Sermon preached by Rev. Emily Tanis-Likkel, Eagle Harbor Church UCC
July 26, 2009
Matthew 22:2-10
Your Kingdom Come
Maybe it's happened to you. You plan a big party at your home for weeks – even months in advance. A few days before, you have no idea how much food to prepare, because no one is bothering to RSVP. You begin calling the invitees. You leave messages on their answering machines that aren't returned. Except for one person who tells you they need to wash their car on your big day. And one of your closest friends forgot and scheduled another commitment on the same day. Another that maybe they'll be there, it just depends . . . on what, you wonder? Ugh! You spent so much time hand-making those invitations, maybe you should have just sent out an evite. You get angry. Maybe you shouldn't have gone to such trouble. But mostly you feel sad, because it's going to be an incredible evening. The food, the entertainment, the fun. You were looking forward to connections being made and relationships deepened. You were looking forward to the opportunity of showing hospitality, of showing love. The kingdom of God is like a banquet where the honored guests don't bother showing up. But the party is not canceled. Instead, the doors are flung wide open and the whole community is welcomed in. Some shady-looking characters, whose history and police records are unknown. The guy who talks everybody's ear off and the woman who is always asking for money. Then there is the drunk, the gossip and the embezzler. They come on in, and they breathe in God's Spirit, and they feel a change coming in their lives.
We are journeying through the Lord's Prayer this summer, and today are exploring the phrase “Your Kingdom Come.” The parable of the wedding banquet is best understood as an allegory of the kingdom of God. The king represents God, and Jesus his Son. Those who decide not to come to the party are those who do not consider themselves to be part of God's household. The slaves who go out and proclaim that all are invited are the prophets. The gathering of people to the feast is the mission of the church to reach out and share the news of God's love. The wedding hall represents the church, the way-station that prepares us for that sharing. If we read on a little further we discover that one guest is thrown out to the outer darkness because he is not wearing a proper wedding garment. It seems pretty harsh – as Tom Long wrote, “A man plowing a field or tending a shop cannot be expected to pack a wedding garment in his lunch box just in case a late-breaking invitation slides down the chute.” However, this is an allegory, and so the guest represents one who is oblivious to God's presence and power in the world. Tom Long continues, “He is the recipient of massive grace. Where is his awe? Where is his wonder? Where is his regard for generosity? The other guests humbly, quietly trade in their street clothes for the festive wedding garments of worship and celebration, but there he is, bellying up to the punch bowl, stuffing his mouth with fig preserves, and wiping his hands on his T-shirt.” 1
What is the kingdom of God? Conventional wisdom does not help us here, because it is an upside-down kingdom, unlike the kingdoms of this world. It is the people of God, a realm characterized by grace, love, openness to all, and it's utmost concern for those who are marginalized. It is God renewing us and renewing the earth. Its doors are flung wide open in welcome. Whenever Bill Edmonds was asked the question whether he was a Christian, his answer was, “I'm trying to be.” We are always working on it, we are always growing in our understanding of how to live as God's children. I have been reading Madeleine L'engle's book of meditations, Glimpses of Grace, mindful that she was one of Bill's favorite authors. In it I found a beautiful jewel in how she understood the kingdom of God. “We can't completely understand the kingdom,” L'engle wrote, “but are given foretastes such as: being a loved and loving part of the body; praying together, singing together, forgiving and accepting forgiveness; eating together the good fruits of the earth; holding hands around the table as these fruits are blessed, in spontaneous joy and love.” 2 The kingdom is where each one is loved and is loving. It is where we receive and give. In our mission statement of EHCC, we use the term Kin-dom because truly we are all family. We are all of one household and one common table. We are invited to a banquet where sustenance comes from more than just the food, but from the togetherness of all who are at the table, and from the Spirit. The kingdom beckons each of us.
In Matthew 6, Jesus says to “seek first the kingdom of God.” Jesus told his disciples to focus on God's kingdom before they focused on God's will. Before we can discern God's will, before we seek answers, before we petition God, we are to look around and realize that we are at no ordinary banquet, but that we reside in God's household. In praying “Your kingdom come,” we are not asking for God to swoop in on a great gilded chariot, but rather are vowing to “allow God's kingdom to be established in us and through us.” 3 It is a call to action. We are to embody the kingdom of God, to become what we pray.
Luke 17:20-21 reads “Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, “The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.” The kingdom of God, although not yet complete, is already evident. Do we live any differently because of that? Are we more grateful, more awe-filled, more loving? When we humans stuff our mouths with fig preserves at a party, it is an effective way to avoid communication with others. When we don't open up and welcome other people into our lives and into God's kingdom we are like that oblivious guest. How beautiful it would be if all of us humans were constantly seeking to share more love, to welcome others, instead of waiting around wondering why no one is coming to us first.
A friend of mine has been a barista for a Starbucks in up-scale neighborhood for the last few years. In talking with her recently, I was surprised to hear how unhappy she is at her job. I thought you loved Starbucks! No, I just can't take it anymore, she told me defeatedly. Is it the corporation? No, Starbucks is great. It's the customers. Many of them don't treat me or any of the other employees as people. I ask how someone's day is going, and they don't even answer. They don't want to engage in any conversation, I don't exist to them. They just want their coffee. Her friends who work at fast-food joints, she told me, have the same experience. At first my friend could look past the rudeness, but now it is wearing her down to the core. What does give her joy is her work and friendship with the teenagers at the inner city youth program where she volunteers. Surely the kingdom of God is evident at Starbucks, when people are treating each other with respect and aware of the greater world around them. Yet as much as I enjoy sitting in a coffee shop, I wonder if God's kingdom is more easily palpable among intentional friendships forming among hurting kids and compassionate adults at a youth center.
The idea of kingdom of God is not a purely NT idea. In Psalm 105, David sings, “All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and all your faithful shall bless you. They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom, and tell of your power, to make known to all people your mighty deeds, and the glorious splendor of your kingdom. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout generations.” My recent trip to Synod allowed me to worship with a huge and very diverse group of people. We heard a sermon by Otis Moss III where he preached that no one can put a period on God's kingdom. Everyone is included, everyone is kin. We pledge to work together as partners with God to bring out the kingdom more fully and completely.
The prayer “Your kingdom come” is a longing within us. We are given foretastes. My family gets together often with another family in our neighborhood, and sense such grace when we are together. I glimpse it when I am with all of you. I sense it when I am having fun with my family, breathing in nature, and reaching beyond my comfort level. When the ice is broken with someone I did not know, who I may not have had much in common with, and suddenly truth breaks forth. When a simple moment becomes a divine appointment, the kingdom is palpable. It's harder for me to sense it when I'm wrapped up in my own worry, when my world gets too small, when I am holding on too tightly to time, or money, or control. When do you glimpse grace, this kingdom of God?
I know a teacher of a private school on the Island who had her own granddaughter in her kindergarten class this past year. She called her on the evening of the first day of school to ask her how her day had gone. They talked together about the day, and she told her granddaughter about some of the things to look forward to as the year progressed. After she hung up the phone she thought, I bet all of my students would appreciate a call. Each child was special and important – why should she only follow up with one? She called all of her students and asked about their experience of the first day of kindergarten. The kingdom is where all people are considered precious, worthy and beloved.
What have we done, I wonder, with our invitations to the banquet? Have we shown up? What are we doing at the party? This is about aligning our will with God's will. We'll have more on that next week when we take a look at “your will be done.”
In his book “Bowling Alone,” Robert D. Putnam tells the story of two men who knew each other from membership in the local bowling league in Ypsilanti Michigan. “Lambert, a sixty-four-year-old retired employee of the University of Michigan hospital, had been on a kidney transplant waiting list for three years when Boschma, a thirty-three-year-old accountant, learned casually of Lambert's need and unexpectedly approached him to offer to donate one of his own kidneys.” They had much different life experiences, were of different generation, and different races. Yet they bowled together, “and that”, writes Putnam, “made all the difference.” 4 What if we were to take seriously the fact that we are all part of God's kingdom? That we are members of the same family, that we love and worship together and that makes all the difference? Your kingdom come. The banquet that is open to all and graces us with a changed life. The invitation that is somewhere on the desk, under a stack of papers, just waiting to spill out and split us open and transform us.
1 Matthew, by Thomas G. Long. (Westminster Bible Companion) Louisville: Westminster, 1997, p. 247.
2 Glimpses of Grace: Daily Thoughts and Reflections, by Madeleine L'Engle with Carole F. Chase. Harpercollins, 1996, p. 208
3 Praying Like Jesus: The Lord's Prayer in a Culture of Prosperity, by James Mulholland. Harpercollins, 2001, p. 53.
4 Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community, by Robert D. Putnam. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000, p. 28.