Proper 13C, 11th Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 12:13-31
4 August 2013
St. Thomas' Episcopal Church, Whitemarsh
“Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.”
With these words Jesus was interrupted. Interrupted in the middle of fine teaching on striving for God’s kingdom in the midst of a fallen world...teaching his disciples and any who would hear and take heed -- that God’s kingdom has broken into the present and this means that when your life aligns with the purposes of this inaugurated kingdom, persecution is sure to follow. But don’t be afraid, take heart -- God is not finished. In the end, as Hillary’s bumper sticker assures us -- Love wins!”
Jesus spends a lot of time in the Gospels preparing disciples and would-be disciples to “be alert -- stay awake -- take heart -- take care - be ready!” The Gospels were written and shared in a time of much tension. Jesus had come, lived full and abundant life in the midst of them, was crucified and buried, rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven from whence the Holy Spirit was lavished upon His disciples. The stories of their lives were written into an old story making new and unexpected twists. What were they to do with this new kingdom -- this new way of life -- inaugurated in Jesus of Nazareth? The world was still hostile. The Roman Empire had a way of proving it was still in charge -- most especially to those who claimed anyone but Caesar was king. The earliest Christians lived with much tension.
Jesus knew they would...he knew because he experienced it firsthand. We would hope that God would just turn the world back right-side up through Jesus resurrection and that be the end of the story. But that’s not the way God’s plan unfolded. But we really should’ve seen it coming. From the beginning God has chosen to cooperate with human beings in creation. He made us His image and likeness in the world, making us co-creators with him, inviting us to rule and subdue the creation, being fruitful and multiplying in it. It only makes sense that God would choose to invite us to cooperate with Him in the restoration and renewal of the creation as part of our healing of the sin-marred image deep within us. Thus, instead of the immediate excision of all that is evil from the good Kingdom of God and fulfillment, we got Pentecost -- power to become citizens of an already but not yet kingdom. A kingdom that came in Jesus Christ, is present as the church lives as the body of Jesus Christ in the world, but still awaits future consummation when the Son of God reappears to rid the world of evil, darkness, and death and make it shine with the splendor of his glorious resurrection.
One thing was clear in the first century world -- the church expected the future consummation to happen sooner rather than later. There was an urgency to faith in the meantime. Most Christians believed that Jesus would re-appear to consummate the inaugurated kingdom in their lifetime, as early as days, weeks, months even.
Jesus spends a lot of time in the Gospels preparing the church for “the urgency of the meantime.” The Gospel is presented as “we have no time to waste -- get to work striving for the kingdom of God above all else, because it is what’s in -- and it’s not a new fad...it’s not a new world power that will rise up and eventually be the stuff of world history -- this kingdom is here to stay....so don’t be caught sleeping or even worse -- blending in with powers and dominions that are fading away -- when it’s king returns to claim everything for His own, be among the faithful!”
For the early Christians, it was this sense of urgency that sparked faithfulness that became fruitfulness for the Kingdom of God. When you really believe that the ruler of the entire kosmos might re-appear to take his throne and make all things new, say .... tomorrow!...your life takes on new meaning and everything in life is put into perspective. Your priorities are completely re-ordered with “striving for the kingdom” being the ultimate aim of each priority.
But days turned into weeks...weeks into months...months into years...years into decades and centuries...and Christ did not reappear to banish evil, death and darkness and make the entire creation radiate with everlasting life. As time progressed, the church had it’s moments shining with the splendor of the future kingdom...but it also became very complacent, getting itself so entangled in the affairs of a fallen world that it lost it’s sense of the urgency. The cry of the Gospel-- to stay alert! Be on Guard! Keep watch! for the new and enduring act that God is going to accomplish for the life of the world -- became for us only a faint whisper in the background of a noisy room.
That’s why I think I, at least, identify more with this anonymous man in our Gospel reading for today. I am part of a church 2000 years separated from that original sense of urgent mission to and for the world. Jesus hasn't come back in 2,000 years, so surely I don’t have to take the Gospel that seriously today -- there’s always tomorrow. And the world we live in doesn’t make it any easier...each empire or government that has existed since then, in the words of Walter Brueggemann, “has established itself as absolute, wanting the present arrangement to appear eternal in the past as well in the future, so that after a while, one cannot remember when it was different from this, which means having a available to our imagination no real alternative.” In other words, as with the character in Jesus’ parable, the world we live in is happy for us to live as if it is our only hope. So we learn to be successful in it so that we may join him in saying to ourselves, “Today is just like yesterday -- great beyond measure! Eat, drink, and be merry!”
It is even easier for us to settle in the present arrangement and loose focus of the urgency of God’s kingdom than it was for the anonymous man in Luke’s gospel. Jesus teaches us about urgency and we too respond with an interruption -- “Good teacher! Could you please stop rambling on and help me secure my future in this world?!”
But what if we were to recover that sense of urgency that propelled the church to mission in the first century world? How would our priorities be re-ordered? What are the things that we spend such time and energy on now that wouldn’t matter so much if Jesus is right and the kingdom is in fact coming in fullness and it very well could happen in days, weeks, or months?
It’s the words that Jesus shares just after the Gospel reading for this week that invite us to return to that sense of urgency:
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear (or plug in whatever it is you spend such time and energy securing for yourself...). For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing... [more than whatever you filled in the blank with.] Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds! And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? If then you are not able to do so small a thing as that, why do you worry about the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown in the the oven, how much more will he clothe you -- you of little faith! And do not keep striving for what you are to eat and what you are to drink [or whatever it is you are spending such time and energy striving for] and do not keep worrying. For it is the nations of the world that strive after all these things, and your Father knows you need them. Instead, strive for the kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.
Jesus invites us to a relationship of trust. We don’t understand why the meantime is so difficult or why it is taking so long for Jesus to return...it’s not for us to figure that out even though we could talk about all the possibilities...Trust God with your life...don’t try to take it your own hands. Don’t burn yourself out with anxiety...don’t work so hard for that which will pass away. Strive for the kingdom that has come, is present and is coming. When that is priority number 1 and the goal of every priority, everything else will fall into place.
Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again -- so strive for what He is bringing with Him. Amen.
