Two Kingdoms - Your Choice
Day 5 — Unseen: Matthew 13:31-33, 44-46
Introduction
Have you ever had the feeling that the physical world you can see and touch isn’t the whole story?
Not in a mystical or strange way. Just a quiet, persistent sense that underneath the busyness and noise of your ordinary life — the deadlines, the bills, the scroll, the responsibilities, the routine — there is something else. Something more. Something that the physical world, for all its urgency, can’t quite account for.
Most of us have felt it. And most of us have learned to push it down. To be practical. To deal with what’s in front of us. To stop asking questions the physical world can’t answer.
But what if that feeling wasn’t random? What if it wasn’t wishful thinking or an overactive imagination? What if it was something closer to homesickness?
The Bible describes a spiritual dimension that is just as real as the physical world — and within that dimension, two kingdoms in direct opposition. The kingdom of darkness and the Kingdom of Light. God’s original design was for humanity to belong to the Kingdom of Light — to live in it, flourish in it, and reflect its values into the world. But since the fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden, something shifted. Humans belong by default to the kingdom of darkness, born into a world that is spiritually out of tune with the one it was made for.
And deep down, somewhere below the noise, we know it. We feel the distance between what is and what was meant to be. We sense that our real home — our real purpose — is not contained in or defined by the world we can see and touch.
That ache you’ve been carrying? Jesus has a name for it. And today He pulls back the curtain on the reality you were made for.
Scripture
He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”
He told them still another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds of flour until it worked all through the dough.”
— Matthew 13:31-33 (NIV)
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls. When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it.”
— Matthew 13:44-46 (NIV)
Reflection
A Kingdom Unlike Any Other
When Jesus talked about the Kingdom of God He wasn’t describing a place you go when you die. He was describing the reality you were made for — present, active, and already operating alongside the physical world you navigate every day.
He said it plainly: “The kingdom of God is in your midst.” Not coming eventually. Already here. Coexisting with everything you can see and touch and measure. The Kingdom of Light, pressing into the kingdom of darkness from every direction — quietly, invisibly, from the inside out.
And here’s what makes it unlike any kingdom the world has ever known.
It doesn’t announce itself with power and spectacle. It starts like a mustard seed — the smallest thing in the garden — pressed into dirt and left to work in secret. Like yeast folded into sixty pounds of flour, invisible to the eye but moving through everything, changing everything, until the whole batch is transformed.
This is how the Kingdom of Light advances. Not with armies or economies or headlines. Not with the noise of political power. Silently. From within. Starting so small you might miss it — and ending larger than anything you imagined from that first tiny beginning.
This is why the feeling of homesickness makes sense. You were made for this Kingdom. Born into the wrong one. And somewhere below the noise, you’ve been feeling the distance ever since.
The Moment You Finally See It
But Jesus doesn’t just describe the Kingdom as something happening to the world. He describes the moment it happens to a person — when they finally see it for what it is.
The man stumbles across treasure buried in a field. The merchant finally finds the pearl he’s been searching for his whole career. And in both cases the response is identical — immediate, total, and joyful. Not reluctant. Not calculated. In his joy he sold everything.
Not because he had to. Because nothing else compared.
That’s what it looks like when a person moves from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of Light. Not a grim religious obligation. Not a list of things to give up. A discovery so valuable, so completely beyond anything else on offer, that releasing everything else feels like the obvious response.
You cannot be a full citizen of both kingdoms. The Kingdom of Light requires a transfer of allegiance — a decision, not just an appreciation. You can admire the treasure from a distance, or you can sell everything and buy the field. But you cannot do both.
The homesickness you’ve been feeling is an invitation. The Kingdom you were made for is real, it is here, and the door is open. The only question is whether you are ready to walk through it.
Grace Note
“For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” — Colossians 1:13-14 (NIV)
You don’t earn your way into this Kingdom. You are rescued into it. The transfer of citizenship has already been made possible — not by your effort, but by the one who loved you enough to cross from one kingdom into the other to bring you home. The door is open. The treasure is real. And the invitation is standing.
Prayer Prompt
Jesus, I think I’ve been living as if the physical world is all there is. As if what I can see and manage and control is the whole of reality. And I’ve been exhausted by it — because it was never meant to carry the weight I’ve been putting on it.
I recognize that ache now. The one I’ve been pushing down. The sense that I was made for something more than this — that the world I’m living in is not quite the world I belong to.
Show me the Kingdom. Not as a concept or a theological category — as a reality. The one that’s already here, already working, already changing things from the inside out.
I want to see what the man in the field saw. I want to understand why he sold everything in joy, not in grief. I want to know what it feels like to finally be home.
Amen.
Response
1. Name the Homesickness: Write down two or three moments in your life when you’ve felt that quiet ache — the sense that there is more than what you can see. Don’t analyze them. Just name them. Then write underneath: that was real. That was the Kingdom calling.
2. Read the Parables as Your Story: Go back and read Matthew 13:44-46 one more time — but place yourself in the parable. You are the man in the field. You are the merchant. What is the treasure worth to you? What would you be willing to release to have it? Be honest.
3. Practice Citizenship: Spend five minutes today in complete silence — no phone, no music, no background noise. Not to hear an audible voice. Just to practice being still in the presence of a Kingdom that operates quietly, invisibly, from the inside out. You belong to the Kingdom of Light. Sit in it for five minutes and let the noise of the other kingdom settle.
To read all the posts in this devotional series, visit: https://www.thisistheway.live/t/unseen
© Steve Peschke / This Is The Way