Podcast: The coming of the kingdom of God (Luke 17:20-37)

Hey everyone, welcome to another week of the podcast here.

And I'm here not with Grant, but I'm here with Allison.

We don't know what to call you something like we were like,

you're not Pastor Allison, you were Pastor Allison.

You are currently not Pastor Allison, but it feels weird to

not, I don't know, because you were preaching and you were

filling that role. And so even though you are no

longer on staff with us, you're like, you're still a part of our

team. Thank.

You. Yeah, that you come up with a

fun title for me. And perhaps not Pastor Allison

is not the title. That's probably not the one she

we should go. With I think that could lead to

some confusion. So that's the other hard part.

Is certainly not capital P. Anyway, we were grateful to have

you with us yesterday. And as always, it's awesome to,

to get you back up there, at least for, for me as the, as the

listener and the one who just gets to receive from, from the

wealth of wisdom. And, and for those who don't

know you, because, I mean, we've had a lot of new faces around

the church and people tuning in. There's a lot of people that

that may or may not be familiar with you And, and you know, you

were on staff for what, seven years and before that, like you

have a long history with, you know, inductive Bible study and

through university and, and, and so like you are someone who

really takes the Scriptures seriously.

That's what I've always thought about you.

And so in light of that, we threw you just a real fun

passage. That was a treat.

It was definitely, you know, I often say like I'll work with

anything, like give you anything.

That one challenged me. Certainly, yes, but it's it's

good like let's you know, as we've said, that's why we like

the style that we're doing. We're working our way all the

way through Luke and we're we're intentionally not skipping

anything. We're trying to go in, go there

and try to understand why did Luke include this?

And so we want to read, read every word and see what God

might have for us in that. And, and, and trusting that God

has something for us and that they're, you know, as we go

through some of the challenging bits feels like there's, there's

always something for us on the other side.

For sure. And in, you know, in inductive

study, when we do that, like honestly, the most fruitful

moments are when I think we have real genuine questions, right?

Like it's the passages that we think we get and we understand

we probably miss the most, but the passages that force us to

ask some of those really tough questions or be like, we, I

don't understand, like what is this about that often those

genuine questions lead to some of the best fruit.

It it helps us to do that. This passage was about the

Kingdom. So for, for those who didn't

listen or were not present for worship this past Sunday, it's

Luke 17 versus 20 through to the very end, which is 37.

And actually I noticed as I was like making your slides for you,

there's like 36, but there's actually no verse 36, which I

thought was like, oh, we, I don't know.

I just, I just noticed that just a little like verse 36 is

absent. It just skips to 37.

And there's a little note that says some manuscripts include

here words similar to Matthew. So there must be like a parallel

that's some manuscripts don't include so.

Thank you. I just noticed it yesterday as

we were as I was making the slides I was like.

You know, I like when I'm doing my perfect actually pull it out

in what we call manuscript style, where you pull out all

the divisions and chapters and verses.

So definitely didn't notice. That so at its core, this is

this is a passage about the Kingdom, which, you know, has

been a pervasive theme all throughout the book of Luke, But

mixed in with this passage is some tricky metaphors and and

out like just the language of Jesus uses is not always easy

here. And so, you know, he, he talks

first with the Pharisees and then he talks with the

disciples, um, and, and kind of uses the example of Noah and the

flood, uses the example of of Lot and, and the destruction of

Sodom and Gomorrah. Like, not pleasant, not pleasant

imagery. Corpses and vultures.

Corpses and vultures, which, like, I love, I love the, you

know, Happy Mother's Day right after that.

Like, it's like so happy, yeah. You know, not to take away from

the seriousness of it, but I think it's also OK to, I think,

I think what I was trying to do in that is just acknowledge this

is intense. And sometimes humor helps us

acknowledge this is intense and there's a lot to this.

So not to make light of that or overlook it, but also to sort of

be able to collectively take a deep breath and go, there's a

lot this is hard here. So we've got those difficult

images and then we've got sort of this, this interesting

picture of, you know, those Jesus says whoever tries to keep

his life will lose it. Whoever loses their life will

preserve it. And then he uses this example of

people just like disappearing. You know, I tell you on, on that

night, two people will be in bed, one will be taking the

other left. Two women will be grinding grain

together, one will be taken and the other left.

And it's like, what does that mean?

And you know, we have a, a particular modern lens, you

know, particular brand of theology will say that that

automatically reads in that that is about OK, I'll just say it

that that is about rapture. And, and I think maybe we'll get

into that a little bit, but I, I want to actually have like a, a

higher level conversation to start of like when we approach

passages like this, whether you are a professional Christian or

whether you are a layperson, just like reading through the

Bible with us, or maybe you're on your own kind of reading

schedule. Like how do we approach passages

like this? Like there, there are so many

different ways to like that poor ways that we can deal with it.

You know, we can just glaze over it.

We could just skip over it makes me feel uncomfortable, so I'm

going to skip. Or we can be like left with this

feeling of like overwhelm and that we just sort of like block

it from our memory and move on to something fluffier.

Like. And so yeah, like there's a

difference between, you know, like when you and Grant and I

sit down like we're, we're digging into all of these

things, asking these hard questions.

We're, but we're, we're taking a solid like hour, hour and a half

to do that, right? So like, I think there's a

conversation to be had there. But like, how do, how can we

encourage everyone who's, who's listening and everyone who's

reading the scripture? How do we encourage them to do

that? They're not maybe going to have

an hour and a half, but like, how do we read these difficult

passages? How do we approach them?

What's the Yeah, what's the what's the vision there?

I think the answer, as it often is, is community.

So that can take us a few forms. First of all, it's why studying

scripture together in community is so rich because we can bring

different insights and contributions that are hard for

any one of us to have alone when we're just reading it by

ourselves that together we can hopefully glean a more accurate

picture. So whenever possible to do this

with other people who are also trying to trying to dig into

what Jesus, what the author would have for us in that I

think is always a gift. Now I get we're not always in a

Bible study when we look at this.

So I think community can also be in a couple other forms.

So one is, it might sound a little bit funny, but I think

there can be somewhat of a leaning on community by looking

at commentaries, looking at scholars who have poured their

lives into understanding the context, understanding the

original languages, that can really help us.

And so that's always part of our prep when we're preaching.

But I don't think that needs to be limited to preachers having a

good trusted commentary or two to say like, well, what did?

What did these people who inherently know more than I do?

What do they say about it? Now?

I want to be careful. I don't like rushing to a

commentary right away. I actually think it's really

important for us to wrestle with it somewhat on our own, to have

our genuine questions bubble up so that we can acknowledge those

and not just read it like, oh, let's go look for the answers.

I also don't want to use commentaries as the definitive

answers on those things. I think seeing them as a voice,

as a friend at the table who's contributing a line of thinking

and a thought. And so we don't take it as the

answer book, but we take it as someone else's thoughts and

contributions. Why it's good to often read a

few of them and get a variety of those.

So it's a little bit of a different way, but I think

that's another way of leaning on community, leaning on the wisdom

of those that have gone before us and what they've come to

think about those things. Um, and then I think finally,

you know, maybe you are reading this of a hard passage in your

own quiet time, in your own personal study and you come up

against this, say phone a friend.

I mean, maybe literally, or maybe it's a roommate or a

spouse or a trusted friend or mentor.

Be like, hey, I was reading this this morning or whatever and I

found this really challenging and I don't really understand

it. Have you read this?

Do you have thoughts about it? Like it can be just sort of in

the natural course of our day, but leaning into knowing that it

is very hard for us in 2026 English speakers to to grasp all

that is contained within these pages.

It's impossible. And it's we are not going to get

there in community either, but we're going to get a little bit

closer. And so I think that's a key way

that we can approach these is with humility to know.

I'm not going to be able to know, I'm not going to be able

to figure it all out. How can I lean on others,

whether in books, whether hopefully also real life people

in front of us to go further? And there's something so there's

two things that come to mind as you're talking about that.

The first being in I think it's Timothy Keller's book on

preaching. He always says, like, read the

passage multiple times, potentially multiple

translations. Write down your thoughts, you

know, like, get it, get it all. So like from a pastoral level,

that's like just a responsible thing to do to write out your

thoughts, like, like, and because God is speaking through

these words, right? And, and sometimes the more we

read the, the, the different angles we can approach it from,

we get to glean bits of wisdom. Like there been times when I

know that like the three of us have been sitting in in the room

and be like, Oh, we've never noticed that before, just

because we've been reading this and talking about it and we're

seeing this connection that and, and, and sometimes maybe the

connection is nothing. Other times it gets confirmed

when we, you know, eventually read a, you know, commentary

like, oh, that person agrees with me.

I think we're in good company you.

Know, and that's often how we use it, right?

It's like we actually kind of work out our own hypothesis

first. Confirmation bias kind of way,

like it's, it's more so like like, hey, like we've gleaned

this. Let's see if others agree.

And but I want to stress the value of doing the wrestling

first, because when you've had to work at it, and I've seen

this again and again in Bible study, when you've actually had

to work at trying to understand something, it just goes in a lot

deeper than when you just read the quote UN quote answer.

Again, it's not the answer, but when you just quickly go to it,

it's there's a surface level of processing that's different than

the processing that has to happen when you're like, I

genuinely don't understand what that is.

What could that mean? How can we piece these things

together? What do you think?

There's just a depth of understanding that you can't

trade for jumping quickly to reading some of those.

Things and that was the second thought I had was like, what a

gift of something like community Bible study.

When we've done that, where, you know, you're at a group, you're

at a table of people who you're before you are given any like

hints about some of like the context or the, the history or

the, you know, some of the, the Greek words or whatever.

Like before we do any of that, which invariably does happen,

right? You know, where, where one of

the teachers will get up there and they will say, like, Hey,

this word actually means this. And this is probably what Jesus

was getting at here. You know, like we do that work

inductively. We do that work just by reading

and studying and parsing and, and like in a way that is more,

you know, it's different than, you know, say we're reading a, a

novel in English class in high school and having to like write

an essay based topic. Like that's not what the work

we're doing here that we are trying to truly understand and

internalize, right? Like it's, it's a deeper work

than just like. How can I analyze this text?

And that's exactly why like the very first thing we do at

Community Bible Study is our own personal study, right?

Like is we take some time to try to absorb it and to try to go,

what questions are coming up for me as I look at this?

Before, like you said, before, we've got more of the history,

historical context before we have the Greek, before we have

other things. Like how can I try to see this?

Even if it's a passage I've read 100 times, How can I try to see

this with fresh eyes and notice and pay attention to what's

happening here? And that just lays such a solid

foundation for the rest of the work that we do, which is really

important and really valuable. But there is something about

having that. Let me try to wrestle a bit with

this before we go into those other stages.

Family member texting me just like last week being like, hey,

I'm confused about some stuff. Can we grab coffee?

Yeah, you know, like I, I love that like, like a like I'm just

working through like I have some questions about like this, that

or the other thing. And, and so like trying to find

a time just to connect, like, and, and just to be able to

like, hey, I admit when we're struggling with understanding

something in Scripture and like, you know, the difficult

theology, things like that, like, and just being able to be

honest and say like, hey, I want to try to figure this out.

I need a bit of help. Yeah.

And not that I'm the expert, but it's like I can help point them

to the right location hopefully. Yeah, yeah.

No, that's exactly what we're talking about, right?

And it's some of the beauty and freedom of what we get to do

with Grant is like, it's OK to not know.

It's OK for us to be stumped. And like I said, that actually

often leads to the most fruitful questions and work.

But you have to have those places where and people that you

can go to to be like, I don't get this.

And then even because I don't want to like leave us with the

impression that like, you know, we can just once we've once

we've rocked our brain enough and we haven't figured it out to

them, and then we go to commentaries or maybe just one

commentary or whatever. That doesn't mean, and this is

where it does get tricky. That doesn't mean that that is

the definitive answer, right? Like you, if, if you read, you

know, like I have access, I think between grants

commentaries and my commentaries and like Logos Bible software, I

have access to like probably like two dozen commentaries on

any given book of the Bible, right?

Do you think they all agree? You know?

Definitely not. Absolutely not, right?

And that's where that's where it does admittedly get potentially

overwhelming, right that like, hey, they've been studying this

for their entire stinking lives and I still and they still don't

necessarily agree or come to the same conclusion.

There might be overlap, there might be connection.

And that's where like, I think the beauty of, of you not

letting us get too down the rabbit hole of like what?

OK, let's let's dive deeply into like the, the, the flood and

Sodom and Gomorrah and the supposed rapture stuff

happening, right? Because it, it can distract from

the main points, right? And same with commentaries,

right? I feel like commentaries can can

do the same thing where where we can read them all and then still

not have actually internalized the thing that we need to

internalize. Yeah.

And I think sometimes it's important to take that step back

and use posture of humility, posture of being a learner.

It's actually our right posture of depending on God.

Ask the Holy Spirit what not just for accurate understanding,

but like, what do you have for me in this moment of my life and

time? Like what are you seeing to me

from this passage? And that's also why we can read

it 100 times and have something different because that's why I

think it's often called the living word is because when the

Holy Spirit inhabits it and inhabits our understanding, it

can mean, I don't mean different like contradictory.

I just mean, um, different aspects of like different

fuller. Picture Yeah, exactly.

And and that when and that's one of the reasons why it's so good

and so important to have multiple different voices.

You are going to see things in a way that I don't just because

partly because of who you are. Like we've known each other long

enough that we know like we we're similar in some ways,

right. But also like look at us.

We're, we're, we're different for you as a woman, you have,

you have a different perspective.

I remember this is just one silly example, but it was Good

Friday, our service. We did kind of a reflective,

contemplative kind of service and, and we had a, a bunch of

the way we were approaching was that we had these different

aspects of the, the passion narrative and the different

people in that narrative outside of Jesus.

So you had, you know, Simon of Cyrene and the Joe Joseph was

the, the guy who carries the cross, Joseph Avermedia.

Sorry, no, that's Simon, the guy who pays for the, the burial.

So all these different examples, the, the other men on the cross,

all that kind of stuff. And I'm giving this example,

these examples to someone who's going to be setting up different

stations for us. Such a gift to have that.

And then they responded, they're like, but wait a minute, there's

like a bunch of women there as well that are doing things as

well. And I'm like, you're 100% right.

And actually I was just, you know, remiss in in including

those in my examples. But it it says something that I

had didn't include them because I'm sometimes a dumb headed guy.

Well, and we all have these blind spots, right?

And so that's again, some of the beauty of hopefully being in

community and and being in community, not just with people

that look like us. Yeah, right.

Like the people that come from more, the more different from us

background, whether that's like ethnically, gender,

socioeconomic, whatever, they're going to bring a different

experience that is going to be different than what I can see.

And so the richness of having those relationships where you

can lean on each other and help each other to see things from a

different angle is, I think, is a beautiful part of the Kingdom.

Like how much like the Beatitudes is one example.

Like, like it's gonna hit different.

You know, I, you know, grew up mostly just like kind of middle

class, you know, Canada, right? For someone who's grown up in,

in a place where there's been persecution and poverty and, and

a real like disparity within their, you know, where they grew

up, like that's going to hit very differently.

That's right. And how much richer probably

their understanding is, and how much I can learn from from a

different perspective. So, yeah, and the other thing

maybe just before we move off of this is like we may, and I think

you kind of alluded to this, like we may walk away with more

questions. Absolutely, right.

And that like sometimes the point of not the point of a

passage, but like sometimes the thing that that we are going to

need to learn to be OK with is that we may just have questions

and they may never fully resolve.

And, and this is a, a lifelong journey, a lifelong almost

battle with scripture in some ways, you know, like that, like,

hey, I, I, the, the things I struggled with 20 years ago in

my faith are very different, but there's still things I struggle

with, right? And, and I'm going to come and

hit these passages and read them and be like, OK, I didn't

struggle with that in my younger years, but now I'm reading this

and be like, oh, that's, that's challenging, you know, in a

different way, right? And, and so like, that's

another, that's another piece of like, there's, there's an

element of like mystery. There's an element of needing to

be OK with, like, not having all of our questions answered.

Yeah. And the the the certainty that

some spheres of Christianity want.

Yeah, and I would almost, I think I, I think I mean this, I

would almost be wary of either a sermon or Bible study that feels

like everything wraps up nice and neat with a bow on top.

Now, my wiring is I like that. I like a nice, neat story with a

clear ending and a boat. Like I want that.

And I wrestle with being OK with living in the tension.

But I think that's probably actually a more accurate and

true place to live. Now, at the same time, I want to

say that doesn't mean we can't know anything, right?

Like absolutely, there are solid truths that we can plant our

feet on. And I think that's that's some

of what I was noticing as I was working through this passage is

like, wow, there's a lot of things that lead to a lot of

questions that I don't understand.

And as I said, I don't think are the point, but what can we say?

What can I plant my feet firmly on?

And I think there are very clear things that we can plant our

feet firmly on in the passage. And so learning to plant our

feet where we can and know what we can know and hold open handed

to the questions and the tensions and the things that we

go, I'm not sure we can know that.

And I think there's two things that I think stuck out for me as

we were as we were going through this passage the first time and

the second time and then also during your.

This one required. But I think there's two, there's

two, there's two particular things that Jesus says that I

think are like worth like hanging, you know, hanging on to

#1 what he says to the Pharisees, Kingdom of God is in.

Your midst. Don't miss it.

Don't miss it #2 toward the very end, and I said this earlier,

whoever tries to keep their life will lose it.

Whoever loses their life will preserve it.

Like those, those two feel like those are and they're.

That doesn't make them any more easy.

But if you, if you hear nothing else, I think, yeah, I think

those if everything else sifts away, you will do well to hang

on to what is being taught in both of those phrases, both to

the Pharisees and to the disciples.

And there's even something like when Jesus, whoever tries to

keep their life will will lose it.

Like I also even think about like my my propensity and I

think our like capital O our like tendency to want to just

like hold on to everything in a neat little way.

And when it comes to the scriptures, when it comes to

faith and and like the Kingdom is is, can't be.

Bigger than that. It's bigger than that.

It can't be boxed in in that way.

It actually would be unfortunate, yeah, if it could

be neat and tidy and contained within our understanding, right?

It is just going to constantly blow out-of-the-box as we try to

put it. So I think to that end, like

that's actually like a great segue into kind of like landing

the this passage a little bit wanted to talk a little bit

about the Kingdom. And, and it's not a new topic.

It's not a novel thing to talk about, but like, I think it's

just worth bringing up on a regular basis, especially since

you're not Grant you and I grant and I have talked about this in

the in the podcast, but since you're a fresher face, you've

only done this like a couple Times Now with us.

Like I want to talk a little bit about like what the Kingdom in

our midst is looking like for us, right?

For, for you, for me, for us as a church, for, for, for things

like that. And so I don't know if you wanna

go with that, but just like I think that there's a a good

conversation to be had there about like just reminding us

like, yes, there's the meta sort of like, OK, this is Paula

passage is challenging, but also like, let's bring it to the

ground. Let's like, talk about like the

work of the Kingdom that is in our midst that's happening.

Yeah, Well, we talked a little bit about the Kingdom being this

writing this, turning right side up of what was turned upside

down. So we talked about how the way

that God intended the world in terms of peace, which is this

word Shalom in Hebrew, which is much more than the absence of

conflict, but it's actually everything it was.

It was meant to be wholeness, right?

Relatedness, yeah, just the fullness of life.

And so that's what was intended. That got inverted, turned upside

down. We are very aware of all the

ways that that is broken and the dysfunction around us.

And so I think we can see the Kingdom wherever we see those

things being righted and put in their proper order.

And so I think one of the the joys for us that would consider

ourselves followers of Jesus is to join in the work of the

Kingdom, which is the work of writing those things that have

been turned upside down. And so whenever we see, you

know, justice for oppressed, hungry, being fed, you know,

even health to sit like whenever we can see and work for those

things, I think those are working to bring the fullness of

the Kingdom. And and I think that that can be

can be the joy. That's not something we have to

wait until, you know, like it talks about in this passage,

till the Son of Man is revealed, is how it talks about it.

Until that day where the Kingdom is fully restored.

We actually get to be part of that happening right now.

And there's like, you know, just thinking across our church

community like because there, there is, you know, this

multifaceted, holistic way of understanding the, the Kingdom,

which is both our, our spiritual selves as well as our, you know,

that there is a, a component where, hey, yeah, right.

When people are being fed, when, when things are being right,

when justice is happening, all of that is the Kingdom.

And also when people come to repentance, that is the Kingdom

and, and, and like what's been really cool over the past little

while is just to see the way that the gospel in the Kingdom

is, is doing something for, for, for unexpected people and

unexpected situations that I mean, I, I don't want to get

into other people's stories because they're not my story,

but just like seeing people changed, seeing someone, seeing

Jesus do something in someone's life that I'm like, Oh, I didn't

expect. Yeah, yeah, you know, didn't,

didn't see that coming. Like, and like, that's just what

Jesus is doing. And like they goes perfectly

with what he says about, you know, like, hey, this is

happening in your midst. It's happening all around you.

You you can't observe it, but it's.

Happening and happening, you know, outside of us and also

within us, right? And that's some of what you're

pointing to. So how do we work for that

outside of us, but also how do we let God do the work of

changing that, of sifting apart those things in us that are

aligned with God and are not and bringing more of the life that

he offers? Just a quick example, recent for

me, we were dealing with a really a bit of a scary and

stressful situation recently. And in the midst of it, I was

finding, I felt like, oh, I think God is offering me peace

because this is scary and it's stressful, but I really feel

this undercurrent of peace. And then I'd have moments to be

spiraling into like, but all the worst case scenarios and I had

to kind of keep coming back to like, he's, I feel like he's

holding it out there for me to actually have peace and I can

choose that. I can choose to live into what I

believe he's offering in me, or I can keep, you know, have those

moments of spiral. And so I think for me, that was

like just a small experience of what I feel like the Kingdom is

about is that he was holding it out there for me.

I could keep choosing to spiral and be stressed, or I could

choose to go, OK, I'm going to try to lean in and trust this

undercurrent apiece that I feel like he's offering me.

That's just one small example of like what that might look like

internally. Well, and the way that that can

change the, you know, the atmosphere in a room and, and

even like the people around you, when you are able to be that

that person and then they come like that agent piece in some

way. That's like, I'm even thinking

about our service yesterday morning where it just felt like

everything was going wrong. Like the screens were reversed.

There was no lyrics on the like all the things.

And I was the point person for the morning.

Grant graciously was able to take the morning off and he was

there, but kind of not there. Like he was there secretly snuck

in, snuck out kind of thing. And like I was, I was so

grateful that he could have that.

And also like it was a lot. It was a lot, a lot, but like I,

I was so grateful and I'm not like this isn't like I pat

myself on the back because I can't attribute this to me in

really any way, shape or form Is like, I was so grateful that

like the the Lord was like, Hey, this is a lot.

But like, you've got this, you know, like and, and, and even if

nothing else works, like we're going to sing the, the Kingdom

is going to be proclaimed, we're going to pray and everything's

going to be OK, you know, like. And I was not that coming into

it. And you were able to gift that

to me. Even though some curveballs were

thrown at you, you were able to lead from that place and offer

that sense of peace both to me to others.

I'm sure you're leading into the congregation as we had some

bumps and. Hiccups now I mean, I can't

speak for like our our tech team who is at the back of the room

and one of them who's like in the room right now with us but

like you know, they they might they might have they might have

gained some Gray hairs yesterday.

I don't know, but I might have as well, But but what was what

was and what was fun, you know, just using this again as an

example is like there was a lot of like laughter and levity that

we were able to do. And like there's something

beautiful when when we can as a community impart that like, Hey,

not everything is like super serious and stress, you know,

stress city, right? Like we can actually just laugh

and be OK. Yeah, and while we strive for

excellence, people relate a lot better to imperfection than to

perfection. For sure.

No, that's good. Um, the other thing I was

thinking about, you know, and this is like, so you know, like,

yes, lives change people, people, you know, being brought

to repentance, justice happening.

There's also other things like I think about where we were

Saturday morning this past this past weekend, we were planting

trees, which is like neighbors with church and neighbors.

And yeah, and our, our. Church family.

And it's like, you know, and if you're listening and you're

thinking, what a bunch of hippies, well, maybe that's

true, but this is, you know, we are in Guelph ON Canada, which

has a lot of those types. Well, and a full picture of the

Kingdom, yeah, includes creation.

Yeah, it includes. It does what is good for the

earth. And I think.

Trees are good. Yeah.

We hopefully where we can all agree that trees are grids.

Well, trees. And not just any trees, but the

idea of trees that will produce fruit that can be a gift and a

blessing to our neighbors, to our church community, and to the

broader golf community. Well, and even like there was

like the local kind of news outlet was there, but also like

are both a are Conservative and Liberal MP's, members of

Parliament were there, which was kind of an interesting dynamic

and of itself that it's like, hey, like this is, yeah, this is

very cool. But there is, yeah, there's

something beautiful about our our neighbors gathering with us

to do this together, to see again, just continuing to to do

that, that call of our vision to become trusted neighbors and to

build those inroads. And I think our food security

garden, our food bank are not the only, but two of the

beautiful expressions that we get to be part of seeing that

Kingdom come, seeing that Kingdom work.

I also think our meal ministry, which is totally hidden and

behind the scenes, but they care so beautifully for people that

for whatever the circumstance could benefit from a good meal.

And, and there's many, many other examples of this, but it's

also fun. Yeah.

Like getting to be part of those things of seeing, seeing people

blessed, part of that Kingdom work is a joy.

It's I think it's good for our souls to be part.

Of 100%, yeah. And there's something, yeah.

There's something again, like going back to what Jesus says to

the Pharisees like that some of this is very at word.

We can see tangible expressions of it, but some of it is like

you can't observe it. Like all of a sudden it's gonna

take like white. The Kingdom has been doing all

of these things all the way. Like there's something very,

very cool, very profound about. That well, think about a couple

of the metaphors that have been used, I believe, already in

Luke. So the Kingdom is like a mustard

seed, right? A seed that's planted in the

ground that grows to bear a giant tree could actually, you

know, give shade for the birds you don't see generally, unless

you maybe have one of those cameras that like is trained on

it and speeds up. You don't see growing happening,

right? Like you can see the seed, you

see the tree, but it's hard to be like, oh, look, watch that

growing or another example that's used as the Kingdom is

like yeast, right? Again, you don't look at your

loaf of bread and be like, wow, that's some nice yeast, right?

The yeast just permeates and is spread throughout.

Like those are some of the images were given for the

Kingdom that I think contribute to what he's saying there with

it can't be observed in the like, it's sometimes I talk

about like it smells like the Kingdom.

Like you can't always like pinpoint exactly what The thing

is, but you just have a sense that like, yeah, this is

something that is aligned with God and that's good.

But it's it's sometimes hard to like yeast to sort of see where

it is. And, and in a church, you know,

here at court, right, where a Church of, you know, most

Sundays around like 200, two, 150 people.

And more than that, when you consider those who would all

call this their church home. Like I think about all of the

different ways that the Kingdom is doing The thing is.

And and the thing that again, unseen ways things, the things

that we don't know, things that like they do people in our

church do that we have no idea about that are like it's such a

thing willing to think. About it would be such a shame

if the Kingdom impact of the church was only the things that

were done by the church like as programs of the church, right?

But hopefully as that community of maybe 400 people, I don't

know are spread throughout golf and beyond, like if we are

working for the Kingdom in all of those little corners of the

city, that is a beautiful expansion and expression of the

if we are loving our neighbors. And yes, I think the definition

of neighbor, you know, is very broad, but also our actual

neighbors. Like even just think about if

those 400 people did an amazing job of loving even just their

like literal either side or down the hall.

Like, that's thousands. Of people like that would be

incredible impact in the city. And that's like, that's actually

the call I believe of the church and what I hope is and would

love to see more of happening. And so, yeah, like I think

that's I think it's a good place to to close out like just

thinking about like the everyday little things, the unseen, the

unobservable ways in which the Kingdom is going forth.

And that the, the ways that the Kingdom will will be in our

midst and will continue to grow in our midst is not going to be

just through these big public acts, but it's going to be

through the ways that all of us are doing our part to, Yeah, to

love our neighbors well, to, to lead them to a greater

understanding and experience of who Jesus is.

And so I hope that, you know, you're able to think about what

that looks like in your life, wherever your context is,

whether it's your work, whether it's your, your home, your

neighbors on your, your house or your, your apartment building.

And so I just hope that you're able to be inspired to think

through the ways in which the Kingdom can be spread, to go out

into our city and then it spills out into the nations, into the

world. And I, yeah, I think I would

just add to that, though, that there can be a temptation in our

culture and in our plate Canadian society, in our, you

know, secular world, to strive for the Kingdom without the

king. That's a phrase that's often

used by Mark Sayers, who I really appreciate and has.

I've learned a lot from both the pastor and cultural commentator.

It's like a philosopher. Feel like, yeah, I don't know,

he doesn't fit in a box, which is which is great.

But I think that's been such a lesson to me is that it's

tempting to be about the things of the Kingdom and to to

separate that from the king, because those are very it's

politically correct maybe to do that.

And So what does it mean for us to be about the work of the

Kingdom while making sure we're, we're still trying to be all in

with the king? And what does it mean for us to

be receiving the friendship that Jesus is offering us?

And also, um, choosing and leaning into that friendship so

that we are about the things of the Kingdom, but that we're

making sure we're about them with the.

King, that's great. Well, that's a great place to

end. So we hope this has been helpful

for you in some way. And we hope that you will

continue to think through the ways in which you are called to,

to bring forth this Kingdom that Jesus calls us to.

So I hope you are able to take that into your week and we'll

see you next time.