Jan 6, 2018               Two Kingdoms                                         

Friday Night, I watched the movie, “Chocolat.” It is the story of a woman who is a chocolatier, who moves to a new town and opens a Chocolate shop.

Now the town is run by the Mayor, who is very religious, and does not like that this woman has opened a chocolate shop during lent. And so he exercises his control over the citizens, and even the church, to dissuade anyone from patronizing her business.

But, somehow the woman has a gift for inviting, welcoming, and knowing just what people want, and need. So that though business is not great, she makes enough to get by, and along the way she gives hope, strength, reconciliation, and love to the people who come to her shop.

Ultimately, the Mayor is so alarmed by the woman and her chocolate shop, that he tells one of the citizens he is close to, that something must be done, and that citizen goes out and sets a gasoline fire that almost kills the woman’s daughter.

Because of this event the woman decides to leave town, just as she has done in the last 4 towns, being run out by those who are afraid of strangers, and make life difficult for her. But just as she is about to leave, she walks past the room where she makes her chocolate, and finds her customers, some who she has taught to make chocolate, making chocolate in order to keep the shop open even if she leaves. They have become a new community, through her service to them.

In the end, the mayor is so filled with rage, he breaks into the shop, and starts to destroy the chocolate creations, and is caught in the process, and the woman stays in the town, having found a home at last.

I know this may not be the greatest way to come at our gospel lesson this morning. But I do know that the gospel of Matthew describes for us a battle between two kingdoms, the kingdom of men and the kingdom of God. In that same way, the movie Chocolat describes a battle between the rule of the mayor over the townspeople, and the community created by the chocolatier. The mayor uses rumor, fear and defamation of the woman to keep people away from her shop. He even edits the local priest’s sermons to suggest that the woman is a servant of the devil, and to remind the church goers that real religion is about reframing from evil – specifically what he determines is evil. All the while, he becomes more and more fearful, as he sees himself losing control.

On the flip side, we see the chocolatier freeing a woman from an abusive relationship, welcoming strangers to the community, reconciling a grandmother and son, and renewing love for a couple that had lost it. Real religion for the chocolatier, comes not in what we reframe from doing, but in the ways in which we care for those in need.  It is in these acts of compassion for one another, that we recognize the true King, Jesus Christ, as a shepherd, not a tyrant.  And that’s the conclusion which Matthew wants us to draw from his stories about Herod in the gospel.

You see, fear causes not only destruction, but even more devastating - in-action, apathy, and oppression. While love causes us to act in ways that lead to healing, reconciliation, a new community, and the kingdom of heaven in our lives. I know that there is plenty of fear in the world today, but I would encourage you, to live not in the kingdom of fear, but to act in ways that bring about the kingdom of God’s love in your lives, and especially in the lives of those in need around you. I think that’s what it means to “go home by another way” as the Wisemen did on that first Epiphany. Going home by another way, leads to a true home, where love is found. And that’s the good news of Jesus Christ!