What Are You Looking For?
Yeshua: The Jesus We Never Knew - Part 5
Sunday, February 13, 2022
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-46
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.
Matthew 13:45-46
Listen to this week’s sermon here:
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Last weekend my daughter and I watched the animated movies “Sing” and “Sing 2.” It’s a story of big dreams and going after them with everything you’ve got. It’s a story of ordinary and humble characters who never imagined their passion for singing could ever be more than a foolish dream, that is, until they took the risk, found each other, and realized that their dreams resonated with the dreams of countless others who were inspired and propelled them to stardom.
One key scene included in the trailer shows a theater full of fans singing Bono’s famous track, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.” In the movie, the writer of that song is stunned that people even remember it, let alone still sing it after so many years. The scene reminds us not only of the power of music, but of the longing for something more that resonates with almost every human heart. Like the characters in the movie, we are all still looking for something that we haven’t quite found yet.
As Christians, we don’t dream of becoming stars, but Jesus does invite us to have big dreams. The characters of “Sing” remind me of the merchant in Jesus’ parable, forever in search of the great pearl… of that one undefinable thing that always seems just out of reach. Perhaps Bono’s hit song could be that merchant’s anthem for life, always searching but never quite finding…
… until he / she does.
And that’s when everything changes. The Kingdom of Heaven is not the pearl itself as if it could be bought or sold. Rather, it is the whole of the search for that which always seems just beyond reach… until it isn’t…
And then when we find it, we, like the merchant, will give up anything to hold onto it. When we connect this to the earlier parables about the mustard seed and the yeast, we realize this treasure always closer than we imagined. Maybe it was even inside of us all along, disguised as something small and insignificant… a Divine Spark, as the Celtic Saints called it, or the image of God in us which has driven and guided our search all along.
What if the Kingdom of Heaven is at the place where the search ends… not when we discover some external treasure, but when we realize our true selves are already found in God?