Do You Have a Reservation?

We were planning a special Friday night out on the town, beginning at one of our favorite local restaurants.  They have a reservation “system” which allows you to call in during the day and reserve a table by leaving a message. When we arrived at the appointed hour we approached the hostess and announced our arrival.  The hostess announced, “I am sorry, we don’t have your name in our book.”  The usual “discussion” followed: we called and left a message; we are not saying you didn’t, but we still don’t have your name in the book; etc., etc.  No amount of talking was going to change the fact, our names were not in the reservation book, and it being a very busy night, there was just no way to get us a table.  We were turned away at the door.

During Rosh Hashanah, the time of celebration of the Jewish New Year, one of the traditions is to greet each other with wishes that a person’s name is written in the book of life.  According to Jewish tradition, there are three “books”: the book of life, the book of death, and the book for “doubters”, those who are unsure whether their lives have been lived sufficiently well to have earned inscription in the book of life.  For all of those whose names are sealed in the book of life there is joyful anticipation of the judgments that follow and the next festival, called Tabernacles, which is a feast of celebration and joy for all whose names are sealed in the book of life.  For those who are unsure, there is a time for repentance, a time to get your life in order so that your name can be written in the book of life.  So, for observant Jews, during Rosh Hashanah, it is customary to greet each other with words which amount to good wishes for an inscription into the book of life and for a good year. (source: Wikipedia, “Rosh Hashanah”)

I believe that there is a book of life, and that it amounts to a “reservation book” for God’s children to dwell with God in the life to come.  We are promised that the inhabitants of the New Jerusalem, which will appear when the New Heaven and the New Earth are revealed, will be “only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.” (Revelation 21:27) 

But here is the thing, it is the “Lamb’s book of life.”  The Lamb, Jesus, does not write with a pencil that bears an eraser. The Lamb’s book is not smeared with erasures caused by cancellations.  The Lamb reservation system does not rely on you leaving a message on voice mail. 

In the biblical understanding of the names written in the book of life there is no “wishing” about it.  There is no concept of “living a better life this year” so as to earn an inscription.  When someone who knows Jesus says, “I hope my name is written there”, what they mean is “I know my name is written there, because my reservation was made for me by the Lamb.”  You can rest assured that you will not be turned away at the door.  You can know that you have a reservation at the Table for the celebration of a lifetime and beyond.  “Yes, I see your name right here! Your table is ready!”

Happy Birthday, People!

This Saturday is, for our friends in the Jewish faith, the last weekend of the year.  Tomorrow, October 2, at sundown, the New Year begins.  (God-created time begins with sundown, not sunrise. Read Genesis 1:5 if you don’t believe me.)  So, on the first day of the 7^th month of the biblical year, the Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah are observed. It begins with the blast of a shofar (a hollowed-out ram’s horn), and so it is a time also known as the Feast of Trumpets.  The trumpet announces the arrival of the time to celebrate the old being made new.

Some people believe that this day is the anniversary of the day God created humankind, namely, Adam and Eve.  We can argue about the meaning of the “six days” of Creation, and all that goes with it, but the thought that brings me joy today is this: humanity has a birthday, and we should celebrate it. October 2 is the day that God spoke the words that ushered in humanity,  which followed the days that God spoke the words which ushered in the globe on which humanity would walk, the Lights which would show them the way, and the animals and plants which would surround them.

“People” have a birthday.  There was a time there were no people. When I woke up this morning I was trying to picture what that must have looked like, when nothingness became the World and all that is in it. What was it like on the day when the rabbits and deer first saw Eve’s eyes admiring them; when the plants first felt Adam’s hands gathered  them up in the harvest?

Why doesn’t the Christian faith have a day to celebrate the birth of humanity? (There is a lot more to Rosh Hashanah than this, of course. Indeed, the Holy Days that follow are known as the Days of Awe, and it all ends with Yom Kippur,  the Day of Atonement. The holy days are filled with thoughts of the Book of Life, a topic to which I will return next Saturday.)

I wonder if Christianity’s lack of a day to celebrate humanity’s birth is because the Christian focus is not so much on what is as it is on what will be.  What the Christian expression of faith in One God adds to the Jewish expression of faith in that same One God is a focus on Hope.  We focus on the Hope that is found in the birth of the Creator who became a human.  We focus on the Hope that is found in the transformation of a new body after the old body dies.  And we focus on the Hope that this Old Earth will become the New Earth. We celebrate Genesis 1 and 2 by reading it through the lens of Revelation 21 and 22.  Go and read just the headings of those chapters and you will see what I mean.

So, yes, we should join our Jewish friends in the faith in helping them to celebrate the anniversary of humanity. Tomorrow night we should raise a “happy birthday, people” shout. I do believe there was a time when we “were not”, and I want to celebrate that we “are.”  But mostly, I want to celebrate the Hope that we “will be”.  Forever. Hallelujah. Sound the Trumpet!