“The Kingdom of God and the Priorities of the World”

Fifth Sunday of Pentecost

Sunday June 27, 2010

1 Kings 2: 1-2, 6-14

Psalm 16

Galatians 5: 1, 13-25

At the heart of the events that are taking place in Toronto this weekend are contrasting visions about the nature of life together in this global community.  The G20 participants, the demonstrators, and the wider public who have watching the events that are taking place this weekend are all, in their own ways, pondering visions about how the global community should be organized and ordered, and how those visions should be achieved.

On both sides of the fence are dedicated people who are aware that we are confronted with profound challenges.  Rampant militarism, shocking economic disparities, insufficient access to health care and clean drinking water, political corruption, environmental degradation, and the threats that are posed by those who would resort to violence and terrorism are only a few of the many issues that must be overcome.

Some feel that these issues are best addressed through the established systems of governance, and advocate a more coordinated approach to legislated policies, economic systems, and governmental regulations; others feel that governmental interference is the primary root of most of these problems; some feel that those who presently hold power are only concerned with their own well-being or, at the very least, are primarily in the service of the wealthy and powerful elites, and therefore feel that the best way forward is to completely overturn the systems of economic, political and social power that are presently in place and replace them with alternate forms of community.

Regardless of these differences, it is only fair to acknowledge that people on both sides of the fence – and those who are looking on – know that the present state of the world is not as it should be. 

We all share a conviction that changes must be made in order to promote a safer, more sustainable, more equitable and healthier vision for our global community.

The suggested Gospel reading for this particular Sunday in the church year invites our reflections on the life of a young man, many centuries ago, who also had a vision for the human community that was met with opposition and conflict.  

The passage begins, “when the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.”  Jesus was journeying to the big, diverse, multicultural city of Jerusalem knowing that there was the very real possibility that he was heading towards a conflict.

The vision of the world that he had articulated, the principles that he had commended, the priorities by which he was choosing to live, and the values that he encouraged his friends and followers to embrace were being greeted with increasing levels of hostility by the political and religious authorities of his day. 

And he knew that things would not go well when he got to the city.

In light of the heightening tensions, his friends asked him if they should engage in some level of action, or call down some level of violent reprisal against those who did not agree with his vision.  “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?”  But Jesus would have nothing to do with such violence.  The passage puts it quite bluntly. “He turned and rebuked them.”  He would not condone the use of violence in the pursuit of his vision for the world.

As he went, the crowds only seemed to attract greater and greater numbers of individuals.  We read, “as they were going along the road, someone said to him, ‘I will follow you wherever you go.’” 

Rather than encourage such an outpouring of loyalty, however, Jesus wanted those potential followers to realize what it was they were signing up for.  It would not always be easy, or comfortable, or safe.  “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”  Be careful, he seemed to be saying, following me is not going to be quite as safe or quite as easy as you might think. Following me will expose you to vulnerability, to challenge, to risk.

And at the heart of his words to them was his vision for the human community, his concept of the kingdom of God.  Both this passage, and so many of the Gospel texts, suggest that the very heart of Jesus’ proclamations was his vision of the kingdom of God. 

So what was the kingdom of God?

As we ponder this question, we must realize that the church has sometimes allowed Jesus’ vision to be reduced to an internalized, privatized form of religion whose main concern is the personal salvation of one’s soul in the afterlife.  Such an understanding actually undermines our ability to comprehend what Jesus came to do, and what his vision of for the global community was all about.

One way of understanding Jesus’ words about the kingdom or the reign of God might simply be to envision a community that is shaped by a common loyalty to the loving purposes of God. 

Such a community, in Christ’s vision, would be shaped by the commands to love God and to love one’s neigbhour rather than bound up in a strict adherence to a series of laws and rules. 

Such a community would not be perfect – if it were, there would be no need for a call to be willing to forgive, since the requirement of forgiveness clearly reveals that wrongs and offenses have been committed. 

And such a community would not be extracted from the stresses, the challenges and the conflicts of life, since the invitation to know a peace that passes all understanding implies the continued existence of situations that upset that vision of peace. 

But in spite of those challenges, it would be in that community – where love rules over all relationships, where forgiveness is practiced, where justice is done, where peace is known – where the love of God would be revealed.  

And the life and works of Jesus revealed what such a community would be like.  As he moved around and proclaimed the coming of that kingdom, that community of God’s love, wonderful things began to happen.  The hungry were fed, with enough for all and resources to spare.  The sick experienced healing and strength; the marginalized were brought back into community; the sinful were embraced rather than shamed and shunned; the powerful were challenged, and the lowly were treated with dignity and honour.  People joyfully shared food and drink – to the point of being called gluttons and drunkards by those who thought that faithfulness must be demonstrated with morbid and life-denying piety.  Greatness was demonstrated in willing servanthood. 

He inspired his followers to envision a community in which the poor would find blessing; the mourning would find comfort; those who sought to live in peace would find their longings fulfilled.   Justice would be done; kindness would be honoured; truth would be told; power would not be used for selfish gain.  It would be a community in which the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control would blossom and grow. 

And, in such a community, life in abundance and joy would be known.  I have come that they might have life, and have it in abundance.  I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and so that your joy may be complete – this is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.

Jesus came to help us to catch a glimpse of what the world might be like if we actually allowed God’s love to shape our common life, and to reign over us.

Of course, such a vision, such a community is a challenge to the established powers and empires of this world.  And such a vision is equally a challenge to those who would use threats of violence, and demonstrations of anger, to try to force others to embrace their competing visions.  

And such a vision required the dedication of one’s entire life.  As today’s passage reveals, Jesus called people to follow him, to set their loyalty to him and to his vision at the central priority of their lives.  And some who he called, as the passage unfolds, were willing to follow him, but had other loyalties, other obligations, other commitments that they felt needed to be honoured first.

A number of these alternate types of loyalty are addressed in the subsequent verses.   One potential follower asked for leave to go and attend to important familial and cultural obligations.  “Lord, first let me go and bury my father”, the follower said. 

And Jesus’ response?  “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” 

Another stated their willingness to be his follower, but asked for the opportunity to quickly go and say goodbye to their family members.

And Jesus’ response?  “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”  The image is quite compelling.  When a farmer has begun to plow a field, they must keep watching where they are going.  To look back over one’s shoulder after the plow has begun to move means that the field will not be properly prepared to produce its crops and fruits. 

In certain ways, his responses to these seemingly legitimate requests seem quite harsh.  After all, who can fault a person for wanting to honour familial obligations, or to bid their families farewell before following an itinerant preacher to the big city?  How many of us would question the lack of courtesy, to say nothing of the mental health, of a person who suddenly took off after some religious guru, without saying goodbye, or who trailed away when their parent had just died and before they were even buried?   When we think about how we might react to someone who followed Jesus’ words in this passage, we cannot help but realize that Jesus’ words were, indeed, quite strange.

So what is the issue that this passage is seeking to address?  What message is it seeking to convey to us, as readers?

Jesus was not suggesting that such obligations were unimportant or that they should be avoided.  Rather, his words called potential followers to an examination of their priorities, and to the loyalties by which they were structuring their perspectives.  As long as one’s family, or cultural expectations, or vocational obligations were more important than responding to his call to follow, the potential follower was not yet ready to respond.  Jesus knew that family, culture, community, ideology, vocation and patriotism, when elevated above the call to discipleship, would have the power to undermine one’s loyalty to Christ – and would undermine their dedication to the community of God’s love that Christ had come to form.  

Until one was ready to place the call of Christ at the center of their life’s priorities, they were not yet ready to follow him. 

And, as he set his face toward Jerusalem, he was about to show them both the lengths to which he was willing to go to demonstrate the forgiving love of God, and the consequences of the clash between his vision and the priorities of the world. He was about to demonstrate the ultimate act of courageous, self-giving, gracious, forgiving love.  In the face of corrupt and despotic powers, he would not compromise who he was or what he had come to do.  He would not resort to violence; he would pray for those who were killing him; he would, even in his moment of greatest need, provide comfort to a broken man who was nailed to a cross beside him.

He would be killed for seeking to live by the vision that he had come to share.

But neither he, nor the vision that he had articulated, would be destroyed.  The cross was not the end of the story.

And the story goes on. The powerful empires of his day have disappeared.  The powerful leaders of his time are forgotten in the mists of antiquity.  The armed insurrections and attempts to throw down the powerful using the threats of danger and of violence continue to rise and to fall away, useless.

But his vision of a community shaped by the love of God lives on – and grows.  And he continues to allow us, as his followers in every age, to catch some small glimpse of the vision of that kingdom, that reign, that community of God’s love.  He calls us to seek that kingdom with our lives, to resist any other obligation, any other claim, any other loyalty which would seek to stand in the way of its fulfillment.

We continue to live in the faith and in the hope that his vision of a community shaped by love will, ultimately, be revealed in this world.  We believe that there will come a time when we will no longer need to spend billions of dollars protecting ourselves from each other; there will come a time when we will pull down the fences and the walls that we build to keep people apart; there will come a time when our harmony with creation will be restored; there will come a time when all of God’s beloved children will share the riches and the resources of this earth; there will come a time when threats of terror and fear will not create divisions between us; there will come a time when peace, abundance, joy and love will be known by all; there will come a time when death itself will be no more, when tears will be wiped from every eye, when mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things will have passed away.  

We wait for such a vision to be fulfilled; and we work towards that vision for the global community with everything that is within us.  The fulfillment of such a vision will not always be easy, but Jesus never promised that it would. 

But the Gospel of Jesus Christ continues to call to each one of us, inviting us to catch a vision of that new community shaped by justice, by forgiveness, by joy and by love – and to offer our lives for its fulfillment. 

Which leaves us with only one question.

Are we ready to follow him?