I love Garrison Keillor’s “News from Lake Wobegone” on National Public Radio. Keillor has usually started his weekly broadcast on NPR by the time I’m headed home from church on Sunday, so I often tune in. “News from Lake Wobegone” is always quirky, sometimes very funny, and occasionally quite poignant. Each week, Keillor pinpoints what makes the people and community of Lake Wobegone unique. With that in mind, I want to give a little report this week on the Kingdom of God – or at least what signs I’ve seen of the in-breaking of the Kingdom of God, and in particular that part of the Kingdom of God that we inhabit here in Greensboro and at St. Andrew’s.

Our gospel lesson today is about Jesus commissioning the apostles to go out and start doing Kingdom work – the same kind of work Jesus himself has been doing for quite some time. Specifically, the apostles are sent to cast out unclean spirits, and to cure every disease and sickness. “As you go,” Jesus said, “proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.” Wow – those are no small tasks. Nevertheless, what Jesus tells the apostles to do is to manifest the message – the good news – by their words and actions.

Perhaps this week you and I haven’t cured the sick, raised the dead, cleansed any lepers or cast out any demons – but maybe we’ve come close. Here’s one sign… In this past week, countless prayers have been offered by many of you on behalf of others - for healing, for support, and for the Spirit of God to sustain those who are going through a difficult time. Some of you have prayed for friends in the parish and members of their extended families. Some of you have prayed for people in other parts of the world – for the people of Iraq, for Israelis and Palestinians, for soldiers and aid workers working to make peace and keep peace in many parts of the world, for the people in Dufar, for children who are starving to death, for people the world over who are tired of living with fear, with war, under famine and poverty.

You see, we are the apostles of God also – just like Simon Peter and Andrew, like James and John, like Philip and Bartholomew and all the others - sent to ease the pain of the world by announcing that the Kingdom of God has come near. Our prayers make a difference. The power of our prayers this past week have resulted in aid being delivered at the right time and at the right place, to individuals showing up at just the right time to offer needed spiritual support. We may never know what power our prayers and our intercessions have, but our not knowing the results doesn’t lessen our call to pray. Prayer is just one way in which the message of Jesus is made manifest by us – his apostles in the 21st century.

In this past week, you and I have accompanied parishioners who have lost loved ones. We’ve been at hospital and nursing home bedsides, we’ve sent cards, called to “check in” with friends on the phone, and dropped meals off. Stephen Ministers have met with care receivers. Meetings have been held to make plans to better meet the needs of parishioners now and in the future. Every single act of kindness and compassion we show to others is Kingdom work, no matter how small or insignificant we think those gestures might be. God uses every act of kindness we show and every expression of compassion we make to further His work in the world. Never think that we don’t make a difference – that every one of us is not furthering God’s work in the world.

In this past week, we’ve baptized a baby, welcoming her into the family of Christ. We’ve celebrated a marriage, offering prayers that God would use the love of this couple for each other to make a difference not only in their lives, but in the lives of everyone they come into contact with. We’ve held our Tuesday eucharist with particular prayers for healing for those who desire them.

Today we honor our high school and college graduates, thanking God for them, for their families, and for the work God will call them to now and in the future. Each of the graduates we recognize today have already been involved in Kingdom work – through their schools, through their EYC activities, through their leadership in Sunday School, through their commitment to Happening and diocesan youth ministry, and through the outreach ministries they have a passion around. These young people are already doing Kingdom work, and will continue to do so in the future. We are proud of their commitment to Christ, and their passion for “making a difference,” for making manifest the message of Jesus.

This morning we prepare to commission the Glory Ridge missioners – adults and youth who are preparing to do Kingdom work this next week in Madison County, North Carolina. They will certainly make a difference in the lives of the residents whose homes they work to improve. They are doing Kingdom work with hammers and nails and power tools. They are doing Kingdom work with their kindness towards those they will meet this week, and with the compassion they will show to new friends. The good news of Jesus will be made manifest through them.

But there are also a million ways in which the Kingdom of God has come near, in ways I have no knowledge of. In your homes, in your places of business, in the errands you’ve run, in the daily round of activity of all who are here today… you’ve gone forth as apostles – just like Peter and James and John and Matthew and Andrew – and done the work that God would have you do. You have made the message – the good news – manifest through your thoughts, prayers, actions, and responses. You have made the good news manifest through love, mercy, forgiveness, kindness, compassion, and care. You have been doing the work of God this past week, as apostles sent forth by Christ himself.

Jesus sent in motion through his own ministry a transformation of the world. He sent his apostles out to continue that transformation through their own ministries done in his name. There is no situation in which we find ourselves, and there is no time in which we cannot make ourselves available so that the Kingdom of God might be made manifest through us. My former boss was fond of saying, “We cannot NOT make a difference.” And of course, the choice then becomes for us, “What kind of difference will we make, with God’s help?”

There are signs of God’s kingdom all around us every day. The people of God – you and me – and millions the world over – are making a difference, helping to usher in the kingdom, bringing the love and compassion of God to bear in every aspect of life, for all manner of people, in all kinds of settings big and small.

The prayer for us this morning is quite simple, as we come to worship the Lord who loves us and calls us to love others. Our prayer this morning as we are nourished to continue God’s work in the world is that we might become day by day, more like Christ himself. And so we pray today, “Lord, help us to be less like “us” and more like you.”

Amen.