Art and Imagination: the apocalyptic vision

What does it mean to live in the kingdom of God?

I would like to contrast 2 attitudes.

Self-righteousness

versus

Humility

To live in the kingdom of God is to have our hearts transformed from arrogant self-righteousness to humble compassion and mercy. We are invited to live in the kingdom of God, but it takes all of us to make it and create it.

Christianity is a social (and therefore political) religion.

What is self-righteousness? The self-righteousness person thinks that he or she has earned and deserved his/her own success and good fortune. The self-righteous person refuses to understand the poverties and inequalities of our world and equates success with personal gain.

It involves judgment (and condemnation) of others.

Self-righteousness is the primary sin of the Pharisees and Jesus is forceful and swift with his condemnation of it. They claimed the love and favour of God as being due to their own personal worthiness, rather than seeing that it is God who is worthy. Such an attitude builds a barrier between human beings, generating a narrative of superiority with which comes an ability to justify cruelty, a callous attitude, indifference and even contempt.

The kingdom of God is quite explicitly a kingdom in which the social and political order, the relationship between peoples really matters. Listen to John the Baptist. Repentance is explicitly linked to the re-forming of social relationships: 

‘Whoever has 2 coats must share with anyone who has none’.

‘Whoever has food must do likewise’.

The arrogant and self-righteous person says in his heart, I have earned my two coats by my own personal skills and qualities, I have worked hard - the other person does not deserve my second coat – I will not give it!

The arrogant and self-righteous person says, I was born in a humble place, I worked hard to get out of it, others should do the same, I received no charity, nor should they, I will not give my coat!

The self-righteous person considers that the other person is poor because of their own fault. They condemn and blame, justifying closing their heart to the suffering of others.

Humility

What is humility? Humility is explicitly linked to faith in God as creator of all. The humble person realizes that all life is a gift, that circumstance, genetics, good or bad fortune, parents, country, are all givens; we have not given them to ourselves. Therefore, all life is gift. This leads to thankfulness and in turn to generosity and compassion.

The humble person says in his heart – I have benefited from a good job, the support of a good manager, a good education, and all that I have has first been given me by God – I will share my second coat with the one who has none.

The humble person says, though I was born in a humble place, I was able to work my way out, and that gave me choices and a new future, I will help someone else to have that new future too.

Who we are and how we act are intrinsically linked.

You cannot read Holy Scripture and not be confronted again and again by the fact that God is a humble and merciful God and he requires us to be humble and merciful too.

God could sit in his throne in Heaven, self-righteously and say: ‘I have given these people everything and yet look at them, they are ignorant, foolish, lazy, arrogant, helpless. I will not condescend to help them - let them rot in their own incompetence!’

But God, doesn’t say that, rather he enters into our world, lives alongside us and preaches a Gospel of repentance, forgiveness of sins and inheriting the Kingdom.

The Hebrew word śāṭān, meaning “accuser” or “adversary,” occurs several times throughout the Hebrew Bible and refers to enemies both human and celestial alike. When referring to the celestial adversary, the word is typically accompanied by the definite article. He is ha-satan—the Accuser—and it is a job description rather than a proper name.

https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-topics/bible-interpretation/who-is-satan/

It is Satan who accuses, but God in Jesus, the judge appointed at the end of times, is the merciful, loving one, who sits at the Father's shoulder begging for forgiveness, clemency, pardon and compassion on us as we stand before Him. As Christians then, we too should seek to be holy as God is holy, to be the ones who seek mercy, compassion, who plead the cause of others. 

God has provided all things into our hands – but we are not born equal – we are born profoundly unequal – in terms of opportunity, choice, genetics, economic status and so on. 

The Christian reveals herself by the way in which she recognizes this simple truth and so is humble, open hearted, willing to forgive, offers compassion and mercy, and resists judging others. She seeks to share what she has been given, by the way that she rejects abuse of power and extortion; and by the way in which she sides with those who are weak and vulnerable.

If as Christians we are not challenging abuses of power, the subjection of the poor, the victimization of the foreigner, the cries of the hungry – we are simply not being Christian.

It is very simple.

We are asked to trust in God – and in His ways – and these are His ways.

SO, the question for us as people who call ourselves Christian is – in what way in my life am I showing myself to care for the poor, the orphan, the foreigner, the vulnerable, the weak, the abused, the forgotten? Advent is the season of expectation. We expect our God to come and to find us at his work when he returns. It is our responsibility to be at that work.