“A few years ago, researchers completed the most meticulous survey ever made of the San Andreas Fault. They found detailed features that nobody could have seen before. “ (Headline from Earth and Science, December 2005)
Everyone agrees: it’s just a matter of time before the rip in tectonic plates (presently resting side by side in California) convulse in cataclysmic chaos. How do we know?
In modern times, geologists discovered that continents are actually floating on a sea of molten lava and originally all land was joined in one mass. Through billions of years, one granite chunk broke into what we now know as the seven continents, drifted apart and continue to float.
Michael Poole
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The floating is not over; it continues and in fact has never stopped. Like pauses between heartbeats, the time between “earthquakes” is momentary in geological terms. The earth is an organism — alive, changing, breaking apart, then reuniting in new forms. Sound scary? That’s not the point.
Similarly, Jesus’ startling announcement, “The Kingdom of God is at hand,” sends political and religious shockwaves in every direction. Yep, such news still rips Judaism to the core, not to mention modern day empires and nations. Infinitely more powerful and important than present belief systems, governing structures or visions of God, this Kingdom news still reverberates to the ends of creation and beyond. The quake still shakes.
Jesus breaks apart earthly Kingdoms (political, religious and personal) for good reason: He wants to re-create and reconnect them in new and better ways. His purpose is not destruction, but reconstruction. From creation comes re-creation — beauty from ashes, from shame to glory, the Cross to the empty tomb.
Our God is an awesome god. He reigns. And he bids us to become agents or reconciliation ambassadors of this “new from the old” Kingdom that seemed so far away, but now is “at hand!” “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5). Thanks be to God.
What does this mean for gender issues, including marriage equality? How does it reshape the many faces of capitalism and democracy? How are social structures — the poor and rich — redefined?
All God’s children are messengers of reconciliation. You want to know what “church” should be about? Here you have it: We are bearers of the good news. The Kingdom of God is at hand. Receive this news, this new way of thinking that leads to a new way of living. Let go of the old life and take up the new life that is at hand — the one that’s here and now.
Feeling unstable these days? CNN and FOX make you want to take an extra sleeping pill or pull the covers over your head? “Wake me when it’s over.” Is your world breaking apart?
Our world has problems, cataclysmic chaos. That’s obvious. The urban blights of crime and poverty are choking the life from our cities. But the disease doesn’t stop at the city line. Suburban families are not doing well either. Behind pulled shades sulk exhausted, debt-ridden, empty shells of humanity. People are convulsing, writhing for an end to the madness. Social worlds are heaving, writhing, breaking apart.
Jesus often talked about the need to let go of one thing before embracing another. Stories like the “old and new wineskins,” “the seed that must fall to the ground and die” before producing new life and fruit, baptism in which burial precedes resurrection.
Here’s a thought: What if the very things that we are trying desperately to hold on to — traditional marriage, traditional worship, and traditional models of God — are exactly what’s keeping us from finding what we really want and need — the new life that God intends?
What if the thing you see as essential to your life and salvation are actually keeping you from the real life that Jesus offers? What if the way you thought things would always be needs to give way to how things can be? “Whoever tries to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
What if, in our miniscule fear-driven realities, we are living somewhere outside of “The Kingdom at hand,” as though the King is away on vacation, out there somewhere, so that we are thinking, “I have to make it on my own, grab everything I can, run for my life — the earth is quaking and shaking, convulsing chaos.”
Jesus said, “According to your faith so it will be for you.” And, “Whoever believes in him will not perish, but will have life AIONION” (the kind of life that lasts forever).
What if we receive this Good News into our lives and begin to embrace “the Kingdom of God is at hand.” The power of the King is present, here and now, not in some future world. Our God-King is here to heal brokenness, resurrect dead dreams, reconcile relationships and bring enemies together in new ways better than ever imagined.
How have you been wounded deeply? Who doesn’t know about that! Dreams crashed and burned? Is the old worldview crumbling before your eyes?
We shouldn’t be surprised that things break apart. Nor should we be surprised when they come together in delightful, unimagined ways. It’s the way God works. Like earth, we are alive, evolving and growing. Do not be afraid: The Kingdom is at hand. What breaks apart comes together again — only better.
Michael Poole ([email protected]) recently retired after 24 years of church leadership in Central Virginia.