of dragons and the dragon won.  There is no more time, no amendment of life when there is abuse, when the boundary of trust and respect have been destroyed.  Patience has proved an enormous waste of time.

This is the bad news.  Sometimes the dragon wins.  And we must be honest about this and not treat the abuse as a mistake.  Can the abusive person be forgiven; can the abuser find a life beyond violence; can the broken heal?  These are the questions of people who stay within the boundaries of civility.  Good questions.  Yet, these questions can rush past the truth that the desolating sacrilege has stood in the holy place.  Before there can be amendment there must be confession; before there can be restoration there must be sincere desire to be restored.  Forgive and forget works with mistakes, not with abuse.

The good news is that the dragons can be managed.  A good therapist will tell you the darkness that has grown in someone who is abusive, who brings destruction, the evil in the person who crosses the boundary, this is in all of us.  The fear that grows into anger that becomes vengeance and then enters the place of bitterness: this dragon is in all of us.  We have just not let it grow.  For whatever reason, we have kept the dragon at a manageable size.

In the children's book, There’s No Such Thing as a Dragon, Jack Kent offers this truth.  Billie Bixby woke one morning to find a dragon sitting at the foot of his bed.  It was about the size of a kitten.  He went downstairs and told his mother, there is a dragon in my room to which his mother said, "there is no such thing as a dragon."  By the time Billie came downstairs for breakfast, the dragon was the size of a dog.  After the dragon ate Billie's breakfast the dragon was the size of his mother.  During the time of morning chores, the dragon now filled the first floor and made vacuuming nearly impossible for Billie's mom.

Having grown quite large and seeing a bread truck driving down the street, the dragon gave chase.  Billie's house, like the shell of snail, went with the dragon.  Billie and his mom were trapped upstairs.  Coming home for lunch the first thing Mr. Bixby noticed was that his house was missing.  He set off looking and found it a few blocks away.  Climbing atop the dragon, he asked, "what has happened here?"  To which Billie said, "there is a dragon."  And his mother responded on cue, "there is no such thing as a dragon." But this time, Billie was not to be silenced, and said, "there is a dragon!"

And then things started to change.  With each recognition, the dragon shrunk and shrunk and shrunk until it was about the size of house cat.

Honesty is a powerful thing.  If you are honest with yourself and others the dragon can be managed.  This is the way mistakes are handled.  Be honest, don't repeat it, ask, why did I think that was a good idea?  This is what keeps our life together, allows the cogs and grooves to continue spinning so to live each day.

Be honest about what you can do and what you cannot do.  Remember dragons are in all of us.  They need to be managed, acknowledged, kept within the boundary.

Although there is a dragon in each of us, they are not everywhere, nor are they the size that brings destruction.  It takes a lot of shame and abuse to foster an abuser.  There is an enormous hurt beneath those who hurt.  This is real, but it is not everywhere.  The dark day when the dragon wins is not common.

When the dragon has grown from kitten-size to something so large it destroys your house, when dishonesty fuels the growth, when denial makes things worse, when the desolating sacrilege stands in the holy place, we need to be honest.  A terrible thing has happened here.  And we need to be just as honest saying: this does not define the world.  Sometimes the dragon wins.  True.  But such is a terrible moment in life, not what life is.

The teaching of the desolating sacrilege is spoken at the very end of Jesus' life.  We need to remember this is a story of Judea not Galilee; this is spoken at the very end, not in the day-to-day.  In the day-to-day Jesus tells us to consider the lilies and the birds; in the everyday Jesus says, there is treasure in heaven, pearls of great price, fields to be plowed and seeds to be sown.  The gospel of Jesus is not dire or menacing.  The path to the kingdom of God is not gloomy or foreboding.  The way, the truth, and the life is beautiful and good and true.  It is about freedom from incarcerating fears not the abuse of those who incarcerate with fear.

Jesus told his disciples every stone must come down.  The temple of our beliefs, the ideals that define us, the rules and laws that keep us safe, all of these must be questioned.  We must be willing to lay aside everything for the sake of freedom.  On a good day such a challenge is met in the gentle reminder, the patient parent, the forgiveness of a partner.  On a bad day, it is the destruction that touches our life, it is the pain of deception, or the violence of abuse.  Sometimes the dragon wins, and it hurts.  This hurt can bring the stones of certainty down as well.  This is a profound mystery of life.  Hard to navigate such murky waters.

Let us be patient with one another.  Bear the foibles and follies.  Don't judge or be quick to point out the errors of others.  It's an unpleasant habit the need to correct everyone all the time.  It doesn't help and no one will like you. We must default to trust, or things just don't work.  The benefit of the doubt is a good benefit; it covers a multitude of mistakes.

We must keep the dragons small.  Be patient, but also be honest.  There are such things as dragons.  They are in all of us.  They are there; they just don't need to grow.  If they do, that requires a different kind of honesty.  This is a hard day, the day we must name the abuse.  It is a hard day in life, but not life itself.  Amen.