The New Testament reading for today comes from Rev. 16:12-21.  It is a terrible image of the end of the world, a great battle against enormous forces of evil.  Regardless whether you view this passage as a factual prophecy or an imaginative metaphor, it confronts us with a central fact of human existence: evil is an actual force, causing enormous suffering, now and in the future.

In the face of that suffering,  is a good life even possible?  The Old Testament reading for today comes from Ecclus. 44:1-15. It is a long poem in which the author remembers his ancestors.   Some of these people, it seems to him, managed to have great blessings in their lives. Some were famous, others anonymous. They were men of mercy, whose good deeds bless the generations that followed them. Yes, he seems to say, a good life may be possible, especially when we take the long view of what is good or bad.

But how are we to live such a life in the circumstances that we face and will face? The New Testament reading for today comes from Luke 13:18-30. In it, Jesus tells the parable of the mustard seed. It is a tiny seed, but when it is planted, it grows to great heights, and the plant gives shelter to many birds.  The Kingdom of God (what Professor John Meier translates as the "kingly rule of God") is like that seed, he says. It is like leaven: a little bit leavens an entire loaf. 

In other words, with just a little bit of the Kingdom of God, the kingly rule of God, planted in our lives and nurtured by the Holy Spirit in our souls, we can have hopes of living a good life, though we may suffer now and know that even greater suffering may lie ahead.    In the day to day of existence, we may lose sight (in fact, we may never see at all) how good deeds may bless not only those around us, but generations to come.  But we can be sure that nurturing that kingdom within ourselves will one day yield blessings for those who follow us, as they struggle against evil that may not even be able to imagine.