Our Particular Truth--June 21, 2023

Our Particular Truth--June 21, 2023

[Jesus instructed his disciples:] "As you go, proclaim the good news, 'The kingdom of heaven has come near.' Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment'." [Matthew 10:7-8]

When we say that Jesus brings the truth, it's not just any random truth.  And when we say that Jesus' followers are sent to speak the Gospel's truth to the world, again, it's not just an assortment of unrelated statements that are factually accurate.  We are called to bring a particular truth--the truth of the Reign of God.

In this passage that many of us heard this past Sunday, Jesus sends his disciples out with a specific message, not just to say things-happen-to-be-true.  The call for Christians is not to insert ourselves into other people's conversations spouting unsolicited trivia factoids--we don't just shout things like "Mercury is the closest planet to the sun!" or paint messages like "Wait an hour after eating before you go swimming!" on sandwich-board signs to wear on the street corners.  The particular message of Jesus' particular community is the specific truth of God's Reign coming among us--what we sometimes hear the Scriptures call "the kingdom of heaven."

In other words, when Jesus sent his followers out to the surrounding towns and villages as his witnesses, they weren't there to just offer unsolicited advice or offer lessons in general knowledge.  They were there to tell people that at long last God's Reign was breaking into the world in a new way, and then they were supposed to show people what that Reign is like--by healing people, raising the dead, casting out the powers of evil, and cleansing those with contagious diseases like leprosy so that they could be restored to community and reunited with those they loved.  In other words, they were bringing both a message and then an embodiment of what the message meant.  And all of it was good--all of it was about showing God's love to people who needed it, in different ways, and in all directions.

You'll notice, too, that Jesus doesn't frame any of this as a sale-pitch or an infomercial.  He doesn't tell the disciples that it's their job to "close a deal" or "get people to sign on the dotted line." There's no, "This first miracle is free, but if you want more, you're gonna have to subscribe."  Instead, they are supposed to show people what God's Reign looks like by helping, healing, and mending people, and then simply to tell them, "This is what it looks like when God's will is done.  Life.  Renewal.  Hope. New creation."  They were supposed to tell people that God's love was coming to them, and then to show them what that love meant in real life situations.  

Sometimes, let's be honest, church folks miss that.  We end up thinking that our job as "church folk" is just to get more recruits for our team, or new customers for our religious product.  But that's not it--we're not here to "sell" ourselves, but to embody for the world what it looks like where God is reigning.  And we offer that to the world, not in order to prop up our institution and get more resources for our little religious club, but as an expression of God's love for the world.  

This is hard for us to wrap our minds around in the culture of free-trials (with strings) and paid-promotions in which we live.  When a TV streaming service has a new show out, they might release the first episode for free to everyone, but it's not out of the goodness of their hearts or selfless altruism--they want to hook new viewers who will pay for the service to watch more episodes and new programming.  When the department store offers you big savings if only you'll sign up for their store credit card, it's not because they want what's best for you, but because they want repeat customers.  And when the grocery store is selling packages of Oreos or your favorite tortilla chips in a two-for-one deal, it's not because they are committed to ending world hunger: they want your business, and they want you to think of them the next time you've got a craving for Cool Ranch or Double Stuf.  But the community of Christ is different--we're sent to speak the true message of God's Reign in our midst, not as a means toward getting more for ourselves, but because God loves the people to whom we are sent. That makes us completely different from all the advertisements, sales-spiels, and telemarketers on the planet.  Like Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it, the church is the one community on earth that exists for the sake of those who do not yet belong to it.  We're not here to salivate over how to "get more people in our pews" as a survival strategy for our congregations or to "win more souls" like we are racking up points in a game.  But rather we have been sent by Jesus so that others may be drawn into the sway of God's love and might more fully experience the fullness of God's goodness.  So we speak it, we enact it, we share it, and we invite others to participate in it, because all of those things are glimpses of the Kingdom.

These days it is terribly tempting for each of us to take our own Strongly-Held-Opinions and decide that these are "The Truth" that the Church must take up and shout to the world--whether it's a political party's platform, culture war wedge issue talking points, or my own personal hobby-horses.  It's easy to turn anyone who disagrees with me as "enemy" and to dismiss them as "rejecting the truth," as though Jesus has committed to endorse my already pre-formed opinions. But when Jesus sends his disciples out, whether in the first century or the twenty-first, he gives them a different message from any of those--a clearer one.  Our calling is to bring the news that God's Reign is right in our midst, and then to be the evidence of what that looks like.  It will be to tell the particular truth that God has come near, and then to embody a glimpse of what that love does among us--healing the sick, raising the dead, and overcoming evil with good.

What if we spent our day today looking for ways to answer the question, "How could I show someone else the truth of what it looks like when God's Reign comes near?"  I suspect those answers will overlap quite a bit with those of the question, "What will it look like to love the people around me today?"

Let's find out.

Lord Jesus, when there are so many possible messages we could send in this day, keep us focused on communicating the good news of your Reign coming near. Let that be our particular message in words and in actions.