“When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is offered to you. Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your town we wipe from our feet as a warning to you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God has come near.’ Luke 10:8-11
“As a child I lived in an area of southern Missouri where electricity was available only in the form of lightning. We had more of that then we could use. But in my senior year of high school the REA (Rural Electrification Administration) extended its lines into the area where we lived, and electrical power became available to households and farms.
When those lines came by our farm, a very different way of living presented itself. Our relationships to fundamental aspects of life—daylight and dark, hot and cold, clean and dirty, work and leisure, preparing food and preserving it—could then be fastly changed for the better. But we still had to believe in the electricity and its arrangements, understand them, and take the practical steps involved in relying on it.
You may think the comparison rather crude, and in some respects it is. But it will help us to understand Jesus’ basic message about the kingdom of the heavens if we pause to reflect on those farmers who, in effect, heard the message: “Repent, for electricity is at hand.” Repent, or turn from their kerosene lamps and lanterns, their iceboxes and cellars, the scrub boards and rug beaters, their woman-powered sewing machines and their radios with dry-cell batteries.
The power that could make their lives far better was right there nar them where, by making relatively simple arrangements, they could utilize it. Strangely, few did not accept it. They did not enter the kingdom of electricity.” Some just did not want to change.”
Dallas Willard in The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God (New York: Harper Collins, 1998) 30-31.
Even as electricity provides “a very different way of living” for those who use it, when we live in light of the kingdom of God that has come near we tap into power, perspective, and generosity that is otherworldly.
Sadly, just like many farmers did not want to tap into the new power source, many people, though the kingdom is right in front of them, will not have anything to do with it. After all, it is “a very different way of living!”
What’s my point today? Those farmers did not want to change. The same holds true with many people. The lesson from today’s Scripture is to serve the receptive and shake the dust off related to the unreceptive.
Many will not be receptive to relying on God as their source of power, perspective, and generosity. As you enjoy the divine hours, “pause to reflect on those farmers” and ask yourself if you are one of them.
Even as life with electricity may well be 100x better than life without it, reliance upon God for provision and generosity is, in the words of Jesus, 100x better (Mark 10:29-30). Are you plugged in?