Hello,
Friends.
This is Mark Gladman,
Also known as Brother Frederick James,
Your friendly neighbourhood monk in docks.
And today is day 17 of our Advent journey towards the light.
And today we're going to reflect on God's Kingdom values.
Jesus made it pretty clear in the way he described the Kingdom of God,
That the Kingdom of God defies all of our expectations.
The Kingdom is a place where power is redefined,
Where the first are last and the last are first,
Completely upside down compared to the world that we live in.
In this Kingdom,
It's the poor in spirit who are blessed,
The peacemakers who are called children of God and the merciful who receive mercy.
And the cool thing is,
We don't have to wait for this Kingdom to come sometime down the track.
Jesus invites us not only to imagine such a world,
But to live as though it is already here.
Because it already is.
The Kingdom of God,
Jesus said,
Was within you and among you and around you and now and here and at hand.
Richard Rohr reminds us that the Kingdom of God is a delicate balance in the liminal space between now and not yet.
It breaks into our reality in moments of love and acts of mercy and choices for justice.
But it also waits to be fulfilled in its fullness.
And Advent calls us into this tension,
Which is sometimes quite uncomfortable.
But in that tension,
We get to see the world as it is,
But to live as though it's become already what God fully intends for it to be.
Micah 6.
8 offers us probably one of the most clear visions of what it means to walk in God's Kingdom values.
After going through a list of things that might be given as offerings to God for God's wonder and beauty and awe and justice and peace and love of us,
The prophet asks the question,
What do we offer you in return,
God?
And the response is simply this,
To act justly,
To love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
Mercy isn't just an ideal or a concept.
It's how we treat one another.
Mercy isn't just about forgiveness.
It's compassion in action and humility isn't weakness.
Humility is recognising that all we have and all we are comes from God.
I wonder,
What would it mean and what would it look like for you to live out these values today?
Perhaps it looks like extending grace to someone who's hurt you.
Or maybe it means speaking up for someone who can't speak for themselves.
Every act of justice and mercy and humility,
No matter how small,
Reflects the light of God's Kingdom into the world.
And so as you go into your day today,
May you see the beauty of God's Kingdom values,
Even when they challenge your own priorities.
May you find the courage to act justly in the situations that call for it,
Trusting that small steps create ripples of change that can have effect all the way to the edges.
May you offer mercy freely as a reflection of the mercy that God has already shown to you.
And may you walk humbly with God,
Aligning your heart with the heartbeat of the Kingdom.
You might like to reflect for a time today on how you can embody the Kingdom as you move forward through Advent.
Choose one act,
Big or small,
Doesn't matter,
That reflects God's justice,
Mercy or humility.
And as you do,
Know that every act of love you offer is a little bit of a glimpse of the Kingdom of God for the people around you,
Right here and right now.
May grace and love go with you as you go,
My friend.
Until tomorrow,
Peace be with you.
Amen.
