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On the rare occasions when they would choose a direct confrontation, rather than their traditional hide-and-seek-ambush-then-melt-into-the-jungle guerrilla warfare at which the Vietcong were so adept, the conflagration would begin suddenly, two or three hours before dawn. This time was no exception. Their confidence bolstered by superior numbers, they had flanked the Marine fire-base on two sides and chose a direct assault through the wire around the perimeter. The din was incredible: rapid pops from automatic weapons' fire, the "woosh" then shattering explosions of mortars swept over them all. It was total chaos, a chaos vividly, frighteningly portrayed for those who have never experienced the terror and chaos of combat in the film Apocalypse Now. The anti-personnel mines that had been strung on the wire around the base served only to blow big, gaping holes in the perimeter, making the Marines all the more vulnerable. Then, with the whole surrealistic scene bathed in the erie glow of magnesium flares, he saw his buddy lying wounded, twenty, maybe thirty yards away. Without hesitation, or even really thinking, he left the wallow (foxhole is too glamorous a word) which afforded him some protection, crawled, scurried, zig-zagged to his friend, cradling him in his arms. Above the din and chaos of it all, he heard the words, "I knew you would come; I always knew you would come."

Do we? We are just shy of three decades from the wake-up call that was the Tet Offensive, and we are thousands of miles away from Vietnam. For those of us who lived through that horror, who saw the obscene waste of human life, who saw the fabric of this nation ripped asunder, and still carry within us the disillusionment and cynicism that was the bitter fruit of that conflict, for us, it seems light years away, bathed in its own surreal light of Easy Rider flickering before our eyes, overwhelmed by the din of Cream, Iron Butterfly, and all the rest.

The jungle, the fire fight, the chaos, the three-hour-pitch-darkness before the dawn remains, however; it all remains. The place and time have changed; the rest is the same. And lying wounded of heart and spirit, with hope and life ebbing, we wonder, "Will he come? Will anyone come?"

Get in touch with yourself for a moment: Where is your battlefield, your firefight, your jungle? Where is your darkness? Is it the darkness of failure, that confrontation with yourself in the dark night of your soul when you are forced to look at yourself, your life as it all really is -- with all the hurt and pain you've caused yourself and others around you? Maybe your struggle is just trying to make it through one more miserable, empty, boring day -- the struggle to sense some direction, some purpose for your life, the struggle to find some joy where you've known only heartache. Maybe the firefight you know is the combat with forces over which you have little or no control: illness that threatens your life; the death of a loved one; the illness or death of a relationship.

Whatever the nightmare is for you -- or for me -- none of us want it to continue; each of us longs for it to end. And the longer it continues, the more joy and hope drain away, the more fragile our faith in a loving, caring, ever-present God becomes. We grow increasingly impatient; we ache for something else. And in our struggle, in our longing, we live the truth of it: faced with what is, but wanting what can be, challenges faith, breeding both cynicism and despair.

In our impatience, God has both a gift and a promise for us. They are the gift and promise that can bring us peace and hope in the "now" as we wait for the "not yet." The gift is Christ who has come; the promise is that Christ will come. Such is the witness from Scripture for us today in John's epilogue to the vision God gave him. Remember how the revelation of John's vision began, even in the first verse of the first chapter. There the Seer says that the vision God has given him is a vision of "what must soon take place." That was almost 2,000 years ago! Was he wrong? Not at all! He was absolutely right! It did take place! But more to the point for us, it is still taking place, and it will take place -- again and again -- until God's work to bring all of the created order to its ultimate completion in Christ has taken place.

To understand this, and to understand its power for us, we need to again grasp John's understanding of time, time in God's arena of action. It is not "sequential." It is not "past, present, and future," but time in God's arena of action is concentric and spiral. What I mean by that is that past, present, and future move back and forth, up and down, all intertwined together. This is why "what must soon take place" not only has, but is taking place, will take place, again and again.

You see, Jesus is always coming to us, bringing his "recompense" (read, "reward"). Jesus is always coming to give us entry into the presence of God -- which is his reward; Jesus is always coming to be the bright and morning star, to lift the darkness from our lives and to renew our battered hope. So above the din and in the darkness, in the chaos of our lives, when you and I are left on the battlefield of our own fire fight, with life and hope ebbing away, when we hear the Risen One say, "Surely I am coming soon," our response is that which has always been the response of the people of God: "Amen! Come, Lord Jesus!" Then, cradled in his arms, we shall be the ones to say, "I knew you would come; I always knew you would come."

How can this be? It's really quite simple; it requires no special revelation, no vision beyond that of seeing the person sitting next to you. We begin to understand it and see it all when we get the story straight: Jesus came to reveal the nature of God to us; he did that -- or, as John says in his Gospel, he made known the "name" of God (John 17:26). That "name" is "self-giving, life-giving love"; in that love, Jesus created a community of persons -- persons who are in Jesus, and because they are in Jesus they are in each other. Moreover, because Jesus is in them -- "with" them -- now, they shall always be with Jesus, and Jesus will always be with them. This is the story.

When you and I get the story straight, our eyes are opened, and we see it; that is, we see each other. We are this community Jesus has created; we are the people in Jesus and Jesus in us. So -- now listen carefully! -- when we come to each other, Jesus comes. Certainly this is not the only way Jesus comes, for Jesus comes in the Spirit, Jesus comes in the Sacraments, Jesus comes as we worship together in community, and so on. But this -- "coming to each other" -- is the most visible way Jesus comes.

You and I now begin to see it, don't we? We are God's gift to impatient people -- all the people out there and in here who are lying there wounded by living, impatiently waiting for Jesus to come and heal them. We are God's gift to the broken-hearted and beaten down. We are God's gift to the hopeless and desperate, to the bored and cynical, to the poor and oppressed. We are God's gift to each and every one who, in the darkness and chaos of their lives, are waiting impatiently for Jesus to come, come and lift up, come and cradle in arms of love, come making new, giving hope, bringing the very presence of God. We are the gift! For in and through us, Jesus comes, comes to love and give life, comes to do it now.

I know and hear a lot of people -- and I think you know them and hear them, too -- who spend a lot of time talking about when Jesus is going to come back. I confess to you that I'm not very interested in Jesus coming back; I don't think John was either. Scripture is of one mind that God and only God knows when God will bring the created order to its completion, and we are constantly admonished in Scripture to give up silly speculation on this and quit wasting our time worrying about when Jesus is going to come back.

So I'm not very interested in Jesus coming back; but I am extremely interested in Jesus coming period! I am extremely interested in Jesus coming to the broken and hurting around us to bring healing and wholeness. I am very interested in Jesus coming to our youth and telling them they are loved; I am very interested in Jesus coming to the bored and hopeless, to men and women who are empty inside. I am interested in Jesus coming to the people around us in this community and city, to people who desperately need what Jesus can do in their lives. I am interested in Jesus coming to his Church, overcoming its apathy and inertia, filling it with a passion to be a servant people; I am interested in Jesus coming period!

Maybe it's because I've been out there, broken and bleeding, in the darkness, with life and hope ebbing away, waiting, waiting ever so impatiently for Jesus to come and cradle me in his arms. Let me tell you, I am not alone! The battlefield is filled with the hurting, the hopeless; they, impatiently, are waiting; they are waiting for Jesus -- which means they are waiting for us! They are waiting for you -- and me -- to give them that chance to say, "I knew you would come; I always knew you would come."