I was driving across my adopted state of South Dakota. It was a long drive. All of the drives across South Dakota are the long drives. (OK, enough with the Hemingway schtick).
To stay awake at the wheel, I took a stab at calling the national talk show on the car radio. Lo and behold, I wound up on air with conservative commentator Mark Steyn.
I stammered into a nervous rant about all of the corruption and decline in everything - government, church, you name it.
The host stopped me and said something like, Now wait a minute. We expect such behavior from politicians. But from those who claim to represent eternal verities? We should be able to expect something better.
Flash back to the early 80s. I'm a self absorbed seminarian. In chapel, one of the cresting wave of feminist students (LGBT wave welling up right behind) was in the pulpit.
There will be no rape in the kingdom, she intoned, and then narrowed her eyes and made an accusing scan of the the pews.
Yeah, it was ham fisted. And that particular bunch of males... well... no, I won't even.
But it strikes me that both the conservative talker and the feminist preacher were pointing at the kingdom of God. There is a realm of eternal truths and abiding love that the church claims to represent. And when it doesn't, it's almost too disgusting to call out, not because one wants to conceal it but because it is, as this good piece points out, so putrid.
So much of what absorbs us - Christian or not - is the stuff that will not be in the kingdom.
Rape, as the feminist preached, won't be there. There will be no more violence, abuse and oppression.
Slimy wheeling and dealing to entitle one and deprive another, as Mr. Steyn pointed out, won't be in the place of eternal verities.
But those are manifestly evil things that most folks don't advocate (although at which many will wink, shrug or otherwise passively approve).
Think about things that are advocated, even militated for, and hold them up to the the idea of the kingdom of heaven:
There will be no abortion in the kingdom.
There will be no gender, racial, economic, national or other privilege or pecking orders in the kingdom.
There will be no sexual identities/fetishes/whatever-the-next-DSM calleth them in the kingdom.
There will be no titles, credentials or other status symbols among the citizens of the kingdom.
There will be no institutions that MUST be preserved in the kingdom.
Oh, I strive for passing junk all over the place. I'm a man, husband, dad, etc. with bills to pay and neuroses to indulge and assumptions to reflexively assert and defend.
Christ's proclamation of the kingdom that is near us in him and that he is bringing to completion challenges me to imbue even all of this passing stuff, to the imperfect extent to which I am able, with signs of that kingdom - love being the first and foremost.
Probably hard to see this picture but it is St. John of the Cross's own little schematic from The Ascent of Mount Carmel. Basically, life in the presence of God - that is, entrance into the eternal kingdom - is at the top and is the goal. Everything that is not God, be it sin in its various symptoms or good things at which we labor, is nada (nothing) and will need to be left behind.
Or as we read in the New Testament,
For all that is in the world - the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and the pride of life - is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (1 John 2:16-17)
We blather about our footprint or our legacy. It is all passing away, if we take a kingdom point of view. So much of what we desire and strive after is nada.
When you get revved up over this or that absolute-must-have-must-do thingy, think on this exercise that I stole from a hospital chaplain. Looking out over an auditorium full of people, he asked,
How many of you can tell me your parents' names and what they did for a living?
Every hand went up.
How many of you can tell me your grandparents' names and what they did for a living?
Lots of hands, but not every hand.
How many of you can tell me you great-grandparents' names and what they did for a living?
The handful of genealogists in the room - less than ten - raised their hands. The rest of us squirmed.
We're all about two generations from nada. So much of what we identify as valuable, even essential right now will not be in the kingdom.
But by the grace of God in Jesus Christ, we can be.
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)
But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. (Philippians 3:20-21)
To stay awake at the wheel, I took a stab at calling the national talk show on the car radio. Lo and behold, I wound up on air with conservative commentator Mark Steyn.
I stammered into a nervous rant about all of the corruption and decline in everything - government, church, you name it.
The host stopped me and said something like, Now wait a minute. We expect such behavior from politicians. But from those who claim to represent eternal verities? We should be able to expect something better.
Flash back to the early 80s. I'm a self absorbed seminarian. In chapel, one of the cresting wave of feminist students (LGBT wave welling up right behind) was in the pulpit.
There will be no rape in the kingdom, she intoned, and then narrowed her eyes and made an accusing scan of the the pews.
Yeah, it was ham fisted. And that particular bunch of males... well... no, I won't even.
But it strikes me that both the conservative talker and the feminist preacher were pointing at the kingdom of God. There is a realm of eternal truths and abiding love that the church claims to represent. And when it doesn't, it's almost too disgusting to call out, not because one wants to conceal it but because it is, as this good piece points out, so putrid.
So much of what absorbs us - Christian or not - is the stuff that will not be in the kingdom.
Rape, as the feminist preached, won't be there. There will be no more violence, abuse and oppression.
Slimy wheeling and dealing to entitle one and deprive another, as Mr. Steyn pointed out, won't be in the place of eternal verities.
But those are manifestly evil things that most folks don't advocate (although at which many will wink, shrug or otherwise passively approve).
Think about things that are advocated, even militated for, and hold them up to the the idea of the kingdom of heaven:
There will be no abortion in the kingdom.
There will be no gender, racial, economic, national or other privilege or pecking orders in the kingdom.
There will be no sexual identities/fetishes/whatever-the-next-DSM calleth them in the kingdom.
There will be no titles, credentials or other status symbols among the citizens of the kingdom.
There will be no institutions that MUST be preserved in the kingdom.
Oh, I strive for passing junk all over the place. I'm a man, husband, dad, etc. with bills to pay and neuroses to indulge and assumptions to reflexively assert and defend.
Christ's proclamation of the kingdom that is near us in him and that he is bringing to completion challenges me to imbue even all of this passing stuff, to the imperfect extent to which I am able, with signs of that kingdom - love being the first and foremost.
Probably hard to see this picture but it is St. John of the Cross's own little schematic from The Ascent of Mount Carmel. Basically, life in the presence of God - that is, entrance into the eternal kingdom - is at the top and is the goal. Everything that is not God, be it sin in its various symptoms or good things at which we labor, is nada (nothing) and will need to be left behind.
Or as we read in the New Testament,
For all that is in the world - the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and the pride of life - is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (1 John 2:16-17)
We blather about our footprint or our legacy. It is all passing away, if we take a kingdom point of view. So much of what we desire and strive after is nada.
When you get revved up over this or that absolute-must-have-must-do thingy, think on this exercise that I stole from a hospital chaplain. Looking out over an auditorium full of people, he asked,
How many of you can tell me your parents' names and what they did for a living?
Every hand went up.
How many of you can tell me your grandparents' names and what they did for a living?
Lots of hands, but not every hand.
How many of you can tell me you great-grandparents' names and what they did for a living?
The handful of genealogists in the room - less than ten - raised their hands. The rest of us squirmed.
We're all about two generations from nada. So much of what we identify as valuable, even essential right now will not be in the kingdom.
But by the grace of God in Jesus Christ, we can be.
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)
But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. (Philippians 3:20-21)
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