Where is the Kingdom of God?

I know that my redeemer lives and that at the last he will stand upon the earth. Then in my flesh I shall see God.

Reading: Luke 17:20-25

The following homily was preached to the student brothers during Compline. You can listen here or read below:

When I was reading this gospel to prepare, I was immediately reminded of the film Kung Fu Panda. The reason for this is this idea that rather than thinking of the kingdom of God as something visible, something observable that’s out there somewhere, that it’s within your midst. In the film, The Kung Fu Panda, Po, the main character, who’s a panda who does kung fu, is trying to find in the scroll some visible secret that’s going to make him into the dragon warrior. But he opens the scroll and there’s nothing there. The whole reveal is that the power to be dragon warrior was within him the whole time. In a similar way, in the second film, we realise that he’s spent a lot of time in this dojo having to refine his skills so that he can reach the full potential of being the dragon warrior. Now, this is a metaphor perhaps for the kingdom of God within us and in our midst.

Now unlike kung fu panda it’s not simply that we have to tap into our inner potential but rather the kingdom of God is God dwelling within us, so reigning within us, so that he enlarges our natural potential and prepares us to come into his supernatural dwellings. Similarly, the church is not just a support group to bring out the best in you, but rather it’s the instrument of Christ’s holiness where our gifts are nurtured through the sacraments so that we become the living body of Christ. In order to make this work, we have to always bear in mind that the kingdom of God, yes, it is here and now; yes, it’s within us; yes, it’s in the midst of us, but it’s also something that’s in Heaven. It’s also something that is still to come. You need to have both the fact that the kingdom of God is inexpressibly close and impossibly distant at the same time. It is now and yet to come.

The fruits of the kingdom of God here and now are real: friendship with God, friendship with our brothers and sisters, joy, peace. In fact, the fact that we have faith, hope, and love at all, the fact that we have the gifts of the Holy Spirit are proof that the kingdom of God dwells within us. These are supernatural gifts. And yet, we remember Christ saying, “But my kingdom is not of this world.” The fact that the gifts we have, those signs of the kingdom of God being here and now are supernatural is in fact a sign that we were made for something that’s beyond this world.

As Herbert McCabe says, “If Christ wanted anything less than the kingdom of God, he might have done it through his own human efforts, but rather because he strove for the kingdom of God, he gave himself completely to the help of his father.” And we have something similar. It’s because we’re striving for the kingdom of God which is beyond this world that we’ve been given supernatural gifts, which too, are beyond this world.

The end of this gospel I think brings a really important point because in thinking of the kingdom of God on this earth we always look to the passion. We look to the cross, the sufferings of the Son of Man. “For the joy that was set before him”, that joy in heaven, “he despised the shame, he endured the pain and is now seated at God’s right hand.” We’re in a similar position. Yes, we have the fruits of the kingdom of God bearing fruit here and now, but we’re pointing, we’re living towards the heavenly Jerusalem. I think this is well summed up in the book of Job where despite his sorrows in this world, he has hope that he will see God. “He has walled up my way so that I cannot pass and he has set darkness upon my paths. He has stripped my glory from me and taken the crown from my head. But I know that my redeemer lives and that at the last he will stand upon the earth. Then in my flesh I shall see God.”

Amen.

Image: Hans I Rottenhammer, The Coronation of the Virgin (c. 1596-1606). Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.