"The Kingdom Nearly Seen"

2 Kings 5:1-15

Luke 10:1-11

Reverend William Nickels

July 4, 2010

Does this ever happen here in Kinston?  

I was going home a couple weeks ago, driving into my neighborhood, and I noticed that something had been hung on the doorknobs of nearly all the front doors I was passing.            

Someone had been busy! 

We get, in this way, up in Greenville coupons for car washes, offers from lawn services, requests for contributions of food, clothing and cars...  

and, as was the case on that day, announcements by local utilities about the work they’ll soon be doing to improve their service in our neighborhood. 

Those we kind of appreciate.  It’s helpful to get a heads-up like that.   

It prevents us from being quite so surprised when we open our curtains at 7 a.m. and find men climbing trees and telephone poles in our back yards. 

Jesus, as you just heard, was planning to do some kingdom-work in a number of towns and places he’d be visiting on the way to Jerusalem. 

And so, thoughtfully and wisely, he sent several sets of disciples on ahead of him… 

To prepare the way, to give advance notice, to warm the crowd up, to offer folks a taste of what was to come. 

Two by two he sent the disciples… with some very specific instructions about how they were to go and what they were to do.            

Eugene Peterson translates the story in this way: 

Travel light – comb, toothbrush, and no extra luggage.  Don’t loiter and make small talk with everyone you meet along the way.  When you enter a home, greet the family, saying “Peace”.  If your greeting is received, then it’s a good place to stay.  But, if it’s not received, take it back and get out.  Don’t impose yourself.   

Stay at one home, taking your meals there.  Don’t move from home to home, looking for the best cook in town.   

When you are received, eat what they set before you, heal anyone who is sick, and tell them, “God’s kingdom is right at your doorstep.”   

When you are not received, go and say, “The only thing we got from you was the dust on our feet, and we’re giving it back.”  Nevertheless, tell them, “The kingdom of God has come near.”  

The kingdom of God has come near, they were to say to those to whom they drew near – both those who received them and the ones who did not. 

The kingdom has come near.  What is the kingdom of God that came near to those people? 

One could, I suppose, think of it as a place with definite physical borders and boundaries –

Like, “everything from the Canadian border on the north to that twenty-five foot wall on the south, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans, plus a little more real estate here and there.”                        

That would be one way to think of a kingdom.  

But perhaps this perspective has some merit: 

It’s been said that wherever in the world two Englishmen stop and have afternoon tea, there one sees a bit of England’s green and pleasant land. 

Likewise, wherever you find persons consciously living by the foundational values we Americans share –  

freedom, individual rights balanced with communal responsibility, honesty, fairness, humility, compassion –  

wherever on the globe you find these being cherished and practiced, there you experience something of the American kingdom. 

So, the Kingdom of God?  You could say it’s where, in hearts, or homes, or congregations or communities, God’s sovereignty is honored, God’s precepts are taught, God’s promises are trusted, God’s love and justice are treasured, God’s values are cherished, God’s will is submitted to, God presence is experienced – there the kingdom’s to be found.   

Wherever God’s grace is known and lived out of, there the kingdom’s close at hand. 

In the lives of those disciples – the God-honoring, Christ-trusting, Spirit empowered lives of those 70 disciples – the kingdom of God came close to the people in all the places that they visited. 

Where, I wonder, have you experienced the kingdom of God coming close to you? 

Has it ever been brought to your home, your church, your community… by a person or by persons who came with love to share, from a simple faith, and with hope that you’d be helped, or healed, or in some way blessed? 

I’ve heard of the impact that a team of disciples from St Louis had when they came to Kinston following Hurricane Floyd to share the community’s struggle to get back on its feet. 

I’ve heard stories of sacrificial giving by persons in this church who opened a way for disadvantaged children to be educated. 

I have witnessed people with great faithfulness and compassion standing by friends sidelined by age, illness and hard circumstances. 

And in actions like these, I believe, something of God’s kingdom really has come close to you, or to others here in Kinston.                        

Blessing has been offered, received, known and rejoiced over. 

But, the nearing of God’s kingdom also sometimes comes within a sobering, even painful form of blessing – in some righteous judgment that humbles a person… and thereby opens the way for that person to receive the help he or she needs. 

Like Naaman, the mighty Syrian general, who couldn’t be healed until he humbled himself and submitted to bathing in Israel’s puny river Jordan.    

I’ve heard stories of how, when some here, under pressure from society, turned their back on friends of a different race or sexual orientation… 

of how they were stung by the gracious way in which their betrayal was borne by those friends… 

how it felt like the very sting of God’s righteous judgment upon them…  

and how it led them to repentance, apology and renewed and deeper relationship with those friends.  

Where, I wonder, have you sensed the kingdom of God coming near you? 

By whom has the reign of God been brought into your life, your home, your church, your community? 

Those whom Christ sent out in advance of his visits to various towns on the way to Jerusalem were intended to take their love for him…  

their trust in God’s goodness and mercy, their espousal of the values Christ had taught them, their willingness to allow the Spirit to work through them –  

they were to take it all in themselves… and, in themselves, to present it to others… to make a present of it, you could say. 

And so are we… 

as well as we can, as humbly as we can, as simply and purely as we can…                        

to show what it is to be alive within the kingdom of God. 

We are to go to present Christ our Lord… to show who he is for us, who he is for all persons.            

We’re to go not for gain, but for giving… 

to go into challenging and even dangerous situations… to be challenging and even a little dangerous, ourselves, sometimes.             

And yet, to go with the peace that he has given us.            

Whether we are received, or not, should matter very little to us. 

What should matter, mainly, is, first, that we go, and then how we go:                        

that we go as those sent by him…  

that we go in his way, with his concern, his compassion, his freedom and faith…  

that we go believing, really knowing, that he will be following us. 

Certainly, you and I are not the kingdom of God… but we are those in whom the kingdom may be seen… or nearly seen! 

Let it be seen.  Help it to be seen.   

Live kingdom lives wherever you go…  

so that you may, in faith, say to others, as our Lord says to us, that the kingdom of God has come near.