A Sermon preached at Pentecost IV 6 July 2025 at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden
2 Kings 5:1-14, Galatians 6:7-16, Luke 10:1-11. 16-20
This morning’s Gospel story in Luke about the sending of the 70 others (or in some translations the 72), is as the word “others” indicates, the second of two similar mission events. In the first one, from Luke 9:1-6 that we never get to hear on a Sunday (only at a weekday Eucharist) it is the 12 disciples who are sent. Their task was the same as today’s: “to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal.” (9:2). Both groups are sent without any baggage “Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money—not even an extra tunic.” (9:3) And they receive very similar instructions on what they are to do if they are not welcomed: “Wherever they do not welcome you, as you are leaving that town shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.” (9:5)
Why do we have two such similar stories? For one thing it is an important reminder that even during Jesus’ physical mission on earth it was not just the 12 disciples/apostles, often seen as the precursors of our current bishops, who were actively involved in his mission. Many more people – both men and women – we commissioned directly by Jesus to do his work of healing and proclaiming. In fact, I have read an explanation in one commentary that one reason the 70 were sent out in in pairs is because they were mixed pairs, one woman and one man to be able to bring Jesus’ message to both men and women.
The second reason is because the mission they were being sent on was both important and urgent. We heard the urgency already in last week’s gospel reading when those who wanted to follow Jesus were told to leave without burying their dead, without saying farewell to their family. In today’s passage we hear and feel the urgency in the call to take nothing with them, to set off at once. We sense the urgency in Jesus’ call not to waste time with a town that does not welcome then: And we hear about the necessity and urgency when Jesus says: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” (10:2) Twelve people are not enough, nor for that matter were seventy!
What is the mission? In the first story it was “to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal,” in the second to bring God’s peace and “to cure the sick, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.” (10:9) I don’t think the different order of first proclaim, then heal vs. first heal, then proclaim is important, as the kingdom of God or kingdom of heaven always includes both wholeness and well-being. The kingdom of God is much more than a future promise of heavenly bliss; it is also a better way of life. That is why the seventy are told to say – both in the towns that receive and welcome then and those that don’t – ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ (10:9, 10:11) We should not be surprised, Christianity is full of “both/and” concepts and ideas. God is both one and three persons. Jesus is both divine and human, we are both sinners and saints, both faith and works are essential, and the kingdom is both a present reality and a future promise.
Politically, I identify as a democratic socialist - in the European sense, not the American one, but I am still not so naïve as to believe that we can achieve heaven on earth on our own and now – though we can definitely do better than the hell on earth of Gaza, and the Ukrainian front and cities when the Russians attack. Heaven on earth through human power and means is not what the “proximity of the kingdom” means - the myth of inexorable and inevitable progress has shown itself to be very mythical indeed.
But nor is it a tantalizing glimpse of something unobtainable. Jesus calls us to live as if God’s kingdom is both possible and real. I see that in Jesus’ teaching – the Sermon on the Mount for example, and in his actions, and in what he commissions and empowers his followers to do, as in this passage. The healing of body, mind and spirit are tangible evidence of the presence of God's reign. But to say the kingdom is near, that it has begun to manifest itself, is not to say that everything associated with the kingdom has already been realized. There is much more to come, and more joy awaits us than we can ever realize in the here and now, this is the glory that is constantly being referred to throughout the Bible.
Paul too, in this final part of his letter to the Galatians, writes about a new reality, a new creation that God has initiated and that the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ (Gal. 6:14-15) is the sign of. The cross stands both for Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice and rejection of all that corrupts us – greed, fear, hate, jealousy – and for our re-creation as a family of faith and the Israel of God: that universal family and nation that knows of no boundaries or limits. His concern, and his annoyance with the Galatians who have been following some very bad advice, is getting this message across, convincing people that they not only need to change but will benefit from changing!
To borrow a phrase, I found elsewhere: Getting people into heaven isn’t Paul’s concern. Getting heaven into people is. God sent Jesus to change and open up hearts and Jesus sent the twelve, then the seventy, and now us to do the same, always without fear or force. It is interesting that both Paul, “So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up” (Gal. 6:9) and Jesus, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest” (Luke 10:2) use harvest metaphors to show how the kingdom of heaven grows.
Before we can reap, before we can harvest, we must first sow. First, we sow the seeds of the kingdom, the seeds of love, peace, healing and God's Word, and then reap a harvest of love, a harvest of gratitude, the joy of response, the coming of the kingdom. But we must remember that reaping a harvest almost never happens on the same day as sowing the seed. In between sowing and harvesting we let God do God’s work: As Paul writes to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 3:6) “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.” And in today’s Gospel passage the seventy are sent “on ahead of him …to every town and place where he himself intended to go.” (Luke 10:1) Their and our role is to prepare the way, not to do all the work of Jesus on their and our own: success and failure are not up to them or us. We just need to be faithful to our calling. And that in itself brings joy and fulfillment. The seventy return with joy, joy in having participated in God’s mission, delight in having been chosen and commissioned, and great wonder at the power they were given when they acted in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
