The Kingdom of God is Already Here

Thich Nhat Hanh writes about his close friend Jim Forest, who was working with the Catholic Peace Fellowship:

‘I remember a number of years ago, when Jim and I were first traveling together in the United States, we sat under a tree and shared a tangerine. He began to talk about what we would be doing in the future.

Whenever we thought about a project that seemed attractive or inspiring, Jim became so immersed in it that he literally forgot about what he was doing in the present. He popped a section of tangerine in his mouth and, before he had begun chewing it, had another slice ready to pop into his mouth again. He was hardly aware he was eating a tangerine.

All I had to say was, “You ought to eat the tangerine section you’ve already taken”. Jim was startled into realising what he was doing. It was as if he hadn’t been eating the tangerine at all. If he had been eating anything, he was “eating” his future plans…

Jim understood. He slowly put his hand down and focused on the presence of the slice already in his mouth. He chewed it thoughtfully before reaching down and taking another section.’ (1)

Jim’s plans were important. Yet even these good and important things were distracting him from the gift of life in the present moment.

The Banquet We Keep Missing

It must surely be a great shame to have the most wonderful food in front of us and not be able to eat it. Jesus famously likens the kingdom to a banquet to which all are invited. And some of the greatest teachers of meditation (silent prayer) in the Christian tradition have understood the kingdom to mean the gift of contemplation, the gift of seeing clearly, the gift of transfigured awareness. (2)

In the Gospel according to Luke, Jesus says:

Those who give their excuses are distracted by a range of material concerns. Like Jim with his tangerine, they are distracted from the banquet wrapped in the present moment. Who, then, comes to enjoy the banquet?  The poor, Jesus says, naming the crippled, the blind and the lame. In other words, all of us (Luke 14:21). But there is an inner spiritual poverty that is necessary, without which we will not be able to eat the meal. ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit,’ Jesus teaches, ‘for theirs is the kingdom of heaven’ (Matt. 5:3).

Poverty of Spirit

The great medieval mystic Meister Eckhart speaks about being poor in spirit as receptiveness.

Just as a bare cupboard is ready to be filled with food, and an empty glass is ready to receive the wine, says Eckhart, those who are poor in spirit, who have ‘abandoned all things to God’ and come with a naked mind are ready to receive.  As our eyesight is ‘poor’ in being bare of colour, and yet is receptive of all colours, he says, so the person who is poor in spirit ‘is receptive of all spirit, and the spirit of all spirits is God.’

It can seem strange, even unsettling, at first, to encounter a way of meditation, an ancient way of silent prayer, that invites us to let go of our thoughts, words and images. This invitation can seem like an invitation to abandon the very tools and guide-ropes we use to navigate life, that help us make sense of our world. And it is. That is exactly what we do during our time of meditation. We may be thinking about some very good, very worthy things, just as Jim was. But thinking about a meal is not the same as eating it.

The Freedom of Letting Go

Despite Jesus’ teaching about the dangers of what you might call ‘spiritual materialism,’ we can very easily become preoccupied with trying to get hold of ‘spiritual possessions’ – like this or that spiritual experience, a special spiritual insight or feeling.

But meditation, silent prayer, is a path of dispossession, of letting go, of helping the mind to become poor, a point of pure receptivity. We discover that this work of dispossession is not a loss, but a doorway to discovering something beyond what our mind can grasp, more wonderful than we can imagine.

The Kingdom Is Already Here

Seek the kingdom before all else, Christ teaches (Matthew 6:33). Don’t get caught up in worries about tomorrow (Matthew 6:34). Be present for this moment.

When Jim Forest was imprisoned for his peace activities against the Vietnam War, Thich Nhat Hanh was worried about how he would endure it. He sent Jim a short letter, saying: ‘Do you remember the tangerine we shared when we were together? Your being there is like the tangerine. Eat it and be one with it. Tomorrow it will be no more.’

The kingdom is right here. It doesn’t come as something we can observe, says Jesus. It won’t be possible to say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ ‘Behold, the kingdom is within you’ (Luke 17:20-21).

The kingdom is always here. It’s part-and-parcel of who we are – the very nature of our awareness. And so we never need to ask whether the kingdom is present. The question to ask is whether we are present. Whether we are present to come into the kingdom. Instead of being distracted by thoughts about the kingdom, what it might look like, or feel like, or sound like, we can lay aside our thoughts for a moment, like Jim, and taste what is right here.

Wrapped within each moment is an invitation to enter the kingdom of awareness, an invitation to the banquet of God’s presence.

Each time we meditate, we come to eat it.