Jarrett McLaughlin
The End of All Things
June 15, 2025
1 Peter 4:7-11
Cold Open:
There are times when you’re working on a sermon and you have pretty much finished it and then something happens in the world. This has been one of those weeks. On top of what we are witnessing in Los Angeles, the news came in on Friday about Israel’s strike against Iran and these already tense times were ratcheted up even more.
In those moments I find myself wondering if I need to scrap the sermon and start over or forge ahead?
I thought about this for a bit and then remembered a certain Zen Proverb.
Before Enlightenment – chop wood, carry water.
After Enlightenment – chop wood, carry water.
You do what you always do – but now with a heightened sense of its importance.
Before the news cycle – love God, love neighbor.
After the news cycle – love God, love neighbor.
—
The sermon this week is entitled “The end of all things.”
It’s a line that comes directly from our reading today in 1 Peter chapter 4, but this week has held a lot of endings for our family.
This week I attended not one, but two graduation ceremonies – 5th grade and 8th grade, though the respective schools prefer to call them Promotion ceremonies.
Our Northside Navigators are moving up to be Culbreth Cougars.
Our Culbreth Cougar moves up to be a Carrboro High Jaguar.
It has been a week of lasts and finals.
On Tuesday our 8th grader was invited one last time to complete the sentence “Cougar Pride – Amplified!”
On the Elementary school front, we received our Final “Quicker Update” – the weekly message we have received from Zanna’s teacher Ms. Quicker who has been with her through fourth AND fifth grade.
We heard Northside Principal Coretta Sharpless give one last Promotion Speech to our twins’ fifth grade class. In addition to being an excellent Administrator, Ms. Sharpless has another vocation. That she preaches at a Church on Sundays is not difficult to discern. The cadence of the African American Church lives in her bones – so like countless black preachers before her – she’s got the “Start Low – Go Slow – Reach Higher – Touch Fire” technique locked down.
It has been a week of endings around our house.
I know that others of you who are graduating High School or who are College grads or who have one in your family are in that same space, but even if that does not describe you – we are all acquainted with endings. We do not have to live long to recognize that nothing lasts forever and life is full of endings.
Our reading today starts with the ending – hear these words from 1 Peter, chapter 4, verses 7-11. Listen:
Scripture:
The end of all things is near; therefore be serious and discipline yourselves for the sake of your prayers.
Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins.
Be hospitable to one another without complaining.
Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received.
Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ.
To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.
This is the word of the Lord
THANKS BE TO GOD.
Sermon:
American Christianity has a mild obsession with end-times speculation…with predicting when the end of the world will come.
From books like the Late, Great Planet Earth or the Left Behind series to websites like raptureready.com, somebody somewhere is always telling us the end is near.
Of course my favorite medium for this topic has got to be Highway Billboards.
There was a time when Interstate 40 and 85 were dotted with these simple billboards, white type face on a black background – each one with a different “message.”
A couple are seared into my mind
One read “Don’t Make Me Come Down There.” Signed – God.
Another one read “Jesus is Coming – Everyone Look Busy.”
I do not foresee UPC designating a line item in our Church budget for billboards like these, but that is not to say we do not take Scripture seriously – and the fact of the matter is that the earliest Christians – those who gave us the letters that make-up so much of the New Testament – they did live with this acute sense that Jesus would return very soon.
That much is as plain as day in 1 Peter.
“The end of all things is near…” it begins.
The difference, however, is that the authors of these letters seem less interested in “When” and far more interested in “…and so what.” IF the end is near, what does that mean for us?
Instead of “looking busy” what is it that we are to be busying ourselves with?
1 Peter reads “The end of all things is near, THEREFORE…”
“The end of all things is near” and so there is a logical set of conclusions that follow – a set of sensible practices that stem from this fact.
In this instance we get three pieces of advice – three directions for practicing faithfulness now that we know the end is near.
1. Be disciplined in prayer
2. Maintain constant love and show hospitality to one another.
3. Serve others with the gift you have been given.
Let’s take these one at a time
Number one – Discipline in prayer.
Is there anybody you have known that strikes you as having a rich and authentic prayer life?
I think about John Trotti at Union Seminary where I studied theology. Dr. Trotti was the librarian at Union for years. He was a short man with dark rimmed glasses, a southern accent that dripped like molasses and as big a Tarheel fan as you’ll ever find. In his shirt pocket, he kept a small flip pad and pen.
He was the kind of guy who would ask you what was going on in your life and you could tell he really wanted to know. You’d find yourself sharing a personal problem or something you were struggling with and he would take out that pad of paper, flip through a few pages and say to you “Okay, Jarrett, I’m going to fit you in to my prayers….next Thursday.”
“Thank you,” I’d say, “but, Dr. Trotti…next Thursday? That’s…very….specific.”
“Well,” he said to me, “I’ve figured out that I can realistically pray for seven people a day…at least in the way I feel like they deserve to be prayed for.”
There’s a lot of things you learn in the classroom, but some lessons you learn from the people you encounter in this life. Dr. Trotti taught me about the discipline of praying…really praying.
Has anybody taught you how to pray?
Number two – constant love and hospitality.
Now, I want you to think for a moment about a time when somebody showed you hospitality. When did somebody express welcome to you in a way that made an impression on you, or that humbled you, or touched you deeply?
I remember traveling to Haiti as a college student.
One of our trip leaders cooked up this idea that we would do this hike in the countryside and arrive at a historic site called Fort Jacque on Haiti’s Flag Day holiday.
In order for this to happen, though, we would need to spend the night out in the rural countryside and wake up very early – I want to say 4:00 am – to get started.
Once on the trail I understood why – it was one of the most uphill experiences of my entire life.
Way worse then Highgrove in the Southern Village neighborhood.
I was in my early 20s and thought that I was in pretty good shape, but I was humbled to see women two or even three times my age pass me effortlessly on those steep hillsides, all while balancing large baskets on top of their heads filled with fruits they were taking to market.
But the truly humbling act of hospitality was that night before. Our group was divided into pairs to stay in the very modest homes of some rural families. Two small rooms in the house I stayed in – two small rooms where the family slept on woven grass mats.
But for us – after they welcomed us into their home, the mother began laying out…ALL of the clothing, the towels, anything soft that this family had, neatly folded to maximize the cushion.
She then stretched a fitted sheet across what constituted most of their worldly possessions and make a homemade mattress for us to sleep on. I will never forget that act of hospitality. It…humbled me.
We get the word Hospitality from the Greek word hospes. It can be translated as both ‘host’ but also as ‘guest.’ It makes you wonder if true hospitality erases the distinction between the two. When you can no longer tell who is the host and who is the guest – perhaps true hospitality is being practiced.
Number three – serve one another with the gift you have been given.
More Greek for you – the word for gift is charisma…that’s one of those Greek words that came right on over as it is into the English language.
I started this sermon talking about schools but I will NOT make the mistake of invoking the slang word ‘Riz,’ because even I know that is “SO 2024.”
When we speak of charisma, we often refer to a certain giftedness that sets you apart from – or even above – everyone else.
But when Scripture speaks about gifts – about these charismas – they are given to us for building up the Church. If I use my gifts to set myself above the rest of you, then I am not faithfully stewarding the grace that has been given to me.
If I, the preacher, ever come to see preaching as more important than those who make and deliver meals to church members who are not well, then I am not honoring the grace given to me.
If I am ever tempted to believe that the Church rises on my sermons when I know full well that people come to a Church community because of the warmth of the people and how well they embrace newcomers, then I am sorely misguided and not honoring the gifts of the whole community…and I am certainly not living with the end in mind.
This passage in 1 Peter concludes by reminding us that we practice these disciplines so that God may be glorified in all things – that’s the purpose of it all.
Which brings us right back to where we started.
Isn’t it interesting that the passage begins by saying “the end of all things is near” and then concludes by saying “…so that God may be glorified in all things.”
I know we’ve had an unusual amount of Greek word studies in this sermon but can I drop one more on you? The Greek word for “end” is telos – “The telos of all things is near.”
Telos isn’t simply the point where something stops or ceases to be. Rather, telos is the point of something, the goal, the culmination.
Maybe it’s less that the end of history is near.
Maybe, instead, the point of all that we say and do is always near – the glory of God, the grace that sustains all things, the promise that tomorrow is in God’s good hands – all of that is not far off…it’s so.very. close and it changes everything.
—
I began this sermon telling you about Coretta Sharpless –
Principal during the week, preacher on Sundays.
Since this was my second rodeo at a Northside Promotion ceremony, I was ready with phone in hand to record her speech this year. This is a bit of what she told that group of hopeful and fearful fifth graders standing at the end of one era and the beginning of another.
She said:
“You are a Navigator and in you lies purpose, persistence and pride.
Sometimes that purpose leads you in ways that others have never imagined before.
When you navigate in ways others have not traveled – there’s no road map.
You have to trust the compass that’s inside of you.”
You know – Fifth graders aren’t the only ones who are filled with fear.
LA is on fire.
Iran is too, and making promises that Israel will pay.
And when there are nuclear arsenals involved there are plenty of reasons to be afraid.
Add it all up and it sure can look like the end of all things.
But God has given us a compass – a way to navigate whatever times we are living in.
We point ourselves in the direction of where all things end – the telos –
Which is to glorify God in all that we say and do.
The end of all things is that close. Amen.