We have read many times already that Christ's Kingdom is not like all our human "kingdoms." It is like salt in food, like yeast in dough, like a seed in the ground that has not yet sprouted. It is real, but not visible to the "naked eye." It cannot be defined by our concepts, but its presence irreversibly changes this world.

That is exactly why it is so hard to limit "membership" in this Kingdom, however much "chosen ones" of every kind try to do so. The question asked of Jesus about the number of those being saved, that is, the participants in God's Kingdom, in essence means a demand to mark the boundaries of salvation: "who is inside, and who is outside?"

This question remains unanswered: instead of a limited sect, there is a call for everyone. Yes, entering by the "narrow gate" is hard, and the chance of being left out is quite real. But the gate is not closed; it is merely narrow. And everyone for whom this is truly important and necessary can find himself at Christ's feast with those who have also passed along this path.

Speaking of the need for everyone to work and earn his bread by his own labor, Paul, as one can see, connects following the "tradition" that he and his co-workers left to the Thessalonian church precisely with such a way of life (vv. 6-10). Mentioning certain brothers who do nothing but, in Paul's own definition, "busy themselves," he advises keeping away from them, not in order to treat them as enemies, but, as one can see, in order not to take part in the fuss that brings no benefit to anyone (vv. 11-15). The context of the letter as a whole allows us to suppose that the brothers mentioned by the apostle were busying themselves not only because of the disorderliness of their own character, but also, perhaps, because they were waiting too tensely for the day of the Savior's return.

Such tense, perhaps even feverish expectation could not fail to produce in the church community a distinctive "eschatological" excitement, so familiar to many churches in many different ages. Apparently Paul was a resolute opponent of the spread of this kind of attitude in the churches. And the point here, clearly, is not only that they did not help normal and full spiritual life at all, but on the contrary only hindered it, as all fuss hinders it. The point is above all that they distracted Christians from the main task: sanctification and witness, without which the spread of the Kingdom is impossible. Indeed, the whole meaning of Paul's letter to the Thessalonian church comes down to the fact that the Savior's return is inseparable from the becoming and revealing of the Kingdom in the world, that this return itself is possible only as the completion of the process of the transformation of creation, a process determined above all by the activity of the witnesses of the Kingdom. Meanwhile, feverish expectation of the Second Coming in the apostle's time, as in all other times, as one can see, was accompanied by anything except witness to the Kingdom. There is nothing surprising in this: after all, such an overly emotional expectation means first of all that for those waiting, the Kingdom is still ahead. For them, the history of the Kingdom has not yet begun; it will begin only on the day of the Second Coming, which in essence will turn out for them not to be the second but the first, because the first, to which the evangelists testify, changed nothing for them and had no effect on their lives.

For Christians living a normal, full spiritual life, the Kingdom is already a reality, although it has not yet revealed itself in all its fullness. For those feverishly awaiting the Second Coming, it is only an exciting premonition that stirs the mind and heart, which of course has very little in common with the life of the Kingdom. And Paul advises the faithful to keep away from the busy brothers not because he hates or despises them, but because the faithful taking part in such fuss will benefit neither those who are busy nor the faithful themselves. It will not bring the former closer to the Kingdom, and it can only move the latter farther from it. One can be joined to the Kingdom only by ceasing to fuss and beginning to live, which is what Paul calls all his Thessalonian brothers to do.

The Kingdom of God, the presence of Christ in our life, is often imagined as something great and bright, something impossible to miss. But in the parable of the mustard seed the Lord Jesus gives us a completely different image. The seed of the mustard tree can barely be seen with the naked eye. It is so small that it is unnoticed by an outsider, and often even by its owner.

That is, the Kingdom has already been given to us as if in potential, in the form of a tiny seed. It does not look like a great tree, like the tangible presence we long for so much. And yet, just as genetically the seed and the tree are one and the same organism, so the small particle of the Kingdom that each of us has and that must grow is the same Kingdom that appeared in its fullness in the person of Jesus.