Word to the Wise
Wednesday, July 8, 2009 - Wednesday in the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
[Genesis 41:55-57; 42:5-7A, 17-24 and Matthew 10:1-7]As you go, make this proclamation: "The kingdom of heaven is at hand."
The message is a simple one to say but not an easy one to explain in our day and age. We are tempted to add at the end, "In other words.....etc." Indeed, what DOES the message mean? Does it mean the same to us as it did to the first century Jews who heard it? It would take a lot more space than I have to give decent responses to those questions. I'm currently working my way slowly through a three volume commentary by an Anglican bishop/scholar, N.T.Wright, that tries to bring together all the current scholarship and adds his own insights precisely on these questions! In the meantime, I think we can say very simply that Jesus represents God's fulfillment of a promise to restore the "kingdom" but not just the kingdom of Israel in the geographic sense but to create a "kingdom" where no human is king but only God. We humans have tried over and over to "co-opt" this action by setting up our own kingdoms, ruled by all too limited and ambitious humans. This includes secular nations and, at different points in history, the Church. When we proclaim the message that Jesus has directed us to proclaim, we call others to faith in a kingdom that is not "pie in the sky by and by" but a true kingdom here that awaits an eventual second coming. It's not an easy message but it's the truth and we need to stand up for it. AMEN