Mark 1:15

“The time has come, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe the good news.”


good news is ever present all shall be well
such a time is ripe for the picking

saving time for another time
makes future time uncouth

Mumu was right about dark time
only Bastian could imaginatively rename

good news is not content driven
for creeds are but derivative byproducts

processing experience and opportunity
requires trust beyond belief

freedom generates a next chaos
wherein and wherefrom now and shall embrace

such a time as this
welcomes and moves on


Time that is καιρός (kairos “opportune”) time is seen as present time. This makes this call to be very urgent. No matter what else is going on, there is no one else, no where else, and no other time than this time.

The way we speak of this time is critically important. “G*D’s kingdom” would have been very understandable in Mark’s day as kingdoms were the way the world worked. It was secular or everyday language that communicated very well. “Kingdom”, in particular, has become sacred or holy language that puts it outside of our experience and thus is unhelpful coded language.

The church has struggled with this for a long time and we are still in the process of trying to find language for the presence of a presence that has a mysterious, yet to be revealed, quality to it and is only able to be hinted at in some graphical way such as “G*D”. Until we crucify and resurrect this “kingdom” language, we won’t be able to do the changing required to radically trust a partnership with G*D. Leonard Bernstein’s Kaddish is one of the places we might listen for new partnership of mutual humility between our past and future.

Yes, the time is now, but “kingdom” is only near, not present, and our map to new relationships is still being developed. It will be interesting to see what comes from the intersectionality found in ex-plorations by “emergent” church folks and those represented by Shambala Press.

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