The Rev. Joseph Farnes
All Saints, Boise
July 30, 2023
Proper 12A
The Kingdom is like …. A mustard seed, like yeast, like treasure, like a merchant seeking the perfect pearl, like a net. Jesus speaks in parables – he hints at the Kingdom of God. He tells stories. He gives us a glimpse of the Kingdom of Heaven. But he does not give us a ten point plan for achieving it. He does not give us a motto, a vision statement, a policy proposal.
Jesus is Lord, the Bible proclaims and we confess in our faith. But Jesus is a lousy politician and activist.
Jesus didn’t stand up in the Temple and agitate for the priests to be overthrown and cast out of the Temple. Jesus didn’t whip up a crowd to run Herod and Pontius Pilate out of town. Jesus didn’t proclaim his Gospel as an action plan for taking control of society and government. Jesus did not start a movement to mold the world in his followers’ image.
And yet, so many Christians seem to act like that is what Jesus meant by the Kingdom. Some of you may have seen that a Christian nationalist group is holding a rally downtown later today, saying that they’re taking the nation back for God. They see themselves as warriors for Christ, going to purge out the “bad” things from America.
I have yet to see what the Gospel has to do with their vision. When Jesus says that we should turn the other cheek, they clamor for vengeance and power. When Jesus says that we should go into our rooms to pray and not make a huge display of piety, they want to re-instate forced prayers in schools, and we know the only kind of prayers they think would be acceptable. I recall what Jesus said about what we should do if we see someone dressed in such a way that we find indecent and provocative… and Jesus sure said that if we are tempted then we better pluck out our own eyes instead of imposing our moral needs on others.
Jesus said to care for the poor and downtrodden. Jesus said to love your neighbor– and not just the neighbor who looks like you, prays like you, thinks like you. Jesus wants us to love our communities and neighbors, not try to mold them into our image.
And it seems to me that Christian nationalist movements are all about molding people into an image other than God’s. It proclaims a narrow box of what is acceptable, what is Christian, what is American, and that anything outside that box is unacceptable, contemptible. What would they do with political power?
The fact that leaders in more conservative Christian denominations have also expressed alarm at Christian nationalism should give us pause – the president of the Missouri Synod Lutherans along with the former chair of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission have expressed concerns about this movement, that it distorts and undermines the Gospel. The Gospel is not imposed by force, and we humans cannot impose the Kingdom of God. Because, if we impose it, it isn’t God’s kingdom, but ours, now isn’t it?
The Kingdom of Heaven is not a thing imposed. The Kingdom of Heaven is a thing that grows and flows with life.
The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed. It is sown, and it grows. It grows and, as Jesus points out, the birds nest in it. The Kingdom of Heaven draws people in, it invites, it shares.
The Kingdom of Heaven is yeast mixed with flour until all is leavened. A little living thing, yeast, is added to flour, and the dough rises slowly but surely, and it gives food to all in the neighborhood. Three measures of flour isn’t a little loaf for dinner – this is fifty pounds of bread!
The Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure that gets found and then buried in a field, and a man sells everything he has to get his hands on that treasure. The Kingdom of Heaven is like a merchant who values pearls, and sells everything to purchase this perfect pearl. The Kingdom of Heaven is not a wise business decision, it seems, but it is worth putting your whole life into.
The Kingdom of Heaven is a net that pulls everyone and everything in. The yummy fish are kept and the inedible ones tossed. Notice carefully that the fish in the net do not get to decide who is yummy and who is not. It seems that this parable right here clearly counsels us to not pass judgment on the dignity and destiny of other humans.
The Kingdom of Heaven is not a thing imposed, or crafted, or instituted, or forced. The Kingdom of Heaven is God’s divine life flowing through the world, creating, renewing, sustaining, liberating, transforming us and all creation into the fullness of the image of God.
We are each made in the image of God. We each bear the image of God. In all the world, in all of history, each person bears that image of God. Every single person. Christ restores the full dignity of that image in each person – not to make them like everyone else, but to make them fully who they are called to be. We are each made, wonderfully made and wondrously restored in the image of God. Such is the work of Christ. Such is the Kingdom of Heaven!
The Kingdom of Heaven grows not by force, not by power, but by love. God’s love in creating each of us, creating us in the image of God. Christ’s love which we see most powerfully on the cross – Christ whose love led him to empty himself of all power and majesty to embrace our humanity on the hard wood of the cross. And the Holy Spirit’s love, sanctifying us and binding us together in communion, to take each bit of flour and bind it together with the yeast of the Kingdom and the water of baptism and create the bread of communion.
St Paul wrote to a community in fear; the Roman Christians lived in the shadow of the seat of full imperial power, a powerful military and great wealth. St Paul’s encouragement to them is not a promise that, one day, Christians would take over the government of Rome and have full access to that power and wealth to impose their vision. No, St Paul’s encouragement to them is that, no matter what, nothing can separate them from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. He writes, “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Who needs to conquer anything, when you have the love of God in Christ Jesus? That love is the leaven. That love is the mustard seed. That love is the pearl and treasure. Love cannot be imposed – love can only be shared, and grow. And nothing will ever separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Amen.