SERMON | Matthew 3:11-17 | GLIMPSES OF THE KIN-DOM - 1. "The Water's Fine" by Rev. Joseph Sanford at Sellersburg United Methodist Church in Sellersburg, IN

Sellersburg United Methodist Church Sermon Podcast

GLIMPSES OF THE KIN-DOM: A series on what it means to be the people of God Kin-dom: what is this word? Why not Kingdom? It’s a fair question… Sometimes we use a word often enough that it loses its meaning. The word AWESOME, for instance. extremely impressive/daunting, inspiring admiration, apprehension, or fear I’ve heard people describe a television show as AWESOME… or the feeling when their team wins… or beach sunsets or the birth of children or watching an adopted child embrace their family over time or seeing wild horses or a podcast about British monarchy or a slice of pizza WE ARE ALL OVER THE PLACE! But AWESOME means that something inspires awe: open-mouthed, wide-eyed, deep reverent fear kind of awe. Maybe I’m eating the wrong pizza and listening to the wrong podcasts :) So…using the word AWESOME has taken in all of these new meanings that have gotten away from its original intent. WORDS DO THAT — they taken on more than they intended sometimes. “LOVE” is another word: Loving The Beatles and loving your parents are two entirely different things. Kingdom, in scripture, referred to the activity or influence of God present on earth. In the OT, it referred to the promise of the ideal kingdom where the people of God lived into their calling to be God’s treasured possession, a priestly kingdom, a holy people; where God’s activity and influence came through Israel for the sake of bringing blessing to all of other peoples. Israel’s kings were anything but ideal, but the people had a vision of God being the ruler one day and true peace and justice being their reality. In Jesus’ time, the Kingdom was the manifestation of God’s reign and rule on earth among people. You could enter into the Kingdom here and now. But we get confused saying “kingdom,” because we often think of a place. But the “kingdom” is not a place as in “there it is” or “there it isn’t.” The Kingdom refers to the reality of God’s will and reign being among the people. People live by God’s compassion, love, truth, grace, and justice. Where God dwells… Life with the eternal God… Where we all awaken to the truth that we are all family with God as our parent—all people belonging to each other. Another word for family is Kin… And so…Kin-dom has become a word that helps us grasp the original meanings. As I prepared this sermon I was texting with a young man whom had been a part of the youth group I directed. He turned 24 this week, so I was wishing him a happy birthday and catching up with him. He asked how old Noah was now. I told him, 18. Last time this guy had seen Noah, he was 10. This young man’s response to learning Noah was a adult: “That doesn’t seem right. But, that’s awesome.” Awesome has lost its meaning and taken on something else. Kingdom is the same way. So…we’ll use Kin-dom to help us understand what Jesus was talking about. (By the way, if you want to spend some time in study and thought, pick a Gospel account and highlight every verse where Jesus is talking about the Kingdom of God or Kingdom of heaven. Then look at those verses and see if you can understand what Jesus is actually describing. You’ll be surprised, for sure.) Senior High Church camp: Jesus spent all of his time preaching about and living examples of the Kin-dom at work. He told parables, performed healings, shared meals, argued with religious leaders, and ultimately died on the cross to reveal the Kin-dom. In the story of Jesus and the The Church, we catch glimpses. In our lives, if we pay attention, we catch glimpses of the Kin-dom, as well. Is there anything else worth investing our focus and energy on than the Kin-dom of God as revealed through Jesus Christ? A question worth pondering. _______________________________________________________________ And so…with that long introduction, let’s begin the series, shall we? We will read from Matthew 3 in a moment. A few weeks ago we read the opening verses to Matthew 3. John preached on the coming kingdom and repe