Now What: The Final in the Gospel According to Lord of the Rings

John 20: 19-31

Acts 5: 27-32

            Happy Easter!  That’s right.  Happy Easter.  Easter is not over.  In fact if you remember, Easter has only begun.  We are in day 7 of a 50 day time period known as Eastertide. Perhaps it’s a reminder to us all that after the events of Easter, the disciples needed a little time to reflect upon things, discerning what any of it meant so that it was not passed by.  Thus for us, every Sunday is meant to be Easter but also particularly during this time of the year, we are meant to remain focused on the events of the resurrection.

            And now the first question we often ask on these days is NOW WHAT?  At least I do.  Imagine that you were present back 2,000 years ago.  Imagine that all of this stuff that seems so much like a fairy tail, like it just can’t happen.  Now imagine that it was you who was there and that you knew it happened.  Jesus lived, healed people, you fed like 5,000 people with a few fish and a couple of a loaves of bread.  And then he died, and then all of sudden he wasn’t dead anymore.  You had the funeral, you mourned, you put him in the tomb, and then he got up and he said, actually, death has no power over mean….I mean after I passed out a couple of times, I think I would be saying NOW WHAT!

            The journey of Jesus is over, but in many ways it has only begun.  But he reminds them throughout the story that he will remain with them a little longer, but not forever.  And in the end, it will be up to the disciples to do something about this story that happened.  So in a way, Now What is not just a story of what each of the disciples is to say now, but what they are going to do to make the world know of this miracle.  And when the reality sets in, the world has changed so much that in some ways, there is no going back.  Easter has changed everything.

Frodo’s story

            In the same way, Frodo and Sam have destroyed the ring.  For 3 and a half thousand years, the power of the one ring could not be undone.  Even though the ring past out of existence for a long time, the shadow in the east remained.  And so when Frodo and Sam destroy the ring, the whole world has changed.  In Tolkien’s world, it is actually the end of the 3^rd age and the beginning of the 4^th.  The first question that probably goes through all the characters minds might be NOW WHAT!  The battles, the losses, the struggle for survival, and now NOW WHAT.  And after the celebration, I’m sure there are a few who need a little bit more reassurance as to what to do.  In fact, this is the brilliance of Tolkien in his closing chapters that the ring is not destroyed and then…well good luck.  There is always the aftermath, the story that actually ends the story.

            And what happens for the hobbits especially is a realization that there is no going back, that everything has changed and that they really can never go on in the way they have.  The trouble for the hobbits is that the Shire, where they are from, doesn’t really know anything of the outside world.  And so when they go home after this amazing journey they have been on, no one is both interested in even slightly aware that anything has really happened.  What’s worse, they probably wouldn’t be them anyway…..which isn’t that different from what I would say about Jesus’ rescurrection.  Very few would actually believe it.

            So NOW WHAT is a bigger question.  There is no going back.  The disciples have seen something amazing, have been on a journey that simply is more than almost anyone else might have ever experienced.  And in the end, they have to decide to make it real.  And of course there are doubts.  Thomas doubts Jesus’ resurrection until he sees it for his own worth.  Doubting Thomas isn’t the focus though, as his doubts are simply what leads him to where we are now….the NOW WHAT moment.

            The now what for the disciples really comes in Acts, which is the story of the Disciples AFTER Jesus leaves.  And the reality that the disciples can’t go back to the way it was it very present in and throughout the stories.  Take for example this short piece we are presented with today.  Likely the disciples have been preaching about Jesus and are brought before the high council, where they tell the Pharisees that it doesn’t really make a difference what the law or they say, they HAVE to tell the story and to let people know about this amazing story.  Everything has changed: the reality of the law means nothing as much as the story does.

            And many of the disciples will actually be killed for this kind of message.  But they hold to their beliefs, to the story that Jesus did in fact live.  That he was in fact the King of the Jews and the Messiah that they had looked for.  The reality is the story is so powerful that they really can’t go back, even it if means giving their very lives for the cause.

            And this is what finally leads to the finale for Frodo.  If you haven’t seen this movie, this is perhaps the most bittersweet moment of all.  All the main characters live, but in the end, Frodo has to leave.  The shire has been saved, but not for me.  Jesus saves the world, saves us from ourselves, creates in us the understanding of how to live the world as it was intended to be…but that world is not for him.  And in the end, the disciples know the world is not even for them.  That’s actually why at the end of the books, the elves return and take Sam to the grey havens as well.  The world is not saved for these disciples, it has been saved for us.  So NOW WHAT.

            Now we are meant to live out a life that reflects upon Jesus, and even upon these disciples.  Do you not wonder where our call to heal, to provide justice, to clothe the naked, where it all comes from.  You know this, because you have heard it before. But are you willing enough to look out at the world as it is, look back at the work of easter, and say, this is what I am now to do.  Have you taken that step. 

            That is what Tolkien has left us with.  A group of people who banded together to save the world.  An insignificant hobbit, someone no one would ever truly know, who saves the world of Middle earth.  And we, as witnesses, to begin to see the good that is in the world.  That is the sheer brilliance of Tolkien.  We don’t ever leave the story.  We take the story with us into whatever it is that we do.  That is the story of the gospel.  It lives inside each of us, bound to us and tearing at our hearts. The message of one who calls us all to conquer even death for the sake of the world.  So this day, this moment, this lifetime, let this masterpiece endure in each of us.  And let us proclaim loudly that NOW WHAT is just a passing thing, and that in the end, all things will be made new.