Been thinking about how the Kingdom grows lately. These thoughts have mostly come from my readings in Jesus for President and my aggravation with some poison ivy that’s sprouted up in our backyard.  Jesus says that Kingdom growth a lot like a mustard tree.

I hear that Jews were not too fond of mustard trees.  There were actually Jewish laws against them being planted in gardens.  The reason why is that they essentially took over the area, planting and sprouting and generally being a nuisance.  Those stubborn little bushes would pop up and ruin all the plans and purposes the farmer had for the garden.  No matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t stop those tiny little seeds from spreading and getting into your garden!

Growing up, I always heard nice sermons about the remarkable power of a mustard seed - tiny as it is, growing into a giant redwood or something.  The only problem is, when you actually look at a mustard tree, its pretty scraggly.  Check out this mustard “tree” below that is busting out of some concrete in Bethany:

This insidious viral plant spreads like wildfire and is under no one’s control.  It breaks all kinds of rules about how plants are supposed to behave.  And what’s more - the fowl are supposed to take refuge in its branches!  This is not the cedars of Lebanon that Israel hoped the Kingdom of God would produce.  This looks more like a renegade sleeper cell just waiting to spread its potent seeds of destruction all over your lawn - and attract and house the worst kind of flying beasts - the kind that poop all over your car and hang out with the wrong crowd.

If we think about the Kingdom of God as Jesus taught about it, what might change in how we live as followers of Christ?  It might mean we see growth as slow and insignificant - rather than splashy and impressive.  It might mean that we are not just on earth to be “nice” to everyone and everything, but rather to help upend and nonviolently overthrow the prevailing systems that dominate and oppress humanity and creation.  Maybe it means we spread like a disease, or a terrorist group, or a clan of starfish. (an earlier post on that here).

The neat thing about mustard seeds is how potent they are!  But you have to crush them up for them to be of any use.  The Anabaptists used to talk about how everything on earth finds its purpose through suffering.  The delicious lettuce you eat in your salad started as a seed in the ground, and grew slowly to produce a head.  It was picked, shipped, and carried to your dinner table, where you rip it apart, cut it into pieces, and then grind at it down till it is no more.  And yet, if you hadn’t done that, the lettuce’s purpose in life would have been in vain.  What if the Christian’s purpose is not so much different from that lettuce, or that mustard seed?  What if Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection was not just a one-time event for our esoteric sins, but actually provided an avenue and a model for us to experience our greatest purpose in life?

Jesus moves beyond mustard to talk about yeast mixed into dough, weeds mixed in with wheat, good and junky fish of all kinds mixed up in a net…all stuff that is a recognizable annoyance in the lives of his audience. It’s interesting that Jesus waits till the end (of time) to call out what is the weed and what is the wheat.

To the some, the mustard-tree Kingdom looks like a weed - to Christ, to the world, and to the marginalized, it is the bread of heaven!

“Let us paint images of the new creation on an age that seems tumbling down.  Although the age may well tumble, our images are painted on the eternal mystery of God and, therefore, sure.”

– David Buttrick

I am back to reading the life of the Messiah Jesus. It is so full of rich, political overtones. I am so thankful to be reading this text now in an election year, as I’m considering the major shifts this country and world are undergoing. I am ready to expand my imagination on who Jesus was in his day, and who he is in this day. He was called “Lord” when Cesar was “Lord,” but today in this country might Jesus be known as the “Commander in Chief”? He certainly seems to cause chaos and fears of revolution even on the cusp of his birth. Herod the Great, the Roman’s puppet King for the area, was troubled, as was the whole city of Jerusalem, when the wise men of Persia came to Herod to see and worship his newest son and next king of the Jews. The only problem was, Herod had not just had a child; which confused and troubled everyone present. I can imagine Herod thinking, “Who is this so-called King? Where is he? If he is allowed to live, he will be a threat to me and my dynasty.”

Joseph and Mary smuggle Jesus out of town just before the infanticide of a terrified Herod. After crossing bandit and desert country, they arrive as refugees in Egypt, and stay there until Herod’s rule is past. The writer Matthew eloquently connects this with the fulfilled prophecy, “Out of Egypt, I will call my son.”

“Come out,” is used all over the Bible as a rallying cry to Israelites who draw back on the imagery of the Exodus. In Jesus’ life and times in Egypt, and his leaving, he is participating in the largest mythos of the Israelite people. Only Jesus turns their common narrative on its head. Now the oppressive regime is not in Egypt, but in the Holy Land of Bethlehem. The very city of David of which Jesus is a descendant and rightful heir to the throne, is now calling for his blood. Israel, co-opted with the Roman Empire under Herod, has become the evil Egypt in the fullest sense. Jesus’ Promised Land is in exile - living in Egypt as a refugee. Jesus’ return to Israel several years later brings him back as a special ops agent of God. Still a young child, Jesus returns to the flock of Israel as the Anointed One, prepared to reinterpret their history as the people of God on his own terms, and prepared to address the “Egypt” of Rome under which all Israelites were afflicted. He brought a message that was not “spiritualized” “privatized” or “apolitical.”

Jesus was not interested in violently overthrowing the pervasive Roman regime as were so many contemporary zealots and revolutionaries of his day. Nor was he going to, like the Essenes, retreat to the hinterlands and set up a new society completely “off the grid.” His plan was to be subordinate to and then creatively subvert the laws, and paradigms of Roman authority, Jewish Priestly authority, and even his own diverse followers. He came proclaiming another Kingdom that was intriguing, much like Martin Luther King’s dream, it was so real and yet seemed so far from the current reality. It would take trust in this crazy Jesus to follow him out of the Matrix and into a new world where there was “enough for everyone’s need by not enough for everyone’s greed.”

Jesus was a revolutionary. He brought a message that spoke to the political issues of the day, and offered an alternative. To some it seemed foolish, to many it seemed dangerous. But to a few it seemed like the only chance at a life of complete peace from all the tumult of high gas prices, outsourced slavery, broken families, a war with no end, abortion, and the crisis of immigration.

The events surrounding his birth set him on a course to become an “enemy of the state” before he could even walk. His life, and his death was a statement against the path of empires and corporations - the bottom line and the bloodshed of desperately grabbing at power and fighting to hold on to it. Jesus’ message wasn’t, and isn’t, a message relegated to the “self-help” or “religion” section of the bookstore. It impacts every aspect of our lives.

Nickelback’s, “If Everyone Cared” stirs in my mind the possibilities of a tidal wave of committed followers of Jesus who see God’s Kingdom being ushered into this world; with his peace and wholeness reigning across the earth and in each heart.

“Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.“

— Margaret Mead

Let me give you just a peak into my childhood.

The church I grew up in was pretty dang conservative. Without going into unnecessary ruminations over things long since gone, one particular concept in this church has sparked my interest as of late. It’s the two words that struck both anger and fear into the hearts of even the most staunch and legalistic.

“CHANGE AGENT”

Beware the accursed label for, much like a pirate’s “Black Spot”, once it has been given to you, you will wear it to your grave. Because the church brotherhood I grew up in believed that the church was perfect and fully “restored” to the pristine blueprint of the New Testament (is there only one model of church in the NT?), anyone who attempted to change the model or expression of how church was done or developed was labeled with attempting to derail the entire holy experiment. For this particular group, “be-holding the pattern” was of utmost importance, and anyone to varied from this pattern was heretical.

It is ironic how God brings people to terms with their own terms. Over the last few years, “change agent” has become a life goal of mine, and I pray regularly for “change agents” all over this continent. Not just the church needs changing either. I’m praying for change agents who change the world. For scores of people who, with eyes fixed on a completely different culture, subvert the culture they’re working undercover in.

I’m hoping to partner and network with as many change agents as I can in Chicago.  I think the church is in deep need of change; maybe the supposed “pattern” of the New Testament is about change anyway!  What I mean is - wasn’t Jesus a change agent?  Weren’t his followers agents of transformation that eventually swept across an Empire stuck in its ways?  Isn’t the Kingdom of God itself an agent of change?

Where would this world be today if more of us refused to sit back and let things rot as they are?  Why is complacency revered?  Why are whole systems built on the assumption that no one will have the gumption to do something about the wrongs they see?  When will there be justice?  When will there be creative life bubbling over into the church?  Our schools?  Our homes?  Our government?  We desperately need change agents to break the pre-conceived “blueprints” and perfect ideas of our world.

Change agents were chided and run out of town in my church growing up - but I say we kick out the squatters.  This world is a changin’.