The rejection of a prophet in his own country is evidently a typical situation: even Jesus Himself faced it during His earthly ministry. The reasons for it are described quite transparently in the Gospel account: paradoxically, in his own country a servant of God is known too well for people to recognize him as a servant of God.

Of course, if Jesus had been officially recognized, the attitude toward Him in His own country would have been different: as usually happens in such cases, people would have been proud of Him and regarded Him as a local celebrity. But the point is that they had to discern the Man of God in Jesus for themselves, without prompts or directions “from above.” Such recognition would have brought no public benefit to Jesus' hometown or the surrounding areas.

In such a situation, other factors come into play, factors connected not with public opinion but with the characteristics of fallen human nature. A fallen person is generally extremely reluctant to acknowledge another as better than himself, especially when such an acknowledgment brings him no benefit. It is not merely that this acknowledgment entails certain practical consequences—for example, privileges of one kind or another due to the better person; in Jesus' case, in particular, there was nothing of the sort. The point is the psychological and spiritual discomfort that such an acknowledgment causes a fallen person. For then he would also have to admit that there is an alternative in the world to the way of life so familiar to fallen human nature. And although this alternative seems to be “not of this world,” here before their very eyes stands the One who became its living embodiment. What can be said to that? Nothing, perhaps, except to refuse to take Him seriously.

And how can one do that? The easiest way is to brush Him aside, fail to notice the obvious, and disbelieve. Memory and reason then come to the rescue: what kind of prophet could He be, much less the Messiah? We have known Him since childhood; He is no Messiah and no prophet. We know all His relatives; He is one of us through and through—what kind of Messiah could He possibly be? It is laughable even to say it... And beneath all this one hears: come now, He is not different at all, He is just like us. Let Him tell others about the Kingdom, show miracles to others, present Himself to others as either a prophet or the Messiah; He cannot fool us, for we know Him through and through.

And the most terrible thing about this position is not even that those who hold it are unprepared to see the Messiah in the Messiah. The most terrible thing is that they will never see the Kingdom either, for it too is different. Not of this world.

In the Gospel the possibility of a miracle is often connected with the faith of the person or people who await or ask for that miracle. It was the same in pre-Christian times: God revealed them according to the faith of those awaiting, or not awaiting, a miracle. If God’s action was too obvious, outwardly it always looked in such a way that, if one wished, everything could be explained by natural causes.

Christ’s miracles were at times more visible and obvious, but He always performed them for specific people who trusted Him and expected help from Him. For the rest, who became involuntary witnesses of what was happening, there remained only to accept the situation as it was. Of course, much in this case is explained by the fact that God is unobtrusive. He will not drag a person to Himself by force, striking his imagination with supernatural phenomena. For God wants a person to commune with Him out of love, not out of fear or self-interest. Therefore the Savior does not drag anyone into the Kingdom by miracles.

But when the matter concerns the Kingdom, it is important to take something else into account. The Kingdom is entirely permeated with God’s light and God’s breath; they are its nature, or more precisely, what in the Kingdom takes the place of the nature of our world. But the Kingdom also has its own structure. A structure formed by the relationships of its inhabitants: their relationships with God, with Christ, and with one another. And the relationship of the Savior Himself with His heavenly Father is the foundation of the Kingdom, its chief spiritual support.

And all relationships in the Kingdom can be only and exclusively voluntary. Here no deceit, no ambiguity, no half-said things are possible. Any unwillingness to see Jesus, any unwillingness to commune with Him, places a person outside the Kingdom. For all the Savior’s miracles are nothing other than the manifestation of the Kingdom, its power, its breath.

It is no surprise that where there is no trust in Jesus, there is neither the Kingdom nor miracles. It is not that they are impossible there; they are simply meaningless. One cannot be made loving by force, and to demonstrate the power of the Kingdom to someone who does not want it means in effect to compel a person toward something to which compulsion is completely impossible. Jesus can only leave, giving those who refuse to trust Him over to their own fate. In the end, it is their choice, to which they have every right.

What, one wonders, does Jesus mean when He speaks of a "scribe trained for the Kingdom"? What treasury is He talking about? And how is what He says connected with the Savior's parables about the Kingdom, in which He compares it to a found treasure and to caught fish?

Indeed, the meaning, for example, of the parable of the found treasure is quite clear: when the matter concerns something truly valuable, one can sacrifice everything for its sake, selling all and buying what gives access to this value. A person who knows and understands what the Kingdom is is ready to give up everything in order to receive the possibility of standing on the path that leads to it. Of course, to buy the field does not yet mean to receive the treasure; the field is only the place where it can be found, just as the path into the Kingdom is not yet the Kingdom itself in all its fullness. Nevertheless, to stand on the path means to make the first and most important step, choosing the right direction. The "scribe," that is, the theologian, "trained for the Kingdom," as we can see, must above all be able to set priorities correctly: he need not renounce his knowledge or his tradition, but it is absolutely necessary to make all of it serve the solution of the main task - movement toward the Kingdom. He will probably have to give up something, but if one pearl is worth more than all the rest of the merchandise, the exchange makes sense.

But simply standing on the path that leads to the Kingdom is still not enough: judging by the parable of the many caught fish, many may find themselves on this path and even at the threshold of the Kingdom, because the net is cast as widely as possible. The history of the Kingdom is above all the history of its revelation in our transforming world, and therefore in one way or another everyone will learn about it and come into contact with it - at least once in life, at the end of time. But such contact in itself guarantees nothing: different fish get into the net, but being in the net does not yet mean getting into the cherished basket; the bad fish is thrown back into the sea.

As we can see, the path into the Kingdom is truly open to everyone, but entrance into it - and therefore salvation - is guaranteed to no one. Christ's coming became for us the guarantee only of the possibility of salvation, whose realization depends in many ways on our own choice and on our own resolve - not only when we are just entering this path, but also when we are already walking it.