Fifth Sunday after Pentecost

The Rev. Rob Fisher

St. Dunstan’s, Carmel Valley

Readings: 2 Kings 2:1-2, 6-14; Psalm 77:1-2, 11-20; Galatians 5:1, 13-25; Luke 9:51-62

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

It is very, very good to be home after our two weeks of travel in the Northeast.

We saw old friends and reconnected with family members.  We drove across Central New York and Vermont, the Catskills, the Adirondacks, and the Green Mountains.  And we collected bites on our arms, legs and foreheads from all sorts of marvelous insects.

Like any good vacation, it was also a reminder of what a wonderful place we get to return home to.

When we actually returned home on Thursday, we were in for a surprise.

First, let me explain that we have two Siamese cats.

The male cat, Sam, has always been the one to be adventurous and affectionate—a very dog-like cat.  He was the cat that first showed me that cats can be quite wonderful.  And since Zoe came into the picture, he has shown unbelievable patience with her as she relentlessly invades his space.

(Incidentally, her first word was “cat.”)

Sam’s litter mate, Cleo, is a female cat, and she is known for sitting around on the softest possible place in the house.

When we arrived home on Thursday, we learned that Sam had slipped out of the house on Monday.  In spite of the fact that our cat sitter had tried tirelessly to find him and to lure him back to the house, he had not been seen since.

Sam and Cleo are city cats.  They were given to Sarah nine years ago when they were kittens, and they lived in New York City apartments for the first four years of their lives.

We occasionally let them out during the daytime to wander around our backyard, but they are such city cats that the minute they come back in they always make a beeline for the cat litter.  They haven’t figured out that they could relieve themselves anywhere else.

When we learned that Sam had disappeared, we feared the worst.

We shed some heavy tears that afternoon and prayed for our little friend.  We know that this valley is not a safe place for cats, especially at night.  And if Sam could keep himself safe from coyotes and raccoons, what would he possibly do for food and water?

Sarah raced off to the animal shelter in Salinas as I started making signs to post in the neighborhood.

As I looked for good places to put up posters, I discovered a veterinary clinic in town.  I went in, and asked the woman if I could put up one of my posters.

She took one look at the picture of Sam and said to me “Your cat is alive!”

She then explained to me that a woman had called the clinic because a very frightened Siamese cat was in her backyard.  The cat was too scared to let the woman get close.  Her husband did a clever thing and took a picture with a digital camera to try and read his ID tag.  They zoomed in on the image, but could not read the address or phone number.  All they could read was the name, “Sam.”

The problem was that the woman called the day before, and now the piece of paper with her name and number had been thrown away.  The woman at the front desk sifted through the waste basket and said, “No, it’s not here.  It definitely went out yesterday, and the trash has been picked up since.  The information is lost.”

We seemed to have no way to locate Sam’s whereabouts.  Just some good news that he might still be alive.

Then suddenly the woman at the desk had an idea.  She said, “Let me try and scroll through yesterday’s calls.”

She found a number that seemed like the one, and started dialing it immediately.  I was on pins and needles.

Sure enough, it was the right number.

I rushed over to the woman’s house to find Sam hiding under a six-inch-tall wooden Jacuzzi deck in her backyard.  He had crawled into this small space, seemingly safe from raccoons or anything of any size at all.  The woman had been putting food and water out for him, but he had not touched it until the day before when his hunger was probably outweighing his fear.

As I walked up to the Jacuzzi deck and called his name, I heard some muffled, low-pitched meows.

He carefully slunk out from under the wood, and I picked him up in my arms.  He was a bit lighter and scrawnier than before, but he was still the same affectionate cat, a little rattled, but that was all.

Seeing him again was a truly unexpected wonder, an answer to prayer.  It was a feeling of the purest kind of joy.

***

In the Gospel this morning, we find Jesus on the road.  His face is set toward Jerusalem.

He is now without a home.

He says, “foxes have holes, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”

Those around him cannot understand what he is about.  And his statements to them even seem a bit harsh.  But that is because they don’t see what he sees.

He does not have his eyes set on the road.  His eyes are set on the Kingdom.  His vision is full of nothing but the Kingdom of God, and that is what makes all the difference.

What is the “Kingdom of God”?  What does this mysterious phrase even mean?

One of the best description I know is by the theologian Paul Tillich.  Tillich believed that we are all created to be children of God, but we unfortunately suffer distance from God all our lives.  In his words, we are estranged from God.  Sometimes more and sometimes less, but we are always to some extent estranged from God.

But the opposite of estrangement is union.  That is our ultimate goal.

To be united with God and to put an end to our estrangement is to dwell in the Kingdom of God.  According to Tillich, we will never get this in its complete fullness in our lifetimes, but we do get a taste of it.  The Kingdom really is near to us even if we are not yet citizens of it.

When we come close to God in this way, all our true needs are met.  And what’s more, we become radically free of the attachments of this world.

Jesus confounds those around him in this passage because he is free in a way that they cannot grasp.

And while this is challenging news for us, the good news is that according to Jesus, the Kingdom of God is nearer than we can imagine.  If we only had ears to hear and eyes to see!  It is the hidden treasure before our noses.

***

On Thursday, within a matter of only five hours, we went from grief to joy.

I took Sam home and in no time he was rolling around on our carpet.  We had never appreciated that cat so much as I did that day he was found.

He was the same cat, but he looked different because our eyes were now fully open.

Yes, even being reunited with a cat can open up the floodgates of love.  And in that love, God is very near.

When Sam was restored to us, we truly got a taste of the Kingdom of God.

Just imagine the joy that God feels when we are reunited with him.

—Amen.