Shelter and Kingdom
Joshua 2 Rahab
1 Kings 17, 2 Kings 4 Elijah/Elisha and the widow(s)
John 8 Stopping the stoning
Isaiah 11 Lamb and Lion shall lay down together
Leviticus 23:39-44 Feast of Booths
Psalm 23
Matthew 25
One of the old tenets of government, very old, is that there is responsibility up and down. In feudal states, the people had responsibilities to the lord, and the lord had responsibilities to the people. The people worked the fields, and if there was a famine, the lord was supposed to feed them. The people could get levied for military service, and if there was a war, the lord was supposed to protect them from enemy combatants. The kingdom is supposed to provide shelter, and nurture, and fellowship.
How does God’s kingdom provide those things? How do we show the kingdom by providing shelter and nurture and fellowship? This may be the easiest question we asked all year. Don’t we show the kingdom by feeding the hungry? By clothing the naked? By sitting with the prisoner and the afflicted? Do we remember what it was to be those people? How do we live when we are those people? If we are to show the kingdom and shelters the children of God, can we do them both at the same time?
