Jesus Walks (Lord's Prayer 2)

Do you ever feel a thump thump, thump, thump as you drive or walk downtown? You look around, and here comes a car whose wheels cost more than the car itself. Slouched down with his cap on cockeyed is a young man whose radio or CD is emitting enough volume energy to drive the car. Sometimes I think I can see the windows of the cars bulging. Guess what? A couple of weeks ago, those sounds were coming out of my speakers! My grandson was next to me, and he had tuned into his favorite station from KW. I usually don’t understand a word of the music. But this time the words caught my attention. It was one of the top songs that kids are listening to this summer. The words? "Jesus Walks . . . and I don’t think there is nothing I can do now to right my wrongs (Jesus Walks with me) I want to talk to God but I’m afraid because we ain’t spoke in so long. ... They say you can rap about anything except for Jesus. That means guns, sex, lies, video tapes - But if I talk about God my record won’t get played Huh? . . . Y’all need Jesus" And on it goes. He’s raps about God’s grace and forgiveness. About the fact that because he’s a believer, Jesus walks with him every day. About God’s rule in this real world, about God’s Kingdom.

But am I the only one who notices that people today are not wildly impressed by the Kingdom of God? How often does the Kingdom of God make Jay Leno’s monologue? Should we be thankful that David Letterman has never done the "Top 10 reasons why the Kingdom of God is on everybody’s lips"? Why do I have the sneaking suspicion that the rule of God is vaguely associated with the oppression of the Taliban and Islamic extremists?

Toward the end of this service we will pray something subversive. We do it every Sunday without thinking a whole lot about it. We will pray: "Thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen." People are being killed for saying that. There are people in Nepal, Indonesia, the Sudan, and many other parts of the world today who are in jail for praying that. In Saudi Arabia, there are people who are fired from their jobs and cut off from their families for praying that in public. "Thine is the kingdom, the government, the rule over everything." It is a pledge of loyalty, like an oath of allegiance. Now, ordinarily, loyalty to government and to laws contributes to the peace and order of the world. But this oath of allegiance takes priority over everything else: "Thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory, forever and ever."

Jesus spoke repeatedly about the kingdom of God. That’s why the two go together, - the kingdom of God and Jesus Christ. Jesus said: "The kingdom of God is among you." Who was He talking about? Himself. That is why He taught us to admit to God: "Your’s is the Kingdom."
Aren’t we wowed by the power that people are able to exercise over others? Is there a year that goes by that doesn’t throw up evidence of how much people will lie, cheat, manoeuver, and manipulate in order to achieve a piddling position of power and authority? And don’t we encourage it? I watch people like Madonna, Bill Clinton, M and M, Elvis, Pierre Trudeau and Jennifer Lopez as they are held in awe and admiration by so many others. Aren’t they encouraged in their life-styles? Preoccupation with power and idolatry of people in power have helped to make our world what it is. It’s a jungle whose dense undergrowth is slithering with rattlesnakes.

This jungle is dying. What ails us is not just a skin rash. We don’t know who we are, or where we’re going.

But the kingdom of God will still be going strong when the kingdoms of this world are dead and gone. It may not look that way to people who follow every hiccup of the prime minister of this or the president of that. But it’s still true: "He that sits in the heavens shall laugh; he shall hold them in derision."

When we were in Minneapolis, the papers and television news were filled with the trial of a wealthy St. Paul family whose 6 figure annual income and nightly hobnobbing with the Minnesota elite didn’t satisfy them. They were accused of hiring shoplifters to go into Dayton’s swank clothing departments and steal Armani suites, Gucci loafers and Rolex watches. We live in a lost world, lost without God. People are without God and when they’re without God, they’re without hope in the world. So they, and we, become vassals of the tyrants of greed and prestige and reputation. Didn’t Jesus get it right when he sadly noted that we are like sheep without a shepherd?

We hear a lot about priorities. How about the first priority? "You shall have no other gods beside me." When the institutions of this world have all died and disappeared, as they will, God will still be God. But how many of us pay any attention to Him? How many of us honour Him? How many of us offer Him allegiance? What if we were to give our allegiance to God’s kingdom? "That kingdom," said Jesus, "is among you." It has come to us. It is here. It is in the two square feet of earth that you and I occupy every moment. Right there, Jesus walks.

Isaiah talked about his own times. He saw a sick society full of frightened people. They were so filled with despair that they were tuned out to the others around them. But in spite of it all, Isaiah saw the hand of God at work. Even though the nations and the rulers of the world are like drips on the rim of a pail, or dust on a scale, Isaiah proclaimed that God is alive and well. God is carrying out His purpose in the world, when it looks like confusion and disaster rule. People in Isaiah’s time asked the same questions that people today ask: "Does God really care about us? Does God really rule this world? Is death the only thing we have to look forward to?"

The kingdom of God is not just some pipe dream. God comes among us. God comes with the glory and compassion of Jesus. Jesus was a human being for all of us human beings. His story is true. As surely as you are born, Jesus was born. As real as your life is, so real was Jesus’ life. As real as death is to you and me, so death was real to Jesus.

In our confused and chaotic world, Jesus walks. The Spirit of God is doing things in people today by the power of God through the Word of God. What does that great good Word tell people? It tells us about the grace of God’s good heart toward every one, toward you and me. We have it in Jesus Christ. He is the One. He’s the Only One. In Christ, you find out who your are, where you are going, and what God is doing to get you there.

Jesus Christ said: The kingdom of God has come among you; repent and believe the good news. Without repentance, will the good news ever be good? Without turning away from the petty counterfeit kingdoms that claim our allegiance, the forgiveness of God can’t be accepted. Jesus Christ died on His cross, that we, just as we are, might turn to Him and be forgiven.
"Thine is the kingdom." "Thy Kingdom come." What are the marks of that kingdom? What language is spoken there?- "Be kind, tenderhearted, forgiving one another," said one Christian, "as God for the sake of Christ has forgiven you." "Love, joy, peace, gentleness, patience, self-control".These are all the gifts of God the Holy Spirit to every one who welcomes and submits to God’s rule in Jesus. They are the evidence that the kingdom of God is among us. That kingdom comes among people who accept the forgiveness of Christ, who forget themselves, who take up their duties for His sake without complaining, and follow Him.

"Thine is the Kingdom." That is life as it was meant to be lived. You and I can have confidence and hope, because in this life, Jesus the King walks among us.
I bet my life on it.