The Kingdom of God Is Like the High Point of Summer

On Sunday, we came home to feast on sweet corn.  Our friend had gone to Ohio and was willing to share her stash of sweet corn with us.

I thought of all those teaching moments of Jesus that begin with The Kingdom of Heaven is like . . ., or the Kingdom of God is like . . .  Throughout the summer, the Program Director of Lutheridge, Pastor Mary Canniff-Kuhn has been posting modern updates with a camp theme:

"The kingdom of God is like gingerbread cookies made in KidzCamp. Delight is essential. Judgement is irrelevant."

"The kingdom of God is like snow in July. All things are possible."

The Kingdom of God is like a friend who shares her sweet corn with you who are stranded at the tip of the continent without good sweet corn to call your own.

Let me end with a different kind of quote about summer, that I got from this blog post.  RJ quotes Parker Palmer:

"Summer is the season when all the promissory notes of autumn, winter, and spring come due, and each year the debts are repaid with compound interest. In summer, it is hard to remember that we had ever doubted the natural process, had ever ceded death the last word, had ever lost faith in the powers of new life. Summer is a reminder that our faith is not nearly as strong as the things we profess to have faith in - a reminder that for this sing season, at least, we might cease our anxious machinations and give ourselves to the abiding and abundant grace of our common life."

As always, Palmer's words leave me in awe of the power of language and the power of seasons.