A New Beginning
Jubilee Preaching Aid for July 6, 2025
Readings for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost (Year C)
- · 2 Kings 5:1-14
- · Psalm 30
- · Galatians 6:(1-6), 7-16
- · Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
These passages clearly illustrate God’s “upside-down kingdom.” It is a phrase coined by Donald B. Kraybill in his 1978 book by the same name, where he explored the meaning of Jubilee and what it means to follow the “Christ who traded victory and power for hanging out with the poor and forgiving his enemies.” A Jubilee mindset is at the heart of Jesus’ teachings about peace, it subverts how power is understood. This is why we now tend to speak about the realm of God or kin-dom of God, where everything is in right relationship.
2 Kings 5:1-14 is rich with metaphors of the kindom. The power structures are upturned in this narrative. The Aramean and Israelite kings don’t know how to operate outside of an adversarial worldview. But a traumatized, displaced, enslaved young girl becomes the conduit for an alternative path that changes the categories of oppressor and oppressed. “We recognize in her actions something that goes to the very heart of the gospel. Jesus was never afraid to confront injustice; however, the justice he preached opens the door for the transformation of the oppressor. In the Gospels, justice is not retributive; it does not give the oppressors what they deserve, but rather what they need: truth, love, compassion, the possibility of transformation, and forgiveness. In the story from 2 Kings, the young girl refuses to see the vulnerability of her oppressor as an opportunity for vengeance or retribution. Instead, her voice embodies hope and inclusivity for someone who has caused her incredible harm. She had the courage to love, offering her perpetrator what he could not obtain through his power: healing, freedom, and the possibility of a new beginning. She gave Naaman not what he deserved but what he needed: the chance to be transformed.” (From The Courage to Love Sermon at the Grossmünster Church by Cesar Garcia on the occasion of the 500 year Anniversary of Anabaptism).
Naaman for his part needed to relinquish his power and his notions of propriety in order to experience his protracted healing and restoration. His submission to the power of Nature, as symbolized by the river, was also a path to his transformation.
As seekers of justice and right relationships between settlers and Indigenous people we would do well to wonder where the power lies and how it needs to be redistributed and redefined in order to nurture healing. This story challenges us to ask which oppressed voices need to be heard and amplified so that we can all find the path of restoration.
In Luke 10:1-11, 16-20, Jesus’ methodology is also an example of the upturning of power structures, especially if we juxtapose it with the domination and conversion approach that has characterized much of Christendom over the centuries. According to Luke, he did not concentrate power for himself but distributed it evenly among his disciples who were sent out in accountable pairs. What they were given was the power to bring peace and healing – and to set boundaries and walk away in contexts where they were not welcome.
Here too humility was a key component to spreading the Gospel of peace. The disciples were not instructed to go to City Hall, or even the town square but rather to find where God was already at work with the people of peace in any given context. And in the spirit of kin-dom, the peace they spread
returned to them. Finally, when the disciples were tempted to boast about the power they found by dominating demons, Jesus put them in their place.
How might our efforts towards justice be strengthened if we open our eyes to finding the people of peace and working together with them? This extends to validating already existing Indigenous wisdom and Nature’s wisdom which are present in the cause of ecological and economic justice. And a tougher question: where might we be asked to wipe the dust off of our feet where we are not welcome and to move on?
Michele Rizoli, M.Div., is a retired Mennonite pastor living in Toronto.
