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Looking Deeper

As the Church delves into Advent - the anticipation and expectation of the long awaited Messiah - we at True North will be delving into the Kingdom of God/Heaven passages from Matthew, a ten week sermon series entitled Looking Deeper. The bulk of these kingdom passages are shortly after the Sermon on the Mount series; Jesus leaves the house and sits by the seaside and a large group of people begin to gather. Seeing the crowd, Jesus begins preaching and teaching them many things in parables. The kingdom parables are arguably the most difficult passages to interpret. Matthew 13:24-30 will be the first parable we look at, that of the weeds sown among the good seed. Matthew 13: 31 and 32 focuses on a very small mustard seed or pine nut that grows into a very large tree. Moving on through the Sermon on the Mount, we will look at Matthew13: 33 and the comparison of God's kingdom to yeast. Matthew 13:44 describes the Kingdom of Heaven to be like a treasure hidden for a long time in a field. The halfway point is Matthew 13:45-46, the flawless jewel. The second half of the series begins with Matthew 13: 47-50, the fishing net that is culled by angels. An owner of a house or general store is used to describe the kingdom in Matthew 13:52. For the remaining three lessons we will journey with Jesus from Capernaum to Galilee to Judea and then into Jerusalem. Matthew 18: 23-35 is a rather long telling of the wicked servant who begs for forgiveness yet refuses to forgive his fellow servant. And we've all heard the tale of the gregarious estate manager in Matthew 20:1-16 who pays the same wages to all workers, be it for an hours labor or 9. And finally, we round out this series with Matthew 22:1-10, the great wedding banquet where the staff was ordered to bring in the dirge of the streets when the invited guests all decline the invitation.

Many of these parables and stories are very difficult to understand. The metaphors and analogies between the kingdom of heaven and the normal almost mundane items encountered in everyday life are easy to miss or mis-interpret. Come join us as we delve into what the kingdom of heaven is (or isn't). Come ... we are all Looking Deeper.