Today’s Reading: Matthew 13:44-46 and Matthew 22:34-40 [see also John 12:44-46, 1 John 4:7-8] NRSV
“The Kingdom of God is like treasure…”
In these two parables Jesus proclaims that the Kingdom of God is worth investing all of oneself in living within it. And all his parables speak of this Kingdom as something we can experience through focusing one’s life on its presence. Yet many people miss what that Kingdom is, thinking that it is something that can only be experienced after our mortal death, i.e. the Kingdom of God is “Heaven”.
The problem with this definition of the Kingdom is that all of Jesus’s actions and illustrations of living in the Kingdom define a life lived now, not in some future state. He proclaims that those who have seen him have seen the Kingdom embodied – the Word made flesh. The Kingdom of God is a relationship between a person and God in which God’s Spirit, as it lives in them, guides their living. The Kingdom of God is the presence of God within each of us and Jesus calls us to recognize that this is something of ultimate importance, worthy of our total investment in it.
What that means for each of us as his followers is to take seriously the ultimate importance of our spiritual journey. Seeking to develop a living relationship with the transcendent, and seeking guidance from that source of life, is when the meaning of our lives is fulfilled. We are a miracle in that we embody the Spirit that created the universe and the fulness of our living is found in discovering and developing this Spirit of God within us. So, what does this mean?
Jesus explained it to the disciples as simply the Great Commandment – to love God with all our heart and mind and soul and to love our neighbor as ourselves. Living in the Kingdom of God is to embody the love God that we see in Christ by loving God with all our being and to spread that love to others. When we are doing this, we are living in the Kingdom of God. And that is indeed a treasure worth our total investment of self.
Reflections 