Welcome to the CommonsCast. We're glad to have you here. We hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Head to commons.church for more information.

Oh, my name is Bobby. I'm a pastor here. I'm a pastor everywhere. Pastoring runs deep. I'll have you know.

Welcome to church. Looks like you've got your coffee, which is great. We are in our fifth Sunday in the series, the world is it could be. All kingdom parables all the time. But also here in Canada, it's Thanksgiving weekend.

And by some lucky draw, I ended up with two October sermons on two October holidays, and I do use that term a little loosely. You'll also be hearing from me on Halloween. It's a Sunday this year. I'm really excited about that. Should we make it costumed?

It's like a little oh, some people are yes. Definitely. Definite costumes. I mean, go for it. Think about it.

Kids can and probably should show up to church in costumes where we talked about that as a team, and we're ready for it. So I think that'll bring great delight. And truthfully, of the two holidays, Halloween is my favorite. Jonathan and I were driving through our neighborhood last weekend, and I got so excited when I noticed the creepy decor set up on people's lawns that I squealed with glee. I love I love the spooky stuff.

And maybe you think I'm a little bit spooky for that. That's fine. But we can save that conversation for October 31, shall we? Today, of course, is about gratitude. And as a pastor, one of my favorite things to say up here is let us pray.

Let us pray. We are well, you don't have to yet. I'm just gonna talk a little bit more. There are three simple words that draw our hearts together even and especially with our differences, and those three simple words draw our minds to a place of peace in the middle of chaos, and let us pray draws our bodies into reverent bowels whether we are feeling sick or healthy. So as a spin on let us pray, let us soak up some thanksgiving.

Let us thank God for our breath and our beating hearts and the love in our lives and the freedom that comes when we say, I'm sorry. Let us thank God for the graciousness of those who choose reconciliation instead of revenge, for the land that is refuge to people who know hardship, for laughter of old friends reuniting. And let us thank God for the never ending nature of our faith journey, relearning Jesus' teachings, divine wisdom found when we ask hard questions, and maybe even move forward without the answers. So add to that list this weekend. Why don't you?

And share it with a friend or maybe your lover today. Today, we are diving into a couple of short parables that are pretty similar to each other. Perhaps you've cruised right by these two parables and thought, okay. Cool. I get that.

Seems simple. But we are going to slow our reading down. Take our time with these cute little parables and see what's here for us. The text is Matthew 13 verses 44 to 46, and these are the parables of the treasure and the pearl. And we're going to talk about subversions, cover ups, joy, and ultimate concerns.

But before we dive in, let us pray. Loving God. It's really precious to be aware of the things that we love. For those today who hold worry or concern for what or who they love, Maybe a friend or family member who is unwell in body and mind. Maybe a sense of worry for city or province or world right now.

Maybe a nagging feeling that something really needs to change. Jesus, may we open our hearts to your way forward. And for those are who are caught up in gratitude for what they treasure, maybe it's the faithful friend who shows us the love that we deserve. Maybe it's the partnership in our lives that brings so much goodness. Maybe it's just this practice of walking every day or meditating when we can or reading that reminds us of who we are.

Spirit, may our awareness of these gifts prompt trust and generosity and grace everywhere, everywhere. Amen. Okay. So we are going to read both parables together. And to change it up, why don't you stand if you are able as a posture of openness for what God may have for you today?

Yeah. Go for it. Hi, everybody. Nice. And even if you're at home, go ahead and stand where you are.

When we finish, I will say the word of the lord, and you are welcome to say thanks be to god. You can say that out loud. And I'll read it so you can just take it in. Ready? It's gonna be fun.

A reading from the gospel of Matthew. The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again. And then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls.

When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it. The word of the lord. Thanks be to god. Beautiful. You can be seated.

Now here's what I love about these two parables. I love what they are not. There is a long tradition of allegorizing these similes. Throughout church history, church leaders would say, oh, get it. The treasure is like Jesus, or the field is like the church, or the pearl is like one's virginity.

That one seems like a bit of a stretch, but okay. And today, scholars resist these allegorical hot takes. They say you don't have to read allegories into these images of treasure and pearls to find meaning. Just read closely and let the images speak for themselves. Algorithm readings might be fun, but they often get kinda carried away and flatten down the message.

The image in Jesus' parables aren't cryptic so that you have to break this code. They are surprising in their context in a way that makes people turn to one another and say, is Jesus saying, like, what I think he's saying? Take the treasure. It was fairly common for people to bury valuable things in fields, especially in times of conflict and war, which happen a lot in Palestine. People would hide their valuables with the hope that they were forced to leave.

They could eventually return, and their valuables would be there when they got back. A rabbinic saying stated that the safest repository for money was the earth. And even the Qumran community where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found had this copper scroll listing where treasure of gold and silver could be found in cisterns, under rocks, out in fields, and in burial mounds. But what happens if you find someone else's treasure? Well, locally, the laws stated finders keepers.

So lucky you. Imagine living with that possibility, that treasure could be everywhere, and it could be yours. Now, let's take the second simile. The kingdom is like a merchant. Only the Greek uses two nouns to introduce this character, anthropos and porous.

And the literal translation is a man, a merchant. And this syntax is known as redundant appositive. In other places, Matthew uses the construction to introduce an enemy, a man, in the parable of the weeds, and a man, a householder, in the parable of the net. But so what? Well, the redundancy emphasizes something particular.

Just before you slide off into allegory wondering if this man stands for God, seeking you like a pearl so pretty, You're hit with the insistence that, no, the man is a merchant. Now we love a moneymaker. In our world, capitalism is king. Influencers get endorsements, and the hustle is admired. But the people listening to this parable are tired of merchants.

The Greek term suggests wholesaler, and in antiquity, the term is negative. The only other place Ampouros appears in the New Testament is in Revelation. It's this racy reference. Merchants get rich by conspiring with the whore of Babylon. Bit of a sick burn.

A merchant is not on your side if you're poor. He tricks you into buying things you do not need. Goods that look so shiny at the market, but break as soon as you bring them home. And right from these starting images, Jesus subverts expectations of what the reign of God is like by centering on ordinary characters and not even very likable ones. And guess what the farmer and the merchant are doing at the start of these stories?

Nothing special. They're just going about their day jobs, hoping maybe that their luck could change. And before it does, we've got these elements of buried treasure not yet found and sought after pearls still hidden. Before the getting, there's a break, a hesitation. And I actually think that this pause is sacred.

I think it's sacred because you've lived it. You've gone about your business maybe unaware of the good below the surface. You've been the person that other people didn't want to see succeed. You've waited for the tides to turn in your favor thinking maybe maybe tomorrow something good will happen. The reign of God includes the feeling of waiting for something better.

You are not outside the work of God when you're waiting. You're just not. The next bit of action, it goes like this. When a man found the treasure, he hid it. Verse 45.

When that man, the merchant, found a pearl of great value, he went away. And the two characters find the treasure and the pearl, but they do not obtain those finds immediately. There's this gap, turning away before turning back towards their findings. Neither characters just grab the goods and run. They enact the first stage of some kind of plan.

In fact, the verb for found here is, it's a prolonged form of the primary verb, hero, which does mean to get or obtain. But the action in the verb, it slows us down. We're not at the getting yet. And I wanna spend some time with this shift, this cover up before the characters get their hands on that jackpot. If If you're like me, some of the most important treasure in your life came after struggle.

To use imagery of the parable, maybe the land of your life was fought over and there's conflict ground into the soil. You spent years digging around in boxes of less precious trinkets looking for something that would last. And just as you start to form a vision of what you want your life to look like, maybe more wholeness and healing and satisfaction, you know enough to put your head down, just like get to work. Maybe the work is therapy or education or good parenting books. Maybe the work is paying down debt or trying your best to do what's right in a pandemic.

Maybe it's the work of self care or forgiveness or going with less. I like that these two guys don't just seize their treasures. They get to work to make sure it will be theirs. The treasure isn't instantaneous. It's a bit of a process.

But here's something else that gets me about these kingdom parables. What really gets me about these guys is that they do not doubt that the treasure will be theirs. They go for it. As my brother said when he worked construction, they make a plan and they work a plan. We never hear them say, no, no, no, I shouldn't.

I don't deserve that gold. We never hear them say, to God be the glory, great things God has done. We never hear them say, oh, here. You can all have some. I'm a really good giver.

These guys, they stumble upon more than their wildest dreams could conjure, and they go for it. It turns out that the kingdom of God isn't looking for worthy takers. The riches of God's reign are available to everyone. Bad dads, troubled priests, climate change deniers, crazy aunties, rude neighbors. We're talking about generosity that really should make us worm.

The kingdom of God isn't checking character references. These stories are about what it feels like to get something you didn't earn and you maybe don't even deserve. The feeling of the possibility of a bright new future. So let's talk about joy like that. And honestly, I come to joy this week a little bit ragged.

I had to take my car to the shop not once but twice, and that 2,009 city Jetta is getting more money and more emotion from me than it deserves. I also had an old conflict flare up, and that took a lot out of me. And there's all this loss, a pile of loss in a pandemic. And that loss, it stays with us. Right?

We are carrying it all the time. Over four million people, close to five now, have died from COVID nineteen, often over twenty a day in our province. I mean, that is sad. But as we soak in this parable of the reign of God, we get the feeling that joy is not only possible, but more exhilarating than you first imagined. It is quite possibly as fun as Bobby on a roller coaster at Six Flags.

And true story, I am not a thrill seeker. Maybe you guessed that. But thrill came to me nonetheless when I worked with teens in California in the early two thousands. One spring, we took a trip to Six Flags, and I got teen pressured to ride a floorless roller coaster that zooms a human body 100 kilometers an hour through a double corkscrew. I was terrified.

I was so sure I was going to hate it. And then I loved it. The feeling of joy in the parable of the found treasure in the pearl is more roller coaster than cozy tea cozy. Let me show you what I mean. After the cover up, the man who found the treasure in the field in his joy went and sold all he had, and the merchant went away and sold everything he had too.

And the word joy isn't in the story of the pearl. It's assumed. Joy propels both to go all in towards the wealth that's within their reach. Now remember, Jesus tells these stories in dusty places to worn out people. These are illiterate people.

They are peasants. They are the underclass. So clearing his throat, Jesus says, hey, listen up. I know that you feel marginalized. I know that you are poor and would give everything to change your position.

I know you spend your nights dreaming of enough food for tomorrow. He goes on, right now, the rulers justify their right to your work and income. They stay powerful and wealthy because they use and abuse you. What if I told you that was never how it was supposed to be? What if I told you that the reign of God distributes wealth where it's needed?

Looking out across the crowd, Jesus sees a man in threadbare clothes and totally worn out sandals on his feet and says, hey, you. You win a million dollars. And the crowd goes wild. And then he spots this woman with six or seven children, also hungry with hallowed out cheeks, and he says to her, you, you win 2,000,000. And the crowd goes wild.

And Jesus says, let's make a world where the poor aren't poor forever. Let's make a world where kids are fed local organic vegetables and treated to fancy YYC ice cream just because we love them. Let's make a world so benevolent that the scales tip to favor everyone, not just the few. Who's with me? And the crowd goes wild.

The reign of God is the feeling of exhilarating joy at the possibility of a better world. I recently read a piece about joy called, and I love this title, we need the funk by Linneese Pinkard and Nicola Torbet. And they talk about the North American obsession with a version of Christianity that divides the world into right and wrong. It's like black and white, good and evil. And with these divisions, we prefer willpower and strength over love and justice and aliveness.

They write, the most terrifying quality of a broken society is the absence of joy. Joy finds no place in a moralistic religion. Joy is messy, unpredictable, kinesthetic, embodied, and erotic. It blurs boundaries wherever moralism attempts to draw them. Joy is intricately interwoven within a relational universe, and it insists that right action be worked out not on the sterile surgical table of moralism, but in the steaming cauldron of relationship.

I mean, come on with that. Now, here's the deal. I do not want to tame these parables for you. Make them about simple choices between right and wrong. I want the parables of the kingdom to stay wild.

The reign of God is about joy that whips you off the ground, throws you through a corkscrew at a 100 kilometers an hour, and makes tears stream down your face with hilarity, laughing so hard at the fact that you made it through all of that in one piece. You're alive. Your legs are maybe a bit shaky on the ground, joking with the teenagers who saw your thick fear. The final scenes in these short parables go like this. The one who found the treasure bought the field, and the one who found the precious pearl bought it.

Now if you're like my husband, you might be thinking, this plan seems like a very bad idea. I mean, what happens next? What's a merchant without merchandise? You can't exactly cut up a pearl and feed it to your family. Only we're not meant to ask what these characters do next.

We're meant to imagine what it feels like to be them. To imagine that the reign of God might feel like you're winning a game you didn't even know you were playing and you're bypassing a system that was meant to keep you down, and you're getting away with something way too good to be true. But let's be honest, who feels like that most of the time or any day. And let's face it. We aren't the poor in the countryside of rural Palestine.

We already own treasures and pearls and RRSPs and ETFs. We have more wealth than most people on the planet even if you feel like your bank account is telling you something different. So how do we, to borrow a word Scott used in the bible roadmap course this week, how do we re story these parables for ourselves? After all, we confess that the scriptures are alive and the words of Jesus speak to us wherever we are. Well, I wanna end today with some questions about your ultimate concern and what it feels like to really pursue what you love.

And New Testament scholar, Amy Jill Levine, says that the parables of the treasure and the pearl give us a chance to evaluate what we would give everything for. And there's a thread of Hebrew wisdom here. We read about that in Proverbs two, wisdom that is searched for like silver, hidden away like a treasure. But maybe you don't have an answer to the question, like, what is your ultimate concern? Maybe you have no idea what you would, quote, sell everything for.

And if that's the case, it's okay. Let's start with some questions. Questions like, will you be someone who knows treasure when you stumble upon it? Will you seek until you find what you're looking for, even if it takes years? Will you trust that the world is not full of traps but treasure chests?

Can you imagine that around every corner, you could run into a gift so great it changes the course of your life? Can you lay down the expectations of what you think treasure looks like, And could you welcome the aliveness of your own life as precious in and of itself? Can you welcome the wisdom that comes to you right in the middle of what you lack? Can you be wealthy with love and with grace and with kindness and compassion as if that is the currency of the kingdom? How about you close your eyes and you breathe in deeply, and you trust that the person you don't love right now, Maybe it's you or it's him or it's them.

That person is worthy of treasure and pearls too. That's the world as it could be. Let us pray. The writer, Rilke, said that we should have patience for what is unresolved in our hearts and try to love the questions themselves. Jesus, give us courage to form the questions that get to the heart of the matter and to seek until we find answers, pearls even.

Will you set us free to love and to resist all that robs us of aliveness and to notice the treasure buried in our own lives? Gifts of resilience, the company of friends and strangers, words on pages that inspire the movement of our bodies in the world, naming how we're feeling, listening to the needs we can meet. Spirit of the living God, present with us now. Enter the places of our worry, our brokenness, our sadness, and heal us of all that harms us. Amen.