Christian Art | Parables Of The Kingdom
Matthew 13: 10-17 – Week 16 Ordinary Time, Thursday (King James Audio Bible KJV)
10 And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables?
11 He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.
12 For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath.
13 Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.
14 And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive:
15 For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.
16 But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.
17 For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them.
Jesus’ disciples have opened their hearts to Jesus. They have responded to Jesus by being receptive to the Christian truth he brings, and therefore they may be given to understand the parables. The disciples’ understanding of the presence of the Kingdom in their lives, of which the parables speak, follows upon their faith in Jesus.
While the religious authorities of Jesus’ time, such as the Pharisees, insisted that God was to be found in people’s observance of the Law, and in all the highly detailed and complex elaborations of the Law that had been made through the centuries, Jesus teaches us through the parables that God is with us in the texture of our everyday lives. With Jesus, the Kingdom is come.
The disciples walk with Jesus – the Kingdom is most directly, palpably present in their midst. It is because the disciples are open to the truth of Jesus that they are able to discover truths concerning our relationship with God through the parables. For others, whose heart is waxed gross, the parables remain obscure and cannot serve as a portal of discovery, leading us to look again at our lives, as contemplatives, and so find God with us. Those others’ sense of God remains elsewhere, turned away from Jesus, perhaps caught up still in the hope of a warrior Messiah, a military-political leader, and so they lose the little they had.
When we think of those of Jesus’ time whose hearts were hardened against Jesus, we may think also of those times when we have been hard-hearted and dull-minded in the presence of God’s grace – when we have sinned and when it is our sins, centuries on, which nail Jesus to the cross. We are warned in these verses to be alert to such dullness, to recall ourselves to the wonderful gift of Christ in our lives, to confess our sins and be responsive to God’s grace, to open our hearts to be blessed in Jesus.
Concluding Prayer | Love Revealed By Jesus Christ
Grant us, Lord, a true knowledge of salvation,
so that, freed from fear and the power of our foes,
we may serve you faithfully,
all the days of our life.
We make our prayer through our Lord.
King James Audio Bible | Endnotes
Are Jesus’ Parables Meant To Be Understood?
In many of his parables, Jesus challenges conventional wisdom and upends traditional expectations. For example, he tells the story of the Good Samaritan, in which a despised outsider demonstrates true compassion and kindness, while religious leaders fail to do so. He also tells the parable of the Prodigal Son, in which a wayward son who squanders his inheritance is welcomed back with open arms by his loving father, while his obedient brother who stayed at home is resentful.
These parables can be seen as challenging the wisdom of the world and the assumptions that people hold about morality, status, and power. By presenting a radically different vision of what it means to be righteous and just, Jesus is inviting his listeners to reexamine their own values and priorities. This can be a difficult and unsettling process, but it is one that is necessary for spiritual growth and transformation.
In this sense, Jesus’ use of parables can be seen as a way of subverting the dominant cultural narratives of his time and inviting his listeners to embrace a new way of being in the world. It is a call to reject the values of the world and embrace the values of the kingdom of heaven, which are often in direct opposition to those of the world.
In this sense, Jesus’ parables are a call to new knowledge beyond heretofore human understanding – the parables precede what further knowledge of God might proceed.
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