The kingdom of God has drawn near. The kingdom of God is at hand.

That’s how the Revised Standard Version translates Jesus’ opening message: that the kingdom of God is at hand, at your fingertips, so close that it is almost within our grasp, if we will repent, that is turn around, and reach for it.

Last week, we heard from John that Jesus decided to return to Galilee, where he was from, and there began to form his group of disciples. A colleague reminded me that what John didn’t say, which Mark tells us today, is that the reason Jesus left Judea and fled north was because John, his cousin, who had baptized him, had been arrested and imprisoned by Herod.

This was not the same Herod as the one who, according to Matthew, ordered the destruction of a generation of infants in Bethlehem, back when John and Jesus were each young enough to be at risk. Still, this Herod, the one who imprisoned John, would be implicated in each of the cousin’s deaths, in the end, and for now, forewarned by the stories of their childhood and the fears of their parents, the vague memories of Egypt and the common knowledge of Herod’s dungeon caves built into the hillside of Makawir, Jesus left the region east of Jerusalem and retreated to the relative safety of Galilee, where he began to call to himself the people who would become his closest friends and companions on the way, and to preach the message to all who would hear it, that the kingdom of God was at hand.

The way of Herod is to arrest those who criticize, to kill those who oppose, to build fortresses against his own people and pay obeisance to the occupiers who keep him on his throne. The kingdom of God is not like that of Herod.

Because there is no higher authority than God, the kingdom of God does not pay homage to the powers of this world nor any other. It does not submit itself to our control, nor does it have any need for force or coercion. Because the kingdom of God is above all and over all, it has no need to trumpet its glory nor to impose its will nor to persuade its citizens. Because there is no threat that can undo the kingdom of God, it does not build fortresses nor arm itself against invaders nor against infidels. There is no army that can undo God, nor any act of violence that can unthrone God, nor any siege that can affect the liberty of God’s covenant with the living.

Because God is not dependent upon anyone’s approval to keep God in power, God can love indiscriminately, show mercy without restraint, do right without obligation, live unconditionally.

No, the kingdom of God is not like that of Herod.

And Jesus turns away from Herod and returns to Galilee to proclaim the gospel: that the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, he says, and believe it. Believe it. Believe that it is within reach.

Do we believe that the kingdom of God is still possible, let alone at hand, in this time, in this place, today? Are we willing to repent of all that keeps us from reaching out for it, touching it, grasping it? Or are we still on the run from Herod, or worse, under Herod’s thumb?

Is God truly our highest authority, our king, if you like, or have we compromised with the powers and principalities of everyday life in a compromised world, in order to get by, to rub along?

I mean, what is the alternative, after all? Get out of the boat like James and John and follow Jesus without a second thought or safety net? 

I do find these stories of scripture humbling. John knew he was playing with fury when he preached repentance to Herod and his wife, but he wouldn’t stop. Those disciples, who dropped everything without knowing what they might find in return. Paul, who practiced what he preached to the Corinthians, living as though each day was the first of his call to serve Christ, and the last chance he had to respond. Jesus, Jesus knew that he himself would one day fall under Herod’s wrath, but that didn’t stop him reaching for the kingdom of God, and finding it to be at hand, like a ripe fig. 

The rest of us are more like Jonah, aren’t we? We will go to some lengths to avoid the call of God upon us to radically change our allegiances and our priorities away from vengeance and toward mercy, away from power and toward service, away from violence toward self-sacrifice, away from righteousness toward humility, from turning directly to the throne of heaven without considering the Cross. And God’s mercy pursues us anyway. 

The present form of this world is passing away, Paul wrote to Corinth. The kingdom of God is at hand, Jesus told anyone who would listen. The present form of this world is always passing away, nothing stays still, nothing stays the same. From the miraculous, like the development of medicines to treat deadly disease, to the terrifying, like the climate crisis, we walk through an ever-changing and kaleidoscopic landscape. What will become of it all, which way the world will turn, that is up to us.

It is unlikely that we will be called from our boats or our desks or our couches by an itinerant preacher, or be blinded by a dazzling vision on the road to Cleveland or Damascus, or be sent single-handedly to preach penitence to a people like Nineveh, although it could happen.

But the kingdom of God is closer than that. It is at hand every time we have a choice to make between the ways of Herod and the way of the Cross, to be powerful or to be kind, to be safe or to be humble, to love indiscriminately, show mercy without restraint, do right without obligation, live unconditionally.

The kingdom of God is at hand, within our grasp, within our hearts, if we will but turn and follow Jesus.

Year B Epiphany 3 readings: Jonah 3:1-5, 10; 1 Corinthians 7:29-31; Mark 1:14-20