A House and a Household

A House and a Household
2 Samuel 7: 1- 29

One of my colleagues likes to remind people that Jesus never talks about our establishing God’s kingdom or furthering it or building it or extending it. In the Gospels, the only things we do to God’s kingdom are wait for it, see it, enter it, seek it, receive it, inherit it, and declare that it has come. In other words, we don’t have an active relationship to it at all. In U.S. culture, this is an unpopular point to make, because people like to feel they can make a difference. They want to achieve. I enjoy watching students shift in their seats unhappily when I repeat my colleague’s point. We don’t like the fact that the gospel is about what God has done for us and not about what we do for God. (Yes, I know, we do have responsibility, and we are challenged to serve God and serve the world and so on, but we will not understand our role—and avoid disillusion—unless we see the point about the way Jesus talks.)...