“The coming of the Kingdom starts, not with a grand
spectacle, but a hidden presence.” Thus says Dale Allison in his commentary on
Matthew’s Gospel.
These past weeks we have been hearing a lot about growth and
seeds and things seen and unseen. The Sunday lectionary has jumped around a
bit, because Matthew uses a structure for his writing which is not easy to
follow if you are not reading very large chunks at once. So he starts one
story, interjects another, wanders around a bit and comes back to what he was
saying. It is actually the way most of us have conversations, but you have to
jump of you want a few concise verses to read in Church!
So the Gospel has a lot of snippets of the Kingdom – a mustard
seed, yeast, treasure, a pearl of great price and the allegory of a net of
fish. From this we may draw comparisons with small beginnings, growth, unseen
action, worth, sacrifice and final judgement. In fact, each of these snippets
is a sermon in itself – Matthew is rich with imagery, much of which takes a lot
of unpacking and none of which does well with over-simplistic interpretation.
So let’s go back to this idea of the Kingdom of Heaven
starting with a hidden presence. That seems to bring us to the heart of some of
the things which we have been talking about here at San Pablo over the past few
months.
We have talked a lot about Outreach, about the mission which
we share to the community in which we are placed. We have thought about what
God might be doing in those around us, in a hidden and unnamed way which people
might refer to as “spirituality” or “higher being”. We have thought about how
important it is to acknowledge that presence and still small voice as something
real and important in every human being – whoever they are. Something which is
in the essence of creation, which God gives to God’s people, every single one
of us.
Then we have talked about that inner life of each person
here – that life which seeps out into the world around us. We have talked about
being so transformed by that life hidden in God with Christ that we simply
overflow with God’s love, even when we are not being deliberately evangelistic.
We have remember how we are each growing to that place where our actions are
transformed and governed by our life in Christ to the point where we become
living examples of Christ and how even through reconciliation after
reconciliation, communion after communion, turning after turning we will always
be journeying towards that time when that hidden life is our whole life.
We have talked about the inner life of this community, how
we must live towards and recognize Christ in each other – even when that is
challenging. How we must look at the other as one in whom God is working, but
also be aware that sometimes we are called to be agents of change and
betterment of relationships between people.
The kingdom starts in a hundred thousand inconspicuous
moments of encounter with God and we are asked simply to notice those first
shoots, to believe that the bread will rise, to be willing to hand all that we
are over to this most precious of stories and make it one with our own.
Remember how a couple of weeks ago I said that Paul keeps
getting excited in Romans 8 – it is almost as if he is bubbling over inside
with excitement and it gets the better of his formal rabbinic style. He says in
our reading today,
“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.”
This to me is the climax of Romans, and perhaps of Paul’s
writings. Nothing, nothing, nothing will be able to pull us away, gnaw us away
or even apathy us away from the love of God – whether we like it or not,
whether we believe it or not and whether we want it or not.
That reality should come as an immense relief to us –
because it is not just true today it has been true and it will be true for us.
Even in your darkest moment, somehow, God was there. Whatever is to come, you
are surrounded by the love of God. And that is true not only for you but for
everyone else who you encounter – even those who are kicking and screaming
their way through this life – everyone has the potential to be able to receive
this love, to know this love.
But not to understand this love. We cannot understand
because when we try to understand, when we try to own God’s love in clever
formulas, or long words we make it less than it is. This is why this one
sentence jumps out in Romans – it is simply poetic – it does not try to explain
why or how – it just is. This love is hidden and real – yes it jumps out and
dances and catches us in its fire but in essence it is mystery because this
love is God.
At the end of the Gospel passage today Matthew uses the
phrase “scribes for the kingdom”. It is entirely possible that he was talking
about himself, but it is also possible he was saying that those who participate
willingly in the Good News of Jesus are themselves scribes for the Kingdom. The
scribes are those who hold the story of the people, those who have the ability
to write for good of for evil. Those whose words give life to the work of God
with God’s people.
Knowing that nothing will separate us from love, knowing
that God always hangs on – what story are we going to tell. Where are we going
to notice the hidden presence of God in our world and how might that be written
into the great narrative of which we are all a part.
The Church has a bad reputation for shouting – telling others
what they should do, how they should be, who they should love – but what if we
are in the business of gathering up lives and stories into this great fabric of
love, weaving together the world around us, carefully, gently, slowly , piece
by precious piece bringing those whom God will never let go of to a knowledge
of that love.
Nothing will separate us from the love of God, let’s commit
to listening and discovering what that really might mean – if we dare to
believe it.
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