Wednesday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time
A pastor, a prophet, a community organizer, Martin Luther King, Jr was steeped in the scriptures and knew the current reality is not God’s desire for the world. In his “I Have a Dream” speech, he laments, with great specificity, the racism of his day. We could easily add to that list in our own day. He speaks God’s word from the prophet Amos, “We cannot be satisfied until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” King paints a dream that is drawn from God’s dream for us. After naming his dream he reminds us again, this is God’s dream, pulling from the prophet Isaiah, “I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.”
It can be easy to be overwhelmed by cooperating with God’s work of the Kingdom, of answering the prophet’s call to let justice roll down like water. But Jesus invites us to “go” do the thing in front of us faithfully and well. I am struck by the word “go,” throughout chapter 8 of the Gospel of Matthew. Jesus has left the mount where he gave his famous sermon and now he is on the go, and “go” is a consistent refrain. Here’s a sampling of this refrain:
Having healed a leper, “Go show yourself to the priest;”
healing the Centurion's servant, “Go let it be done…”;
Telling a would-be follower not to go and wait for his father to die before following Jesus.
And now today, he tells the demons to “Go.”
There is a lot of “going” going on after his sermon on the mount!
Jesus has proclaimed God’s upside-down kingdom where the poor are lifted up, those who mourn are comforted, the meek inherit the earth, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness and those who are merciful, those who are pure in heart…all find joy in God’s kingdom. Now, he’s on the go, and inviting us to do the same, to not just ponder how we are salt and light in the world, but to do it! Doing the thing in front of us is not a call to sit on the sidelines simply waiting for the right moment to come into our lap or be content with moderate little bits of God’s dream.
Christ calls us to faithfulness, to dream alongside God’s dream and desire for the world and then to go do something now, cooperate with God to make it be today. So today, go, enact the Kingdom and live God’s dream for you and for the world!
—Kelly Adamson