Acting So Jesus Might Know Who We Are

"Acting So Jesus Might Know Who We Are"

"We are not sent into the world in order to make people good. God forbid! We are to let people know God is for them! . . . God is calling us into the family of God's love; the uniqueness of each forms a part of the whole! God is a gracious God who has already judged the earth in mercy. This is the good news -- that we can be! We can be what in our deepest hearts we know we are entitled to be. We can do what we are meant to do." (Gordon Cosby)

Prayer acts upon how seriously we believe "God" is taking "us" -- hoping in, even expecting for us, entrusting us as co-creators, as partners; prayer plaintive language of partnership, imagining best in ourselves, in each other, God-likenesses bolstered and built-on: We, so limited, glimpsing our one tiny part of the whole, doing what we would not, not doing what we would -- yet even we distinguish the giving of good from bad to our children? Glimpsing as well how much has been given, good from bad, to us?

We are not alone, not left to ourselves -- even when visitors knock without warning at midnight, since none of their own bread on hand is fit for their guests! All neighbors response-able for any in need, bread baked communally anyway, so everyone knows whose batch is freshest, most likely providable. Entitled, empowered to do all it takes, even shouting out, banging on every door, to see that justice of Hospitality done, dignity of Hospitality respected, community of Hospitality offered for least expected of guests in our lives.

Praying is rattling God's cage and waking God up and setting God free and giving this famished God water and this starved God food and cutting the ropes off God's hands and the manacles off God's feet and washing the caked sweat from God's eyes and then watching God swell with life and vitality and energy and following God wherever God goes . . .

When we pray we are not sending a letter to a celestial White House, where it's sorted among piles of others. We are engaged, rather, in an act of co-creation, in which one little sector of the universe rises up and becomes translucent, incandescent, a vibratory center of power that radiates the power of the universe . . .

History belongs to the intercessors, who believe the future into being.
(Walter Wink)

Parables, deceptively short, if not sweet, plain, if not simple. built to last -- like river, never the same stepped in twice! Where are we in this picture? Where is it in us? How many people are we anyway -- and how many parts of us here? Both sowers and seeds, for instance? Never knowing when, where, how, how soon, how many results of our life-work we will be?

One seed in four finding growable soil, not rational ratio for Master Sower! No underestimating -- birds, thorns, rocks, sun, not a whole lot of soil to begin with; no forcing to grow up too soon, to come out before we are ready! Transitions -- darkness to light, dream world to real -- intensely stymieing; sufficiently rooting, blooming where planted?

Jesus gratuitous, graciously "green," breaking new ground, turning old ground into new, making future way out of none -- waiting forever on all us slow seeds? Parents on children, children on parents? Students on teachers, teachers on students? So much interminable busyness everywhere - how do we keep from killing (more of) each other? Seeds enduring, stones crumbling to soil, holding out in such stony spaces as war -- for thousands of years! Leading poet to question, "What kind of seeds do you think we're talking about?" (Stephen Mitchell)

Wangari Mathhai, Kenyan, now Minister of Environment, yet longtime beaten, arrested, repeatedly jailed, forced underground -- seed-like! -- colleagues killed, organization good as abolished -- and yet! Green Belt Movement, planting 30 million trees over 30 years! "When you're trapped in poverty, the poorer you become, the more you degrade the environment, the poorer you become! It's a matter of breaking the cycle" -- A Jubilee Matter! For Pentecost Work!

"It is easy, it is doable, and you could go and tell ordinary women with no education: OK, this is the tree. It is now flowering. We're going to observe the tree until it produces seeds. When they're ready, we'll harvest them. We'll dry them, we'll put them in the soil. If they're no good, we'll eliminate them. We'll nurture them. We'll plant them in gardens. If they're fruit trees, within five years we'll have fruits. If they're fodder, our animals will have fodder. The tree has become for me a wonderful way of breaking that cycle." Last year awarded Nobel Prize for Peace . . . .